BOYHOOD MEMORIES

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21904, 3 October 1936, Page 17

BOYHOOD MEMORIES

School Dai 1 ,- -; < \‘i f ’ *'\ 1 ' v, „ ■s * ! * I ■ J When Iv was 12 years old" I left Dublin with my parents and came to live in Christchurch. I thought the boys at the school I went to, who were extraordinarily muscular and weH built, should be imitated in the manly way that they read the school journal in gruff unintelligible voices into their shirt fronts, and in this I achieved such a measure of success that a master at the secondary school I went to later said that I the worst New Zealand accent he had ever heard. I mention this because I have since heard that very good English is spoken in Dublin, and - I have sometimes wished since , that I had not been a such pains to lose my native voice. In school in Dublin we were never taught to “speak correctly,” as is often done in New Zealand schools, but I, remember that we were ad much amused as the accents of the English boys who came to our schools as at the broad tongue and sing-song lilt , of those from the sputh and the high-pitched Scots sounding voices of those from the north. . We knew we spoke correctly. “You have almost been cured of your English accent, but it comes out when you read poetry,” I remember a teacher saying to an English boy, and it did not strike us as odd that it should be necessary to cure anyone of ’ speaking English with .an English accent, Students of historical phonetics have often pointed out how many eighteenth century pronunciations survive in Ireland, and it may be possible that English spoken in Dublin to-day is a very close approach to that spoken by Dr. Johnson,. There probably have been fewer, changes in the manner of speaking 1 English in Ireland than in England* This is indicated by the fact Jthat there is certainly less affectation and- disi tinction between the method of talking of different classes of people, showing an absence- of changing fashions in the mode of speech. I do not know so much about the real Irish in Dublin, as portrayed by James Joyce in “Dubliners” and “Ulysses,” because I was brought up in the Protestant community; Our political sympathies were entirely English: we detested- the Irish nationalists much • more, I. think, than the English themselves did, but we disliked English people because of, their abominable speech and their strange ways. Catholics and' Protestants The ill-feeling between the Catholics and the Protestants was very strong in Dublin. As schoolboys we carried on an unending feud. Roughly speaking, neighbourhoods were either Catholic or Protestant, and all the national schools were denominational. I remember many small battles with groups ol Catholic boys whom we met on our way home from school's, and among the more" philosophically inclined long arguments about transubstantiatibn jand the value, of confession, things it would be difficult tc imagine New Zealand children discussing, The religious aspect of outr disagreement was, of course,- bound up with politics. ‘ We were really frightened of the Catholics and Sinn Feiners. A boy once told us that there was to be a massacre of all the Protestants in Ireland when the Mayor of Cork, McSweeney, who was on hunger strike in prison, died. We were very much concerned; he was positive of it, but he was to be in England at the, time, and was leaving the next day. Two rough Catholic boys, who lived in the cottages at the back of our heat row of brick two-storey houses, once asked me if I went to church or chapel. I was terribly frightened, as there was nobody in sight at the time, and I said I didn’t know. They were much older than I and they apparently believed in my feigned ignorance, as 1 was small and looked younger than I really was. They said they would wring my neck if they found out that I was a dirty proddy-dog. Once or twice I joined in the shouting and jeering of a mob of my friends when they decided in the middle of, a game that no morb Catholics would be allowed to play, and flung back some of the stones that the retreating minority threw into *bur midst, I might say, however, that such manifestations of religious L feeling were only occasional, 1 and that/for the most part we got along very well indeed. - . > Education Methods. , Our education at the Presbyterian school which I attended was very different from , that at the State schools of New Zealand. It was attended by children of various protestant denominations, for, the Church of Ireland and the Methodist schools were a long distance away. The school was not a large one, but the dividing up of the school according to denomination that took place at 10 o’clock every morning for religious instruction was an elaborate proceeding. “Presbyterian boys stay where you are! , Church of Ireland boys stand tip. Right turn; Mark time. Quick march. Methodist boys . . . .” The Church of Ireland minister let his class. out at 10.30. The Methodist minister let them out at' 10.45., The unfortunate Presbyterian boys were kept 1 till 10.55, with only five minutes* I grace till the school resumed its ~ 11 '" ; ■' *

