When a boy has reached the age of eleven or twelve, another consideration presents itself which is a source of serious perplexity to parents. Shall he be educated at home—that is, attend school in his own city or town—or be sent to one of the boarding-schools or academies which are ready to open their doors to him and fit him for college? Here again we are met by the suggestion that the boarding-school of this type is not a native growth, but an exotic. England has supplied us with a precedent. The great boarding-schools, Rugby, Eton, and Harrow, are the resort of the gentlemen of England. Though termed public schools, they are class schools, reserved and intended for the education of only the highly respectable. The sons of the butcher, the baker, and candlestick-maker are not formally barred, but they are tacitly excluded. The pupils are the sons of the upper and well-to-do middle classes. A few boarding-schools for boys have been in existence here for many years, but in the last twenty there has been a notable increase in their number and importance. These, too, are essentially class schools, for though ostensibly open to everybody, the charges for tuition and living are beyond the means of parents with a small income. Most of them are schools of a religious denomination, though commonly a belief in the creed for which the institution stands is not made a formal requisite for admission. The most successful profess the Episcopalian faith, and in other essential respects are modelled deliberately on the English public schools.
The strongest argument for sending a boy to one of these schools is the fresh-air plea. Undeniably, the growing boy in a large city is at a disadvantage. He can rarely, if ever, obtain opportunities for healthful exercise and recreation equal to those afforded by a well-conducted boarding-school. He is likely to become a little man too early, or else to sit in the house because there is nowhere to play. At a boarding-school he will, under firm but gentle discipline, keep regular hours, eat simple food, and between study times be stimulated to cultivate athletic or other outdoor pursuits. It is not strange that parents should be attracted by the comparison, and decide that, on the whole, their boys will fare better away from home. Obviously the aristocratic mother will point out to her husband that his predilection for the public school system is answered by the fact that the State does not supply schools away from the city, where abundant fresh air and a famous foot-ball field are appurtenant to the institution. Tom Brown at Rugby recurs to them both, and they conclude that what has been good enough for generations of English boys will be best for their own son and heir.
On the other hand, have we Americans ever quite reconciled ourselves to, and sympathized with, the traditional attitude of English parents toward their sons as portrayed in veracious fiction? The day of parting comes; the mother, red-eyed from secret weeping, tries not to break down; the blubbering sisters throw their arms around the neck of the hero of the hour, and slip pen-wipers of their own precious making into his pockets; the father, abnormally stern to hide his emotion, says, bluffly, “Good-by, Tom; it’s time to be off, and we’ll see you again at Christmas.” And out goes Tom, a tender fledgeling, into the great world of the public school, and that is the last of home. His holidays arrive, but there is no more weeping. He is practically out of his parents’ lives, and the sweet influence of a good mother is exercised only through fairly regular correspondence. And Tom is said to be getting manly, and that the nonsense has nearly been knocked out of him. He has been bullied and has learned to bully; he has been a fag and is now a cock. Perhaps he is first scholar, if not a hero of the cricket or foot-ball field. Then off he goes to college, half a stranger to those who love him best.
This is fine and manly perhaps, in the Anglo-Saxon sense, but does it not seem just a little brutal? Are we well-to-do Americans prepared to give up to others, however exemplary, the conduct of our children’s lives? Granting that the American private boarding-school is a delightful institution, where bullying and fags and cocks are not known, can it ever take the place of home, or supply the stimulus to individual life which is exercised by wise parental love and precept? Of course, it is easier, in a certain sense, to send one’s boy to a select boarding-school, where the conditions are known to be highly satisfactory. It shifts the responsibility on to other shoulders, and yet leaves one who is not sensitive, in the pleasing frame of mind that the very best thing has been done for the young idea. In our busy American life—more feverish than that of our English kinsfolk whose institution we have copied—many doubtless are induced to seek this solution of a perplexing problem by the consciousness of their own lack of efficiency, and their own lack of leisure to provide a continuous home influence superior or equal to what can be supplied by headmasters and their assistants, who are both churchmen and athletes. Many, too, especially fathers, are firm believers in that other English doctrine, that most boys need to have the nonsense knocked out of them, and that the best means of accomplishing this result is to cut them loose from their mothers’ apron-strings.
It is to be borne in mind in this connection that the great English public schools are a national cult. That is, everybody above a certain class sends his sons to one of them. On the other hand, the private boarding-schools on this side of the water, fashioned after them, have thus far attracted the patronage of a very small element of the population. It is their misfortune, rather than their fault, that they are chiefly the resort of the sons of rich or fashionable people, and consequently are the most conspicuously class schools in the country. Doubtless the earnest men who conduct most of them regret that this is so, but it is one of the factors of the case which the American parent with sons must face at present. It may be that this is to be the type of school which is to become predominant here, and that, as in England, the nation will recognize it as a national force, even though here, as there, only the sons of the upper classes enjoy its advantages. That will depend partly on the extent to which we shall decide, as a society, to promote further class education. At present these schools are essentially private institutions. They are small; they do not, like our American colleges, offer scholarships, and thus invite the attendance of ambitious students without means. Moreover, they are almost universally conducted on a sectarian basis, or with a sectarian leaning, which is apt to proselytize, at least indirectly.
While those in charge of them indisputably strive to inculcate every virtue, the well-to-do American father must remember that his sons will associate intimately there with many boys whose parents belong to that frivolous class which is to-day chiefly absorbed in beautiful establishments, elaborate cookery, and the wholly material vanities of life, and are out of sympathy with, or are indifferent to, the earnest temper and views of that already large and intelligent portion of the community, which views with horror the development among us of an aristocracy of wealth, which apes and is striving to outdo the heartless inanities of the Old World. He must remember that a taste for luxury and sensuous, material aims, even though they be held in check by youthful devotion to the rites of the church, will prove no less disastrous, in the long run, to manhood and patriotism, than the lack of fresh air or a famous foot-ball field.
If, however, the American father chooses to keep his sons at home, he is bound to do all he can to overcome the physical disadvantages of city life. Fresh air and suitable exercise can be obtained in the suburbs of most cities by a little energy and co-operation on the part of parents. As an instance, in one or two of our leading cities, clubs of twelve to fifteen boys are sent out three or four afternoons a week under the charge of an older youth—usually a college or other student—who, without interfering with their liberty, supervises their sports, and sees that they are well occupied. On days when the weather is unsuitable for any kind of game, he will take them to museums, manufactories, or other places of interest in the vicinity. In this way some of the watchfulness and discipline which are constantly operative at a boarding-school, are exercised without injury to home ties. There is no doubt that, unless parents are vigilant and interest themselves unremittingly in providing necessary physical advantages, the boys in a crowded city are likely to be less healthy and vigorous in body, and perhaps in mind, than those educated at a first-class boarding-school. It may be, as our cities increase in size, and suburbs become more difficult of access, that the boarding-school will become more generally popular; but there is reason to believe that, before it is recognized as a national institution, sectarian religion will have ceased to control it, and it will be less imitative of England in its tone and social attitude. Until then, at least, many a parent will prefer to keep his boys at home.