midst of a large room, in which there were more than a thousand power-looms at work, besides many other large rooms filled with spindles and other machinery. The room was lofty, and so well ventilated that the atmosphere was that of a gentleman's drawing-room. Several thousand, chiefly of young women, were employed, being clean in themselves, neat in their dress, and, as far as their faces spoke the truth, very healthy and happy. There were on the premises commodious dining-rooms for those who came from a distance, retiring-rooms for both sexes, readingrooms for all. On inquiry, I found that so strict was the code of morality enforced, as well as the rules for cleanliness, that an esprit de corps had been generated amongst the hands employed which relieved the employers of all further trouble in the matter. The persons employed in these works will not themselves for a moment tolerate that any one of their number should be giddy in conduct, or untidy in person or dress. Employment at these works consequently was at a premium in

I

the neighbourhood. Applications for admission are so numerous that another room close by is being constructed, to contain 1,200 additional looms. asked what was the secret of a factory, so often in all respects the very reverse, being thus made a happy and improving home. I found it to consist of a principle which, if the owners and occupiers of land would of their own accord adopt, there would be no need of an Agricultural Labourers' Union, the very principle, in short, which it is the object of the Union to establish. The principle, as stated by the owner of these works to me, and which, he added, had contributed as much to his own welfare as to that of his work-people, was expressed in the following few noble and striking words: "I have always held that the object of factories is, first, to make money; and, secondly, to improve the physical and moral condition of the persons employed in them; and my experience is, that the more consistently the latter of these two objects is pursued, the more certainly and largely the former is attained." E. GIRDLESTONE.

CHAPTER XXI.

LIFE AT HOLYSHADE-AN ESTIMATEHOLYSHADIAN MORALITY-ENJOYMENT -AIDS TO LEARNING-A HOLYSHADIAN BOY'S DIARY-FAGGING-THE ORDEAL -A PROSPECT.

I HAVE no hesitation in recording the fact, that, if I was not the best boy at Holyshade, at all events I was not the worst. Like Lord Nelson, I could say primly, as far as the Holyshade code went, "I have not been a great sinner." But I am equally bound to add, that I do not hold in high estimation the Holyshadian code of social morality, unless I am called upon to admire the justice of a thief who shares his plunder with his companion in the theft, and refuses to compromise his honour by turning Queen's evidence.

It was said by them of old time, that no Holyshadian would tell a lie, and that, therefore, any master could rely upon a Holyshadian's "honour as a gentleman."

I say that the honour depended on the circumstances.

When Tulkingham major, who could fag me, ingeniously branded my new bureau with my initials, using for that purpose the red-hot poker, did I give up his name to my tutor when he demanded it? No. Why? Because I thought I should get the worst of it with Tulkingham.

The boys themselves, with a keen sense of humour, had a graduated scale of honour, which was represented by the following formula :

"Yes."

"Will you bet sixpence ?"
"No."

The Holyshadian youth was taught to pay some deference to authority in the hours of study, but he was likewise taught, that, in play-time, this same authority is a half-sleeping dog, which, as it is dangerous to approach, it is necessary to avoid.

Thus the Holyshadian learnt that there were bounds beyond which he might not venture.

He was told, for example, that boating on the river, beyond these bounds, was permitted, nay encouraged.

To be on the river was allowable; to be caught going to the river was punishable. Therefore the object of the boy, bent on enjoyment in a boat, was to get out of the way of any master whom he might happen to see on his way down to the river. The boy had to "shirk," that is, to dodge into a shop, or behind anything, anywhere, out of sight of the master. The latter knew it to be all nonsense; the former knew it too. Like the augurs, they would have laughed had they met. The Holyshadian Moral Code was easily summed up in one commandment, "Do what you like as long as you are not found out."

But I shall presently state a case which roused all Holyshade at the time, and not Holyshade only, but the municipal authorities of the City of London, and two boys, two Holyshadians, whose guilt was known but to a select few, held out in the face of rigid examination and cross-examination, were proof against surprise, and thus it happened that, finally, Falsehood triumphed, and Vice was triumphant. Of this later

on.

For my part, I took Holyshade as it came; and for me, after the first year, it came pleasantly enough.

My father never seemed to expect any learning from me, and was perfectly satisfied with my improved appearance in the holidays, when at Easter and Midsummer he took me to the Opera, which was an enormous treat. I did my best to prove myself worthy of this advancement.

If Holyshade can do anything for a boy, it can do one thing, and that is, make him independent.

Whether this be for his advantage, or not, is for the consideration of the Holyshadians generally. I answer, that, as the system was in my time, this independence was a disadvantage.

