Gerald Eversley's Friendship: A Study in Real Life

by J. E. C. Welldon

‘I say, Arbuthnot,’ cried a little red-haired boy named Thornton, who had been watching the two new boys as they rounded the corner of the passage leading from the boys’ entrance of the boarding house into the street, ‘here’s a new chap come who has got “stick-ups” and a jacket.’

Thornton, as having been exactly one term in the school, had arrogated to himself the position of an authority upon scholastic etiquette. Seniority soon confers authority at a public school. It may be necessary to explain that the social solecism of which Gerald Eversley was thus pronounced to be guilty consisted in wearing the ‘stick-up’ collars which are at St. Anselm’s the traditional accompaniments of a tailcoat, instead of the smooth flat-lying collars—sometimes known as the Eton collars—with a jacket. His costume had thus become a curious blending of the dress of the senior and the junior boys at St. Anselm’s. It offended the sentiments of both classes of boys.

Arbuthnot opened his eyes in astonishment. It seemed impossible to believe that any boy, however ‘green,’ would be ignorant of the immemorial laws of dress at St. Anselm’s.

‘No,’ he said; ‘that’s too rich.’

‘I swear he is though,’ was Thornton’s reply; ‘he’s just come out of Brandiston’s study. I wonder what the old ’un said to him.’

The impeachment of Gerald Eversley’s costume was unfortunately true. Mr. Eversley, knowing nothing of public schools, had not imagined that it could matter what kind of collars a boy in jackets might wear.

‘Well, he must be a “green,”’ said Arbuthnot.

‘I believe you,’ answered Thornton. ‘I took a wink at him this morning in Hall, and, my eye, if he hadn’t been blubbing all night! We’ll have some fun out of him when the fag-spotting’s over.’

It was the humane and merciful rule of Mr. Brandiston’s house that a new boy might not be molested or persecuted by impertinent interrogations until twenty-four hours after his entering the house. The reason of it was that on the evening of the second day of the term all the boys liable to fagging (including, of course, all the new boys) were divided by a long-established principle of selection among the Sixth Form, and after that time, but not before, a new boy was felt to possess a natural patron or protector, and therefore to be a legitimate victim for the shafts of his natural enemies.

The ceremony of choosing the fags, or, as it was technically designated, ‘fag-spotting,’ deserves something more than a passing notice. It was a strange and almost barbarous ceremony. In some respects the nearest parallel to it may be said to have been the sale of slave girls in the market at Constantinople. The fags, or rather the boys liable to fagging, were marshalled after supper at one end of the Hall, and the Sixth Form boys stood at the other. Between them, seated at the different tables and turning their faces now to one end of the Hall and now to the other, according as they were interested in the deliberations of the Sixth Form or in the behaviour of the various candidates for their favour, were the mass of boys in the house, who had risen, by seniority or by position in the school, above the obligation of fagging, but were still below, and some of them much below, the dignity of the Sixth Form who were alone entitled to choose or ‘spot’ fags. These boys constituted what may perhaps be called a neutral or buffer state between the fagmasters and their fags. The Sixth Form boys chose fags in turn according to an order of precedence which depended upon their rank in the school, and the choice might be made either by calling a boy’s name, or, if his name were not known, by walking up to him and laying a hand upon his shoulder. When every Sixth Form boy had chosen a fag, the choice began over again, and so continued until the number of the fags was exhausted, every one of them having now received his fagmaster. It was open to any Sixth Form boy to inspect these candidates (if they may be so called) for the privilege of waiting upon him, for cleanliness was a recommendation in a fag as well as attractiveness of appearance or alacrity, and it would happen not unfrequently that one Sixth Form boy, acting the part of the Præpostor Immundorum or Præpostor of the Dirty Boys in the ancient days of English public school life, would cause a boy, whom he thought of choosing, to hold out his hands amidst the critical applause and laughter of his schoolfellows. With the fags it was a point of honour to be chosen early. Happy indeed was he who was so fortunate as to obtain the suffrage of the head of the house. Sometimes a fag was chosen on grounds of personal friendship, or of domestic interest, if a Sixth Form boy ‘knew him at home’ or had been specially asked to select him as a fag; but in general the choice was determined by the superficial merits or demerits of the fags themselves.