I took not the faintest interest in my work
for a long time; but I read a great many English books, wrote
poetry in secret, picked up a vague acquaintance, of a very
inaccurate kind, with Latin and Greek, but possessed no exact
knowledge of any sort.
Gradually, as I rose in the school, a faint idea of social values
shaped itself. Let me say frankly that we were wholly democratic.
There were many wealthy boys, many with titles; but not the
faintest interest was taken in either. I was surprised to find
later on in my career at school, that boys whose names I had known
by hearsay were peers, though at first I had no idea what the
peerage was. Whatever we were free from, we were at all events free
from snobbishness. Athletics were what constituted our aristocracy,
pure and simple. Boys in the eleven and the eight were the heroes
of the place, and the school club called Pop, to which mainly
athletes were elected, enjoyed an absolute supremacy, and indeed
ran the out-of-doors discipline of the school. In fact, on
occasions like big matches, the boys were kept back behind the
lines, by members of Pop parading with canes, and slashing at the
crowd if they came past the boundaries. All the social standing of
boys was settled entirely by athletics. A boy might be clever,
agreeable, manly, a good game-shot, or a rider to hounds in the
holidays, but if he was no good at the prescribed games, he was
nobody at all at Eton.
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