At the end of the eighteenth century the Eton boys had become somewhat difficult to control. Heath and Goodall had both been Headmasters fond of comfort and ease, and in order to keep things from drifting into a state of open disorder, ignored many infractions of discipline. In consequence of this they both enjoyed a fair measure of personal popularity—the parents would seem to have known little about what was going on, for, in spite of the continued deterioration in discipline, the numbers of the school continued to rise.

When Keate became Headmaster in 1809, he found himself confronted by a somewhat difficult situation. A man of unflinching character, he had at first to suffer for the weakness of his predecessors and, owing to his stern methods, incurred unpopularity which it took some time to efface.

No one who had ever come in contact with Keate ever forgot him, for his appearance was exceedingly striking. He was a small man, little more than five feet high, short-necked, short-legged, thick-set, powerful, and very active, whilst within his small frame was concentrated the pluck of ten battalions. His countenance resembled that of a bull-dog, and he also had something of that animal’s mouth. Indeed, it was said in the school that old Keate could pin and hold a bull with his teeth. His iron sway was to many a very unpleasant change, after the long, mild reign of Dr. Goodall, whose temper, character, and conduct corresponded precisely with his name, and under whom Keate had been master of the Lower School. He was at first, there can be little doubt, too severe; discipline, wholesome and necessary in moderation, being carried by him to an excess; on one morning alone he is said to have flogged eighty boys. Flogging, indeed, may be said to have been the head and front, or rather the head and tail, of his system. Like Dr. Busby, the famous Headmaster of Westminster School, he never spoilt the child by sparing the rod. According to Dr. Johnson, Busby used to call that instrument of correction his sieve, and declare that whoever did not pass through it was no boy for him. Keate, although rigid, rough, and despotical, was on the whole not unjust, nor devoid of kindness, a proof of which is that, after twenty-five years, he retired fairly triumphant, applauded and respected by the vast majority of those with whom he had come in contact. During one of the frequent visits which he paid to Eton after his retirement, his grim old face was seen looking down on the boats in Boveney Lock, whereupon the crews stood up and cheered their old master with a will.

Much has been written of the curious appearance of the famous Headmaster, who has been said to have worn a fancy dress partly resembling the costume of Napoleon and partly that of a widow woman. This was a great exaggeration. It is true he wore a huge cocked hat; this was not from eccentricity, but because he was a Conservative and respected tradition—it had long been the custom for the Head- and Lower-Masters at Eton to wear such a head-dress, and Keate merely retained it after it had become obsolete with the rest of the world.

As a rule the famous Headmaster wore an angry look, whilst ever ready to explode into a rage, though occasionally flashes of unexpected good-nature would temper his attitude of unwavering severity. This, however, was seldom, his command over his good temper being so complete that he scarcely ever allowed it to appear. On the other hand he could not be put out of humour, being always in the ill-humour which he thought fitting for a Headmaster. He had a fine voice, which he could modulate with great skill; but he had also the power of quacking like an angry duck, and the latter was his almost invariable way of speaking to boys to inspire respect. His red shaggy eyebrows were so prominent that he habitually used them as arms and hands for the purpose of pointing out any object towards which he wished to direct attention. The rest of his features were equally striking in their way, and highly characteristic of the man.

Dr. Keate was not devoid of sense of humour. On one occasion when he had set a certain form an essay on “Temere nil facias,” one boy named Rashleigh failed to send in any work at all. The Doctor, who of all men was the last to be trifled with in such matters, sent for the delinquent, and, glowering with ferocity, demanded the meaning of such conduct. The culprit, however, was quite undismayed and replied, “Sir, you told me yourself not to do it.”

“What do you mean?” retorted Keate in tones of thunder.

“Why, sir,” replied the boy, “in setting the theme you said, ‘Do nothing rashly,’ and I have obeyed you.” This display of ready wit, it is said, secured the offender’s pardon.

When Keate assumed the Headmastership the whole public-school system had remained behind the age, and many of the manners and customs of barbarous times still continued at schools long after home life and manners had become civilised. There is no reason to suppose that Dr. Keate was in any way of a brutal disposition or wanting in natural affections. He had to deal with a very difficult situation, and it is greatly to his credit that he maintained the prestige and increased the numbers of Eton in spite of almost insurmountable difficulties.

