A MAN AND A MEMORIAL

Evening Post, Volume XCIX, Issue 77, 31 March 1920, Page 4

A MAN AND A MEMORIAL

Tho excellent record of Wellington College in war service has teen noted from tfine to time in the columns of The Post. It is a record in every way worthy c-f comparison with those of the older public schools of England. The Old Boys' Association decided some time ago that it should be fittingly commemorated, and the most appropriate form, of memorial, it was thought, was one which would bring the record before present and future students of the college. A memorial hall to contain the names and photographs of all old boys who served at the front, and to serve as an assembly hall for the school, was decided upon, and to erect it a sum of £5000 was aimed at. Some £3400, including generous subscriptions by Mr. and Mrs. Firth and weekly donations by college boys, has been collected, and the association is now setting itself to collect the balance. Mr. Firth will retire from the headmastorship of the college at the end of the year, and the association is greatly desirous of completing the collection before that time. There is little need to draw attention here to the work performed by Mr. . Firth for the school and for the nation—a work ranking with that of Dr. Arnold for Rugby, and of double importance ,in a young country. In the thirty years that the college has been under Mr. Firth's guidance he has made it an institution possessing and exercising great influence in the development of character. Boys who have passed through the scliool have had ever before them an ideal of citizenship, and in their headmaster a striking example. They have been taught to work hard and to play manfully, neither losing sight of manly sport in the pursuit of scholarship nor subordinating work to games. And at all times the precept and practice of their headmaster has led them to seek truth and honour. Though Mr. Firth .himself would be the last to claim it, the excellent record of Wellington College is indeed the enduring memorial to his leadership, for most of the boys who served in tho war had their characters moulded under his guidance. What more fitting, then, than that the memorial to that war service should be closely associated with the man who made it possible for such a record to be attained ? Old Boys will certainly desire to mark Mr. Firth's connection with the school in some direct way, before he finally retires; but in the meantime they have the opportunity of showing that they have pride in the college war service and recognise Mr. Firth's intimate association with it. .