Havergal College - Magazine Yearbook (Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada)

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Havergal College Magazine or cousins might walk up and down together. When a boy wanted his sister he had to stand at the top of the Flags and wait; sometimes there would be quite a little crowd standing, and the sisters would then go and join them ; or it might be the sister who had to wait fo r her brother at the corner of the green. Games were entered into keenly; we played cricket and tennis and croquet in the summer, and hockey and chivey (prisoner ' s base) in the winter. The playgrounds were very large, there were two of them besides the green and the ash tennis courts. The boys had their own playground and fields for cricket and football. When I was at Ackworth we had a fine open-air swimming bath, but we were never allowed to stay long in the water, as it was usually chilly until the end of June, when we went home for the holidays. As a result the standard of swimming was a poor one. I recollect well one day in our half-hour ' s recess going down to the bath with the only four other girls who could swim and we all five, one by one, attempted and succeeded in swimming the width ! We each received s ixpence, as a prize ! Since then the bath has been covered in and swimming and life saving and diving have gone forward wonderfully, and I have pleasure in recording the fact that within the last three years Ackworth has been awarded the Hundred Guinea Gold Cup offered by the Roj al National Life Saving Institution, in open competition over the two hundred other schools which entered for it. A number of visitors used to come to the school during the course of the year, some of them came frequently and we got to know them and to look forward to their coming. One old man in especial we used to find most entertaining. He was tall and had a very long snow-white beard. His hobby was elocution. He used to come into all the classes and give us demonstrations and then we had to try the passages after him. Out of school hours he would sometimes suddenly appear from nowhere, armed with a huge basket of oranges or apples ; when a crowd had collected he would say, Any girl who catches can have, and then he used to throw the fruit high into the air. Very often he recited to the whole school in the lecture room. Pieces after the style of Peter Piper had a fascination for him, he used to get the headmaster to time him and he always tried to beat his own record. There was one piece that began something like this, There were two boot-blacks, a white boot-black and a black boot-black. And the white boot-black said to the black boot-black, ' Black these boots black! ' And the black boot-black said ' No ! ' and blacked the face of the white boot-black. Another piece depicted the alarm of some ladies when a mouse ran across the floor. The old man used to have 22

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Havergal College Magazine no speaking was allowed in the dormitories after we went up- stairs to bed. Anyone turning round to look at the clock in service on Sunday was severely taken to task. And no one might go upstairs during the day without leave. Quite often during meals, when we had been too noisy, we were condemned to spend the rest of the meal in entire silence. In byegone days it had been the custom for no speaking to be allowed at any meal. Certain traditions, relics of this age, reached down to my time in the shape of peculiar signs that were made instead of asking for the various things upon the table. When we were put under the silence rule we all resorted to these signs : the three middle fingers placed on the table meant, Please pass the milk, the little finger indicated the need of salt, all five fiingers water, and so on. The diet was exceedingly wholesome and exceedingly plain. For breakfast we had milk and bread, the only possible vari- ation was in the milk ; we could have it either hot or cold. Whichever we chose we had to drink half a mugfull — we had large mugs without handles — and in order to show that we really had no milk left in the bottom of the mug we had to turn it upside down on our plates. Twice a week we had porridge for breakfast. Dinner consisted of two courses, some sort of meat and vegetables and puddings or pies. Tea was like break- fast, milk and bread, but on Sundays we had a piece of cake each, and on the two half-holidays we had extras, butter or cheese or jam and tea, coffee or cocoa. On Friday nights we were allowed to have our own jam which we brought with us from home. The extreme plainness of the fare has been done away with by now, indeed the change began at the end of my time, when the sixty eldest girls had tea and bread and butter every evening. But in spite, or perhaps because, of the great simplicity of life, we were gloriously happy. The school was built of grey stone round three sides of a square. The west wing was the girls ' , the east wing the boys ' , and the centre contained the library and other public rooms and the Headmaster ' s quarters. Stretching between the two wings was the boys ' playground and the girls ' green. On the boys ' wing straight opposite to us was a large clock surmounted by a weather vane in the shape of a lamb. This clock regu- lated the time for the school and for the whole village. One of the jokes to have over a new child was to announce that when the clock struck twelve at midnight the lamb came down and grazed on the green. Quite true, doubtless, only the clock was one which never struck any hour at all ! A narrow strip of flagged pavement separated the boys ' playground from the green. This was neutral ground and was known as The Flags, and on the Flags brothers and sisters 21

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Havergal College Magazine several chairs on the platform for this piece and he played the part of each lady in turn, screaming and jumping on chairs and doing all the things that a lady is supposed to do on the ap- proach of a mouse. A certain dear old visitor, Hannah Cadbury, was a great favorite. She was little and plump and pink-cheeked, and she wore eye-glasses attached by a cord ; she laughed constantly, and every time off would drop her glasses ! We liked her to come round the classes and we liked to show her our work, because she invariably aside, Very nice, dear, very nice, to all and sundry. It is a far cry from Winnipeg, The Queen of the Prairie, to the quiet little Ackworth village. But if any Havergalian ever finds herself in Yorkshire and visits the school, she will be able to see for herself the same old gray stone buildings, and the splendid playing fields, and will further realise the place that Ackworth must hold in the hearts of all who know her. G. M. S. A BURIED TREASURE. Among the treasures of Havergal is a calf-bound volume which looks like an office ledger, or a complete English Dic- tionary. Its title, Baker ' s Chronicle, is not very illuminat- ing, its cover is not attractive, and its size is most certainly against it, but anybody whose courage or curiosity is sufficient to carry them beyond dull brown leather and faded red edges, will be rewarded by much that is interesting and, indeed, by much that is entertaining within. The book came to us three years ago — the gift of Mr. G. W. Baker, whose ancestor was the author of the Chronicle, and such has been our respect for its age and worth that it has ever since been carefully preserved among volumes of cor- responding size, bulk and apparent dullness, on the bookshelves of the Staff Sitting Room. It is not a book that can be easily circulated, and it is too valuable to trust to what might possibly be careless hands, and this may account for the seclusion in which it has lived so long. At the same time it is worthy of much more attention than it now receives ; hence — this article. There are few books that we do not like the better for knowing something of the authors, and of the circumstances under which they wrote. The story of Sir Richard Baker is somewhat pathetic (though Sir Richard might resent our pity!). He was born in Kent in the days of Queen Elizabeth, probably in 1568, and in due time went up to Oxford. There he shared rooms with Sir Henry Wootton, whom we know as the author of two charming little poems included in our Golden Treasury. 23