no means pleased with the innovations myself.

I put the matter before the Vicar, asking him if he thought his
novelties were worth while in the face of the opposition of the
village and the loss of his religious influence with the children. He
would not go back from what, he said, he regarded as a matter of
principle, and could not see that he was throwing away a unique
opportunity, but he agreed to withdraw the unwelcome Server.

In spite of the fact that every detail of the new school building had
been submitted to, and approved by, the Education Department, trouble
began with an officious inspector, who on his first visit complained
of the ventilation. An elementary school is never exactly a bed of
roses, but we had a lofty building and classrooms, with plenty of
windows, which could be adjusted to admit as much or as little fresh
air as was requisite. We protested without result, and we had
eventually to pull the new walls about and spend £20 on what we
considered an uncalled-for alteration.

Our inspectors of schools varied greatly: some were quiet with the
children and considerate with the teachers; others vindicated their
authority by unnecessary fault-finding, upsetting the teachers and
alarming the children. In the days of our voluntary school I have seen
a room full of children in a state of nervous tension, and the
mistress and pupil-teachers in tears, as the result of inconsiderate
reprimands and irritable speech. My sympathies have been strongly
aroused on such occasions with a child's terror of being made an
exhibition before the others. As a boy at Harrow, in the form of the
Rev. F.W. Farrar, afterwards Dean of Canterbury, I had an unpleasant
experience, though it was no fault of his and quite unintentional. The