When, for instance, it became clear to the boys that the easy-going state of affairs which had prevailed under Dr. Goodall had come to an end, the school was thrown into a state of latent rebellion. One of the first innovations imposed by Keate was to impose an “absence” the evening after what was then known as “long church.”

The first time this was put into force the whole school booed the Headmaster as he opened his mouth, and it took him two hours to get through calling the “absence,” though various tutors did all they could to help him detect the boys who were the ringleaders of the disorder. After trying to discover the principal culprits and failing, Keate finally determined to punish the last remove of the Upper Fifth and the whole of the Lower Fifth (there was then no Middle Division), whom he considered responsible for the outbreak, by making them attend a five-o’clock “absence.” Some ninety boys absented themselves, or rather hid behind the trees in the playing fields where this “absence” was called, and purposely did not answer their names. The situation was grave, and at first it seemed likely that all of these rebels would be expelled; eventually, however, Keate determined to be more lenient and merely announced that he would “flog the lot.”

When the first batch came up for punishment in the library a scene of riot took place, and as the first boy knelt down on the block a shower of eggs smashed round Keate; in fact, after three victims had suffered, the Headmaster’s clothes had got into such a state owing to the unsavoury missiles hurled at him, that he had to go home and change. On his return, however, he was seen to be accompanied by a number of assistant masters, and owing to their aid in keeping order he had finished swishing the whole of the ninety boys by eight o’clock that evening.

The masters must have had their work cut out to subdue the insubordination of such turbulent boys. Though the number of these boys was close on 500—later, from 1821 to 1827, it varied between 528 and 612—at no time were there more than nine assistants, including the Lower Master. While some of the forms in the Lower School only had twenty or thirty boys, certain divisions in the Upper School were of quite unwieldy size. In 1820 Dr. Keate’s own division had swelled to 198. He then relieved himself by creating the Middle Division of the Fifth, but he continued to keep about 100 boys under his own charge at the end of Upper School, where much disorder prevailed.

All sorts of jokes and tricks were indulged in, and about 1810 it became a regular practice during the Winter Half to try and put out the candles in the two great chandeliers. There had originally been three of these, but according to tradition the third had been broken in the great rebellion some thirty years before. On one occasion a huge stone that was shied at the chandelier went within an inch of Keate’s head and cracked the panel behind him. Having somehow got to know the culprit, Keate let it be known that it was a boy at a certain dame’s, at the same time declaring that the only chance the boy had was to give himself up and trust to his leniency; otherwise he would be expelled. The boy was George Dallas, a straightforward fellow. He immediately went to Keate, confessed, and solemnly assured the Doctor that he had never intended to hurt him. Keate said he believed him, but of course Dallas must know that the lightest punishment he deserved was a good flogging, and that flogging he got.

A large part of the boys’ time seems to have been spent devising ingenious forms of annoying Keate, who sat enthroned in a spacious elevated desk, enclosed on all sides, like a pew, with two doors, one on each side. One fine morning he entered Upper School, and, going to his desk, tried to open one door, and found it was fastened. He went round, grinning, growling, and snarling, to the other side; the door there had been screwed up too. The desk was up to the breast of a tall man and as high as Keate’s head; nevertheless, laying his hand on the top of it, he lightly vaulted in, the feat being saluted with loud cheers and a hearty laugh. This made the Doctor more angry than ever. “I will make some of you suffer,” he said, and he did; for the next day, to the general astonishment, he called up all the boys who had been concerned in the screwing up and soundly flogged them. The secret of this was that Cartland, Keate’s servant, suspecting that mischief was afoot, secreting himself between the ceiling and roof of Upper School, had witnessed the whole screwing-up process through the rose from which hung a chandelier, and carefully noted down the names of the boys concerned.

Another time a huge mastiff was put under Keate’s seat, but the Doctor was fiercer than the dog, which ran away, frightened at his angry gaze.

One of the old school, Keate had no sympathy with innovations. Though he himself is said to have always carried an umbrella in sunshine as well as rain, he could not bear to see a boy with one. “Wet, sir? Don’t talk to me of weather, sir,” he would say; “you must make the best of it. This isn’t a girls’ school.” By way of paying their Headmaster out for such a remark, a party of boys once made an expedition to the neighbouring village of Upton, took down a large board inscribed in smart gilt letters “Seminary for Young Ladies,” and fixed it up over the great west entrance into the school-yard, where it met the Doctor’s angry eyes in the morning.

