But _The Hill_ stands high. It cannot be hid. It is supersentimental at times, but then so are schoolboys. And the characters are clean-cut and finely finished. Scaife is a memorable figure; so is Warde. John Verney, like most virtuous persons, is a bit of a bore at times; but the Caterpillar, with his drawling little epigrams, and their inevitable tag--"Not my own; my Governor's!"--is a joy for ever. Lastly, the description of the Eton and Harrow Match at Lord's takes unquestionable rank as one of the few things in this world which will never be better done.
Two other books may be mentioned here, as illustrating the tendency, already mentioned, of modern school-novelists to shift the limelight from the boy to the master. The first is Mr. Hugh Walpole's _Mr. Perrin and Mr. Traill_. A young man lacking means, and possessing only a moderate degree, who feels inclined, as many do, to drift into schoolmastering as a _pis aller_, should read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest this book. It draws a pitiless picture of Common Room life in a third-rate public school--the monotony; the discomfort; the mutual antagonism and jealousy of a body of men herded together year after year, condemned to celibacy by want of means, and deprived of all prospect of advancement or change of scene. It hammers in the undeniable truth that in the great majority of cases a schoolmaster's market value depreciates steadily from the date of his first appointment. _Mr. Perrin and Mr. Traill_ is a very able book, but should not be read by schoolmasters while recovering, let us say, from influenza.
If the reader desires a further picture of the amenities of the Common Room, viewed from a less oblique angle, he can confidently be recommended to turn to _The Lanchester Tradition_, by Mr. G. F. Bradby. _The Lanchester Tradition_ is a comparatively short story, but it is all pure gold. It is written with knowledge, insight, and above all with an appreciation of that broad tolerant humorous outlook on life which alone can lubricate the soul-grinding wheels of routine. In _Mr. Perrin and Mr. Traill_ we have a young, able, and merciless critic exposing some of the weaknesses of the public-school system. In _The Lanchester Tradition_ we have a seasoned and experienced representative of that system demonstrating that real character can always rise superior to circumstance, and that for all its creaking machinery and accompanying friction the pedagogue's existence can be a very tolerable and at times a very uplifting one. It is the old struggle between theory and practice. _Solvitur ambulando._