‘I fear you have led your child to think there is a question to be settled now as to which is the supreme authority. Of course, if this is so, it is much to be deplored; it is something like a conflict between father and mother before their child. We so earnestly wish that the home and school should be one in spirit. If this cannot be, it is best, as I have already said, that the child should be placed in another school.’
One letter to a parent on a matter of the same kind ended with this postscript: ‘Sometimes we cannot, and sometimes we ought not, to keep a promise made under a wrong impression. Consider Herod’s case.’
Parents who did not send their children back on the right day, or who kept them at home for insufficient reason, always heard from her. She would write thus:
‘Had I known how difficult it would be for —— to return, I should have advised her remaining here for her holiday’; or, ‘I know things are not considered so serious at a girls’ school as at a boys’ school, but no boy would be received back, I am sure, at one of our great public schools who had been absent without the leave of the Head-master.’
On the other hand, Miss Beale was always most anxious to support the authority and dignity of the parent. Once, when this seemed not to have been done by a teacher, she wrote: ‘She saw when I pointed it out how very wrong it was even to hint to a child that I thought her mother in the wrong.’ ‘She was never tired,’ ran a notice by an old pupil after her death, ‘of impressing upon the girls that home must come first in their affections. It was indeed pathetic to hear her speak, as she did almost weekly in her addresses to the assembled divisions, of the beauty of the relation of a child to its parents.’
It is impossible to do more than refer to the many letters which show the confidence and gratitude of the College parents, but, as an example, one from a father who held high official rank, on his daughter’s passing an examination in 1877, may be quoted, with its good wishes which were so entirely realised:—
‘Excuse my sending you one line of sincere thanks for your valuable (and inestimable, I may call it) friendship towards my dear daughter.
‘We were immensely pleased at her success, which we attribute entirely to the love of work instilled into her by your system at College generally, as well as by your personal influence. You not only obtain the respect and the devoted love and loyalty of your girls, but through them the admiration of their parents and all those who take an interest in their careers. I am sure few persons in the army of teachers are more highly esteemed than yourself, few for whom more hearty prayers are offered for a long, long life of usefulness.
‘We feel so proud of our [girl’s] success. With every good wish for the health and prosperity both of yourself and your glorious College,’ etc.
Lastly and supremely, it was through Miss Beale’s own personal influence upon her teachers, her clearly defined example always before them, that the spirit of the College came to be what it was. She had the gift of inspiration in that rare degree which makes actual direction of less value. She did not neglect details; she would indicate minor matters deserving of attention which others would overlook; she often quoted at a teachers’ meeting the example of the great general who, on taking over a command, first paid attention to the boots of his men. But it was never necessary for her to harp upon little things, or to go personally to see if her wishes had been carried out. One, who had had some years’ experience in teaching before she arrived at Cheltenham as a student, spoke with something like rapture of the College organisation as it appeared to her coming fresh from other places of education.