I have been considering the subject of school magazines, and I wonder
whether it would be possible to run a school magazine here. I have had
no experience with a school magazine, but I edited a university weekly
for a year. It wasn't a success. I wrote yellow editorials and placarded
the quadrangles with flaring bills which screamed "Liars!" "Are School
Teachers Socially Impossible?" "The Peril and the Pity of the Princes
Street Parade," at the undergraduates passing by. It was of no use. No
one bothered to reply to my philippics, and I had to sit down and write
scathing replies to my own articles. I could never bring my circulation
up to the watermark of a previous editor who had written editorials on
such bright topics as "The Medical Congress" and "The Work of the
International Academic Committee."
In Edinburgh the students are indifferent to their 'varsity magazine,
but in St. Andrews the publication of _College Echoes_ is the event of
the week. The reason is that the St. Andrew's students form a small
happy family; if a reference is made to Bejant Smith everyone
understands it. If you mentioned Bejant Smith in the Edinburgh _Student_
no one would know whom you were referring to.
The success of _College Echoes_ gives me the idea of a school magazine
that would succeed. A magazine for my hundred and fifty bairns would be
useless; what I want is a magazine for parents and children. It would be
issued weekly, and would mingle school gossip with advice. If Willie
Wilson knew that Friday's edition might contain a paragraph to the
effect that he had been discovered murdering two young robins, I fancy
that he would think twice before he cut their heads off.