TORONTO OF OLD. 259 



lads with. sucH intentions was on one occasion intercepted ty the unlooked-for appearance of 

 the head-master hy the side of the stage-coaeh as it was just about to start for Montreal in the 

 dusk of the early morning, with the young truants in or upon it. 



As to the modes of discipline : —in the school at York — for minor indiscretions a variety of 

 remedies prevailed. Now and then a lad would be seen standing at one of the posts above 

 mentioned, with his jacket turned taside out : or he might be seen there in a kneeling posture 

 for a certain number of minutes ; or standing with the arm- extended holding a book. An 

 "ally" or apple brought out inopportunely into view, during the hours of work, might entail 

 the exliibition, article by article, slowly and reluctantly, of all the contents of a pocket. Once 

 we remember, the furtive but too audible twang of a jewsharp was followed by its owner's 

 being obliged to mount on the top of a desk and perform there an air on the offending mstru- 

 ment for the benefit of the whole schooL Occasionally the censors (senior boys appointed to 

 help in keeping order) were sent to cut rods in Mr, McGOl's property adjoining the play-<Tound 

 on the north ; but the dire instruments were not often called into requisition ; it would only 

 be when some case of unusual obstinacy presented itself, or when some wanton cruelty, or 

 some act or word exhibiting an unmistakable taint of incipient immorality, was proven. 



Once a year, before the breaktng-up at midsummer, a "feast" was allowed in the school-room 

 at York — a kind of pic-nic to which all that could, contributed in kind — pastry, and other 

 dainties, as well as more substantial viands, of which all partooli. It was sometimes a rather 

 riotous affair. 



At the south-east comer of the six-acre play-ground, about half-an-acre had been abstracted, 

 as it were, and enclosed : here a public school had been buUt and put in operation : it was 

 what we should call now a Common School, conducted on the "BeU and Lancaster" principle. 

 Large numbers frequented it.' Between the lads attending there, and the boys of the Grammar 

 School, difficulties of course arose: and on many occasions feats of arms, accompanied with 

 considerable risk to life and Umb, were performed on both sides, with sticks and stones. 

 Youngsters, ambitious of a character of extra daring, had thus an opportunity of distinguish- 

 ing themselves in the ejes of their less courageous companions. — The same would-be heroes 

 had many stories to tell of the perils to which they were exposed in their way to and from 

 school. Those of them who came from the western part of the town, had, according to their 

 own shewing, mortal enemies in the men of Ketchum's tannery, with whom it was necessary 

 occasionally to have an encounter. While those who lived to the east of the school, narrated, 

 in response, the attacks experienced or delivered by themselves ; in passing Shaw's or HugiU's 

 brewery. 



Across the road from the play-ground at York, on the south side, eastward of the church-plot, 

 there was a row of dilapidated wooden buildings, inhabited for the most part by a thriftless and 

 noisy set of people. This set of houses was known in the school as "Irish-town;" and "to 

 raise Irish-town," meant to direct a snowball or other light missive over the play-ground fence, 

 in that direction. Such act; was not unfrequently followed by an invasion of the Field from the 

 insulted quarter. Some wide chinks, established between the boards, in one place here, enabled 

 any one so inclined, to get over the fence readUy. — We once saw two men, who had quarelled 

 in one of the buildings of Irish^town adjourn from over the road to the play-ground, accom- 

 panied by a few approving friends ; and there, after stripping to'the skin, have a regular fight 

 with fists ; after some rounds, a number of men and women uiterfered and induced the com- 

 batants to leturn to the house from which they had issued forth' for the settlement of their 

 dispute. 



The Parliamentary Debates, of which mention lias more than once been made, took place, on 

 ordinary occasions, in the central part of the school-room ; where benches used to be set out 

 opposite to each other, for tke temporary accommodation of the speakers These exercises con- 

 sisted simply of a memoriter repetition, with some action, of speeches, slightly abridged, which 

 had actually been delivered in a real debate on the floor of the House of Commons. But they 

 served to familiaTiae Canadian lads with the names and character of the great statesmen of 

 England, and with what was to be said on both sides of several important public questions : 

 they also probably awakened in many a young spirit an ambition, afterwards gratified, of being 

 distinguished as a legislator in earnest. On public days the Debates were held up stairs on a 

 platform at the «ast ead of a long room with a partially vaulted ceiling, on the south side of the 



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