ON HOLIDAY "TAGS."

Press, Volume L, Issue 15023, 18 July 1914, Page 9

ON HOLIDAY "TAGS."

(SPFAIAIXT WRITTEN FOR "THE PRKBB.")

(P-,- KK.vEsr A. Belchek, M.A.)

Readers of Mr Bradbv's delightful book "Dick"' will remember how Dick's hiist enquired after the holiday task ■which had been set. Dick admitted there was one, but bo had left thehook in his study cupboard at Rugby. "Ho would have plenty of time U> do it when he got back —enough at least not to get floored. That wati what most of the felloWe did, though a few read it in the train. He. Dick, had looked at tho book before he came away and seen that it was awful rot. What was it called Oh! 'Old Morality.' or something like that." Mr Bradby—as iiid-xfl one would ox- • • ct from a Rugby housemaster —knows 'boys, for Dick Rodney is just exactly liie average typo of public schoolboy today. Is it auy -u.su setting such boy-s * holiday tasks, and, if so. how should thov bo tet? "We confine ourselves to the .|iiestion of English literature, ocean-* that is tho only form of holiday task which is defensible. There are, • of course, exceptional cases, which must bo treated exceptionally, but, in a general sonse, to set a boy down to wrestle v.ith mathematical problems or to writo Latin verees during the holidays is rank folly. Either ho has worked properly during the term, or ho has not. In ' the former caso ho needs, and should have, a comr>lete relaxation from ordinao' school routine; in tho latter case Jio is unlikely to develop qualities of industry in his home- which the discipline of school lifo lias failed to unearth —in other words, ho simply does not do it. and unless his parents aro prepared ponsonallv-to superintend, and to set, work which must b<? regarded as a punishment, it is bettor to loavo it alone. With English literaturo it is different Tho conditions of modern public school life aro such that opportunities lor reading during term time are limited/The most that the average schoolmaster can hope to do is to keep alive ihai strain of imagination, which, every boy <&» in childhood, until it has been "sioWered' under the verbs in—mi." Aid ho must do this by indirect influence rather than by direct teaching, fir it is to be feared that—despite the reformers —one's English education i« still got mainly ont of school. Take you never so interesting an author, and ! tlie process of'reading him in small doses in form will seldom inspire the average boy with any real affection for < lie author. And that is under the hap- "- piest conditions, when taught by the scholar who understands boys. What of the scholar who does not? Some yean?' ago wo ran across a British Con- ' wil in a remote Mediterranean . island. Be*" was an old public school boy, had read much, travelled", and observed much. The "' conversation turned on Milton, and the Consul admitted that he did not read Milton. "When I was a boy," he said, ' - -'we woro doing 'Paradise Lost' in lorra; the master was explaining some- • thing to which I did not listen, but, ' read on ahead to see what the poem • nras like. When he on to read ' 1 had lost the place. He said I was Siot attending, and gave mc five hundred lines of Milton to Tcnte out. That •was twenty-fir© years ago, and I have Jever read 7 a line of Milton since." - It nruet have been good to bo 'twelve years old with Andrew Lang, when the Christmas books were writ. S«n by Dickens and Thackeray, and the sheets of "A" Christmas Carol came damp from tho press, fcowadays there aro other rivals, and not always '' vorthv • ones. The modern magazine, vith its inevitable detective story, has much to answer for. and not the least * the fact that it is breeding a race, • w.ho lfeo Mr Saintebury's disagreeable < little boy, find Scott "assommant, , and - ft ru raoro interested in tho Chevalier 'dUndustrio than in Front do Bceur. Ivlr Andrew Lang distrusted a course - of. reading. "People who really care far toofe? he used to say, "read all ■ er/tAeo." That is very truo when ap- ¥.'■ to tho young men from America \ JTio wroto to him and asked for nd- * --,jVsJe. But with schoolboys it is difIf we aro to eavo them from till magazine disease, eorae sort of. advfe is essential. How should it be gireii ? Wo do not beliove that tho principle of selecting: one book as a haßday task is always successful. Thcro rffiwt bo very fow schools where, as a n'ritlv indignant parent recently parted out. the selection falls on '-The Ctennings." which it has been said rinter is noither English nor litimturo. Birt the fate that awaite the'single book is that which ''Old Mortality" would have mot had not Dick Kotlney stayed with such sensible peopfo for his holidays. Boye cannot bo fragoonod into reading, and the geneal result of. figuratively cramming a particular author or a particular book dow& boy's throat is to sot»up in his tnindlan" obstinate opposition which yearaimay not remove. On the other iiaudjlif the choice, within certain „ limits! bo left, to the boy and the 11 niastefe part, oe confined to making euggrdsons, the result may be assuccessful. Such at least was oui experience some years ago in Englani, when the following panor was pet for English "extras" for tho holidays. Wβ quote tho pajxsr exactly as set:~V You art*, to select one or more ont of each --..-■ ioiliwing , eections. In the case of Sections A and B (Essays and Poetry) it 13 BUgseifcd thatiyoa Should read a little of the eelectoi work cadi Bay and . commit some iwrtioa V> memory. Section D is voluntary, »cd is ,m«an*t to suggest a few recommended woNte of modern fiction. In each <a* tbc pubh^}i er and price have been given. A paper on subject matter of these - books vexcludingvSection D) -will be set on tho first day of nfe«s term. SECTION (ESSAYS), ilorky: "On the of Literature." (Macmillaji and Co., 5».V-. Fronde: "England's WoTthws.' (I«ngnians, Crcon and Co., i s net.). Ruskin: '•"War." (Lecture x.\ j' n 'Crown et Wild- Olive.") (Allen. Is net.,' _ Stevenson: "A Christmaa *SerL O n" (from "Across the Plains.") (Chatto ano. "W'jndus, Is net.). . SECTION B (POETRY). Movrie: "The Man Born to be Ki*^ - * (from '■ "An Earthly Paradise.") (Longmans, Matthew Arnold: 'Sohrab and Enstum.' (Clarendon Press: ''Oxford Plain Texts," 13 H*t). i«atjfeilow: "King Olaf' , (Dent, "Everyfc ?J I ' , aeries, 13 net.). BaJlnda. and Poems, illustrating English a *Wy. (Pitt Press, Is net.). SECTION C (STANDARD FICTION). "Legend of Montrose." (Kelson, *Js@f*Jis: "Barnaby ' Rndge." (Dent, series, Iβ net.). , "Cranford." (Oxford Umvcr- ' Is Sd). Eliot: "Silas Marner." (Blacknv5 d ?L"The Cloister and the Hearth.' , series, 1& net.). ••/ , ■ ' nrt2R : J "Th« Dove in the Esgle'e Ae3t. l *"«s?3a. is net.). D QIODEKN FICTION). K*S,T : "Chippiage." (Smith, Elder, 4s

