ford!" cried Lord Duddingstone incredulously, the form of his countenance changing. "Is't possible?-but 'tis amazing! The missing piece of the puzzle, the key to the cipher, begad! Sir, allow me to tender you my sincere commiseration. I know your story, the unmerited humiliations brought upon you by this ill-conditioned whelp here. Yes, by you, sir!" with a scathing sideglance at the Honorable Frederick, who stood shifting himself from one foot to its fellow, picking at the lace upon his cuff. "But, apologies are poor stuff if they stand alone; I purposed reinstatement when I first heard of that Oxford business, and did what I could to get the dons to reconsider your case. 'Twas your going down so precipitately which baulked me. And now I fear that door is closed." He stopped, finding himself upon the edge of revelations which were not for the ear of his son. "After all, honor comes first. Ye sent your cartel once to this poltroon of mine; he got his tutor to take it up, eh? And now, after what has passed but a minute since ye judge him unworthy of your sword, eh? But sit ye down here and write your challenge again, and ye shall see him eat it." "Oh, sir, for pity's sake," whined the Honorable Frederick, bursting into tears. "Sir!-my lord!" stammered Travis, "I am in your hands and Major Justin's, but, of my own motion, I'd not pursue my quarrel farther." "Naturally ye would refuse to fight a thief!" "We are all sinners, my lord," said the youth, with a meaning look and in a shaken voice, the color mounting to his brow, but meeting his host's eye steadily. Both men stopped speaking. Travis resumed: fluence, young sir; you, at least, will do me credit. Whilst as for you-" he wheeled upon the unworthy inheritor of his name, who, divining that the wrath that boded ill for his personal comfort was past, had recovered his jaunty carriage and was surprised in the act of taking snuff. "As for me, sir? I beg ye will not concern yourself: ye cannot set aside the entail." "But I can and will cut ye out of the personalty. Begone!" "And I can and will give post-obits," riposted the scapegrace, snapping-to the lid of his snuff-box and retreating with undignified haste. His father kicked-to the door behind him, and after a momentary struggle for self-mastery rang for wine. His During this painful personal interlude neither Lord Duddingstone nor the young fellow, who, having entered the house as Repton, had since confessed to another name, had given a thought to Justin. The Major, never careful to hold the centre of the stage, had kept in the background. protégé now turned at the gentle pressure of a hand upon his arm and found himself confronted by an illumined countenance; little kindly ellipses framed the angles of an astonished mouth; twitching crowsfeet puckered the corners of incredulous eyes, eyes that shone and sparkled for all the intensity of their scrutiny. "My lord, pardon me, I beg!" cried the Major, low and with a sort of breathless haste in his tone, turning to his host, but still retaining his hold, as though he feared that his newly found ward might elude him. "Repton?" he swung round again and faced his man-"What does this mean?-Did I catch? Did I hear?-Travis ye call "I have vowed my life to my king, yourself-and the Christian names my lord." "You are right," interrupted the Viscount impetuously. "Command my in Draycott and Sigismund? Then it must be. A coincidence is impossible, 'tis millions to one. Who was your father. Rep-Travis, I mean?-Yes, yes! And your mother? Then it is-you are the boy!" The youth, having replied to his friend's questions, stood in silent embarrassment, awaiting he knew not what of news from a father of whom he had never heard good nor bad, but whose character, by reason of this unnatural reticence, he suspected had been flawed. north again. She knows nothing ofthis? Naturally; but ye can look her in the face now. But in the meantime," turning to Lord Duddingstone, who was finding the pursuit of archæology difficult under the circumstances, and was growingly interested in his guests, "My Lord, I should explain" "As ye will, Major; but first let me fill your glass. Help yourself, Mr. Travis. I am still somewhat in the dark, but none the less delighted. It looks as though we had both been hunting our young friend here upon different lines, and had run into him simultaneously. Ye may think yourself lucky, youngster, for this gentleman and myself—(Between you and me, Major, 'twill go hard but we make a man of him yet. My interest, of course, I place, but I have already said that.) Is there er much that needs setting-er tion) means are needed, ye have only—" "My lord, I thank ye-he thanks ye; but Mr. Travis is amply-” His lordship, perceiving that for the moment his presence was forgotten, and his cabinet the scene of a crescendo movement of recognitions and éclaircissements, behaved as a gentleman should. Intercepting the entrance of the servant, he served the Major with wine with his own hands, and, turning a discreet back, examined one of his newly recovered intagli with a watchmaker's eye-piece whilst his guests rearranged their mutual relationships. "But I have sought ye half over Eng--right? If-er-(pardon the suggesland, my boy. Did ye never see my notices and rewards in the News? Did no one ever tell ye? My lord, this young gentleman turns out to be the son of one of my oldest friends. His mother, of whom I can scarce trust myself to speak, I knew before her marriage. His father