My Dear Mamma
I have not written to you for a long time because nothing worthy of mention has happened until the other day, when there was what you might call row, out of which, though I was there at the time, I prudently kept; as ill luck would have it, a certain dog came into the school yard just before 6 Bill or callover, so someone proposed to take it in there, which they did; of course this created a great noise and it was further increased by a great fat boy dragging the dog out by the paws, so the master waxing wroth said that there would be another bill at 7 o'clock; after this extra bill some of the boys waited outside and made a terrible noise and followed the master to his house calling out all sorts of abuse; the end of this was that after Dr Butler had finished reading out a list of prizes; he gave notice that the next holiday would be stopped, unless the boys who made the disturbance gave up their names to the head of the school before ten AM next day. I heard that before the evening 40 had given in their names but they have had no punishment as yet.
Radcliffe who sleeps in my room wants me to spend part of the Christmas holidays with him near Manchester where he lives, and where his father and brother have some very large cotton spinning mills and his uncle some iron works where he tells me they keep 3 locomotives to run about the premises; I should very much like to have him spend part of these next holidays with me; I am sure you would like him for he is gentlemanly in all his ways.
I have joined the rifle corps but cannot yet get my uniform but I will get it when I can.
I have been doing such good verses lately that my tutor is going to send me to Dr Butler that he may see them.
I am getting on with my swimming so well thet the other day I swam the length of the bath with ease. I have also learned to dive so that I may amuse myself fishing up stones from the deep water, but the other day in getting up a stone which was rather near the side I hit my knee against the brick and cut it.
I hope you are all well
I remain your affectionate son
Robert Story
P.S. I am as usual in a hurry to learn my lesson.
My Dear Mamma
I have ordered the clothes as you said but having got my double remove I had to order 2 tailcoats instead of the jacket; none of them have yet been made because the tailor has so much to do but on Monday he will have finished one of the coats. I shall get them nearly pulled off, as all the boys do when they first put on tails, but I do not care a pin. I have left off French and begun German which I think not bad because I have less of it to do and as all of those sort of things are done out of school it is a good thing; any work is of course much harder, I will tell you what I have to do this afternoon, which is a half holiday for those who have nothing to do. This morning "me miserum" I forgot to take my notebook to school, for which I must translate on paper 40 lines of Greek play, which is nothing! Then 12 verses to be shown up before dinner, then for tomorrow morning a map of St Paul’s 3rd missionary journey and at 2 o’clock to go to my master’s house to have some exercises corrected which he had no time to do before. One consolation is that I have done 8 verses, so I think I shall not do any more as I did not understand when they were set.
I have got a very nice alabaster clock with an alarum and I find it most useful for it has saved me from being late many a time.
I am very fortunate in my masters, for Mr Farer who takes the 4th 5th in which I now am, is a very nice master; he let me off at least half of the translation for forgetting my notebook.
I think Louisa will have to teach me to speak and pronounce German. I heard Miss whatever her name is talking about Louisa’s pronunciation of that word TAG - a day and the master here pronounces it like Louisa does.
Yesterday I went to "stinks" the natural science master who gave us an hour about magnetism, but he told us nothing wonderful and made no explosions or smells so I did not care much for it. He will soon I think begin about electro/magnetism which is very nice as I have been reading about it.
I remain your affectionate son
Robert Story
The wind is somethink hawful, it tuck me hoff my legs the hother day.
My Dear Mamma
I received your letter enclosing the order; I am much obliged to you for it; as for my Exeat, this term I can only take it on the 29th of this month, that is, I can start on the evening of the 29th which is a Friday and be back on the next Monday. This term is different from the last in this respect, that all the boys take their Exeat at the same time, unless for some special reason and even then their second one is stopped on the smallest pretence, very often for nothing.
I have been going in wholesale for singing, and I find that I have only lost two notes in my voice, and that I have gained some low ones; so that in reality my voice has only gone down a step. In our house I was chosen as one of the 6 best trebles to sing in the glees at the end of term, I used not unless I like but I think I shall for I like it very much and lastly and not least it takes up only half an hour on Saturday afternoon. I went to the first practice yesterday and found there only 6 trebles out of the school to sing against at least 20 tenors and Basses, so you may imagine that I and the rest had to open our mouths, and then I say why the organist is always trebble-hunting. Only one other of those in our house came and he had to take the alto part by himself!
I go to Dr Butler tomorrow, but I feel quite confident that I shall get through, if I do not I loose my Exeat.
Before I go for my Exeat I must have a letter of invitation from Uncle Neville to show Mr. Middlemist.
Mr. M makes me laugh more and more now that I am not afraid of him I can look at him and watch him; his favourite threat is "I’ll send ye up and have ye flugged" but he never carries it out. I have forgotten to tell you that we are all obliged to get football clothes, I have got mine, namely 2 jerseys and a cap with the house colours, 1 pair of white trousers, 1 pair of enormous boots and a leather belt. I have also got all my new clothes which are of fashionable make, that is the trousers tight at the knees and growing wider at the bottom; my waistcoat is double breasted and my necktie is a made up one like all the boys wear.
It is perishingly cold today though the sun is out and we have no fires, for "Old Bob" would not think of such a thing unless it was cold enough to half kill us.
The rifle corps has not drilled once this term and I have not thought about my uniform and very likely I shall not get it till next year for it would now be no use to me unless I went to the ranges.
Miss Wee and Polly ought to be smashed into good behaviour; I wish I was there to give Polly lessons in the noble art of obedience.
I remain your affectionate son
Robert Story
Mr. M. never has the audacity to threaten me.
Notes:
Uncle Nevile Reid lived at The Oaks, Hanworth
Miss Wee and Polly were Robert and Louisa’s ponies
My Dear Mamma
I found out yesterday that what I said about my exeat was a mistake; I can take it any time I like but I shall get a very short one if I do not take it on the 29th. If I take it on the 29th I can start from here on the Friday evening, but if I take it any other time, most likely I shall only be able to start on Saturday at 1 o’clock unless that Saturday is a holiday, and I think that I will not have the chance of going on a holiday for they will most likely be on Thursdays.
I was place 8th last week and I expect to be still higher this week. Before last week I had not been higher than 19th so I think I have made a good jump.
I hope to bring you over one or two very nice songs when I come home, for I am learning several very nice ones, amongst others a very pretty christmas carrol, none of those in our house seem to care for it however, because it is neither noisy nor comic; for very few of them care for anything else. I lost your letter this morning so that before I take my exeat I must have another invitation. Our sergeant has been using these new breech-loading rifles (the Henry-Martini) and with them he can fire 48 shots in 3 minutes and hit the target nearly every time at 200 yards. I was watching him from the school yard, which is nearly a mile off from the targets, partly with a telescope and partly without , and I never saw anything like the pace at which he shot, both lying on his back and kneeling. He said that the rifle was not a good one, and needed some alterations as there was a flaw in the barrel, so I dare say that if it was all right he could fire even faster.
I remain your affectionate son
Robert Story
Someone has just found your letter and given it to me: but Uncle N. has better send me an invitation all the same.