Weekend Feature: The Boyhood of Raleigh

I shouldn't laugh at such things but I do

I was thinking about my school days this morning and recalling some of my adventures and occasions that made me laugh (and still do).
Our school master was in his late fifties – bald and short tempered.
He had every reason to be short tempered for we were an unruly bunch. He looked forward with a keen anticipation to a well-earned retirement: (but like Saint Augustin praying to God to be blessed with chastity ) not yet!

We teased him unceasingly and on the occasions when he took his cane down from it's place we well deserved it. Teachers these days are not allowed to administer corporal punishment. I am not sure that it is a clever new rule; nor do I understand how discipline can be upheld without the threat of it.

Anyway, shall I tell you some of the tricks we played upon him and his reaction to them.

Well, schoolmasters in those days did not aspire to own motor cars and on the occasions when he had to do business in town, he had to catch the three thirty bus. So it was a bit of a rush.
He would grab his trilby hat, smack it on his head and rush down the steps into the street outside school.
He was very angry next morning for his wife said on his return: "Ramsey, why have you got a collection of straws and milk bottle tops sticking out of your hat band?"

He placed a basket work waste basket beside his desk. Normally it was filled with all manor of rubbish from Orange peel to scraps of paper. Now, it was his habit to summon the pupils back to lessons after the Lunch break by positioning himself so that having blown his whistle from the near end of the school field, he would turn rapidly and trot back in to the school and be in position at his desk when the pupils streamed in.
A plot was hatched!
The door was partially opened which gave a perfect perch for the waste basket.
So when he trotted in shoving the door open without breaking step and he got the lot, basket and all.

He was a kindly man who continued to take an interest in his pupils even after they had left school.
Getting any kind of job was not easy and John had fairly recently obtained an apprenticeship in Crewe railway works. Now, the young and small lads all began by being sent into the bowels of the steam engines in order to clean the boiler of a year's accumulation of muck and soot. John was no different, and of course returned home each evening black with soot and not very presentable at his parents' door.

John's father by contrast, worked for the Council and very important work he did too.
His job was to accompany the horse, and mobile tank, carrying away the night soil from houses and of course the school.
There was of course a whole row of pail closets, each equipped with a tin bucket with a rather shaky handle and each bucket had to be carried to and emptied into the container. Not a nice job ,but somebody had to do it.

The school gaffer supervising this operation addressed John's father thus: "How is John enjoying his new job Mr ???."
John's father paused for a moment and standing with a tin bucket in each hand, he replied: "Oh, Mr Smith', 'ee's got a very dirty job".

School started each morning with assembly. Now this consisted of a couple of prayers and possibly a hymn, depending on how he felt. Sometimes he deeply resented being master of a Church School. But duty is duty and it usually absorbed the first fifteen minutes of each day.

On the occasion of which I write, assembly proceeded with the usual piety and devotion. After about five to ten minutes into our devotions the front door suddenly flew open and in strolls Allan with an impudent grin on his face. This late arrival and similar insolence had become Allan's party piece. He had begun to enjoy his notoriety and anyway he had no interest in school and was only there because he had to be.

He made to stroll to his desk and was abruptly stopped by the headmaster's peremptory signal to stand beside the school cupboard and in that manner await the head's forthcoming wroth. The head was not to be interrupted at prayer. Allan could not just stand there, he had to start to make faces at the head and the effect of this behaviour soon became obvious to the rest of us as the head's ears began to turn bright red as his temper rose.

Now this was definitely not in the spirit of school protocol and definitely fell foul of the school motto which was taken from Sir Henry Newbolt's poem Vitai Lampada "The TORCH OF LIFE". This is a poem of 1892 dedicated to the establishment and preservation of the Empire. And yields within it the Legend "PLAY THE GAME".
Allan was definitely not playing the game and nor for that matter was the Head.

At last rage over got him and he leapt to his feet and running halfway around the room he took hold of Allan by his shoulders and began in a frenzy to shake him.

Now, as I have previously said Allan was standing in front of a very large and heavily laden cupboard which soon began to oscillate back and forth in time to the collisions with Allan's back. On top of the cupboard was the school bell placed there for safekeeping since it was taken down from the school roof. It stood about two feet high and weighed a good half hundredweight. Propped against the bell was a copy of a picture called The Boyhood Of Raleigh. The original is by John Everett Millais and hangs in the Tate Britain. However and fortunately this was a copy, for it began to rock in time to the rocking of the cupboard.
Now the cupboard was adorned with a very wide cornice along it's top edge. I don't suppose it was designed to protect a person being shaken against but it did. You can imagine how this scene fascinated the fifty or so pupils who were standing a safe distance away and watching with an avid interest.

Anyway, the picture rocked and tipped and fell dead centre over the master's head and came to rest upon his shoulders with his head having brocken the glass and followed through by bursting through the picture. This scene was accompanied with uproar as we pupils hooted with laughter as the head tried in vain to lift the picture frame off his shoulders easing it gently past the shards of broken glass and torn picture. The scene came to an end with the master dabbing his bleeding head and showing his handkerchief covered in blood to the still defiant Allan.

The assistant head, Harold, was commendable in refraining from laughing with the rest of us. Years later I asked him how he had managed not to laugh. He said he nearly choked stifling his laughter.

Footnote:
I have tried many times to catch out my editor with an impossible illustration to my tales. I bet he can't find the picture I refer to.
(Editor adds: Sorry Geoff – Google wins again!)

Cheers for now

Geoff

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