The villagers themselves had three ways of living: working for the Squire, or on the farms, or down in the cloth-mills at Stroud. All other needs were supplied by a church, a chapel, a vicarage, a wooden hut, a pub – and the village school.
The village school at that time provided all the instruction we were likely to ask for. It was a small stone barn divided by a wooden partition into two rooms – The Infants and The Big Ones. There was one dame teacher, and perhaps a young girl assistant. Every child in the valley crowding there, remained till he was fourteen years old, then was presented to the working field or factory with nothing in his head more burdensome than a few facts learned off by heart, a jumbled list of wars, and a dreamy image of the world's geography. It seemed enough to get by with, in any case; and was one up on our poor old grandparents.
This school, when I came to it, was at its peak. Universal education and unusual fertility had packed it to the walls with pupils. Wild boys and girls from miles around – from the outlying farms and half-hidden hovels way up at the ends of the valley – swept down each day to add to our numbers, bringing with them strange oaths and odours, quaint garments and curious pies. They were my first amazed vision of any world outside the womanly warmth of my family; I didn't expect to survive it for long, and I was confronted with it at the age of four.
The morning came, without any warning, when my sisters surrounded me, wrapped me up in scarves, tied up my bootlaces, thrust a cap on my head, and stuffed a baked potato in my pocket. 'What's this?' I said. 'You're starting school today.' 'I ain't. I'm stopping 'ome.' 'Now, come on, Loll. You're a big boy now.' 'I ain't.' 'You are.' 'Boo-hoo.'
They picked me up bodily, kicking and bawling, and carried me up the road. 'Boys who don't go to school get put into boxes, and turn into rabbits, and get chopped up Sundays.' I felt this was overdoing it rather, but I said no more after that. I arrived at the school just three feet tall and fatly wrapped in my scarves. The playground roared like a rodeo, and the potato burned through my thigh. Old boots, ragged stockings, torn trousers and skirts, went skating and skidding around me. The rabble closed in; I was encircled; grit flew in my face like shrapnel. Tall girls with frizzled hair, and huge boys with sharp elbows, began to prod me with hideous interest. They plucked at my scarves, spun me round like a top, screwed my nose, and stole my potato.
I was rescued at last by a gracious lady – the sixteen-year-old junior teacher – who boxed a few ears and dried my face and led me off to The Infants. I spent that first day picking holes in paper, then went home in a smouldering temper.
But after a week I felt like a veteran and grew as ruthless as anyone else. Somebody had stolen my baked potato, so I swiped somebody else's apple. The Infant Room was packed with toys such as I'd never seen before – coloured shapes and rolls of clay, stuffed birds and men to paint.