COMMEMORATION Below we print the text of the Headmaster's leaving address: You will not be surprised to know, and I must ask for your tolerance, that I am in a somewhat reflective mood this morning. Today, except for some finishing touches during the holidays, marks the end of my thirty-five years in teaching, my seventeen years as a Headmaster and the decade when I have had the opportunity and privilege to lead this school. You will sympathise with me as I question whether I have been abje to emulate the status and achievements of the great Headmaster's of the past. There was for instance Dr. Busby, Headmaster of Westminster in the 1640's. When asked why he had kept his hat on while showing King Charles II round the school, he replied, "It would not do for my boys to suppose that there existed in the world any greater man than Dr. Busby." Or nearer our time in the earlier part of this century a boy asked Allington, the famous Headmaster of Eton, "Is there any difference between a Headmaster and God?" Allington paused and then replied, "Yes there is, but so long as you are a member of this school the difference need not concern you.'' I fear that as I look back I do not possess quite this degree of confidence. Indeed as I stand here in my finery I wonder whether Margot Asquith's comment on Lord Kitchener may be somewhat nearer the knuckle: "He was not a very good general but he made a good poster.'' And as to reflecting on what I have achieved during my Headship that useful motto of Pope John XXIU may not be too far off the mark: "See everything, ignore a good deal, improve things where possible." But before the reminiscences I have the pleasure of paying respects and compliments to our distinguished guests. It is always a great honour to have the Lord Mayor with us at Commemoration. This school, founded in 627 A.D. and, in those well-quoted words of A. F. Leach, "Older than the House of Commons, older than the universities, older than the Lord Mayor, older than the House of Lords, older even than the throne or the nation itself', is part of the fabric of the City of York. To have its First Citizen with us is a special privilege, and we thank you, Lord Mayor, and wish you very well for your term of office. Dame Janet Baker modestly describes herself in Who's Who as a 'professional singer'. In fact we are greeting today one of the greatest mezzo-sopranos of all time and one with close York links: a pupil at York College and now Chancellor of the University of York. I hope that Dame Janet will permit me to describe the occasion twenty-five or so years ago when I went to Covent Garden to hear The Trojans by Berlioz. Just before the performance the curtains twitched and a man in a dinner jacket emerged to tell us that Josephine Veazey was indisposed and that Dido would be sung that night by Janet
Baker. He added that this would be her first appearance at Covent Garden. Immediately a man in the audience shouted out, "And about time too." It would be impertinent of me to echo him but I do want to say what a special honour it is for us to have such a celebrated guest with us. We give her and her husband a very warm welcome. Dame Janet will be addressing us in a few minutes. I guess that she will have more of substance to say than that other Speech Day guest of honour who, having done the task several times before, said to the Headmaster, "What I do is congratulate the prizewinners, admit I never won anything, place the responsibility for future world peace squarely on their shoulders and ask for a halfholiday. Okay?" Usually at this point I have a further visitor to thank, namely the preacher at our Minster service. This year, my last Commemoration, I particularly wanted to invite Steven Harvey to address us and am very glad that he accepted. I knew from hearing over the years his excellent contributions day by day in Chapel that his sermon on this special occasion would be good, and so it was. I thank Steven for this morning; I thank him also for all that he contributes to the community of the school. I recently came across a Headmaster's definition written in 1932 of what makes a good school chaplain. Allowing for the dated references to 'boys' and 'public school' it hits the target: He has got to be a young-minded man who is a figure in the life of the school, not someone apart, a grim ecclesiastical figure, different from other men, but a man the boys have come to like and respect in other spheres of school life. He has got to be ordinary, natural, genuine. But religion must be the chief interest of his life; thers is no doubt about that, for no one so quickly and correctly sums up a man as the public school boy. There is much in that which speaks of Steven Harvey, and we all thank him for both his sermon and for his continuing ministry within the school. I also wish to acknowledge the contribution to the service this morning of Andrew Wright, our Director of Music, and his choir and instrumentalists. Schools, I believe, should heed those lines in The Merchant of Venice: The man that hath no music in himself Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils; The motions of his spirit are dull as night, And his affections dark as Erebus; Let no such man be trusted.