Practically, out of the actual schoolroom, the Holyshadian boy was his own master, and could do, within certain limits of time, just exactly what he pleased.

I am told that Holyshade is improved now-a-days. I am glad to hear it. It needed improvement. From what I have been able to gather from present Holyshadians, however, I am inclined to think that, in spite of some studies having been rendered compulsory, and official encouragement given to novel athletic sports, the morale of the place is very much the same as it was twentyfive years ago, and as it was twenty-five years before that, and as it will be, while the circumstances of its present existence remain unaltered, to the end of its time.

Only Holyshadian masters ruled over Holyshadian boys. They knew therefore by experience what was going on under their very noses, but, satisfied with results which had placed them where they were, and provided for themselves and their families for life, they did not intend to open their eyes to the fault of the system, or to own themselves wrong, where they had the credit, from outsiders, of being in the right. They pointed with pride to the names of Holyshadian worthies, but were loth to admit that each Worthy would have been worthier under better moral guid

ance. That these have become great men is no proof of the system's excellence; that they have, in some instances, been good Christian men is certainly irrespective of it.

I remember busts of some of these Worthies arranged along the walls of the Upper School. Ghastly objects they were, with their dirty white faces, blank eyes, and dusty double chins, stuck up on brackets as though to warn the thoughtless youth against following in their footsteps, along the road to fame, which would bring them to this complexion at last.

Clerical Holyshadians, of the Tory High Church type, used to point with pride to a modern Holyshadian Worthy in the person of a Missionary Bishop, whose energy of character and physical capacities would have stamped him as remarkable in any profession. He was invariably spoken of, with much shaking of heads and uplifting of eyes and hands, as "Apostolic." The Holyshadians, who used this term, being pressed for an exemplification of its appositeness to this eminent Worthy, usually fell back on tales of the hardships and fatigues endured by their schoolfellow, and were never weary of narrating how his Holyshadian training had been of the greatest use to him in -swimming rivers. I do not think it was ever said that he received his strongest religious impressions from Holyshadian teaching.

I soon discovered that the Colvin nature was admirably adapted to the Holyshadian constitution.

Money was no object, apparently, not even to the tradesmen, who were kind enough to allow an almost unlimited credit. This was generous on their part, as it involved a risk. The tutors signed orders for clothes and books with the openhandedness of those liberal spirits who have carte blanche to deal with others' money.

I found myself in a new world, with a paper currency, and means at hand of obtaining present enjoyment, without the drawback of immediate outlay.

There were clubs, there were social

gatherings, there were, in fact, all the appliances at hand for forcing the young ideas, and turning growing boys into men before they were half through their teens.

The Holyshadian was, at a very early stage, initiated into the wary use of those miserable short cuts to knowledge known as "cribs." Better to have plenty of time for breakfast and tea, and five minutes for the preparation of lessons, than a few moments for either meal, and half-an-hour of careful, painstaking study. It was a simple plan. One boy took the "crib," and read from it slowly, the others seated about the room following him with the utmost attention, and each writing down with a pencil in his own book, any word which there was a chance of his forgetting.

As to the science of making Latin verses, why, it was clear that, as every Holyshadian, in my time, was compelled to make verses, whether he had any taste for the employment or not, anyone, stupid or clever, could make verses. If stupid, he would do stupid verses; if clever, clever. After a year and a half of this, a boy would be indeed a dunce if he had not mastered the knack of treating any theme in Ovidian metre, from the Birth of Minerva to the Reform Bill. Was there not a Gradus ad Parnassum, with a perfect store of epithets, which you could pick and choose at will, and fit in to measure? But, for the Holyshadian too stupid, or too busy with any of the various amusements, boating, billiards "up town," cricket, and so forth, to have any leisure for prose themes or Latin verses, what was he to do? Nothing-but to come to an understanding with someone to perform these learned exercises for him. short, with a few honest, hardworking exceptions, mainly among the Collegers, the whole school was employed in getting the maximum of enjoyment with the minimum of work, out of Holyshade. They were fine dashing fellows, placed there to commence an acquaintance with those with whom they would either have to mix by right of birth and position, No. 167.-VOL. XXVIII.

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or with whom they might hope to be associated by good luck; and as to learning-well, if they picked up enough of it to pass creditably among some who knew no more, and others who knew less than themselves, that was sufficient, provided only they were gentlemen, and, this being granted, they might be what else they liked compatible with respectability.

Mathematics and modern languages were beneath a Holyshadian's notice. They were included among the "extras," as were also music and drawing. My personal and peculiar acquaintance with the properties of a triangle was limited to what I had seen of it as a musical instrument in a regimental band, or in the orchestra of a theatre.

