The season in which schools "break up" for the summer holidays has commenced, and in addition to the usual prize distributions there are the customary speeches made by some notability or other, Generally he or she devotes a portion of the oration towards consoling those, who have watched with envy their more fortunate fellows receive the rewards for their industry, or perhaps, their brilliance. It usually takes the line of telling them that it is not always the bright boys in school. who do the best in life, as a rule making the brighter lads wonder whether after all they are not condemned to a future of mediocrity because they happen at the moment to be shining. Yet it is not always the good boy at school who in the long run does the best, as the following list of dunces will show:—
Winston Churchill was a dunce at school, He broke all records by the length of time he remained in the bottom form at Farrow. Lord Halifax, now Britain's Foreign Secretary, never Fassed an examination in his life.
Thomas Edison, Robert Burns, and the Duke of Wellington were all considered school dunces Edison in his youth lost job after job for slacking, Pacerewski use to run from his house and hide in the Garden when the time came for his music teacher to call. Beethoven hated his first music lessons, and cried bitterly when it was insisted he should take them.
President Roosevelt failed in his final 1: examinations. Sir Henry Wilson was "ploughed" for Sandhurst. and only got into the Army through the militia.
Then of courte, there is Herr Hitler. He sat for the entrance examination at the Vienna Academy of Art and failed. Then he tried the Architectural School—and failed again. Now he is trying to build up a new order in Europe, and the British are going to do their utmost that he shall add a third item. to his list of failures, So all those boys, and girls who will be listening to the sympathy of various speakers during the next few weeks can, if they happen to be dunces, take comfort from the fact that after
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.