A CHAPTER OF BLUNDERS.
Pass, certificate, and competitive examinations are, no doubt, all sufficiently serious affairs to examinees, and sufficiently trying ones to examiners. To the outer public, however, to those “who have no son or brother there,” such “exams.” are, as a rule, nothing if not a source of amusement. The “results” aimed at in examinations are, for the most part, admirable; but in the course of the processes, in the answering of examination questions, the unexpected constantly happens, and it is the unlooked-for results, the “surprises” of the occasions, that make sport for the Philistines. The situation on this head is easily explicable. It is a natural result of the modern system of preparation for examination—the cram system. Examinees bent only on “getting through” will answer questions on the hit-or-miss principle, while others, whose brains have become more or less addled under the pressure of “memory work,” will evolve from their unbalanced inner consciousness replies fearfully and wonderfully made.
Some of the “exam.” stories current in educational circles, though characteristic, and possibly “founded on fact,” have an air of belonging to the too-good-to-be-true category. A number of these are told against—and, if invented, were probably invented by—undergraduates. Thus—so the story goes—an undergraduate was asked to name the minor prophets, and, not having “got them up,” neatly and politely replied that he would rather not make invidious distinctions. Another university man, called upon to give the parable of the Good Samaritan, did so correctly enough until he came to the passage where the Samaritan said to the innkeeper: “When I come again I will repay thee,” to which he added, “This he said, knowing that he would see his face no more.” Perhaps, however, the examinee upon this occasion was a conscious humorist, and had in mind the worldly-wise saying, that there are a great many people willing to play the part of the Good Samaritan, less the oil and the twopence.
Something of the same stamp must have been the candidate for a degree, who, asked to state the substance of St. Paul’s sermon at Athens, said that it was “crying out for two hours, ‘Great is Diana of the Ephesians.’” With variations, that is the substance of a great many sermons, and of other discourses beside sermons.
Such stories as the above may or may not be rather broadly illustrative than strictly true, but in any case they can be pretty well matched by others, about the truthfulness of which there is no doubt. Every year a certain proportion of the children of the London board schools enter into a competitive examination in Scriptural knowledge, for the “Peek Prizes,” which consist of handsomely got-up Bibles and Testaments. They are “paper work” examinations, and the following are a few of the many curious “hash” answers that have at various times been put in at them.
“Abraham was the father of Lot, and ad tew wives. One was called Hishmale and tother Haggar, he kept wun at home, and he turned tother into the desert where she became a pillow of salt in the day time, and a pillow of fire by night.”
“Joseph wore a koat of many garments. He was chief butler to Faro and told is dreams. He married Potiffers dortor, and he led the Gypshans out of bondage to Kana in Gallilee, and there fell on his sword and died in sight of the promised land.”