TIIE
PETERITE. Vol . . \II .
NOVEMBER, 1S92 .
No . rot.
AUTUMN. 110 could not write an essay on Autumn? Who does not know that it is the ",season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, " and all that sort of thing ? Who could not tell with half an eye, by looking out of my window at this moment, that the bounteous Sun is straying from Libra into Scorpio, which being interpreted means that it is neither Spring, Summer, nor Winter, but the jocund Autumn . For what would he see? To him, looking eagerly forth upon the bosom of the fruirfui earth, would appear imprimis at this early hour of 4 .30 p .m. a grey-blue air with a sky like cold gravy, shortly to disappear before Tartarean darkness . No voice of bird, not even the dulcet peacock breaks the silence, except at intervals when . . Beelzebub doth prompt an ass to pour his sorrows on the evening air . " There falls a tine drizzle, the atmosphere is such as to tip your nose with cold, and the general effect produced is that, no matter what Keats said in his ode, or Keble in his on the Redbreast's song amid the calm decay, " we, the scribe, love better the days when the snoring fire chortles on the hearth, and the godlike footballer sports upon the green . And because man is made to mourn, there comes to us a memory of days wherein the form divine of the cricketer added poetry to the prosaic Yorkshire landscape, when the bireme flashed past Marygate, and of days of more or less ethereal mildness called by mortals—Spring. And to us it seems that we like the downright seasons better than your one horse undecided ones .
W
2 94
AUTUMN.
To everything there is a season, and though, as we most sapiently remarked before, " man is made to mourn," we cannot disguise the fact that there are even in Autumn times from which he may extract mirth and laughter . The consideration of many things is not untempered with joy, and firstly let us consider the being of him who plays at the barbarous and unchristian sport of football . The Autumn is the time for him . Summer is too hot, Winter is too cold, and oft-times with frosts and snows it makes the gentle footballer sit within, feeling his biceps with a hand that grows daily flabbier to an accompaniment of strange oaths that ever wax more guttural and evil sounding . But in the Autumn he is glad, for the soft earth receives him unharmed to her breast, and the winds have not attained the force necessary to screw his drops to the side instead of over the cross-bar . Now comes the guileless day-boy in his hundreds to the field, and now is the tmparisyllable in knees" fitted for the fray, and he of the spondaic feet taught how best to use them in the scrimmage . Now daily throng from Gillygate, Walmgate, and whatsoever gate there be, the gilded youth of York, not unaccompanied by the women and children, the sweethearts and wives of the same, to the York Ground, clamouring to be allowed to pay threepence each for the privilege of seeing the York Nippers play York Bounders, or the Ebor United Grocers oppose the White Rose Amalgamated Dustmen in the manly and ennobling sport of which we speak. There are, however, in this vale of tears, men whose eptderm is so thick, and whose mental temperament so crass, that they', like Gallio, care for bone of these things . Moreover, should you speak to tucm of football they look sad and squirm, and try to lead the conversation to other regions, such as bi-metallism, or the choice of books, or the place of Tennyson in the poets of the world, but you must understand please that we know and care nothing about football . Such men love the Autumn . Its inherent sadness agrees well with a bilious temperament, and its calm decay goes well with brooding and philosophy. Long walks, at least not too long, but just long enough, because in every mile you add, you hear thirteen additional performances of Boom-de-ay . Walks, therefore, with " rapt soul sitting in the eyes and looks commercing with the skies, " more jump with their liking than
AUTUMN .
