Benbow and Illingworth have each written to me and I find that I treasure letters from boys above all others. Where other men of my age fall in love with girls I suppose I give my affections to those boys who show promise in English and take advantage of the seclusion of my rooms to come and pour out their petty worries and ask for advice.
I have been reading somewhere of late that it is a dreadful thing for a man with any brains to live always in the society of others less mature than himself: he becomes didactic and in every way obnoxious: I know that Charles Lamb was not alone in flying from the presence of all schoolmasters: there is a distinctly noticeable trait in us, as a profession, which makes us want to teach and advise, to lay down the law: it is a habit against which I must most carefully guard.
On the other hand, always being with crowds of healthy youngsters certainly tends to keep a man young: there are very few responsibilities, I am catered for, I pay no rates or taxes, I have £150 a year to spend on books, clothes, travel, and any other incidental expenses I like: I have longer holidays than any other professional man: for four months in the year I am free to do whatever I like.
Of course I shall never be able to marry, never have sons and daughters of my own. But then, as I never see a girl of my own class at Radchester, I am never likely to want to settle down to domestic life. After all, instead of one wife and a few children, I have three or four hundred children of the most fascinating ages: I stand in loco parentis to countless numbers.
I don't feel that I want to become rich: I am willing to forgo all the ordinary ambitions if I may have a more or less free hand in education, and at last realize my many ideals about the training of youth.
It seemed unduly lonely at home during Christmas week compared with the noisy cheeriness of school. For the first time in my life I am beginning to feel quite bored with life at Darley. I long for the games, the chatter, my form, my books, yes, even for Common Room, with an aching heart. I hope the rest of the holidays will pass more quickly than these last ten days. I take no pleasure in bridge-parties or tea-fights: my only solace is to write reams of nonsense to Illingworth and Benbow, and to read all that I can lay my hands on which bears on the million or so theories of education.
[II]
January 20, 1910