In spite of his stern disposition and rough ways Keate was highly sensitive as to ridicule, and especially disliked attempts to caricature his appearance.

When the informer in the celebrated case of the Cato Street conspirators—an Italian image-man by trade, and a very clever one—made his appearance at Eton one day with a tray full of plaster busts of the well-known Doctor, cocked hat and all, Keate was very much annoyed to find that his likeness was selling like wildfire amongst the boys. There seemed to be only one way of preventing the wholesale popularisation of his dumpy figure, so, buying up what was left of the Italian’s stock, he had the figures taken to his backyard and broken up.

One or two boys had the temerity to personate Keate. Lord Douro, son of the Iron Duke, dressed in an exact copy of the Doctor’s robes and hat, actually painted the Headmaster’s door red one night, to the amazement of a few persons who saw him.

In some verse commemorating this feat, the watchmen were supposed to be summoned before a conclave of masters the next morning to describe what they had seen:—

Keate never discovered the culprit till years after when, as a Canon of Windsor, he was entertaining Lord Douro at dinner. The latter, speaking of Eton days, alluded to the door-painting incident, and was about to make a full confession when Keate became so red in the face that he thought it wiser to desist.

Lord Abingdon was another Eton boy noted for his mimicry of Keate; indeed, dressed up in a cocked hat and gown made expressly for him, his disguise was so perfect that he actually went round one night and called “Absence” at the different dames’ houses without being detected. Years later, after a dinner-party at his home in Oxfordshire, his Lordship would dress up as Keate, and, birch in hand, enact a scene in the “library” for the edification of visitors. On one of these occasions he persuaded one of them to “go down” on a block, made in exact imitation of that at Eton, which stood in the room, whilst two others “held him down,” and the story goes that the noble host pitched into his guest with such hearty goodwill that, when allowed to get up, the latter was so sore in more ways than one that he called for his carriage and drove off in a great rage.

Though boys mimicked and laughed at Keate behind his back, very few had the courage to stand up to him face to face. One of the few, however, who did so was Charles Fox Townshend, the founder of “Pop,” who, “staying out” on account of indisposition, refused to write out and translate the lessons of the day, in consequence of which he was in due course summoned to the awful presence of the redoubtable Headmaster. In the well-known tones of thunder which made four generations of Etonians tremble, Keate demanded the meaning of such conduct. “Don’t speak so loud, Dr. Keate,” replied Townshend, “or you will make my head ache. If I had felt fit to write out and translate the lesson I should have gone into school, but I did not feel well enough, so I stayed out.” The famous Headmaster, it is said, was so dumbfoundered by the readiness of the delinquent’s reply that he let him go without any punishment.

On the whole, Keate does not seem to have been an ill-natured man, for, in spite of his occasional fits of ferocity, he was held in considerable esteem by a large number of the boys. They bore him no ill-will for the floggings he had caused them to undergo, and, when he left Eton in 1834, presented him with a gift testifying their appreciation of his merits. This consisted of a silver reproduction of the Warwick Vase, on the pedestal of which was inscribed—

PRESENTED
BY THE EXISTING MEMBERS OF ETON SCHOOL
TO THE REVD. JOHN KEATE, D.D.
ON HIS RETIREMENT FROM THE HEADMASTERSHIP
JULY 30, 1834,
AS A TESTIMONY OF THE HIGH SENSE THEY ENTERTAIN
OF HIS EXQUISITE TASTE AND ACCURATE SCHOLARSHIP
SO LONG AND SO SUCCESSFULLY DEVOTED
TO THEIR IMPROVEMENT
AND OF THE FIRM YET PARENTAL EXERCISE
OF HIS AUTHORITY
WHICH HAS CONCILIATED THE AFFECTION
WHILE IT HAS COMMANDED THE RESPECT OF
HIS SCHOLARS.

Keate was in Paris soon after Waterloo, and there he met a number of old pupils to whom he had administered castigations. The latter determined to give their former pedagogue a dinner, which in due course took place at the Restaurant Beauvilliers, then one of the best dining-places in Paris, the hosts being Lord Sunderland, Lord James Stuart, and other scions of the aristocracy. The banquet was a most jovial one, and Keate did full justice to its excellence, drinking every kind of toast, and making a most suitable speech, which appropriately ended with “Floreat Etona.” After dinner a good deal of chaff began to fly around the table, and the guest of the evening was told of many Eton happenings which he had never heard before. For the first time he learnt of how two of his masters had secretly contrived to go up to London every Saturday in order to dine with Arnold and Kean at Drury Lane, surreptitious suppers at the “Christopher” were described, whilst tales of tandem expeditions, fights with bargees, and poaching excursions in Windsor Park reached his somewhat astonished ears. The old man, however, took everything in excellent part, merely remarking that all he had heard but inspired him with regrets that he had not flogged the assembled company as much as they appeared to have deserved. On leaving, he thanked his hosts in a few well-turned phrases, and, parting from them on excellent terms, went home amidst loud cheers.

