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I began teaching as an Eton master in 1885, and taught classics there for nearly 20 years, starting with a whole-hearted faith in their merits for educational purposes, and coming gradually and reluctantly to a very different conclusion.
The average boy without literary and linguistic aptitude never seemed to me to get within reach of Latin and Greek as living things at all.
I am, &c.,
A. C. BENSON
Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge
Hubert Burge had been headmaster of Winchester, which no doubt explains his and Benson’s differing success rates with their pupils. The latter perhaps exerted more influence over the heirs to Greece and Rome by writing the words to “Land of Hope
and Glory”.
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Witnessing the Russian Revolution in 1917
9 March 1925
Sir, Saturday was the anniversary of the outbreak of the Russian Revolution. No one who was present in Petrograd at the time is likely to forget it. During the morning and early afternoon, sullen crowds thronged all the main streets. Mounted police moved quietly among them. There was no disorder, all seemed to be waiting for something; they might have been workmen outside the gates of a factory before opening time. Nevertheless one felt instinctively that the atmosphere was charged. It reminded one of the strange, gloomy silence that so often comes before a storm.
I boarded a tramway car to visit some people near the Nikolai Station. It was very crowded, but I was able to stand in front near the driver. As we proceeded up the Nevsky Prospect I became aware that a lady I knew was a fellow-traveller. I suggested that she should stay with the friend she was on her way to visit, and not attempt to return, as I felt there was going to be trouble.
I had hardly spoken the words when there rose a dull murmur, and one caught snatches of “Give us bread, we are hungry.” The tramway car was not travelling fast owing to the crowds. A university student jumped on to the footboard, said something to the driver, and then turned to the control lever, and the car came to a standstill. This held up all the rest, so my friend and I got off and walked. I took her to her destination, and begged her friends to keep her for the night, and then returned to Nevsky.
There I found everything changed. The placid dullness of these sullen crowds was replaced by alertness and excitement. As I neared the statue of Alexander III, a workman ascended to the plinth, and began to address the people. A policeman approached and remonstrated. The speaker refused either to get down or stop talking, whereupon the policeman drew his revolver, and shot him. It was the match to the fire; the smouldering fuse had reached the powder, and it went off. The Revolution had begun. In 20 minutes there was hardly a vestige of that unfortunate policeman left. Men, women, and even children fell upon him and literally tore him to pieces. One could hardly
believe that those sad, silent people of half an hour before could have
been suddenly transformed into such savages, lusting for the blood of the wretched man.
After this the crowd moved down Nevsky in one solid mass, were met by police, and were fired on. Every one knows the rest: innocent and guilty alike were shot down until the troops joined the people, and the so-called “bloodless Revolution” began.
I am, etc.,
B. S. LOMBARD
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A Swindle by Telephone
16 January 1926
Sir, I wish to warn your readers about a swindle, which has trapped even astute men of business. The modus operandi is a telephone call from a person claiming to be a friend or to have a business or personal connection with the victim. The gentleman is in distress, having been robbed of his purse.
Would his friend help him with a telegraph remittance in the nearest post office to enable him to return to his home in the counties? This in itself sounds bald and unconvincing, but is elaborated with sufficient circumstantial detail to make the story appear genuine. The device comes from America, where it appears to be very successfully played, and is a very profitable transaction for the swindler, who will continue to make a handsome revenue if the public is not warned.
The most effective answer is to promise the required help and then, immediately, to communicate with the police, who, if the case is genuine, can render the assistance needed, or, if not, can put a stop to these activities. No doubt the trick will appear in varying disguises, so as to keep it fresh, but the net result will be the same.
Yours truly,
VIGILANS
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Il Duce Writes
26 June 1925
Sir, I am very sensible of the fact that your most important paper attentively follows my political and polemical manifestations. Allow me, however, to rectify some statements contained in your last editorial.
It does not correspond with facts that the last Bills voted by the Italian Chamber are against the most elementary liberties, whereof you will be convinced by carefully considering the article of the aforesaid laws. It is not true that patriots are discontented. On the contrary, the truth is that the opposition is carried on by a small dispossessed group, while the enormous majority of the Italian people works and lives quietly, as foreigners sojourning in my country may daily ascertain. Please note also that Fascism counts 3,000,000 adherents, whereof 2,000,000 are Syndicalist workmen and peasants, these representing the politically organized majority of the nation. Even the Italian Opposition now recognizes the great historical importance of the Fascist experiment, which has to be firmly continued in order not to fail in its task of morally and materially elevating the Italian people, and also in the interest of European civilization. Please accept my thanks and regards.
I am, &c.,
MUSSOLINI
The Times had criticised Il Duce’s repression of the press and political opposition. Himself a former journalist, Benito Mussolini was keenly aware of the influence of the media on public opinion, at home and abroad.
