SOME RECENT FICTION

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 305, 20 September 1919, Page 11

SOME RECENT FICTION

An English Public School Story. Mr. D'ohglas Strong's story of life nt nn English public (school, \oung JSnKland" (Xletlmen and Co.), is a wellwritten novel, which oMsters among its readers-and they should be many-may compare with that- favourite ot tlieir youth, "Tom Brown's School Days, anu young men of tho present generation with Alee Wangh's much-discussed "Loom of Youth." Mr. Strong does not hesitate to bint at the, weak points in the English pufmc school system, more N . especially the lack ot definite purpose underlying so much ot the tuition given, tuition in which science is so seriously neglected,' and whose directors appear to be blissfully .indifterent to lanyltliing like vocationoil training. Also, without perhaps meaning to do so, ho exposes the snobbishness and occasional brutality of tiie '.'fflgßinß system, and the extravagant importance attached by a certain : class of Bnlu>l. schoolmnsters to prominence in spoits ot vario.l,s kinds. But lus. story is not dsfigured by the acerbity with which ill. Waugh tinged his criticism of the same system, and I am inclined to think thnt Mr. Strong's memories ot his public school career have been much more. Penally agreeable thaft those which coloured the Loom of Youth." His hero is a manly English lad, w'hofo mental and spiritual development'is described very f*«j very carefully. There ml never be mueh wrong with the Mo lerlnnd.so -hm M she produces lads like Dick Gar anc. Shellborough (the orimtuiV ar- which w, by the way, easily identifiable) may M destined to witness many drastic changes in liio details of its system' of training, both in and out of school. It mnstbo remembered to the credit cf n«old#lie school system that it was with all its faults, productive of a body of young men whose personal galnntry and fne standard of honour, individual and national, displayed during the Great Wai has evoked jusfly-deserved admiration and prUle wherever the English tongue » spoken.