No doubt he owed a good part of the popularity which, in spite of his sternness, he eventually obtained to the attractions of Mrs. Keate, who was a very fascinating woman. In the year 1814, during a match with Epsom, the Eton champion, John Harding, scored 74—an extraordinary number in those days, when the bowling generally beat the bat. It called forth a poem from a clever Colleger (“Marshal” Stone), in which were the following lines. The Doctor saw them and was vastly amused:—

When the allied sovereigns were present at a fÊte in the gardens at Frogmore in 1815, the King of Prussia is said to have gone up and kissed Mrs. Keate, making the excuse of her remarkable likeness to his Queen.

All sorts of stories have been told of Keate’s fondness for wielding the birch. “Remember, boys,” he is once supposed to have said, “you are to be pure in heart, or I’ll flog you till you are.”

He certainly did castigate an enormous number of Etonians, amongst them, it is said, half the Ministers, Secretaries, Bishops, Generals, and Dukes of the earlier portion of the nineteenth century; but, nevertheless, the boys in his own division were usually punished by having to write out impositions, and were not flogged except for some very flagrant offence, such as intoxication.

Keate, as Headmaster of Eton, it must be remembered, was chief executioner, and had to do justice when a boy was complained of by any assistant master.

The school had drifted into very slack ways, and Keate, who possessed a very intimate knowledge of Eton, realised that leniency would merely make matters worse. Consequently he rather favoured drastic measures, and in spite of adverse criticism his system had a good effect. It has often been urged that it failed because the boys at times openly defied his authority. In the earlier days of his rule this was occasionally the case, and gross insubordination prevailed, though it never reached such a point as it had attained in the days of Keate’s predecessors. On the other hand, when the stern old Headmaster handed over the reins of power to Dr. Hawtrey, the school had become quite orderly and controlled.

Though, as has already been said, not much given to flogging boys under his immediate control, he was a firm believer in the efficacy of the birch for almost every kind of offence, and was quite ready to be a ruthless executioner in order to facilitate the work of his subordinates.

His methods were entirely Napoleonic, and when flogging boys who had committed some unusually heinous offence, by way of making an impression on their minds as well as their bodies, he used to accompany his infliction of punishment with a number of cutting remarks punctuated by strokes of the birch: “A disgrace to your friends” (swish, swish), “Ruin to your parents” (swish, swish, swish, swish), “You’ll come to the gallows at last!” and so forth.

Flogging at Eton was once described by the Edinburgh Review as “an operation performed on the naked back by the Headmaster himself, who is always a gentleman, and sometimes a high dignitary of the Church.”

The Eton boys of the past took their floggings very lightly. One of them having, it is said, been flogged by the Headmaster by mistake for another boy, though he knew that he had done nothing to deserve his castigation, made no attempt whatever to escape it. When, however, the real culprit was discovered an investigation took place, and the flogged one’s tutor then asked, “Why did you not explain to the Headmaster that you had never been complained of?”

“Well, sir,” was the reply, “I have been complained of so often that once more or less didn’t seem to matter much; besides, I thought that very likely some master I had forgotten about might have complained of me after all.”

Like many others, Fielding, a typical Englishman of a long-past age, was in after life proud of having been flogged. Alluding to Eton in his introduction to the thirteenth book of Tom Jones he says, “Thee in thy favourite fields, where the limpid, gently rolling Thames washes thy Etonian banks, in early youth I have worshipped. To thee, at thy birchen altar, with true Spartan devotion, I have sacrificed my blood.”

