Trafalgar School - Echoes Yearbook (Montreal, Quebec Canada)

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CONTRAST The boat slid away from a country Apparently lifeless and black; She crept from the harbour unlighted And silently turned on her track. No-one knew she departed. Save those within her on board. No lights in the harbour or city Betrayed ought to the foe far abroad; Though no lights shone out brightly And no visible life could be seen Though all seemed dead and forgotten, A fire glows through shutter and screen, A fire that ' ll burn forever. Kindled with hatred and love. Far brighter, far fiercer than either The moon or the stars up above. The boat drew into a country After fifteen days on the sea. Where hundreds of others were harboured, Where they hooted and whistled so free. Lights shone far up the river. Millions and millions all round. Which glimmered and flickered and twinkled With scarce a black space to be found. With yelling and hooting and screaming. We drew into the dock at New York; Amid hustle and bustle and shouting. We got away from the dock to walk. Along full, busy, brightly lit streets. And sky-scrapers dotted with lights — Here no shutter, thick curtain or screen Hid that life that hummed gaily at nights. Shelagii Forbes, Form Vb, Ross House. [23]

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THE FRENCH LYCEE OF LONDON I DO not think you can imagine anything more democratic, more international, more liberal and more interesting than a French Lycee in a foreign land and especially in London which is the largest city in the world. The history of this London Lycee is very simple. It was founded for Belgian refugees during the last Great War; then, after 1918, it moved to a big old building opposite the Victoria and Albert museum. A few years ago it was officially opened a few blocks down by our President Albert Lebrun. Now it has been evacuated to Cambridge because of the war. Do not think that one learns there the manners of court or delicate arts. Oh no! It is a place where one is taught to work and to associate with all kinds of people, boys and girls of every age, of every nationality, of every class and of every creed. Our only link with one another is that we all want to be active and to be guided by cultured French people. It has two other characteristics. There are there the most active and ablest teachers I have ever met (and I have been to six schools) and there is a great lack of discipline and manners: if one wants to learn, one learns as much as one likes because their (the teachers ' ) knowledge seems unlimited; if one wants to discipline oneself one does. The only basic rule is that one does not bother one ' s fellow student and if this rule is broken there will be trouble at once. It may be discussed whether this is a good or bad system; I think it is good because when one comes out in the world one does not have a guardian angel to guide one. The numerous different characters of the school range from the young countess aged three to the butcher ' s son who is trying to pass his junior exam before becoming a grocer. Meanwhile you will find the very well mannered English boy with an Oxford accent who is a little shocked by the bad language of some rougher students, the very intelligent Russian girl who loves mathematics, the ruffian who want to learn boxing and nothing else and the Mohommedan Siamese children called all three by nearly the same name, Komut, Kamut, Kumut. I must explain why these children come to our school. It is because the English speaking world educates its children in a totally different way from the European continentals; we have higher scholastic standards; you have wider general knowledge and are more particular about social standards. Our program was as follows. We worked everyday, at school, from nine to one o ' clock in the morning and from two to four in the afternoon. Then we have about two and a half hours of studying left. And what studying! We have to rack our brains out, but once we have found whatever we are looking for, we could write it on our paper from the bottom right hand corner if we wanted to so long as it was worth writing. The competition between the boys and girls was something extraordinary; the boys were rough but the girls were softer and each side tried to prove to the other that [24]