and I served in the old Thirty-ninth for a score of years. Both are dead, Colonel Travis upon the day on which I sailed, seven months since, and after charging me to assist his children. Your sister, Travis? Ye have a sister, my lad, Baby Sue. I remember her well. Where is she? At Chester with your aunt? To think of it! And but t'other day we were within a few miles of her. And neither of us understood. Well, well! We must ride ""Tis unknown to me, then," gasped the poor lad blankly, feeling his head begin to turn. "As a loan between gentlemen," urged his lordship, unwilling to be baulked. The youth dropped upon his knee, caught his host's hand and, having carried it to his lips, sought the darkest corner of the room in which to master his emotions. "La, la," muttered his lordship, extending his box to Justin, "He will do, this one. Ill-usage would have made a devil of him, but you and I, Major, you and I, eh?" (To be continued.) Ashton Hilliers. THE FALLACY OF THE ELDER BROTHER. It was a distinguished headmaster who defined the proper attitude of the younger masters to their pupils as that of elder brothers. If I am not mistaken, it was the same headmaster who said that the ideals of a young master should be those of a good Sixth Form boy. Now, with great diffidence, I should venture to dispute the soundness of both these propositions. I am inclined to think that the influence of an elder brother often does as much harm as good; and I am quite sure that even a good Sixth Form boy should have learnt something of value in his three or four years at the University, which it would be a pity for him to unlearn when he starts his profession of schoolmaster. In fact, I should be inclined to alter the phraseology somewhat, and say to the tyro at the outset. "Remember always (1) that you are not the elder brother of your pupils, but their teacher, and (2) that you are not coming back as a Sixth Form boy to the duties and responsibilities you were familiar with four years ago, but are engaging on an arduous profession, which you will have to start learning at once. in which you are sure to make constant blunders, and will still be only a learner twenty years hence." It is easy, of course, to see what was in the mind of the distinguished authority from whom these dicta emanated. The freedom of Public School life has its dangers; at the age which most needs guidance, boys are taken from their homes and left to the mercy of a public opinion which bans much that is good and tolerates much that is bad. The schoolmaster of the past was often too much out of sympathy with his pupils to be of any help to them in their difficulties. His position as teacher might inspire respect, but it also inspired grave doubts in the boy's In At the same time, the fallacy of the elder brother is widespread; it is the feature of the times in most of our modern schools, and attention is called to its growth and exuberance at all prize-givings and other occasions of legitimate self-applause. It has certainly established much pleasanter relations between the master and his pupils, unless the master is unluckily constituted by nature; for it has nearly killed the old idea of "natural enmity." He is no longer forced to be constantly on his guard, to be always jealous of his dignity. If he is naturally inclined to mirth, he may sport and frolic undismayed; he can indulge in quips and pranks, and they will be sympathetically and generously applauded-not with the forced and frigid applause of the class-room but with that of genuine appreciation; he can renew his youth like the eagle; alone of men he has dis covered the elixir of life, and remains at forty what he was twenty-five years earlier, a joyous, light-hearted schoolboy-but for one or two trifling differences which we may consider later. I do not propose to draw a fancy portrait of the elder brother in our midst; he is a sufficiently familiar figure from Connemara to Constantinople; and his virtues and his golf and all that he does, are they not written in the book of "The Hill" and elsewhere? What I want to draw attention to is that the fraternal view of the schoolmaster's duties is no longer confined to individuals, but has permeated every branch of our school life-not always, I think, to the advantage of the Public Schools, of the Universities, which they feed, or of the nation, to which in the long run both have to give account. It is well that we should try to understand and sympathize with the interests and the amusements, the weaknesses and prejudices of our pupils; but it is not well that we should live habitually in their world, or we may lose all sense of the true value of things. A house-match is rightly an event of supreme importance to a boy; but all the world ought not to be darkened for the house-master because his house has failed to win. The schoolboy virtues-courage, keenness, frankness, the joy of rivalry-are admirable things; but our sympathy with the boy's point of view should not lead us to treat these as the only qualities that master, and to look upon the harder virtues as a sort of extra, like drawing-a delightful accomplishment for those whose tastes lie that way, but not a thing that the average boy need trouble about. For surely, if a school is in a healthy condition, the school-boy virtues will propagate themselves; we ought to assume them rather than to be constantly preaching them: whereas width of sympathy, intellectual enthusiasm, an interest in the wider concerns