In later times, however, a certain number of boys have shown an invincible dislike of being birched, and some have actually preferred to undergo expulsion rather than kneel at the block. The 4th Marquis of Ailesbury (notorious for his follies) when a boy at Eton, having been complained of, ran away in order to avoid a punishment to which he declared he would never submit. This, I believe, happened twice, after which he was at last obliged to confront the Lower Master, who administered a certain number of strokes. On rising from the block, however, the irrepressible culprit made use of such language that his sojourn at Eton was at once cut short. In most cases, however, fear of expulsion has generally made those summoned to the block submit. A peculiar case was that of a boy high up in the school, and a well-known swell at athletics, who, going up to Oxford in order to matriculate, instead of returning to Eton directly the examination was over, outstayed his leave and remained for some days amusing himself with a Christchurch friend. As a consequent result, when he did return the voice of a praepostor was heard inquiring “Is —— in this division? He is to stay.” The culprit, who considered himself a grown man, at first stoutly declared that nothing would induce him to undergo a flogging, and it required a good deal of persuasion to make him realise that continued resistance would entail his going away from Eton without a leaving book; that is to say, practical expulsion, which is liable to injure a boy’s prospects in after life. Eventually, concluding that it would be best to submit, he duly paid the required visit to the library, where Dr. Balston officiated in a most sympathetic but efficient manner.

In rougher days, scapegraces used to make a flogging the occasion for all sorts of jokes. One boy, for instance, got a friend who had some knowledge of art to paint a rough portrait of the Headmaster on that portion of his body which has always been associated with the punishment of youth. When the Head was about to deliver his blows he was at first considerably taken aback by being confronted by his own likeness upon such an unconventional background. However, he rose to the occasion, and, with the aid of a couple of birches, completely obliterated all trace of any portrait.

In the case of big boys there is some humiliation in being flogged. A certain captain of the boats, who had indulged too freely in champagne, a very tall and powerful young man, about to be flogged by Dr. Hawtrey, begged hard that he should receive his punishment in private, and thus escape the degradation of being observed on the block by a large crowd of boys looking through the open door. The Headmaster, however, would not hear of this for a moment, declaring that publicity was the chief part of the punishment.

When Election Saturday was in full swing, a certain number of boys made a point of indulging in insubordination, thinking that so close to the end of the half they would escape punishment. Some of the masters, however, made a point of punishing irregularities at such a time with ruthless determination, and never failed to complain of any boy whom they found to be intoxicated on Election Saturday, with the result that floggings on the Sunday (the boys then went home on the Monday) were not infrequent.

In order to castigate such offenders. Dr. Goodford would be ready in his room on Sunday, where he would sometimes attend at 10.30 at night, in order to flog boys going by an early train next day. Even those leaving Eton altogether had to submit, for otherwise they would have been ranked as being expelled. Mr. Brinsley Richards tells of a boy, nearly six feet high, and with a moustache, who debated in agony of mind whether he would take a swishing on the night before leaving the school. He had actually got a commission in the cavalry; his uniforms were ordered, and he was to join his regiment in ten days; but on Election Saturday night he got uproariously drunk, was seen by a strict master, and put in the bill. He duly surrendered to his fate, received twelve cuts with “two birches,” and the following day took leave of Dr. Goodford on the pleasantest terms possible.

Dr. Goodford seems to have taken a genial view of flogging; on the morning of one St. Andrew’s Day he swished a Scotch boy who was coming to breakfast with him, and greeted him later on at that meal with a cheery “Here we are again!”

An amusing story used to be told of a boy just about to leave Eton who, having refused to be flogged, on his arrival at home discovered, to his horror, that his refusal to bow to constituted authority would prevent him from being allowed to enter the career upon which he had set his heart. Hoping to put matters right, he at once set out for Eton, only to find on his arrival there that the Headmaster had gone to Switzerland. The ingenious youth, determined to get flogged, then somehow procured two birches and hurried off to Geneva, only to find that the Head had gone on to Lucerne. To that city he too followed, but, missing the pedagogue whom he sought, again had to continue his pursuit, which eventually ended in the refectory of the Monastery of Mont St. Bernard, where he eventually persuaded the Doctor to administer the sought-for flogging amidst a circle of edified monks. The ordeal over, the Headmaster was presented with the leaving fee, which was then customary, in return handing the relieved youth a leaving book in the shape of a Guide to the Alps, which happened to be the only volume procurable.

