THE PUBLIC SCHOOL
WORD-BOOK
PREFACE
It has been a matter of note and, maybe,of surprise that no attempt has hithertobeen made to gather in one volume thenumerous Words, Phrases, and Turns ofExpression peculiar to Our Great Public Schools.Bare lists of a dozen or more examples may be foundin certain (mostly out-of-date) Records and Histories;but taking the Schools individually, only in one instance—Winchester—hasthere been anything but the mostperfunctory attention given to the subject; and in nocase has the question received that analytical, scientifictreatment—historically and comparatively—which hasproved so invaluable in the “Oxford Dictionary” andin “Slang and its Analogues.”
It would, however, seem almost necessary to emphasisethe fact that this Word-Book is not, per se, adictionary of school slang. On the contrary, it is farmore than that. For, though such colloquialisms as arepeculiar to Public School life are naturally and rightlyincluded, yet by far the larger number of the exampleshere set down do not, by any accepted method of classification,fall within that category. I am led to makethis clear at the outset by reason of a somewhat curious,but altogether erroneous idea that the present bookwas to be a mere reprint of extracts from the largerwork on which, for many years, I have been engaged.That is not so.
Nor, moreover, do these words and phrases appear,save in very few instances, in any other work—not evenin so admirably complete a dictionary, in other respects,as “The Century,” while the monumental Oxford undertakingwill not be available, as a complete authority, formany years to come.
Having thus stated what this work is not, it seemsborne on me to explain, anew, what it is, or rather, whathas been my method. Briefly put, my idea has beento collect such words, phrases, names, and allusions tocustoms as now are, or have been, peculiar to EnglishPublic School life, and to apply to their definition andelucidation what is known as the “historical” method,illustrating such examples as lent themselves to it byquotations from old and present-day writers.
The Public Schools with which I have been concerned,arranged chronologically in order of foundationor charter, are as follows:—