AGS Magazine December 1948

THE

ABERDEEN GRAMMAR SCHCOL MAGAZINE

ABERDEEN

printed forThe Former Pupils' Club al-The University Press Price - One Shilling and Sixpence Volume LII, No. 1

December 1948

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212

CONTENTS ILLUSTRATIONS Facing page . 98 . . z " Chrys " at the Dinner . 34 F.P. Club Cricket Section— Strathmore Union XI—Season . 67 99 1948

Facing page

Theodore Watt, M.A., LL.D. • Classical VI-1896-97 .

• Upper VI-1948-49 •

.

•

4

•

•

. . . Page 1 . .

• .

F.P. Club Memorial Schemes . . . .

Presentation of Dr. Theodore Watt's Portrait . . . . . . . . .

7 .

Boys Old About Notes . . . . . . . . . .

Marriages .

• . . . .

29 • • • • . .

Obituary • • . .

1896-97 VI, 34 Group—Classical .

• An Old Class . .

35 Boom in Empire: A Vision Comes True. By H. T. Sorley . . . . . .

39 Bogota Incident. By D. T. LI. Marr . „ 42 • • An Innocent in India. By James L. Mowat . . . .

• . . ., 47 Italy Revisited. By W. D. Allardice . ,, 49 • Grammar F.P. Cricketing Memories. By C. H. Webster . . . . . . .

52 . . .

Books by F.P.s . .

• $4 • • • University Notes .

• • School Section— 57 School and Random Notes . „ 6z .

Lower School Notes. Changes in the School Staff .

• • . „ 63 . . . . . .

Aberdeen . . „ 64 . . . . .

Innocents Abroad . . . „ 63 . . . .

Art at the Edinburgh Festival . . . „ 67 . .. . .

A Mountain Sunrise . . . „ 68 . .

Reveries on a Skull and Cross-bones . . . . „ 69 . .

A Storm in the North-East. Enigma . . . . . . . . ,, 70 .

Boy Grows Up . . . . . . .

Scottish Schoolboys' Club . . . . . .

• 72 House Notes . . .

• . . . :: 7 35 The Literary and Debating Society . . . . . . . . . . ,, 74 Cadet Force Notes . . . . . .

• • . . ,, 75 Scout Notes . . . . .

The Dramatic Society. The Arts Club .

School Sporting Activities— . . . . . . . ,, 77 .

Rugby . . . .

• • „ 79 • • .

Hockey . . . .

• „ 8o Cricket. The Swimming Club .

The Former Pupils' Club— . . .

• .

Si .

Club Executive Notes . . . „ 82 Members of the F.P. Club Resident Abroad . . . . . „ 92 Old Copies of the Magazine . .

93 F.P. Club Consuls. F.P. Club Boarding House . . .

94 The Annual Dinner of the Club .

• • • . .

99 F.P. Cricket Section .

F.P. Hockey Section. F.P. Golf Section. F.P. Tennis Section . . . „ tot . . .

F.P. Rugby Section . .

The Glasgow Centre . . . „ 103 The London Centre. The Yorkshire Centre ,, 104 F.P. Club Office-Bearers 1948-49. Rates of Subscriptions 2

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IMP

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 65th year; No. 163 (New Series, 56th year, No. 554)

Vol. LII

a

No. I

DECEMBER 1948

Former Pupils' The Magazine is published under the auspices of TheCommunications Club, twice a year at present—in December and July. should be addressed to the Editor, ALAN C. R. WATT, M.A., 52 Bon-Accord Crescent, Aberdeen.

[NOTE: An asterisk after a name indicates that tbo F.P. is a member of the F.P. Club.]

The Memorial Schemes

Subscriptions amounting to almost £1,430 have been received for the three Club Memorial Schemes. Details of these are as follows : .

• .

Roll of Honour . .

Dr. Theodore Watt's Portrait . .

Mr. W. P. Stewart's Memorial To be allocated by the Club Executive

.

•

. .

. . .

•

£225 8 6 149 15 8 15o II 2 904 3 O

£1,429 18

4

Although the Appeal officially closed on 3o September 1948, subscriptions from F.P.s who have not yet contributed and who wish to do so, will still be welcomed and should be sent to the Secretary.

Roll of Honour to the list of names for inclusion in the added been have There of Roll of Honour the names of five more F.P.s and the total number where. the as to information give can who Anyone 193. now names is abouts of the next-of-kin of the late ALEXANDER JAMIESON (1884-85), who was killed during an air raid in London in November 1940, is requested to communicate with the Secretary immediately.

Dr. Theodore Watt's Portrait As reported on page z of this issue, the posthumous portrait of the late Dr. Watt was presented to the School on 1 November 1948.

Memorial to Mr. W. P. Stewart The establishment of the Fund in memory of Mr. Stewart, which extrais to be used to assist boys at the School to participate in date. early an at with proceeded be scholastic activities, is to WAR MEMORIAL IN THE SCHOOL HALL There has been an unfortunate but unavoidable delay in the comin the pletion of plans for the War Memorial which is to be placed the with touch close in keeping are Executive School Hall. The Town Council in this matter, and they hope that before long the work of erecting the Memorial will be commenced.

a

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Presentation of Dr. Theodore Watt's Portrait The posthumous portrait of the late Dr. Theodore Watt, Secretary of the F.P. Club from 5959 to 1946 and Editor of the Magazine from 1907 to 1946, subscribed for by F.P.s and friends of the School, was presented to the School at a. ceremony held in the School Hall on Monday i November 5948. The President of the Club, Sir Arthur Lothian, K.C.I.E., C.S.I., presided and he was accompanied on the platform by Mrs. Theodore Watt ; the Very Rev. Provost Kinnell, Convener of the staffing sub-committee of the Education Committee of Aberdeen Town Council ; Mr. J. J. Robertson, Rector of the School ; Mr. Alan C. R. Watt ; the Rev. P. D. Lawrence, School Chaplain ; Principal T. M. Taylor, Aberdeen University ; Dr. Edward W. Watt ; Mrs. Duncan Fraser, the Lady Provost ; Mr. Frank Scorgie, Director of Education ; Mr. R. B. Williamson and Mr. Alexander Gray, Chairman and Vice-Chairman respectively of the Club Executive ; and Mr. J. Scott MacLachlan, Secretary of the Club.

The platform party also included other members of the late Dr. Watt's family, past and present officials of the Club and their wives, and other guests, and the body of the Hall was well filled by subscribers to the presentation fund, members of the School staff, and boys of the School. Dr. Watt's portrait, painted by Mr. Francis Hodge of London, who was unfortunately unable to be present at the ceremony, was mounted on an easel on the platform.

Sir Arthur Lothian said :— We have assembled together to-day for a purpose at once sorrowful and glad, that of presenting the posthumous portrait of the late Dr. Theodore Watt to the School he loved so well ; sorrowful because of the calamity which snatched him so prematurely from us, and glad because of the opportunity it gives us of paying honour to his memory.

Following the family tradition he entered the Aberdeen Grammar School in 1889, the last of three distinguished brothers. He was much younger than most of his class-fellows and, like others so circumstanced, found the Grammar School rather a stem nurse. For he was of a quiet and studious nature—qualities which do not ordinarily find favour in the robust atmosphere of school, but nevertheless his good humour and integrity won the respect and affection of all his contemporaries, which they manifested by appointing him editor of the School Magazine at the youthful age of sixteen.

Sir Arthur then referred to Dr. Watt's years at the University, to his business career, in which he rose to the highest eminence, and to his many services to his Alma Mater and to various public bodies in the city, and went on:— Truly a remarkable record of public service—and I have not yet referred to

what was perhaps the main interest of his life, the A.G.S.F.P. Club and the School Magazine. He became a member of the Executive Committee of the Club as soon as he left School, and a few years later, when the School Magazine was taken over by the Club, he was appointed Editor-in-chief. From that date until his death almost forty years later, Theodore Watt was the life and soul of the Magazine and of the Club, and both are now his monuments. Well might he have said with Horace, motnanenium errs perennau exegi, and it would have afforded him peculiar satisfaction to know that his son was following so ably in his footsteps. For he made the Magazine a model of its kind and through it enshrined himself in the hearts of all Old Grammar Boys. It is difficult to convey the interest with which in distant places devoured it to get news of their old school-fellows. DuringF.P.s the

The Presentation Portrait

TIIEO

R E WATT, M. A., LL.D.

(Front the painting by Francis Hadge.)

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

*

•

3

two great wars that have disrupted civilisation, it was often the only medium by which they kept touch with home.

But the School Magazine represented only a fraction of his activities on behalf of his old school. In 1923 he published the " Aberdeen Grammar School Roll of Pupils 1795-1919, annotated from 186; ", a truly colossal task, representing many years of tedious labour. He was an enthusiastic supporter of the schemes for F.P. Club Centres and Club Consuls. He was also joint secretary of the Byron Statue Committee and did much to bring the scheme to fruition. He was a member of the 1914-18 War Memorial Committee and a director of the School Boarding House Company from its start.

When we reflect that these were all labours of love, undertaken in the scant leisure of a busy business career, we can but marvel that in one short life-time he was able to compass so much. Foreigners have often remarked with envy and admiration on the immense amount of laborious unpaid public service rendered by individuals in the British Isles. Theodore Watt might well be their exemplar. No one was ever more unobtrusive, and yet no one was ever more in demand for any task requiring knowledge, hard work, and competence. Men like him, who are content to labour unceasingly in the background for the good of their kind, without publicity or thought of reward, are the real salt of the earth. When he comes up for the last dread reckoning, it is sure the verdict will be " Well done thou good and faithful servant ".

The portrait we are now presenting was spontaneously subscribed for by members of the Grammar School F.P. Club as a symbol of the inestimable debt they feel to Theodore Watt for his lifelong labours and devotion on their behalf.

We owe our sincere thanks to the artist, Mr. Francis Hodge, for his success in producing so speaking a likeness from the material at his disposal, and to Mr. Charles Carter, Curator of the Aberdeen Art Gallery, who first put us in touch with Mr. Hodge.

On Sir Arthur's invitation Mrs. Watt then unveiled the portrait and the Very Rev. Provost Kinnell accepted it on behalf of the Education Committee. In the course of his speech he said— I am very grateful that I have the opportunity this afternoon of paying my tribute of admiration and respect to Dr. Watt, such a great son of the Grammar School, and such a notable citizen of Aberdeen. I am happy too to be here representing the Education Committee because it seems to me that this occasion, so to speak, crystallises and dramatises the spirit that we on the Committee would like to see among the former pupils of every school.

There are three attitudes adopted by former pupils towards their school.

There is the attitude of those who say " My school days were the best of my life " —a sentiment that, if sincere, would not be in praise of the school but in its condemnation, because it would mean that the school had truly failed to equip its sons for life. There is also the attitude, far more common, of those who are only too glad to escape from school, who regard their years there as years to be forgotten as quickly as possible, who have not taken away from the school any desire for further knowledge, who have not learned the use of leisure, and who have not carried out into life those lessons of citizenship which our life to-day so sorely needs and so gravely lacks.

There is also a third attitude—the attitude of which Dr. Watt was such a notable example, the attitude of those who do not idolise their school, who do not look back to it with nostalgia, but who recognise that it was there they learned really the beginning of what life can be, who learned there the joy of physical strength and fitness, and who had there enkindled for them a sense of curiosity and a desire to know more. Such men have learned in the common life and discipline of school those lessons of obedience and of leadership, and those spiritual values which alone can make home life what it should be.

Now that spirit is to be found among the former pupils of this school and to-day we are honouring one who was a supreme example. Any member of an Education Committee on such a day as this can surely feel justifiably proud, because it has been shown that that for which he has given his time and thought has, in great measure, been achieved under the Rectors and the staff of this ancient and great school and, not least, under the present Rector who most worthily sustains

4

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

its traditions. It is for these reasons, Sir Arthur, that I am indeed pleased and honoured to accept this portrait at your hands and I would entrust it now to the keeping of the Rector.

Mr. J. J. Robertson, Rector of the School, in accepting custody of the portrait, said— Since a work of art must be one man's creation before it can be other men's possession or solace, I should like at the outset to re-echo the chairman's words of tribute to the artist. To a degree beyond all reasonable hope, he has recovered for us the lineaments of the living man.

With all that has been said in praise of Dr. Watt, I proudly and gratefully associate myself and the School. The passage of time takes nothing from my sense of the wonderful strength of his attachment to the Grammar School, so strong and yet so unobtrusive, how completely undemonstrative, not from any deficiency of feeling but because that loyalty of his was a response of the whole man, of the judgement that had found in his old school a fit object of his devotion, of a will steadily set towards its service, and of a heart in full accord with that intention.

Dr Watt's contribution to the well-being of the Grammar School was unique in his generation, and very massive in its proportions. For him it meant labour, toilsome, long sustained and very costly in those things which most men grudge— time and patient care. Such attachment had small need of words to declare itself.

So as long as we who knew him remain, this portrait, set in our midst this afternoon, will have a two-fold power—first, to evoke very rich, gracious and happy memories, and second, to be to us a comforting reminder that the worth of a school is mirrored best of all in the affection it inspires.

And when we are gone, the significance of the portrait will abide. For it will take its place within the large inheritance of an ancient school ; become part of that still background to the continuing stream and surge of young life through this place, witnessing always to the dignity and sufficiency of our human lot whenever man rises above his own impermanence in the service of causes and institutions that are bigger than the individual life.

Sir Arthur, and Gentlemen of the Former Pupils' Club, what you give us this afternoon is precious for his sake and for yours. We receive it proudly and will guard it well.

The Rev. P. D. Lawrence, School Chaplain, then dedicated the portrait and Mr. Alan C. R. Watt, Dr. Watt's eldest surviving son, expressed on behalf of Mrs. Watt and the other members of the family their sincere gratitude for the honour that had been done to the memory of his father.

We are especially grateful (he said) for two reasons--first, because there is no honour that my father would have appreciated more than that his portrait should have been given a permanent place alongside the portraits of Dr. Morland Simpson, Mr. Keith Leask, and Dr. Charles McLeod, with the presentation of each of which he was intimately connected ; and second, because he took a particular delight in attending ceremonies in this Hall. Whether the occasion was an annual School prize-giving or a gathering of F.P.s, such as was held for the unveiling of the Malayan Clock, he looked forward to all such functions with enthusiasm and participated in them with relish. He would indeed have been proud to know that a ceremony such as this had been arranged in his honour.

I should also like (he went on) to associate myself, again on behalf of my mother and the family, with the chairman's expression of thanks to the artist, Mr. Francis Hodge. Portraits notoriously give rise to animated differences of opinion as to their merits and demerits, and it might well have been feared that a posthumous portrait would have given rise even more readily to criticism. I think it is a fact, however, that all those who have seen this fine portrait have unanimously approved of it and for this we are, of course, very much indebted to Mr. Hodge, for the interest he has shown, the care he has taken, and the artistic skill he has displayed.

He concluded by moving a vote of thanks to all those who had contributed in large or small measure to the ceremony and in particular to Sir Arthur Lothian, Provost Kinnell and the Rector.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 5 the proof a hymn and singing with the closed The proceedings nouncement of the benediction by the School Chaplain. Thereafter the company inspected the portrait and tea was served in the Infant Department of the School.

• •

The Original—in Retrospect and After-thought Mr. Bultitude shrank only in body, not in spirit, when he went back to school after a long interval. That was in accord with Anstey's fantasy of Vice Versa—once performed as a play in the School Hall by some of Theodore's schoolmates, under the happy auspices of " C.D.", that evergreen bay tree flourishing to-day semper eadem— but it is not in accord with fact. When we F.P.s re-enter the portal of the School we may not shrink in body bulk, but our spirit is certainly minished and brought low. Witness that great uprising in the Hall, what time the platform party entered, of present pupils, as was most fit and seemly, but also of Former Pupils of all ages, rheumatics and other disabilities notwithstanding. It was as though " H.F.M.S. ", from his portrait on the wall, had thundered Surgite. * * * It was a happy thought to have the senior boys of the School assisting at the unveiling ceremony. After all, Theodore was the Senior Boy of the School in excelsis. There never was such pietas to a school. It was conterminous with life. It seemed he never could repay the debt of happy schoolboyhood.

Sir Arthur—we are all proud of our Indian proconsul but off the platform he had to surrender the " Sir "—traced in plain, unadorned speech the steady, persistent stream of activity of his old schoolfellow, ever increasing in volume till it massed and concentrated all its strength for the indivisible cause of School and University.

It was a great achievement, and laden with significance and heartening for the rank and file of a big school. For this was no distinguished scholar that was being honoured, nor great civic personality. All that was left to the other brothers of the triad—the brilliant scholarship to George, Dux of the School in his day and First Bursar that amius mirabilis when the School had the first four places in what was called by Sir William Geddes "the great Olympic of the North" ; and the civic premiership to Edward, still happily in our midst.

Theodore went his own way, the fallentis semita vitae. He busied himself with the Library and the Magazine in the days when both were struggling for existence.

We take the Magazine for granted to-day, with all its ramifications and consulates. But no more than Rome was it built in a day.

Aeneaswise Theodore had much ado condere urbem. It would not be too much to say that even his spell as editor of Alma Mater at Aberdeen University was all a part of the preparation for his final assumption of the editorial chair of the School Magazine.

Even so the half had not been told. There were all his multifarious activities on behalf of the University, his membership of various Committees, his services to the University Review, his help in the

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine Roll of Service, 1914-1919, his Grammar School Roll of Pupils, 1795-1919, his Roll of Graduates, 19o1-25, all in that encyclopaedic tradition which is the peculiar pride and achievement of our NorthEast. He was the natural choice of his fellow-graduates for the honorary post of Class Secretary and Editor of the Class Record, a labour of love, alas, which he was not able to round off to a close.

Such services to his Alma Mater received fitting recognition in the highest honour the University can bestow, the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws.

I return to the School Magazine, which, for me, is Theodore's supreme achievement. It is the link which unites all pupils of the School past, present and to come in. one continuous stream of consciousness, as if we might speak, with all reverence, of the School Visible and Invisible. Do we ever pause to think how it was all done, this gathering of news of Former Pupils from all the ends of the earth ?

What method lay behind it all, what meticulous care ! Certainly he was the " chid takin' notes "par excellence. But it was not from Maidenkirk to John o' Groats, nor even from Land's End to John o' Groats, but literally from China to Peru and Pole to Pole. In China there were the Shanghai clock-donors, and in South America there were Jim Mowat and Ernest Buchan. In North America there was Ashley Cooper with his Hudson Bay trappers, and at the South Pole was imperturbable " Scout " Marr. On India's coral strand, at least till recently, stood Herbert Sorley, and in South Africa Andrew Clark of Kingswells and W. S. Mackie of Drumoak. Truly the sun never sets on the Grammar School Magazine.

Even more surprising is it to remember that all this store of news and information, all those informative articles and stories of adventure, were amassed by the homely wits of a home-keeping youth: for Theodore was not a globe-trotter by any means. Rather do I see him high up in his eyrie in his Moray Tower, with all his index cards about him, shuffling them and reading them, and out-watching the Bear. This was his Radar, as if he had anticipated his great name-sake. * * * 6

Theodore—I have called him by that name in this recollection; and to us his classmates he was always " Theodore ", dignified, composed, self-contained. There was no attempt at abbreviation, no pet or nickname, simply " Theodore ", with its inner meaning interpreted to us long ago by Doctor Moir in our first Greek class— gift of God. The gift was to the Aberdeen Grammar School.

So his portrait hangs in the Hall of the School he loved and served so well, in that Valhalla which year by year grows richer in adornment and dear memories. It will hang, I hope, not far from the portrait of the rector who first inspired him with the significance and the nobility of service to his fellows.

J. M. R.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

7

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•

*,,,* The Editor is glad at all times to receive from any quarter items of information for this section of the Magazine.

The dates given in parentheses after names indicate the sessions of attendance at the School.

William Ernest Adam (19oz-09), J.P., Rector of St. Kentigern's Church, Ballater, since 1945 was in October of this year installed by the Bishop of Aberdeen and Orkney as a Canon of St. Andrew's Cathedral, Aberdeen. He is to continue in his present charge at Ballater, where he is also Provost of the Burgh.

Hugh George Jeffrey Aitken* (1928-4o), M.A., who won a Hudson's Bay Company scholarship in 1947 for a year's study in Economics at Toronto University, has now been awarded a Rockefeller scholarship and is studying at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

James Alexander* (1919-28), B.Sc. (Eng.), A.M.I.C.E., has returned from Trinidad, where he was an executive engineer under the Colonial Office, and is leaving in January for Hongkong where he is to take up a similar post in the Public Works Department.

Alexander James Allan* (1908-15), left Aberdeen in October to take up an appointment as branch manager of the Eagle Star Insurance Company in Dundee. He has worked for the Company in Aberdeen for many years. He is an old member of the F.P. Cricket Section and has for many years been on the selection committee of the Rugby Section.

Thomas Philip Gray Allison* (1928-31) was this summer appointed President of the Aberdeen University Union for the year 1948-49. He is at present a final year medical student. It is interesting to recall that since the new University Union was opened in 1939 ten of the eleven male presidents have been F.P.s.

Robert Douglas MacGregor Armitage* ,(1945 -47) went to Canada in August 1947 to study at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver. He is now in his second year and taking a general Arts and pre-Medical course with a view to graduating in Medicine.

During the summer vacation he was employed as master of the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club's tender (a fourteen-knot launch), and spent several weeks at Hatzic evacuating flood victims.

Frederick Cooper Arnaud* (1929-36), B.Sc. (Eng.), has obtained a post with the Crown Film Unit, Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, in the capacity of sound engineer. Ile is at present " on location "

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

at Enugu in the Eastern Provinces of Southern Nigeria (four days' trek by lorry from Lagos), engaged on the production of a major documentary feature concerned with the " fundamental education" of the native population. As spontaneity on the part of the native cast is essential, he has found it necessary to devise a system by which sound and film may be recorded by a single mechanism. Such a system has not previously been operated under tropical conditions and much of the work is experimental.

William Cranna Bain* (1930-39), M.A., B.Sc., who graduated at Aberdeen in July with first class honours in Natural Philosophy, has been awarded a scholarship for research work in that Department of the University. He is at present working on problems of the ionosphere in conjunction with a team of physicists in the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge.

Kenneth Mackenzie Bell* (1928-34), M.B., Ch.B., has since September 1946 been in general practice at Harrow. During the war he served in the R.A.M.C. for over six years in France and Belgium (1939-40), Syria, North Africa, Italy and France (after D Day). He reached the rank of Major, was twice " mentioned ", and was wounded in August 1944 during the battle at Falaise. It is noteworthy that for five years less seventeen days he served as medical officer with the same unit, 14th Ind. Corps Field Ambulance (later 14th Light Field Ambulance).

Archibald Ernest Bennett* (1920-30), A.R.I.B.A., who decided in 1947 to devote himself entirely to music, has now returned to architecture and is working in the City Architect's Office at Edinburgh.

Frank Charles Briscoe Black* (1914-17), who joined the Eastern staff of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank in 1925, was transferred in August from Shanghai to Hongkong, where he served almost twenty years ago.

Robert Alexander Ross Black* (1930-41), B.Sc., who graduated at Aberdeen University in July of this year with first class honours in Mathematics, has proceeded to Trinity College, Cambridge, where he is studying aeronautical engineering. At Aberdeen he won a halfblue for rugby and a full blue for golf, in which game he has been one of the outstanding players in the North-East since the war. This summer he won the Braemar and Ballater open tournaments and was third in the international students' tournament at St. Andrews for the Boyd Memorial Quaich. He has now found a place in the University golf team at Cambridge and has been playing as number three.

Charles W. J. Bodie* (1914-18) has completed twenty-three years' service on the design staff of New South Wales Railways at Sydney, and is at present designing engineer at their locomotive workshops at Redfern, a suburb of Sydney.

Edward Kerr Borthwick (1933-42), M.A.(Aberd.), who was classical dux of the School in 1942 and who had a brilliant record in Classics at Aberdeen University, took the degree of B.A. this summer at Cambridge with first class honours in Part II of the Classical Tripos,

Aberdeen Grammar School Magaine

9 being awarded a distinction in Literature. He has been awarded the Croom Robertson Fellowship at Aberdeen University for 1948-51, and intends to continue post-graduate study at Cambridge.

Charles Ogilvie Will Bowman* (1910-15) has taken over the management of two rubber estates in the Klang district of Selangor, Malaya. After over twenty years in West Africa and three-and-a-half years in the West Indies and southern states of America, he is somewhat critical of conditions for rubber planters in Malaya. " My heart ", he says, " is still in West Africa" but he hopes that after more experience in his new surroundings he may come to like the place.

Thomas Stewart Boyd* (1930-38), who was previously with the Ministry of Labour in Edinburgh, has passed a further reconstruction examination and is now an officer of Customs and Excise. He is at present undergoing training in London and Edinburgh.

William Gillespie Gilbert Bruce* (1919-34), Ph.C., M.P.S., F.C.S., has been appointed lecturer in Pharmacy at the Technical College of Natal in Durban, South Africa. He sailed from this country in September and will be at his new post for the next three years.

George Alston Buyers* (1906-08), C.A., who was for over twenty years before the war a chartered accountant in Shanghai, has been assumed as a partner in the firm of Messrs. James Meston & Company, chartered accountants, Aberdeen.

Douglas James Calder* (1927-31), who was formerly in his father's watch and jewellery business in Diamond Street, Aberdeen, is now burglary assessor with J. B. Yabsley, jeweller, Ludgate Hill, London. His elder brother, Robert Henderson Calder* (1921-24), who has been in Australia since 5927, is now a representative for Stewarts & Lloyds (Australia) Limited, steel manufacturers, Perth, Western Australia.

George Gordon Cameron (1889-91), M.A., B.D., minister of Rutherford Church, Aberdeen since 1923, retired in October of this year. He was minister of Alford U.F. Church from 1901 to 1915 and of St. David's U.F. Church, Bathgate, from 1915 until he returned to Aberdeen.

Ian Fyfe Cameron* (1918 and 1919-28), A.R.I.B.A., is now with the J. Arthur Rank Organisation in the art department at Denham Film Studios.

Leslie Thompson Carnegie* (5925-38), B.L., Legal Assistant to the County Clerk of East Lothian, played an important part in the relief and restoration work following upon the extensive flooding in East Lothian last August, when damage to the extent of about kzoo,000 was caused to over 250 homes, numerous commercial premises and large areas of agricultural land.

Among the tasks with which Mr. Carnegie was concerned were the provision of temporary accommodation in halls, hospitals and military camps and the supply of meals for victims of the disaster. He also arranged for the distribution of part of the Lord Provost of Edinburgh's

to

Aberdeen Grammar School lthgaVne

National Flood Appeal Fund among the distressed families of East Lothian.

George Adrian Carroll* (1905-12) retired from India last year after thirty-four years' service and has since been appointed welfare officer to the Paddington Estate. From 1913 to 1923 he served with the Imperial Indian Police in the Central Provinces, and in 1920 he was awarded the King's Police Medal for a special act of gallantry when he was Assistant District Superintendent of Police at Seoni.

In 1923 he joined the Indian State Service and was for fourteen years administrator of Khetri, a feudatory estate of the Jaipur State, Rajputana. From 1928 he had the additional work of being guardian to the minor Raja of Khetri, who is now a B.A. (Cantab.), a barristerat-law, and a member of the Constituent Assembly of India. From 1937 to 1941 he was tutor-guardian to the minor Raja of Chamba, one of the Himalayan states of the Punjab, and in 1941 he joined the Indian Army. For a time he was in charge of the welfare organisation in Burma with the rank of Major, but from 1942 he worked in G.H.Q., New Delhi, in various capacities, finally as a LieutenantColonel in Intelligence, when he had the very interesting task of organising the security of all the military depots in India. In 1945 he went to Jodhpur State, Rajputana, to instruct the heir apparent (now ruling Chief) in administration. He was also on the Council of the State as Minister in charge of Public Works and Supplies and, at a time of great grain scarcity, had to organise a very thorough wheat-procurement scheme, which was the most effective in Northern India. In his final year in India he was tutor and guardian to the minor Raja of Chhota Udepur.

Robert Selbie Clark* (1 895-1901), M.A., D.Sc., Scientific Director of the Scottish Home Department Marine Laboratory, Torry, Aberdeen, has retired under the age-limit. He entered the service of the Scottish Fishery Board in 1923 as senHr naturalist at the Fishery Board Laboratory at Torry and in 1934 he was appointed superintendent of scientific investigations under the Scottish Fishery Board. He has for the past two years been chairman of the Consultative Committee of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea and he is continuing to hold this appointment.

Sir Andrew Gourlay Clow* (1896-98), K.C.S.I., C.I.E., was in November appointed chairman of the Scottish Area Gas Board, a post which carries a salary of £4,500 per annum. He entered the Indian Civil Service in 1913, was Secretary (Labour) to the Government of India 1936-38, Communications Member of the Government of India 5939-42, and Governor of Assam 1942-47. According to The Scotsman, he was regarded as one of the most widely informed members of the I.C.S. on industrial problems.

Robert Rannie Cook* (1899-1908) has recently left this country for Nairobi, Kenya, on a visit to the Club Consul, GRAEME GEORGE SUTHERLAND (1903-09). In March 5946 he returned from Australia to resume his life as a rubber planter in Malaya. He was in this country on leave in 1947 and then spent a further eight months in

Aberdeen Grammar Schaal Magazine Malaya before coming back to the U.K. in September on account of ill-health. In October 1946 he formed at Seremban a concern known as the Negri Sembilan Proprietary Estates, managing secretaries of rubber and oil palm estates, and he is still a partner in this business.

From May 1944 until December 5945 Mr. Cook was a member of the Committee of the Malayan Research Bureau, Australia, an organisation set up at Sydney in 1942 by Mr. Roger Dolbey, M.A., F.R.G.S., " to collect and sift all information regarding civilians missing in Malaya, Borneo and the D.E.I. and to trace the civilian men and women who left these countries shortly before and after the capitulation ". Mr. Dolbey, who was well-known in North Borneo before the war, had wide experience of this work in London in 1940 (after Dunkirk), and under his guidance the Malayan Research Bureau was developed in a very short time into a remarkable organisation whose work brought comfort and relief to the relatives of many hundreds of internees in Japanese camps. Questionnaires were sent to over z,ooo Malayans in Australia who had escaped from occupied countries, and members of the Bureau interviewed hundreds of individuals who had taken part in the evacuation of Malaya and who had been bombed in the Archipelago and in the Malayan Seas, as well as refugees from the D.E.I. Between 1942 and 5945 the Bureau published from time to time lists of internees along with details that had been established about each, and altogether information was collected in respect of over 1O,OOo persons.

After the Japanese surrender copies of the lists were sent by the first ship to the civilian and P.O.W. camps in Singapore, and Mr. Cook tells us that on the first ship that went to Singapore from Australia he also sent two copies of the Magazine to the former camp, addressed to two fellow planters, JoHN Giaa LORIMER* (1905-14) and GRAHAM HENDERSON* (1906-12) or "any other Aberdonians interested ". It would be interesting to know whether these Magazines reached any F.P.s.

James Fyvie Cowie* (1937-43), M.R.C.V.S., received an appcintment in August of this year as an assistant in a veterinary surgeon's practice at Kippen, Stirlingshire. He studied at the Royal (Dick) Veterinary College, Edinburgh, and was awarded his rugby blue.

James Ian Cormack Crombie* (1908-21), C.M.G., M.A., Third Under-Secretary to the Treasury, gave evidence on behalf of the Treasury before the Royal Commission on the Press in May of this year. He was questioned about newspaper criticism that " the whole Public Information Service is a very expensive luxury with which we can afford to dispense" and in reply he stated that in Home Information Departments alone the cost is £403,000 a year and in the Overseas Information Departments almost £1,400,000 a year. In October Mr. Crombie was appointed a member of a Committee under the chairmanship of Sir Henry French to inquire into costs and workings of the Government public relations services.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Alexander Cruickshank* (191x-17), O.B.E., M.D., retired early this year after twenty-four years in the Sudan Medical Service. He has acquired a small farm of fifty-eight acres at Limuru, Kenya Colony, and he states that this farm will be his hobby while he runs a local medical practice and helps at the nearby native hospital.

