“You must forgive my meddling in your affairs, and accept the fact that I am, in some sense, an old family friend, as my excuse for offering you a word of advice. I knew your father before you were born, and as a young man I often dined at your grandfather’s table. This gives me a kind of right to make a suggestion which I have no doubt you will take in good part. Three young people, who as students in this college are more or less under my charge, have got into a scrape which might very well be serious but which, I hope, will turn out in the end to be merely ridiculous. They have printed and published a small magazine in which no less than twenty-one of the Irish bishops are fiercely attacked.
“It is only fair to say that they have been actuated by no sectarian spirit. They are equally severe on Protestant and Roman Catholic ecclesiastics. The publication was at once brought under my notice, and I could do nothing else but send for the delinquents. Nothing could have been more praiseworthy than their candour. They gave me an account of the purpose of their society—they have formed a society—which showed that their objects were not in any way vicious, although the means they adopted for furthering them were highly culpable. I spoke to them strongly, very strongly indeed, and I trust made some impression on them. At the same time I must confess that one of them, Miss Lalage Beresford, displayed the greatest determination and absolutely declined to give me a promise that the publication of the magazine would be discontinued, except on conditions which I could not possibly consider. You will recognize at once that for Miss Lalage’s own sake, as well as for the sake of college discipline, I cannot have any further publication of the Anti-Tommy-Rot Gazette.
“At the same time I am unwilling to proceed to extremities against her or either of the others. They are all young and will learn sense in due time. It occurs to me that perhaps the simplest way out of the difficulty will be for you to withdraw the guarantee of financial assistance which, as I understand, you have given. If you are prepared to support me in this way I may safely promise that no further notice of the absurd publication will be taken by the college authorities. There are rumours of libel actions pending, but I think we may disregard them. No damages can be obtained from you beyond the amount of your original guarantee, which, I understand, did not amount to more than £30. All the other defendants are minors, dependent entirely on their parents for their support, so the aggrieved parties will probably not proceed far with their action. If you agree to stop supplies and so prevent the possibility of further publication, I shall use my influence to have the whole affair hushed up.”
There remained only the fifth letter; the second of those which bore a typewritten address. I opened it and found that it came from Lalage. She wrote:
“We have only been able, to hire this typewriter for one week so I’m practising hard at it. That is why I’m typing this letter. Please excuse mistakes.”
There were a good many mistakes but I excused them.
“Your copy of the Anti-Tommy-Rot Gazette went to you first thing. Hilda nearly forgot to post it, but didn’t quite, which was lucky, for all the rest were seized from us, except nine, which Selby-Harrison gave to a news agent, who sold them but didn’t pay us, though he may yet. Hard Luck, I call that. Don’t you? Some ass sent a copy, marked, to the Prov. and the next thing we knew was that both offices were raided by college porters and our property stolen by force. We were furious, but before we could take any action—we were going to consult a lawyer, a K.C., whose son happens to be a friend of Selby-Harrison’s on account of being captain of Trinity 3rd A (hockey), in which Selby-Harrison plays halfback—our doom was upon us and Selby-Harrison was sent for by the Prov. He came back shattered, like that telescope man who got caught by the Inquisition, having spent hours on the rack and nearly had his face eaten off as well. Our turn came next. We (Hilda and I) had just time to dart off on top of a tram to Trinity Hall (that’s where we have our rooms), you know, of course, and jump into our best frocks before 1 P.M., the hour of our summons to the august presence. Hilda’s is a tussore silk, frightfully sweet, and I had a blouse with a lot of Carrickmacross lace on it.
“Hilda was in a pea-blue funk when it came to the moment and kept pulling at her left glove until she tore the button off. I was a bit jellyfishy myself down the back; but I needn’t have been. The minute I got into the room I could see that the old Prov. was a perfect pet and didn’t really mean anything, though he tried to look as if he did.”
I have always disliked the modern system of co-education and after reading Lalage’s letter I was strongly inclined to agree with the bishop who wants to stamp it out, beginning with the infant schools. I do not agree with his reasoning. My objection—it applies particularly to the admission of grown-up young women to universities—is that even-handed justice is never administered. The girls get off cheap. Some day, perhaps, we shall have a lady presiding as provost over one of our great universities. Then the inequalities of our present arrangements will be balanced by others. The Lalages and Hildas of those days will spend hours upon the rack. If they are fools enough to jump into tussore frocks and blouses with Carrickmacross lace on them before being admitted to the august presence, they will have their faces eaten off as well. On the other hand, the Selby-Harrisons, if reasonably good-looking young men, will find the Prov. a perfect pet, who doesn’t really mean anything; who, perhaps, will not even try to look as if she does.
“He jawed a lot, of course, but we did not mind that a bit; at least I didn’t, for I knew he only did it because he had to. In the end he asked us to promise not to annoy bishops any more. Hilda promised. Rather base of her, I call it; but by that time she had dragged the second button off her glove and would have promised simply anything. I stuck on and said I wouldn’t. He seemed a bit put out, and he’d been such a dear about the whole thing that I hated having to refuse him. You know the sort of way you feel when somebody, that you want frightfully to do things for, will clamour on for what you know is wrong. That’s the way I was and at last I couldn’t stand it any more, so I said I’d promise on condition that the bishops all undertook not to say any more silly things except in church. That was as far as I could well go and I thought the Prov. would have jumped at the offer. Instead of which he first scowled in a very peculiar way and then his face all wrinkled up and got quite red so that I thought he was going to get some kind of fit. Without saying another word he in a sort of way hustled us out of the room. That was the only really rude thing he did to us; but Selby-Harrison sticks to it that he was perfectly awful to him. We don’t quite know what will happen next, but both the other two think that we’d better not have the college porters arrested for stealing the magazines. I’d like to, but, of course, they are two to one. Selby-Harrison is looking like a sick turkey and is constantly sighing. He says he thinks he’ll have to be a doctor now. He had meant to go into the Divinity School and be ordained but after what the Provost said to him he doesn’t see how he can. Rather rough luck on him, having to fall back on the medical; but I don’t think he’ll mind much in the end, except that he doubts whether his father can afford the fees. That will be a difficulty, if true.”