“I really don’t think it necessary to say much to prove that the school is degenerate. Look at the clubs! They aren’t nearly as good as they were in old Wyndham’s time. Parrett’s clubs, thanks to Mr Bloomfield, keep up; but where are the others? Then the rows. (Hear, hear.) I’m sure there have been more rows in the school this term than all the rest of the year put together. The juniors seem to do what they like,”—(“Hear, hear,” from Telson, Parson, and Co.)—“and no one seems to know who has a right to keep any one else in order. Now, why is all this? (Loud cheers from Bosher.) You know as well as I do. The captain of the school always used to be a fellow the boys could look up to. Old Wyndham and the captain before him were something like fellows. (Loud Parrett’s cheers.) They weren’t afraid to look any one in the face — (cheers) — and they didn’t, when they got tired of one house — (cheers) — ask the doctor to move them to another. (Terrific applause from the Parrett’s and Welchers.) Why, if this boat-race affair had happened in old Wyndham’s time, do you suppose he wouldn’t have made it right, and found out the fellow, even if it was his own brother? (Loud cheers, amidst which young Wyndham blushed a great deal at this unexpected piece of notoriety.) I’m not going to say any more.” (“Hear, hear,” from Fairbairn.)
Mr Porter rose to open the debate on the other side. He wasn’t going to give in that Willoughby was going down. It was unpatriotic. (Cheers.) He meant to say if the school did go down it was the fellows’ own fault, and not all to be blamed on one boy. Mr Riddell would probably answer for himself — (laughter) — but he (Mr Porter) was pretty sure the school would not degenerate under him. The fellows seemed to think the only thing in the world was brute strength. He had no objection to brute strength — (cheers and laughter) — in fact he fancied he had a little of his own — (“Hear, hear,” from Telson whose ears Porter had boxed only that morning) — but Willoughby wanted something better than that; and he meant to say there were plenty of fellows in the school who didn’t make much noise, but who did as much to keep up the school as all the rowdies put together. And when things have quieted down, as he hoped they would, these fellows would get more thanks than they did now. (Cheers from a few, who apparently considered this last allusion referred specially to them.)
Porter was not a good speaker, and the little he did say was a good deal bungled. Still there was a manly ring about his speech which pleased the better disposed section of his audience, some of whom did not even belong to the same house.
Silk followed. The Welcher monitor was clever to a certain degree, and although he never chose to devote his cleverness to good purposes, he usually managed to get himself listened to when he chose to take the trouble. And at present, his peculiar position as the deposed head of Welch’s gave a certain interest to what he had to say. Bitter enough it was.
“What chance is there of the school not going down, I should like to know,” said he, “when cant is the order of the day? (Hear, hear.) Of course the school is going down. What interests can any one have in his house when some one comes and begins by setting the juniors against the seniors and then turning up the whites of his eyes and saying, ‘What a shocking state of disorder the house is in?’ Why, before ‘the little stranger’—(loud laughter) — came to Welch’s, the seniors and juniors never fell out,” (“Hear, hear,” from several quarters), “but now there’s a regular mutiny. And what’s bad for one house is bad for the school. I don’t care who’s head of Welch’s. He’s welcome to the honour if he likes, but let him act above-board, that’s what I say, and not snivel and look pious while all the time he’s doing a dirty trick.” (Cheers from Tucker and one or two more, which, however, instantly died out when Crossfield rose.)
Crossfield was the plague of the senior Welchers’ lives!
“I was much affected by the beautiful speech of the gentleman who has just sat down,” he began. “It is always so sweet to hear conscious innocence asserting itself. After the gentleman’s noble efforts for the good of his house (laughter) — and the splendid example he has set of rectitude — (laughter) — and high moral principle — (laughter) — it is truly touching to find him put on one side for an interloper who is villainous enough to tell the juniors they need not walk in his saintly footsteps! (Laughter.) But that is not what I wanted to say, and as the gentleman appears to be overcome by his emotions — (Silk was at that moment angrily leaving the room) — I don’t think we need trouble any more about him. (Cheers and laughter.) All I wished to say was this: I always understood from the gentlemen of Parrett’s that Mr Bloomfield was captain of Willoughby,” (Loud cries of “So he is!”), “and that nobody cared a straw for Mr Riddell.” (“No more they do!”). “Then, I don’t think Mr Ashley is very complimentary to Mr Bloomfield when he says the fault of all the mischief is that the captain is not an all-round man. For all that he’s quite correct. Mr Bloomfield is a well-meaning man, no doubt, but he certainly is not an all-round man.” (Uproar.)
Riddell then rose, and his rising was the signal for a great demonstration of party feeling. Parrett’s of course went against him, and a large section of Welch’s, but the schoolhouse, aided by Cusack, Pilbury, and Co., backed him up. He spoke nervously but boldly.
“I am sorry to have to support the motion of Mr Ashley. I agree with him that Willoughby is not what it was, and not what it should be. (Cheers.) And I also agree with him in thinking that the school might have a good deal better captain than it has.” (Cries of “No!” from the schoolhouse.) “However, I do not want to say a word about myself. What I do want to say is this — it’s one thing to discover that we are degenerate, and another to try to put ourselves right again. And are we likely to do that as long as we are all at sixes and sevens, pulling different ways, caring far more about our own gratifications than the good of the whole school? I don’t think so, and I don’t believe Mr Bloomfield does either. Every fellow worth the name of a Willoughbite must be sorry to see things as they are. (Hear, hear.) Why should they remain so? Surely the good of the school is more important than squabbling about who is captain and which is the best house. Of course, we all back up our own house, and, as a Welcher now, I mean to try if our house can’t give a good account of itself before the term’s over. (Loud cheers from Pilbury, Cusack, Philpot, etcetera.) And if each house pulls itself up, not at the expense of a rival house — (Hear, hear) — but for the glory of the school — (Hear, hear) — we shan’t have to complain of Willoughby being degenerate much longer. You remember what old Wyndham said the night before he left. As long as the fellows think first of the school and then of themselves Willoughby will be all right. Depend upon it he was right. We cheered him loud enough then, why not take his advice still?” (Loud cheers.)
This spirited address roused the applause of all the better-minded section, whose cheers were not wholly unmingled with self-reproach. Bloomfield himself, it was plain, felt its force, and as to the more vehement members of Parrett’s, it considerably damped their ardour.
“Old man,” said Fairbairn that evening to his friend the captain, “you struck a really good blow for the school this afternoon. I don’t know how you managed to pitch on just the right thing to say, as you did. Things will come all right, take my word for it. They’re beginning already.”
Alas, there is many a slip ’twixt the cup and the lip, as Willoughby had yet to discover.
Chapter Twenty