I
shall not waste many words on an occasion like this; only I trust that
those of your schoolfellows who saw you staggering and rolling into the
room on Saturday evening in a manner so unspeakably shameful and
degrading, will learn from that melancholy sight the lesson which the
Spartans taught their children by exhibiting a drunkard before them--the
lesson of the brutalising and fearful character of this most ruinous
vice. Eric Williams and Charles Wildney, your punishment will be public
expulsion, for which you will prepare this very evening. I am unwilling
that for a single day either of you--especially the elder of
you--should linger, so as possibly to contaminate others with the danger
of so pernicious an example."
Such a sentence was wholly unexpected; it took boys and masters equally
by surprise. The announcement of it caused an uneasy sensation, which
was evident to all present, though no one spoke a word; but Dr. Rowlands
took no notice of it, and only said to the culprits--
"You may return to your seats.
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