PREFECTSHIP
Prefectship is the coping-stone of a public school education. The boy
who leaves without becoming a prefect has missed, we are continually
assured, the most important part of his school career. And yet what
percentage of an old boys' list, I wonder, reaches the dignity of house
prefectship. One gets the impression sometimes that every one, provided
he stays on long enough, becomes a prefect. All school stories follow a
convention. They open with the new boy closing behind him the
green-baize door of the head master's study, gazing wistfully down a
long corridor at the end of which is the oak door of the day room. From
behind that door comes to him the sound of laughter and eager
conversation. There is the unknown, mysterious world he has to enter.
That is how every school story opens. And every school story closes on
the departure of a hero crowned with athletic and academic honours. The
space in between is occupied with the 'see-saw up' process. How else a
school story is to be constructed I do not know. It has to be narrative
rather than dramatic. But it gives the impression that public school
life for the average boy is a slow voyage from fag to prefect. Indeed,
if _Peg's Paper_ printed school stories, 'From Fag to Prefect' would
probably be the title. Such a tale would, however, be little more
generally applicable than a tale of army life entitled 'From Bugler to
Brigadier.' The majority of schoolboys do not become prefects. But the
people in whose hands the framing of the convention lies think they do,
because they did themselves. The dwellers in Mayfair think London
consists of a few drawing-rooms and a few restaurants. The schoolmaster
naturally follows the conventional course, otherwise he would not be a
schoolmaster. If he had not reached the Upper Sixth he would not be in a
position to teach. If he had not reached the Eleven he would not be a
games master. The story-writer may not be an athlete, but it is hardly
possible that a man who can write an interesting book should have failed
to make some mark at school if he had stayed out his full time. And so
there has grown up a tendency to ignore entirely the careers of the
insignificant, which form the background for more striking exploits. And
yet, as always, the insignificant are in the majority.
A couple of years ago I spent an afternoon in the company of some
friends at the school where their son was completing his second term. It
was a warm afternoon and we naturally walked down to the cricket field.
On the Upper a senior house match, which we should have liked to have
watched, was in progress. Our small guide assured us, however, that this
would be impossible. 'It isn't our house, you see, and the fellows
would think it awful niff of me to watch another house playing. But
there's a house game of our own going on down there.' Realising that it
was impossible to overcome the novice's fear of doing the wrong thing,
we reluctantly, slowly, and with backward glances, followed our young
friend to the far end of a big field, where a ridiculous junior house
game was being played on a sloping and bumping pitch. The small boy was,
however, more interested in his friends than in the cricket. Beyond this
game there was the pick up.
Now I do not believe that I had ever before watched a pick up at all
closely. I had imagined that the cricket would be pretty bad, that
firm-footed batsmen would mow full pitches towards long on, that wides
would be only more frequent than the fall of wickets, that every third
scoring stroke would be in the nature of a chance. I had never, however,
anticipated anything approaching the complete impotence of that game.
The batsmen could not hit the ball hard, indeed it was only on rare
occasions that they managed to connect the bat with the ball. There was
no need for any fieldsmen, with the possible exception of long-stop, to
stand more than twenty-five yards from the wicket. The bowler's main
object appeared to be the keeping down of wides. Every game has its own
technique; this game was certainly not cricket as it is played
generally, and, no doubt, the victorious side was the one that bowled
fewest wides. For no other reason would any captain have kept on either
of those two bowlers for a second over.