Andrew Forbes Davidson (1905-15), who held a regular commission in the Indian Army, is now on the staff of Wester Elchies Preparatory School, Aberlour.

Eric George Beattie Davidson* (194o-47) has passed the entrance examination for the Academy of Arts at Newark, New Jersey. He hopes to enter Columbia University, New York City, next April.

William Kennaway Dron* (1921-34) has since February 1946 been managing director of William Kennaway Limited, bakers, caterers and confectioners, Aberdeen. During the war he served with the R.A.S.C. and commanded a Mobile Field Bakery Unit.

Alfred John Meldrum Edwards* (1908-21), M.A., B.Com., Lower School Master at the School since 1934, has been appointed Head-master of St. Clement Street School, Aberdeen. He was a " triple blue " at Aberdeen University and won his swimming blue at Cambridge. He is a former secretary of the Aberdeenshire Cricket Club and during the war was secretary of the F.P. Rugby Section.

John Alexander Simpson Emslie* (1905-17), M.B., Ch.B., who was in practice at Banchory for over twenty-one years, is now in Eastbourne, where he has joined his brother, Alfred George Emslie* (1912-24), M.D. Before leaving Banchory, he was Provost of the Burgh in 1945-46.

Robert John Esslemont* (1920-23), M.B.E., is now serving as Master of the S.S. Merchant Royal. In September he was on a voyage to Australia with a cargo of " the motor cars which we have all been trying to buy for the past two years ". He said that it made his mouth water to see the models they had on board, from utility vans to M.G. sports cars.

Francis Millar Esson* (1918-25), Major, R.A.S.C., who served during the war with the Royal Engineers as a Lieut.-Colonel and Acting Colonel, was granted a permanent regular commission and transferred to the R.A.S.C. in January 1947 with the substantive rank of Major.

After passing a senior regular officers' course at Aldershot, he was appointed to command a water transport company in H.M. Gun Wharf, Portsmouth, which operated a variety of R.A.S.C. fleet vessels ranging from patrol and target-towing launches to 3,ooo-ton L.S.T. (Landing Ships Tanks), destined to serve in the Far East.

At the end of July he was appointed company commander of the General Transport Company in Trieste.

James Raffan Fiddes* (1924-37), M.A. (Glasgow), B.A. (Oxon.), LL.B. (Glasgow), was admitted to the Faculty of Advocates in September of this year.

Andrew Scott Finnie* (1925-35), M.A., has qualified as a chartered accountant and been admitted to the Society of Chartered Accountants

*

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine in Aberdeen. He served his apprenticeship with Messrs. Williamson and Dunn, C.A., Aberdeen and passed the final examination with distinction. Two other F.P.s—James Garden (1930-37) and Thomas Marshall Knox* (1932-35)—also passed their final examinations at the May diet this year and have been admitted to the Aberdeen Society.

Matthew George Fisher (1896-1900), K.C., M.A., LL.B., Professor of Civil Law in the University of Edinburgh since 1939 and Dean of the Faculty of Law since 1943, has been appointed chairman of a committee set up to review the whole field of local government law in Scotland and to prepare the necessary measures for its revision and consolidation. Professor Fisher is senior counsel to the Secretary of State under the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act 1936.

Ian Stark Flett* (1925-37), M.A., Ed.B., has been appointed educational psychologist to the County Burgh of Sunderland and is to take up his new appointment on I January 1949. During the war he served for six years with the R.A.F., chiefly in the educational service.

Gordon Esslemont Fordyce (1925-27), M.B., Ch.B., was in Jitly admitted a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh, (F. R.C. S.E.).

Douglas Christian Fraser* (1907-17), who obtained a civil appointment with the Admiralty in 19i9, was appointed to the Naval Aircraft Inspectorate on its formation in 1944 and is at present stationed at the Royal Naval Aircraft Repair Yard, Donibristle, Fife. Formerly a tea planter in Assam, he was F.P. Club Consul for Assam from 1933 to 1937.

Stanley Mayer Fraser* (1908-19), who was manager of the Clevedon Tea Estate, Sylhet, from 1940 to 1947, was in January 1947 appointed manager of Nonaipara Tea Estate, Panerihat P.O., Assam.

He has been engaged in tea planting in Assam since 1925.

Allan Cameron Frazer* (1925-30), M.A., W.S., has been assumed as a partner in the firm of Messrs. Hagart & Burn-Murdoch, W.S., Edinburgh. Until October of this year he was a partner in the firm of Messrs. A. G. Cairns & Fraser, W.S., Edinburgh.

Maurice Gordon Gillies* (1923-30), M.A., LL.B., advocate, who graduated in Law at Edinburgh University in July 1939, was admitted to the Faculty of Advocates in July 1946 and has been practising as such since that date. He served throughout the war in Field Artillery and commanded a battery of 33 Field Regiment, R.A., in 3rd Division in the North-West Europe campaign of 1944-45, and subsequently in Germany after the end of the war.

Thomas Wilson Gow (1920-33) has this year been resident manager of the Dornoch Hotel, Dornoch.

Alexander Gray* (1920-28), M.P.S., has sold his chemist's business in Aberdeen and is now manager of a new branch of Timothy Whites and Taylors Limited, Streatham, London.

John Alexander Gray* (1926-3o and 1932-35), who has been with the B.B.C. since 1940, has been transferred to the Monitoring

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Service and is now chief sub-editor of the Monitoring News Bureau at Caversham, near Reading. Whatever else may be said for or against the job, he says, he is at least very much up to date with world events.

Basil Lewin Greeson* (1898-1902), vicar of St. George's, Crosby, Scunthorpe, since 1938, was last year appointed Rural Dean of Manlake and this year Canon and Prebendary of Lincoln Cathedral. Previously he had been made a Surrogate in the diocese of Lincoln.

George Campbell Hadden* (1925-37), M. B., Ch.B., is now assistant in a medical practice at Biddulph, Stoke-on-Trent. During the war he served with the R.A.M.C. in Abyssinia and North Africa.

David Sinclair Hay* (1907-1 I), B.L., left this country in October for Zomba, Nyasaland, where he is resident director of the Colonial Development Corporation (Central Africa) Limited. It was announced in August that the Colonial Development Corporation was to set up regional subsidiary companies to supervise its activities in the various groups of colonial territories and Mr. Hay's Company covers Basutoland, Bechuanaland, Northern Rhodesia, Nyasaland and Swaziland.

James Hay* (1883-87), D.L., M.A., B.L., LL.D., advocate in Aberdeen, who is secretary of the North-East district of the Scottish Golf Union and who for twenty-six years has been in charge of the Northern Counties Cup competition, was at the conclusion of this year's competition at Balgownie presented with a wireless set from the competing clubs in recognition of his services.

NEWS FROM A RUBBER PLANTER IN MALAYA

Graham Henderson* (1906-12), M.C., who has been a rubber planter in Malaya since 192o, is Club Consul in Negri Sembilan. He has recently written to the Editor, at the latter's request, giving information about present conditions in that troubled country. In the course of his letter, he says :— My own particular bit of trouble started in May when I had a two months' strike engineered by a Communist-led Labour Union . . . but since then—touch wood—this district has been comparatively quiet. Forty special constables, all Malays, have been recruited and armed, and they form guards on bungalows and essential estate buildings by day and night. These arc all wired-in and a number of them are flood-lit, but it isn't exactly fun going round the estate armed and going to bed with a sten-gun, revolver and Mills bomb lying handy.

The worst areas are those which have large areas of jungle adjacent to them in which the bandits hide and train and come out on occasion, cause a lot of bother, and nip in again before the Police and Army can get at them. Johore and Perak arc the worst states, with certain portions of Selangor and Negri Sembilan a good second, and the security forces—whatever the papers say—are still a very long way from getting the position in hand.

A considerable body of troops has recently been drafted here from home and elsewhere but they require at least six months' intensive training locally before they are any use. They have to learn the language before they can find their way about and jungle warfare is about the most, if not the most, difficult type of warfare, extremely unpleasant at any time, and particularly so during the next few months which are the rainiest period of the year.

In a leading article at the beginning of November, the sixth month of terrorism in Malaya, The Straits Times stated that in early June, when

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

three European planters were murdered in one morning, the country suddenly realised that the wave of violence which had first been noticed in May was not just industrial intimidation in an extreme form or the feud between the Communists and the Kuomintang, but a full-scale revolt by the Malayan Communist Party and the M.P.A.J.A. (Malayan People's Anti-Japanese Army), with the object of driving the British out of Malaya, wrecking the planting and mining industries and setting up a Communist government.

Mr. Henderson explains that the M.P.A.J.A. has now changed its title to M.P.A.B.A. (anti-British Army), and that ninety-nine per cent. of its members are Chinese, all migrants from China. Before the war the Communist Party was illegal but, as they were anti-Japanese, they were armed in the later stages of the Battle of Malaya and they were a thorn in the flesh of the Japs throughout the occupation, playing the same game as they are doing now.

When Force 136 (formed as the spearhead of the forces detailed to re-take Malaya) landed and the British Military Administration took over, an agreement was reached with the M.P.A.J.A. to the effect that, if they turned in their arms and worked along the lines of a normally constituted political party, they would be recognised, and a number of them were decorated and sent home to the Victory Parade. They didn't play the game, however, and only a token amount of arms was handed in, the rest being hidden while they waited for their day.

Of what has been going on during the last two years, the Police, and the planters and miners, who are ill close contact with the Chinese, have been aware, and Government cannot say they were not warned, but the fact remains that the warnings were disregarded and the present situation has resulted. There can be no doubt that there is influence and support from behind the " Iron Curtain " throughout South-East Asia and that the real trouble is yet to come.

Sir Hubert Douglas Henderson* (19o1-04), M.B.E., M.A., LL.D., Professor of Political Economy at Oxford University since 1945, in his presidential address to the Economics Section of the British Association at their conference at Brighton in September spoke on " The Price System ", or as he called it " The Mechanics of the Economic Problem ". A century ago, he said, economists were laughed at as the practitioners of the dismal science. " They scarcely deserve that taunt or, should I say, that compliment to-day."

Sir Hubert has for the past two years been chairman of the Royal Commission on Population which, since 1944, has been at work on the vital statistics of Britain. In July of this year he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy.

Thomas Jaffrey Henderson (1932-38), Lieut. (E), who holds a permanent commission in the Royal Navy, has been serving in H.M.S. Birmingham based on the East Indies Station at Trincomalee and has recently visited South Africa, East Africa and Singapore. His twin brother, Steven Leslie Henderson (1932-38), who served during the war in the Royal Engineers, is serving his apprenticeship as a chartered accountant with Messrs. James Meston & Company, Aberdeen.

Gordon Frederick Hendry* (1928-39), M.A., has since July 1947 been an assistant economist in the farm economics branch of the Department of Agriculture for Scotland, Edinburgh.

Francis Lumsden Farquharson Innes* (1929-36), M.B., Ch.B., was in October of this year admitted a Fellow of the Royal College

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine of Surgeons, Edinburgh, (F.R.C.S.E.). He is at present on the staff of the Royal Aberdeen Hospital for Sick Children.

Redvers Noel Ironside* (1907-17), M.B., Ch.B., who was one of the F.P.s whose addresses were asked for in the last issue of the Magazine, has, since demobilisation from the R.A.F. in 1946, resumed his practice in London at zz Wimpole Street, W. 1. He is neurologist to the West London Hospital and to the Hospital of SS. John and Elizabeth, and on the staff as physician to the Maida Vale Hospital for Nervous Diseases. He is also consultant neurologist to various Metropolitan regional boards. During the war he served as Consultant in Neuropsychiatry to the R.A.F. (Overseas) and held the rank of Air Commodore.

Ronald Herbert Johnson* (r 922-26) has been engaged in naval construction duties in the Admiralty since 1943 and resides at Bathampton, Bath. He finds that trying to run a 38/25o MercedesBenz road racing car on five gallons a month is extremely irksome after being in the habit in days gone by of setting off from the West Country at dawn for the Granite City.

John (Ian) James Johnston* (1905-06), who has been engaged in sugar planting in British Guiana and rubber planting in Malaya for over thirty years, left the rubber industry last February and went to Western Australia where he joined the /9Ianzimup Machinery and Transport Company. He says that he has been lucky to get a house, which he has called after his old house in Cults, " Clach-Ian ".

William Alexander Johnstone (1896) retired at the end of July from the position of Harbour-master at Aberdeen. His association with the Harbour extended over almost twenty-seven years.

16

CONTROVERSY ON " CRIMOND"

Robert Sangster Kemp (1876-78), M.A., D.D., minister of Deer Church, Aberdeenshire, since February 1899, has been mentioned in the correspondence columns of more than one Scottish newspaper in recent months in connection with the controversy as to who composed the well-known Scottish psalm tune, " Crimond ", which first appeared in the 1872 edition of The Northern Psalter. This controversy— whether the tune was composed by Miss J. Seymour Irvine, daughter of the late Dr. Irvine, minister of Crimond, on the north-east coast of Aberdeenshire, or by David Grant, an Aberdeen tobacconist, who was also the compiler of The Northern Psalter—has been re-opened since the tune was included in the wedding service of H.R.H. Princess Elizabeth.

Dr. Kemp stated as long ago as 1924 that both a sister and a niece of Miss Irvine had told him personally that " Crimond " was her composition and that she had got David Grant to harmonise it for her, and in a recent letter to The Press and Journal, Dr. Kemp states that, in all probability, in the next edition of The Scottish Psalter Miss Irvine's name will appear as the composer of the tune and that, as the harmonising of the tune, as it appears in The Scottish Psalter, is not that of David Grant, his name will no longer appear.

Percival Robson Kirby (1892-1901), M.A., D.Litt., F.R.C.M., about whom a note appeared in the last issue of the Magazine, has

17 Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine retired from the chair of Music in the University of Witwatersrand, South Africa.

James Gray Kyd* (1891-98), C.B.E., F.R.S.E., retired from the post of Registrar-General for Scotland at the end of November.

From 1898 to 1911 he was in the service of the Northern Assurance Company and in 1912 he joined the Civil Service, being appointed Actuary to the National Health Insurance Commissioners in Ireland. He was head of the Actuarial Department in Ireland from 1912 to 1921 and in Scotland from 1921 to 1926. He then became principal Actuary of the Department in London, a post which he held until 1937, when he became Registrar-General for Scotland.

He is an ex-president of the Faculty of Actuaries. In November 1944 Mr. Kyd proposed that a Third Statistical Account of Scotland should be prepared and, although he has now retired, he is to continue work in connection with this survey.

William Young Laidlaw* (1925-35), M.B., Ch.B., has taken up general practice in Bo'ness, \Vest Lothian.

John A. Lewis* (1914-20) has succeeded his father, Sir Andrew Lewis, on the Aberdeen Harbour Board. He is a director of the firms of John Lewis Limited, coal merchants, and John Lewis & Sons Limited, shipbuilders and marine engineers, Aberdeen.

Alexander Lightbody* (I 92.2 - 33), B.Sc.(Eng.), D.C. A., A.M.I.Mech.E., A.F.R.Ae.S., completed last July a two years' post-graduate course in Aeronautics at the New College of Aeronautics at Cranfield in Bedfordshire. Thirty-six graduates from various parts of the country attended this, the first course at the new Government centre for advanced training in Aeronautics, and he was one of ten who were awarded the College Diploma with distinction.

In addition he was awarded the Governor's prize for the best allround student of the course, and is therefore the first student to have gained this honour. He was recently appointed head of the Aerodynamic Research Department of Sir W. G. Armstrong Whitworth Aircraft Limited, and is now living in Coventry.

Robert Arthur Drysdale Lindsay* (1933-39) left this country in July for Cholo, Nyasaland, to take up an appointment as a planter with the African Lake Corporation.

Eric R. R. Linklater* (1913-16), M.A., LL.D., was in 1924 one of a party of Aberdeen University students who, in the course of a Gala Week " stunt", " captured" the Aberdeen B.B.C. studio and held it to ransom, while a broadcast was in progress. Mr. R. E. Jeffrey, the first studio director at Aberdeen, has recently recalled in the Evening Express how the students burst into the studio and commandeered the microphone. Linklater got hold of a drum and announced in a sombre voice to startled listeners: " Every time I beat this drum the studio director, gagged and bound in the corner, will lose a drop of blood ". The " stunt " was so realistically carried out that listeners immediately telephoned to the studio and asked if help was wanted, and the B.B.C. authorities in London were not amused! It appears, however, that they have now forgiven Mr.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Linklater. In October of this year he was invited to open a " B.B.C. At Home" exhibition in Aberdeen, arranged in connection with the celebration of the silver jubilee of Aberdeen's broadcasting station.

He described himself as " one of the innocents who troubled the crystal and agitated the whisker " 1 Norman McAdam* (1938-43) went to South Africa in April of this year to take up a post with Messrs. Woodall & Duckham, builders.

He is now in charge of stores and equipment at Vanderbijepark, a satellite town which is being built ten miles from the old town of Vereeniging, about thirty-six miles from Johannesburg.

Duncan Ronald Macgregor* (1925-38), M.A., who graduated at Aberdeen University in July with first class honours in Geography, has been appointed to the staff of the Geography Department of Edinburgh University.

Neil Mackay (1924-29) has since 1929 been at Rotorna, New Zealand, and is at present in the employment of a milling company.

During the war he served with the New Zealand Forces in Egypt, was wounded, and mentioned in dispatches. His brother, Mervyn Sutherland Mackay (1925-29) has been in the Navy since 1938 and is presently in H.M.S. Formidable, which is being refitted at Rosyth.

John Moir MacKenzie* (1905-08), C.B.E., M.C., T.D., M.A., M.B., Ch.B., Colonel, R.A.M.C., is at present on the headquarters staff of the British Military Mission to Greece.

William Mackay McLachlan* (1876-78), M.A., W.S., who is aged eighty-seven, has been an elder of the Kirk of the Greyfriars, Edinburgh, for sixty years and session clerk for fifty-six years. He recently received a presentation from the congregation of the Church.

He was general secretary of the Foreign Mission Department of the Church of Scotland until 1934.

James Stewart McPherson (1928-33), M.A., principal teacher of Classics at Campbeltown Grammar School, was in September appointed Head-master of Bowmore Junior Secondary School, Islay.

From 1939 to 1946 he was an assistant Classical master at the School but he spent five of these years as a prisoner-of-war in Germany.

Douglas Marshall (1905-07), manager of the Invergordon branch of the North of Scotland Bank since 1928, retired at the end of August.

He entered the service of the Bank in 1908 at the Cluny Square branch, Buckie.

George Edward Mayor* (1928-36), M.A., M.B., Ch.B., was in October admitted a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh, (F.R.C.S.E.). He is at present registrar in the professorial unit at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary (Ward 8).

James Godsman Mearns* (1913-zo), B.Sc.(Agri.), returned from Malaya this summer, on medical grounds, after a year as a manager with the Kuala Lumpur Rubber Company. He first went to Malaya in 1923.

Robert Alexander Esslemont Menthe* (1924-36), M.A., who has been with the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company and associated com-

19 Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine panics since 1943, is now with the B.P. Benzine and Petroleum A.G. in Zurich.

Charles Napier Gordon Milne (1893-94) has been appointed factor for Glenmuick, the zz,ooo-acre estate near Ballater which Colonel Sir Ian Walker recently bought from Colonel Eric Mackenzie.

Francis James Milne* (1924-35), M.R.C.V.S., who is in practice in Kent, has been appointed lecturer in the Surgery Department of the Royal Veterinary College, London.

James Mathewson Milne* (1895-19oz), M.A., Docteur es Lettres (Rennes), who retired from the rectorship of Nairn Academy last year after forty years in the teaching profession, was entertained at a luncheon in Inverness arranged in his honour by the Aberdeen and District secondary teachers' branch of the E.I.S. In the course of his speech Dr. Milne said: " The trouble with education is that everyone knows all about it—from the bishop to the butler and from the Cabinet Minister to the cabinetmaker".

Malcolm Ross Milne* (7926-35), M.B., Ch.B., who joined the Australian " flying doctor" service last year, finds his work most varied and interesting, as well as full of adventure. In a recent letter he writes:— I had a long and thrilling adventure last week, when I got a message by pedal wireless from a settlement, eighty-six miles from my depot, that a truck had overturned and that there were serious casualties. I took a Sister and an orderly from the Hospital, and two days' rations, and was on the road in fifty minutes. What a road 1 No description is adequate—through scrub and bush with very sandy track underwheel, covered with anthills and similar traps for the car; a blistering hot day, no human habitation all the way, and no stream or water of any kind.

We got there in five hours—very good going indeed. There we patched up a fractured jaw and humerus, a fractured pelvis, and other minor mishaps. At 4.30 next morning I left (with crew) for another Mission station fifty miles further on, where no doctor had been for three years.

The nun in charge showed me a black-boy "with a minor scalp wound" ; as I examined him, brain came oozing out 1 So we set to, with no theatre, no lighting, not one brain instrument and precious few others, to undertake a major brain operation. We finished in one hour, and sat holding breath for long hours till he came round. The table was a bare wooden one, the theatre the rough log and bark hut which is the Mission schoolroom, daylight entering by a hole in the wall, and the Orderly giving the anaesthetic 1 The risk of meningitis was great, and we had no penicillin nearer than the depot.

I got on the pedal set, and requested a 'plane to drop supplies—no landing ground here—and we set about making a circle of fires to guide the pilot. Nothing came— but eventually at 1.30 a.m., a truck arrived with penicillin. The wireless operators had been unable to call up a 'plane, and had asked for a volunteer to run out. The chap did it in an all-time record time of five hours-136 fearsome miles at dead of night, to bring the needed penicillin for this little native boy.

Next day we set out for home—having been made most comfortable at the Mission—the three of us in the front of the Utility with Joey (the boy) across our knees, his head cradled in pillows on the Sister's lap. We reached the settlement all safe, and rested the kid all afternoon. At nightfall we set off again on the long trek back to depot with another patient lying in the back of the car, and arrived in six hours.

The boy is now up and about, so far with no ill-effects. He should have died many times, and would most certainly have done so without penicillin.

Robert Arthur Milne* (7907-75), Lieut.-Colonel, has retired from the Army, in which he held a regular commission, and was until the

20

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine end of November on the staff of the Regional Economic Officer, North Rhine-Westphalia, Dusseldorf, with the Control Commission for Germany. His elder brother, JOHN NORMAN NfILNE (1909-12) was killed in action in 1941 in Malaya, where he was a rubber planter with Harrisons and Crosfield Limited. The death of their father, ARTHUR PLEDGE MILNE (1881-83), is reported on another page.

Ronald Duncan Mitchell* (1924-31) has received a post as cutter with Messrs. P. & J. Haggart, tweed merchants, Aberfeldy.

James Glegg Moir* (1928-34), M.B., Ch.B., has been assumed as a partner by Dr. G. P. Middleton, M.V.O., Ballater, who is SurgeonApothecary to H.M. Household at Balmoral Castle.

Eric Keir Morrison* (1921-32), M.A., who holds a permanent commission in the Royal Army Educational Corps, was posted this year to H.Q., Mombasa Sub-Area, Kenya.

Douglas Alexander Mortimer* (1895-99), solicitor, Dundee, was in September appointed by the Lord President of the Court of Session to be legal member of the Electricity Arbitration Tribunal (set up under the Electricity Act 1947) in relation to proceedings to be held in Scotland. He will also act as president on the tribunal in such proceedings. He qualified as a solicitor in 1908, was with Harrisons and Crosfield Limited in Sumatra and Malaya from 1912 to 1918, and thereafter in practice in Dundee as a solicitor. In 1945 he obtained a full-time post with the Pensions Appeal Tribunal for Scotland.

John Mortimer* (1923-27), manager of the National Employers' Mutual General Insurance Association Limited in Aberdeen, has been successful in examinations which qualify him for Fellowship of the Chartered Insurance Institute. Another F.P., Alistair MacDonell Milne* (1924-32), branch manager of the Scottish Insurance Corporation Limited in Aberdeen, has qualified as an Associate of the Institute.

James Lawson Mowat* (1915-16), M.A., Ph.D., of the I.L.O. at Geneva, visited India in October-November 1947 on behalf of the I.L.O. and in April of this year, in the same capacity, he was present at a conference in London on Safety of Life at Sea. Shortly afterwards he attended the. Assembly of the International Civil Aviation Organisation in Geneva. The other international bodies represented there included U.N.O., I.A.T.A., I.M.F., I.C.C., I.U.A.I., I.F.A.P.A., U.P.U., W.H.O., I.M.O., I.S.O., I.T.U., F.A.T., I.L.A. and F.I.T.A.P. (Readers may care to attempt to identify these mysterious bodies I) William James Adair Nelson* (1914-24), C.A., has returned to Aberdeen on being appointed Treasurer to the University after nearly twenty years' absence from the city. On qualifying as a chartered accountant in 5930, he lived in London for three years before going to Ceylon, where he remained until the end of 1937. From 1938 until the outbreak of war he was in Belgium and thereafter he served in the Royal Artillery. He was wounded in the Middle East and was demobilised with the rank of Captain in 1945. Since then he has lived in \Vales and London where he was with the Finance Department of the National Coal Board. He is a former Scoutmaster of the 9th Troop.

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Alexander Adam McIntosh Nicol* (1915- x 7), M.B., Ch.B., F.R.C.P., who, in June 1947, was appointed senior physician and director of the medical unit at Sunderland Royal Infirmary, has along with another P.P., Ian Campbell Cowan* (1924-33), B.Sc., M.B., Ch.B., and two other doctors, begun the first attack by specialists on the problem of rheumatic diseases. They have organised an arthritis clinic in Sunderland Royal Infirmary.

Ian Durance Pennie* (1926-33), M.B., Ch.B., who is in practice at Tongue, Sutherland, is conducting an inquiry on behalf of the Council of the Scottish Ornithologists' Club into the present status and habitat of the capercaillie in Scotland. The purpose of the inquiry is to bring up to date knowledge of the spread of this species since its reintroduction, and to assess any decreases caused by the cutting of woods during the war years.

George Barclay Pirie* (1894-97) is an export agent in London and deals chiefly with steel, barbed wire, etc. On leaving the School he was in the Commercial Bank, Aberdeen, until he volunteered to serve with the Gordon Highlanders in the Boer War. Later he served with the irregular cavalry in the Zulu War of 1906 and thereafter he was for a number of years with the P. & O. Company, London. In the first world war he served in India and Mesopotamia with the Royal West Kent Regiment, holding various staff appointments, and in 1919 he was with the 126 Baluchis in Kurdistan. Thereafter he was for some years a foreign exchange broker in the City, during which time he published a Ready Reckoner in Rupees, the first published since 1882, and he then joined a stockbroker's office before becoming an export agent on his own account.

Harry James Rae* (1898-1904), M.C., M.A., M.B., Ch.B., D.P.H., has been appointed to the executive committee of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. He has been concerned with public health in Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire for over thirty years and is now Chief Medical Officer for the Public Health Services of the City of Aberdeen and the Counties of Aberdeen and Kincardine.

John Scott Riddell. (1927-31), M.B., Ch.B., is in practice at Stockton-on-Tees.

George Ferguson Ritchie* (1917-24) has been with the Lago Oil and Transport Company, Aruba, Dutch West Indies, since 1929. Aruba is located in the Caribbean Sea, off the coast of Western Venezuela, and is about zoo miles north-east of the large stretch of oilfields that dot the eastern part of Lake Maracaibo. No oil is produced on the island but probably the biggest oil refinery in the world, owned by the Standard. Oil Company of New Jersey, is situated there. Oil is shipped from Venezuela in shallow draft tankers and the daily throughput at the refinery is about 400,000 barrels. All major petroleum products, with the exception of lubricants, are manufactured and during the war it was estimated that fifty per cent. of the petroleum products used for warfare came from that part of the West Indies.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine George Muir Glen Robbie* (193o-41) is now engaged in tea planting on Galcanda Estate, Haputale, Ceylon.

John Watson Robertson (1903-05), M.A., B.Sc., who has been Head-master of the Aberdeen Central School since 1926, was in July re-elected an assessor of the General Council of Aberdeen University on the University Court for a further period of four years. He has sat on the Court since December 1943.

Louis Seton Rusack* (1926-37), M.B., Ch.B., is in practice at Gifford, East Lothian.

Ramsay Roger Russell* (1923-35) retired at the end of July from the command of 612 (County of Aberdeen) Auxiliary Air Squadron, to which he was appointed in August 1946.

George Brown Cameron Sangster* (1928-37), D.S.C., M.A., B.D., who graduated in Divinity at Aberdeen University in July, was in October inducted as minister of St. Kcssog's Church, Comrie, Perthshire. In his final year he was awarded a Lumsden and Sachs scholarship by Christ's College, Aberdeen.

Arthur Leslie Scott* (1908-14), son of the late JAMES SCOTT (1864-67), I.S.O., sometime Consul-General at Canton, who joined the British Consular Service in China in 192o, was in the Far Eastern and China Departments of the Foreign Office from 1937 to 1948.

He is now working in the Department of Health for Scotland at St. Andrew's House, Edinburgh.

Herbert Brebner Scott* (1905-08), M.C., who joined the Royal Insurance Company Limited after the 1914-18 war, has been appointed Manager for the East (covering India, Burma, Ceylon, Pakistan and Iraq) for the Royal Insurance Company Limited, the Liverpool and London and Globe Insurance Company Limited and their subsidiary companies. Mr. Scott, who is President of the Bengal and Assam Centre of the Club, has recently returned to Calcutta after leave in this country. He has been Manager of the " Royal" there since 1939 and before that he was in Shanghai.

James George Dawion Scott (1884-88), M.A., F.S.A., has retired to Kintore from the charge of Logiealmond Parish Church, Perthshire, where he celebrated his jubilee as a minister in February 1947. He went to Logiealmond in 1935.

William Walker Scott* (i 903- I 3), formerly Administrative Officer at Base H.Q., R.A.F., Seletar, Singapore, has left the R.A.F. and been appointed Superintendent Assessor of the War Damage Claims Commission at Kuala Lumpur.

Alexander James Sheret* (1890-96) has moved from Florida to resume his association with the Theo. Presser Company, music publishers and wholesalers, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He went to the United States in 1911.

Andrew James Shinnie (1897-1903), M.D., D.P.H., who has been Medical Officer of Health for the City of Westminster since 1924, was recently appointed a member of the working party which is to make recommendations for securing sanitary and clean conditions in the catering trade.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

23

William Douglas Simpson* (t9ot-i3), M.A., D.Litt., was elected an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland at the Incorporation's annual convention held at Aberdeen in June.

Ian Wayman Sinclair* (1938-41), M.B., Ch.B., Lieutenant, R.A.M.C., who graduated at Aberdeen in 1947, has been serving at the Station Hospital, Nanyuki, Kenya.

Robert Stewart Slessor* (1927-29), M.B., Ch.B., son of ROBERT ALEXANDER SLESSOR* (1887-92), M.A., M.B., Ch.B., D.P.H., Fraserburgh, was in July appointed to the Colonial Service as a senior medical officer in the Falkland Islands. Since graduating in 1935, he has held medical appointments in Birmingham, Torquay, Dublin and the Falkland Islands. He served in the R.N.V.R. during the war and was mentioned in dispatches.

Bernard Hooper Smith* (1932-35), M.B., Ch.B., left U.N.R.R.A. in October 1946, was attached for six months to the Department of Pathology at Aberdeen University and thereafter became a supernumerary medical registrar in the wards of Professor R. S. Aitken at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary. In July 1947 he became an M.R.C.P. (London) and since October 1947 he has been working in the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases, Queen's Square, London, W.C. t.

Charles Edward Smith* (1921-32), M.B.E., has gone to South Africa to take up an appointment with George Mackenzie & Company Limited, chartered accountants, Johannesburg.

James Edward Smith* (19,6-22), B.Sc., Ph.D., who received an appointment in 1937 as geologist with the United British Oilfields of Trinidad, is now with the Caribbean Petroleum Company Limited at Maracaibo, Venezuela.

John Morrison Smith (1924-32), who has been with Steel Brothers & Company Limited, Rangoon, since December 1934, has been posted to Jesselton, North Borneo, where there are two other F.P.s—James Smart Abernethy* (1925-26), our Consul, and George Grant Thomson* (1 9 i 0- i 2).

