Ferrers wrote a great deal about Public Schools to the various London papers. He was fast winning a name in the educational world. But he was always being asked to modify his statements. He raved against the weakness of the authorities.
"They don't want to know the truth," he said, "they are afraid to hear it. 'Tell us lies,' that's what they say. 'Lull us into a false security. A big bust-up is coming soon, but keep it off till after we are gone.' They know their house is built on sand, running out into the river. They want to barricade their own tiny houses for a little. I want to go and search for the big firm land, but they are too comfortable on their cushions and fine linen to dare to move. Oh, prophesy smooth things!"
Gordon listened intently to it all. Ferrers was his ideal. Often they would talk of books: of the modern novel; of Compton Mackenzie, in whom idealism and realism were one; of Rupert Brooke, the coming poet, who was to make men believe in the beauties of this earth, instead of hankering after an immaterial hereafter; of the Elizabethan drama, of Marlowe, Beaumont, Webster. They were very wonderful, those hours. Gordon felt that he had at last, after wandering far, come to his continuing city. Glancing back over his last two years, he used to laugh and say:
"I don't regret them; I was happy; and the only thing to regret is unhappiness. But I have outgrown them; they did not last. They were what Stephen Phillips would number among the 'over-beautiful, quick fading things.' They were good days, though. But I am happier now. I can see the future spreading out before me. Next winter Hunter will be captain, but I shall be second in the team and lead the forwards. It will be a year of preparation. Then will come my year of captaincy. All the things I wanted seem falling into my hands. 'Life is sweet, brother,' life is sweet!"
And, looking back, it seemed as if in the wild orgy of Pack Monday Fair he had finally burnt the old garments and put on the new. That day had been the funeral pyre of his old life; and, like Sardanapalus, it had died of its own free will. A glorious end; no anti-climax. But the future was still more glorious. When he watched the morning sun flicker white on the broad Eversham road from the station to the Abbey, the leaves breaking on the lindens, the dim lights waking in the chapel on Sunday, he saw how far he had outgrown his old self. Now he had begun to perceive what life's aim should be—the search for beauty. Tester had been right when he said that beauty was the only thing worth having, the one ideal time could not tarnish. And yet Tester was not satisfied. The hold of the world was too strong on him. He could see where others were going wrong, but he himself was all astray, at times morbidly wretched, at others hilarious with excitement. It was merely a question of temperament. Gordon saw stretching before him the fulfilment of his hopes. There was no niche for failure. His destiny would unroll smoothly like a great machine; he was at peace, in sympathy with a world of beautiful ideas and dreams. At times he would feel an unreasoning anger with the Public School system, but his rage soon cooled down. After all, it had left him at the last unscathed, and was in the future to bring many gifts. Others might be broken on the wheel; but he was still sufficiently an egoist, sufficiently self-centred to be indifferent to them. He had come through, with luck perhaps, but still he had come through. That was all that mattered. He had not read Matthew Arnold's Rugby Chapel. If he had, he might have recognised himself in the pilgrim who had saved only himself, while the world was full of others, like the Chief, who were "bringing their sheep in their hand." But probably even if he had read the poem at that time, he would have been too happy, too self-contented, too successful to realise its poignant truth. And it would not have been surprising. Youth is always intolerant and self-centred. It is only when we grow old, and see so "little done of all we so gaily set out to do," that we suddenly appreciate that, even if we have ourselves failed, yet if we can by our experience help someone else to succeed, our life will not be utterly vain. Altruism is the philosophy of middle age.
On a few, but very few, occasions Gordon was temporarily roused out of his secure atmosphere. One of these was on the last day of term, when a letter appeared in The Fernhurst School Magazine suggesting that the Three Cock should be changed into a Two Cock, since the School House had for the last few years proved itself so incapable of holding out against the strong outhouse combination of three houses against one. Much of what the writer said was true. The House numbered only about seventy, while each outhouse contained some forty boys, with perhaps six day boys attached to each. The House did not take in day boys, so that the House was always playing against a selection from double its number. A Two Cock would be far fairer. Nevertheless the House was furious.
"Confounded old ass," said Mansell. "I believe Claremont wrote it. Let him wait till next year and he will see his beastly blue shirts rolled in the mud."
"But it is such infernal swank," said Gordon. "We smashed them in the Thirds; to all intents and purposes we routed them in the Two Cock; the only thing the outhouses won was the Three Cock; and they are so bucked about that that they want to clinch a victory, get up and shout: 'Look at us, what devils of fine fellows we are! You can't touch us. Better take charity.' Unutterable conceit! Why, we won four times running about seven years ago. I have a good mind to go to Claremont and give it him straight. Betteridge, you absurd ass, why did you print this thing?"
"Well, you see, there were a few rather risky things in the paper, and I thought if I cut it out he might hack about the rest of the rag. And, besides, it will be an awful score when we win next year, as we are absolutely certain to. Can't you imagine the account: 'Last year some rather foolhardy persons doubted the ability of the School House to deal with a combined side of the best three outhouses, and they were rash enough to express their doubts in print. But this year, under the able captaincy of G.F. Hunter, with the forwards admirably led by G.R. Caruthers, the House gained a thoroughly deserved victory by fifteen points to three.' We shall crow then, my lads, sha'n't we?"
"Yes, it will be all right then," said Mansell. "My lord, I wish I was going to be here to play in it. My governor is a fool to make me leave and go to France."