THE PUBLIC SCHOOL BOY IN INDUSTRY.
• [To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
Sin,—You ask in a footnote .to the letter of " A Working Man " how the whole idea of " the Public School In industry " is working out. Your correspondent writes as a foreman in engineering works, and throughout his letter perpetuates the Trade Union misnomer of calling a mechanic in the engineering trade an engineer. Engineering is a most exacting profession, as well as a great source of trade ; the qualifica- tions required to make an engineer eligible for any of the great technical Institutions are very different from those required of a first-class mechanic or foreman. Your con- tributor seems unwittingly to have come under the influence of the class-war party in his attack on the Public School boy. Workmen complain of the self-interest of the employer ; - but if the Public School boy gives the best results in the higher grades of industry, the employer will be foolish not to employ him. And, with, of course, exceptions, that type unquestionably does give the best results. It is not a matter only of book-knowledge, though even in this respect " evening classes " obviously cannot compare with a University educes- • tion capping the Public School.
I write as a Wykehamist and as an engineer who went through the shops in the early 'nineties, along with scores of others of similar standing, and others again without the Public School guinea stamp. The majority of us reached good positions, and I do not think there was much to choose in this respect between the two categories. " Merit and merit only," as your contributor says, " should be the qualifica- tion for the higher posts " ; and in my experience it has been so. Certainly I have never made a recommendation on any other grounds. There are occasional cases of nepotism, but an employer with a post to fill, and his credit depending on his choice, is unwise if he does not select the best man.
But -what constitutes merit and the best man ? Your contributor, as a foreman, will naturally look first to aptitude in doing a job in the shops better than other men. I grant the importance of this--the so-called engineer who has not been through the shops is very often incompetent for the higher posts—but the " more important responsibilities " of the design and execution of engineering works postulate years of intensive training coupled above all with character. A Public School, followed by a University education, gives not only the groundwork of mathematics and technical science, but also, through classics, social life and games, that indefinable asset character. No monopoly of character is assumed ; but, nevertheless, that attribute which, coupled with knowledge, fits men to "direct the great sources of power in Nature for the use and service of man " is more often found in the Public School boy than in the Grammar School boy or (still more) than in the Board School boy. *There are, for all that, many eminent engineers who started life with no such adi,antages—except that " merit only " ,which landed them at the top of the tree. Degrees in science were often scoffed at by employers thirty years ago, while 'now there is active competition to obtain the best all-round graduates as student apprentices, as every " Appointments 'Board " will tell you.
Certainly we are losing many of our more capable and holder young mechanics, who naturally will not stay here to be kept down by ca' canny to the level of the inefficient ; but we are not losing our more capable engineers, who will presently take our places in the world and endeavour to maintain the unrivalled prestige of our Empire and the threatened supremacy of our factories.
It would be hardly courteous to discuss the only conceivable reasons why some young men are discharged " immediately they emerge from their apprenticeship." Works managers and foremen alike will keep the best. That there is a lament- able number of qualified engineers, and ten times that number of mechanics, unemployed at present is a sad fact and the plaything of politicians.
In concluding this over long letter I may add that the Public School type of man is ready, for his own and his firm's+ advancement, to do any job and to work any hours at his hardest, whereas the workman is not allowed to do any such thing. We, who are not reckoned as working men, hive often put in over a hundred hours a week, and I have many times put in thirty-six or more hours on end of my own free choice. The working-class apprentice has not a fair chance, but it is his Trade Union, not the employer, who is
responsible.—I am, Sir, &c., J. W. MEAuEs. Elstozoe, Jenner Road, Guildford.
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