Roy Stuart Smith * (1931-40) is one of ten young Aberdeen artists who last year formed themselves into the " 47 " Group. All of them are former pupils of Gray's School of Art, Aberdeen and in September of this year a second exhibition of their work was held in the Aberdeen Art Gallery.

Sydney Robertson Smith* (1924-3o), B.Sc.(Eng.), A.M.I.C.E., has been appointed county engineer for Angus. Before the war he worked in the Roads Department of Aberdeen County Council and thereafter was senior engineering assistant to the Burgh of Motherwel and Wishaw. During the war he was with the Air Ministry Works Directorate and since then has been chief assistant engineer with Aberdeen County Council.

John Coutts Smollett* (1938-43) is a sugar planter with Demerara Company Limited at Leanora, British Guiana. During the August Bank holiday week-end he paid a visit to another F.P. in British

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Guiana, John Angus Colin Marr* (1936-43), who is an overseer on a sugar estate.

Rev. Adrian Hay Stephen (1914-18), minister of the United Kininmonth and New Leeds churches, Aberdeenshire, since 1940, was inducted in September to St. Cuthbert's Church, Glasgow.

William Sutherland* (I9z8-34), M.A., LL.B., who has for some years been practising as a solicitor in Inverness and who is also proprietor of the Victoria Park Hotel, Forres, was in November appointed secretary and treasurer of the Fife Mental Hospitals Board of Management.

James Frater Taylor* (1886-88), who was the successful reorganiser and later chairman of the old established iron, steel and colliery concern of Pease & Partners Ltd., Darlington, England, returned to Montreal, Canada, in 2939 on a special mission for the Bank of England. Throughout the war years he continued to act for the Bank, crossing to the United Kingdom many times by air and sea.

Mr. Taylor is now living in Victoria, British Columbia, but continues to act in an advisory capacity. He is a Commander of the Order of St. Olaf of Norway.

George Alexander Thomson* (1903-06) has retired from the Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China, London, after thirty-five years' Eastern service, during which period he has been stationed at various places in China, Japan, Malaya and India. For the last eight years of his service he was in charge of the Bank's agency at Kanpur (Cawnpore), India, and previous to that, he was agent at Delhi and Amritsar.

Ian David Fiddcs Thomson* (1944-48) is a junior reporter with Aberdeen Journals Limited at Aberdeen.

James Booth Thomson* (2928-30 was in October appointed youth organiser for Carlisle. He has been associated with youth organisations, chiefly in Aberdeen, since 1929 and in July 2946 he was appointed youth service organiser for the joint counties of Moray and Nairn.

James Laing Thomson* (1894-96), M.A., B.D., retired in April from the charge of St. Peter's Church, Peterculter, where he had been since 1905. He is at present living with his brother, George Eddie Thomson* (1894-99), M.A., B.D., minister at Monquhitter.

John Berry Thomson* (2927-33) left Aberdeen in February and is now accountant on Cavens Estate, Kirkbean, by Dumfries, and manager of the Southerness Development Company, Southerness-onSolway. Southerness, formerly a compact little fishing village, has been converted into an unusual hotel, especially suitable for families.

The old-world charm of the cottages has been retained but they have been modernised internally. When building restrictions are removed, the Development Company hopes to form a township over the whole area.

Ronald Cooper Thomson* (1931-42), B.Sc., was in 1946 appointed technical officer (chemist) with Imperial Chemical Industries Limited, Billingham Division. Ile has been engaged for the past two

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

25

years on research work in the petroleum chemicals group, in preparation for the opening of a new chemical factory at Wilton, Yorks.

William Maxwell Todd (I920-32), B.Sc.(Aberd.), D.Phil.(Oxon.), who for the past three years has been a senior lecturer in pharmaceutical chemistry at the Royal Technical College, Glasgow, received an appointment in August as assistant to the County Analyst in Aberdeen.

SENIOR OFFICERS OF THE R.A.M.C.

• •

Kenneth Alexander Macdonald Tomory* (1899-1908), O.B.E., Temporary Major-General, is D.D.M.S., Scottish Command and senior R.A.M.C. officer in Scotland. Last June he had the honour of receiving Her Majesty The Queen when, as Colonel-in-Chief of the R.A.M.C., she attended a party in Edinburgh to mark the jubilee of the Corps. There are two other F.P.s in the higher ranks of the R.A.M.C.: Rudolph William Galloway* (1902-06), C.B., C.B.E., D.S.O., Major-General, is D.D.M.S., Western Command at Chester, and Thomas Menzies* (1905-to), O.B.E., has recently been appointed D.M.S., M.E.L.F., with the temporary rank of Major-General.

David Verel (1925-32), M.A., ALB., B.Chir. (Cantab.), M.R.C.P., received the degree of Doctor of Medicine (M.D.) from the University of Cambridge in June, and in August it was announced that he had been awarded the Copeman Medal for medical or biological research.

In the same month he was awarded a junior fellowship by the trustees of the Beit Memorial Fellowships for Medical Research. He is now working in the clinical research unit, Guy's Hospital, London.

George Douglas Walker (2919-22), manager of the Palace Theatre, Aberdeen, for the past two years, was in August appointed manager of the Odeon Theatre, Glasgow, Odeon's leading cinema in Scotland.

Harry Lyon Williams* (1925-36) has been appointed to the Middlesex County Architect's office in London.

Charles Featherstonhaugh Wylie* (1915-2o) left Edinburgh in April for Cape Town, where he is now manager of the Central Hotel.

AWARDS AT GRAY'S SCHOOL OF ART, ABERDEEN

In October 1948 diplomas and prizes at Gray's School of Art, Aberdeen, were awarded as follows : Diploma in Architecture— Andrew Martin Dalgleish (2930-36), Hugh Ross Souper (19z 8-3 1) and Harry Lyon Williams* (1925-36) ; The Founder's Prize (Art)— William Thomson Ord (1942-47) ; Alexander C. Barker's Legacy Prize (Architecture)—Ernest Ian McConnach (2932-43) ; Aberdeen Society of Architects' Prize (Architecture, junior)—Richard Gemmell Jones* (2928-38).

HONOUR FOR MEMBER OF THE SCHOOL STAFF

Mr. JAMES WILLIAM COLLIE, M.A., B.Sc., who has been a member of the School staff since 1926, was made a Fellow of the Educational Institute of Scotland in June of this year, in recognition of his services as secretary of the Aberdeen and District secondary teachers' branch of the Institute.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Marriages Bowes (1915-28).—At New 14Ionkland Parish Church, Airdrie, on 4 September 1948, GEORGE WILLIAM BOWES,* 239 Knightsbridge, London, S.W. 7, son of the late Mr. George Bowes and of Mrs. Bowes, Newtonhill, Kincardineshire, to Marjorie Barton, widow of Major R. J. Barton and elder daughter of the Hon. Sheriff James Tennent, D.L., J.P., and of Mrs. Tennent, Beechwood, Airdrie.

Brown (t923-36).—At King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on 14 September 1948, ALEXANDER JOHN YOUNGSON BROWN, M.A., son of Dr. Alexander Brown, 49 Waverley Place, Aberdeen, and of the late Mrs. Brown, to Elizabeth Gisbome Naylor, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Naylor, 164 Forest Avenue, Aberdeen.

Brown (1915-21).—At Holbum West Church, Aberdeen, on 14 October 1948, ANDREW GALLOWAY BROWN,* C.A., 58 St. Swithin Street, Aberdeen, to Margaret Leiper.

Carnegie (r 925-38).—At King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on 28 September 1948, LESLIE THOMPSON CARNEGIE,* B.L., elder son of Mr. and Mrs. H. C. Whyte Carnegie, 96 Mile-End Avenue, Aberdeen, to Isobel Jane M'Combie, only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Alexander M'Combie, 495 King Street, Aberdeen.

Coull (r9zo-23).—At the South Church, Stonehaven, on 9 October 1948, FREDERICK EADIE COULL,* son of the late Capt. J. F. Coull and of Mrs. Coull, 1S4 Forest Avenue, Aberdeen, to Florence Margaret Wilson, elder daughter of the late Mr. W. H. Wilson, Inverness, and of Mrs. Wilson, 2 Westfield Road, Stonehaven.

Craig (1934-42).--At Bucksbum Church, Aberdeenshire, on 4 August 1948, DEREK JOHN ALEXANDER CRAIG, son of Mr. and Mrs. N. A. Craig, 5 Auchmill Road, Bucksbum, to Margaret Ellen Mitchell, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. John T. Mitchell, 4 Don Street, Woodside, Aberdeen.

Cruickshank (1922-34).—At St. Andrew's Cathedral, Aberdeen, on 18 September 1948, WILLIAM CHEYNE CRUICKSHANK,* SOD of Mr. and Mrs. James C. V. Cruickshank, 28 Gladstone Place, Aberdeen, to Isobel Alice Craib, daughter of the late Dr. A. George Craib and of Mrs. Craib, 23 Devonshire Road, Aberdeen.

Curr (19o8-18).—At Aberdeen on 12 June 1948, THOMAS THISTELTON CURR,* of Thomas Curr & Co., Aberdeen, to Mrs. Margaret Provan Longmore.

Duffus (192o-28).-At St. Mary's Cathedral, Aberdeen, on 31 August 1948, Jorml CALDER DUFFUS,* son of the late Mr. John C. Duffus and of Mrs. Duffus, 216 Union Grove, Aberdeen, to Caroline Isobel Forbes, daughter of the late Mr. T. Forbes and of Mrs. Forbes, 23 Ferryhill Place, Aberdeen.

Dunlop (I934-41).—At King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on 12 August 1948, CHARLES MOIR DUNLOP, M.B., Ch.B., son of Mr. and Mrs. P. F. Dunlop, 91 King's Gate, Aberdeen, to Jean Gordon MacKenzie, M.A., daughter of the late Mr. David MacKenzie, M.C., M.A., former rector of Banff Academy, and of Mrs. MacKenzie, 3 King's Cross Road, Aberdeen.

Fulde (1926-38).—At St. James' Church, Mapperley, Nottingham, on 3 July 1948, KENNETH WILLIAM THOMAS FULDE,* only son of Mr. and Mrs. T. H. Fulde, 136 Duthie Terrace, Aberdeen, to Dora Madeline Shafto, only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. T. Shafto, 134 Moore Road, Mapperley, Nottingham.

Fyfe (I916-24).—At St. John's Episcopal Church, Aberdeen, on ro September 1948, GEORGE PATERSON FYFE,* son of the late Mr. George Fyfe and of Mrs. Fyfe, 551 Holburn Street, Aberdeen, to Gladys Walker, youngest daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Wm. Walker, 20 Jamaica Street, Aberdeen.

Gibb (1925-36).—At King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on 29 October 1948, WILLIAM Scorr Grim,* M.A., second son of the late Mr. and Mrs. George L. Gibb, late of 291 Great Western Road, Aberdeen, to Helen Garden Crofts, only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Harold Crofts, 204 Great Western Road, Aberdeen.

Gilbert (1923-3o).—At Greyfriars Parish Church, Aberdeen, on x5 September 1948, PETER MURRAY GILBERT, S011 of the late Mr. P. Gilbert and of Mrs. M. Gilbert, 56 Polmuir Road, Aberdeen, to Henrietta Hayden Repper, daughter of the late Mr. and Mrs. Alex. Repper, 79 Argyll Place, Aberdeen.

Gill (1929-37).—M King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on 4 September 1948, DAVID JAMES GILL, M.B., Ch.B., son of Mr. and Mrs. Ian M. Gill, 6 Bayview

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine Road, Aberdeen, to Alexandra June Sadler, daughter of Mr. David P. Sadler, A.M.I.Mech.E., and of the late Mrs. Sadler, of Burma, and 2o Fountainhall Road, Aberdeen.

Hadden (1935-39).—At King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on z September 1948, ANDREW JAMES HADDEN,* only son of Mr. and Mrs. Andrew W. Hadden, 7z Ashgrovc Road, Aberdeen, to Kathleen Murray Morrison, M.B. Ch.B., only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Morrison, 155 Hutcheon Street, Aberdeen.

Hastie (1926-35).—At St. Mary's Church, Carden Place, Aberdeen, on 3o August 1948, ROBERT HASTIE,* son of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Hastie, Heatherlea, Milltimber, to Barbara Black, youngest daughter of Mr. and Mrs. A. A. Black, 71 Forest Avenue, Aberdeen.

Jack (193o-38).—At King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on 4 August 1948, ERNEST Mtmato JACK,* M.B., Ch.B., Astlcy Bridge, Bolton, Lanes, only son of Mr. and Mrs. Murray Jack, z8 Carlton Place, Aberdeen, to Violet Elizabeth (Betty) Ferguson, M.S.R., second daughter of Mr. and Mrs. W. A. Ferguson, Rothiebrisbane, Fyvie.

Johnstone (/926-35).—At Queen's Cross Church, Aberdeen, on I4 August 1948, BRUCE RErrit JOHNSTONE, son of the late Mr. Alexander Johnstone, late of Malaya, and of Mrs. Johnstone, 45 Beaconsfield Place, Aberdeen, to Bunty M`Leod, younger daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Peter M`Leod, 16 Gordon Road, Aberdeen.

Ludwig (1922-z9).—At King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on 4 September 1948, BRIAN LUDWIG, son of the late Mr. C. F. Ludwig and of Mrs. Ludwig, 68 Desswood Place, Aberdeen, to Mrs. Doreen Christie, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James Walkdcn, 6 Homby Street, Wigan.

M`Dougall (19z1-34).—At St. Mary's Church, Carden Place, Aberdeen, on 23 September 1948, DUNCAN HERDMAN M`DOUGALL,* C.A., youngest son of Mr. and Mrs. J. Lyle M`Dougall, 7 Carden Place, Aberdeen, to Eileen Isobel Anton, only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. R. J. Anton, z Bogie Street, Huntly.

Menzies (P921-25).—At St. Saviour's Church, Walton Street, London, on xi August 1948, WILLIAM MENZIES,* youngest son of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Menzies, Farragon, West Cults, to Joceline Elizabeth Morgan, younger daughter of the late Sir Benjamin Morgan and of Lady Morgan, Sussex Grove, Roehampton, London.

Monro (1899-1902).--At Overton, Kirkcaldy, on I September 1948, the Rev. ALEXANDER JAMES FALCONER MONRO, O.B.E., M.A., minister of Newhills, Aberdeenshire, to Christian Miller Dickson, daughter of the late Rev. W. J. Dickson and of Mrs. Dickson, Ford, Midlothian.

Morgan (1932-42).--At St. James' Church, Styvechale, on 3 July 1948, DOUGLAS GEORGE MORGAN,* son of the late Mr. W. S. Morgan and of Mrs. Johnston, 49 Woodstock Road, Aberdeen, to Helen Mary Inns Will, daughter of Dr. and Mrs. A. J. Will, Daventry Road, Coventry.

Morgan (1906-I z).—At Deer Park United Church, Toronto, on 26 June 1948,

by George Stanley Russell* (1894-1901), M.A., D.D., EDWIN MORGAN,* son of the late Mr. and Mrs. George Morgan, Aberdeen, to Katherine Isabel Elliot, second daughter of the late Mr. and Mrs. Walter Elliot, Milton, Ontario.

Morrice (1937-41).--At Queen's Cross Church, Aberdeen, on t 2 August 1948, FRANK MORRICE,* only son of Mr. and Mrs. F. Mortice, 164 Union Grove, Aberdeen, to Elizabeth (Betty) Fordyce, daughter of the late Mr. John Fordyce and of Mrs. Fordyce, Mains of Corsegight, New Deer, Aberdeenshire.

Morrison (1926-19).—At Queen's Cross Church, Aberdeen, on 28 August 1948, FREDERICK WILLIAM MORRISON, only son of the late Mr. F. W. Morrison and of Mrs. E. S. C. Morrison, 32 Carden Place, Aberdeen, to Stella Elizabeth Grant, only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Grant, 5 Decmount Avenue, Aberdeen.

Patterson (1919-36).--At King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on 8 July 1948, DOUGLAS GORDON PATTERSON,* only SOD Of JAMES PATTERSON* (1906-I z), advocate in Aberdeen, and of Mrs. Patterson, Earlswells, Bieldside, to Elizabeth Irene Harrison, daughter of Mrs. Harrison, 19 Fonthill Terrace, Aberdeen, and of the late Mr. G. Keith Harrison.

Patterson (1926-38).-At. St. Aidan's Church, Clarkston, Glasgow, on 16 July 1948, DOUGLAS JAMES COCHAR PATTERSON,* elder son of the late Mr. James Cochar

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Patterson, spirit merchant, and of Mrs. Patterson, Is Belgrave Terrace, Aberdeen, to Jessie Hay Russell, elder daughter of Mr. and Mrs. William Russell, 35 Chapel Street, Carluke.

Reid (I936-4o).—At St. Mary's Episcopal Church, Carden Place, Aberdeen, on 3 July 1g48, GEORGE REID, younger son of Mr. and Mrs. William A. Reid, s Viewfield Gardens, Aberdeen, to Morag Macnab, second daughter of the late Mr. and Mrs. Peter Macnab, Greenock.

Robbie (193o-41).—At St. Mark's Church, Badulla, Ceylon, on 14 September 1948, GEORGE MUIR GLEN ROBBIE,* elder son of Mr. and Mrs. George Robbie, 5z Devonshire Road, Aberdeen, to Dorothy Maud Miller, younger daughter of the late Mr. James Miller and of Mrs. Miller of Liverpool.

Sangster (1927-39).—At St. Raphael's Church, Surbiton, Surrey, on 8 September 1948, Major ERIC GARDEN SANGSTER,* The Gordon Highlanders, son of the late Mr. T. J. Sangster and of Mrs. Sangster, 13 Annfield Terrace, Aberdeen, to Gwenda N. Weddell, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Herbert Weddell, 78 Bcrrylands, Surbiton.

Sangster (1928-37).—At King's College Chapel, Old Aberdeen, on 15 September 1948, the Rev. GEORGE BROWN CAMERON SANGSTER,* D.S.C., B.D., only son of Captain A. P. Sangster, ;6 Gray Street, Aberdeen, and of the late Mrs. Sangster, to Audrey Elizabeth Davidson, only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. J. M. Davidson, 6 Westfield Terrace, Aberdeen.

Sharpe (1937-44).—At St. George's Church, Gateshead, on 18 September 1948, JOHN HAROLD SHARPE,* only son of Mr. and Mrs. J. W. Sharpe, 22 Leslie Road, Aberdeen, to Lillian Baty, only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. J. Baty, 27 Essex Gardens, Low Fell, Gateshead.

Shirran (s9r4-s9).—At St. Andrew's North Church, Kilmarnock, on 2 June 1948, EDWARD HENRY PATON SIMPSON SHIRRAN,* 33 Auchentrae Crescent, Ayr, elder son of the late Mr. A. M. Shirran, Braemar and of Mrs. Shirran, 3 Woodburn Avenue, Aberdeen, to May Ross, youngest daughter of the late Mr. James Ross and of Mrs. Ross, 17 Stirling Avenue, Kilmarnock.

Thomson (1935-39).—At Carden Place Church, Aberdeen, on zo September 1948, ALEXANDER M'ARA MONCRIEFF TnoMsoN,* son of Mr. and Mrs. E. 13.

Thomson, i King's Cross Terrace, Aberdeen, to Margaret Jane Williamson, daughter of Mr. Charles O. Williamson and of the late Mrs. Williamson, St. Olaf Street, Lerwick, Shetland.

Verel (1925-3z).—At King's College Chapel,. Old Aberdeen, on 18 November 1948, DAVID VEREL, M.D., M.R.C.P., Guy's IIospital, London, only son of the late RAYMOND VEREL (1896-99) and of the late Mrs. Verel, Aberdeen, to Agnes Williamson, M.B., Ch.B., elder daughter of Mr. and Mrs. E. L. Williamson, 2 The Chanonry, Old Aberdeen.

Walker (1925-36).—At the Church of the Sacred Heart, Tilburg, Holland, on 27 July 1948, WILLIAM LUMSDEN WALKER,* M.B., Ch.B., D.P.H., son of the Rev. VANE WALKER* (1904-05) and of Mrs. Walker, (:u par, Fife, to Maria Helena Lucia (Riet) Mallens, daughter of Mr. Jan Mallens and of the late Mrs. Mallens, Tilburg.

Watt (1934-19).—At North Momingside Church, Edinburgh, on I July 1948, the Rev. JOHN GEORGE MONCUR WATT, M.A., Bonnygate Manse, Cupar, son of the late Rev. John Watt, B.A., Dumfries, and of Mrs. E. A. Watt, to Isobel Edith Thomson, elder daughter of Mr. and Mrs. J. A. Monteath Thomson, 5 Polwarth Terrace, Edinburgh.

Wright (1887-94).—At Aberdeen, on 19 October 1948, WILLIAM SCOTT WRIGHT, 6z Cranford Road, Aberdeen, to Mary Couper or Bowman, late of Brow Cottage, Gienkindie. *

*

*

Hunter (School Staff).—At Woodside North Church, Aberdeen, on 9 July 1948, EDWIN I IUNTER,* son of Mr. and Mrs. William Hunter, 24 North Street, Montrose,

to Sheila Margaret Lunan, elder daughter of Mr. and Mrs. George Lunan, so Leslie Road, Aberdeen.

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29

Obituary Ernest Fraser Anderson* (1940-46) died of wounds at Singapore on z6 October 1948 in his twentieth year. He was the son of Mr. and Mrs. Henry G. B. Anderson, z Cairnfield Place, Aberdeen, and had been serving in the Army for ten months. After completing his basic training he was employed as a clerk in the R.A.S.C. Command Depot at Folkestone but, having volunteered for overseas service, he was drafted to the and Battalion of the Guards Brigade which left Liverpool for Singapore in September. He landed there on 8 October and the circumstances of his death, which occurred just over a fortnight later, have not yet been reported. At the School he was a keen scout in the 9th Troop and also a member of the Army Cadet Force. He passed the clerical grade examination ih the Civil Service and was employed with the Ministry of Labour in Aberdeen for three months before he was called up.

Andrew Campbell* (1902-04), M.B., Ch.B., D.P.I-I., F.R.C.S.E., died at Johannesburg in June of this year, aged sixty-one. He graduated at Edinburgh University in 191o and was admitted an F.R.C.S.E. in 1919. Two years later he left for South Africa and, after a short time in Port Elizabeth, went into practice in Johannesburg. He retired in 1940 on account of ill-health and resided for a time in Port Elizabeth before returning to Johannesburg. Ile was well-known in America and South Africa for his work on ear, nose and throat diseases. A keen golfer, he was president of the 'I'ransvaal Golf Union in t932. During the first world war he served in the Indian Medical Service from 1917 to 1919.

John William Clark (1879-81) died at Aberdeen on 3 September 1948, aged eighty-two. After leaving the School he entered the firm of Clark Brothers, grain and forage merchants, Aberdeen, which had been founded by his father, became head of the firm, and carried it on until he retired in 1937. Always interested in modern inventions, he purchased his first motor car about 191o and drove a very large mileage each year until his death. He displayed the same pioneering spirit in his business and introduced baling machines, hand-operated at first and later power-driven, into the forage trade. He was a very well-known character in agricultural circles throughout the North-East of Scotland. Ile is survived by his son, JohN CLARK. (1914-22), B.Sc. (Agr.), who, after being engaged in farming for many years, is now Agricultural Economist with the North of Scotland College of Agriculture.

Alexander Lee Cobban (1880-85), M.A., M.B., C.M., died at Edinburgh on 21 August 1948 in his eightieth year. He was for a few years an assistant in Manchester but thereafter went into practice at Ashton-in-Makertield, Lancashire, where his life's work was done. He knew his work and loved it, and always kept up to date with the latest developments: it was a great disappointment to him when he had to retire in 1945 on account of ill-health. Thereafter he and his wife went to live with their daughter in Edinburgh. Both at School and at Aberdeen University he was keen on sport and he will be remembered by his contemporaries as a footballer, cricketer and oarsman.

His youngest brother, Ct.mar..N"r Lea COBBAN (1891-96), Major, 'Indian Army (retd.), was lost by enemy action at sea in September 1941 when he was returning from Paris in order to offer his services to the War Office.

A FORMER CLUB CONSUL William Maurice Grant Dawson* (1905-07), O.B.G., M.C., A.M.I.C.E., son of the late Colonel \K'ILLIAM F. G. DAWSON (1863-67) of the North of Scotland Bank Limited, Insch, Aberdeenshire, died at Canal House, Ardrishaig, Argyllshire, on 3o June 1948, aged fifty-six. After serving his apprenticeship with Messrs.

Walker & Duncan, Aberdeen, he practised as a civil engineer in Aberdeen and in 1914 he was appointed assistant engineer for the construction of the Aberdeen Water Works at Invercannie. Commissioned in the 6th Battalion, The Gordon Highlanders in November 1914, he transferred to the Royal Engineers in the following year and served in France for four years. In 1918 he was awarded the Military Cross and was twice mentioned in dispatches. After the Armistice he was appointed C.R.E. of the Saint Quentin Sub-Area. In 1919 he went to India to be an assistant engineer in the Irrigation Branch of the Public Works Department in the United Provinces and rose to be chief engineer. He was F.P. Club Consul

30

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

for the United Provinces from 1939 until 1946, when he retired from India. In 1943 he received the O.B.H. for war work.

Sir WILLIAM TENNANT* (1904-10), C.I.E., M.A., has sent us this appreciation:— "Maurice Dawson's twenty-five years in India were strenuous, fruitful and happy ones. He revelled in the human, no less than the technical, side of his work on the Sarda, Ganges and Jumna Canals, because his heart was in the welfare of the cultivators who depended on him for their irrigation water—the life-blood of Indian agriculture. To ensure them their regular supply and its equitable distribution, his wife and he toured for months together, year in and year out, always patient to hear and prompt to remedy their grievances and troubles. We shall long remember the genial hospitality with which] they welcomed us to their camps and the manifest trust and affection with which the villagers regarded them.

The war years brought him added responsibility and wider opportunity. In 1942 he was specially chosen to prepare a score or more of airfields spread over an area as large as England, and he completed this task with a skill and promptitude that won him the commendation of Government at a cost barely two-thirds of the average elsewhere in India. These strenuous years broke his health, but his friends, Indian as well as British, arc glad to think that he was selected to be head of his Service before he was invalided. He will be remembered in the United Provinces as one who worthily maintained the highest traditions of the British in India."

Frederick Henry Fraser* (1888-99) died at East Grinstead, Sussex, on 8 June 1947. aged sixty-six. He studied Agriculture at Aberdeen University and in 19oz left to join his father, the late Mr. Joseph Fraser, in tea and rubber planting in Ceylon. (In an issue of the Magazine at that time, it is recorded that " about half the 'Varsity" was at the station to see "Freddy" off.) After being an assistant on the Pitakande group of estates at Matale and on the Neboda group, he became manager of the Pitakande group in 1907 and remained there until he retired to East Grinstead about twenty years ago. Thereafter he lived a quiet life but during the war both he and his wife did a great deal for the East Grinstead Hospital, their house being an open home for the patients there. During his last few years he lost his wife very suddenly and his only son was killed in a motor accident. He is survived by two married daughters. In his young days he played rugby as a wing three-quarter for both the School XV and the University XV, having a remarkable turn of speed over a short distance. He also represented the University in the Hundred Yards at the inter-University Sports.

FIFTY-FOUR YEARS AT INVERBERVIE Patrick Lindsay Gordon (1878-80), M.A., B.D., minister of the Parish of Glenbervie, Kincardineshire, since 1894, died at his manse on 27 August 1948 in his eighty-fourth year. His family had occupied the Manse of Glenbervic, without a break, since the year of the Battle of Waterloo and he could trace a family connection with the parish as far back as 1628. His maternal grandfather, the late Rev. James Drummond, was ordained minister of the parish in 1815 and his father, the late Rev. William Gordon, was inducted as Mr. Drummond's assistant and successor in 1863. Patrick Lindsay Gordon was the eldest of three sons, all ministers of the Church of Scotland, and on 17 October 1894 he was ordained assistant and successor to his father. He remained at Glenbervic for fifty-four years until he died and a neighbour and fellow minister of his has spoken of him as the finest parish minister he ever knew.

A man of wide interests he was, according to an obituary notice in The Press and Journal, equally at home in the pulpit, imparting kindly advice at some cottage fireside, or at the ringside in Stonehaven Mart discussing the merits of stirks with farmer neighbours. He was a past president of the Kincardineshire Farmers' Club and, combining practical farming with his ministerial work, he won many prizes at agricultural shows. He gave a lifetime of service to a variety of local public bodies and presided over innumerable committees in the area of his parish.

During the 1954-18 war he served as an ambulance driver with the French Red Cross on the Western Front and was awarded the Croix de Guerre.

Francis William Gray (1888-91), M.A., D.Sc., F.R.S.C., died at his home, 31 Hamilton Place, Aberdeen, on z July 1948, aged seventy-four. After graduating in Arts at Aberdeen University, he taught Mathematics for two years at Airdrie and then returned to become assistant to the late Professor Japp in the Chemistry

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

31

Department at Marischal College. In 1904 he became senior assistant in Chemistry and in 1911 he was appointed lecturer. He retired on account of ill-health about twelve years ago, but his interest in research was such that he continued this work after his retirement. He was the author of several books on Chemistry, including " A Manual of Practical Physical Chemistry ", published in 1914.

Sydney Watson Gray (1911-13), whose death in South Africa on az February 1948 at the age of fifty was reported in the last issue of the Afagazitre, was for about twenty years engaged in rubber planting. For a time he was on the Diamond Jubilee Estate, Malacca, Straits Settlements, and from 1926 to 1 934, when he retired from the East, he was manager of the Johore River Estate and of Nanetti Rubber Plantations Ltd. Soon afterwards he bought the George and Dragon _Hotel at Baldock, Hertfordshire, which, after much hard work on his part, became one of the most popular small hotels in the South. On account of ill-health he had to sell the business in 1946 and in January of last year he went to Cape Town. Unfortunately his health did not improve and, after having recurring illnesses, he died at Cape Town in February of this year.

David Kyd (1885-92) died at his home, 4r Chalfont Road, Oxford, on 5 September 1948, aged seventy-one. On leaving the School he joined the Northern Assurance Company Limited, of which his father the late Mr. Thomas Kyd, was manager in Aberdeen, and he was a surveyor with the Company successively in Glasgow, Birmingham, the Potteries, and Bradford, before going to Oxford in 1914. For twenty-two years he served the Company there until he retired. He had always had a great interest in agriculture and, after his retirement, he started work among farmers and became an agricultural adviser. A very good cricketer in his younger days, he continued to take a great interest in the game throughout his life. After going to Oxford, he took an active interest in the Oxfordshire County Cricket Club and was for many years treasurer and a member of the committee. He did a great deal for local and county cricket.

Mr. Kyd was an elder brother of JAMES GRAY KYD* (1891-98), C.B.E., F.R.S.E., Registrar-General for Scotland from 1937 until November of this year.

Arthur Pledge Milne* (1881-83), eldest son of the late Mr. John Milne, Aberdeen, died at Shrewsbury on I July 1948, aged eighty. He was for many years engaged in the business of Messrs. Milne & Pledge, wholesale warehousemen, Aberdeen, and on his retirement he went to reside permanently at Woking, Surrey.

He was one of six brothers who attended the School and his two sons, the late Jour.

NORMAN MILNE (I909-12) and ROBERT ARTHUR MILNE* (1907-15), were also pupils there. (See page 19.)

Robert Valentine Mitchell (1901-02) died at Stonehaven on 6 October 1948, his sixty-first birthday. He was a grain merchant in Stonehaven and when his business became a limited company he was appointed managing director. He was also local agent for Smith, Wood & Company Limited, coal merchants. From 1934 he was a member of Stonehaven Town Council; in 1939 he was elected Dean of Guild; in 1945 Junior Bailie, and in 1947 Senior Bailie. He was for many years a member of the Stonehaven Harbour Trust and he took a keen interest in shipping, being connected with the ownership of a number of craft plying between Stonehaven and the Tyne and the Tees.