295
the sight of heroic Grocers grovelling under hordes of high souled Dustmen, or even of other sports more taking to the general eye. Books, music, culture, all good enough too in their way, but given to pall on the ordinary Philistine, who takes it that he has enough thereof when he has wearied his legs and arms by running and straining over the surface of the earth, such are their delights. We, the Philistines, love the days of Autumn, for that they completely throw out of work the gentlemen who in the smiling days of Summer sit and say, " We have nothing to do, and we are doing it. The day is passing splendidly, and it will soon be dinner-time . " The Autumn, or what an esteemed contemporary would call meteorological considerations" prevent this . You cannot lie on the grass with a book when it is raining, and if you went to-morrow to the Baths the minions at Marygate would be justified in indicating the path to the N .R .A . And here comes in the blessedness of Autumn, for the fires are not universally lighted over which he may sit, and the slacker must turn out and play football, where, slack he never so acutely, he gets some exercise into his bloated and over-fed person. For ourselves, in this season of the year we do not feel as happy as in others . Yet we are not wanting in the grace of humility when we say we are quite as desirable now as at other times . Our heart sings within us, and we are become as one to whom the world is a smiling vale of brotherhood, and class distinctions as though they were not . Yet, za tihi ridenli . hnow we not well that as we go out of this room there will be drips falling from off the roof, one of which from pure spite will go down our devoted back, that an icy breeze will sweep round and clip us by our aquiline nose, so as to cause discomfort and strange oaths, and that we shall find dead leaves everywhere? These are the uses of the Autumn, and they but serve, apropos of our present case, to accentuate the saying of the poet " Peace, to make it stick at all Must be druv in with bagnits ."
Often do we think of Autumn when each day we lie in bed and are roused from hard earned slumber by the sounding brass of Lucifer Bootboy . Each day we mark the lessening light and the growing darkness ; each day the struggle waxes harder, and each day we come
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AUTUMN.
nearer to missing the time for getting up . This is entirely due to its being Autumn . If it were decent Summer it would be light and all would be well ; if it were Winter it would be pitch dark and the gas would be lighted . But being Autumn it is neither one thing nor the other, and we struggle through our washing and dressing, come down in slippers instead of boots, and forget to brush our hair, and some of us to shave, all because it is Autmn. Now let us speak last of a worthy race of men, nay a royal race, a race of kings of the earth, of princes of the pen, the tribe whom the unfeeling world rewards rather with its kicks than with its shekels, and mentions with up-curled lip and supercilious glance as frauds who cumber the earth and give no pleasure to any, nor are ever known to do good in this world . And these princes, of whom men blaspheme and call them Fitz-Belial, and other encouraging titles, are known to the callous outer world as " Editors ." And, as we say, these Edit ores find pleasure in wickedness, and live a life which is one accumulated mistake, and though they are human, yet should they, goaded thereto by one who taunts them with forgetting this or misrepresenting that. " reach for a stake to open him," the sympathies of the world are with the aggressor . And on these devoted, but much misconstrued tribe. descends the Autumn with cruel and unsparing hand . They must deliver the tale of bricks, and publish a certain number of Peta•ites, and though all men know it is the slack time . and there is nothing to publish but football, yet they swear, and the Editor must bow down and kiss him who says his production is " skittles, " though it has been produced literally in the sweat of his brow, and at the cost of gallons of midnight oil . Even Editors have nerves, and it was such an one that I saw once, when a correspondent called an article of his " Treacle," retire beneath a blasted pine overlooking a tarn of glassy black water, and after making preparations to leave his paper Editorless, think better of it and determine to live . Yet he shed abundant tears—I looked twice to make sure, seeing he was an Editor, and I bitterly thought of the Autumn . And now when comes the mellow season when the Play has not begun, when Sports are not, when Boating is off, when Football alone is on, and he that should contribute rejoices in his bed, then in the sad and weary Autumn do I think of my guide, philosopher and friend dwelling alone and
O .P. CLUB RULES .
309
III.
The objects of the Club shall be (a) to unite past members of the School, and (b) to keep up a lively interest in its welfare in all past members.
IV.
For these objects the Club shall (a) hold the Old Peterite Dinners, (b) organize either alone or in conjunction with any club belonging to St . Peter ' s or any other School, tours and teams for playing Football, Cricket, or other games, and for competing at any of the principal regattas in England.
V . For the purposes of Rule iv . the Treasurer may out of the Funds pay such sums of money as may be determined in General meeting. VI.
The Treasurer may on behalf of the Club subscribe out of the Funds such sums of money to such charitable and other institutions as may be determined in General meeting.
VII.
The officers shall be President, Vice-Presidents, Head Secretary and Treasurer, and Secretaries for districts determined by Committee and General meetings ; the committee shall consist of the above and all other members of the Sub-Committees of Rule viii . and six others, with power to add to their number, two of such six shall retire annually by rotation, but shall be eligible for re-election.
