THE HIGH SCHOOL CAP.

Evening Star, Issue 7495, 13 April 1888, Page 3

THE HIGH SCHOOL CAP.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,—l hope some notice in proper quarters will be taken of the letter which a High School bpy has written you. It may be said that complaint should be made to the Board of Governors; but if such were done the complainant would occupy a very unpleasant position, and I think this is just a case in which the anonymity of the Press is an advantage. For the subject is one of importance, though at first sight it mity appear trivial. It is certainly a serious matter for the boys. If any of them object to conform to the custom which the rector has created they are marked; they suffer the disgrace of being joined to the detention class, and are eoon threatened with expulsion. Surely this is the very height of " squeerism." That Dr Belcher is entitled to the sympathy of the whole community in his difficult and, indeed, "deadly "position I admit, and for trying not only to teach the boys well in the ordinary subjects, but to create an esprit dt corps and to give them a " tone," credit i 3 due to him. It may well be, too, that it is desirable to have some badge or other mark in the nature of a school uniform. But such badge or mark should not be absurd, or cause inconvenience to the wearer, as the cap in does. I noticed a boy this morning wearing a cap in the rain, and tho water was fairly running over his forehead and face. The cap is similarly wanting in giving protection from the sun, and altogether is a very poor affair. Further, although it is no doubt desirable that if the cap is to be in the nature of a uniform, the boy 3 as a rule should wear it, yet there should be a degree of voluntary - ness about the wearing of it; and if a boy or his parents object to its being worn, the boy ..hou'd not be marked or disgraced in school on that account. To talk of expulsion for euch a i';'.us>e is monstrous. 1 hope Dr Belcher will not persist in this. If he does, lie ought to be told that the school is a public otic, and that he must not injure or trammel the usefulness of the school or unnecessarily punish the scholars because of a personal fad, begotten of O'd World notions and a too imperious temper.—l am, etc., P. Duncdin, Apiil 1-.