James Ogilvie Rennie (1894-19ot), last surviving son of the late Dr. Thomas Rennie of Foochow, China, and of Mrs. Rennie, Invercolne, Radlert, Herts., has died in Southern Rhodesia. He joined the Indian Public Works Department in 1906 and in 1913 was engaged in work in connection with the building of New Delhi. His elder brother, PATRICK MANSON RENNIE (1895-1901), Lieut.-Colonel, I.M.S., died in 1934, and his younger brother, Major-General Tom GORDON RENNIE (1908-so), C.B., D.S.O., M.B.E., was killed in action on 24 March 1945, when he was in command of the 51st (Highland) Division.

Alexander Ritchie (1907-13), M.B., Ch.B., died at Sheffield Royal Infirmary on zo August 1948 in his fifty-fourth year. He graduated at Aberdeen University in 1918 and, after a short period as house physician at Sheffield Royal , Infirmary, he was in general practice at Newcastle-under-Lyme from 1922 until his death. During the 1914-18 war he served as a surgeon probationer in the R.N.V.R.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine William Alexander Robson (1880-84) of 17 Summerside Place, Edinburgh, formerly of Aberdeen, died suddenly on z November 1948, aged seventy-seven.

William Annesley Ross* (1923-32) died suddenly at Durban, South Africa, on 5 June 1948, aged thirty-one. After serving his apprenticeship as an engineer with John M. Henderson & Company Limited, Aberdeen, he went to India in 1938 as engineer on the Borjuli Tea Estate, Assam. He joined the Assam Valley Light Horse and, after the outbreak of war, was commissioned in the Royal Engineers. In July 1943 he transferred to the Royal Indian Navy and was stationed at Bombay, holding the rank of Engineer Sub-Lieutenant. On demobilisation in 1946 he returned to his Company and went to one of their tea gardens in Dooars, Bengal, but in May of this year he left India for South Africa. He had had recurrent bouts of malaria, however, and soon after his arrival in Durban, he contracted meningitis and died after only three days' illness.

The F.P. Club Consul for Natal, FRANK B. F. DUGUID* (1919-26), who was able to be of great assistance to Mrs. Ross at the time of her tragic loss, has sent us this tribute :— " He had come over here from India, as so many others are doing at the present time, and contacted me through the old Mag. He was indeed a fine man and a type who gives the Grammar a name abroad. My wife and I were very fond of him and to us his death was a real and tragic loss. He was only thirty-one years old and always so full of life and happiness. . . . He was very fortunate in securing an excellent billet in " tea" in one of the most beautiful parts of Rhodesia, where the climate is really wonderful, and was due to leave to take over the position two days before his death. He was very elated about his new venture which, unfortunately, was not to be. . . . Another of the Old School's fine sons has passed on and I and the friends he made in Natal mourn his loss."

William Francis Gordon Scott (1895-96), L.R.C.P., L.R.C.S.E., L.R.F.P.S., died at Glenugie, Longside, Aberdeenshire, on 16 July 1948, two days before his sixty-eighth birthday. Born in Bombay, he attended Dulwich College before coming to the School and thereafter he studied Medicine at Aberdeen and Edinburgh Universities. Before qualifying he acted as a medical assistant in the Argentine and, after qualifying, he was for three years in Patagonia. (Most of his visiting in South America was done on horseback.) In 1915 he was commissioned in the R.A.M.C., and served in the Mediterranean, at Gallipoli, in France, Flanders and Italy and with the North Russian Relief Force in 1919. After the war he was in practice in Fifeshire until 1924, when he went for a year as " locum" to Dooars, Bengal, and after some time in Lanarkshire, he was in practice at Longsidc, Aberdeenshire, from 1929 to 1939. When he retired, he received a presentation from his friends and patients in Longside, Rora and Kinmundy. In 1940 he was re-commissioned in the R.A.M.C. for fifteen months and served on the Central Medical Board in Edinburgh, examining recruits. Later during the war, he served on the temporary war-time staff of St. Leonard's (L.C.C.) Hospital, London. He was keenly interested in all sport, especially rugby and boxing, and another of his great interests was fishing. " He was unconventional but essentially kind and generous, singularly selfless and loyal to his principles and his friends—always at his best and most cheerful in an emergency or crisis—and a born campaigner."

Alexander Smith (589o-92), eldest son of the late Captain and Mrs. Alexander Smith, Kurrajong, Turriff, Aberdeenshire, died at Auckland, New Zealand, on z3 November 1948, aged seventy-two. Having served his apprenticeship in the Sophocles, he was for some years an officer in the Aberdeen Line and then in the service of the New Zealand Shipping Company for nine years. In 1913 he was an officer in the Rarawa of the Northern Steamship Company, trading between Onehunga and New Plymouth, New Zealand, and thereafter he was a master stevedore in Auckland with the New Zealand Shipping Company.

Thomas Walker Tait (190z-08), eldest son of the late Mr. T. S. Tait of Invcrurie, died on 7 October 1948, aged fifty-seven. On leaving the School he started his apprenticeship as a chartered accountant with Messrs. James Meston & Company, Aberdeen, but during the 1914-18 war, when he served in France with the Army Service Corps, his health was damaged and he was never able to complete his C.A. training. He held various posts of a clerical nature and latterly was a chartered accountant's clerk for about eight years. He had three brothers who also attended the School : WILLIAM WALKER TAIT (1904-11), formerly of the Titaghur

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34

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

An Old Class Group—Classical VI, 1896-97 Continuing our series of photographs of old class groups, we reproduce in this issue a photograph of Classical VI, 1896-97. The following are brief notes on those who appear in the photograph.

(One member of the class has not been identified.)

Robert Bain* (1893-99), M.A., F.E.I.S., retired from the headmastership of Torry Intermediate School, Aberdeen, in 1943. William Clark* (1893-99) has been in South Africa since 1903. He retired in 1946 from Durban Navigation Collieries Limited, Dannhauser, Natal. George Hendry (1897), M.B., Ch.B., has been in medical practice at Buckie for many years. He is also Provost of the Burgh.

Edward Legge (1893-99), M.A., B.L., formerly in business at Winnipeg, resides at Walton-on-the-Hill, Tadworth, Surrey. Hugh McCallum (1896-99), M.A., was principal teacher of Science at Buckie High School from 1906 to 1945, when he retired. Eric Alexander Mackay Macdonald (1896-98), M.A., was a teacher at Hutcheson's Boys' Grammar School, Glasgow, until he retired in 1943.

Gordon William Maconachie (1897-98), M.B., Ch.B., has retired from the Indian Medical Service in which he held the rank of Lieut.-Colonel.

William Alexander McRobbie* (1893-97), F.R.I.C.S., was formerly district valuer, Inland Revenue, Aberdeen, and is still employed in the Valuation Department. David Richards (1894-99), M.A., retired from the head-mastership of Aboyne Higher Grade School in 1943 and now resides at Findhorn. Russell Sharp* (1893-98) is an estate factor at Cupar, Fife. George Eddie Thomson* (1894-99), M.A., B.D., is minister at Monquhitter Church, Cuminestown, Aberdeenshire. John Webster (1888-97), now an American citizen, has been in business in Los Angeles for many years.

HENRY MARTYN BURNETT (1893-98) was superintendent of Manaos Harbour Limited, Brazil, and died there in 1915. ALISTAIR SIM GARDEN (1896-97), M.D., died at Southport in 1934. JoHN HUNTER (1888-98), M.B., Ch.B., died at Fraserburgh in 1906. WILLIAM Low (1895-98), M.A., M.B., Ch.B., was in medical practice at Alderney, Channel Islands, and died in Guernsey in 1924. CHARLES CREIGHTON MINT° (1888-98), solicitor, Aberdeen, died in 1932. JAMES ROBERTSON (1893-99), M.A., mathematical master and principal of technical classes in the Vale of Leven Academy, Alexandria, Glasgow, until 1918, and subsequently manager of City Bakeries Limited, Glasgow, died in 1936.

JAMES SHIRRAN (1893-99), M.A., science master at Dornoch Higher Grade School, died in 1909. JOHN SMITH (1894-97), chemist and postmaster at Dyce for thirty-six years, died in 1945. WILLIAM STEPHEN (1896-99), M.A., Fraserburgh, was killed in action in 1916.

CHARLES WArr (1894-98), of Messrs. Watt & Milne, drapers, Aberdeen, died in 1924.

Up-to-date information has not been obtained regarding the following : Wilfred Maclaine (1896-97), who went to Detroit in 1912 ; Edgar Henry Poison (1893-97), sometime a merchant in Pretoria, Transvaal ; and Thomas Clugston Stuart (1896-99), a minister of the Irish Presbyterian Church at Macosquin in the presbytery of Coleraine in 1906.

I

Classical VI—Session 1896-97

Bath Row—C. Watt, J. Robertson, Unidentified, W. Low, W. Al. McRobbie.

Third Row—E. Legge, J. Webster, D. Richards, R. Sharp, R. Bain, W. Clark.

Second Ron—C. C. Minto, W. Stephen, H. M. Burnett, J. Shirran, G. Hendry, H. McCallum, E. A. M. Macdonald.

Front Row—W. Maclaine, J. Smith, J. Hunter, A. S. Garden, G. E. Thomson, G. W. Maconachie, T. C. Stuart.

Sitting in Front—E. H. Poison.

Aberdeen Grammar School Alagaine

3S

Boom in Empire : A Vision Comes True Impressions of Southern Rhodesia To-day We sailed wherever ship could sail We founded many a mighty state.

Pray God our greatness may not fail Through craven fear of being great.

Only eighty hours separate the gray murk of London from the golden radiance of Rhodesia. Strong wings of Speedbird and Viking make nonsense of the six thousand miles. A magic carpet really flies.

As it flies it brings transformation indeed. Time there is on the way to walk round the Pyramids and suffer a whole afternoon of the pestiferous touts of Cairo : time to amble through the tawdry Indiamodelled bazaar of Nairobi : time too, to sec for one glorious half-hour below one the sapphire brilliance of Lake Tanganyika set about with wispy clouds that seem to rest on pedestals of ice ; surely one of the loveliest sights on earth. There is time for all these. It is good measure. Then to complete the transformation, the aeroplane drops five thousand feet to the Belvidere airfield at Salisbury while the taste of the barley-sugar is still sweet in the mouth. Attired in a trim uniform, a capable woman driver of Central African Airways drives the large bus swiftly into town and lo I in a moment one is booking in at Meikle's Hotel amidst the bustle and flow of many travellers, voyagers and wayfarers from all ends of the earth, and a host of Rhodesians who come for business or pleasure to the throbbing metropolis of Rhodes' land. Such is the modern approach to Rhodesia, an improvement beyond all calculation upon the limping, lumbering progress of the past.

So I entered a land of plenty, a land of free enterprise, a land holding fervently the deep faith of Cecil Rhodes in British grit and initiative.

Rhodes still reigns majestic over this great plateau of grass and savanna, of kopje and woodland, of mealie patch and tobacco field, bathed in the clear sunlight of a genial climate, never too cold, seldom too hot for comfort and energy. Rhodesians are building on it a state that embodies the middle-class ideals, whose emphasis is on justice and freedom, and not on reward. They see the vision of the great pioneer coming true. They believe in it as fervently as ever Rhodes accepted or Kipling praised the great feats of the soul. This latest, youngest, gayest and freshest of all the dominions of British race holds fast to the ideals that animated Britain a decade ago, before there fell on Britain's heart the chilling cramp of egalitarian collectivism, of the levellingdown of opportunity, of envy of exceptional achievement or success.

The creeping blight of an over-industrialised civilisation has not tainted Rhodesia yet. If Rhodesians continue wise, it never will.

Though the country is one of plenty, bathed in all the luxury that comes from being at the right end of the export drive, with such things in the shops as flowered dinner services, new style cut-glass, curtains, napery and furnishings in endless variety, and household conveniences, couponless and docketless, such as no British housewife

36

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

has seen for years, it would not be correct to call the land one flowing with milk and honey. Paradoxically enough, amidst all the abundance of good things milk and honey are assuredly not of the abundance.

Cows are too few to provide milk, butter and cheese in full store for a rapidly growing population. The bees of Rhodesia have not yet mastered the technique of large-scale production, or else nature has bred them too sparingly. Milk and honey, in fact, along with houses, doctors, good roads and motor buses are in short supply. In this respect they present a sad contrast to the estate agents, the garage proprietors, the " cashers-in" on tobacco lands and the sellers of farms. For verily Rhodesia is booming. Salisbury, which I knew fourteen years ago as an administrative and educational back-water, sedate and dignified; to-day wears the expression of a Texan town in the roaring days. Hurrying crowds push past in the streets, cars jockey for any open space in the temporary car parks that line all the main streets and avenues of the town centre, and hotel accommodation is a commodity to be cajoled for, wooed and won, or otherwise subjected to the wiles of the super-psychologist or the master lover.

Not myself possessing these compelling Casanovan qualities I made the best I could of Scots perseverance and foresight. As I had, before my departure from Britain, managed to book hotel accommodation for two periods of five days, I was on my arrival ten days ahead of the game and in a fairly comfortable position for the moment.

Having ten days in hand made all the difference. I took myself to a telephone and fixed up at once, for as long as I intended to stay in the country, the locations of all the roofs under which I would lay my head, and by a succession of five-day bookings I managed to make all necessary arrangements. From others I learnt of the extreme discomfort and worry to which those who did not know where they would be sleeping the next night and the night after were subjected. The hotels can sell their rooms five times over. Every hotel is full and the pressure is greatest in the cool and rainy seasons of the Rhodesian year. Getting into a boarding house (and there are many good ones in Rhodesia) is even harder than getting into a hotel.

Houses to buy are at a premium, three or four times their real value.

They are sold as soon as they are offered for sale. The only houses " to let" are those vacated for a few months only, by well-to-do Rhodesians taking a trip to the seaside in the Union during the hot season, or flying home to make the Mecca-like pilgrimage to Britain, the wonderful land that bred Cecil Rhodes, and the " pioneers ", and the men and women who stood up to Hitler's Germany and Tojo's Japan when no one outside Britain thought much of their chances in the grim fight against odds.

The mental nostalgia that British Rhodesians have for the " Home " that most of them have never seen is remarkable and engaging.

Britain stands as the guardian of freedom, of justice, of ripeness of soul.

The younger Rhodesians have never set foot outside their own sunny land, have never seen winter snow, have never known the clammy cold of mist in a boreal clime. But they have listened to fathers and mothers who knew these things, or who suffered the dangers and

Aberdeen Grammar School Magaine

37

anxieties of the Shabani River days and Matebele savagery. I made one day an uncomfortable journey by motor bus from Umtali to Inyanga.

In the tiny first-class compartment which passengers shared with bottles of whisky, hams and great parcels of cakes, chocolates and groceries being delivered to farms out in the wild, or the bundu as the Rhodesians call it, my fellow travellers were a young Rhodesian matron, perhaps twenty-five years of age, and her two small children. As we sped by the Christmas Pass to Penalongha and left the gold mines for the rougher country that lies between them and Bonde, she asked me at every turn of the atrocious road whether this hill or that mountain was like the Cumberland fells. There was nothing, she said, she wanted to see more than the Cumberland fells. Her mother, a Cumberland woman, had painted their beauty and appeal in colours that her daughter could never forget.

This girl is not exceptional. All British Rhodesians arc like her.

They are intensely conscious of being shoots of British stock planted abroad and retaining in the transplantation the vigour and the force of the parent tree. This great new dominion is sure that it has the world at its feet ; that it will in time be as important for the perpetuation of the ideals that made Britain great, as Canada, Australia and New Zealand are. The signals are set, the steam is up, the doors have been closed, the engine is whistling. It is full steam ahead and no turning back. Such is the spirit of Rhodesia to-day, hopeful, self-assured, steadfast and alive.

What are the advantages of Rhodesia ? They are many. First, there is a climate that must be about the best in the whole world, if one is able to stand living continuously three thousand feet or so above sea level. There is food in plenty without rationing. There are few controls. Second, free enterprise not only flourishes : it is almost fanatically encouraged. Though prices of most imported things are about the same as in present-day Britain, the import-duties taking the place of the purchase taxes, the citizen is allowed to keep a very large share of what he earns. He does not find nearly half his income taken from him and still more of it removed for " overtime ".

Thirdly, there is no blight of industrialism over the land. Rhodesia is a primary producer of tobacco, gold, chrome, coal and food ; and such of the tobacco crop as is available for export has been bought for the next five years. So tobacco farmers are " sitting pretty" and making fortunes. The sale of tobacco farms as well as of tobacco is a major business. In the tobacco sales at Salisbury, which go on for many inonths every year, the average daily value of produce sold is fifty thousand pounds sterling, all of which is poured into the country's economy. Some of the old pioneers, the cattle breeders and the dairy farmers shake their heads dubiously and say that tobacco will be the ruin of Rhodesia because it is diverting too much money and energy to what may be only a temporary advantage : nor does tobacco-growing help to feed a growing population. It is certain that dairy farming, fruit farming and mealie growing cannot pay the enormous dividends that tobacco barns at present do. Fourthly, with the great spaciousness of the geography go a spaciousness and a

Aberdeen Grammar School MagaVne 38 magnanimity of soul giving these young and active people a generous kindliness that welcomes the stranger.

What is on the other side of the account book ? First, there is the problem of native labour about which many Rhodesians feel doubt and nervousness. The strike of native servants this year came as a shock to many, because Rhodesians have not thought out fully where events are taking them. The problem is not at present formidable, as it is in the Union of South Africa. There is good friendship between master and servant in Rhodesia and the native boys are treated well. But there is undoubtedly a danger that Rhodesians will rely too much on native labour to do things that they should do for themselves. I heard a lively argument one day in a barber's shop. Young Rhodesians, it was alleged, were being brought up " too soft ", to be " gentlemen ", who expected to have their noses blown for them and couldn't or wouldn't dean their own shoes.

This is of course an exaggeration, but the gibe has a barb of awkward truth in it.

Secondly, the country is too dependent on the motor car, which can be a " gey kittle" instrument. Personally I dread dependence on any machine that is liable to break down without warning and leave me stranded. Till cconmunications, are improved in Rhodesia and buses or trains connect adequately all parts of the country, this weakness must persist and cause anxiety. Thirdly, the land is a new one, still in the pioneering and building-up stage, even if the pioneering is of a milder kind than it was half a century ago. It is not to be wondered at therefore that cultural influences and social refinements are somewhat backward. Some poets and artists have indeed begun to create a Rhodesian tradition, but notable books by Rhodesian authors are few and they do not catch the spirit of the place. The field before the Rhodesian writer is immense and largely untrodden.

But a young country has seldom much inclination for the softer urbanities and the sedentary fulfilments of life. These will doubtless come in time as they came in due course to the United States of America.

Fourthly, the climate has its vices as well as its virtues. Fear of drought must always chasten the farmer who grows anything, and the breeder of cattle. Some losses from drought must always be expected. Water supply can be precarious and bush fires are dangerous.

Apart from the Zambesi, king in its own right among rivers, the streams of Rhodesia are poor and disappointing. They run with no pellucid flow. There is nothing in Rhodesia to equal the sparkle and bubble of the Aberdeenshire Dee. The water snail in muddy pools carrying the seeds of bilharzia makes all bathing in streams and lakes unwise and dangerous.

No country developing as rapidly as Rhodesia is to-day and having so much money poured into it can remain without growing pains.

It is no case therefore of roses, roses all the way. Inflationary tendencies exist. They are likely to spread with the big development schemes envisaged by the government for the immediate future.

Immigrants continue to pour into a country where there is both lack

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 39 of housing and an unhealthy concentration of European population in the towns, only two of which, Bulawayo and Salisbury, are of any size.

The other places of which Umtali, with its avenues of tulip trees and its wealth of bougainvillia, jacaranda and golden shower, is the prettiest, are not much more than expanding villages. The habit of crowding into the towns will, unless arrested, produce the same undesirable sociological results as are now apparent in Australia.

All the difficulties can be overcome by wise stewardship, of which the authorities have shown themselves more than capable.

Not without reason then are hope and self-assurance the watchwords of Rhodesia to-day. Sit nomine ch:gna is its proud motto, mindful of Rhodes. For here is a land without industrial conurbations. It has no snarling economic groups eating each other in a muddle of doctrinaire collectivism. It has no dread of hard work. It makes no disparagement of profits. It attaches no stigma to rising above the throng, to making good, and to building much out of little by personal energy, initiative and enterprise. The eye of Rhodes still watches benignantly from granite kopje and red-blooded people feel its power and penetration to-day. Lucky Rhodesia ! so sunny, so happy, and so young, singing in its heart and yet not forgetful of the sombre regret of its great founder : " So little done : so much to do ".

When birds were songless on the bough, I heard thee sing : The world was full of winter, thou Wert full of spring.

H. T. SORLEY (1899-1909).

Bogota Incident Friday, the 9th of April, was a date looked forward to by some and feared by others. That night was to see the opening of " Arsenic and Old Lace ", which we of the Bogota Players had been strenuously rehearsing for many weeks. One month later we were able to announce in the local press that the play had had to be postponed, due to circum- ' stances beyond our control.

After lunch that Friday, my siesta was rudely interrupted by our cook who rushed into the lounge screaming that Jorge Elicier Gaitan, the Leftist leader and people's favourite in Colombia, had just been assassinated. I immediately switched on the wireless and was greeted by a fanatically hysterical voice sobbing that the " Leader " had been treacherously murdered and calling the people out into the streets to avenge his death. I listened for a few minutes, then decided to make my way down town to the office.

Already one could feel the tension building up. Nervous groups huddled outside every house. Children were being herded home from their schools. The plaza, which was normally packed sardine-fashion with cars, was practically empty. Office staffs were being told to go home, but a few of us decided to stay and made our way up to the roof to get a better view of the proceedings. Several large fires were soon to be seen and a large mob was making its way down to the plaza from all sides, screaming and waving their arms. Then we saw

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 40 the first shop being broken into. In streamed the mob and out they came, armed with machetes, knives and shotguns. After that there was no stopping them ; in a few minutes every shop in view had been broken into and almost every person was armed with some form of weapon, from Winchester Repeaters to hacksaw blades. The few cars which had been left in the plaza were broken into and were to he seen roaring off, overloaded with revolutionaries. Just about this time the rain started. (Looking back, one can fully appreciate that, had it not been for the rain which continued intermittently during the next few days, Bogota, without a shadow of doubt, would have been completely reduced to ashes.)

About five o'clock two of us decided to make our way home and, having tied pieces of a red duster round our arms, red being the colour of the rebelling party, and having armed ourselves with carving knives, rather fortunately sent to us as samples from London, we made our wary way back. Every time an armed band of revolutionaries passed, we stood to one side lustily cheering to the greater glory of the party and the revolution.

Darkness fell, and the sky was quite red, reflecting the countless blazes still under way. During dinner, the glass in our dining room window was shattered by a bullet and thereupon my friend and I decided to continue our meal in darkness, on our stomachs. Some hours later we made up our minds to venture into the town again and, this time armed with a sturdier weapon, a Ghurka's kukri, we went out. I do not think I have ever seen, or ever wish to see, such complete and utter destruction as confronted us when we reached the main road. Buildings were burning furiously on both sides and a mass of people were frantically looting every possible thing they could lay their hands on. Bare-footed ragamuffins were staggering under the load of Frigidaires, electric motors, radiograms, fur coats, bolts of material, sides of meat and cases of Scotch whisky. At the same time, hysterical parents were trying to save their belongings from the buildings on fire and shepherding their children away from the flames and falling debris.

Needless to say, all the wine and spirit shops had been sacked and most pf the looters were well under the weather, a factor which did nothing to help the general situation. Fights broke out among themselves and we saw several of them badly cut with machetes. During the whole night there was no sign whatsoever of the Army or the police.

Later I found out that there were only 4oo troops in Bogota, and they were kept more than busy guarding the President's palace and the main banking centre. As for the police, well, they were all members of the rebelling party. . . .

By morning more troops had been rushed to Bogota and an attempt was made to restore some sort of order. Up to that time there had not been much shooting, but now every house-top seemed to harbour a sniper and bullets became as frequent as the raindrops. For the next couple of days things continued more or less in this way. Food began to get scarce and people had to brave the gunfire, furtively scurrying around the few shops that had not been smashed and looted, looking for milk, bread and, for that matter, beer.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

41 By decking ourselves with cameras and posing as news photographers, we were able on many occasions to make our way through most of the barricades, in search of rations for ourselves and the other families in our apartment building. We were continually caught in gun battles between troops and snipers, and on one occasion we were forced to lie in a gutter for almost an hour, whilst the two sides shot it out over us. Having no confidence whatsoever in the ability of either of the sides to shoot straight did not make us any more comfortable. So it went on for about a week and then gradually more snipers were cleared out, and the Army assumed control of the situation.

Of course, countless " revolution " stories still circulate, some tall, some true. For instance there was Doc. Wilkie, a Dundonian chemist in Bogota, who, showing true Scots canniness, set to preparing his shop for all eventualities early on in the proceedings. He cleared out his shop window, removed everything visible from the front door, closed the shutters and hung a large notice outside stating that the premises were for sale. Shops on either side were looted but his remained untouched. Another friend of mine, Captain Latorre, on duty in a bad area, allowed a coffin followed by a weeping cortege to pass through his barrier. Suddenly he realised his mistake and rushed after them calling upon them to halt. The coffin was immediately dropped and the mourners scattered like rabbits. Inspecting the coffin, he discovered that it contained nothing but arms and ammunition. What had made him suspicious was the fact that there were no women following the coffin—quite enough to make him thoroughly inquisitive.

Naturally, there were horrible tragedies, one of them occurring a few yards from our flat. When walking through the town, one always proceeded with one's arms as far up in the air as the sockets would permit. On the Sunday, a man walked across the park with only one arm up, the other apparently in his pocket. Challenged from a distance by a soldier, the man panicked and started running. The soldier, thinking the man had a gun or grenade in the concealed hand, fired, and killed him. Inspecting the body, he discovered that the man possessed only one arm.

When I left Bogota some eight weeks ago, things were nearly back to normal, although the town was still under martial law and curfew was still in force. The damage caused by these few days of madness was still visible, but slowly the rubble and debris were being cleared away. Until this year, no political or civil trouble had occurred in Bogota for almost half a century and she was justly proud of such a record. Now, with over 5,ooo businesses either partly or totally wrecked, and over 2,5oo people killed, she is stricken by a deep sense of shame and bewilderment. But Bogota is not sitting idly by, licking her wounds. Already plans are complete for the rebuilding of her destroyed areas and out of the ruins she will rise a newer, broader and brighter city.

D. T. LI. MARR (193o and 1936-42).

October 1948.

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An Innocent in India I feel I must apologise at the outset for daring to write about India so soon after two articles have been written for the Magazine by Dr. Sorley, who spent over thirty years in the country. I was there for thirty days—and India has already suffered enough from writers who have done a brief conducted tour and then published books purporting to tell all about the sub-continent. However, if it is clearly understood that I am talking merely of fleeting first impressions, here goes in response to the Editor's request.

At one time it seemed doubtful whether I would go to India at all.

First, the conference which I was to attend on behalf of the International Labour Office was postponed because of the political situation, but Partition came in August 1947 arid the conference was scheduled for October. Then came an outbreak of cholera in Egypt, and the American service, which used Cairo as one of its intermediate landings, and with which I had a passage booked, was suspended. Meanwhile I was busy being inoculated against typhus, typhoid, cholera, tetanus and plague ; I already had the necessary certificates for vaccination and yellow fever. Fortunately, I didn't react very strongly, but I had stiff arms and occasional fever for a few weeks on end. Eventually a passage was booked from Paris to Karachi by the Air France plane to Saigon. We took off in a very comfortable Douglas D.C.4 (Skymaster) about 11 A.M. on 13th October and landed in Karachi at midnight (local time) on the 14th, having come down at Tunis—five hours delay waiting for a spare part—Lydda and Baghdad.

Karachi airport is on the edge of a desert some considerable distance inland from the town and the drive from the airport to my hotel in the early hours of the morning was my introduction to India. (Let me hasten to add, before someone tries to trip me up, that Karachi is now the capital of Pakistan. But this is not a political article, and I shall continue to refer to the whole sub-continent as " India ", although I may have a few words to say about the situation in the two new dominions, when it will, I hope, be clear from the context that " India " means the dominion of that name.) The bus bumped along a rough road, passing innumerable carts drawn by oxen or camels, presumably carrying produce to the town. At one point I saw a dead camel by the roadside ; it was still there when I left two days later, having become much more pungent in the interval I Later on I saw a dead cow which lay for at least four days in a busy street in Calcutta. There you have one aspect of India—the crying need for some elementary knowledge of and training in hygiene and sanitation.

When I reached my hotel in Karachi I found that, owing to my late arrival, there had been some muddle about my room. The clerk at the desk assured me I would have a room, but for half an hour appeared to do nothing about it except engage in animated conversation (which, of course, I couldn't understand) with various bearers.

Then he told me to cross the street to the annex. There the night porter assured me a room was available, but invited me to take a seat in the lounge. At 2 A.M. after twenty-seven hours' flying with no sleep, one becomes a little irritable, but the porter remained imper-

Aberdeen Grammar Scbool Magazine 43 turbable and told me my room was being prepared. What was my surprise when, about 3 A.M., I saw a gentleman descend the stairs, followed by a bearer with his luggage, and I discovered that he had been rudely awakened and turned out to make room for me. I am still grateful to him for the philosophic way in which he accepted the situation.

After this experience of the East, as I had thought, refusing to get a move on, I was due for another shock. I thought I was doing quite well when I got up about nine the following morning, but while I was still shaving a visitor was announced—a Pakistan Government official who wanted to show me round. He had been expecting me for a fortnight, and when he learned from the hotel that I had at last arrived, he determined to waste no time. I may mention here that, in addition to attending the conference to which I have referred, I had also been sent on a mission to study the conditions of work of seamen in the chief ports of India and Pakistan. The result was that during the time I spent in Karachi, Bombay and Calcutta, I saw a lot of the port areas, but I had not a moment for general sightseeing. The East may not hurry as a general rule, but the Governments of both India and Pakistan had made such excellent and thorough plans for my trip that they kept me busy from morning till night.

In view of the way I spent my time, you must not expect me to be able to give even a sketchy description of the three ports I have mentioned. I shall only mention the small details that appeared to me to throw some light on India. One of these occurred on my first evening in Karachi. Having spent a hot day visiting Government departments and seamen's homes, interviewing trade unionists and making a short speech to some unemployed seamen, I felt ready for a cocktail when I got back to my hotel. I found that the barman poured in the gin and vermouth and passed the shaker to a second man to shake. He in turn passed it to a third, who poured it out and brought it to me.

Later on I saw another instance of the same kind. I was taken to lunch at a club in Bombay. The cricket field was being rolled with a roller which at home would have been pushed by one man ; there it was being pulled by two men and guided by a third, and probably the three together were earning only a fraction of the wage which the single European would get for the job. There you have one of the basic problems of India. The population is nearly 400 millions and growing rapidly, and under existing economic conditions there is just not enough work to go round. Consequently, wages are extremely low and a large part of the population is underfed, many dying of starvation and diseases due primarily to malnutrition. It seems probable also that, as most of the people are half-starved, the individual worker is not physically capable of the same effort as a well-fed worker in a Western country.

From Karachi I flew to New Delhi for interviews with officials there before pursuing my investigations in Bombay and Calcutta.

Two of my four weeks were spent in New Delhi, as I was also required to act as interpreter at the Preparatory Asian Regional Conference of the International Labour Organisation, which was held there.

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New Delhi is like Washington in that it is a capital city laid out according to plan and not a natural growth. I must admit to a decided preference for cities that have grown : they are less tidy, but so much more interesting. Setting aside that prejudice, I must admit that New Delhi is well laid out. There is one huge circular area, Connaught Circus, which contains the whole shopping section. Some distance away is the handsome Council House and the huge blocks of the Secretariat, which contain all the Government offices. The remainder of the city consists of radiating avenues and cross streets, all wide and shaded with trees.