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Making Proper Porridge
17 August 1925
Sir, The recipe given last Saturday for porridge is not very helpful, nothing being said as to the quantity of water or of oatmeal a person.
The time for preparation given as 1½ hour’s boiling, during which stirring is to be frequent and therefore attendance constant, is enough to scare off anyone not cursed with too much leisure from attempting to supply an article of food which has no need to be so costly of one’s time and for firing.
It is impossible to make good, appetizing porridge in a double saucepan, the only means of cooking it without stirring at frequent intervals, for the simple reason that it is not possible to bring the contents of the inner pan to the boil, and porridge that has not boiled for some time will not “set” when poured out: and if it will not “set” it is not nearly so palatable as if it does set. Porridge that is set will slide out of your plate a few minutes after being poured into it without leaving a smear behind. It is of a jelly-like consistency, not a viscous half-cooked mess. I repeat that it is impossible to attain this consistency with a double pan, and so far I agree with “E. E. K.” I merely mention this to emphasize it. Having, then, a single unjacketed saucepan of a capacity equal to twice the amount of water to be put into it — so as to avoid boiling over, which porridge is very prone to do — put into it, overnight if porridge is wanted in the morning, or, say, for six hours before wanted, for every person or for each small soup-plateful of porridge required, 2oz. of best coarse Scotch oatmeal, and not any of the crushed and mangled or otherwise pre-treated substitutes. Add one pint of water, and leave to soak. About half an hour before it is required bring it to the boil and take care that it does not boil over, stirring nearly all the time. Then keep it gently boiling for 20 minutes, stirring often enough to prevent sticking and burning. Finally boil briskly for five minutes and pour into a tureen or direct into the soup plates from which it is to be eaten. As much salt as will stand on a sixpence may be added per portion when the oatmeal is put into soak, or not, as desired.
To enjoy porridge properly it should be “set,” thoroughly swollen, and boiled, which the above treatment ensures, and eaten with plenty, say 1/3 pint per portion, of the best and freshest milk. There may be added salt, or sugar, or cream, or all three; or it may be eaten with treacle. Half an hour is ample for boiling, and I have cooked it satisfactorily in 20 minutes frequently. But it must boil, and not merely stew. Scattering the meal into the water is done to prevent it binding into lumps. It rarely does this if put into cold water for six hours before boiling begins, but it is just as well to see that there are no lumps before leaving to soak. I know of no reason why soaking beforehand should be objected to, and it saves firing and the cook’s time and trouble.
W. B. HOPKINS
Porridge, like trains, schools and the younger generation, appears to be a subject guaranteed to raise strong passions in the breast of every generation of Times readers.
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Cold snakes
13 April 1926
Sir, The truth of the statement in the last sentence of your note on Puff Adders and Pythons (The Times, February 13), about a cold snake being nearly always a relatively safe snake, is well borne out by an experience of my own.
While shooting in the Bindraban nala, in Pangi, in 1913, I was after a red bear one cold, drizzly, wet day. The bear was on a high, grass-topped ridge while I was on a lower one running parallel.
I had looked about for a good place from which to take a lying down shot, and, having found a flat rock with a nice slope, lay down. My knees — bare, as I was in “shorts” — were on the ground at the edge of the stone.
Having wriggled about until I was in a comfortable position, and after having sighted the bear, I concluded it was not good enough to risk a shot at that long range, so sat back on my “hunkers”.
To my very great surprise and fear, there was a snake coiled, sitting up and watching me from the very place in which my left knee had been pressing into the ground, and still well within striking distance of my knee! It made no effort either to strike or get away while I remained still, but when I sprawled backwards it made off.
When I had killed it with a stone, I found that it was a very good 26in. specimen of the Himalayan pit viper (Ancistrodon Himalayanus). The height up would be somewhere between 10,000 ft. and 11,000 ft., and it was, as I have already said, a cold day, with a thin rain falling every now and again; but as my left knee must have been actually pressing upon the snake, it was fortunate that it was a “cold” snake with which I had had to deal.
I am,
T. H. SCOTT
United Service Club, Simla.
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Mr MacDonald’s Honorary Degree
8 June 1926
Sir, Since the recent unfortunate occurrence may easily be misinterpreted outside, or even inside, this University, may I express what I know to be the feeling of others also, from the point of view of one who has twice voted for Mr MacDonald’s party at General Elections, but who would probably have abstained from voting either way on the question of his degree?
