The book begins with a portrait of my native Cornish village, as it remained virtually unchanged from Victorian days, with its old customs, characters, and stories, up to the war of 1914-1918. For this part I have relied upon a note-book which I kept while my father was alive, in which I jotted down stories and memories of his that take us back to the village as it was in the 1860s. While for the later chapters I had my own schoolboy diaries, which I kept during my last years at school, to go upon and keep me straight. With these aids I hope that the book may reveal something of the inner process of a working-class child's education, and may have some value for the discussions as to the future shaping of our educational system. - Preface.