During the writer’s school days at Eton, though flogging was in full swing, the castigations administered by Dr. Hornby—and he speaks from personal experience—were not severe. On the other hand the Lower Master, the Rev. J. L. Joynes, tempered the severity of his floggings according to the offence which they were intended to correct. On one occasion the writer remembers him laying with a will into a boy who is now a distinguished officer. The latter, however, although he received some thirty-two strokes, administered with two birches (the first one after a time became useless owing to the force with which it was used), never flinched in the least, though this “real flogging” must have occasioned considerable pain, very different from the mild sensation produced by the usual ones—often little more than a disagreeable form. At that time the tradition still prevailed that the wielder of the rod whilst “swishing” was not allowed to lift his hand above his shoulder. Though, as far as the writer can remember, this rule was adhered to by the executioner, he has since heard that the sole foundation for the idea was a curious underhand motion of the right arm peculiar to Dr. Hawtrey which his successors seem to have copied.

From time to time more or less public protests have been made against the use of the birch, which has always been an object of detestation in the eyes of sentimentalists and professional humanitarians.

In 1856 a long correspondence appeared in the Times dealing with the question of flogging. This arose out of the case of a boy named Morgan Thomas, whose father upheld him in not submitting to be flogged.

A report that in future no Upper boys will be flogged, recently called forth some controversy in the newspapers, most old Etonians being, it would appear, of opinion that the abolition of the birch and the substitution of other punishments, including, I believe, caning, are to be deplored. The inevitable sentimentalist, however, was of course well to the front, declaring that “birching, or even caning, is out of date, it being much better to bring boys up to do the right thing and to avoid doing the wrong thing from a sense of honour and pledge.” Apparently this gentleman was under the impression that such a method of education was a new and entire innovation!

In future it appears that amongst Upper boys, flogging is to be supplanted by something resembling the painful process once known as a “College hiding.” At the time when Oppidan Fourth Form boys used to delight in jeering at Tugs, a good many, being captured by Collegers, were dragged off and given a number of cuts with a cane—a far more painful ordeal, it was said, than an ordinary swishing by the Headmaster.

On the evening of the 12th May 1836 three old Etonians—Lord Waterford, Lord Alford, and Mr. J. H. Jesse, who had been entertaining some boys to dinner at the Christopher after a boat race against Westminster, being in particularly high spirits, determined to have some fun before driving back to town. Not being able to get into Upper School (where the block was then kept) by the door, Mr. Jesse and Lord Waterford, at considerable risk, crept along the narrow stone ledge over the colonnade, and, entering Upper School by an open window, forced the lock of the door from within, and carried their prize off in triumph, in spite of an attempt to stop them on the part of the College watchman. The trophy, I believe, was never returned, and is still in existence at Curraghmore.

Though the abduction of the block was considered a capital joke, a more serious view was taken of another exploit afterwards perpetrated by Mr. Jesse. During Ascot week of the following year he contrived to wrench the sceptre from the hand of the statue of the founder in School Yard and get away with it. This aroused a very strong feeling of indignation amongst boys as well as masters, and the emblem of sovereignty was, in consequence, soon restored with an apology. This is the only time that the bronze effigy of Henry VI., erected by Provost Godolphin in the early years of the eighteenth century, has ever been molested.

The block in Lower School has also had its adventures. In or about 1863 a King’s scholar, Lewis by name, during some disturbance abstracted it—according to tradition to save it from being destroyed during some disorder. Whatever may have been the truth of the matter, he kept it, and when, a short time later, he obtained a Postmastership at Merton, took it away to Oxford with the rest of his belongings. On his death this block passed into the possession of Dr. Lewis, who lived in Glamorganshire; and when this gentleman died, Mr. F. T. Bircham, obtaining it from his widow, handed it back to the Headmaster of Eton on May 3, 1890.

The venerable, though somewhat gruesome relic in question is of some historical interest, for on it are carved a number of names, amongst them Milman, Lonsdale, Routh, Wellesley, and H. Hall (1773). It is to be hoped that, should Lower boys ever cease to need the discipline of the birch, this relic of sterner days will be kept in Lower School, with the old-world appearance of which it so well accords.

The present block, the one used in the library, was, I believe, abducted some three or four years ago, two boys having carried out the extraordinary feat of climbing into Upper School through a window and smuggling out the awesome relic of torture, which they eventually sent to the authorities of the British Museum, who returned it to the authorities of the school.