A memorial has been circulated in Cambridge deploring that this incident will embarrass, or even destroy, the convention of offering honorary degrees to politicians as such, apart from any direct services which they may have rendered to learning, letters, or art. Some of us, on the other hand, while deeply regretting this incident on other grounds, would welcome that result, and rejoice that some good, at least, had emerged from the present evil. Many, even among Mr MacDonald’s political opponents, have the greatest admiration for what he did, as Foreign Minister, in the cause of this country and of world-peace. They heartily regret that, practice in these matters having been what it has been, the first break in that practice during the last few years should seem to imply personal discourtesy to Mr MacDonald. But they cannot agree with the memorialists in branding the small group of determined opponents as persons whose political intolerance humiliates this University; they feel that this would come perilously near to denying the right of conscientious objection to all persons whose objections we ourselves do not happen to share.
Is there any real way out of this difficulty, so long as universities are in the habit of offering Doctorates in Law to politicians or soldiers as such? It is argued that the honour is here offered not to the politician but to the distinguished servant of the Crown, ex officio. If that were clearly understood on all sides; if it were generally known that the Prime Minister is thus to be honoured automatically, while others must take their chance of an adverse vote, this would certainly remove the misgivings felt by many at the present moment. Although an honour is certainly somewhat lessened by being automatic, yet such a clear understanding would relieve us from our present attempt to fly in the face of nature, and to combine the advantages of free will with those of absolute obedience to rule. We should be a very dead University if there were not strong differences of political opinion, accentuated by the present crisis.
Is it not a contradiction in terms to say that we offer degrees to politicians qua politicians, yet without reference to their politics? At least, this is contrary both to reason and to practice in normal cases, where the scholar, the littérateur, and the artist are chosen with the directest and most explicit reference to the value of their performances in scholarship, literature, or art. There are men here who joined in a similar public protest against Lord Randolph Churchill’s degree; this did not prevent Lord Randolph from receiving his degree on a majority vote. It is as certain as anything can be that Mr MacDonald would have had a sweeping majority; to doubt this would be to suggest, by that very doubt, the strongest possible justification for the opposers’ action. In the absence of absolutely clear understandings and precedents, this matter could not possibly have been emptied of all political significance. Some people (as things are at this moment) would have found political significance in the unopposed grant of a degree; even more will find political significance in the fact that it was opposed. Therefore (to repeat my earliest question in a different form), must not a politician be always ready to face a politician’s chances?
If universities deliberately intend that a certain studied gesture, when made to a politician, should mean something essentially different from that identical gesture towards a scientist, then ought it not to be understood beforehand, beyond any possibility of misconception, that this offer of a degree is simply an automatic sequel to the King’s offer of the Premiership?
Yours, &c.,
G. G. COULTON
Cambridge University had been debating whether to award the customary honorary degree to Ramsay MacDonald, the Labour leader, after he became Prime Minister.
Some dons took issue with his opposition to the First World War and his recent encouraging of the General Strike. MacDonald eventually let it be known he did not want the honour. Nearly 60 years later, Oxford would find itself in the same position – see page (#litres_trial_promo)
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The Yale’s Horns
15 June 1926
Sir, A few years ago, when the King’s Beasts were placed on the bridge over the moat leading to the gateway at Hampton Court Palace, I was distressed beyond measure at the effigy of the Yale1 (#ulink_b812b4e6-0bfb-50aa-917a-a0fe97d650c4). Both its horns were directed backwards! I drew the attention of the late Lord Harcourt to this on more than one occasion, and he was genuinely vexed and said that something must be done. But judging by a picture postcard I have recently received, nothing has been done.
My distress and grief have been increased by the action of those who are responsible for restoring the King’s Beasts on the outside of the Royal Chapel at Windsor, for here again the Yale has both horns pointing backwards. The Dean of Windsor kindly lent me for a day or two a little book which clearly shows this appalling lack of appreciation of what a Yale really is. For it is in the very essence of a Yale to have one horn pointing forward over the nose and the other horn pointing backwards. I have traced the history of the Yale back to the fourth or fifth Egyptian dynasty, back to the old kingdom, nearly 3,000 years bc. One finds them repeatedly throughout Egyptian art. Herodotus describes them as ỏπισθονóμοί, because their horns curve forward in front of their heads so that it is not possible for them when grazing to move forward, as in that case their horns would become fixed in the ground. Aristotle gives a similar account. Pliny describes their horns as mobile, so that should the front horn be injured in a contest the horns are swivelled round and the hinder horn now comes into action. But in spite of Pliny’s uncritical mind and unbridled fancy, he could hardly have invented the Yale. At the present time certain of the domesticated cattle in the great territory of the Bahr-el-Ghazal, to the south of the White Nile, have their horns trained by the natives, one to project forward and one to project backwards.