And I could not help wondering what a public school career stood for in
the lives of those pitiably ineffectual cricketers. It is possible that
one or two of them might be brilliant scholars, or that a few played
football successfully, though this I am prepared to doubt; for the true
sportsman is self-declared the moment that he walks on to a field. It
seemed to me incredible that any one who had played any game
successfully could tolerate the miserable travesty of sport that was
being enacted on that sloping, bumping pitch. But even if there were a
few exceptions, even if one or two were destined for privilege and
authority and a name upon the honour boards, the fate of the majority
was certain. They would remain inconspicuous, belonging to that large
tribe of those whose names on the old boys' list are vaguely familiar to
us, but with whom we can connect not one incident, anecdote, or
conversation. They pass and they leave no mark behind them. They never
rise to a position of responsibility. They never learn to wield
authority. They never acquire, that is to say, those qualities of
administration that have made English rule so tolerant and so
universally respected. What can public school life mean to such as
these? I put the question, but I cannot answer it. I do not know. Public
school life is designed as a slow voyage from fag to prefectship, and,
even if only a minority complete that voyage, it is the process and the
stages of that voyage we have here to represent and interpret. It
should, however, be here set on record that, be the advantages or
disadvantages of the public school system what they may, a great many
public school boys never partake of them.
From the distance of early years the obligations of prefectship seems
slight in comparison with their enormous privileges. A prefect does not
have to answer his name at roll; he can wander round the studies without
leave during hall. He has fags to clean his study, to wash his plates,
to light his fire, to carry his books down to chapel in the morning. He
can inflict punishment without being liable to it. The new boy who has
recently been caned, in his opinion most unjustly, for whispering in
prayers, looks forward to his day of revenge. The life of a prefect must
be free from all the cares that so perplex him. Prefects can never be
troubled with impositions and imperfectly prepared exercises. He glances
up to the Sixth Form table and contemplates the majesty of Meredith with
his neatly-tied tie, and hair brushed back immaculately from his
forehead. What master would have the cheek to 'bottle' Meredith? The
very idea is unthinkable. Meredith has the invulnerable infallibility of
a god. The small boy reconsiders this view as he rises in the school.
The horizon narrows. But even when he reaches the Sixth Form table he
sees prefectship in terms of freedom rather than of service. And it
would, of course, be absurd to maintain that the obligations outweigh
the privileges. They do not: but they are none the less considerable. If
a prefect is found playing the ass, ragging in the studies, or cutting
lock up, he would be neither lined nor beaten; but the twenty minutes
interview with the Chief would be far worse than any caning. He would
feel humbled, he would feel thoroughly ashamed of himself, he would have
done a rotten thing. Punishments have ceased to be a pawn in a game
between boy and master. And, when a prefect realises this, he realises
also that this particular game is finished.
The degree to which a prefect appreciates his obligation, depends a good
deal on the way his house master treats him. The boy who is trusted
usually proves himself worthy of that trust. I do not mean in
everything. If a master says to a boy: 'Now, Jones, I am going to let
you prepare your lessons in your study in future. I trust you to work,'
Jones feels himself under no obligation to work. By going to his study
he is sparing the master the irksome duty of supervision. That is a fair
bargain. He has saved the master work and the master has saved him work.
In matters of form work a boy will never cease to regard his
relationship with his master as that of the hunter and hunted. He will
find when he reaches the Sixth Form that instead of being told to
prepare fifty lines of Virgil, he is expected to prepare as much work as
is possible in the time at his disposal. If, when put on to construe in
form he states as an excuse for an unsuccessful effort, that the fifty
line limit has been passed, he will be handled roughly: 'My dear Evans,'
the head master will say, 'you have ceased to be in the Lower Fourth.
You don't work to scale. If you haven't had time to prepare the passage,
say so, and I won't put you on, but whatever you do don't bring forward
that middle school excuse about fifty lines.' The new arrival will look
abashed, but he will not feel that he has been put upon his honour to do
an hour's work every night. He may possibly prepare next time, with the
aid of a crib, an extra dozen lines, but he will do it as quickly as he
can.
