A HISTORY OF HAMPSHIRE 



master and 2s. 6d. to those under the usher ; but poor boys nominated by 

 the council were admitted free. The scholars of the first two forms were 

 only to speak Latin, unless by special leave. A portentous list is given 

 of the Greek and Latin authors read. Erasmus' Dialogues were still used, 

 and Terence was still popular. But the list includes Florus, Quintus 

 Curtius, Sallust, Martial and Juvenal, besides the usual Ovid and Virgil ; 

 and in Greek, Lucian, Isocrates, Herodotus with Homer, Pindar and the 

 Anthology. The school hours were from 6 a.m. to 1 1 a.m. in summer 

 and from 7 a.m. to 1 1 a.m. in winter ; and from i p.m. to 5 p.m. 

 There were to be three vacations at Christmas, Easter and Whitsuntide, 

 but holiday tasks were to be imposed. At the breaking up at Whitsun- 

 tide there was to be an examination by the corporation and clergy of the 

 town, and declamations in Greek and Latin. 



The school was originally in Winkle Street, but in 1695 was removed 

 to an ancient hall called the West Hall in English Street, and was at that 

 time a very fine building for a school. Under its latest Wykehamical 

 headmaster, Richard Mant (the father of a more famous man in his day, 

 the Bishop of Down), from 1770 to 1795, the school had a great name. 

 In 1 8 1 9 ' it was reported as only containing boarders. Later the premises 

 became out of date for boarders. After the Municipal Reform Act 

 removed the government of the school from the town council to a body 

 of municipal charity trustees, disputes arose as to the endowment. The 

 case went into Chancery, and from 1854 to 1860 the school was closed 

 altogether. After a compromise had been effected, under which the 

 school received 150 a year from the corporation and anew schoolroom, 

 it re-opened under C. W. Hawkin, B.A., on a different basis. In 1867 

 it contained eighty-three day boys and sixteen boarders, and practically 

 ceased to send boys to the universities. Its curriculum became what 

 was intended to be popular, but its government remained a close corpora- 

 tion of co-optatives. A scheme of the Charity Commissioners under the 

 Endowed Schools Acts approved by the Queen in council and dated 20 

 October, 1 875, established a governing body of sixteen members, of whom 

 the mayor is one, six appointed by the town council, two by the school 

 board (which will soon cease to exist under the Education Act, 1902), and 

 seven co-optative. In 1 880 the present headmaster, James Fewings, B.A., 

 B.Sc., was appointed. In 1896 the school was moved to new buildings. 

 The school is not however on a scale commensurate with the growing 

 greatness and needs of the town. It is subject to competition from below 

 by the Taunton Trade School, which undersells it by a lower tuition fee, 

 and from above by the Hartley University College. There is need for 

 another Hartley to convert the Grammar School into a school to serve 

 Southampton as Hymer's College serves the rival seaport of Hull. 



A somewhat unfortunate career has been that of Portsmouth Gram- 

 mar School. A priori it might have been supposed that there could be no 

 better governing body of a grammar school than a college in a university. 



1 Carlisle's Grammar School, ii. 448. 

 390 



