School 1894

"You children should think yourselves lucky that you're going to school instead of washing slates all day," said Mother.
"Oh, I am," said Tommy.  "It's much better than washing the dirt off slates until your hands are numb.  They're the best years of your life, at school.  You get a long lie in, as well.  Don't have to get up until seven o' clock."
"When I was a child I used to push coal trucks in the mine," said Grandad.
"They have ponies," said Harold.
"They do now but they didn't then.  Children used to push the trucks.  Just the right size to get in behind the truck."
"I should have gone to school," said Mother.  "Education was made compulsory in 1880 but we couldn't afford to pay the fees."
"It was made free in 1891," said Father.
"What is it like at school?" asked Harold.
"You sit in a big hall," said Tommy, "and the school master writes things on the board.  You have your own little easel and your own little chalk.  And just be careful that the school master doesn't lose his temper."
"What happens then?"
"If you get caned, Harry, I don't want to know," said Father.  "If you admit being caned I'll ask, what for?  You don't to be caned again, do you?"

 

Harold arrived at school and was led into his classroom.  There were nearly a hundred girls and boys in a large hall.  All the children sat on benches and none of them had desks.  A man with tiny round glasses wore a black cloth cap and long black robes.  He walked around with a long wooden stick.
"Good morning, children.  I'm Mr. Spoors.  There are 3 sounds I love to hear.  The sound of little children speaking politely when they are spoken to.  The sound of my cane, whizzing through the air like this."  He twirled his cane and produced a whistling noise.  "And the sound of my cane hitting something hard, like this."  He brought the cane down on the desk.  "Those are the 3 sounds that I love to hear.  I assure you, there are many, many sounds that I dislike, many, many sounds that I don't love to hear."  One of the boys started laughing.  "Master William thinks that my cane is funny.  We must be understanding of his strange sense of humour.  Come here, Master William."  The boy came.  "Hold out your hand.  Six of the best.  Enjoy."  The cane came down on the boy's knuckles once.  He burst into tears.  "Seven of the best because you didn't take it like a man."  Mr. Spoors finished caning William.  Then the teacher smiled like a grinning Cheshire cat.  "I read an interesting article in the Times today.  The government are considering raising the school leaving age to 12 in 1899.  The new children who have started school today will be here until they are 12 years old."  Harold cried out.  "Who was that?"  No one answered.  "If the boy who cried out in agony, when I said that about this lovely school, makes himself known, he will receive 6 of the best.  If I am not told who it was in the next 5 minutes, all the children in this room will receive 6 of the best, even if I have to stay here until half past four."  Harold turned to the boy next to him.
"It was me," he whispered.  The boy gesticulated violently.
"Well, tell him, tell him," said the boy.  Mr. Spoors looked at the boys.
"Did one of you boys make the noise?"  Harold nodded.  "Which one of you?"
"Me, Mr. Spoors," said Harold.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"I was scared, Mr. Spoors.  I didn't want to get the cane."
"So everybody would have got the cane, including you.  But that doesn't seem quite so bad, not if everyone else is suffering as well.  You are a despicable little boy and that is a despicable little thought.  Come to the front.  I want you to stand in front of the whole class."  Harold followed Mr. Spoors.  "Hold out your hand."

 

It was time for the first lesson.
"Miss Gwendolin," called Mr. Spoors.  "Come down to the front of the class.  I want you to write the alphabet on the board."
"Yes, Mr. Spoors," she said quietly.  Gwendolin came down to the front of the hall and picked up a white piece of chalk.  She wrote a big letter A on the board.
"A is for apple," said Mr. Spoors.  "Master Henry, I want you to draw a picture of an apple."  Henry came down to the front, picked up the chalk, and tried very hard to draw a round circle with a stalk at the top.  He did not succeed in making his drawing round or at all like an apple.  One of the girls giggled.  "Miss Charlotte," said Mr. Spoors.  "You think you are more intelligent than Henry, do you?"  Charlotte said nothing.  "Answer me, Miss Charlotte.  Do you think that you are more intelligent than Henry?"
"Yes, Mr. Spoors," she said, nervously.
"Then come down to the front, Miss Charlotte.  Show us all how intelligent you are."  Charlotte walked down to the board.  "I want you to write the words next to the pictures on the board."  She picked up a chalk and wrote the word "apple" beside Henry's attempted drawing.  "Very good, Miss Charlotte.  A is for apple.  Excellently written.  B is for budgerigar.  Master Henry, draw us a budgerigar."  Henry did nothing.  "Are your hands paralysed, Master Henry?  Have you suddenly been taken ill?  Can you not move?"
"No, Mr. Spoors.  I don't know what a budgerigar is."
"It is a kind of bird."  Henry began a hideous attempt to draw a bird.  "Miss Charlotte, as she is so remarkably intelligent, is going to write the word budgerigar."  Charlotte did not know how to spell budgerigar.  She wrote several jumbled letters and looked embarrassed.  "Oh, Miss Charlotte, I thought you were really intelligent, so intelligent that you could laugh at Master Henry's attempts to draw an apple and consider him to be an imbecile.  Very well, Miss Charlotte, B is for Bird."  She wrote the word bird on the board.  By the time the class had reached the letter Z, it was lunch time.

