The requirements of boys not intended for the Universities will be specially kept in view, including the case of those who are candidates for Woolwich or the Indian Civil Service. It is hoped that this provision may obviate the supposed necessity for removing boys to a private tutor’s precisely at an age when the influences of public school life are most powerful and most salutary.
Except for purposes of instruction there will be no distinction whatever between boys on the Modern Side and boys on the Classical Side.
No boy will, for the present, be admitted to the Modern Side unless he has been in the school for at least a year, and has hitherto shown diligence and made fair progress.
The nature of the instruction in the “Army Class” at Eton is described by the Head-Master (Rev. Dr. Hornly) as follows:
The Army Class was established by Dr. Goodrich in the year 1858. It was established in order to give Eton boys greater facilities for preparing certain subjects which were required in the army examinations, and to obviate the supposed necessity of giving Eton boys a special preparation, elsewhere than at Eton, in order to fit them for the army examinations.
At first fortification and military drawing were included in the course, and a considerable proportion of the ordinary school work (e.g., Latin verse writing) was remitted.
This was not found to answer. The course included more than was necessary for the ordinary army examination, and not enough for the higher examinations at Woolwich. There seemed to be a danger of the class becoming a sort of refuge for the idlest boys in the school.
Dr. Goodford subsequently altered all this, and placed the class upon its present footing, which is as follows:
Two lessons a week (repetition lessons) are remitted to make time for lessons in modern history. English essays, or abstracts of what has been taught in school, are written by the boys out of school (one exercise a week), and carefully looked over. No other part of the ordinary school work (except the two repetition lessons) is given up. Boys cannot join the class till they are 16 years of age. They are expected to stay at Eton till the time comes for their examination. The class consists at present of 28 boys, with an average of 25.
The class has certainly been successful. No boy going up from Eton has failed yet in the army examination since the reconstitution of the class of which I have spoken. I think the class has done good in the school.