When the Bishop was rector of Whittington he was a most diligent teacher in the village school, going there from nine to ten almost every morning. He was also for some years a diocesan inspector of schools. He was, therefore, keenly alive to the numberless mistakes and misapprehensions of children, and recorded in his note-book a large number of absurd answers which he either heard himself or of which he was told by friends. A selection of these is given here.
In examining the schools of the deanery of Oswestry I once visited Selattyn school, and set four questions for the senior class to answer in writing. They were, (1) "What do you know about Tarsus?" (2) "Why did St. Paul go to Damascus?" (3) "What is the meaning of Asia in the New Testament?" (4) "What happened at Lystra?" The following is a copy of one paper sent in:
John Jones, 12 last birthday, a teacher in Selattyn. Tarsus was a man which could not walked from his mother womb and he used to go to the temple every day and St. Paul heal him St. Paul said to tartus I say unto thee arise so Tarsus sat up and leap and walked.
St. Paul went to Damascus to preach to the Gentiles. Asia means the place where they ended when they started from Antiock to Asia.
It happened at Lystra that the two seas met and the soldiers cut the ropes.
The Vicar of King Cross, Halifax, asked a class of boys what was the difference between a priest and a deacon, and one boy said the deacon only wore that thing over one shoulder. The Vicar asked why he did so, and after some hesitation another boy answered, "Because he hasn't put both shoulders to the wheel."
At Almondbury in 1897 a class of boys were asked the meaning of an Archangel, and one boy suggested "One of the angels that came out of the Ark."
The Rev. T. F. Dale, when in India teaching in his school, asked the boys what is the meaning of faith. A European boy answered, "When you believe something you are quite sure isn't true."
A lady was explaining to a class the passage "Not with eye-service as men-pleasers," and asked the children if they knew what eye-service meant. One girl suggested, "service in 'igh families."
Mr. B—— of Stamford, in a Teachers' Meeting, urged his Sunday School teachers not to take it for granted that their scholars knew the meaning of words, and illustrated his caution by the word "Epiphany," telling them that they should always explain that it meant "manifestation." Shortly afterwards the diocesan inspector was examining the day school and accidentally asked what "Epiphany" meant. One little girl said, "A railway porter, sir." The inspector asking what made her think that. She said her teacher had told her it meant the "man at the station."