THE SCHOOLMASTER AT THE FRONT
—; ♦ WILL HE RETURN TO TEACHING? Will the public school master now fighting atm the front return readily to the classroom? Mr. S. P. B. Mais, a. master of Sherborne School, discussing this question in the January "Nineteenth Century," writes: "Of all callings in the kingdom now there is none comparable in importation with that of tbo piiblic school master," he writes, "aud by a strange irony there is no calling ivhicli is so calculated to die tlio death; the universities are practically closed; wc have no source of supply save one; those who have fought aud been permanently injured may come back and help us and bo grand schoolmasters if they will; but I am uncertain whether it is not too much to ask. "So many such men might say with perfect truth: 'We have done our bit; there is 110 glamour in an "usher's lii'o; he has been despised through the ages; as a profession it leads to nothing and requires a sense of self-disol- — pline which Ido not i-aro to practice; I have deserved hotter of my country than that; I have tasted of the sweets of life; I should, be too restless, over to settle down to '.lie tedium of a routine which does not even permit me to smoko in front of boys; this war has sickened mo of pretences; 1 am sorry, but I cannot return to that life. The littleness of it is so obvious; every fresh temporary master never fails to romind me of it. 'I couldn't bear this life for long,' each one of tliein says with monotonous regularity, as if he had discovered a startling truth after much cogitation; that is just the difficulty. "To all outward appearance it always has seemed a. belittling life, and to judge from the sneers of some ardent patriots one that could well lie spared in war-time. It requires deliberate thought and some fearless looking forwiird into the unknown future to realiso the importance of the effect of even ono strong man's iniluence 011 the schools of to-day. The material is hero, malleable, ready, even keen to absorb whatever principles of life wo may care to instil; we have a duty to the dead; they died that England might live. Whether England . lives, in tho true sense of that word, depends entirely on the rulers of to-morrow. The rulers of to-morrow depend entirely upon tho schoolmaster of to-day." .
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Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2693, 12 February 1916, Page 14
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408THE SCHOOLMASTER AT THE FRONT Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2693, 12 February 1916, Page 14
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