‘I have trusted you,’ the Professor went on, ‘from the very first. Bon sang ne peut mentir. Yet it was wise not to hurry matters. Your life, and my own life too, if that matters much, hang upon the success of my design. Nothing could have happened more opportunely than the Duchess’s proposal. Why? on the one hand, a sweet, charming, delightful girl; and on the other, a repulsive, bad-tempered old woman. While your blood is aflame with love and disgust, Lord Chester, I tell you this great secret. We have three months before us. We must use it, so that in less than two we shall be able to strike, and to strike hard. You are in my hands. We have, first, much to see and to learn.’
Their first halt was Windsor. Here, after ordering dinner, the Professor took her pupil to visit Eton. It was half-holiday, and the girls were out of school. Some were at the Debating Society’s rooms, where a political discussion was going on; some were strolling by the river under the grand old elms; some were reading novels in the shade; some were lying on the bank talking and laughing. It was a pleasant picture of happy school life.
‘Look at these buildings,’ said the Professor, taking up a position of vantage. ‘They were built by one of your ancestors, beautified by another, repaired and enlarged by another. This is the noblest of the old endowments—for boys.’
The Earl looked round him in wonder.
‘What would boys do with such a splendid place?’ he asked.
‘Have my lessons borne so little fruit that you should ask that question?’ The Professor looked disappointed. ‘My dear boy, they played in the playing-fields, they swam and rowed in the river, they studied in the school, they worshipped in the chapel. When it was resolved to divide the endowments, women naturally got the first choice, and they chose Eton. Afterwards the boys’ public schools fell gradually into decay, and bit by bit they were either closed or became appropriated by girls. There was once a famous school at a place called Rugby. That died. The Lady of the Manor, I believe, gradually absorbed the revenues. Harrow and Marlborough fell in, after a few years, for girls. You see, when once mothers realised the dangers of public school life for boys, they naturally left off sending them.’
‘Yes—I see—the danger that——’
‘That they would become masterful, Lord Chester, like yourself; that they would use their strength to recover their old supremacy; that they would discover’—here she sank her voice, although they were not within earshot of any one—‘that they would discover how strength of brain goes with strength of muscle.’
She led the young man back across the river to the Windsor side. On the way they passed an open gate; over the gate was written ‘Select school for young gentlemen.’ Within was a gymnasium, where a dozen boys were exercising on parallel bars swinging with ropes, and playing with clubs.
‘As for your education,’ said the Professor, ‘we have discovered that the best chance for the world is for a boy to be taught three things. He must learn religion—i.e. submission, and the culture of Perfect Womanhood; he must learn a trade of some kind, unless he belongs to the aristocracy, so as not to be necessarily dependent; and he must be made healthy, strong, and active. History will credit us with one thing, at least; we have improved the race.’