The Story of Baden-Powell | Page 9

Master Ste, who, in 1870, came to him in the old Charterhouse, that
hoary, venerable pile which seems to shrink into itself, as if to shut out
the unpoetic and modern atmosphere of Smithfield Meat Market. B.-P.
went to Charterhouse as a gown boy, nominated by the Duke of
Marlborough, and owing to the ease with which his infant studies had
been conducted, was obliged to enter by a low form. But he had, as we
have already said, an enquiring mind. He had also a clear brain, all the
better for not having been crammed in childhood; and, therefore, strong
in body, full of health and good spirits, and just as keen to get
knowledge as to get a rare bird's egg, he began his school-days with
everything in his favour. The result was that 1874 found him in the
sixth, and one of the brilliant boys of his time.
Dr. Haig-Brown, as we have said, was sure to have been impressed by
B.-P., and there is no need for his assurance that he remembers the boy
perfectly. Of course, when one sits in his medieval study and asks the
Doctor to discourse of B.-P., he begins by recalling Ste's love of fun;
indeed, it is with no great willingness that he leaves that view of his
pupil. But the boy's inflexibility of purpose, his uprightness and his
eagerness to learn are as equally impressed upon the headmaster's mind,
and he likes to talk about the exhilarating effect which B.-P.'s virile
character had upon the moral tone of the school. "I never doubted his
word," Dr. Haig-Brown told me, and by the tone of the headmaster's
voice one realised that B.-P. was just one of those boys whose word it
is impossible to doubt. A clean, self-respecting boy.
He was the life of the school in those entertainments for which

Charterhouse has always been famous, and his reputation as a wit
followed him from the stage into the playground. B.-P. was a keen
footballer, and whenever he kept goal there was always a knot of
grinning boys round the posts listening with huge delight to their hero's
facetiæ. He also had the habit, such were his animal spirits, of giving
the most nerve-fluttering war-whoop imaginable when rushing the ball
forward, and this cry is said to have been of so terrifying a nature as to
fling the opposing side into a state of fear not very far removed from
absolute panic. By the way, it is interesting in the light of after-events
to read in the school's Football Annual (1876, p. 30) that "R.S.S. B.-P.
is a good goalkeeper, keeping cool, and always to be depended upon."
But it was not only at football that Baden-Powell spent his time in the
playground, although it was only in football that he shone. Into every
game he threw himself with zest and earnestness, playing hard for his
side, and finding himself always regarded by his opponents as an
enemy to be treated with respect. That he continued to play cricket,
racquets, and fives, although not a great success, is characteristic of his
devotion to sports, and his habit of doing what is the right thing to do.
Then he was a faithful and lively contributor to the school magazine,
added his lusty young voice to the chapel choir, and was for ever
seeking out excuses for getting up theatricals. Of one of his
performances at the end of the Long Quarter in 1872 it is interesting to
note that the Era of that time remarked that it was "full of vivacity and
mischief." He was always a great success as an old woman, and we
shall see that in later days he played a woman's part with huge success
in far Afghanistan. At one of these school entertainments big brother
Warington was present, and he laughingly recalls how the vast
audience of shiny-faced boys broke into a great roar of delight directly
B.-P. appeared in the wings--before he had uttered a word or made a
grimace. Dr. Haig-Brown and the other masters who remember B.-P.
like to recall scenes of this kind, and it is no disparagement of Ste's
other sterling qualities that they seem to have been more impressed by
his excellent fooling than by any other of his good qualities. It is the
greater tribute to his genius for acting.
[Illustration: Rev. William Haig-Brown, LL.D. Lombardi & Co.,

Photographers, 27, Sloane Street, S.W.]
So long as the world lasts, I suppose, the intelligent boy who works
hard at school will play the clown's part in popular fiction. Tom Sawyer
is the kind of youth we like to see given the chief part in a novel, while
George Washington, we are all agreed, is fit target for our lofty scorn.
But how