1833 SCHOOLING 7 



enforced to certain rules, no means were taken to 

 reach the boys themselves, to guide them and help 

 them in their school life. The new-comer was left 

 to struggle for himself in a community composed 

 of human beings at their most heartlessly cruel age, 

 untempered by any external influence. 



Here he had little enough of mental discipline, or 

 that deliberate training of character which is a lead- 

 ing object of modern education. On the contrary, 

 what he learnt was a knowledge of undisciplined 

 human nature. 



My regular school training (he tells us) was of the 

 briefest, perhaps fortunately ; for though my way of life 

 has made me acquainted with all sorts and conditions of 

 men, from the highest to the lowest, I deliberately affirm 

 that the society I fell into at school was the worst I have 

 ever known. We boys were average lads, with much the 

 same inherent capacity for good and evil as any others ; 

 but the people who were set over us cared about as much 

 for our intellectual and moral welfare as if they were 

 baby-farmers. We were left to the operation of the 

 struggle for existence among ourselves ; bullying was the 

 least of the ill practices current among us. Almost the 

 only cheerful reminiscence in connection with the place 

 which arises in my mind is that of a battle I had with 

 one of my classmates, who had bullied me until I could 

 stand it no longer. I was a very slight lad, but there 

 was a wild-cat element in me which, when roused, made 

 up for lack of weight, and I licked my adversary effectu- 

 ally. However, one of my first experiences of the ex- 

 tremely rough-and-ready nature of justice, as exhibited 

 by the course of things in general, arose out of the fact 

 that I the victor had a black eye, while he the 

 vanquished had none, so that I got into disgrace and he 