He feels differently, however, about what happens outside the
class-room. When an excuse is accepted because he is a prefect that
would not be accepted without a long cross-examination were he not a
prefect, a boy considers himself to have been put on his honour. I will
give an example. The O.T.C. was, with us, practically compulsory;
ninety-seven per cent. of the school was in it, and that three per cent.
was garrisoned with doctors' certificates. Like all compulsory things it
was extremely unpopular. We used to employ elaborate devices to get
leave off. In break we used to visit the matron and suggest that our
health required some castor oil. If possible we would retain the dose in
our mouths till we got safely into the passage and then deposit it in
our handkerchiefs. When this was impossible we swallowed it. A dose
alone was not a sufficient excuse. We had to assume faintness,
sickness, or some other indisposition during afternoon school. It was an
intricate business that rarely proved successful. The authorities were
prepared for it. Corps Parade was on Friday, and one Friday after I had
become a prefect, I decided that never before had I felt less like doing
squad drill. I had a headache, I had not finished my Latin Prose, we
were playing Dulwich the next day and I was anxious to be as fresh as
possible. I had also very, very slightly twisted my ankle. Remembering
my courage in the days of castor oil I thought it worth making an
attempt to get leave off. On this occasion I went to the head master.
I informed him of my injury, and was about to embark on a lengthy
explanation of the accident when the head master cut me short. 'Oh, yes,
Waugh, of course, that'll be quite all right. I hope you'll be fit for
to-morrow.' I felt thoroughly ashamed of myself. Because I was a
prefect, my word had been accepted without examination and without
proof. I was trusted to tell the truth. And yet I actually had produced
as feeble an excuse as a fellow in the Lower Fourth. I went on parade
that afternoon, and from then onwards I never tried to get off anything
unless I was absolutely certain that I could have got off it without the
influence of prefectship. And whatever may be urged against the inflated
opinion of himself that the power to exert authority may give a boy, I
can only believe that this sense of duty, this obligation to be true to
himself is an invaluable experience. It comes out in all sorts of ways.
I remember an old colour once telling me at the end of the season that
he had not enjoyed his cricket half as much as he had the previous year.
I was surprised. 'I should have thought you'd have enjoyed it much
more,' I said; 'you haven't had to worry about your colours; you've been
certain of your place; you've been able to play whatever sort of game
you liked.'
'That's just what I have not been able to do,' he replied. 'Last year I
was a free-lance. I took risks. I had a dip when I wanted to, and when
we played unimportant matches against the town and the regiment, I
thought more about hitting a couple of sixes than making a big score.
But I can't do that now. I'm captain of my house. I spend half my
evenings trying to persuade those young asses in the junior side that
seven singles between cover and mid off are of more use to the side than
the most tremendous six. If they see me going in and chucking away my
wicket in a school match, they'd think me a pretty sort of captain,
wouldn't they? I've got to set an example of sorts.' And, though the
captious may maintain that it would have been more to the point if that
particular sportsman had worried a little less about the example he was
setting on the cricket field and a little more about the example he was
setting in the form room and the studies, virtue is virtue wheresoever
it is found and in whatsoever garb it is adorned. It is a good thing to
feel that an example has to be set and to decide to set it. It is the
high privilege of service.
There are occasions when the setting of example grows not only irksome,
but pointless. Throughout one winter my whole dormitory and myself
subjected ourselves to the miseries of a freezing cold bath because
neither party had the face to own itself defeated. In the first warm day
of October the whole house ran cheerily to the shower bath down a long
passage that faced east and was filled with sunlight. But when the
November frosts came on, the long run down the passage in bare feet with
a small towel gathered round our loins became increasingly unattractive.
By the time we reached the bath we were thoroughly cold and the zinc
tubs under the cascade of water were not enticing. Each morning fewer
feet pattered down the passage. But my dormitory maintained its courage.
As long as I went on having a bath I knew that they would go on having
one, and as long as they went on having one I knew that I should have to
also. There were mornings when I longed to say: 'Look here, you fellows,
you don't want to have a bath. Nor do I. Let's chuck it.' The words were
sometimes on the tip of my tongue. But just as I was about to utter them
some one would rise from his bed, reluctantly divest himself of his
pyjamas, wrap a towel round himself, and run out into the passage. After
that retreat was hopeless. The thing had to be seen through. Not one of
us missed his bath throughout the term. It may have been good for us: I
don't know. Most things that are supposed to be are unpleasant.