One of the Canons of Windsor states that the new King’s Beast on the outside of the Royal Chapel was copied from one in the interior of the chapel. Should this be the case, those who have been or are responsible for the King’s Beasts at Windsor are doubly guilty, for they are misleading the public not only without but within the walls of the sacred edifice. It is impossible to test the accuracy of this statement owing to the present reparations to the building. A distinguished archaeologist in the neighbourhood of Windsor who has been kind enough to inspect for me the false Yales on the outside of the chapel, writes that “we can do little but mourn.” But surely that is a counsel of despair. At Hampton Court Palace, and still more on or in the Royal Chapel at Windsor, under the very shadow of Royalty, we might at least expect a certain degree of historical and heraldic accuracy in such matters as the King’s Beasts, and the horns of the Yales should be set right.
I am, Sir, yours faithfully,
A. E. SHIPLEY
1 (#ulink_a8b3501c-9941-5838-a5ef-6da9f2e7b629) A mythical beast akin to an ibex used in heraldry and associated with the arms of the Royal Family since Tudor times. It also figures in those of Christ’s College, Cambridge, of which Shipley was Master.
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Timed Out
5 July 1926
Sir, The Eton and Harrow match is again at hand. May an imponderable quantity, who with countless other such, has suffered from four consecutive draws, venture a suggestion?
Whatever the rule, could it not be the practice in this match for the ingoing batsman always to leave the pavilion gate for the wicket as the outgoing batsman reaches the pavilion gate? Considering that there are 30 to 40 intervals on the fall of wickets, during each of which at least a minute (on the average) is lost, more than half an hour would be saved. Last year’s match would have been finished and not impossibly that of the year before. In fact, one has seen several draws in this match which another half-hour would have converted into a win.
This definite practice would have one other advantage: it would automatically save whichever side was tempted in that direction from lingering to the legal limit between wickets to avert defeat. Good sportsmanship, as a rule, takes care of that, but one remembers hearing shouts of “Hurry up!” The reasons against this saving of time no doubt will now be given to him, for they are with difficulty imagined by
Your faithful servant,
JOHN GALSWORTHY
The Nobel Prize-winning novelist had been captain of football at Harrow. His suggestion did not bear fruit until 1980, since when incoming batsmen can be given out unless they get to the wicket within a short time, now 3 minutes.
The annual cricket match against Eton was a highlight of the summer Season.
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Silly Point
11 August 1926
Sir, Down ’ere we be ’mazed along o’ they writer chaps an’ the goin’s on o’ they Testës. Laws be laws, an’ rools be rools, an’ they as makes ’em should keep ’em. Paarson — they sez as ’ow the rev’rend gentleman played fer the Blues afore ’e was so ’igh — tell’d us: “Once they arm-chair crickets gets yer into the papers, yer ’ave to be’ave yerself ’cardin’lye. That be the crucks of the matter.” I never learned French lingo, but we agrees along of ’im. So do Joe Rummery, as ’as umpir’d fer us nigh fitty yers.
Laast Saturday we at Firlin’ played a side from Lunnon — furriners, they be — an’ we ’ad two goes apiece, though I knaws we only played from foor till eight, cuz Farmer Beckley said Eb an’ me must finish that ten-acre field first.
I was out twice leg-afore, an’ it bain’t no use sayin’ “wot fer,” cuz Joe wunt be druv. “If it ’its yer leg, yer goes out, sartin sure,” sez Joe, who knaws the rools. Joe ’as the same coppers to count over-balls as when he started, with picturs o’ the Good Queen on ’em.
We thinks as ’ow they chaps at Lunnon be narvous, else ’ow should they be allus callin’ fer tay as soon as they be done dinner? An’ these paper chaps makes ’em wuss, a-tellin’ us wot it be about, pilin’ up pettigues (Paarson sez “worries”), till they batters wunt knaw whether they should be ther at all, or som’eres else.
Firlin’s played ’ere ’unnerds o’ yers, long afore that ther Mary Bone lady started ’er pitch at Lards in Lunnon, though we likes ’er, an’ ’opes she’ll keep purty blithesome an’ not fergit that we be cricketers too. We ain’t wantin’ foor stumps, as we finds three a plenty, an’ we ain’t thinkin’ that they pros an’ such like ’ave read the rools. If they did as Paarson sez his Irish friend did — when yer sees a ’ead, ’it it— ther wouldn’t be no cause fer this gurt talk o’ foor days.
I am, &c.,
F. CARTWRIGHT
It was felt in cricketing circles that, because of advances in preparing pitches, modern batsmen were scoring too freely off bowlers. Reforms to what was then regarded as the national game were mooted by correspondents to The Times. The options generally favoured were widening the wicket with an extra stump or extending the duration of first-class matches from three to four days in the hopes of enabling fewer to be drawn. In the event, no changes were made, prompting England some years later to target Australian batsmen rather than their wickets: see Bodyline p. 116.
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