us positive injury, by withdrawing themselves, and with them all that was good and true amongst us, into a small exclusive circle, which slept and worked, played and walked together, happy, no doubt, in their own pleasant set, and happier still in keeping themselves free from the evil which predominated in the little world around them. The wheat and the tares were not allowed to grow together until the harvest; the wheat was carefully planted out in a little paddock aside, and such a rank crop of tares there was in the large field that it stifled any little blades of wheat not grown tall enough yet to be transplanted, or not strong enough to force themselves up clear from the weeds around.

And yet should these lines meet the eye of those who have filled the position of big boys in private schools, they, perhaps, may say, "What is this to us? We were pure and virtuous, and were not bound to associate with fellows we did not like for the sake of others: besides, we might ourselves have been contaminated, and have done the rest no good?" It is not for me to say how far in each instance elder boys were bound to act as

moral police; but I know they might have improved the moral atmosphere of Weston in a few days, and have reduced our bruises and wounds in a fortnight. The three or four strongest boys in the school were of the virtuous party, and two or three vigorous thrashings would have changed it all. But they chose to be popular, rather than loved, and merely kept their reverence for good and their hatred of evil for private consumption, instead of obliging all to share it with them.

I will not here go into the monitorial question, nor discuss the point whether Mr. Wentworth ought not to have given them even more power than they naturally had, or whether he should not have at all events impressed their moral responsibility upon them; but certainly had he made them monitors, the change would have been most beneficial. I have said they had the physical power; I believe they had the inclination; and I am sure, had it been made their duty to protect the young, to put down bullying and to punish all coarseness, they would have done it nobly and enjoyed it much.

I must say that the learning at Weston, though

rather wanting in energy and zeal, was of no inferior sort, and that there were many very good scholars among the elder boys. The mathematical standing of the school was quite of a first-rate character; and more attention was given to foreign languages, and to the natural sciences, than at the public school I subsequently went to. Many of the leading fellows were much interested in chemistry, and explosions were of frequent occurrence; some of them being rather dangerous : in one instance the operator's hand was very nearly blown off.

I made but little progress in lessons: my time was so completely taken up in suffering pain, or in bewailing my unhappy lot, that I got on but very badly in the school, and went home at the end of the half-year with no honour, though with many wounds and bruises.

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The only game in which the school showed any spirit or proficiency was hockey of all dangerous amusements the most perilous. It is played with a ball made of wood, and covered externally with shoe leather, which is struck with thick strong ash sticks, meriting the name

of clubs, as they are iron bound at the hooked end. The boys divided into two long lines; all the right side hit up the playground, and all the left side down the long field. Were the danger only confined to the ball, which was hit about in every direction, and to the sticks flying accidentally out of the hands of the players, it would be certainly considerable; but when, in addition to this, on the slightest infringement of rules too numerous to be remembered and too hard to be learned, any of your many adversaries may hurl his stick at your head, and any of your own side who thinks he can arrest the flight of the ball by throwing his club at it, is at liberty to do so; the reader may fancy the kind and amount of bruises inflicted by this shower of balls and sticks.

But our pluck and spirit did not enable us to carry on so vigorous a game for many consecutive weeks; "hop-scotch" was a much more favourite amusement, and as it consists in hopping in and out of a variety of circles, parallelograms, and squares drawn upon the ground, kicking from one space to another a flat stone or old oyster shell, and occasionally balancing it on the top of the nose,

or carrying it from one figure to another on the point of the toe, it was peaceable and harmless enough. In this game many of us were great proficients; indeed, I have seen boys sixteen years of age and older, devoting themselves to the solitary practice of it for an hour together, yet at last failing in the final exploit of kicking up the oyster-shell into their mouths at the last semicircle. Marbles were a continual excitement, of course; "alley taws" "alley taws" were cherished, and

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agates" of great price nestled in the breeches pockets of some of us. On a wet afternoon, the school was divided into three equal parts: the virtuous ones, who read and chatted; the little boys, who doted on a good game at marbles; and the tyrants, who were busy annoying and bullying the rest.

The great fault of a private school lies in the title never being carried out: a private school is a public one, inasmuch as all live together; and however hunted a boy may be, he has not a quiet place where he may rest his weary head without fear of disturbance or annoyance. Hurried on ever, from public play to public repetition, and