REFLECTIONS.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 16763, 12 June 1920, Page 6

REFLECTIONS.

CORPORAL PUNISHMENT. SCHOOL DAYS. THE SNARK. (By ’’John Doe.”) AV© wer. ..d pleaded that the Prince of Wales . cd such interest in the children, ana glad that tho children made such a lino and cheering appearance: there is no doubt that the children’s displays and the children themselves wero tho outstanding feature in tho rccopitions at the various places the Prince visited in New Zealand. Add certainly there is—to uso the jargon of tho day—splendid raw material in our New Zealand children. Fortunately tho importance of proper education is becoming more clearly realised, and the country is becoming educated to tho value of education. Among the many duties that teachers have to perform that of punishment is regarded as' within their scope. A parent of a child complains to “John Doe” that corporal punishment, the use on small children of strap or stick, is far too common. Now lam tho father of two small boys so 1 am practically experienced in corporal discipline, iiut I certainly regard it as quite unnecessary that a teacher should have power to inflict corporal punishment frequently on any child, and I also think that, when all is said, it is very rarely indeed desirable for a man to inflict a thrashing, or oven loss than that, on a small girl, which is the punishment complained of by the parent referred to. D. Marie Slopes, a well-known English writer and authority, in an article I road recently on “Married AVomen Teachers and Resignations.” brings strong arguments to show the desirability of having as teachers, especially of young children, married women and mothers. Such would ordinarily he very sparing of corporal chastisement: it seems that male teachers in Taranaki aro not so minded. There are I am aware rules and regulations and oven laws regarding corporal punishment, but they can be of little avail. The spirit in the teacher is tho thing needed. No proper-minded teacher, bo he or she never so harassed or troubled regarding a child, would wish to hit until every other means had failed; the rod is a confession very largely of failure. I have road Solomon’s remark on this subject, but “they didn’t know everything down in Jndeo.” Teachers ’ and parents alike might with advantage read George Bernard Shaw’s well-known “Introduction” on the subject of education generally and in particular on punishment.

The attendance at the annual meeting of the Library—tho Carnegie Institute—was miserably small: the least a subscriber might do would be to go, for a few minutes once in to show af least outward appreciation of tho committee’s work. Hundreds of people use the Library, which supplies them at a very cheap rate with the novels they so insatiably devour, but they do not interest themselves in tho least in the Library otherwise. Tho committee might well, considering tho high prices of all books including novels, buy less fiction; there are already a large number of novels which the novel-rending section of the public bus not yet read, more particularly the bettor writers. Rut I fear we are at a very low ebb intellectually. I have been shown a copy of the. May number nf “Tho Tarahnkian,” the New Plymouth High School Magazine. It is a very well produced magazine, giving detailed accounts of tho school doings, and news of GUd Plymouthians. The school does not seem to publish literary or general articles bv the boys,, as wo did in a. magazine I was one of the editors of at school, with the exception of the editorial article. I assume this article in spite of its outside attitude towards boys at school, was written by oho ’of the boys and not by a master: for I hope no master, especially one who teaches the boys Greek, wrote the paragraph about “defunct Latin” and “dead Greek”! And it is a pity that anyone should write words involving the implications involved in tho statomertt that “the sorrors of Dido or tho woos of Andromeda are not going to make better conditions of life in New Zealand.” Who over supposed they would, directly? But has the writer ever heard of “Literae Humaniores” and the School of Lit. Hum. at Oxford? Let him consider the reason for and the inner meaning of the word “Humaniores,” and ho would perhaps rewrite that paragraph. But why should there not be room in a real education, such fts tho High School essays to give, for both tho Humaner Learning and Civics and Economics? I myself in this column recently advocated tho teaching of elementary civics as part of the school curriculum, and I am pleased that the writer of the “Editorial” has also sugr nested it. * * « No, a study of classical literature will not directly make better conditions of life in New Zealand; that is not its function. But .as my old headmaster said to mo when I was leaving school for tho university, I should later on find that it is a welcome relief to turn from tho dust and heat and worry of business life and everyday affairs, to the old stories and legends of Greece and Rome, and to -wander among the islands with Homer, and *‘Hear like waves upon a western beach The surge and thunder of the Odyssey.” Civics and Economics may be taught at school, but any boy who is fortunate enough to have the chance of acquiring some knowledge of the classics and classical works in “dead” or living languages is wise to grasp the opportunity with both hands. # • A friend asked mo if I had read which I had—“ The Hunting of tho Snark,” and informed mo that only two people in New Plymouth beside herself had read it, and I made a fourth 1 I refused to believe it, even although my informant has far bettor opportunities than I of j knowing what people have road, and read. Lewis Carroll, pen-name of Rev. C. L. Dodgson, was a delightful person. If you, more fortunate than V. know any nice little girl of from 6 to 12 years old, you can on my behalf give For a most onjovable treat by introducing to her the Snark, with the Bellman’s strange crew, which, like H.M.S. Renown, included a billiard-marker, and, probably unlike the Renown, “A barrister brought to arrange their disputes, And a broker, to value their goods.” | Any little girl will be delighted to have i the poem read to her, to its shuddering | climax—shuddering in view of the 1 baker’s fate— j “For tho Snark was a Boojum you see.” |

The illustrations by Henry Holiday axe a«joy; don’t get any other edition; one figure looks like a joyful caricature of the Right Hon. Augustine Birred, K.O. If you are one of those inferior not superior persons, who do not like, probably not being able to understand, such books as these of Lewis Carroll, and are bored by children, well, God help you—go and read Hall Caine and Mrs. Barclay and the like. • « » The reflections above on punishment in school were partly suggested by a friend, a lady from Paisley, the town that Disraeli told us to “keep your eye on,” as Asquith did. Those who come from ayont the Tweed, or aiblins the Clyde, may have heard it in auld lang syno; “Sometimes she’ll tak’ her hackle, Sometimes she’ll tak’ her cane, Sometimes she’ll steep me hen the room, Or mak’ me bide my lane. Sometimes she’ll tak’ her open han,’ Or clash me on tho jaws; I’d rather hae a lickin’ V Frae tho old pair o’ tawse.” As Junius remarked of the Duke of Grafton, I do not give this as a pattern to imitate hut an example to deter.