Whether it was these purgations, or the fumes of the carbolic which
exorcised the infection, or whether the pest was starved out by the
immediate and careful isolation of the cases that occurred, we must leave
doctors to determine. It is certain that the epidemic came to an end in
less than ten days after the first case. That we were able to apply the
most necessary of measures, that of isolating at once all cases declared
or suspected, we owe to the readiness of the villagers to put house-room
at our service, a readiness on which we certainly had no right to
calculate. The rent we might pay them was no measure of the service
rendered. If a panic had closed their doors, our situation would have
been worse than critical.

The cause of the outbreak could not be confidently assigned, but since
the most probable theory traced it to a recent railway excursion made by
some school parties, these expeditions were discontinued for a time. This
was no great privation, for the year was closing in.

About this time, October 16th, the appointment of new "Praepostors" was
made, to fill up vacancies in the body. In speaking as usual on the
occasion, the Headmaster called attention to the experiment in
self-government which our special circumstances were affording. There
would be little reason for our recording the occasion, were it not that
since that date the monitorial system in public schools has been
canvassed in the Press, on occasion of an untoward incident of recent
notoriety, and has been described by some as the parent of the "grossest
tyranny," ruinous to the future of any school from which the institution
is inseparable. We had thought this view of the system obsolete, or
correct only of schools subject to obsolete conditions. If we were
mistaken, it may be worth while to record an experience which tends to a