An important functionary in connection with Eton castigations has always been the Headmaster’s servant, rod-making being one of his traditional functions. Under Keate the office was held by Cartland, opprobriously nicknamed “Sly” by Collegers, who abhorred him. In Dr. Hawtrey’s day came Finmore, who, after the former’s death, continued in office as servant to Dr. Goodford. Part of the duties of the office lay in seeing that there were always at least half a dozen new rods in the cupboard of the “library,” Dr. Goodford being apt to get very angry if an execution had to be adjourned for want of birches. A dozen new rods were supposed to be at hand in the cupboard every morning, for there was no calculating the number of floggings that might be inflicted in a day. Finmore used to make the rods at his own house, with the help of his wife, and brought them to the library quietly after Lock Up, or in the morning before early school. Sometimes, however, when the supply of rods ran short Finmore had to bring in fresh birches in the middle of the day, which, for several reasons, was a somewhat hazardous task.

One afternoon, after three o’clock school, when there were only three birches available, six boys were up to be flogged. The Head flogged three of the culprits and adjourned the others till six o’clock, at the same time ordering the Sixth Form praepostor to be sure and tell Finmore that the cupboard must be replenished before six. Some Lower boys, however, getting wind of this, and hearing that Finmore was bound to come to the library between four and five, lay in wait for him, and in due course espied him hovering near the top of Keate’s Lane, empty-handed, but walking suspiciously near to a grocer’s cart making its way towards Weston’s Yard. Suddenly a shout was raised, and the crowd of boys, scampering off, stopped the cart just as it was turning into the yard, surrounded it yelling, and extracted from it six new birches wrapped in a cloth. Finmore, breathless and almost choking with emotion, vainly tried to save his rods. Half a dozen boys, however, soon ran off with one apiece, the unfortunate official being left to bewail his evil fate. In Dr. Hornby’s day the custodian of the birches was White, a spruce, neatly-dressed figure whom many old Etonians will still remember.

He it was who, in consideration of a fee of a guinea, saw that the names of boys leaving Eton were cut in Upper School. For a consideration he would also supply birches tied up with blue ribbon to any one desirous of carrying away such grim mementoes.

Whilst the block, for Lower boys at least, remains one of the features of Eton, fighting, once a characteristic institution of the school, has long disappeared, having seemingly fallen out of favour in the late fifties of the last century.

In the period preceding Waterloo the combats were fierce and frequent; there was one nearly every day, and so determined were the Etonians of that era that there is a case on record of two boys rising at six in the morning to begin the conflict, and sparring away for three hours!

Whilst the Oppidans, according to immemorial custom, settled their differences in “Sixpenny Corner,” the Collegers fought their battles in Long Chamber. An unwritten code decreed that when a King’s scholar wished to fight he must ask permission of the Captain of the school to be allowed to do so after Lock Up, and this, as may be imagined, was never refused. About nine o’clock a fairly spacious ring was formed just below the second fireplace, boys standing on bedsteads placed around, holding candles, which enabled the combatants to see one another. It would appear that in the old fighting days the Collegers fought fewer battles than the Oppidans,—the fights of the former were usually short and sharp, the boys being so well acquainted with each other’s strength and powers, that after a round or two the fight was discontinued and the quarrel made up.

The old-fashioned encounters in “Sixpenny Corner,” which seem to have been conducted in a more or less formal style, were, of course, most frequent in the days when the Prize Ring occupied a prominent place amongst sports patronised by men of fashion.

Young Corinthians who had only just left school no doubt indoctrinated friends still at Eton with enthusiasm for the knights of the fist, and caused them to regard pugilism as a science worthy of attention.

A curious piece of etiquette in connection with fighting was, that if a Lower boy wanted to fight one in the Upper School, he could do so only after having obtained leave from the Captain of the school.

At one time Eton battles were fought with hats on, which caused the Westminster boys to declare that, owing to the damage inflicted upon knuckles by the hat brims, most Etonian encounters were not of a serious kind.

The Sixth Form and Upper boys were expected to see that fair-play was enforced, and that when one combatant was clearly overmatched and plainly worsted, a reconciliation took place. Both were made to shake hands, and having vented their ill-feeling in a manly and honourable way, they were afterwards often found to be the best of friends.

A great battle at the beginning of the nineteenth century was the fight between Calthorp and Forster.

“Sixpenny Corner,” at the angle where the wall game now takes place, was the traditional scene of battle, and here the great Duke of Wellington, as little Arthur Wellesley, fought Bobus Smith, brother of Sydney Smith, the fight, according to all accounts, ending in a draw.

