“I have been much interested in what Sir Philip Whaley has been telling us, but I am not sure whether I interpret him correctly. Do I understand him to say that he wishes shorthand and commercial French to form a necessary part of the school curriculum?” “I do,” said Sir Philip, “most certainly I do.” “I realise,” continued Mr. Bent, “that for anybody who is aspiring to a post in Sir Philip Whaley’s office, shorthand and commercial French are a necessary branch of culture. But what about the boys who are going in for the learned or other professions--the Church, for example? Might not commercial French be, to a future bishop, what Homer is to Sir Philip himself, an ornamental but irrelevant accomplishment? And we must not ignore the bishops.” “You must specialise,” said Sir Philip grandly. “You must be prepared to fit every boy with the special knowledge that he--um--er--will require in the profession of his choice. You schoolmasters, if you will forgive me for saying so, do not sufficiently realise the importance of specialising.” “The difficulty of specialising beyond a certain point,” said Mr. Flaggon, “lies in the additional expense: and public school education is costly enough already. Our problem is to find a common basis of education for all.” Sir Philip was not accustomed to have his judgment disputed, and he met the objection by repeating his previous remarks with amplifications. When he had finished for the second time, a Mrs. Sparrow, who had been making chirruping little noises to herself all the while, seized the opportunity to say that, for want of somebody better, she had come to represent the mothers’ point of view; and what mothers cared most about were just the little things that men so often didn’t notice. She was sure that the food was all that could be wished for or desired, and she wasn’t for a moment complaining about _that_. But she did think that the boys weren’t given enough time to eat it in. She was horrified at the way her own boy had learned to gobble his food in the holidays, and all doctors were agreed about the importance of eating slowly and biting properly. That was one thing. And, then, she did think that, for a big school, the sick-house was _rather_ a dreary place--such bare unfurnished rooms and floors. When her boy was ill last Easter Term and she came down to see him, she went away feeling quite depressed. Of course everybody was _most_ kind, and she knew that the school doctor was a very clever man; but she did think that the sick-house might be made a little more cheerful. That was the mothers’ point of view, and she hoped that Mr. Flaggon would not mind her putting it; for, after all a mother _did_ know more about her own children than anybody else did.