As so often happens with preconceived ideas, the only duties of
prefectship which present any terrors to the imagination of the new boy
turn out singularly simple. Most boys are self-conscious; they dread a
silence, they hate being conspicuous. They regard, therefore, the taking
of hall and the reading of the house list at roll as terrible ordeals.
They are not so really. One is a little nervous lest the pitch of one's
voice may sound curious as one shouts out the name of the top boy on the
list: but it doesn't: not unless one is very odd. And the taking of hall
is simple, unless one goes down there with an established reputation for
inefficiency. In such a case the prefect does stand a poor look-out, as
poor a look-out as the master who has proved himself weak. But such
reputations are not easily acquired, and the possessors of them are well
advised to bribe some hardier colleague to take their places. No attempt
is made to rag the average prefect. He goes down on his first night
fully prepared to inflict a violent punishment on any harbinger of
insubordination. He may even carry down with him his swagger stick as a
cautionary signal. But it is unlikely that he will be called upon to use
it. The chief embarrassment, indeed, of taking hall is the importunities
of small boys who come and ask one to help them with their translation.
One hums and hahs, looks at the notes and the vocabulary and discovers
how extremely hard it is to translate Livy without a crib.
To a great extent the proficiency of the prefectorial system depends on
the house master. If prefects admire and respect their house master, the
tone of the house will almost certainly be a good one. If they dislike
him the tone may very likely be a good one. It is a toss up. Dislike and
fear often go together. And a prefect who dislikes, and thinks he is
disliked, by his house master may very well decide out of affronted
dignity to perform his duties thoroughly. 'The old beast hates me,' he
says; 'he thinks I'm no good. I'll jolly well show him!' Dislike is, at
any rate, a positive emotion. It will produce something. Nothing, on the
other hand, is more fatal than the sort of genial, indifferent
good-natured friendship that so often exists between a house master and
his prefects.
In Chowdler, G. F. Bradly has drawn just such a house master. Chowdler
pretends to be the elder brother: he talks of 'good old Jones' and 'dear
old Joe.' He has the prefects up in his study for heart to heart manly
talks. And the prefects listen, agree with what he says, echo, when they
speak, his own sentiments, and generally hoodwink him. They treat him as
he treats them. They call him 'good old Chowdler,' and leave it at that.
When there is a conscientious and an officious head of the house things
go fairly quietly; when the head of the house is a lazy, sociable
creature, the house runs itself, and with results that would cause
little pleasure were they published to the mandarins of the common
room. No new house master, Arnold Lunn says, has to face a more
difficult task than he whose predecessor has earned the reputation of
being a sport. The house master who always announces to the head boy his
intention of visiting the studies is popular enough, but he has a rotten
house.
Yet, however badly the prefectorial system may on occasions work, it is
impossible to dispense with it. It is not so much the need for a heavy
hand as the need for a scapegoat. Some one must be responsible to the
supreme authority for any disturbance that may take place. If a house
master enters the day room during 'prep.' and finds that an impromptu
concert is in progress, he knows that it would be impossible for him to
disentangle the muddled evidence of interested witnesses. He could never
find out what it was all about, how it started, who started it, what
happened next. He makes, therefore, one person responsible for the
maintenance of order in the day room during 'prep.' He puts a house
prefect there on duty. When, therefore, he interrupts an unseemly brawl,
he does not concern himself with the incidents of the affair; Brown's
face may be plastered with red ink, the head of Evans may be slowly
extricating itself from the wastepaper basket, Ferguson may be
withdrawing a battered compass from the unprotected quarters of an
enemy. He does not notice that. He does not punish Brown and Ferguson
and Evans. He asks the prefect in charge for an explanation. If the
explanation is not satisfactory that prefect is relieved of office. It
is the knowledge of this fate that inspires the industry of prefects.
