"Yes, rather. Go on!"
"He growled:—'Boy, do you consider roller-skating a Sunday pastime?' I, of course, looked a fool, and said, 'No, sir.' 'Well,' chuckled the old bird, 'I do: but I always make a point of respecting a man's religious scruples. I will therefore confiscate your skates.' And he did! He gave them back to me next day, though."
"I always remember him," says another, "the time I nearly got sacked. By rights I ought to have been, but I believe he got me off at the last moment. Anyhow, he called me into his study and told me I wasn't to go after all. He didn't jaw me, but said I could take an hour off school and go and telegraph home that things were all right. My people had been having a pretty bad time over it, I knew, and so did he. I was pretty near blubbing, but I held out. Then, just as I got to the door, he called me back. I turned round, rather in a funk that the jaw was coming after all. But he growled out:—
"'It's a bit late in the term. The exchequer may be low. Here is sixpence for the telegram.'
"This time I did blub. Not one man in a million would have thought of the sixpence. As a matter of fact, fourpence-halfpenny was all I had in the world."
And so on. His ears—especially his right ear—must be burning all day long.
Of course all Housemasters are not like this. If you want to hear about the other sort, take up The Lanchester Tradition, by Mr. G. F. Bradby, and make the acquaintance of Mr. Chowdler—an individual example of a great type run to seed. And there is Dirty Dick, in The Hill.