UNKNOWN

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 184, 25 December 1886, Page 8

UNKNOWN

Etow must have been what the*Engliah call' a "queer" school from 1821 <to 1828. William E. Gladstone was 12 years of age, when he and hia two elder brothers' Thomas and Kobertson, got down from the coach in 1821 at the Christopher Inn, Eton, and walked acroßs the street to their boarding-house. The two elder Gladstones were "old-; boys j" so that William was not a stranger among the aix hundred inmates of the . school, The fact of their boarding-house being juet opposite the inn, at which coaches and post-chaises were continually stopping, was not favourable to study, and still less . to good morals. It was easy for fags to dart across the street and bring back a bottle of wine for a carouse; and often the , elder boys, under the pretence of " seeing friends from London," would indulge in potations in the inn itself. The tutor of William Gladstone was a, clergyman of a type then not uncommon • - a good scholar, an agreeable man, but exceedingly fond of all mundane pJeasurea. He and another master, with one or two of the elder boye, would go to London on a Saturday afternoon by post-chaise, attend the thoatre in the evening, stay over Sunday, and ride back to Eton (20 miles) in. time for school on Monday morning. On one of these expeditions the boye behaved so badly in the streets at night that they,,' were arrested and locked up. One of the* royeterors was the son of the Lord Chancellor, by whose influence they were released. The boye received no education on the moral side. They lay in bed on Sunday mornings fcill ten o'clock, and got up in the wildest haete to get to chapel at half past 10. A great number of them would enter at the last stroke of the bell, rushing in pellmell, laughing, ehoviug, and making all possible noixe Noblemen's sons and the members of the . highest class sat in special seats raised, above the rest ; find the first time these boys occupied the distinguished place* they distributod packages of almonds and raisins, --vhich were eaten during the service. The head master, Dr. Keate, a Doctor of Divinity, was a capricious, violent, foolish man, who rook pleasure in flowing. One Sunday at prayers a boy accidentally knocked off William Gladstone's bat. " Playing at cricket with your hat, eh 2" roared the absurd little despot. He was about to flog the future orator, when the victim succeeded in explaining to him the nature of the mishap. "Well," raid the master, "I mo&t flog somebody for this. Find mo the boy who gave jou the nudge " In spite of these demoralising: circumstance?, there was a respectable number o£ boyff -who worked hard <md behaved wall. The majority were turbulent and gluttonous barbarians ; but a few stuck close to their studies kept themselves tree from the vices of the school, and even resisted the temptation to prevaricate, which the eeneeless tyranny of the unastor daily created. In this honourable runjority were the Gladstones, and particularly the youngest of the three brothers, viho Went <o Oxford so well prepared that, without excessive exertions, he graduated first-class in classics and first class in mathematics, " double first " of thif year. Happily, Dr. Arnold has lived since tbafc period; and partly through his- influence, but chiefly through the genera! amelioration of morals and manners, 'he worst abuses of great English school- have been, abolished.