This system is the basis for all administration, for the delegation of
all responsibility. It rarely fails. When I shared a study with another
prefect we divided eight fags between us. The best of these eight we
appointed fag-master. 'You will do no fagging yourself, Marston,' we
told him. 'To each of the other seven fags will be allotted one day of
the week. You will see that they do their job. If the fire goes out, you
will be beaten.' During the whole of that winter our fire never went out
once. It is a regrettable fact, but a true one, that human beings will
only work under the influence of a bribe, or of a threat. In the wide
world it is usually a bribe. One may not threaten the foreman of an oil
works. He has his union behind him. But there are no trade unions for
fags: a judicious threat works wonders. And, when all other forces
weaken, the wish to retain office helps the prefect to his task. Were
there no prefects, no scapegoats, there would be no order. They are the
exchange of hostages.
Suppose an attempt was made to run a house without them? How long do you
imagine that it would last? Five days, six days, a week? Yes, perhaps as
long as that: not longer: certainly I would not give it longer than a
week. Such an experiment might be tried at the end of a long and
unsatisfactory term during which several of the prefects had, at some
time or another, come into collision with official ruling. And the
climax might have been reached, shall we say, on the last Tuesday of the
term, when the head of the house was discovered during 'prep.' playing
the organ in the big school.
Next day, after lunch, the house would be astonished by the following
announcement: 'I don't know,' the house master would say, 'whether I
approve of the prefectorial system or not--that's neither here nor
there. At any rate it has not worked well with my present set of
prefects, and, for the rest of the term I propose to dispense with them.
I shall occupy during preparation the small study at the end of the
passage, and the house tutor will supervise preparation in the day room.
I shall occupy the small single dormitory by the fire escape. That is
all.' It is possible, is it not, as the sudden resolution of an
overworked, exasperated man who had not paused to consider the results
of his decision.
Well, what would happen then? We can guess to a certain extent. It is,
at least, a subject of interesting speculation. What would happen to a
house that had no prefects?
For a couple of days all would go smoothly, I imagine. The house would
behave like a whipped dog. Its tail would be tucked between its legs.
The prefects would make an ineffectual stand upon their dignity. Then
the possibilities of the situation would become apparent. Authority
spreads a veneer over the boisterous spirits of a boy of eighteen. But
at heart he remains a ragster. In a couple of years' time, as an
undergraduate or a medical student, he will be destroying furniture and
organising preposterous bonfires. And, when authority is taken from him,
he feels once again the old itch to enter the lists, to try one last
throw with the marshalled forces of officialdom. It may, for instance,
occur to Morcombe, the head of the house, that, though he has ceased to
be a house prefect, he remains a school prefect, and that, outside the
precincts of his house, he is still a force. When, therefore, he sees
Jones mi. flinging stones against the cloisters, he orders Jones to
appear before him that evening after roll. It is after roll, during the
silence of first hall, that punishments are inflicted. And, that night,
the house master, sitting in his narrow study at the end of the passage,
will be astonished to hear the silence broken by a series of resounding
bangs. He hurries down the passage and discovers Jones mi. straightening
himself beside the water pipes, one hand ruefully stroking his trousers,
while the head of the house proudly surveying his handiwork, delivers a
last word of admonishment and taps his cane against his boots.
'But what on earth, Morcombe, is the meaning of this?' says the house
master.
'I had occasion, sir, to beat a boy.'
'But you've no right to beat a boy. You're not a prefect any longer.'
'I was punishing him, sir, for a school and not a house offence. He was
throwing stones against the cloisters. As a school prefect I felt myself
bound to take official notice of his action.'
'But you know quite well, Morcombe,' the house master would answer
hotly, 'that you've no right to do anything of the sort. You are only
quibbling.'
'Then am I to understand, sir, that I have ceased to be a school
prefect.'
'You are to understand you have no authority over any one in this
house.'
'But that will make it difficult for me, sir; if I were to discover a
boy in this house and a boy in another house smoking on a Sunday
afternoon, I should be able to order the boy from another house to put
out his cigarette and return to school at once, but the boy in my own
house I should have to leave where he was. It would be suggested that I
was favouring my own house.'