The religion of Holyshade was a dull Respectability, hallowed by the external surroundings of antiquity. It was a "made" wine in a genuine cobwebby bottle.

Chapel-time on a whole holiday took the place of school-time. It had this advantage, that it required no preparation. It had this disadvantage, that it effected nothing for individual benefit.

How impressed has any visitor been on seeing that grave old Medieval Chapel for the first time. What Holyshadian has not delighted in the sweet strains of the anthem sung by fresh young voices, and felt his heart throb at the rejoicings of the Hallelujah resounding beneath that glorious roof? Yes, for a moment he has seen the stones instinct with life; for a second, he has heard the echo of the past, and has mistaken it for the voice of the living. Another minute, and the grey stones are again inanimate, the momentary throb of life has ceased, the clanging doors are shut, and the echoes are once more homeless.

The time-mellowed colours of the venerable stained glass window, over the spot where once stood the altar, dye the sun's rays as they pass through to fall, in richly-toned patchwork, upon the chancel floor,-a variegated woof as unreal as the mere sentimentalism of religion. Save for this the chapel is cold and drear; for all that made its

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glory and its life in the past, left it three hundred years ago, and all who gave it animation but half-an-hour since, are in the playing-fields, or on the river, rejoicing in their liberty. Well,-in after life the majority will find out how they have been educated only to enshrine Respectability, and, seeing, that, in the long run, this worship is the least irksome, and the most generally accepted, they will contentedly bring up their children in the practice of the same rites and ceremonies.

Apart from the highly instructive sermon in chapel, which those boys who had watches were accustomed to time anxiously, the sole approach to anything like a religious moral training, was, that on Sunday afternoon, or evening, a class had to read an abridgment of Paley's "Evidences of Christianity," in "Pupil-room" to their tutor. Paley's, in fact, were the only evidences of living Christianity in the place: the chapel and the College itself were monuments of a defunct Faith. It can be easily imagined how interesting this study was to a set of boys, from fourteen to sixteen, who would have willingly sacrificed to Jupiter (being on familiar terms with the heathen deities) for the sake of the hour's leisure, whereof Paley had deprived them.

Austin Comberwood wrote to me frequently, and through him I commenced a correspondence with Alice.

Deprived of my friend's recitals of Scott's novels, I developed a taste for light literature, and, inspired by Alice's "Blue Beard," I composed a drama on a story in a book of romantic legends, called "Chess with the Devil." About this time I began to keep a diary, and though separated by distance and by age from Austin, our friendship grew stronger and stronger. I told him everything concerning myself in my letters to him, a confidence which he was not slow to return. Alice, too, honoured me beyond my years with letters, which in after times were important, as voluntarily conferring upon me a sort of fraternal right to assist and advise, where assistance and advice were

possible from one so much her junior in every way.

I find an entry in my diary, dated September 19, after I had been a year at Holyshade ::

"Whitledge came for subscription to the Chapel Window. Humbug. Wrote to Governor for one pound. Will give less if I can. Subscribed to the Football and Field. No letter from Alice. Nor from Austin. Bad. Not heard

from Governor for an age. Charles O'Malley. Capital.

Finished

'SUNDAY.-Hot and fine: went for a walk with Bifford mi. Met Uncle Herbert. He said he was only down for a day. Gave me seven and sixpence. Glad of this, as I am rather low in pocket. Thompson ma. offered me five shillings for my buttons. Shan't sell them till I am very hard up. Old Jugson's not quite so strict as he was.

"MONDAY.-Had a magnificent game of football. Worked like bricks. Got one shin. No letters again to-day: horrid bore that. Put in a lottery for a set of camelian (West's) buttons. Bill got 'em. Sarah came to put my light out. Baited her by lighting it again. Good night.

"TUESDAY.—No letter from Governor. Letter from Austin, at Boulogne in France. He begins to speak French. I don't. Hate extra work except for going out at night. Lark.

Another day:

"No letter. Pulled up to Squigley after four. Hunted swans coming back. Nearly swamped in locks in Bill's outrigger, and so obliged to go in Parry's tub. Left Bill in the lurch, and hunted swans coming back. Dead tired."

Here is a sequence :

"So tired from yesterday's events I overslept myself, and went into school late, for which I got sixty lines of Long Ovid. Came back. Letter from Alice. Fryer came to-day for music lesson. Bore. What with fagging, music, and work for my tutor, I could only get five minutes for breakfast. Not much play for me to-day. Go to my tutor at a quarter to seven, and after twelve, and do a pæna after four."