A redoubtable pugilist was Stratford de Redcliffe, who emerged victor from many a tough contest. Less successful was Shelley, who is said to have received a severe thrashing from little Sir Thomas Styles. During another fight the youthful poet attracted a good deal of attention by refusing to rest on the knee of his second, preferring to stride round the ring quoting Homer! No wonder the boys used to call him “mad Shelley”! It must be remembered, however, that he was a constant butt for a large portion of the school. “My belief,” said Dr. Hawtrey, “is that what Shelley had to endure at Eton made him a perfect devil.”

In the early days of the nineteenth century a gigantic boy named Wyvill became celebrated for his fistic powers. He once gave a Lifeguardsman a severe thrashing in Windsor, and the soldier was so much upset that he went to the Headmaster, Dr. Goodall, to complain of his mauling. The latter, who hated to have to take notice of any Eton escapade, said, “My good fellow, how can you expect me to know what boy it was?” “Boy!” he answered with a country accent; “he is the biggest mun in the tuttens,” or two towns. And so Wyvill ever after went by the name of “the biggest mun in the tuttens.”

When a challenge had been given and accepted, the details of the forthcoming fight were arranged by friends, after which the combatants just walked into the playing fields with their seconds, stripped off their jackets, and went to work, the boys forming a ring, no other formalities being observed—hardly even a sponge or a watch. When a minute was supposed to have elapsed, one got up from his second’s knee and said, “Come on.” A little hot blood flowed, and as soon as either felt he had enough he had only to say so. Drawn battles were not common or popular, boys preferring to have matters brought to an issue. There was the most perfect fair-play, and if things were carried at all too far, interference was pretty sure to be at hand, though not otherwise. When, during a fight, Keate just showed himself at the corner of the playing fields, the hint was immediately taken.

Fights between Lower boys, it should be added, were deemed of small account, but a battle between two well-known Uppers always attracted a large crowd.

The most tragic fight which ever took place at Eton was a fierce battle between a small boy named Ashley Cooper and a big one named Wood (afterwards Sir A. Wood). For three hours the unequal combat was carried on, till, in the last round before Lock Up, the former fell senseless and had to be carried to his tutor’s house, where, half an hour later, he expired. His death, however, seems to have been caused by a quantity of brandy given him by his elder brother, rather than by the effects of the fight. Also, had medical attendance been procured, Cooper’s life would probably have been saved. After, however, he had been carried senseless to his house, every effort was made to conceal the state in which he was in, gloves being placed upon his hands so that their dreadful condition might not be visible. The boy died the same night.

The sequel of the encounter was a trial at Aylesbury, where, on March 9, 1825, Charles Alexander Wood, seventeen years old, was charged before Mr. Justice Gazelee with the manslaughter of the Hon. Francis Ashley Cooper, after a quarrel in the Eton playing fields. The fight, it was proved, had been conducted in the strictest accordance with the rules of the Prize Ring, which at that time still flourished. No less than sixty rounds were shown to have been fought with the fiercest determination—the time occupied, two hours. Cooper, who was two years younger than his antagonist, had been given nearly a pint of brandy to enable him to continue the struggle against a more powerful opponent. Wood was, of course, acquitted; besides which, Cooper’s brother entirely exonerated him, taking all the blame on himself for having administered the brandy.

This battle—the most serious schoolboy fight which ever took place—probably had some effect in decreasing the popularity of fistic encounters. It certainly created a great sensation, being, according to some, commemorated by an inscription (now illegible) upon the white stone let into the wall at Sixpenny Corner. The late Mr. Brownlow North, Lord Kintore tells me, declared that he had been a second at the fight, and remembered the insertion of the stone as a memorial.

The Gasworks eventually superseded “Sixpenny” as a fistic arena, though the time-honoured phrase, “Will you fight me in ‘Sixpenny’?” still remained the recognised form of challenge.

In 1858 fighting was already beginning to go out of fashion. In 1865, while the Public Schools Commissioners were sitting, they examined a Lower boy touching fights, and asked him if he had any theory to explain why regular stand-up fights had become so rare? The boy answered, “Oh! I suppose it’s because the fellows funk each other.”

The real reason of the disappearance of fighting was that it came to be thought bad form, and consequently no longer received any patronage from boys who were the swells of the school. Once it began to be considered “scuggish,” the fate of Eton pugilism was sealed, and though informal encounters occasionally occur—there was a determined battle near the railway arches in 1893—within the last forty years fighting has become a thing of the past.