The internet is being a “biddy” tonight (as my grandmother used to say) and I’m exhausted with more work yet to ignore in favor of collapsing into bed in exhaustion, but I want to try to stay as disciplined as I can. Therefore, I’m going to take look at one letter at least.
When we last left our intrepid Jack Lewis, he had penned his last letter from the Hell-hole that was Wynyard School. The school shortly thereafter gave up the ghost, and, within a year, so did its proprietor, Robert Capron (who died in an asylum in November 1911). Jack spent one part of one semester at Campbell College, just down the road from his home, before transferring to a small preparatory school (Cherbourg) just outside Warnie’s beloved Malvern College. The brothers could travel to school together now, and Jack could expect to move on to Malvern where Warnie was already cutting quite the figure.
The letter in question, written in January 1911, was Jack’s first from Cherbourg. There are a few small points of interest, perhaps.
Jack, for all of his eventual love of learning, definitely has the standard schoolboy’s approach to school–They’ve apparently hardly arrived before he’s figure out how much longer they have to go before the next holidays. At this point, he’s figured on 79.
Up to this point, Jack had loathed England and its countryside. Of course, since his primary experience of England had been Wynyard, that isn’t surprising. He was pleasantly surprised here, though, to find that “Malvern is one of the nicest English towns I have seen yet.” He does note that, “The hills are beautiful, but of course not so nice as ours.” (226-7, 16)
He is also asking Albert for his prayer book, which has apparently gone missing. Unless this is an early example of the posing he later carried on with his father (from whom he hid his eventual atheism), it is an indication that he indeed had carried some belief with him. I would like to know exactly what prayer book he’s referring to–it might illuminate his “unconscious” respect for the higher liturgy to which he had been exposed. Of course here I might be revealing my own ignorance by not knowing off-hand.
Finally for tonight, I see that in Hooper’s footnote, Cherbourg was a school that was literally tied to its founder, Arthur Clement Alan. He created it, it followed him when he moved, and finally closed when he retired. I wonder why? Was any effort made to see to a more enduring legacy? If so, it obviously failed.
And so, good night!
Mere Lewis 
Brian: The Prayer Book was almost certainly a 1662 Book of Common Prayer, which was the standard Prayer Book for all Church of England parishes, high and low. The church of England tried a revision in the first decades of the 20th century, but failed (unlike the Episcopal Church in the United States) to produce one.
Hmmm…I wondered (obviously). So did the Ulster Protestants of Ireland use the same prayer book as the Church of England? I need to read more Irish history, perhaps, but given the background of the two countries and their general distaste/competition between the two nations, I didn’t want to make assumptions. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that the Irish used another one for no other reason than it was it was different from what the English used!
Thanks for stopping in!
Yep, the Church of Ireland at that time would have used the same 1662 Prayer Book as the Church of England (which is a somewhat more “Protestant” edition than Cranmer’s 1549, on which the American 1928 is based).
There were two Irish translations published, though — and not having access to the original language I don’t know how much revising might have occurred in the translation process.