The traffic consists of taxis (very scarce), tongas, thousands of cyclists, cows which apparently wander about unattended, bullockcarts and innumerable pedestrians. The tonga is a vehicle drawn by a thin and decrepit horse, sometimes bearing gaudy plumes on its worn collar. The driver squats on the front seat or on one shaft, so as to balance the passengers, who mount at the back and sit with their backs to the horse ; it is always an alarming business, and when the passenger is heavy, one almost expects the shafts to go up in the air, lifting the horse with them. Tonga drivers usually know the names of the main streets in English, but they need to be guided, for they have a habit of taking the unwary stranger by the longest route to his destination. In other cases they pretend to understand the address, drive for several miles and then make it clear that they have no idea where they are supposed to be going. The poor foreigner is then completely stumped until he can find a passer-by who knows English and can act as interpreter. Even tongas were somewhat scarce during my visit, the reason being that most of the drivers were Muslims, who had either left for Pakistan or been killed in the riots that took place a few weeks before I arrived. I sometimes felt that the taxi-drivers, who were mostly Sikhs, were still trying to continue the extermination of the tonga drivers, but the fault would quite often have lain with the latter, who tend to amble from side to side of the road.

As regards accommodation in India, my experience covers a few hotels and a Government hostel. Rooms are generally spacious and airy, fitted with fans as big as the propellor of a small plane, which inevitably give the visitor a cold in the head and a crick in the neck.

I suppose in very hot weather they are a boon, and that residents get used to them ; whenever I was free to choose, I either switched them off or let them run dead slow. In dry periods of the year, all the places I saw were extremely dusty, and one's bedroom soon acquires a thick layer. This is disturbed daily by a sweeper with a switch, who sends the dust swirling into the air—only to fall back again in the same place.

But the chief objection is the variety of insect life : mosquitoes, cockroaches, moths, scorpions, and insects that look like black beetles but prove capable of flying into the air when one attempts to exterminate them with a heavy shoe. Lizards crawl over the bedroom wall, but they are not unattractive creatures, and they have the merit of remaining on the wall. An occasional visit from a mongoose proved not uncommon. Here again, I suppose the resident gets used to the abundance of wild life, but to someone used to the super-

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 45 main of the was one dirt of India cleanliness of Switzerland, the drawbacks.

A visit to Old Delhi, a few miles from the new city, confirms the impression that filth is one of the outstanding characteristics. This is not a reproach ; conditions in Europe were doubtless similar some centuries back, and it will take years of education and of energetic Government measures to remedy the situation. But as things are at present, the prevalence of dirt is one of the things which strikes the visitor most forcibly. As you approach Old Delhi, the stench of dead animals and decaying matter assails your nostrils and remains with you as you wander through the crowded streets, where the pavements are cluttered with people squatting for hours on end, either doing nothing, or talking, or selling their fruit, vegetables, etc., all of which are exposed to the dust of passing vehicles and are sometimes so covered with swarms of flies as to be completely hidden from sight.

At night, thousands of people, including small children entirely alone, sleep on the hard pavements.

One goes to the East having read of it as " glamorous" and " colourful ". It is true that one sees a certain number of beautiful saris (the normal women's dress, wrapped several times round the body, the end being carried over the head), and the Sikh turbans provide a spot of gay colour, but in the cities a considerable proportion of the men are in European dress, and the poorer classes, who constitute the great majority, wear a rather grubby white garment or are clad in a few dirty rags of cloth or sacking. Thousands show obvious signs of undernourishment and disease ; beggars with the most appalling twisted limbs or sores abound—so much so that one is tempted to think some of the deformities must have been deliberately inflicted during infancy as a means of providing a livelihood, although I have no evidence that this actually happens. The general impression of a walk through the streets is one of squalor, dirt, poverty and misery rather than glamour. It is true that there are many interesting and picturesque scenes, such as coppersmiths and weavers at work in their tiny shops, open to the street. Elsewhere one can see magnificent buildings of historical and artistic interest—the old Red Fort at Delhi, containing a beautiful mosque, palaces, gardens, fountains and all the luxurious surroundings of a wealthy prince, the striking monument of Qu'tab Minar, a few miles south of New Delhi, and thousands of others, scattered over India, which I had no time to see. But these only serve to accentuate the fact that India has been, and to a great extent still is, a country of great extremes of wealth and poverty.

The people with whom I came in contact were civil servants, some clerks and typists whom we engaged locally for the conference, and a few bearers. The civil servants are having a difficult time, for most of the departments are working with very depleted staffs—depleted by the departure of British officials and again by the departure of officials to Pakistan. In Pakistan, the problem is one of building up a complete set of Government services, with only a nucleus of staff available—those who have left the Government of India and gone to Pakistan. Among the minor difficulties is the fact that great numbers

Aberdeen Grammar Stbool Magaxine 46 of files have to be duplicated before the Government of Pakistan can tackle many of the problems which now concern it but were formerly, of course, dealt with for the whole sub-continent at New Delhi.

Two things struck me about civil servants—and again I must emphasise that my experience is much too slight to give my opinion the validity of a general judgement. The first is the question of hierarchy. I venture to think that Indian civil servants have been affected by two influences—on the one hand, the influence of the British civil service tradition (which is probably that of most civil services), which stresses the strict hierarchy of the various grades, and on the other hand the influence of the caste system which is so deeply rooted in India. The result seems to be that the Indian in the Civil Service is unduly imbued with a sense of his own importance and the inferiority of his subordinates. The second point is that red tape and delaying tactics seem to be even more highly developed in India than in any other civil service I know. The East, perhaps very wisely, has not that sense of hustle and urgency which seems to grow greater the farther West one goes. But for those who in the West are in the habit of getting through conference work in a rush, there is a constant sense of frustration and exasperation when they come up against the unhu trying East.

I mentioned the question of caste and the distinctions between grades. One finds this at every level. If I complained to my bearer that my room was dirty, he replied that he would inform the sweeper, making it quite clear to me that I was guilty of an insult in suggesting that the bearer was responsible for sweeping up dust. There is also the case of the innocent who asked his Sikh chauffeur to carry his bag some ten yards from the air-line office to the taxi. The chauffeur replied coldly : " There is a bearer there ", but did not even condescend to call him.

The innocent simply carried his own bag, but thereby he undoubtedly lost any face which he may have had in the eyes of the chauffeur.

This reminds me that I had quite expected that in Dominions which had so recently thrown off the yoke of Britain there might be some feeling of hostility towards British visitors. I saw not the slightest sign of this ; everywhere I received the friendliest treatment. Perhaps it is a case of absence beginning to make the heart grow fonder.

I don't propose to go into the question of Indian seamen. I have prepared an official report on the subject, so let that suffice. All I would say by way of conclusion is that I found my trip extremely interesting, that there is a tremendous task to be done in India which might well attract and inspire a young man at the beginning of his career, but that I fear I have been too long spoiled by the comforts of Europe to want to spend more than a short time in the East. This confession is a criticism of myself rather than of Asia, which has always had and will doubtless continue to have a great attraction which the casual visitor cannot hope to appreciate. Perhaps if I go there again I may revise many of my judgements, but in the meantime I have given them for what they may be worth.

JAMES L. MOWAT (I 91 5 -16).

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

47

Italy Revisited My journey to Italy this year brought a favourite verse to my mind : " Return O my soul unto thy quiet rest for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee ".

On my first visit there I entered as a prisoner-of-war and was confined to a prison camp in the Province of Macerata for nearly a year. In September 1943, my friend John MacKay and I found ourselves enjoying unwarranted freedom and roaming about the beautiful Italian countryside. We found a home eventually in the upper slopes of the Apennines where we were fed by a group of peasants.

These natives belonged to a religious body called Pentecosts, hardworking, honest and God-fearing people who lived strictly in accordance with the teaching of the Bible. They prepared their own food and made their own clothing and had absolutely no faith in doctors or in medicine. There was the case of a child who was bitten in the the arm by a poisonous snake. A doctor wished to amputate the limb immediately to save the child's life. To this the Pentecosts would not agree and they insisted on taking the child home, where fervent prayers were offered to the Almighty, and strange to say, the child was completely restored to health. For their beliefs, they have suffered great persecution, in some cases spending three to six months in prison.

To these Pentecosts we owed much, for without the food and comfort provided so willingly by them it would have been impossible to spend an Italian winter in the mountains. When we finally said adieu to them, it was with promises that we would return.

Since that time our thoughts were ever with them and we determined to visit them at the first opportunity when wars and rumours of war were no more. Accordingly with a fellow gym teacher, Eric Campbell, I decided to visit Italy this summer. My prisoner-of-war comrade, John MacKay, and his wife agreed to join us at a certain place in Italy and by arrangement we agreed not to advise our Italian friends of our impending visit.

Campbell and I set out from Edinburgh for Folkestone and from there we crossed to Boulogne and made for Paris. Four days were spent sightseeing there before proceeding to Dijon, centre of the wine industry. Then to Lyons and through Roman France to Marseilles, where there is sunshine usually from May to October—day after day of warm and perfect weather. We spent a short time there and had time to visit the Chateau d'If, immortalised by Alexander Dumas in his " Count of Monte Cristo ". Our next stopping place was Menton, which lies on a rambling stretch of coast streaked with coral coloured rock and on the more fertile ground there are pine and olive trees— a real summer paradise. Menton is the most easterly of the Riviera towns and the most sheltered, resting as it does at the foot of the Maritime Alps. If it owes much to its unrivalled beauty, it owes more to its remarkable climate. We spent one week there climbing in the Alps and swimming under perpetually blue skies.

At Ventimiglia on the French-Italian border we were joined by John MacKay and his wife. We all continued our journey along the

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 48 Italian Riviera between hills and sea, through the Garden of Europe, gay with flowers, semi-tropical trees and fruit, and down the Aurelian Way to Rome.

After a short stay there we continued our journey east of Rome to Tivoli, an old Italian summer resort in the Sabine hills, famous for its ruins and lovely gardens. Later we reached Capestrano, a small place near Sulmona at a considerable altitude in the mountains. From there we proceeded on foot to the home of the Pentecosts, a small settlement about 3,5oo feet above sea level called Scarafan.

The houses in the settlement are built of stone and the furnishings consist of the bare necessities of life. The people themselves see nothing of luxuries, their food consisting of the fruits of their labour from their native soil.

On our way to the settlement we had to pass through two villages on the mountain road. At these villages word quickly got around that we had returned and everyone turned out to welcome us. As soon as we were recognised many recalled incidents and experiences we had had with them. It was with real friendship that they greeted us and it was with difficulty we managed to get away from them and make for our destination, Scarafan.

There the first one to greet us was Gennaro Ciccone, the man who had first extended the hand of friendship four years previously. We were the last people on earth he had expected to meet and the astonishment and delight portrayed on his kind face was a real pleasure to us— a never-to-be-forgotten memory. A word from Gennaro brought the whole settlement, sixty in all, round us, and tears were visible on every face.

Their first reaction was to hold a solemn service of thanksgiving.

Then followed a joyous reunion with a special meal chiefly of spaghetti, bread, cheese and coffee.

That evening was indeed a memorable and happy one, spent in the company of those dear and kind people. We remained with them for the best part of a week and little was done in the settlement during that time. Social functions were held in various houses where the evenings were spent in friendly talk and always finished off with a short religious service.

We found time during the day to revisit the cave in the mountains which had been our sanctuary for many weary days and nights. Here our friend Gennaro Ciccone, sixty years of age, had visited us as frequently as possible, bringing baskets of food at great personal risk to himself. Now we could fully appreciate what these poor peasants had done for us. All their kindness had been bestowed willingly and with no thought of personal gain or reward.

When we had unwillingly to part from them on our return to Scotland there were many sorrowing hearts, but with a promise that we would come again we managed to get on our way.

W. D. ALLARDICE (1934-39)•

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49

Grammar F.P. Cricketing Memories In view of the triumph of the F.P. Club Cricket Section, who in 1948 have for the first time won the championship of the Strathmore Union, I have been ordered by the Editor to write about past trials and triumphs, and I do this in a manner reminiscent rather than statistical.

Many people assume that Grammar F.P. Cricket is an ancient institution, on a parallel with F.P. Rugby which stretches back incredibly and most honourably, but there was no organised F.P. Cricket prior to 1917. At times a scratch Eleven might be raised to play School, and at Mannofield an occasional game was played, " Grammar F.P.s v. Rest of Club ", but that was all. One of my earliest memories is a meeting, probably about 1897, between School and F.P.s, played for some mysterious reason at the Royal Asylum. The School Eleven included Willie Clark, John and Stephen Hunter, John Brebner, and Tommy and J. M. Robertson—fine players—but were severely defeated by a side captained by Dr. J. F. Christie and including G. 0. Gauld and William Webster. Gauld in later years became in turn captain and president of Nottingham County, and William Webster, a moody cricket genius, starred for Aberdeenshire for years and frequently played for Scotland. In the game in question, Webster made a hundred, hitting many " sixers" over the high Asylum wall into Berryden Road.

But it was in 1917, during the first world war, that the first real F.P. Cricket Club was started by Lennox Riddell and Alan McBain.

Lennox was a fierce and at times very successful fast bowler and a good batsman, and Alan, always a very good cricketer and captain, was at that time a fastish bowler who bowled an occasional slower delivery called the " McBain Ball". This afterwards became his standard delivery, and was a great success, against Fifeshire in particular. Rubislaw Field had just been opened as the Grammar School's first real playfield—it was known as " Newfield " to thoseowho did not speak of it as " Bleachfield "—and a big match was arranged which brought the Field to the notice of the public as a cricket ground.

There had been only one match of consequence in 1915 ; in 1916 no cricket was played in Aberdeen, and the public turned out in large numbers to see F.P.s play " Aberdeenshire ". The County Club was not functioning, Mannofield (closed since 1915) was in ruins, and the opposition was pretty much the full military, naval, and civilian strength of the city. Members of Aberdeenshire C.C. who played included the far-famed Arthur Broadbent, then in the full flower of his magnificent cricketing ability, J. R. F. Elsmie, who had captained Aberdeenshire so many times, and A. I. Mortimer, an enthusiastic batsman-wicketkeeper and father of John and Arthur Mortimer. A group of fine cricketers from the services was led by Captain N. V. H. Riches, later to captain Glamorgan County and Wales, the first and perhaps still the only Welshman to make a century against the Australians.

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Our side, led by Alan McBain, included Lennox Riddell, Alan Reid (who kept wicket), James Lindsay, and one or two other clever players under military age. McBain and I were Army " rejects " but we were pretty lively then and afterwards. For this match the side was strengthened by the inclusion of the two sons of dear old Professor McKerron—Pat and Robin, both of whom had spent early school-days at the " Grammar ". Pat was home on leave and Robin, a young and quite small boy but a brilliant young cricketer, was home on holiday from Glenalmond.

We were a bit overawed by the opposition, but had good hopes of Robin McKerron's slow spin bowling, which indeed was most successful, and he and I dismissed " Aberdeenshire" quite cheaply.

Fortunately we did not know who Riches was, and when he came in, I in happy ignorance bowled him first ball, which I would scarcely have had the pluck to do otherwise. He was short of practice, as were all the others, but I am still proud of that ball. We made the necessary runs pretty easily, and were exceedingly pleased with ourselves.

In 1918 we had a few games, some against School and University, but more in opposition to the various Asylums, whose personnel was not affected by the war. We enjoyed such cricket as we could snatch, and in 1919 there was great enthusiasm in Aberdeen for cricket, the war being happily over. F. R. Sleigh, John Sorley, Keith Robson and others had returned from the Forces or from captivity in Germany and F.P.s had a side well capable of tackling any local opposition, although Huntly beat us three times.

The third of these beatings was during the first of a succession of highly successful F.P. tours. In 1919 we went North, and lost to Huntly, then a grand side headed by the famous Scott brothers, great left-hand batsmen, and G. J. Clemens, a splendid cricketer and formerly a master at the School. We won our other three " tour" games against Inverurie, Elgin and Nairn, but the most exciting hours were those we spent at the various hotels, awaiting the belated arrival of McBain and Sorley, travelling by ancient and highly unreliable motor bicycles which broke down regularly every evening.

192o saw us reinforced by W. K. Moir and G. N. Gordon who had left School—Moir a clever forcing batsman who feared no bowler, Gordon a good fast bowler, a rare " miter ", and perhaps the finest fieldsman in an outstandingly brilliant fielding side. F.P.s were now a really formidable Eleven, strong all round, quick-scoring and well worth watching, fast between the wickets, not always victorious, but fearing nobody. Our tour that year was to the South, and we played strong Elevens of Forfarshire, Perthshire, and Clackmannan and Stirling Counties, and did well. We were defeated by Stirling County on the Friday of our touring week, but remained in Stirling over-night as Aberdeenshire were playing that County on Saturday and we had been warned that some of our players would be needed. Aberdeenshire were at a low ebb in 192o, and had won but one County game previous to this, their last fixture for the year. They sent down only three players from Aberdeen, and F.P.s supplied eight members of the

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 51 the three without by nine wickets, Aberdeenshire Eleven which won who came from Aberdeen doing anything.

From 1921 until 1924 great demands were made upon the F.P. Eleven by Aberdeenshire for County games. McBain, Sorley and I were always in the County side for County matches, and we were often joined by other members of the F.P. team. In spite of this, the F.P. side continued to play splendid cricket. Captained at different times

by McBain, Sorley and myself, we frequently defeated all other sides in Aberdeen and district, won the Aberdeenshire Cup, and year after year toured the Scottish Counties, all of whom we defeated at different times, Fifeshire (strongest of all the Scottish Counties) being defeated

by F.P.s twice in one season. E. M. Anderson, C. M. Moir, A. J. M. Edwards, R. S. B. Hervey, and J. R. L. Cruickshank all did well with bat and ball, the fielding was always splendid, with the late E. R. Sorley holding every catch he received over a period of about seven seasons.

About 1925, McBain was asked to become treasurer for Aberdeenshire, and I, secretary, so we had to abandon F.P. Cricket for the time being. Sorley and others went abroad, the side became weaker, and after a few seasons, F.P. Cricket lapsed for a time. The enthusiasm of G. P. Marr, T. M. Allan, J. A. Innes, Jack Manley and others revived and maintained the Club, however, and although two grand and steadfast players, E. A. Gauld and Douglas Innes, lost their lives in the war, we have carried on until now, when the fine 1948 Eleven have won the Strathmore Union Championship under the enthusiastic captaincy of Dr. T. M. Allan. Grand bowling has been done by two members of the School staff, T. H. McCrea and L. E. Tyson, ably assisted by A. A. C. Edmond, Douglas Stuart and others. We had a rare pair in H. S. Cardno and Jack Manley to open the batting, and a fine hard hitting " smiter " in Neil Macdonald. At present the greatest asset to School and F.P. Cricket, however, is undoubtedly L. E. Tyson —as groundsman, player, coach, and general adviser, a man in a thousand.

C. H. WEBSTER (1897-1901). *

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The Cricket Section held a Celebration Dinner in the Royal Hotel on 27 November 1948, to commemorate the winning of the Strathmore Union Championship. There was a considerable attendance of members and friends, and the following toasts were honoured : " The Cricket Section ", proposed by Edward W. Watt (1883-94) and responded to by J. Lennox Riddell (1907-16), a founder member ; "Aberdeenshire Cricket Club ", proposed by Mr. T. H. McCrea (School Staff) and responded to by Mr. G. T. Forbes, Aberdeenshire's Captain ; " The Strathmore Union ", proposed by Mr. L. E. Tyson, responded to by Mr. Harry Haxton, the Secretary of the Union ; and " The Team ", proposed by W. Wallace Porter (1915-23), and responded to . by the Captain, T. M. Allan (193o-36).

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Books by F.P.s GEORGE FRANCIS COLLIE* (1916-26), M.B.E., Highland Dress.

A King Penguin Book. With Colour Plates from McIan's The Clans of the Scottish Highlands. Penguin Books, London. as. 6d.

It is curious that I have recently been reading Duncan H. MacNeill's The Scottish Realm, in Chapter 4 of which the author contrasts the Roman feudal system with the Scottish clan system, and states: " Scotland had no need of Feudalism nor was it forcibly introduced ". This statement recurred to me immediately I read on page I1 of Collie's book: " Nowhere did the feudal system attain greater perfection and remain longer the social organisation of the country than in the Highlands ". Where historians differ so fundamentally, a mere accountant dare not take sides, but he can express satisfaction at the interest and pleasure he has derived from the text and the illustrations of our fellow F.P.'s brief study of Highland Dress.

Such a large subject naturally suffers from the restrictions of size inherent in the King Penguin series, but within these limits Mr. Collie has condensed an excellent history of the kilt and its predecessors mor and feile beag, to use the more usual spellings. I was somewhat taken aback at the omission, from the bibliography on pages 19 and 20, of J. G. Mackay's Romantic Story of the Highland Garb and the Tartan, the pre-eminent authority on the subject, but in another part of his book Collie gives due weight to the history by that illustrious Skyeman.

An odd error in spelling, such as " Gad " for " Geal " on page 29 (slogan of Clan Menzies) will no doubt be rectified in future editions.

Meantime, it may well be claimed that his book fulfils a most useful purpose in introducing strangers to, and reminding natives of, the story of Scotland's national garb, and that in a very attractive and authoritative publication. One can well imagine that exiles from Yukon to New Zealand would welcome it as a breath of peat-reek from the Land of Bens and Glens and Heroes.

Tir nam beann 's nan gleann 's nan gaisgeach.

E. R. B. * * * GEORGE• SUTIIERLAND FRASER (1924-35), M.A. : Vision of Scotland.

Paul Elck, 25s. The Traveller Has Regrets. The 1-larvill Press and Editions Poetry. 8s. 6d.

In prose and in poetry Mr. G. S. Fraser discloses again his considerable qualities as a writer of discernment and skill. These newer books of his will run for the reader more pleasantly in harness because (if one may echo the great—and alas, the late—Professor A. A. Jack), while the poems communicate what impinges on Mr. Fraser, the prose reveals more explicitly what there is in Mr. Fraser to be impinged upon.

In Vision of Scotland Mr. Fraser ranges in a fresh and orderly manner

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 53 over his own country, bringing into agreeable and unusual juxtaposition a sound judgement and a flexible prose. As its title presages, his commentary is a personal review of his native heaths and while it says many good things about Scotland, it tells us also—with an agreeable absence of deliberation—not a little about Mr. Fraser. His wide range of reference, his Scottish good sense and his sense of history conspire to cast upon the beach many quaint quartzes, and time spent in picking them up will not be wasted. Mr. Fraser's unusual disquisition adorns scores of superb photographs and several deft drawings in colour and monochrome. The format has distinction and there is a map.

The Traveller Has Regrets will reveal to those who have not yet received this intimation that Mr. Fraser is already a poet of some stature and that additional cubits may almost certainly be expected from time to time. Mr. Fraser has the necessary antennae, the mind, and, increasingly, the music. He is also, in his analyses, honest with himself—a rarer quality. Iris title-poem, his lyrics and his translations of Mallarme (among others) arouse the enlivening hope that the emigrd Byron may not after all be our one sweet singer.

R. J. M.

*

*

*

(1907-17), M. A.(Aberd.), B.Litt.

(Oxon.) : A Preface to Eighteenth Century Poetry. Geoffrey Cumberlege, Oxford University Press. izs. 6d.

I think it is true to say that the average educated reader, as distinct from the literary specialist or connoisseur, is still apt to be obtuse in his responses to Augustan poetry. " Why so many people come with an open and receptive mind to eighteenth century furniture, architecture, or music, and yet approach the poetry of that period with a closed and even hostile mind is something of a mystery ", says Professor Sutherland. It is deplorable, but it is hardly mysterious, for the phenomenon can be fairly easily explained. A part, though by no means the whole of the explanation is that the teaching of poetry in schools has for long fostered appreciation of the romantic in English poetry, not so much by ignoring Augustan poetry, as by treating it as something inferior, against which the merits of romantic poetry may be more easily perceived.

This new book by Professor Sutherland is the very thing to clear away from adult minds the disabling prejudices so often formed in childhood against the great Augustans. It is not written in the obscure and portentous manner of much contemporary literary criticism (so balefully influenced, as I believe, by the competition in America for research degrees in literature), but in the older and happier tradition of pleasant, simple and lucid writing which aims, not at creating astonishment at the depth and complexity of the writer's mind, but at leading the reader delightfully to the discovery of new delights.

R. S. W.

JAMES RUNCIEMAN SUTHERLAND

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University Notes The Rectorial Election on 13 November 1948, when the Right Hon. Lord Tweedsmuir was elected Rector of the University in succession to Eric Linklater (1913-16), M.A., LL.D., was preceded by lively campaigns organised by the supporters of the rival candidates, Lord Tweedsmuir and Sir Malcolm Sargent. The Mitchell Tower of Marischal College was climbed in the dark three times during these campaigns and the banners of the opposing parties were attached on successive occasions to the weathervane on the tower at a height of 235 feet from the ground. The feat of climbing the Mitchell Tower was first accomplished in December 1931 when the late Dr. CHARLES LUDWIG (1917-26), then a third year medical student, affixed to the weathervane a human-size wooden framework crowned with a human skull and a silk hat. We understand that on one of the occasions during the Rectorial when Ludwig's feat was repeated, the intrepid climber was another F.P. * * * In the University rugby team at the beginning of this season no fewer than nine players were F.P.s. They were Robert Arthur Spark* (1916-35), James Sinclair Taggart* (1931-42), Ranald Fyfe Findlay Steven* (1933-43), James David Garden* (1935-41), John Michael Eddison* (1939-48), William Calder Macphail Lawrence* (1940-43), Ian Wilkinson Kirton* (1934-40), James William Rogers* (1940-43) and Alexander Ian Cheyne* (1937-40 and 1943-48). It is also noteworthy that six of these F.P.s—Spark, Garden, Eddison, Kirton, Rogers and Cheyne—are former Boarding house boys. Other F.P.s who have been playing for the University XV this season are Albert Alexander Lawrence* (1940-46), Ian Cook McLean* (1930-43), Eric Rogers* (1940-43), another ex-hoarder, and Douglas Stuart* (193o-43). In the team which drew with the F.P. XV on 11 December 1948 there were eight F.P.s.

DEGREES AND PRIZES At the Summer Graduation on 7 July 1948 degrees were conferred on the following :— Degree of Master of Arts (M.A.) :— David Alexander West* (1939-44), with first class honours in Classics.

Duncan Ronald Macgregor* (1925-38), with first class honours in Geography.

John Charles Stanley Arnaud* (1929-40), with second class honours in English (Language and Literature).

Ian Milne Cay Crawford* (1935-44), with second class honours in Economic Science.

Percy Stuart Boyd* (1927-40), with second class honours in Psychology-Philosophy.

Alistair William Logie Torvaney (1938-4o), with third class honours in French-German.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 55 (1933-39).

Stephen Duncan Morrison* William Ogilvy Pattullo* (1939-41).

Iain Johnstone McBeth Sutherland* (1933-41).

Degree of Bachelor of Education (Ed.B.) Ian Stark Flett* (1925-37), M.A., with second class honours.

Degree of Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) :— Robert Alexander Ross Black* (193o-41), B.Sc. ( r 944), with first class honours in Mathematics.

William Cranna Bain* (1930-39), M.A., with first class honours in Natural Philosophy.

John Thomson Wiseman* (1932-44), with second class honours in Natural Philosophy.

William James Coulson* (i936-44), B.Sc. (1947), with second class honours in Chemistry.

Degree of Bachelor of Science in Forestry (B.Sc. For.) :— Ian Stuart Watt* (1928-4o).

Degree of Bachelor of Science in Engineering (B.Sc. Eng.) :— , 938-44), B.Sc., with £rst class honours Forbes Fraser Gauld* (1 in Civil Engineering. (Second class honours in Mechanical Engineering, July 1947.)

Malcolm Harold Tawse* (1928-40), with second class honours in Civil Engineering.

Allan Ross Cameron (1935-37), with second class honours in Electrical Engineering.

George Robert White Dalgleish* (1936-41), in Civil Engineering.

Ian Adam Innes (1936-38), B.Sc. (Mech. Eng., 1945), in Civil Engineering.

Arthur Allardyce Kelso* (1932-45), in Civil Engineering.

William Keith MacTaggart* (1933-45), in Civil Engineering.

James William Gorrod Petrie* (1926-39), in Civil Engineering.

John Ferguson Semple* (1929-41), B.Sc. (Mech. Eng., 1944), in Civil Engineering.

Kenneth Mackay (1933-38), in Electrical Engineering.

Degree of Bachelor of Divinity (B.D.) George Brown Cameron Sangster* (1928-37), D.S.C., M.A., with distinction in Biblical Criticism.

Degree of Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.) :— William Ogilvy Pattullo* (1939-41), with distinction.

In the Faculty of Arts David Alexander West* (1939-44) was awarded the Black Prize in Latin, the Jenkyns Prize in Classical Philology and the Seafield Gold Medal in Latin ; William Cranna Bain* (193o-39), M.A., was awarded the Greig Prize in Natural Philosophy ; and Kenneth George Buthlay (193o-42) was awarded the Martin Prize in Christian Evidences.

In the Faculty of Science John Harold Mundie (1932-45) shared the Nicol Prize in Zoology.

In the Faculty of Divinity George Brown Cameron Sangster* (1928-37), D.S.C., M.A., was awarded the Stephen Wilson Prize in Christian Ethics and Practical Theology.

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In the Faculty of Law William Ogilvy Pattullo* (1939-41) was awarded the Edmond Prize (for the most distinguished graduate in Law of the year 1947-48 who has attended the classes of Scots Law and Conveyancing) ; Alexander Elder Anton* (1932-33 and 193 5-40), M.A., was awarded the Hunter Gold Medal in Roman Law ; and Andrew Scott Finnie* (1925-35), M.A., was awarded the Whyte Prize in Accountancy for C.A. students.

In the Faculty of Medicine Lindsay Symon* (1934-46), was awarded the Silberg Prize in Anatomy and the Silberg Prize in Physiology. * * * At a Medical Graduation on 29 September 1948 degrees were conferred on the following :— Degree of Doctor of Medicine (M.D.) :— Eric Kennedy Cruickshank* (1920-32), M.B., Ch.B., M.R.C.P., with honours for thesis.

John Anthony McCredie Smith* (1927-38), M.B., Ch.B., with commendation for thesis.

Degrees of Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (M.B., Ch.B.) :— Adrian Michael Campbell Duffus (1932-38), with commendation.

Ian McIver Duguid* (1938-43)• Arthur Gordon Laing* (1931-43)• Adrian Michael Campbell Duffus (1932-38) was awarded the Keith Gold Medal for Systematic and Clinical Surgery. * * * At a Graduation on 27 October 1948 degrees were conferred on the following :— Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) :— George Forbes Walker* (1923-34), B.Sc. Thesis—" The Clay Mineralogy of some Aberdeenshire toils ".

Degree of Master of Arts (M.A.) :Eric Beattie Mackay* (1930-40).

Degree of Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) :— John Ingram Archibald* (1930-42).

John Brands* (1928-31).

Degree of Bachelor of Science in Engineering (B.Sc. Eng.) :— Alexander Lindsay Watson (1933-45).

Degree of Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.) :— George Irvine Matthews (1925-33), * * * William Sharp Davidson* (1921-26), M.B., Ch.B., was awarded the Diploma in Public Health (D.P.H.) during the session 1947-48.

UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH

At a Graduation in the University of Edinburgh on 24 July 1948 the degree of Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.) was conferred on Hamish Thomas Burns Hall* (1927-32), M.A. (Edin.), and Victor Wallace Jaffray (1930-36), M.A. (Aberd.).

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

57

SCHOOL SECTION School and Random Notes Do but take care to express yourself in a plain, easy manner, in well-chosen, significant and decent Terms, and to give a harmonious and pleasing Turn to your Periods : study to explain your Thoughts, and set them in the truest Light, labouring as much as possible, not to leave them dark nor intricate, but clear and intelligible .—Cervantes.

Regretfully shunning any indecent or too significant Terms, and doing our best not to emphasise our Thoughts in the truest Light, we are labouring to give you a clear, but not too intelligible view of the dark and intricate life of the Grammar School—which still survives despite the addition of a 9th period on Thursday. * * * This year we welcome two newcomers to the School Staff, Mr. Douglas Prosser and Mr. Alan Wilkins. Mr. Prosser joins the Garioch contingent in the Staff Room and shows innate skill in distributing Debater syllabuses (or -bi ? Room 3 v. Room 15 ?). Mr. Wilkins made the acquaintance of the School (or vice-versa) last year as a student.

