A College Club.

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18418, 26 June 1925, Page 8

A College Club.

It was quite/ justifiable of the old boys of Christ's College to regard the opening of their club rooms on Wednesday night as an event of some public importance. To the College itself the importance of retaining a hold on (lie old boys can be measured in tens of thousands of pounds, and that would be an excellent justification for club rooms if there were no other. But of course the i-emarkable sum of money which these "boys" have raised for new buildings and equipment during the last eighteen years is only (lie outward and visible expression of their corporate life. The real expression of I he College is spiritual. Though it is very important that as ,ue\>: boys

arrive new block.-? should go up for i housing and educating thein, the I supremely important fact is the mI fluencc of the College mind on the • public and private life of the City. ; It is because the Club cannot be "a

" re;;l source of help and strength to "Christ's College" without being a source of help and strength to Canterbury that providing it with rooms ; means so much more than helping a few young men and some not so young to while away their idle hours. And the Headmaster was certainly right in 1 saying that what the College is doing is not merely transplanting English ideas into Xew Zealand, but interpreting the ideals of the English public schools in terms of this Southern democracy. But perhaps Mr Crosse would prefer us to say that this is what the College is trying to do. Done perfectly, it would be the greatest educational achievement of the day, and among the greatest of all' days; but we remember that Mr Crosse quoted Dr. Kendall, and we think we remember that Dr. Kendall is not quite happy about the extent to which oversea secondary schools are neglecting the classics. It is possibly true also that "' the good old English tradition '■' that games arc played for their own " sake rather than for the sake of the " spectators " has suffered a sea-change here in the South which is not good for our souls. Lord Balfour took part in a charity debate the other day in wh:»:h his task was to prove that it is not a tragedy when world championships go to other nations. There cannot be many products of the secondary schools of: the Dominion who regard the loss of championships as a tragedy, and we arc sure that there are none in the Old Collegians' Sports Club. Should there not be in sports as well as in other matters some confidence that the English tradition can adapt itself to the ardours of so young a Dominion without risk of serious hurt?