innumerable residences, detached and semi-detached, which had gathered
round the school. For the intentions of the founder had been altered, or
at all events amplified, instead of educating the "poore of my home,"
he now educated the upper classes of England. The change had taken place
not so very far back. Till the nineteenth century the grammar-school was
still composed of day scholars from the neighbourhood. Then two things
happened. Firstly, the school's property rose in value, and it became
rich. Secondly, for no obvious reason, it suddenly emitted a quantity
of bishops. The bishops, like the stars from a Roman candle, were
all colours, and flew in all directions, some high, some low, some to
distant colonies, one into the Church of Rome. But many a father traced
their course in the papers; many a mother wondered whether her son, if
properly ignited, might not burn as bright; many a family moved to the
place where living and education were so cheap, where day-boys were not
looked down upon, and where the orthodox and the up-to-date were said to
be combined. The school doubled its numbers. It built new class-rooms,
laboratories and a gymnasium. It dropped the prefix "Grammar." It coaxed
the sons of the local tradesmen into a new foundation, the "Commercial
School," built a couple of miles away. And it started boarding-houses.
It had not the gracious antiquity of Eton or Winchester, nor, on the
other hand, had it a conscious policy like Lancing, Wellington, and
other purely modern foundations. Where tradition served, it clung to
them. Where new departures seemed desirable, they were made. It aimed
at producing the average Englishman, and, to a very great extent, it
succeeded.

Here Mr. Pembroke passed his happy and industrious life. His technical
position was that of master to a form low down on the Modern Side. But
his work lay elsewhere. He organized. If no organization existed,
he would create one. If one did exist, he would modify it. "An
organization," he would say, "is after all not an end in itself. It must
contribute to a movement." When one good custom seemed likely to
corrupt the school, he was ready with another; he believed that without
innumerable customs there was no safety, either for boys or men.

Perhaps he is right, and always will be right. Perhaps each of us
would go to ruin if for one short hour we acted as we thought fit, and
attempted the service of perfect freedom. The school caps, with their