His spirited dealings with last year's V were indeed a sign of great worth. * * * The following were appointed prefects for the session : Eric H. Cruickshank (Senior Prefect), J. Edward Fraser, J. Keith Farquharson, David A. Brittain, William A. J. Davie, Brian S. Gray, Frederick P. Lynch, Patrick G. Innes, Eric McLeod, William D. Ogston, David M. Craig, Alan S. Hall, John F. McClellan, Charles D. Mowat, Andrew M. Stephen and Eric D. Watt. We extend congratulations to them and to all others who hold office in the School. * * * The annual School Service was conducted by the School Chaplain, the Rev. P. D. Lawrence, M.A., in Rubislaw Church on 1 z September.

The Rector and the Senior Prefect read the lessons and Mr. Falconer played at the service. There was a large attendance of boys and friends of the School. * * * On It November, the F.P. Club presented to the School a handsome portrait of the late Dr. Theodore Watt. Sir Arthur Lothian presided over the ceremony and Mrs. Watt unveiled the portrait. On behalf of the School we wish to acknowledge with reverence this fine memorial of one of its great sons. * * * School Rugby has had a successful term, with the usual elations and disappointments. But I Gordon's have been soundly thrashed at last. A year's training on free milk and fourpenny dinners has made all the difference to our XV. We notice in passing that Middle School XVs now have more interesting fixtures than were available a few years ago. For these we are indebted to the good offices of Mr. Hunter.

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This year's Hockey XI, which is much the same as last year's, has also met with considerable success, and beaten Gordons by three goals to two. The Press and Journal hails it as " one of the best Grammar School teams seen for some years ", whose players show " classic play and fine passing movements ". We congratulate the team and also Mr. Ian Park, who for some years has devoted a great deal of time to training and securing facilities for the Hockey XIs. * * * On the occasion of the Australians' visit to Aberdeen, Mr. J. A. Broadbent and Mr. Kerr gave a very interesting and instructive talk.

In the afternoon, the School went to Mannofield en masse, where Mr. L. E. Tyson, our popular groundsman at Rubislaw, was one of the umpires—indeed a fitting recognition of Mr. Tyson's cricketing skill and his knowledge of the game. The School offers its heartiest congratulations. * * * Golf and swimming occupy a somewhat anomalous position in the School. Each features in an annual School event, but neither has any part in the sports curriculum—in spite of the excellent municipal facilities for both. So when a Grammarian provides " copy " for the local Press by his skill in driving or diving, we feel he deserves extra congratulation for the personal effort involved. In this particular instance we call attention to the winning of the Tom White Golfing Cup by Scott Hodge of the Middle School. Several other Grammarians featured in the prize-list at this competition. We hope they will all be in form for the Masters v. Boys match in the Spring—the only golf match in Britain which both sides win every year. * * * The School's cultural interests have not been neglected. A select party of Upper School boys, accompanied by Messrs. Russell and Hemingway, spent a riotous week-end in Edinburgh during the Festival. After " shining in the high aesthetic line ", for three whole days, they returned with long hair, purple corduroys, and a broadened outlook. A more exhausting account of their dire deeds will be found elsewhere. * * * The Quiz has long been regarded from a somewhat Olympian standpoint in the School as a stopgap for Middle School classes at the end of term. After the B.B.C. invited the School to compete in the " Top of the Form " programme, this quizzical (N.B. pun I) attitude was abandoned. A team of four—ready for anything, even the perennial crack about " Encyclopaedia Britannica "—was conscripted and took part in two broadcasts. In the first, the team beat Dundee High School by 36 points to 24. It was in this broadcast that Mr. Lionel Gamlin generously credited the High School with several centuries more than does history, Mr. Richard Dimbleby, the questionmaster at A.G.S., being content with the School's bare minimum of 700 years. In the second engagement the team lost to Edinburgh Royal High School by z8 points to 31. . . . The School has resumed its former outlook.

59 Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine The Debater once more has been giving us something to think about. After tactfully changing the colour of its syllabuses from controversial yellow to impartial green, the Society decided to hold a bye-election in the School. The result of the election justified the Conservative Central Office's choice of the A.G.S. as a " safe seat ".

More interesting was the publicity which preceded the election—the posters which covered every available inch of space in the corridor.

The more conscientious of our number, seeing that some of these posters were not quite so amusing as they might be, promptly made the necessary adjustments, generously leaving their work anonymous. . . .

The meeting itself went off quite quietly, all the masters present behaving in a most exemplary fashion. * * * This year's Dramatic production, T. S. Eliot's " Murder in the Cathedral", is of a futuristic nature, although the events portrayed took place over 70o years ago. We learn that there is a serious problem created by the lack of chain-mail plus-fours and bowler helmets for the Knights, but that Thomas is, as yet, to be killed cleanly by the sword, not by the sawn-off shot-gun. We have no doubt that in spite of the serious argument evoked ( a stentorian " No " followed by an equally stentorian " Yes " is heard at least once every Monday after School) Mr. Russell will guide the Society to the highly successful production we have come to expect from it. *

*

*

The School has begun practising some songs for the forthcoming School Concert. Included in the repertoire is the old favourite " Come if you dare "—not, perhaps, a very good advertisement. We have no doubt, however, that you will dare, knowing the powers of Mr. Falconer as an organiser of successful concerts. * * * Khaki is predominant in the Thursday colour-scheme, especially since the Rector addressed us in the Ilan about our duty to the country in general, and the A.C.F. in particular. The ranks of the Corps now include more than ioo cadets, from C.S.M. P. G. Innes downwards.

A change of uniform has been effected whereby the smartness of the Glengarry has been changed for the shapelessness of the " soup-plate ", but perhaps the War Office has a reason for doing these things.

In 51111111.10 imperatore gliattuor has res . . . . We wish each member of the Company at least as much military knowledge, valour, prestige and fortune as he requires for Cert. " A ". * * * Action Committees have been springing up in School with almost alarming rapidity—only the Debater Election assures us that this is not a swing to the Left. Debater Committees and sub-Committees, Library Committees, Magazine Committees, all are functioning very efficiently apart from the regrettable tendency of the members to forget about the meetings. . . .

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

The prefects are conducting their allotted tasks with dignity and decorum. In their few moments of leisure also they do their best to enliven the School's activities (on both sides of the murus).

In order to lessen the effect of the September holiday on the sensitive schoolboy, they decided to employ the balm of " Music while you Work ". So, in spite of " Frere Jacques" opposition from one classroom, and harmonic variations from another, the exquisite air, " Bluein' the Blues ", played by Mugsy Spanier and his boys, burst from the Prefects' Room and ricochetted through the corridors. The unusually mellow tone was achieved by packing the gramophone loudspeaker with a representative selection of contemporary prefectorial apparel. (Mr. Falconer, please note. See infra.)

Evidence of the prefects' extra-mural activity is to be seen in such inscriptions as " Myrtle doesn't love Buckets any more. . " Still, prefects have their faults, incredible as such a statement may seem. They have actually been making additions to the notices in the Prefects' Room I " Redski " has been appended to the name of our local pseudo-Socialist by some Unctuous pen, but the senior prefect sees no reason for the addition of " R.I.P. " after the names of those who have performed Lunch Duty. * * * The desire to be remembered by posterity is alive in everyone who has taken up pen-knife and assaulted the fabric of the School—i.e., every member of School except, of course, the prefects. But now that a photographer has been unearthed staunch enough to photograph the whole School in one day, a new outlet for this desire has been found.

We now hope for the usual crop of biennial school photographs— the very mention of which conjures up groups of the " Growing up on Bourneville " and " Cow and Gate " type.

Judging by the prints which have passed beneath the hypercritical glare of the editorial eye, it seems that the latter have been eliminated, but we would draw attention to a fine example of " before and after " —the two C—s—in the Upper Six print. * * * We are greatly indebted to the Education Committee for providing some new desks to write Random Notes on. Previously we were using the floor. Grateful as we are, we feel sure that they are export surplus and were probably intended for the children of some Central African tribe of pigmies. * * * Mr. Gray has flitted from his room upstairs to Room 14. Consequently there has been an important deviation. " Infinity out there " has changed from its North-South meridian and taken up an East-West direction. The value of the " drop in the ocean ", however, remains constant. * * * We now turn to Room i a—the Isles of the Blessed. There, tit ferunt, the votaries are continually blessing such transcendental aestheticisms as Lower Latin and such earthy, material realities as the high priest's boots. One student, after vast research (in Cassel's ?)

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine has proudly identified the verb flappere with the English verb " to fly ". Lewis and Short withhold their recognition, but Dr. Bimbo gives his full authority. Whether the high priest's response (" Merciful Heavens I ") to the sentence Daedalus primum flapperet was uttered in wondering praise or shocked execration is, as yet, unknown. * * * " Drink ", says Rabbit, "gi'es us mair than either school or college ", but Dr. Mearns, who recently lectured the senior classes on Temperance, did not appear to take this view. Interest in the lecture was keen, as was shown by one questioner who asked, with pathos in his voice, " Is there any harm in just an occasional cocktail ? " Although the lecturer used no apparatus, the School's experiments in the milk-hut have supplied this need. With the crudest equipment— just a stove, a straw and a milk-bottle—several keen scientists have performed experiments to discover the nature of the gas evolved when milk is rapidly heated.

F.P.s are carrying out parallel experiments in the D—s H—t—l. * * * Science, whilst carrying out of the cause OBITUARY : Died in delicate experiments on the compatibility of oxalic acid with the human frame, a well-known and sincerely mourned ornament of Upper Six. quae cause indigna serenos foedavit radius, aut cur beer vulnera cern° ?—Virgil. *

*

*

Whilst interest in Jazz has a place in the Staff-Room, that it should creep into the Music Room is truly marvellous. But Upper Six were regaled (by permission of Mr. Falconer) with the following melodies : " The Dark-town Strutters' Ball " played by Bump Johnson and his New Orleans Band and Albert Ammonds's rendering of " Shout for Joy ". A talk on Appreciation of Jazz by Mr. Falconer followed in which he expressed his ability to play " boogie-woogie " with the best.

The School awaits this treat with avidity. * * * to be. In the good old days when used what they Things arc not " cigarettes were eleven-pence half-penny for twenty and pipes sixpence each, eh M—l— ? " as good old Archie said, Random Notes were more than ten pages long. Nowadays degenerate and decadent youth, whose only interests are marbles and the winner of the two-thirty, has little time for such pen-pushing. (N.B. " this is, of course, all spoke sarcastic.")

But we feel we have said enough and probably you feel the same.

In spite of our firm resolve to be original, " quotha ", we could not bring ourselves to finish these Notts without any reference to beatus ille forsooth. . . . Enough no more 'Tis not so sweet now, as it was before.

—Eddison's Anthology.

The strife is o'er, the battle done.

—For use of Visitors. Not to be taken away.

Aw, gee, shurrup I —Anon.

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Lower School Notes Lower School staff and pupils returned in September to classrooms resplendent with new colour schemes, re-painted exhibition boarding, and blackboards it seemed a shame to sully with chalk. The effect was refreshing and almost all settled down to post-vacation days of honest endeavour. Only the playground was unchanged, and ball games were resumed during intervals in curtailed space with shed posts as goals and ancient trees to be swerved past. At least one of the latter, however, has been earmarked for possible destruction in the near future and if it goes there will be no regrets among games players.

The new session started with Miss Tough an absentee owing to illness, and before long, Miss Stewart too was off duty for the same reason. Happily both are now back and well-nigh completely recovered.

The Lower School monitors were installed in office early in the term and have been carrying out their duties quite as efficiently as the more exalted prefects of the Upper School. They are Alan K. G. Paterson and Donald R. Nicol of 4A, Stephen A. Pacitti and William S. Taylor of 4B, Alistair A. R. Henderson, Robert Miller and Stewart Wilson of 5A, and Dougal E. Baird, J. M. Dodd and G. R. Howie of 5 B. Highlights of the session so far have been the taking of class photographs, copies of which are eagerly awaited, and the half-holidays on the occasions of the visit of the Australian cricketers to Mannofield, and the birth of the Royal baby. The transfer examinations have come and gone. Thursdays s i and 18 November were days of tribulation for the candidates, but " it's an ill wind . . . ", and on both these dates the majority of Lower School pupils had no morning school.

A. J. M. E.

Changes in the School Staff Mr. Douglas Prosser, M.A., who has joined us as assistant in the English Department, is a native of Inverurie and was a pupil of the Academy there right from the ABC stage. His subsequent studies at Aberdeen University, where he graduated in 1947 with honours in English, were interrupted by five years' service with the R.A.F. He completed a full tour of operational flying with 431 Squadron, Bomber Command, dealing with strategic targets in the Ruhr and Western Germany. Later he saw service with Transport Command, Middle East, where his squadron operated from Bilbeis, near Cairo.

Mr. Alan J. Wilkins, A.R.C.O., a Sassenach from Hampshire, was educated at Queen Mary's School, Basingstoke. From 1936 to 1946 he was on the analyst staff of the Royal Naval Cordite Factory, Poole, and his early aptitude for music secured him a post as church organist in Poole, as well as the conductorship of the Royal Naval Factory orchestra. After the war his enthusiasm for voluntary Youth Work was rewarded in 1946 by his appointment as Music Adviser for Youth Service in the N.E. area of Scotland. Since coming North, he has qualified at the Aberdeen Training Centre as a teacher of Music, and he has now joined the Grammar staff in that capacity.

Mr. David Taylor, after a year's service as assistant in the Music department of the School, has been appointed master in charge of Music at a junior secondary school in the city.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Aberdeen (in the manner of Mr. A. Pope)

Fair silver city of an hundred spires Where gleaming granite to the heav'ns aspires 1 Muse 1 let me sing her praises in these measures And pen the beauty of her legion treasures.

Encircled by dark realms of aged hills Where babble dancing brooks and purling rills, She sets her beauteous face toward the main, Bounded by golden fields of rustling grain ; On one side, o'er its course of murmuring stones, Fair Dee delights the earth with soft harmonious tones : While on the other side (the dunes below) See the slow Don in smoother numbers flow.

Can my unpractised hand and feeble lyre Sing the full praise of yonder ancient spire, The cobbled streets, the mansions, gardens fair, And all the fragrant flowers that flourish there ?

Let us toward the sea ourselves betake And thro' the streets our wand'ring journey make, To where the cloistered sheds in coolness keep The finny harvest of the briny deep ; Or to the district where, devoid of spires, Perpetual burn an hundred endless fires : There, amid constant toil of men, we see The ceaseless furnaces of industry, Where gaunt black stones in murky arches rise To touch the mantle of the azure skies ; Or from some lofty eminence survey The mighty mansion and the winding way : The towers and churches, gardens thronged with flowers Where humble-bees beguile the passing hours.

Say : is this town or country, where the air Is sweet with fragrance, fairest of the fair ?

Where in profusion spring these blades of grass While people's hurrying feet in ceaseless traffic pass ?

Where trees create fresh bowers of pleasing shade And lawns and plots in tasteful walks are laid ?

Or let us journey by the Western way And watch our Aberdonians at their play Where in small bands they speed the pristine ball And watch it rise, curve far, and swiftly fall.

Lo 1 see these woods, these glades of sylvan ease, Stirred by the zephyrs and the gentle breeze, And walk these plots of grass, embowered in leafy trees.

Perchance some wandering Strephon here may stray, Far from the beaten track, the trodden way, With pipe or flute to cheer the umbrous shade And woo with music there his buxom maid.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine So let us, with this passing glance, retrace Our footsteps Southward from this fount of grace.

Would that my Muse might yet more sweetly sing This wondrous town, so rich in everything !

But let me bow the knee once more, O Queen, And sing thy praises, glorious Aberdeen I DAVID M. CRAIG (Upper V).

Innocents Abroad Edinburgh—the Castle, the Mound, the dignified hubbub of Princes Street, the sudden surprising glimpses of the surrounding hills—and, of course, the Festival! Our innocents arrived safely notwithstanding the many vices and temptations of a journey on a British Railways line (the three-card trick, the railway lunches, the £i fine, and so on), and at four p.m. we set foot on Waverley Steps.

Some hours later, having battled our way up in the teeth of a northerly gale, we staggered forth into Princes Street, battered and bewildered, and sought sanctuary and sustenance in the St. Andrew Street hostel and a plate of hot dogs.

Our surfeit of culture was admirably interspersed by a hilarious round of the city's less salubrious and more plebeian pleasures. The visit to the Mound Stands was an experience in startling contrast to the Ballet but it formed a background in complete harmony with " The Three Estates ", a lively performance which Edinburgh enjoyed in full force. The Mound was soapbox oratory at its best—a unique blend of split infinitives, profuse perspiration, and misplaced enthusiasm.

Joking apart, however—if that is possible—we contrived to visit a remarkable number of shows and concerts for so short a time.

We were in turn delighted by the gaiety of the opera (" Cosi Fan Tutti "), thrilled by the graceful beauty of the ballet, entranced by the perfection of Menuhin and Kentner, and Piatigorsky, convulsed by the hilarious " Three Estates ", and fascinated by the gruesome and moving tragedy of " Medea ". Such a blend of music and drama may seem strong meat, but we had no difficulty in assimilating it.

In spite of the all-too-brief duration of our stay, we had some free moments to reflect on what we had seen: the chroniclers, however, will draw a kindly veil over our cogitations and colloquies during the long sleepless hours at the hostel.

Our most poignant memory of Edinburgh at the Festival season, however, is not the faery beauty of the floodlit Castle, not the horticultural heterodoxy of the floral clock, not the tintinnabulating tramcars, not Forsyth's genteel facade—but the succulent sausage dans le petit pain a la Y.M.C.A., on which we kept alive the spark of life for those three memorable days of frenzied relaxation. Next year, perhaps, we will plunge even deeper into the maelstrom of Festival life 1 J. EDWARD FRASER (Upper VI).

DAVID M. CRAIG (Upper V).

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

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Art at the Edinburgh Festival The visitor to the 1948 Festival of Music and Drama in Edinburgh had the opportunity of seeing a number of art exhibitions of uncommon richness and moment ; ancient and modern works of art were displayed side by side, the beauties of honoured tradition along with all the controversy and excitement of what is novel.

Rembrandt's etchings, on view in the National Gallery, acted as a criterion of the worth and quality of everything else. The exhibition was a full and interesting history of his development as an etcher, with representative examples of the early simple etched line, the later dry-point style, and the final blending of the two. Rembrandt is so honest that he never shrinks from recording the ugly, the gross, the pitiful ; here was an etching of a slaughtered sow ; there a decaying hovel on the mud-flats of Holland. In a general impression so forceful and disquieting, the beauty of detail and delicacy of drawing of the individual etching tended to be lost.

The most delightful exhibition of the Festival was that of embroidery and old lace in the Signet Library. A huge Baroque Chamber housed a display of rare historic and artistic interest : green velvet hangings worked by Mary Queen of Scots, embroidered with scrol work and pictures in coloured silks ; gorgeous tapestries with scenes from classical tales ; miraculous shawls of Chantilly lace ; fine examples of Ayrshire early nineteenth century needlework ; fans of mother-of-pearl and lace ; prayer-books ornamented with gold and silver thread ; and one resplendent example of seventeenth century horse-furniture of blue velvet adorned with gilt and jewels ; all of exquisite workmanship of never-fading charm.

The arts, the crafts, and the old way of life in the Scottish Highlands, were set forth in a small and homely collection on show in the lovely old house in the Lawnmarket, " Gladstone's Land ". What every visitor must have noted was the excellent taste of these Highland people.

Their furniture, however primitive, has fine proportions and shape.

Their textiles are cheerful and full of character. Their simplest baskets, reels and pack-saddles, their flails, ploughs and spades, are sturdily fashioned and have a vigorous beauty.

Pride in Scotland's artistic achievements was not increased by my visit to the exhibition of paintings by seven young Scottish artists in the Church of Scotland's Art Centre. The influence of the moderns was very conspicuous, Picasso of the early thirties, Chagall, Klee, Nicholson, Xceron. But these pictures were characterless and imitative.

The artist Emil Nolde writes : " The art of an artist must be his own art. What the artist learns matters little. What he himself discovers has a real worth for him." Nowhere, I felt, was the style properly understood, nowhere was it the natural result and expression of personal experience. And under the pretensions of modernism the elementary drawing was clumsy and the painting feeble. But the exhibition showed that a few of Scotland's artists are aware that changes in artistic values and theories have taken place in the last half-century.

To this mediocrity, the boldness, the wit, the brilliance of the Bonnard exhibition was a radiant contrast. The art of Bonnard is

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 66 impressionistic, an impressionism of vastly more force and conviction than reality, whether the picture be the good-humoured grey-toned " View of Montmartre ", or the satiric " Cider Feast". His later style is a delightful reflection of his own gay boyish nature—simple expansive design, big broad masses of warm colour, a sense of sun and fresh air. Vuillard, by comparison, gave me no pleasure. His work seems so brown, so stuffy, so middle-class. Vuillard's gaze seems fixed on the ornaments on the mantlepiece, on the pattern of the wallpaper ; Bonnard's out through the clear air, over the colour and freshness of the French countryside.

Andre Masson is a third French artist of whose work examples were on view during the Festival. I wish to speak of Masson's drawings for Jean-Louis Barrault's production of " Hamlet ", simply as drawings, because their relation to the singularly varied and interesting examples of theatre design by Picasso, Mayo, John Piper, Leslie Hurry, Alexandre Benois and Maurice Brianchon, used at the Festival, requires a separate study. Andre Masson is a master of the use of line. His wonderfully modulated and controlled line creates the mood of his drawings. In " Ophelia " it is lyrical and a little melancholy ; it attains a perfection of purity in the advanced abstract " Graveyard " ; it springs up with explosive intensity in the " Sunrise " design. In the illustrations for " Bestiaire ", it is thickened and shuffled and chopped into shapes horribly and curiously expressive of terror. Masson's colour, too, has moods quite as diverse. It alternates between restrained greens and blues flecked with brown, and a Fauviste savagery of reds and purples and yellows. His illustrations for Shakespeare's sonnets and some poems of Coleridge enter the field of unaffected design, though their appeal has an emotional element which is fitting for literary illustration. To a Britisher, these drawings have the same stimulating newness of approach as the French " Hamlet " of Jean-Louis Barrault.

The last exhibition which the lamentable shortness of my visit to the Festival allowed me to see, was of a most interesting collection of recent bronze busts by Jacob Epstein. It is often said that Epstein is a modeller, not a sculptor, and certainly his concentration here on facial expression might suggest this. But those gaunt almost Egyptian female portraits have a composition and a sense of line that is distinctly sculptural. His mastery of expression, especially in portraits of children, gives vivid and dramatic power to the bronze heads ; I personally found them deeply satisfying.

These, then, were the exhibitions on view in the Scottish capital during the Festival. I have already spoken of the one commonplace and impoverished effort of native artists. Of course, the foreign visitor could walk about and admire Edinburgh ; he could take a bus to Rosslyn Chapel or the Southern Abbeys ; he could visit " Highland Traditions ". But this is not good enough ; we cannot live on our artistic heritage, while no national or original art flourishes in our midst. These superb exhibitions are a challenge to Scottish art. Can this country produce anything bold enough and alive enough to answer the challenge ?

GEORGE D. S. HENDERSON (Upper VI).

Upper VI-Session 1948-49 -l fa

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H. Tempest Ltd., Nottingham.

Back Row—L. D. Cruickshank, M. G. Hampton, D. A. Brittain, C. Murray, B. S. Gray, C. M. Grubb, M. J. Wagrel.

Second Ron—M. S. Jamieson, F. W. Bultitude, E. H. Cruickshank, A. M. McQueen, W. A. J. Davie, F. P. Lynch.

Front Row—G. Henderson, J. R. Cutts, A. M. Milne, I. Donald, L. G. Laing, J. E. Fraser, J. K. Farquharson.

(Absent—U. A. Wannop.)

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

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A Mountain Sunrise At one-thirty a.m. I was dragged out of bed after barely an hour's sleep and unwillingly I pulled on my boots. Sleepily, the three of us left Glen Brittle Youth Hostel to its slothful inhabitants and set our faces to the hills. All the Cuillin of Skye lay swathed in the sombre robes of night and the shadows were deep in the corries and glens.

I was guided up the side of Sgurr Dearg by the white flash of Andy's socks, a foot or so in front. It was a warm night and we were soon bathed in sweat and dry with thirst. Once we stopped to lick a wet hollow in the rock and to look at the Canna lighthouse winking at us from a dark expanse of sea studded with black islets. To the north we had been aware of a pink glow disappearing behind the shoulder of Sgurr Dearg, and now, as we topped the first peak of Dearg, a blood-red north-eastern sky rose to view with a dozen jagged rocky peaks thrust up, jet black against the scarlet. Almost as impressive was the silence, broken sharply by the croak of a raven as we sent it flapping its dark form across the sky. We traversed the knife-edge ridge slowly, the stillness shattered by the crunch and tinkle of our bootnails and the clatter of stones falling into the void on either side.

It was almost five o'clock when we reached the " Inaccessible" Pinnacle and aimlessly drifted up to its sharp summit. The air was chilly as we sat perched on top awaiting the dawn, but we were so engrossed in watching the sky that we hardly noticed the cold. Soon the sun came, throwing its warm rays on the surrounding peaks and turning the huge wet slabs below us to a gruesome crimson. Just to make things perfect, a bank of mist drifted up from Coire Lagan, coiled over the ridge and trickled down into Coruisk. So, for a moment we basked in the rays and gazed on the sunlit world beneath.

Never did sun more beautifully steep, In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill ; Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep I

The sun rose behind a long, low belt of cloud and, leaving us in shadow, cast a thick, pink blanket over the peaks and lochs from Assynt to Ardgour and from far inland to our very feet. This lovely effect soon passed and we were aroused from our dream world by the warm glare of the July sun heating our bodies and dazzling our eyes.

All the early morning we climbed up and down over the peaks of Coire Lagan—An Stac, Sgurr Mhicoinnich, Sgurr Tearlach, Sgurr Alasdair and Sgurr Sgumain, all bathed in glorious sunlight. The rock grew warm to the touch and the ring of our nailed boots was deadened by shimmering waves of heat.

We were very pleasantly tired when at last we stood at the foot of Sron na Ciche looking back at the serrated outline we had just traversed, and on the way down our minds were full of thoughts of food and rest.

The sluggards began to emerge from their tents and leave the Hostel as we descended. We pitied them and agreed that he who has never seen a Cuillin dawn has never truly lived.

W. D. BROOKER (Upper V).

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Reveries on a Skull and Cross-bones An ancient skull on a piece of crimson velvet, with two crossed bones behind it. It is very prosaic, that little group, in the grey morning light in the classroom; the skull looks like stone in its hue, until you scrutinise it carefully. The empty sockets stare vacantly at you; the red velvet gleams like blood gushing from a wound.

Imagine the group in an ancient, deserted house, on a black old oak table in a dark panelled library. Shafts of moonlight bring out the hidden sinister tints of the velvet; the eye sockets, dark as Erebus, glare at the panelling, watching—for what ? Some ghostly presence, some misty skeleton form, some fiend, Satan himself in all his awful glory of corruption and evil ?

The dead skull conjures up visions of a black flag, straining in the breeze over two ships locked in death-grapple. Flashing cutlasses, slippery decks, blood, smoke, agony, death and plunder. And then the black flag flies over one ship only.

The bone is greyish-white; the lifeless skull is dry, dry as dust.

There is in it no semblance of dead humanity. It is impersonal.

But it is the symbol of Death, and merciless men made it the symbol of Piracy also.

Looking at the white rim of the velvet, one's mind flies back to the pirate ship and its prey. One imagines a murdered captain.

His blood wells out from his side over his own white decks, scrubbed white so carefully, but now slippery with dark blood. But what cares he ? His eyes are glazed by death.

One gazes at the stony tints of this relic of a man. Like the dark walls of the Catacombs, with those dark holes in their sides, and a little heap of pale bones lying there in a little heap of dry dust—all that remains of warm flesh, sparkling eyes and rippling hair or the cold, impassionate, holy body of some tonsured priest.

Curious, isn't it ? Those bones are so impersonal, so lifeless, while a piece of dark red velvet is so sinister and suggestive, like clotted blood, the depths of a wine cup, or the pristine heart of a ruby for which men have fought and died for centuries. A class-room table is no place for a skull. It must be on a red-stained black flag; in a dark hole in the walls of the Catacombs ; lying in the corner of a witch's cottage, beside a black tome of evil magic and a corroded cauldron ; or on a black oak table, in a dark panelled room of a deserted house, lit up by moonbeams. The eye-sockets stare at you, pierce you, looking at something at your back, some sinister presence, some fiend whose sight would blast your soul for ever 1 Don't turn round I . . .

DAVID BRIGHT (Middle IIIA).

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A Storm in the North-East Under an ominous sky everything prepares for the coming storm.

Over the cliffs the wailing gulls hover, warning the world of things to come. In the grey hamlet on the hillside, women hurry to bring in the washing and summon children from their play, while blue-jerseyed fishermen stagger in laden with nets, and boats are dragged out of reach of the merciless waves.

Out at sea the sullen waves heave monotonously. The breeze has died away to nothing and the air is heavy and tense. No birds save the seagulls are voicing their foreboding.

Suddenly away to the north the sky is riven by a blinding flash and some seconds later a crashing peal of thunder proclaims the onset of the storm. Then from the same quarter comes a low moan.

The moaning glows louder and louder until it sweeps round the cottages in snarling gusts.

All night the storm rages unabated. Anxious villagers lie in their beds unable to sleep. The boats secured to the side of the jetty strain at their moorings like captives struggling with their bonds. Towards morning the wind drops, the lightning ceases its violent flashing and for a while nothing is heard but the drumming of the rain.

Just before sunrise that also stops and with the dawn comes a widespread feeling of relief as everything gradually becomes normal once again.. Men and women go to inspect their sodden property.

The sea lies waveless and placid, the small birds resume their twittering and the storm clouds slowly sail away. The morning sun makes every pool and puddle sparkle and gleam. And the accustomed way of life is all the lovelier in the calm that follows the storm.

A. STEWART HUNTER (Middle Is).

Enigma The ghastly liquid bubbled up, Well masked by gleaming froth, As would the great Vesuvius, When Hades was full of wrath.

The ruddy light cast fevered glow On countenances grim, And noxious gases whirled about The vile container's brim.

Although the liquid fizzed and sparked, Not one of the watchers spoke, But mesmerised, with bated breath, They watched the twining smoke.

A witches' Sabbat ? No indeed l From thoughts of atoms flee.

Just Science in the " Chemy Lab." When acids don't agree.

A. GRAEME NIcoi, (Middle ILIA).

7o

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Boy Grows Up (A Symposium arranged by the Magazine Committee) First-Year Boy—At the end of his first term the schoolboy wanders along the corridors with his hands in his pockets and an air of self-confidence. How different from the beginning of term I He blundered along asking everybody where the Geography room was, and when he reached it, he found he had left his pen or his scarf in the last room.

He blundered into the Science Lab. expecting to be allowed to mix everything together and then place a Bunsen Burner under the mixture to see what would happen. Thundering French, Latin or Spanish masters drummed their respective languages into his head. He soon learned of the delights of Algebra ; isosceles, hypotenuse, and names like these bewildered him in Geometry ; but he knew how to do his Arithmetic, for he had done that in the Lower School.

Baffled by this second infancy, the schoolboy managed to survive by finding out where the dinner-hut, the library and the notice-board were. On Thursday he cast aside all thoughts of lessons and lines and went to Rubislaw for a game of rugby.

Second-Year Boy—A second-year schoolboy at last. I'd no idea that it felt like this to be in the Second Year. Was I erer so small as that First-Year kid? And I'm quite sure I was never as insignificant as those noisy little Lower School brats.

Still, these Second-Year exams. aren't far off. I wonder what the Romans wanted subjunctives for; I seem to manage the English language nicely without them.

English is perking up a bit; hut, it's hardly worth being a Second-Year boy, having to cope with Phsychic Quadelaterals. (Something wrong there; I must ask Mr. Johnstone where that's gone askew.)

In the meantime, what ho for rugger 1 The game's the thing 1 I suppose every boy wants to play for the juniors. I certainly do. It's all very well cracking my game up to these First-Year kids, but— ! Pity they don't see what a budding Daily . . . , I mean Mr. Allardice, I am.

I really must impress upon my mother, the elemental necessity of having " longs ".

Why doesn't she see how important it is 1 And this pocket money business !

