Chapter One.

Dry-Rot.

Bolsover College was in a bad temper. It often was; for as a rule it had little else to do; and what it had, was usually a less congenial occupation.

Bolsover, in fact, was a school which sadly needed two trifling reforms before it could be expected to do much good in the world. One was, that all its masters should be dismissed; the other was, that all its boys should be expelled. When these little changes had been effected there was every chance of turning the place into a creditable school; but not much chance otherwise.

For Bolsover College was afflicted with dry-rot. The mischief had begun not last term or the term before. Years ago it had begun to eat into the place, and every year it grew more incurable. Occasional efforts had been made to patch things up. A boy had been now and then expelled. A master had now and then “resigned.” An old rule had now and then been enforced. A new rule was now and then instituted. But you can’t patch up a dry-rot, and Bolsover crumbled more and more the oftener it was touched.

Years ago it had dropped out of the race with the other public-schools. Its name had disappeared from the pass list of the University and Civil Service candidates. Scarcely a human being knew the name of its head-master; and no assistant-master was ever known to make Bolsover a stepping-stone to pedagogic promotion. The athletic world knew nothing of a Bolsover Eleven or Fifteen; and, worse still, no Bolsover boy was ever found who was proud either of his school or of himself.

Somebody asks, why, if the place was in such a bad way, did parents continue to send their boys there, when they had all the public-schools in England to choose from? To that the answer is very simple. Bolsover was cheap—horribly cheap!

“A high class public-school education,” to quote the words of the prospectus, “with generous board and lodging, in a beautiful midland county, in a noble building with every modern advantage; gymnasium, cricket-field, and a full staff of professors and masters,” for something under forty pounds a year, was a chance not to be snuffed at by an economical parent or guardian. And when to these attractions was promised “a strict attention to morals, and a supervision of wardrobes by an experienced matron,” even the hearts of mothers went out towards the place.

After all, argues many an easy-going parent, a public-school education is a public-school education, whether dear Benjamin gets it at Eton, or Shrewsbury, or Bolsover. We cannot afford Eton or Shrewsbury, but we will make a pinch and send him to Bolsover, which sounds almost as good and may even be better.

So to Bolsover dear Benjamin goes, and becomes a public-school boy. In that “noble building” he does pretty much as he likes, and eats very much what he can. The “full staff of professors and masters” interfere very little with his liberty, and the “attention to morals” is never inconveniently obtruded. He goes home pale for the holidays and comes back paler each term. He scuffles about now and then in the play-ground and calls it athletics. He gets up Caesar with a crib and Todhunter with a key, and calls it classics and mathematics. He loafs about with a toady and calls it friendship. In short, he catches the Bolsover dry-rot, and calls it a public-school training:

What is it makes Benjamin and his seventy-nine school-fellows (for Bolsover had its full number of eighty boys this term) in such a particularly ill-humour this grey October morning? Have his professors and masters gently hinted to him that he is expected to know his lessons next time he goes into class? Or has the experienced matron been overdoing her attention to his morals? Ask him. “What!” he says, “don’t you know what the row is? It’s enough to make anybody shirty. Frampton, this new head-master, you know, he’s only been here a week or two, he’s going to upset everything. I wish to goodness old Mullany had stuck on, cad as he was. He let us alone, but this beast Frampton’s smashing the place up. What do you think?—you’d never guess, he’s made a rule the fellows are all to tub every morning, whether they like it or not. What do you call that? I know I’ll get my governor to make a row about it. It won’t wash, I can tell you. What business has he to make us tub, eh, do you hear? That’s only one thing. He came and jawed us in the big room this morning, and said he meant to make football compulsory! There! You needn’t gape as if you thought I was gammoning. I’m not, I mean it. Football’s to be compulsory. Every man Jack’s got to play, whether he can or not. I call it brutal! The only thing is, it won’t be done. The fellows will kick. I shall. I’m not going to play football to please a cad like Frampton, or any other cad!”

What Benjamin says is, for a wonder, the truth. A curious change had come over Bolsover since the end of last term. Old Mr Mullany, good old fossil that he was, had resigned. The boys had heard casually of the event at the end of last term. But the old gentleman so seldom appeared in their midst, and when he did, so rarely made any show of authority, that the school had grown to look upon him as an inoffensive old fogey, whose movements made very little difference to anybody.

It was not till the holidays were over, and Mr Frampton introduced himself as the new head-master, that Bolsover awoke to the knowledge that a change had taken place. Mr Frampton—he was not even a “Doctor” or a “Reverend,” but was a young man with sandy whiskers, and a red tie—had a few ideas of his own on the subject of dry-rot. He evidently preferred ripping up entire floors to patching single planks, and he positively scared his colleagues and pupils by the way he set to work. He was young and enthusiastic, and was perhaps tempted to overdo things at first. When people are being reformed, they need a little breathing time now and then; but Mr Frampton seemed to forget it.

He had barely been in his post a week when two of the under-masters resigned their posts. Undaunted he brought over two new men, who shared his own ideas, and installed them into the vacancies. Then three more of the old masters resigned; and three more new men took their places. Then the “experienced matron” resigned, and Mrs Frampton took her place. No sooner was that done than the order went out that every boy should have a cold bath every morning, unless excused by the doctor. The school couldn’t resign, so they sulked, and gasped in the unwelcome element, and coughed heart-rendingly whenever they met the tyrant. The tyrant was insatiate. Before the school could recover from his first shock, the decree for compulsory football staggered it.

Compulsory football! Why, half the fellows in the school had never put their toes to a football in their lives, and those who had had rarely done more than punt the leather aimlessly about, when they felt in the humour to kick something, and nobody or nothing more convenient was at hand. But it was useless to represent this to Mr Frampton.

“The sooner you begin to play the better,” was his reply to all such objections.

But the old goal posts were broken, and the ball was flabby and nearly worn-out.

“The new goals and ball are to arrive from London to-day.”

But they had not got flannels or proper clothes to play in.

“They must get flannels. Every boy must have flannels, and meanwhile they must wear the oldest shirts and trousers they had.”

Shirts and trousers! Then they weren’t even to be allowed to wear coats and waistcoats this chilly weather! Hadn’t they better wait till next week, till they could ask leave of their parents, and get their flannels and practise a bit?

“No. Between