"I once chided a pupil, a little, pale, stupid boy—undersized and seemingly half-sick—for not being able to recite his very simple lesson. He looked up at me and said with a touch of spirit: 'Sir, why do you get angry with me? Do you not know I am doing the best I can?'"
One of the clergymen present asked Arnold how he punished the boy for his impudence.
And Arnold replied: "I did not punish him—he had properly punished me. I begged his pardon."
The idea of a teacher begging the pardon of a pupil was a brand-new thing.
Several clergymen present laughed—one scowled—two sneezed. But a Bishop, shortly after this, urged the name of Thomas Arnold as master of Rugby, and added to his recommendation this line: "If elected to the office he will change the methods of schoolteaching in every public school in England."
The ayes had it, and Arnold was called to Rugby. The salary was so-so, the pupils between two and three hundred in number—many were home on sick-leave—the Sixth Form was in charge.
The genius of Arnold was made manifest, almost as soon as he went to Rugby, by the way in which he managed the boys who bullied the whole school, and what is worse, did it legally.
Fagging was official.
The Sixth Form was composed of thirty boys who stood at the top, and these boys ran the school. They were boys who, by reason of their size, strength, aggressiveness and mental ability, got the markings that gave them this autocratic power. They were now immune from authority—they were free. In a year they would gravitate to the University.
We can hardly understand now how a bully could get markings through his bullying propensities; but a rudimentary survival of the idea may yet be seen in big football-players, who are given good marks, and very gentle mental massage in class. If the same scholars were small and skinny, they would certainly be plucked.