She should appreciate the dignity and demands of the Second Year. But rale chaps ; I'm off to cribbers' corner. What a boon it is to tired brains.

Third-Year Boy—Although, as I amble up the long corridor, it barely seems a year since I first crept this way, I find, to my surprise, that I am in the Third Year.

It is a pleasant year if one forgets the academic side for one moment. The faces all around are of old friends of years' standing, among whom petty squabbling is almost extinct. I am now able to speak condescendingly to the First Year without loss of dignity and to be accepted, more or less, by the Upper School, while the masters grow daily more human as my acquaintance with them ripens. Alas !

The picture is not wholly a bright one, for, as the " Ilighers " grow more imminent, lessons are no longer an enjoyable pastime, but a full-time occupation. To compensate for the trials of school, my outside interests have increased. Each week I attend the meetings of the Debating Society, where I am an efficient listener. A weekly event, also, is the drill of the army cadets which I joined because of prickings in my developing conscience. On Fridays I receive lessons in the art of ballroom dancing, for which, at the expense of innumerable combs, I have finally trained my hair to lie in a wave. I watch and play rugby enthusiastically and afterwards, owing to a rise in pocket-money, am able to indulge myself at the tuckshop. Forgive me if I sound a trifle conceited. After all, I am the very heart and hub of the Secondary School I Fourth-Year Boy—As I stood waiting for a friend, I perceived a boy striding down the corridor with strides far too big for his size. He held his head well up and seemed to glance down his nose at the small boys rushing about the corridor.

When he met seniors, he walked past them without so much as a glance. As he disappeared, it suddenly struck me that he was no longer a member of the Middle School but one of Upper IV. . . . I now understand all his actions as I myself am conscious of having done the same. Ever since the beginning of term and my entry into the Fourth Year, I have found myself assuming airs and declining to answer questions from the small boys. I feel I have now outgrown my childhood and have to face the serious matters of life. I look forward and see the grim " Highcrs " and feel that these can be passed only by hard work and by throwing off my cloak of

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

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frivolity. I have also decided that my prestige will have to be boosted if I am to have a chance of playing my role of manliness. This can be done only by becoming a leading member of all School clubs and by securing a position in one of the senior rugby XVs. My next object must be to draw attention to myself by adding new features to my sartorial elegance (I) : a brighter pullover and a dashing tie, a perfect crease in my trousers, and of course a new hair style. In deference to my new superiority 1 have discarded my case, and I now stroll into Hall with one hand in my pocket and the other clasping a few choice text-books. Should I now discourse on some weighty political problem? This question was soon answered when, on joining a group of boys where a heated discussion was taking place, I found that much energy was being expended on the merits and demerits of the latest swing records.

Needless to say, in this atomic age many of my " big ideas " have been shattered.

But I still feel on the threshold of a new life. As I passed Lord Byron on my way out, I fancied that he cast me a look of encouragement.

Fifth-Year Boy—Is a handsome, well-knit fellow; cultured, courteous, clever; his voice has lost the squeak of the Third and Fourth Years; his curls are waves, after years of pummelling and plastering and Brylcreem. He has learned all the tricks of the School trade and is sophisticated and rather cynical in his own sphere.

He knows that now he is a man of importance in the School and assumes his honours with a pleasing, nonchalant air. lie is rarely studious by nature, but the proximity of a certain Examination has the effect of spurring him on to five or ten minutes' intensive study each evening.

Perhaps you would expect such mental strain to reduce him to a haggard, sickly creature, but not so : he keeps the roses in his modestly bristling cheeks by indulging in rugby or hockey. Why I at Rubislaw, any Wednesday, you can sec him getting his humerus fractured or his head split open.

His character and, much more important, his idiosyncracies, have developed.

If you saw a red bow-tie attached to a beflowered shirt, strolling down the corridor with brown stains on its fingers, you would immediately recognise S—n. Again, under that soft hat, instilling Conservatism into infants at a rugby match, could And when you see thirteen stone of syncopation beam no other fact than somewhere between the Prefects' Room and the Cycle Sheds, do not hesitate to t. name it M But I am aweary of this task. The cry of my " extra-mural activities " is strong. I must hie me to some such sanctuary of the Fifth-Year Boy as dear old B .and W.s. Dum vivo, vivam.

Upper Six is a unique year. On the one hand the boy sees former schoolmates elevated to rank of " student ", on the other he secs himself as one of the controllers of the School's destinies—quite the man, in fact. He finds his masters' attitude rather different—more tutorial than before—and relations with them become far easier. He is astonished to find how much he is left to his own devices as to work— and also how much more work he does than before 1 In the Sixth Year, four distinct types can be found. First, the enthusiast, who takes part in one or more of the School activities with zeal—Sport, Societies and, of course, Work. Second, the dilettante, soon to become one of Professor Knight's corduroyed intellectuals. Third, the character who looks upon the Sixth Year as an everlasting " free period "—an eternal round of " lead shot golf". Fourth, a type defying definition or analysis, known to psychologists as a " School Editor ".

Scottish Schoolboys' Club With the restarting of regular meetings in the gymnasium, recruits were not slow to come along and before three weeks of term had passed, recruits and " veterans " alike were joining in the inevitable games of basketball and skittleball. Although these games are not always played strictly according to the rules, they are thoroughly enjoyed by all, as is seen by the scant respect shown by our new recruits even for giants of the ist XV. After the outstanding success of the previous rugby tour, there are high hopes among all members that a similar tour will be arranged for the coming Easter holidays. The prospects of such a venture seem very bright, and rumour also has it that a cricket tour, run on the same lines, may take place during the summer.

In conclusion, I should like, on behalf of all members, to thank Mr. T. H. McCrea for his untiring help and the interest he has shown in our meetings.

E. H. CRUICKSHANK, School Representative.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

House Notes Byron House The officials elected at the beginning of September were : House Captain, I. Donald ; Rugby Captain, I. Donald ; Rugby Vice-Captain, C. Ramsay ; llockey Captain, F. P. Lynch ; Swimming Captain, W. Brooker. When I. Donald left to enter the University, F. P. Lynch became House Captain, and C. Ramsay Rugby Captain. This year Mr. Eddison has become House Master in place of Mr. Lynch and we wish to convey our thanks to Mr. Lynch, who has so often led the House to victory at the annual Sports and in other inter-House events.

Byron cannot be expected to do well on the rugby field as we arc in the unfortunate position of having very few experienced players. In our only House game to date we were heavily defeated by Dun. The hockey team are not in any better position and lost their first game to Melvin.

FREDERICK P. LYNCH, House Captain.

Dun House At a meeting held early in the session, the following officials were elected : I louse Captain, B. S. Gray ; Rugby Captain, W. T. McKain ; Vice-Captain, B. S. Gray ; Hockey Captain, E. D. Watt ; Swimming Captain, J. L. G. Thompson.

As House scribe, I hasten to put on record our latest success. To the surprise of our opponents, we finished the summer term by winning the House cricket championship.

This term we have played only one House rugby match, against Byron. We have yet to meet Melvin and Keith, and they will provide much stiffer opposition.

The junior rugby XV held Byron to a draw in their first match of the season. The Hockey XI were narrowly defeated by Keith, the score being 4-5.

We welcome Mr. Park as our new House Master and wish him success in this important office. Also we thank Mr. Paterson for having filled the breach so willingly since the departure of Mr. Forbes.

Ahead of us in the early part of the coming year lies the swimming gala and there we arc determined to retain the championship, which we won last season.

With two scalps in our collection, the championships of cricket and swimming, and good prospects of more to come this session, we can fairly say that Dun occupies a creditable position in school affairs.

BRIAN S. GRAY, House Captain.

Keith House At a meeting held early in September, the following officials were elected : House and Rugby Captain, P. G. lanes ; Vice-Captain of Rugby, H. 13. Paterson ; Hockey Captain, A. F. Tough ; Swimming Captain, P. G. Innes. At this meeting also, our stalwart friend Mr. Gray intimated that he was resigning his post as House Master in favour of a younger member of the staff. We are sure that Mr. Gray will continue to take a deep interest in our activities. In his place we welcome Mr. Robert Wilson.

The rugby prospects for Keith House this session arc bright indeed, as the House rst XV contains seven members of the School rst XV and a number of prominent players from the School and and 3rd XVs. The opening match of the season, against Melvin, was won after a gruelling struggle by 9 points to 3. Our junior rugby team were led to victory• over Melvin by P. Littlejohn, captain of the team.

Our hockey prospects this year arc also bright, and in the only fixture as yet A. F. Tough led his men to victory over Dun by 5 goals to 4.

In swimming Keith House can, and I am sure will, put up a creditable show in the forthcoming gala. So Keith swimmers, support your House as you have done in the past.

In all House games this session, we have not yet met defeat. This run of success can be attributed to the grand team spirit shown by all members of the I louse.

PATRICK G. INNES, House Captain.

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Melvin House At a meeting held in the beginning of September, the following officials were elected : House Captain, E. H. Cruickshank ; Rugby Captain, E. II. Cruickshank ; Rugby Vice-Captain, C. D. Mowat ; Hockey Captain, E. McLeod ; Swimming Captain, T. G. Henderson.

The outlook for the House rugby team was exceedingly bright at the beginning of the term, and our team, on paper, seemed a strong one. In the first House match against Keith, however, we suffered a nasty set-back and, due to a lack of cohesive play, we were beaten by 9 points to 3 in a rather scrappy game played under atrocious conditions. The inter-I louse tournament this year is, however; to be decided on a " points scored " basis, and so there is still a definite possibility of our finishing at the top.

It is with great satisfaction that I report that our hockey team completely overwhelmed Byron by s6 goals to 3—a truly amazing performance. We congratulate the successful team and hope that they will deal with the remaining Houses in similar fashion.

Although we did not occupy too distinguished a place in the swimming world last year, we have in our captain, T. G. Henderson, an excellent swimmer, and it is the duty of every boy to rally round him and endeavour to gain for the House the leading place in swimming.

This year Mr. Cunningham has taken over the functions of I-Iouse Master.

We thank Mr. Milne for the many years of faithful service which he has given to the House, and look forward to many more successful years under the guidance of Mr. Cunningham.

E. H. CRUICKSHANK, House Captain.

The Literary and Debating Society The Debating Society has again begun its season with a bang, and a large membership and overflowing coffers arc signs of its flourishing condition. Although the senior speakers still seem to bear the brunt of oratory, some successful maiden speeches have been made and it is hoped that the prevalent shyness—never a conspicuous failing of the young Grammarian—will not last much longer at the meetings of the Society.

The Society gained considerable notoriety at its first meeting owing to its decision by a narrow majority that the School was going to the dogs (figuratively, of course), but, so far, the Education Committee has taken no action. The Society's cynical tendencies were demonstrated still more clearly the following week when, at the F.P. debate, the vote was in favour of cynicism in opposition to naivety. The innovation of the F.P. meeting was an outstanding success, made possible by the kindness of Messrs. Paterson, Cain, Cap and Brown, all leading lights from the Society's glorious and not too distant past. A rapt audience of sixty-five was given an object-lesson in the art of fluent and witty oratory and the after-speaking was inspired to heights of unusual eloquence.

The discussion " I believe . . . " was not the success its author had hoped for and it tended to degenerate in the customary way into vaguely-expressed dissatisfaction with the modern way of life, little or no serious effort being made to suggest any remedy, but Mr. James Morris of Upper V, a newcomer to the School Debating Society, showed a considerable eloquence and an acid wit which he used to great effect a fortnight later in the General Election. This was a riotous affair, heralded a couple of days before by a sudden rash of lurid posters in the main corridor and a turbulent sea of Middle School enthusiasts shouting " Vote Conservative " in falsetto monotone. Their persistence was amply rewarded when Mr. Morris, the Tory candidate, was returned by the convincing majority of thirty-nine votes over his distinguished and plausible Labour opponent, Mr. J. Edward Fraser.

Mr. John Forrest McClellan, an amusing Communist both visually and verbally, was compensated for his lack of success by the obvious and vociferous enthusiasm of his supporters (should 1 say comrades ?), but Mr. David M. Craig, the Liberal candidate, must have been thankful yet again that there was no deposit. The Election was a triumph of organisation for Messrs. Hall and Davie, Returning Officer and Chief of Police respectively.

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The debate with Gordon's College produced the usual keen clash of wits and the resultant high standard of speaking. Mr. Keith Farquharson courageously supported the Second Negative in his maiden speech and the Grammar boys who were there rose nobly to the occasion and discussed with spirit and intelligence the highly controversial motion, " That the Artist is more beneficial to the Community than the Scientist ". The cause of Science triumphed narrowly.

I shall take this opportunity of renewing the Society's invitation to the few boys who are not yet members to join straight-away. I think the office-bearers can say with justifiable pride that the programme for the remainder of the session is quite attractive and varied ; it includes three inter-school debates, a Staff lecture, a talk by an F.P., a visit to that shrine of local government, the Town Council chambers, and, the piece de resistance, a lecture by Dr. Eric Linklater. A welcome is extended to all Grammar boys to join the Society and help settle the affairs of the Universe in true Grammarian fashion.

D. M. CRAIG, Secretary.

Cadet Force Notes The School unit is in a flourishing condition with a strength of 3 officers and go cadets. 57 recruits enrolled at the beginning of the session.

It is with regret that the resignation of Captain I. M. Park is recorded. Captain Park joined the Company when it was originally formed and is thus the last of the original members to leave the unit. We give him our sincere thanks for the extremely useful service he has rendered to the unit during the past six years.

The following are the W.O. and senior N.C.O.s of the unit at present : C.S.M. P. G. Innes, C.Q.M.S. D. Jack, Sgt. W. D. Ogston, Sgt. R. II. Thomson, Cpl. C. K. Mackay and Cpl. A. S. Fraser.

Two major events have taken place since the last edition of these Notes. The first was the Annual Wappenschaw of the Scottish North-Eastern Area, Army Cadet Force, at Blackdog Ranges in May, where two unit teams shot well to gain third and seventh places respectively. Secondly, annual camp was held at Cairnbulg R.A.F. Camp, near Fraserburgh, where, despite bad weather, an enjoyable time was spent in training and recreation.

Training this session is proceeding apace and has been improved too per cent. by the assistance of P.S.I.s from the 4/7 Gordons (T.A.), the unit to which we are affiliated for training, and from Aberdeen University Contingent S.T.C. (T.A.).

Eight cadets arc sitting Certificate A examinations in December, but the bulk of the cadets will sit the May examinations ; then we expect a record entry for Part I and Part II examinations—and a record pass.

Pipes and Drums continue training under civilian instructors—P/M Rennie, who is Pipe Major of the Aberdeen and District Pipers' Society, and Mr. Herbert Cooper. We were rather unfortunate last session owing to frequent changes of instructors, but we hope that we arc settled now and that we shall produce, in due course, Pipes and Drums that will be a credit to the Company and the School. In this connection, a class for young pipers, boys of Middle I and II, has been formed.

If anyone has a spare chanter, drumsticks, bagpipes, etc., lying at home and not being used, we should be most grateful to have such items. We can use them.

As regards the future of the unit, considerable changes will take place in the near future. It has been decided to convert the unit from a company of the Army Cadet Force to a contingent of the Combined Cadet Force. This new organisation prepares boys for entry to all three Services, and is limited to schools. The School Contingent will consist initially of a Basic Section (training cadets for the Certificate A Part I examination), and Army and R.A.F. Sections to which cadets will pass on completing Certificate A Part I. It is regretted that in the meantime an R.N. Section cannot be formed. Cadets in the Army Section will aim for Certificate A Part II, while those in the R.A.F. Section will work for the A.T.C. Proficiency Certificate. When called up for National Service, a cadet in possession of Certificate A will be posted to that corps or regiment of the Army which he chooses to join.

A cadet possessing the A.T.C. Proficiency Certificate is assured of entry to the R.A.F., if he chooses that Service.

In conclusion, an appeal is made to ex-members of the unit. Several members have left the unit in past years and omitted to return items of personal clothing and equipment, pipe and drum equipment, pamphlets, etc. Could they please be returned now, regardless of their present condition ?

D. M. A.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

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Scout Notes 1st Troop The Group were very successful in the Scout Athletic Sports this year, carrying off the Shield for the sixth year in succession, while the Pack also did very well, being among the first six.

We had a very successful camp this year in Glen Clova, Kirriemuir, Angus, in spite of very bad weather. Although high winds and torrential rain greatly hampered our activities, a lot of first class scouting work was accomplished. On one of the really fine days, the Troop made an expedition over the hills to Driesh, and in the evening there was a very good camp-fire with a Dundee scoutmaster and three of his troop as guests. On the following evening, the Troop paid a social call and joined a camp-fire in the Kirriemuir Girl Guides' camp about a mile and a half away.

Arrangements for our cafe and dance on z7 November are almost complete.

These have entailed a lot of hard work and some heart-break for the parents' committee and we should like to thank them and all the parents for their splendid support.

The following are the promotions : Brian Gray to acting A.S.M., J. Edward Fraser to Troop Leader, John Mathieson and David Kilgour to P.L., Richard Cradock and Ross Renton to Second. We welcome back from the services Alan Thomson as Acting A.S.M. There is nothing of note to report this time from the Pack, although they are now thriving even better, if possible, under Miss Mackintosh, who returned to us during the summer vacation from a Wood Badge course and the Blair Atholl Jamboree, where she gained a lot of valuable experience.

J. K. B.

9th Troop The annual summer camp was held at Loch Kinord, Dinnet, during the first fortnight of the School holidays. Despite the adverse weather, the camp was a successful one, and enjoyed by the forty campers.

The Troop owes a great debt of gratitude to Acting A.S.M. Ian Donald, who acted as quarter-master of the camp and retained his sanity despite a deluge of ration books, forms and vouchers. Rover Scout Robert Tennant and A.S.M. H. Gavin Alexander, on vacation from Oxford University, were also present and did a great deal to help, and we were also glad to welcome a previous Scoutmaster, Dr. A. Gordon Laing.

Two patrols, the Stags and the Plovers, held a camp at the Bridge of Bogendreep during the last week of July. It was organised by P.L. Ian O. Brown and lain Esslemont and was a great success. The weather was particularly fine and most of the time was spent " dooking " in the river Dye. After summer camp an outing was held to Alten's Haven on the Kincardineshire coast, which was much enjoyed, and in September we held an outing to Brimmond Hill.

Second Tom Craig has been promoted to Patrol Leader of the Wolves, a new patrol.

Our congratulations are due to the Pack under Miss I. Gauld for their continued success. Despite the number of cubs who came up to the Troop before summer camp, the Pack's numbers remain unimpaired and it is now at full strength with a waiting list. Miss Gauld is at present assisted by Miss M. Taylor, Acting A.C.M. Douglas Bruce being at present in the services.

During the summer vacation our headquarters underwent a much needed " freshening up " and the results were much admired at an Open Night attended by about two hundred and fifty parents and friends on Friday, 1 z November. The programme took the form of a history of the Troop under the title, " The Troop Past and Present ". Those who took part were Robert L. Milne, Dr. Norman S. Clark, Dr. A. Gordon Laing, all previous Scoutmasters, while the Group to-day was presented by Cubmastcr Miss I. Gauld and Scoutmaster T. N. Watson. The Group Scoutmaster, John C. Esslemont, presided and the Rector of the School addressed the gathering. The talks were illustrated by a selection of slides belonging to the late Dr. A. F. Hyslop and a set of Mr. Fenton Wyness's colour slides. A splendid display of old Troop photographs and early records was available for inspection. These greatly interested old members of the Troop who, we are glad to say, constituted a large section of the audience.

T. N. W.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine 17th Troop

We held out summer camp this year at Burnfoot, near Dinnet, a site which is very popular with the Troop, and in spite of very bad weather everyone thoroughly enjoyed the camp. After many postponements, we did a hike to Bum o' Vat in perfect weather. We also attempted a night exercise, which was not so successful, and I doubt if some members of the Troop enjoyed going back to bed with the rosy tints of dawn in the sky.

The Troop did well in the football five-a-sides, and in the athletic sports. Our junior team won the " under sixteen " competition and everyone did very creditably, the team finishing only two points behind the ist Troop, who are to be congratulated on an amazing series of wins.

In August and September extensive repairs to the hut were undertaken. A gang of conscripts worked at high pressure to clear the precincts, level the ground, and lay the area with cinders. The inside of the hut has been completely rewired, windows have been put in, and a certain amount of repainting has been done.

During the Christmas holidays the walls will be repaired and the hut painted. All these repairs have cost a lot of money, and to help to pay for them a very successful whist drive was held in Scout Headquarters. Another will be held in the hut in January or February.

Attendances continue high, and a growing keenness for scout work, which became evident at the summer camp, continues. The cubs, whose numbers arc increasing, hold their meetings on Thursdays at 6 p.m. Recruits will be made welcome.

The following arc this year's promotions : T. L. Macdonald to A.S.M., Second Monte) to P.L. of Curlews, and Scouts Booth, MacDonald, Findlay and Gray to Seconds of Curlews, Owls, Eagles and Pigeons respectively.

F. R. P.

The Dramatic Society

•

The Dramatic Society is meantime rehearsing " Murder in the Cathedral", a modern play by T. S. Eliot, to be presented in St. Machar's Cathedral on at and 22 December. The undertaking of such a play is admittedly a considerable task, but the enthusiasm of the players, together with the experience and organising ability of our honorary president, Mr. Russell, will make possible the surmounting of all the many difficulties involved. We should like to take this opportunity of thanking Dr. Baird and the Session who have kindly given us permission to use St. Machar's Cathedral.

The making and arranging of the banners and drapings necessary for the play will provide ample employment for the more artistic section of the Society, and no doubt the help of the Art Department, which was of great assistance in our last production, will again be called for. The resources of the Technical Department, too, will be utilised to the full for the making of the various " props." which arc required. Mr. Falconer has very kindly agreed to look after the musical side of the play. lie will himself play the organ pieces and is meantime training the choir to sing the Latin chants.

Though there is still a great deal of work to be done, I feel sure that we can look forward confidently to a performance as well acted and managed as was last year's production.

A. STEWART FRASER, Secretary.

The Arts Club The Arts Club continues to flourish and meetings, held on Friday evenings in the Art Room, have been well attended.

At the moment plans are afoot to hold an " Xmas Pairty ". Among our more serious projects, those now under way include the making of a model harbour, a Scottish fishing village, a series of " pictures " depicting the life of the School, and even a film in colour to be called " Canterbury Pilgrimage ", based on a series of panels illustrating Chaucer's Prologue. This last epic will be eagerly awaited by all connoisseurs of cinematographic art.

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School Sporting Activities Rugby Rugby this season, as always, was greeted in a most enthusiastic style, and this made the problem of team-building a comparatively easy one. This season saw the inauguration of a 4th XV, and although difficulty is being experienced in obtaining fixtures, it is hoped that, in time, a suitable fixture-list will be arranged for them.

E. H. Cruickshank and P. G. Innes were elected Captain and Vice-Captain respectively of the ist XV, and their enthusiasm and co-operation are proving most valuable to Rugby throughout the School.

So far the 1st XV have played seven inter-school games, of which five have been won. Of these, the victories over Morgan Academy, Gordonstoun and Gordon's College were the most notable. The team-spirit is remarkably good in the ist XV, and inspires confidence in their ability to give of their best in every game.

The znd XV arc also in winning mood, and to date have suffered only one defeat.

The 3rd XV, as ever, show that indomitable spirit which has been peculiar to the 3rd XVs of past years, and are carrying on the victorious tradition.

The standard of play among the Colts, Juniors and Minors is exceptionally high, and the latter two teams arc determined to go through the season unbeaten.

At this point, a word of congratulation is due to all teams on the particularly high standard of turn-out. This is most gratifying in view of the present restrictions and shortage of supplies.

Thanks are due to those members of staff who have given freely of their time to assist in coaching, refereeing, etc., and who have contributed in no small way to the smooth running of games in the School.

EDWLN HUNTER, Games Master.

1st XV Inter-School Matches 18 September 1948.—r. Dundee High School at Rubislaw. Team: J. C. K. Steel, E. II. Cruickshank (Capt.), P. G. Innes, I. Donald, A. G. Watt, H. B. Paterson, R. T. Hamilton, J. J. Rae, C. A. W. Ramsay, C. D. Mowat, J. H. Littlejohn, J. F. McClellan, B. S. Gray, W. T. McKain, B. T. J. Morris.

School kicked off on a day on which conditions were perfect for rugby. For the first quarter of an hour, play swung from end to end and although School's forwards were playing well and obtaining a good share of the ball from set and loose scrums, the taller Dundee forwards had the advantage in the line-outs. Full back Steel's handling and kicking were excellent, and he often took School out of a dangerous position. Gradually, however, the School backs began to put on pressure and, following a good three-quarter movement, Cruickshank kicked ahead, and outpaced the Dundee defence to touch down for an unconverted try. School continued to press and Watt was conspicuous for determined running. The forwards were also enjoying a spell of superiority, during which Cruickshank snapped up a loose ball and dived over to score another unconverted try.

After half-time, School once again swept to the attack and went further ahead with a penalty goal from far out by Cruickshank. Dundee replied strongly but fighting defensive play by the forwards, amongst whom Mowat was outstanding, enabled School to hold out the eager Dundee players. School tired, however, and because of faulty marking, the Dundee centres were able to score three tries, two of which were converted. School tried hard to regain the lead, but, hampered by an injury to " hooker " Ramsay, were unable to pierce the Dundee defence. Final score—School, 9 pts.; Dundee High School, 13 pts.

2 October 1948.—v. Morgan Academy at Dundee.

School showed four forward changes from the side which lost to Dundee High School, W. D. Brooker replacing Rae, McKain moving to hooker, R. F. Craig joining the hack row as a wing forward and Gray moving to lock.

School won the toss and decided to play uphill against a slight breeze. Straight from the whistle School were on the offensive, but, although playing with great spirit, could not penetrate the Academy defence. A long spell of midfield play followed and School were awarded a penalty kick, but Cruickshank failed narrowly from far out.

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In the second half, School with the following breeze pressed home their attack and after a continuous spell in the Morgan '25, Brooker scored an unconverted try.

School's three-quarters were running well and handling the ball cleanly. The forwards were playing a grand attacking game, Craig and Mowat being conspicuous in rushes, and it was after one of these rushes that McClellan dropped on the ball to score a try which was converted by Donald. School were now all over the rapidly tiring Morgan team and were unlucky not to add to their score. Final score—Morgan Academy, Nil; School, 8 pts.

9 October 1948.—v. Gordonstoun School at Gordonstoun.

School's only change from the previous game was a positional switch between Mowat and Gray. School attacked strongly from the start, despite the heavy pitch, and penned the Gordonstoun team in their own '25, Innes having hard luck when he slipped after cutting through the opposing defence. After about ten minutes' play, Cruickshank finished off a good three-quarter movement by scoring an unconverted try at the corner. School scored twice in the next ten minutes through Innes and Cruickshank, Steel converting the latter's try. The heavier Gordonstoun forwards excelled in rushes and after one of these they scored an unconverted try.

In the second half, Gordonstoun attacked strongly, but School's forwards broke away and scored again through Craig. Gordonstoun, however, were undeterred and by the ferocity of their attack carried School back to their own '25, where they were penned for a long period. The continual fast-rushes of the opposing forwards were difficult to stop but School weathered the storm, and gradually carried play upfield, until they scored again. Donald, who was playing his last game for School, cut through beautifully, and passed to Watt who scored far out.

Steel converted with an excellent kick.

Full marks must go to McKain for his hooking against the heavier pack and to all the forwards for their grand defensive play. Hamilton's kicks from the base of the scrum constantly saved the situation and the three-quarters earned commendation for their excellent attacking play with the wet ball. Final score—Gordonstoun, 3 pts.; School, 59 pts.

16 October 1948.—v. Dollar Academy at Dollar. Team: J. C. K. Steel, E. H. Cruickshank (Capt.), P. G. Innes, A. G. Watt, B. T. J. Morris, H. B. Paterson, R. T. I lamilton, J. H. Littlejohn, W. T. McKain, J. F. McClellan, A. W. Milligan, C. D. Mowat, It. F. Craig, W. D. Brooker, B. S. Gray.

Winning the toss, Cruickshank chose to play with the sun. It was soon evident that this was going to be a good game, and in the first quarter of an hour play swung from end to end at a tremendous speed. School were unfortunate to become three points down from a penalty goal, but, spurred on by this reverse, they fought back and carried play to the Dollar '25, where they were awarded a penalty kick, Steel narrowly failing to bring out the points. Shortly after this, Dollar went further ahead with another penalty goal. School's backs were suffering from lack of the ball from their forwards who were far outweighted by the opponents. Just on half-time a Dollar centre cut through and passed to the wing: Cruickshank caught and tackled his opponent, who, however, just managed to touch down as he fell.

The tremendous speed of the first half was slightly modified after the break, but play was still very fast. School tried hard to score and time and again raids to the Dollar '25 broke down through lack of the ball at the vital moment. School came near to scoring when Cruickshank was just beaten to the touch-down after cutting through and kicking ahead. The same player soon after failed with a penalty kick. The scoring was completed when a Dollar forward scrambled over from a loose scrum.

School were slightly unlucky to lose by so many points in a very• interesting and thrilling game and a word of praise must go to the forwards who never gave up, though completely outplayed, and to the backs for their defensive play, especially Morris in his unaccustomed position. Final score—Dollar Academy, 12 pts.; School, Nil. 6 November 1948.—v. Gordon's College at Rubislaw.

School showed only one change from the team which played Dollar, J. J. Rae deputising for McClellan, who was injured.

School won the toss, and the game was started under perfect conditions. With their first three-quarter movement Innes cut through and sent Cruickshank over

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

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for a try at the corner. After about ten minutes of continual pressure, they went further ahead through Cruickshank after another fast three-quarter attack. The forwards were playing a fine hard game, and were making up for any loss in weight by their speed in following up and fine rushing. The three-quarters showed their complete superiority when they scored again, Cruickshank outpacing the defence to score far out. A. long spell of midfield play followed, with Gordon's making only spasmodic raids into School's 'z 5. Just before half-time Watt, receiving a pass from Paterson, raced through the centre to score yet another unconverted try.

After half-time, School continued to attack but could not round off their movements with the same polish as in the first half. The three-quarters were not seeing so much of the ball as before, and the forwards were not so impressive. However, during an intense spell of pressure, School were awarded a penalty kick and Steel kicked a fine goal. Spurred on by this, Gordon's put in a determined spell of attacking, but School fought back, and the final whistle saw them once more in their opponents' half of the field.

School were worthy winners of this game and congratulations must go to the forwards, especially Littlejohn and Mowat, for their forceful play, to all the backs for their outstanding display and to Steel for his confident kicking. Final score— School, 15 pts. ; Gordon's College, Nil. 13 November 1948.—v. Abbey School at Fort Augustus.

Once again School showed changes, A. G. MacCrimmon taking the place of Steel, who was unavailable, and McClellan resuming in place of the injured Mowat.

Cruickshank won the toss and decided to play with the prevailing breeze.

School were slow to settle, and showed a lack of confidence and spirit, which had an adverse effect on their play. It was therefore against the run of play when Watt cut through to score an unconverted try. School's lead was short-lived, however, for an Abbey School centre intercepted a pass, and scored under the posts. The try was converted. After this School rallied, and once again took the lead.

Hamilton initiated a blind side movement, which ended with Cruickshank bursting over at the corner. Once again the lead was short-lived, and Abbey School went ahead when a centre cut through the defence to score an unconverted try.

After half-time School tried to make amends for their poor first-half display, and good work by the forwards was rewarded when Cruickshank scored after a quick pass front McKain. School's backs were showing only a shade of their previous week's form, but the forwards were trying hard, and gaining most of the ball from both loose and set scrums. McClellan and Gray were prominent in this attacking spell. School went further ahead through Morris who took an inside pass from Watt to score far out. The scoring was completed when Cruickshank rounded off a passing run by the forwards. The try was converted with a good kick

by I lamilton. Final score—Abbey School, 8 pts.; School, 17 pts.

20 November 1948.—v. Perth Academy at Rubislaw.

In this game Steel resumed at full back and Mowat at forward, in place of Rae. School kicked off against a stiff breeze and for a while enjoyed a spell of superiority.