 

Mr. Spoors led the children into the dining hall.  They queued to be given a plate of food from the kitchen and then sat down at their tables.  Mr. Spoors took his meal and sat down next to a posh lady dressed in black.
"Good morning, Miss Scriven."
"Good afternoon, Mr. Spoors," said Miss Scriven, taking her gold watch out of her breast pocket.  "It is, indeed, afternoon, by twelve minutes."  The two teachers ate their meals.  When they had finished, Mr. Spoors asked,
"Will you watch the children eat, Miss Scriven, or should I?"
"Allow me," said Miss Scriven, smiling.  "It's a pleasure."  Miss Scriven got up from the table and walked around the dining hall.  She looked on the floor where a boy was throwing slices of beetroot.  "Master Charles thinks that beetroot tastes much nicer when it has been on a muddy floor.  Vegetables are so boring when they are clean, isn't that so, Master Charles?  Well, go down there and pick up the beetroot, put it on your plate again and eat it, now that it's nice and muddy, just as nature intended.  How lovely."  Charles started picking up the beetroot and putting it back on his plate.  "Master Benjamin, you have not eaten your turnip."
"Please Miss Scriven, I don't like turnip.  I can't stand it, Miss Scriven, it makes me feel sick."  Miss Scriven opened her mouth wide and stared at Benjamin in horror.  The talking in the dining hall stopped.  Mr. Spoors got up from his table and came across the hall.
"Is that right boy?  You don't like turnip and it makes you feel sick.  Perhaps you'd prefer six of the best.  Stand up, and follow me.  I want you to stand in front of the whole school."  They went to the front of the hall.  "Hold out your hand."  The cane struck Benjamin's knuckles six times.  "Now, I want you to compose yourself like a man, stop crying, sit back down again and eat that turnip.  If I see you leave any of that turnip, or if you so much as twist your face at it or cough, I'm going to march you back in front of the whole school again and cane you again.  Is that understood?"
"Yes, Mr. Spoors."

 

That afternoon Mr. Spoors' class had an arithmetic lesson.  He had written a long series of simple sums on the board.
"One add one is two," chanted the children.  "Two add two is four.  Two add three is five."  They carried on until they reached the number twenty.  Then Mr. Spoors took the wooden duster and rubbed out all the answers.  "Master Boris, Miss Catherine, Master Daniel and Miss Victoria, come to the front."  The four children came to the front of the room.  "Give everybody their slates and their chalks."  Each of the four children picked up a cardboard box and went around the room ensuring that each of the other children were given a slate and a chalk.  "Now you are going to write down the answers to the questions."

 

On Friday afternoon it was the swimming lesson.  They all walked together for half an hour to get to the local swimming pool.  Harold stood, in his swimming trunks, by the side of the pool at the deep end.
"Aren't you coming in?" asked Boris, efforlessly doing a front crawl.
"No.  I'm scared.  I tried to get down the steps before, but the water's cold."  Harold didn't see Mr. Spoors running towards him at a fast pace, coming up from behind.  Mr Spoors took ahold of Harold and pushed him.  Harold fell into the water and was splashing around.  Mr. Spoors stood there, looking at him and laughing.
"Can you swim now, boy?"
"No, no, Mr. Spoors, I can't, I can't.  I think I'm sinking." 
"This boy's in trouble," said Mr. Spoors.  "Isn't somebody going to help him?  Master Boris, you're a very strong swimmer.  Why don't you see if you can assist?"
Boris came alongside.
"You're splashing too much," he said.  "Slow down.  Don't thrash around like that, you'll wear yourself out.  Move your arms and legs slowly, like I'm doing.  That's right.  No effort at all now, is it?"  Another teacher, dressed in black robes and a black cloth cap, was taking a lesson on the other side of the swimming pool.  He had seen what Mr. Spoors had done to Harold and was indignant.  He stomped his way across the building with a horrified look on his face.
"Mr. Spoors," he said, "I have told you time and time again, don't teach your boys to swim by pushing them in at the deep end.  That boy nearly drowned."
"Mr. Grey, I have told you several times that my boys are very good at helping anyone in the pool who gets into trouble.  I have trained them to a very high standard.  In fact, one of my old pupils wrote me a letter.  He said that he was deeply grateful that he had had me as a teacher.  He is now a professional life guard."

 

Friday night was bone broth night.  Mother had a collection of bones she had been boiling in the big soup pan all afternoon.  The smell of the boiling bones filled the kitchen.  The big soup pan also contained chopped potatoes, carrots and onions and all the other vegetables Mother had found in a three pound cloth bag of mixed vegetables from the green grocer that had cost sixpence.  Mother scooped the bones out of the pan and threw them into the bin.  She cut the home made bread cakes in half and spread them with lard.  The lard would have torn the bread cakes into pieces if they hadn't been so thick.  The family sat down to eat.
"How has Harold found his first week at school?" asked Granddad.
"Very good," said Tommy.  "He's a great little swimmer.  He got 6 out of 20 for his arithmetic, even though he's only known arithmetic for a few days.  He's been a very good boy, and Mr. Spoors has never had to cane him once."
"He must be a very good boy," said Father, laughing.  "Mr. Spoors canes everybody."