I was now to enter on a new life. My home was to be a monastic one, which
three hundred years before had been the residence of mitred abbots. A
king had expelled these from their Gothic dominion; another and a better
king had given it to his children, among whom in these latter days were
Coleridge, Leigh Hunt, and Charles Lamb. And now I was to be there, to
tread in their steps, to pace the same ancient cloisters, to catch the
same earnest mood in pacing them.
The place was more like a university than a school. Four classical
masters to teach us the languages of Athens and Rome; two
writing-masters, who themselves wrote like copper-plate, and made us do
likewise, besides teaching us figures.
Then we had playgrounds by the acre. One looking on Little Britain
through lofty palisades, on which same ground were the residences of the
masters and of certain dignitaries, among them that of the treasurer,
always a City magnate, and to us inscrutably great. The counting-house
was in the grounds, as well as the head and junior master’s houses,
together with the office and house of the steward. With all these
buildings, the playground was not crowded; and apart, in the large open
space on the north side, stood the grammar school.
Now that the institution is to be removed, the character of the boys
will change, and all its traditions end. The cloisters and garden within
their quadrangle, with the monkish dormitories and other old places, have
hitherto shaped the minds of the boys, and this influence will cease, and
the feeling will vanish that the school owed its foundation to a king.
It was in this feeling that the pride of the boys lay; it indulged them
in the belief that they were superior to all other boys. They thought
of their royal founder almost as if they were descended from him, and
honoured their very dress from its similarity to that which the youthful
sovereign himself wore.
In my time the cloisters were Gothic, as originally built; half a century
ago they were reconstructed into Saxon or some other contemptible
pattern, which has perpetuated the architect’s ignorance, insensibility,
and bad taste up to the present. But it signifies little; all will be
swept away and covered with shops, where the name of Homer will nevermore
be heard. But Parliament, in sympathy with open spaces, may grant the
necessary million. Not they!
But nothing was intended to last for ever, if we except—what?
The genius of the place affected me very soon, I felt myself growing into
monkhood. I preferred the sombre cloister to the playground, and for that
reason I often had to be alone there, not in steady thought, but under
involuntary emotions which ran through me like an underground current.
Then, the suggestiveness of some of the inscriptions on the walls, thus,
“Here lies a benefactor, let no one move his bones.” This I used to
regard as a very pathetic appeal, as if the bones were very comfortable
where they were yet in constant dread of being disturbed. Had nothing
been said they might have been safer from the antiquarian.
But I should mention that the first ordeal I was put through was to
fight. Every boy knew whom he could fight; this was required of him for
the benefit of his public. A boy named Yardley was selected to test my
pugnacious powers. We were of a height, both tall, and of about the same
age. We were taken into a private yard. Of fighting I knew nothing; but
I had a quick eye and was quick of limb. More than this I had dramatic
imagination, and to this it was that I owed my victory. I pictured to
myself a tiger springing at his prey, and with this example I leapt at
my antagonist from some distance, and my fists covered his face and eyes
almost before he knew that I was upon him. He had not a moment’s chance,
he floundered each time that I was upon him.
This encounter was never forgotten by the boys, and I was never asked to
fight again.