of men, duties whose fulfilment brings no applause such things as these are hard for boys, and they will only learn to value them if they realize that we are always thinking about them, and that to us they are more important than many successes in the humbler sphere. There are, of course, certain practical difficulties that face us, if we try conscientiously to carry out the fraternal ideal. In the first place, we are brought face to face with rather a large family of little brothers; there is a danger of some of them being left out in the cold. And I am afraid this often happens; the more attractive of the younger members of the family find many elder brothers; the shy and awk. ward and unattractive, who need help and sympathy most, have to struggle on without. Then, again, as I said above, it is essential that we should avoid the superior manner; we must make our pupils forget that we are the tyrants of the class-room; we must get on to their level. If we had time to know all our little brothers individually, we might find out what each of them is really interested in as an individual, and draw him out on that subject to our mutual advantage; but we have to deal with them in groups, and we must address ourselves to the average boy. The average boy is interested in nothing but games and school gossip; therefore these will have to become the staple of conversation. Now I am not at all clear myself that the average boy really exists-at least, as a raw product: I believe he is a highly finished article, and needs some years of steady work on him at a Public School before he can really pass muster-before "funditus omnes corporeæ excedunt pestes," and he begins to realize that it is bad form to be interested in anything outside the routine. Even after some years at school, I believe he is a much rarer specimen than we imagine. I we are human beings, and can appreciate a joke at the expense of our own order. have never forgotten the remark a friend of mine made to me when I was a boy at school. He was a very good cricket and football player, a bad scholar, and a bright and amusing companion, so that he had more friends among the inasters than any boy I knew. He came back in rather a bad temper from some entertainment with a master, and broke out, "These masters all seem to think I am a perfect baby; they talk to me about games, games, games from morning to night, as if they were the only things I cared about." As a matter of fact, he used to write quite a lot of bad poetry; his note-books were full of clever caricatures of his masters and school-fellows; he was rather proud of his musical powers; he read widely, if promiscuously, and his literary judgments were wild and vigorous. There are many boys who would be only too glad to discuss such things as these, but they have got an unfortunate idea that the master's interests are confined to athletics and school topics. If only they were convinced that he liked to talk on other subjects, I am sure they would do all they could to encourage and draw out a shy or modest master. Too free a discussion of school topics, again, sometimes leads to misunderstandings. I knew a boy, a year or two ago, at one of our leading public schools, and asked him about the masters there, among whom I happened to have some friends. "Some of them are all right," he said, "but they all hate one another like poison." I expressed my surprise. "Oh, everyone knows," he explained, "that if you want to please one of them, you have only to tell him a story against another; we always do, when we go out to tea with a master." This was, of course, a libel; but it shows how our motives may be misinterpreted, when we are only anxious to make the boys realize that But, of course, the chief argument for the elder brother is that he will be able to exercise a useful moral influence, because he will be on friendly and confidential terms with his pupils. This I doubt, except within certain limits. If he has succeeded in persuading them, as he sometimes can, that his outlook on the world is much the same as theirs, except that his interests are rather narrower, he can, within those limits, exercise great influence; but his sincerity is suspected if he transcends them. A clergyman with a comfortable private income and a motor-car may inculcate many Christian virtues from the pulpit, and be heard with profit; but when he preaches from the text "Blessed are the poor," he will be less convincing that St. Francis of Assisi. But on the whole question of direct moral influence I confess I am sceptical. I believe when we speak, three times out of four we do more harm than good. For, after all, what an audacious thing we are trying to do, if we rush in to meddle with the conscience of another human being, unless we are forced into it. How little, at best, we know of him; how likely we are to insult him, to misread his motives, to misunderstand his temptations. It is surely a sufficiently serious thing that, whether we like it or not, we are exercising an indirect moral influence for good or evil every hour of the day, far more powerful than any words can be; for it is not by what we say, but by what we are, that the boys are really guided. I think it is a temptation that we schoolmasters are specially liable to, to imagine that because we know more, we are equally ahead of our pupils in more vital matters, and by virtue of our position know the right answer pat in each case of difficulty, without much trouble to think. |