It is unlikely that the house master will have a reply; he will order
Morcombe to return to his study and to cease being impertinent. It
depends on the courage of Morcombe and the respect he has for his house
master whether five minutes later there will be a tap on the door of the
narrow study at the end of the passage and a quiet voice will ask:
'Please, sir, I hope you'll excuse my worrying you, but I am not quite
certain whether you said I was, or was not, a school prefect. You see,
sir, it's my turn to read the lessons in chapel to-morrow. I wondered
whether I ought to run round and tell the head master that I am no
longer privileged to read them.'
There will be several such imbroglios.
Whether or not the term will end without an actual conflagration is
problematic. On the whole I should say that the chances were even. It is
the end of the term. Spirits run high, constant supervision is
impossible. On the last morning but one, for instance, there is no early
chapel. There is a long lie in bed. The house master will return to his
own part of the house to shave, bathe himself, and dress. There is no
one left in the dormitories with any authority. Every one is
good-tempered and excited with a surplus store of animal spirits. There
is a lively exchange of compliments which terminate in a pillow being
flung across the room. There is a moment's nervous hush. The power of
the prefectorial system dies hard: a week ago such an act would have
been dealt with instantly and severely. And, even now, a single word
would be sufficient to restore order.
But the prefect takes no notice. He sees no reason why he should exert
himself in the interests of one who considers his services to be of no
further use to him. He feels justifiably aggrieved. The house master
considers he can run the house himself--well then, let him run it. He
has asked for no assistance from his prefects. He can therefore expect
none. The pillow is returned. It is inaccurately flung, however, and the
contents of a water jug streams across the floor. Again there is a
brief embarrassment. But the prefect reassures his dormitory.
'My dear fellows, don't worry about me,' he says, 'I have no authority
over you. There is no need for you to take the slightest notice of
anything I say or do. Indeed I'm not at all certain that I shan't take a
hand in it. Ferrers, you brute, take that.'
And with the sudden flick of the forearm that in the cricket field had
proved so disastrous to the batsman who had risked a short run to cover,
the unerring discharge of a pillow has prostrated the startled Ferrers.
From that moment mischief is afoot. It takes what course it will. And
that course will probably involve the overturning of a good many jugs,
the stripping of innumerable beds, the splitting of several pillows. In
a brief while the air will be filled with feathers, the floor with
mattresses and soaking sheets. And when, an hour later, the house master
is summoned by an indignant matron to view the battlefield, who will be
held responsible? To whose account is he to debit the broken jugs and
the torn pillows? Whom can he deprive of office? He will, no doubt,
collect the house in his study; every one will spend the last day
inscribing a georgic or an eclogue. But the house will feel that it has
triumphed. What, after all, can the house master say? If he begins to
criticise Morcombe the reply is obvious.
'But I tried to stop it, sir, I did my best. But they wouldn't take any
notice of me, sir. I had no authority over them.'
If the house master is wise he will say as little as possible. He will
announce the punishment, and the next term place more trust in his
prefects. However bad an individual set of prefects may be, without them
things would be a good deal worse.
S. P. B. Mais in his first, and perhaps best, book dealing with Public
Schools, devoted a chapter to the various types of prefects, the effect
that office had on each type, and the use each type made of its
privileges. He maintained that certain types were unfitted for
authority, and that no boy who had not a view of life that passed beyond
the limits of school should be given such authority. That is no doubt
the ideal, but it is impracticable. A house master has to make the most
of the material at his disposal: if he is dissatisfied he must blame
himself. He has had his five years in which to fashion the malleable
substance to his fancy. If a boy is high in form and a school colour and
has been several years in the house, it is impossible to pass him over
in favour of a junior boy who is lower in form and a less successful
athlete. Prefectship has to go by seniority. The moment it was felt that
office went to the boys in whom the house master happened to have most
faith, the word 'favouritism' would be run like a corroding poison
through the system of the house. The favourite would be universally
distrusted and disliked. A certain class of boy would develop the
'conspiracy complex' that every hand was against him, and, in time, he
would become what he imagined others took him for.
