Those days, on which leave is given to be absent from the Hospital during the whole day, are called whole-day leaves…. A ticket is a small oval medal attached to the button-hole, without which, except on leaves, no boy is allowed to pass the gates. Subjoined is a list of the holidays, which have been hitherto kept at Christ's Hospital; but it is in contemplation to abridge them materially. Of the policy of such a measure great doubts may fairly be entertained, inasmuch as the vacations are so short as to give sufficient respite neither to master nor scholar; and these occasional breaks, in the arduous duties of the former more especially, enable him to repair the exhausted energies of body and mind by necessary relaxation. If those days, which are marked with an asterisk, fall on a Sunday, they are kept on the Monday following; and likewise the state holidays.
HOLIDAYS KEPT AT CHRIST'S HOSPITAL
Jan. 25. St. Paul's conversion.
*30. King Charles's martyrdom.
Feb. 2. Candlemas Day.
24. St. Matthias.
Shrove Tuesday.
Ash Wednesday.
March 25. Lady Day.
April 23. St. George.
25. St. Mark.
May 1. St. Philip and St. James.
*29. Restoration of King
Charles II.
Ascension Day.
Whit Monday.
Whit Tuesday.
June 11. St. Barnabas.
24. St. John Baptist.
29. St. Peter.
July 25. St. James.
Thursday after St.
James. (Nurses' Holiday.)
Aug. 24. St. Bartholomew.
Sept. *2. London burnt.
*21. St. Matthew.
29. St. Michael.
Oct. 18. St. Luke.
*23. King Edward VI. born.
28. St. Simon and St. Jude.
Nov. 1. All Saints.
*5. Gunpowder Plot.
*9. Lord Mayor's Day.
*17. Queen Elizabeth's birthday.
30. St. Andrew.
Dec. 21. St. Thomas.
Also the birthdays of the King and Queen, and the Prince and Princess of Wales: and the King's accession, proclamation, and coronation.
In addition to the generous allowance of holidays above given the boys had every alternate Wednesday for a whole day; eleven days at Easter, four weeks in the summer, and fifteen days at Christmas. In 1837 the holiday system was remodelled. Compare Lamb's other remarks on his whole-day rambles in "Recollections of Christ's Hospital" (Vol. I.) and in the essays in the present volume entitled "Amicus Redivivus" and "Newspapers."
Page 16, line 14. The Tower. Blue-coat boys still have this right of free entrance to the Tower; but the lions are no more. They were transferred to the Zoological Gardens in 1831.
Page 16, line 16. L.'s governor. Meaning Samuel Salt, M.P.; but it was actually his friend Mr. Timothy Yeats who signed Lamb's paper. More accurately, Lamb's father lived under Salt's roof.
Page 16, line 7 from foot. H——. According to Lamb's Key this was Hodges; but in the British Museum copy of Elia, first edition, some one has written Huggins. It is immaterial. Nevis and St. Kitt's (St. Christopher's) are islands in the British West Indies. Tobin would be James Webbe Tobin, of Nevis, who died in 1814, the brother of the playwright John Tobin, author of "The Honeymoon."
Page 17, line 2. A young ass. The general opinion at Christ's Hospital is that Lamb invented this incident; and yet it has the air of being true.
Page 17, line 18. L.'s admired Perry. John Perry, steward from 1761 to 1785, mentioned in Lamb's earlier essay.