THE PUBLIC SCHOOL spirit seems to be double-distilled at Cranwell,
the Royal Air Force College. From someone who has a boy there I have some interesting details of the 'hazing,' or toughening-up process, by which the seniors undertake to put some backbone into the new entrants in their first term. Much of the scanty spare time which those youths enjoy is taken up with after-dinner obstacle races, the while they are cursed in good old-fashioned sergeant-major language. Such proceedings culminate in a grand parade held at half past ten in the evening, after Lights Out, in which the new boys are obliged to paint a facsimile of their uniforms on their naked bodies, and then to carry out exercises in the open air, nude and barefoot, to the commands of their fully clad seniors. On the night that my correspondent's son took part in this parade, the ground was covered with snow and the temperature below freezing-point. This may seem small beer to those who remem- ber the farcical lengths to which the wartime battle-schools went in their early and unrestrained days, but it is outrageous enough in all conscience for peacetime.
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