3-016-816 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

"Going To School," by T. Webster, R.A., in the National Gallery (British School), South Kensington, 1864. Engraving of a painting. 'Two boys are "creeping, like snail, unwillingly to school." The elder, skulking irresolutely at the door of the school, long after the opening hour, is in the act of doffing his cap in order to make his entrance in a submissive and deprecating manner; and we have no doubt that he will try do put the best face upon his late appearance. But the younger boy, perhaps his brother, who may have been a half-unwilling accomplice, cannot conceal his guilty terror. Indeed, the elder one, simple urchin as he is, and but little practised in the art of deceiving, forgets that terribly criminating evidence of his truant wickedness - the stalk strung with birds' eggs, which he carries in his hand...Meantime a scholar inside, who has caught a sight of the truant, seems, boylike, already to anticipate the fun of seeing his fellow's punishment; but the little girl, threading her needle to proceed with her sampler, will be more likely to cry...the old dame, sitting near her hour-glass (which runs ominously low), is teaching a little one to read'. From "Illustrated London News", 1864.