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WHITELANDS COLLEGE 215
In a village, a woman brought up in a refined home,
though devoid of brilliant gifts and lacking the support
of pnwerful friends, has been known in scores of instances
to have lifted the whole life of the locality: not by noisy,
pushful self-assertion, but by tact, by patience, by faith
and " love unfeigned." There has been much tall talk
since the war about the strength of the British Empire
lying in the character of the people, but it is not widely
perceived that the backbone of England has ever been
the breed of young men and women brought up in the
country.
If such, then, be the aspirations in the minds of patriots,
how far is such a college as Whitelands fulfilling them ?
I am fain to bear witness to what I found among the staff :
a zeal for things of permanent value, a steadfast affection
(or duty, which have built up a vigorous tradition of
loyalty for the institution and an esprit de corps, all the
more remarkable in presence of grave disabilities. Would
the local patriotism evoked by each of our great Public
Schools be what it is if the time of residence for each
boy were only two years ; if no notice were taken of the
institution by the rich and great in the land ; if the
destination of all the boys were to an occupation not yet
recognized nor duly upheld by the community, but still
'criticized from above and tolerated as a necessity of
modem times ? It is hard to exaggerate the difference
in equipment, in popular favour, in amenities, in superficial
attractiveness and glamour, between the venerable'
Public Schools and these modem, upstart, unromantic
seminaries of training. A College like Whitelands is
destitute of nearly all the advantages I have named. Yet
I make bold to say that, in spite of the difficulties it has
bad to contend with, most of which are a sorry credit to
the community, there is an unmistakable vitality about
the place which not only inspires warm affection and •
joyous loyalty, but kindles an unquenchable hope for the
future.
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