A GREAT HEAD-MASTER

Bruce Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 2263, 8 May 1891, Page 6

A GREAT HEAD-MASTER

The work of a schoolmaster has perhaps less than all other professions of palpable result to show for years of hard work. But the influence is none the less lasting. The different qualities, moreover, needed in an ideal headmaster are such as are very rarely found in one man. In a large public school, such as the City of London School, it is practically impossible that the personal influence of one man should be felt by every boy. in the school ; but it may safely be said that there could have been few men whose influence was so farreaching as Dr Abbott's, and the boy must indeed have* been difficult to touch who was never impressed by any of the little addresses sometimes delivered by " the Doctor." And yet, impressive and even severe as Dr Abbot might seem to the younger boys of the school, to those who knew him least he was always ju3t and impartial, while to those who came under his own personal supervision he was always more than a master — he was a friend. The kindly humour, the friendly interest, the impression he left on a boy that he was not regarded simply as one item out of seven hundred items, his wonderful personal charm, endeared him to : all with whom he came in contact, and still forms a delightful recollection to many who have ceased to have any actual intercourse fl^ith him. Who that was in his Sixth Form could ever forgot the delightful readings of "In Memdriaih," or of Bacon's Essays, or the.careful investigations into the mysteries of Thuoydides; who of all the youthful, and, ib mrtst be confessed, somewhat reluctant devotees of Latin Elegiacs or d-reek, lambics, has not experienced the pleased expression and helpful word for the painstaking student, or, perhaps more frequently, the surprised ' look of dis may, or the amused smile,, when a rather unwontecU" poetical license " was taken? Th,e interest which he dis^' played, too, not only iii 'the intellectual,' but the physical of. the, boys,, was very remarkable, i and the greabvimn provement effected during 5 his term of < offrde in < the i 'spa'ce allowed for recreatiop waa( due/ in no small! 4 e g r 0 e to , ( Bi8 e'n'^. tbjaaiastic championship of the cause.— xj. The Cabinet Portrait; Gallery. .■. .■ c.• .: 6