lierriman: "Bar'each of. the Guard.' (Smith, Elder, 2e net.). Khoecomyl: "Old. Fireproof.' (D'icx■worth, 4e 6d net.). Lubbock: "Bound the Horn before- "ke Mist." (Murray, 2s €d net.). Turley: "The ilinvern Brothere." (Nelson, 33 Gd net.). X.B.—Ar.y oth-er liet, drawn up on ti'.e same principle as this, but alternative vo it, may bo substituted, if previously submitted fer approval. It -would, of course, be quite easy to criticise this list or to draw up halt a dozen equally good—but that is not the point. Some form of selection is necessary .and obviously it will bo coloured by the taste of the selector. Any fear that the reading will run too much in a groove is removed by allowing the boy t-o submit an alternative list himself. It should be added that the average age of tho boys concprncd was fiftoen and a half, and that they were all army candidates. ' It is open to question- whether any paper should ho set on holidaj? reading at the beginning of the next term. In favour of setting a paper is to be said tliat itfunijs.ht's a test that some actual reading has been done When a is set the questions should be of tbo easiest description. In a paper of this description the average number of marki; secured by this particular set of boys was 64 per cent. Of course, in this, as in every other scheme for encouraging reading, everything depends upon a boy's parents. If a boy comes from a house where the pursuit of wealth or pleasure leaves no room for culture, "the best laid schemes gang aft agley." Our grandfathers had an unerring conviction, that holidays should be made improving. The sentiment was admirable, though the means were not always so. We have I changed all that. There are too many I homes where the definition of "giving I a boy a f;ootl time" consists in relaxing all the discipline of school life and sending him back with a jaded appetite, a ruined digestion and a taste for that form of "literature" (save the mark) which finds its highest expression in 'he modern musical comedy. Nor are our medical authorities alvery helnful. There lies before us, as we write, a letter received a year or two ago from a public schoolboy* He had accented, if not with enthusiasm at all events with resignation, some , suggestions fox holiday reading. Whatever else is tho matter 'with this Ifby, his eyesight is sound, but he writes:— "Dear Sir.—l thought you would /like to know that the doctor says I musn't read nyich. I'm awfully bucked."