Such a system would encourage endless sycophancy. If the house master
were married, his wife would play too large a part in the politics of
his house. There would be those who would not hesitate to ingratiate
themselves with her in the hope that at the critical moment her
influence might turn the scales in their favour.
When a boy whom his house master dislikes reaches the point where, in
course of seniority he would have to be made a prefect, the house master
has only two courses open: either he must make the boy a prefect, or he
must write to the father saying, though he has nothing definite against
his son, he does not feel that he is the sort of boy who ought to be
made a prefect, and he must ask the father, therefore, to remove his son
from the school at the end of the summer.
He can do nothing else. He cannot keep on a boy whose claims he has
passed over deliberately and without cause. What house master, on the
other hand, is going to write such a letter to a parent. The parent is
bound to object. He will appeal to the head master.
'You have nothing against my son,' he will say. 'During the four years
he has been at school he has never been in any serious trouble. He has
worked hard and he has played hard. I have always regarded prefectship
as the crown of a public school education. I sent my son to you rather
than to some other educational establishment because I wished him to
have the invaluable experience of being a prefect in a Public School.
And now, at the end, when he has reached this position, you say, without
giving any reason, that he is not a fit person to occupy it. It is
scandalous.'
And even were the head master to endorse his subaltern's verdict, were
he to say: 'That is all very true, Mr Evans, but a house master is the
best judge of the type of boy that he wants to have as a prefect. I am
very sorry, but we must abide by his decision,' the reputation of the
school would suffer.
Old boys would discuss the verdict in their clubs.
'That's no school for my son,' they would say. 'Prefectship depends on
the caprice of a house master. And, if by the time one gets high in the
house, one's told one's got to go--why, if that had happened in my case
I know I'd never have become captain of the Eleven. My house master
would have got rid of me long before I had got my colours.'
Gray heads would shake seriously over the port; the numbers of the
school would sink. Seniority may, now and again, bring most unsuitable
persons to authority, but it is a far more satisfactory system than any
that would be based on the choice and dislike of one person.
Certainly many unlikely people reach the high-backed chair of the Sixth
Form table. And a house master must often wonder how will taste the
strange stew that is simmering--a compound of so many unknown
ingredients. In spite of experience, he is always guessing. But the
changes are less considerable than might be expected, or it would be
truer to say, perhaps, that the changes follow a more or less ordinary
course.
A boy's attitude on reaching office is ordered by what he has read and
by example. The ragster usually becomes a martinet. He has read of the
reformation of Prince Hal; the epigram about Kildare ruling all Ireland
is the one piece of Elizabethan history that his memory has retained.
How nice he feels it will be to surprise every one. What a shock it will
be to his old companions. Every one must have said of him: 'Oh, Park'll
be all right. He's such a ragster himself, he's sure to go pretty easy!'
In his first week, therefore, he canes a quite senior boy for playing
the piano too loudly in the changing room. He becomes in a short while
extremely unpopular and a general terror. If on the start of the school
year one were asked to tell which of the new prefects one would be best
advised to avoid, one would almost certainly place one's finger on the
boy who had been most frequently in trouble during the previous term.
There is no sign, however, by which we can detect the officious type of
prefect who speaks solemnly of his responsibilities and makes life
extremely unpleasant for his house and for his old companions. It is
impossible to tell on whom this germ is going to settle. It need not be
the reformed rake: perhaps because rakes reform so seldom. It is not
necessarily the religious boy, or the intellectual boy. But on some one
that germ is sure to settle, and it is of all the germs the most
annoying.
There is nothing more exasperating than the officious prefect. On the
third evening of the term he walks into the study of a former associate,
looks confoundedly uncomfortable, seats himself on the table, and then,
after a moment's embarrassed silence, permits his features to assume an
expression of austere dignity, and says:--
'Jones, you confided in me two terms ago a little secret, you'll
remember what it was. Well, I feel that it is my unpleasant duty, now
that I am a prefect, to report this matter to the head of the house. He
will take what action he thinks fit.'