: school listened ; the 3 Bible for I^. '" During the t^^^^'WjS^^S?' , the,. Old .X<^Uro^V=T«f^>^p^r r "V "" I did nofc however* Jgriifeggttji" ; ligious near thetios tf v will be seen, a dustmcaoi^-w^»Q«* f of. The two each week had the- task at iQmon . the homework during ite-jSvqgMf * '- religious- , Tbat '*&s£ : sfetediinvapahly of 4ftfe.gW3ft-r*jig the method of setting it was a iMP'* . one/ Every hoy did.'^lPSs'TO". ■ sums.' 'There was^coqsefl^wpSr;M '. great deal of variation, 'fpWHg*--' ■ being considerably * aheadf,#/«*-' i work being done in school,, mm -\ ' others, behind, as there was B3B| . . more absence Ifcan is " i Zealand; (This wag ajß» Ifltes§ffl£- ! and explanatory > were not required.- * I** . absence the ! prmclpal .. touch with the parents' - . These sums were marked boys in each class from a*b3dfc ; answers. -The whole buspeas'«■£ a complete farce, Tftos&wjio ,/ marking, who gained their position . ; from their proficiency? m .spelling and geography hi teste which twe • teacher marked himself, complete control of the factor which Redded the weekly places £n-elgj& and consequently the prizes at.JfflfcjSg-, of the year. There were-ojouy-wm . six in each class who- shared- **fpfchonourrof top. and second r week to week.. .They did »Jjt*«t* . to mark their own"v^k-?i##_.i£ 3* i was wrong. It was i for they copied out - the sums they, would - • -following day- while they , ing the marking. -■s*^.**^ll^; over the prize* and those. 7?|l*LflsP' - relinquished it would .vnlunjip&submit to havhtg . wrong towards the endiof £b^3rg&-: The bribes >were accepted i boys to nave all their suras-'aatppagfea right. The work was 6rdy« examined by the teaeheiy, ybjfr4ss|: . mallyallotted the mjjjirksi' -3pgg«jp . considered . this as : though, strangely : considered a -Rotten i ' out the marks on a sums'; 'and submit thenf'raismiipSr. - even to copy them- out And its-Moral I . It was;a pity, X tota&'fxhiraU . a state of affairs was u|Mp£:ft b ; develop, arising as it diq.-|cigm ,= an ,- ■ absurd trust on the part'jg^^'cbe/; ■ teachers in the moral resp&niplily -'" i of young boys. It is'iic*'|6fe^f^^f 1 thing for boys, to learn igltjispQ»§R • way, how easjjr it Aisj;^Zmumm& **■*,; ' might be called, a *&&i^Wsfa--J' ! teacher had.,dlsejOYereS, iS wJ|^^tllf^^;-, going.;on he would-.nd.d^Whl^eVj' ' pointed out the folb* —■ • 'hi'this manner, which--1 dishcmest practice for |. keerf, eompetltiop-m 'wbvSg .m-msr>-'¥ taihly gf gafflf 5 ■ i \ teachers delivering a lecture on the disgrace of such as- might' be- beard , Zealand. schpoJL .for jiwe markably free from tality about such^ihmg&^W^W"^V V boy was found .'copying other in an > examination' occasion -he was givetf a tab on the hand -with, a -canl£ ">§|ffi|,."f - ' asked what- he thQUght'-W^.W : rufle - . of the. teacher settinga test to #B|d ' out what we knew; if we'wenjoo3g£ ; to copy from'one .an6^ery'.T|iei r was, a reasonable;* qnej ' the methods'of making '-the sums ithad been discovered \%", shoulS fc imagine that/an ot»e would have been. made. ' I>thln(k ;., it would haaffrr-beeitt jnit . and less $ discourses,,on .lying, cnentiifei/.hai--'-our, character, and so on, that headmasters are accustomed to 'deliver. 1, in our schools, which because , of;. their abstraction :generajujly' a . have very little effect' iSn -younjg. [ boys. They are more jncltoeeTto.". learn what is right .and wrong b;y hearing practical reasons .given t for, the best.line of condiic^^.particai-..; lar instances, and to their own > generalisations later At any rate I do notve-ver remember hearing any thing ever said apbut ' acter building and becoming good *:• citizens, in Dublin, and ;much' vmOr ". able tjme was'thus The al>-~ \ sence, too, of rigid central foontrol and the adherence to syllabuses meant that teaching methods were - much more flexible. v h\ amy. rate,*. when I entered Standard V- vet Christchurch ? had a good grounding in French, algebra, ! r and geometry, .subjects whiclv I ; i was not to commence till two years. later inNew Zealand.' ' *" J , I remember litfle of therebellioh ' ■ in 1916. I was in the country at the time. We had a return ticket to be 'used within three weeks* but as there were-no trains runjung during the rebellion we fiad to s«Ry« a : month. The. local, .stajftonmasler. was doubtful if we could use .the ; ticket, but in the end he supposed it wasn'tlour:fattlt the trains were not/rtmning, and the .guard on.the Arain ' evidently'" tqok the&ame view. , . > . r * \