[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR, --Returning after three
years abroad, I have, during the last few months, been very much occupied with just those considerations with which the Head-Master of Harrow so ably deals ; and I do not see how anyone who realizes what is happening can fail to arrive at the same conclusions.
There is a decided increase of bitterness between classes which, fanned as it is by the personal polemics of politicians and reiterated cries of many daily newspapers, bids fair to end in a prolonged and disastrous struggle. The Public Schools meanwhile, each a snug little kingdom of its own, know nothing more disastrous than the loss of a Rugger match or an examination failure. Outside, Unemployment, low wages and poverty with their usual concomitants of crime and vice are breeding revolutionaries. Two different 'Worlds—each knowing less and less of the other, and this ignorance breeding distrust, suspicion and dislike. It is a dangerous situation. The solution ?
Undoubtedly, as the writer says, the first thing is to impress on the boys the obligation of social service. From my own experience (I have spoken at one or two schools lately oh the subject) the boys are not unsympathetic if their interest is aroused. But a mere sympathetic interest will probably not survive the excitement of the next Rugger match. Something definite is called for.
Personally, I think that in the Scout movement, to which Dr. Norwood refers, the best solution is to be found. Ikre is the widest (though, of course, not the only) field of useful social service and the best because it establishes that personal contact which is at the root of the whole matter. What is admittedly the finest movement for boys ever discovered is crying out for leaders. Who ought to provide good leaders if not the Public Schools ? Scouting provides a link between all boys of all classes of all nations and, properly understood and carried out, would give just that wider outlook which is so urgently wanted both in home and in international affairs. —I am, Sir, &c.,'
A COLONIAL HEAD-MASTER.
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