Jones sits back in his chair, a look of horrified disgust upon his face.
'But, my dear fellow,' he says, 'you couldn't possibly--I mean I told
you that in confidence. You couldn't be such a sneak!'
The prefect would shake his head.
'You do not understand. It is not sneaking. You would not call it
sneaking on the part of a policeman if he arrested an old friend whom he
found breaking into a house. This is an official duty that has nothing
to do with our personal relationship.'
Jones is tempted to say that in another minute personal relationships
will have a good deal to do with the matter, but he appreciates the
necessity for tact. He talks, he argues, he cajoles; his patience is
tried to the last degree. It is difficult to discuss a matter on
grounds of personal and practical expediency when the other party
refuses to desert the platform of high morality. In the end probably
Jones is promised silence in return for reformation, and, as the door
closes behind his old friend, he murmurs: 'Put not your trust in
princes.'
The officious prefect is not content with the exposure of confidences
received during his period of probation, he endeavours to unearth
present scandals, and this is a point on which popular opinion is very
strong. The moral tone of the house is not considered to be the concern
of the house prefect. That is the province of the house master and the
head boy.
The position of the head boy is a little difficult to define. He is the
intermediary between mortality and Olympus. He is supposed to be above
suspicion. He is the only person who is allowed to do anything out of 'a
sense of duty.' If a house prefect interferes in the private affairs of
another, an ulterior motive is always suggested, and the suggestion is
probably justified. Whether or not a head boy is justified in unearthing
scandal is an open point. There are those who will maintain that he
should only take notice of what actually hits him in the face. The
reason being that what hits the head of the house in the face will,
sooner or later, inflict a similar shock to the physiognomy of the house
master. And this should be avoided. In the first place, the house master
will lose his high opinion of his head boy; in the second, a scandal
that might have been prevented will reach official notice.
Indeed, there are not a few who will go so far as to assert that the
function of a head boy is that of the taster, the impersonal critic who
says: 'No, that is going too far.' He is the aeroplane photograph of a
strategic position, that shows what gun emplacements are obvious and
which are not. And, according to this line of argument, head boys should
only concern themselves with the obvious; what was not apparent to them
would certainly not be apparent to a house master; there is no need for
them to play at Sherlock Holmes.
But this is a point on which the vote has not been taken. There are
several schools of thought: all schools of thought are, however, joined
in the denial of the right of the head boy to report to the house master
anything save a case of insubordination or disloyalty on the part of a
brother prefect. A head boy, it is felt, should be able to deal with the
discipline and conduct of the house himself. To report is to confess a
failure.
To the house prefect no such fine shades of motive are ascribed. He is
not considered to be above suspicion, and he is allowed to indulge
certain corresponding weaknesses. His business is to see that order is
kept; the new prefect forms numberless resolutions. He is acutely
conscious of his dignity, his bearing partakes of the solemnity of
Malvolio. He wonders whether he ought to remain on terms of such easy
familiarity with certain rowdy elements in the house. A prefect should
not have too many friends. He should be the calm, implacable judge,
impersonal, impartial, with bandaged eyes. He is very haughty for a day
or two. But within a fortnight he has recovered. He becomes sociable
once more. He walks down to the field with his old friends. He does not
wonder whether it is wise or unwise to exchange confidences with those
whose conduct one day he may be forced to view with official
disapproval. He takes notice of, and deals with, only those problems
that crop up from time to time. He acquires a wholesome tolerance of
other people's business, a tolerance that slips over the border of
indifference, but remains an admirable social lubricant.
It is this indifference, this refusal to be upset about trivial matters
that can be left to adjust themselves, that is the secret of the success
of British administration. Other nations and classes do not seem to
possess it. The artisan when put in a position of authority bothers
about the unimportant, he gives himself no peace, and he gives those
under him no peace. There is constant friction. Troops almost invariably
prefer to be under the command of public school men rather than of
'rankers.'