VIII.
At the annual General meeting two Sub-Committees for the ensuing year shall be elected,—the Sports Committee and the Dinner Committee, consisting each of three members of the Club . The Sports Committee may organize teams for tours or matches, and provide a crew and boat for regattas ; the Dinner Committee shall make all arrangements for the Old Peterite Dinners.
IX.
A Committee meeting and a General meeting shall be held annually in York on the second day of the School Theatricals, and at such other times as the President shall consider necessary. A week's previous notice of all business to be transacted shall be given.
X . For Committee meetings, three shall form a quorum ; for general meetings, ten .
NOTES AND ITEMS.
310
XI. XII.
A copy of the rules, together with a list of Officers and Members shall be supplied annually to each member. The Accounts shall be audited and published annually . Two Auditors shall be appointed, one by and on behalf of the editors of the School Magazine, the other by and on behalf of the Committee.
XIII.
The Club colours shall be dark blue, light blue, chocolate and white.
XIV.
The Committee shall have power to add or to alter the existing rules subject to the approval of the next General meeting.
NOTES AND ITEMS. MARRIAGES. . Cuthbert's Church, Bensham, Gateshead, T . L. August 4, at St Shann, to Lucy F ., daughter of J . Watson, Esq ., of Gateshead. September 6, at Holy Trinity Church, Huddersfield, the Rev . Hector Macturk, to Ella, second daughter of D . Mackay, Esq ., of Donegal. October 4, at 52, Esplanade, Greenock, J. Arthur Jackson, to Hamilton Agnes, daughter of J . M . Hill, Esq., of Greenock.
The following O .P .'s have been playing : — F . Mitchell, for Sussex County (Rugby and Association) ; N . L. Hood, for St. Thomas' Hospital ; S . O . Bingham, for St . Thomas' Hospital v . Old Leysians ; C . J . N . Carter, for Ealing ; F . R . Brandt, for East Sheen v. London Welsh, The Rev . C . B . Clarke sailed on October 14th for Calcutta, to work for the Church Missionary Society. G . W. Clarke passed in the Senior Division of the Oxford Local .
NOTES AND ITEMS .
31I
A . M . Daniel proceeded to the degrees of M .A. and M .B . on October 27. Alan Gray, Mus . Doc., appointed organist at Trinity College, Cambridge ; at the recent Leeds Festival Dr . Gray's Cantata " Arethusa " was one of the few novelties. A . I . Hopkins ordained Deacon at York Minster on September 25th, and licensed to the curacy of Cottmgham. C . L . Naylor appointed organist at St . Peter's Church, Harrogate. R. S . Roy obtained a Naval Cadetship. The Dunelmian-Peterite Football Matches have been arranged as follows : January 4 .—V . Hartlepool Rovers. 5 .-v Sunderland. 6 .—v . York. The match Past v . Present has been fixed for Tuesday, December loth. The Old Boys Dinner will be held on the same day. The Annual General Meeting of the O .P . Club will be held at the School on Monday, December 19th, at 5 p .m. The nights fixed for the Play are Saturday, December 17th, and Monday, December 19th. The last two numbers of the Peterite, Nos . 99 and loo, were published in July and September. During the temporary absence of Mr . Burton, his work was taken by Mr. H . F. Nesbitt, B .A ., Clare College, Cambridge. Those who wish to play in the Old Boys match must send their names to K . E. T . Wilkinson, Caius College, Cambridge. In the September number of the Contemporary Review, in an article entitled "Edward `'I . : Spoiler of Schools . " Mr . A . F . Leach, who visited the School on behalf of the Charity Commissioners, refers to us as one of the most ancient schools in the kingdom .
312
NOTES AND ITEMS.
In the November number of the Fortnightly Review, the same writer deals with the subject of our age more fully under the title of " Our Oldest School ." We hope to publish extracts from both articles : suffice it to say that he traces the existence of the School to the Eighth Century. We beg to acknowledge, with thanks, the receipt of the following :— Sedberghian, Hurst Johnian (2), Dunelmian, Giggleswick Chronicle, Eastbournian, Ulula, Uppingham Magazine, Leodicnsian .