McKain was hooking well in the set scrums, and the backs received a fair share of the ball. School took the lead when Watt cut through, and scored a fine try which was converted by Steel. Shortly after, Hamilton scored a neat blind side try which was unconverted. Cruickshank was also just off the mark with a 35-yard penalty kick. At this point, however, School forwards began to lose their superiority, and were soon pushed off the ball both in set and loose scrums. Perth scored from a penalty kick and shortly after drew level through a score by their scrum-half, the try• being converted.

Shortly after half-time School once again took the lead when Cruickshank kicked ahead, dribbled past the full back, and touched down for a try which was unconverted.

School's forwards were not putting up one of their best displays, and Perth were obtaining most of the ball. The Perth players tried hard to equalise but School never gave up, and managed to hold on to their lead. Final score—School, it pts.; Perth Academy, 8 pts.

Hockey It is probably fair to assert that this year's team ranks as one of the best we have so far had. This is not unexpected, for competition against adults requires two

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

years' preparation, and last year was the first in a two-year plan. This year's team is almost unchanged from the young side of last year and their " growing pains " stage has passed.

Faced with having no experienced goalkeeper at the start, we found a cheerful victim in J. Milne who looked like filling the bill till he had an unfortunate illness.

To take his place we have a young player, D. Greig, who sportingly volunteered and has played brilliantly. At full-back R. Cromar and E. McLeod are sound players, while the half-backs G. Mackie, E. Watt and A. Cromar are, as a line, I think, the best we have ever had. Incidentally, it is now on record that Mackie has scored a goal, and a valuable one it was too. The forwards are unchanged from last year, H. Duncan, T. Wilkinson, F. Lynch, C. Grubb and A. Philip, and, as their confidence has grown, so have their performances improved, Wilkinson and Lynch being now very dangerous forwards. Grubb is a lively player, fast and with beautiful stickwork. Though he is not very penetrative yet, I go as far as to say that he is one of the best forwards playing locally.

In previous notes I have referred to Eric Watt—our bright shining star whose fame is now firmly established outside our own ranks. Picked to play in the local trial, he has now been selected for a representative Aberdeen side to meet a very powerful south team, including Britain's Olympic goalkeeper.

If any should wonder why the game has made such remarkable progress, in the playing sense, in the short time it has been established, there are several answers.

We have always been lucky in our choice of Captain and Vice-Captain; there is the enthusiasm of the ist XI and the keenness of the rest of the players for a game in which disparity of physique has no marked effect either way; and lastly, it is certain that no other school enjoys such remarkable facilities for playing the game.

I. M. PARK.

Cricket It is only fitting that due recognition should be made of the outstanding success of last season's ist XI. Its record—Played so, Won 9, Lost 5—was a fine one, and although it was not an unbeaten side, many other points in its favour rank it as one of the best teams School has ever produced.

The batting of the side was undeniably strong, and the century was reached on many occasions, the fastest being at Arbroath when School ran up the hundred in forty minutes. That the batting strength of the side did not depend on the same persons each week, was shown by the fact that four players claimed a half-century— Eddison and Dunn, one each ; Steel and Cruickshank, two each—and various other high scores were obtained by these, and other members of the side.

The bowling attack, too, was a strong one and the variety and accuracy of the School attack were too much for all our opponents, except Glenalmond.

Great satisfaction was shown by all at the two decisive victories over Gordon's and, while it is not certain whether our score of 592 for 6 (decl.) is a record, it was a particularly fine achievement. The following awards for the season were made:— ist XI Cap.—E. H. Cruickshank, J. M. Eddison, J. Dunn and J. C. K. Steel. ist XI Full Colours.—D. S. Robbic, I. Donald and R. T. Hamilton. ist XI Half Colours.—E. McLeod, F. P. Lynch and E. D. Watt.

Swimming Club At a meeting held early this session, officials were elected as follows : Captain, P. G. Innes ; Vice-Captain, J. L. G. Thompson ; Secretary, R. C. Shand.

This term the swimming activities of the School have been confined to the usual after-school sessions (Monday and Friday) in the Municipal Pond. At these meetings coaching and instruction is being given by Messrs. Allardice, Barron, J. C. Hunter and Wilson of the School Staff.

Next term, in February, the School is to hold its annual Gala. It is hoped that all school swimmers, pretentious or otherwise, will enter for the Gala, and make it an even greater success than last year's (if this be possible).

Great efforts arc being made by Mr. Wilson to secure fixtures with other schools, but so far there has been little response.

P. G. INNES, Swimming Captain.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

81

The Former Pupils' Club Founded 1893

Club Executive Notes Since the last issue of the Magazine, there have been two events of major importance affecting the Club. Firstly, the Annual Dinner, which I think all who were present will agree was a most successful function, and in keeping with the tradition of former Dinners. Secondly, the presentation of the portrait of the late Dr. Theodore Watt, which took place in the School Hall. The Executive were pleased to sec such a representative attendance of F.P.s., including several of the same age-group as the late Dr. Watt. It will be a matter for very considerable gratification to all F.P.s that we have been able in this small way to perpetuate the memory of one who has clearly done more than anyone else to place the Club on its strong foundation. The informal tea reception after the presentation was very much appreciated by those present, and I think this form of meeting is of great value in cementing the various generations of F.P.s. *

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We had hoped by this time to have seen the extension of the 5954-18 War Memorial, to include those who gave their lives in the recent war, duly completed and unveiled, but through no fault of the Town Council or the Executive, there has been a slight delay in the matter. It is hoped that the work will be completed at an early date. *

*

*

The original Constitution of the Club has been so altered in course of time as now to he rather complicated and out of date. It is hoped to submit a draft of a revised Constitution for approval in the near future and meantime we appreciate the work that Mr. James S. G. Munro and the Secretary are putting into this onerous task. a a * By the time that the next Magazine is published, I will have demitted office as Chairman of the Executive, as the procedure with reference to the appointment of office-bearers very wisely provides that the honours should go round and that two years is the allotted span for the chairman. One advantage is that one may now return to one's class table at the Annual Dinner in comparative obscurity " below the salt " without having to appear on the Toast List. I am convinced that the recent alterations we have made in the Constitution to permit of a regular retiral of so many members a year are to the material advantage of the Club, and have resulted in our having a very live and enthusiastic Executive. In view of the above, I would like to take this opportunity of expressing my thanks to the Executive and the other office-bearers for their co-operation during my term of office and, in particular, I would mention the work of the Secretary and the Editor of the Magazine. The Magazine itself speaks as to the amount of time and interest given by Mr. Watt to our affairs, but I think sometimes that members do not quite appreciate the amount of time and energy that arc expended on their behalf by the Secretary. Might I suggest that we all, when appropriate, endeavour in the future to be perhaps a little more punctual in answering communications, paying subscriptions, and the like. * * I cannot close without again expressing my appreciation of the continued interest that our Rector, Mr. J. J. Robertson, takes in the welfare of the Club and of the loyal co-operation he encourages between the School and the Club.

R. B. WILLIAMSON, Chairman.

8z

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

Members of the F.P. Club Resident Abroad We frequently receive requests for the names and addresses of F.P.s resident abroad and the following list has been compiled with a view to meeting such requests.

We have endeavoured to make the list as accurate as possible but the Secretary of the Club will be glad to be informed of omissions, as also of errors. It should be noted that only those F.P.s who arc members of the Club have been included, and that F.P.s in the Services have been excluded.

The Secretary is to keep the list up to date and similar lists will be published in the Magazine from time to time. Members resident abroad are therefore asked to keep the Secretary informed of changes of address and those going abroad arc asked to give him their new addresses. The list has been compiled from the Register of Members and as some overseas members have given the Secretary only their home addresses, or the address of a bank in the United Kingdom, it has not been possible to include all such F.P.s. Members in this category arc asked to inform the Secretary of their overseas addresses, stating whether or not these arc to be used for communications from the Club.

Club Consuls are indicated by a dagger (t).

AFRICA EGYPT KING, Robert Leslie (1912-24), Anglo-Egyptian Oil Company Limited, Cairo.

RENNIE, Ian Smart (1914-24), c/o B.B.C., 15 Sharia Ahmed Pasha, Cairo.

M.B.E., M.A., British Embassy, TAYLOR, John William (1906-10, Cairo. tWALICER, Alexander George (1906-20), c/o Northern Assurance Company Limited, St. Mark's Building, P.O. Box 1695, Alexandria.

GOLD COAST DUNNETT, Arthur Hugh (1927-33), M.B., Ch.B., Medical Department, African Hospital, Kumasi, Gold Coast, B.W.A. tGAULD, Edgar Reuben (1919-23), M.B., Ch.B., Medical Department, Kumasi, Gold Coast, B.W.A. HARPER, Francis Gordon (1925-28), B.Sc.(For.), Forestry Department, P.O. Box 167, Cape Coast, Gold Coast, B.W.A. KENYA CRUICKSHANK, Alexander (1911-17), O.B.E., M.D., Limuru, Kenya Colony.

RIDDOCH, John Louis (1906-09), O.B.E., Y.O. Box 4o, Kisumu, Kenya Colony.

1-SUTHERLAND, Graeme George (1903-09), P.O. Box too; Nairobi, Kenya Colony.

WOOD, Douglas Mitchell (1918-29), c/o Barclay's Bank (D.C. & 0.), Nairobi, Kenya Colony.

NIGERIA (Northern Provinces) tMcKENZEE, Captain Campbell Grant (19 so-12), cfo The Secretary, N.P., Kaduna, Nigeria, N.P. ROSS, Simon Douglas (1914-19), B.Sc.(Agr.), c/o Department of Agriculture, Samaru, Zaria, Nigeria, N.P. NIGERIA (Southern Provinces) C.E., c/o Public Works Department, Lagos, Nigeria.

(1923-25), William GRANT, HAY, Ian Kennedy (192o-33), M.B., Ch.B., Medical Research Institute, Lagos, Nigeria.

MENZIES, Graeme Mitchell Mill (5917-2o), M.B., Ch.B., c/o Director of Medical Services, Lagos, Nigeria.

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83

'PHILIP, Superintendent Frederick Strathern (1914-24), Police Headquarters,

Lagos, Nigeria.

SLEIGH, John Manson (1914-16), B.Sc.(Eng.), c/o Public Works Department,

Lagos, Nigeria.

NORTHERN RHODESIA THOMSON, Hugh Haldane (1928-3o and 1933-37), The Boma, Mwinilumga,

Northern Rhodesia.

NYASALAND DICKSON, Alastair Ogston (1919-28), Standard Bank of S.A. Limited, Blantyre,

Nyasaland.

HAY, David Sinclair (1907-11), Colonial Development Corporation (Central

Africa) Limited, Zomba, Nyasaland.

MILNER, Thomas Gordon (1925-37), B.Sc., cio Public Works Department,

Linongwe, Nyasaland.

PORTUGUESE EAST AFRICA tDUGUID, Marshall Keith (1919-29), c/o Duguid and Anderson Limited,

P.O. Box 422, Beira, Portuguese East Africa.

SIERRA LEONE tWATT, Edward William Murray (1918-31), M.A., District Commissioner,

Bo, Sierra Leone.

SOUTHERN RHODESIA COBBAN, James William Spence (1920-21), The Land Bank, Salisbury, Southern

Rhodesia.

tMacGREGOR, James Wyness (191 o-23), P.O. Box 91, Umtali, Southern

Rhodesia.

STEPHEN, Alexander Thomas (1906-15), Post Box 604, Bulawayo, Southern

Rhodesia.

YULE, John Morgan (1914-19 and 1923-24), P.O. Box 277, Salisbury, Southern

Rhodesia.

TANGANYIKA DUTHIE, Douglas Watt (1915-21), M.A., B.Sc., Ph.D., F.I.C., E.A. Research

Station, Amani, Tanganyika Territory.

HUNTER, Edward Alexander (1917-26), P.O. Box 97, Arusha, Tanganyika

Territory.

tWILSON, George Alexander (192o-23), M.B., Ch.B., cjo Health Office, Dares-Salaam, Tanganyika Territory.

UGANDA BISSET, Charles Barton (1909-18), M.A., B.Sc., P.O. Box 9, Entebbe, Uganda.

EDWARDS, David (1903-09), Chief Justice, High Court, Kampala, Uganda.

SANGSTER, Robert Gray (1919-30), P.O. Box 204, Kampala, Uganda.

UNION OF SOUTH AFRICA

Cape Province ANDERSON, John Campbell (1909-53), Masonic Hotel, Springbok, Namaqualand, Cape Province.

BRUCE, John Lamb (1921-23), C.A., Eyck, Jameson Road, Rondebosch, Cape

Town, Cape Province.

CLARK, Andrew (1895-1901), M.A., 3 Krohn Street, Cambridge, East London,

Cape Province.

CLARK, Alexander (1885-89), M.A., z9 St. James Road, East London, Cape Province.

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COLLIE, James Stuart Gorham (19o5-to), M.A., B.L., Vredenhof, Firgrove, Cape Province.

DUTHIE, Alexander William (1911), B.A., c/o Administrator's Office, Wale Street, Cape Town, Cape Province.

FAIRWEATHER, John Fordyce Robertson (1919-25), c/o The Royal Insurance Company Limited, Cape Town, Cape Province.

MacPHERSON, Colin Robertson (I935-4o), c/o Lt.-Col. Brorac Walton, " Abc,yne ", Mill Park, Port Elizabeth, Cape Province.

MACKAY, George Neil Whyte (1922-25), " Floreal ", Camps Bay Drive, Camps Bay, Cape Town, Cape Province. tMACKIE, Professor William Soutar (1895-1901), " Drumoak ", Greenfield Road, Kenilworth, Cape Town, Cape Province.

PETERS, Sir William (1900-06), C.M.G., M.A., P.O. Box 1346, Cape Town, Cape Province.

RUSSELL, Douglas Thomas Henderson (1921-3z), P.O. Box 148, Umtata, Cape Province.

RUSSELL, Thomas Henderson (1926-37), P.O. Box 148, Umtata, Cape Province.

TAYLOR, Alexander (189o-93), c/o Barclay's Bank, 82-84 Addcrly Street, Cape Town, Cape Province.

WILSON, George Alexander (1882-83), :Malvern House, 31 Havelock Street, Port Elizabeth, Cape Province.

WYLIE, Charles Featherstonhaugh (1915-18 and 1919-20), Central Hotel, t8-zz Short Market Street, Cape Town, Cape Province.

Natal BRUCE, William Gillespie Gilbert (1929-34), Natal Technical College, Durban, Natal.

CLARK, William (1893-99), No. 22 St. Regis, 40 Smith Street, Durban, Natal. tDUGUID, Frank Bruce Farquharson (1919-26), 8 Lambert Road, Durban, Natal.

FORBES, James Rennie (1920-2O, The Standard Bank of South Africa Limited, A.B.C. Branch, Durban, Natal.

STRACHAN, David (1893-1902), P.O. Box 1858, Durban, Natal.

THOMSON, Andrew Pearson (1894-98), P.O. Box 8, Rosetta, Natal.

THOMSON, Charles Ferguson (1912-14), c/o The Standard Bank of South Africa Limited, Durban, Natal.

Orange Free State STILL, Oswald Hastings Ritchie (1922-33), clo Fraser Limited, Wetenner, Orange Free State.

Transvaal ADAM, David (1898-1904), B.Sc., 9 Newport Road, Parkwood, Johannesburg, Transvaal.

BRUCE, John Grant (1882-85), P.O. Box 5483, Johannesburg, Transvaal.

DAVIDSON, Alexander Campbell (1904-06), 283 Victoria Street, Germiston, Transvaal. tHENDERSON, John Ewan (1884-87), P.O. Box 4466, Johannesburg, Transvaal.

McADAM, Norman (1938-43), clo Woodall and Duckham, Pretoria, Transvaal.

McLAREN, George Scott (1928-32), The Manor, 5 Winifred Road, Parktown, Johannesburg, Transvaal.

McPHERSON, Henry Nicoll (1934-37), toz8 Pretoria Street, Ilatfield, Pretoria, Transvaal.

MILNE, Arnold Statham, (1883-9o), Ridge Road, P.O. Box 5, White River, Eastern Transvaal.

RENNIE, James Cooper (1913-18), 13 Cradock Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg, Transvaal.

SMITH, Charles Edward (1921-32), M.B.E., 34 1st Avenue West, Parktown North, Johannesburg, Transvaal.

WISHART, John Strath (1925-35), B.Sc.(Eng.), A.M.I.Struct.E., is Wellington Avenue, Sandringham, Johannesburg, Transvaal.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

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AMERICA CANADA

Alberta ANGUS, James Alexander (1894-99). 420 Beaver Street, Banff, Alberta. tHARPER, Douglas (1888-98), M.A., B.L., 609 Tegler Building, Edmonton, Alberta.

POPE, David A. (1881-88), Hayter, Alberta.

WALKER, Charles Addington Peel (1894-1902), D.C.M., High Prairie, Alberta.

British Columbia ARMITAGE, Robert Douglas MacGregor f,t 945-47), 2260 Allison Road, University Hill, Vancouver, British Columbia.

BUTCHART, William Robert (1889-94), Fraser Mills P.O., British Columbia.

GERRARD, Frederick Wernham (1905-06), " Kawana", Marine Drive, Caulfeild, British Columbia.

KEENAN, Thomas Austin (2927-3o), R.R.z, Vernon, British Columbia. tMILNE, William Ernest (1881-90), c/o Milne & Middleton, 347 Water Street, Vancouver, British Columbia.

MOIR, James Alexander Milne (2929-33), 132 Wildwood Avenue, Victoria, British Columbia.

ROY, Thomas (1879-84), O.B.E., M.Inst.C.E., Anderson Lake Lodge, D'Arcy, British Columbia.

TAYLOR, James Prater (1886-88), 661 Newport Avenue, Victoria, British Columbia.

Manitoba tCRUICKSHANK, John Duguid (1899-1904), The Canadian Bank of Commerce, Personal Loan Department, Winnipeg, Manitoba.

SANGSTER, John (1896-1900), Ste. 5, River Apts., River Avenue, Winnipeg, Manitoba.

Ontario ABBEY, Robert (2903-08), 75 Ridge Drive, Toronto, Ontario.

BROWN, James (1876-79), c/o T. H. Bryson, Esq., Apartment 8, boo Lonsdale Road, Toronto, Ontario.

BUTCHART, Alexander Bruce (1889-97), 781 King Street East, Hamilton, Ontario.

CROMAR, Colin Douglas Leslie, M.B., Ch.B., F.R.C.S.E., 34o Cooper Street, Ottawa, Ontario.

FINLAYSON, Finlay William Nugent (2902-09), 48 Junkin Street, St. Catherines, Ontario. fFLEMING, Robert (1891-98), Wood, Fleming & Company, Royal Bank Building, Toronto 2, Ontario.

GEATER, Richard William (1938-47), 471 Cumner Avenue, Newtonbrook, Ontario.

McKENZIE, Archibald (2922-31), c/o C. S. Jamieson, 544 Wyandotte Street, Windsor, Ontario.

MORGAN, Edwin (2906-12), The Canadian Bank of Commerce, Head Office, Toronto, Ontario.

MORGAN, Frederick William (2903-09), The Royal Bank of Canada, Toronto 2, Ontario.

MURDOCH, George Fyfe (1921-16), c/o The Canadian Bank of Commerce, Ottawa, Ontario.

RUSSELL, George Stanley (1894-1901), M.A., D.D., zoo St. Clair Avenue West, Toronto 5, Ontario.

SCROGGIE, George Everett (1901-05), clo F. O'Hearn & Company, Pigott Building, Hamilton, Ontario.

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SIMPSON, John Alexander Trager (1919-28), D.F.C., 40A Main Street, Kirkland Lake, Ontario.

TROUP, Wallace (1907-12), M.D., r8o Wellington Street, Ottawa, Ontario.

Quebec McDOUGALL, James Lyle, Jr. (1925-22), c/o Price Brothers Limited, Riverbend, Quebec. tMcKINNON, Norman (2907-26), B.Sc.(For.), 1610 Sherbrooke West, Montreal, Quebec.

THOMSON, Professor David Landsborough (1911-18), 3521 University Street, Montreal, Quebec.

WATSON, George (1904-09), c/o Hudson's Bay Company, too McGill Street, Montreal, Quebec.

Saskatchewan McDOUGALL, Ian Anderson (1915-26), 2728 20th Avenue, Regina, Saskatchewan.

MEXICO BOWMAN, Robert (1907-09), M.A., LL.B., C.A., Mexican Light & Power Company, Apartado 124 Bis., Mexico, D.F. tWALKER, Patrick John Milroy (1914'20), C.A., Apartado 12 Bis., Mexico, D.F. SOUTH AMERICA

Argentine ADAM, Franklin MacPherson (1917-25), Banco Londres Y America Del Sud., Bartolome Mitre 399, Buenos Aires, Argentine.

RUSSELL, James Knox (1917-28), Contaduria, F.C. Sud. Plaza Constitution, Buenos Aires, Argentine.

WILSON, Reginald John George (2905-21), c/o Anglo-South American Bank, 78 Reconquista, Buenos Aires, Argentine.

Brazil HAY, John M. (1913-19), Fazencla. Boa Esperanca, Caixa 86, Ibipora P.S.C., Est. do Parana, Brazil. f LYON, John Blake (2900-04), c/o San Paulo Gas Company, Caixa Postal 19B, Sao Paulo, Brazil.

MELVILLE, James Irvine (1917-2I), The Royal Bank of Canada, Rua 15 dc Novembro, 34, Sao Paulo, Brazil.

British Guiana MARR, John Angus Colin (1936-43), Plantation Albion, Bcrbice, British Guiana.

SMOLLETT, John Coutts (5938-43), Plantation Lcanora, W.C. Demerara, British Guiana.

Colombia tYOUNG, Robert William (1914-21), Embotelladora Tropical, S.A., Calle 9 del y Carrera Eugenio Macias, Barranquilla, Colombia.

Uruguay COLLIE, James Michael Vernon (1918-29), Estancia " San Grcgorio ", Carmelo, Dpto. de Colonia, Uruguay.

Aberdeen Grammar Schaal Magazine Venezuela

87

MARK, Dennis Trevor Llewellyn (19;o and 1936-42), cjo Wilson Sons and Company Li mired, Caracas, Venezuela.

SMITH, James Edward (1916-22), B.Sc., Ph.D., cio Caribbean Petroleum Company Limited, Maracaibo, Venezuela.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

California DAVIDSON, Andrew John (1916-zi), 3204 Norwich, Alhambra, California.

EDWARD, Alexander Wishart (1911-17), 4501 Whelan Place, Windsor Hills, Los Angeles 43, California.

Georgia GILCHRIST, Robert John (1897-19oo), P.O. Box 428, Savannah, Georgia.

Illinois PETERKIN, Daniel (188o-86), c/o Morton Salt Company, 310 South Michigan Avenue, Chicago, Illinois. fSMITH, James Bruce (1918-25), The Bruce Smith Insurance Agency, 2°8 South Lasalle Street, Chicago, Illinois.

Minnesota GIBSON, Thomas (1874-75), Board of Trade, Duluth, Minnesota.

New Jersey DAVIDSON, Eric George Beattie (194o-47), c/o Mrs. M. Howard, 107 Quitman Street, Newark, New Jersey.

New York CHRISTEN, Armand Bruce (1898-1903), South Mountain Road, Pomona, New York.

CUSHNIE, Peter (1911-14), 19 East 213th Street, New York.

OGG, John Simpson (19o4-07), C.A., 15o Cambridge Street, Syracuse so, New York.

YOUNG, John (1889-94), 9 Willow Place, Great Neck, New York.

Pennsylvania SHERET, Alexander James (1890-96), c/o Thco. Presser Company, 1712 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

West Virginia OGG, William Alexander (1897-19oo), Guaranty Bank Building, Huntington, West Virginia.

BRITISH WEST INDIES CRAIG, Thomas Jamieson (1907-11), "Mary&ld", Go Hope Road, Liguanea P.O., Jamaica, British West Indies.

McLEOD, Douglas James (193o-33), c/o Sugar Factory, Antigua, British West Indies.

MILLER, Noel W. J. (1906-11), Jas. Miller & Company Limited, Port of Spain, 'Trinidad, British West Indies.

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MILNE, John Macgregor (1927-30), c/o Alston and Company Limited, San Fernandos, Trinidad, British West Indies.

tREID, Kenneth (1901-04), King's Bay, Tobago, British West Indies.

DUTCH WEST INDIES tRITCHIE, George Ferguson (1917-24), Lago Oil and Transport Company Limited, Nlarine Department, P.O. Box 643, Aruba, Dutch West Indies.

AUSTRALIA New South Wales BODIE, Charles W. J. (1914-18), 4 Holway Street, Eastwood, New South Wales.

CARDNO, James Alexander (1929-32), M.A., University of Sydney, New South Wales.

HEPBURN, William Roger (1913-25), " St. Albans ", Bent Street, Paddington, Sydney, New South Wales.

SMITH, Ian Lansley Fraser, 36 Carlton Parade, Carlton, Sydney, New South Wales.

Queensland CRAIG, William James (1909-14), C.A., c/o Burns Philp & Company Limited, Townsville, North Queensland.

Victoria McPHERSON, John (1900-03), M.D., 33 Bay Road, Sandringham, Melbourne, Victoria.

Western Australia BISSET, Douglas Maitland (1901-08), c/o Joseph Muir & Williams, solicitors, St. George's Terrace, Perth, Western Australia.

CALDER, Robert Henderson (1925-24), 126 Wellington Street, Morman Park, Perth, Western Australia.

JOHNSTON, John (Ian) James (1905-06), "Clach-Ian", Caldwell Street, Manjimupo, Western Australia.

MILNE, Malcolm Ross (1926-35), M.B., Ch.B., Broome, Western Australia. tTHOM, Ian (1912-25), Wydga Station, Mount Magnet, Perth, Western Australia.

EUROPE CHANNEL ISLANDS tMILLER, William (1894-?), Franc Fief House, St. Brelade, Jersey.

NORWAY tSIMONSEN, L. George Stephen (1910-14), Ferjevein, 5, Framnes, Sandcfjord Norway.

PORTUGAL SMART, James Dow (1874-77), 22 Rua do Monte, Foz do Douro, Oporto, Portugal.

SWITZERLAND MENNIE, Robert Alexander Esslemont (1924-36), M.A., B.P. Benzine and Petroleum A.G., ilandelshof, Urania Strasse, Zurich, Switzerland.

tMOWAT, James Lawson (1915-16), M.A., Ph.D., c/o Bureau International du Travail, Geneva, Switzerland.

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FAR EAST CHINA MYERS, William Robertson (1895-99), e,'o The Inspectorate, Chinese Maritime Customs, Shanghai.

DUTCH EAST INDIES CANTLAY, Alexander Vernon White (19°3-1o), cfo Anglo-Dutch Estates Agency Limited, P.O. Box 139 Medan, E.C., Sumatra.

TRAIL, James (1919-28), c/o Ross, Taylor & Company Limited, Surabaya, Java.

HONGKONG ALEXANDER, James (1919-28), B.Sc.(Eng.),

Public Works De-

partment, / longkong.

BLACK, Francis Charles Briscoe (T914-17), cfo Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, Hongkong.

DUNNETT, John Stewart (1922-28), cfo Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, Hongkong.

LAWRENCE, John Roger (1918-31), to8 Mountain View, The Peak, Hongkong. tNICOL, Andrew (1903-15), Public Works Office, Public Works Department, I Iongkong.

MALAYA

Negri Sembilan BLAIR, Thomas (1934-44), cfo C.I.D. Office, Seremban, Negri Sembilan, Malaya. tHENDERSON, Graham (1906-12), Sua Betong Estate, Port Dickson, Negri Sembilan, Malaya.

LORIMER, John Gibb (19°5-14), Sengkang Estate, Port Dickson, Malaya.

ROBERTSON, Douglas Graeme (1904-15), Tebolang Estate, Tampin, Negri Sembilan, Malaya.

Pahang ROBERTSON, Ernest Graeme (t9io-19), Telemong Estate, Bcntong, Pahang, Malaya.

Penang RICHARDSON, William Brian (1919-28), Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China, Penang, Malaya.

Perak ALLAN, George Douglas (1919-3o), cfo Malayan Tin Dredging Limited, Batu Gajah, Perak, Malaya.

Selangor ANDERSON, George (1914-24), Seafield Estate, Batu Tiga, Selangor, Malaya.

BAND, Robert William Ingram (1924-26), cfo Malayan Establishment Officer, Kuala Lumpur, Malaya.

BOWMAN, Charles Ogilvie Will (1910-15), Padang Jawa Estate, P.O. Box zoz, Kiang, Selangor, Malaya.

CHALMERS, Alan (1915-19), Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, Kuala Lumpur, Malaya.

FEARBY, George Edward (1937-45), cfo McAlister & Company, Kuala Lumpur, Malaya.

LOO, Yew Hoi (1907-14), cfo Kwong Yik (Selangor) Banking Corporation, 91 High Street, Kuala Lumpur, Malaya.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

MEARNS, William John (1916-zo), Sungei Choh Rubber Estate, Selangor, Malaya.

1- MURRAY, Alexander Ross (1903-13), c/o Drainage & Irrigation Department, Kuala Lumpur, Malaya.

SCOTT, William Walker (1903-13), " I I illview ", 3 Treachcr Road, Kuala Lumpur, Malaya.

WRIGHT, Daniel Overbeck 9r 5-16), c/o Guthrie & Company, Kuala Lumpur, Malaya.

Singapore BRUCE, Robert Douglas (1913-22), Wing Commander, R.A.F. Hospital, Changi, Singapore.

CRUICKSHANK, Douglas Scott (1918-23), B.Com., C.A., c/o Francis Peck & Company, Singapore.

FRASER, James Milner (1918-20), c/o Singapore Improvement Trust, Municipal Office, P.O. Box 702, Singapore.

KING, Charles Forrester (1912-23), Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China, Singapore.

KING, Francis Henry (1916-26), Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, Singapore.

McICERRON, Patrick Alexander Bruce (1904-to), C.M.G., Colonial Secretary, Singapore.

IMAVOR, William Ferrier (1923-30), M.A., c/o Customs House, Maxwell Road, Singapore.

RANKINE, Charles Adam (1918-3o), c/o United Engineers Limited, Singapore.

SCRIMGEOUR, Arthur Martin (1921-22), c/o Anglo-Thai Corporation, 32 Queen Astrid Park, Singapore.

NORTH BORNEO (ABERNETHY, James Smart (1925-26), M.A., W.S., Commissioner of Lands and Mines, Jesselton, North Borneo.

THOMSON, George Grant (19ro-t 2), Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, Jesselton, North Borneo.

PHILIPPINE ISLANDS REID, Alan (tot 1-14), c/o Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China, Cebu, Philippine Islands.

INDIA, PAKISTAN, BURMA AND CEYLON INDIA

Assam CURRIE, Stanley (1930-38), Lukwah Tea Estate, Lukwah P.O., Assam.

FRASER, Stanley Mayer (1908-19), Nonaipara Tea Estate, Panerihat P.U., Assam.

JAFFRAY, Lawrence (1909-14), Rungli Ting Tea Estate, Lahoal P.O., Assam.

MILNE, Leonard Shepherd (1916-2o), Dhendai Tea Estate, Barjuli P.O., Darrang, Assam.

MUNRO, Hamish Andrew (1908-21), Dufflaghur Tea Company Limited, Halcm P.O., Darrang, Assam.

RAE, William Brewster (1920-24), Lcpctkatta Tea Estate, Barharuah P.O., Dub ruga rh, Assam.

Bombay BARR, Bertram John Alexander Gray (1909-13), Mercantile Bank of India Limited, Esplanade Road, Bombay.

(BOOTH, Benjamin (1935-39), c/o Mackinnon, Mackenzie & Company, Ballard Estate, Bombay.

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MILLER, the Rev. Robert Taylor Stewart (1925-26), M.A., Wilson College,

Bombay 7.

SIMPSON, Alexander Lancelot (1956-25), M.C., c/o National Bank of India

Limited, Bombay.

Coorg MACKINTOSH, John Falconer (I902-12), M.C., Fairlands, Sidapur P.O., Coorg,

South India.

Madras ANGUS, Arthur Robert Hall (1913-16), Kardoora Estate, Meppadi P.O., Wynaad,

Malabar, South India.

CROMBIE, Peter (19 I9-zo and 1922-24), M.B.E., M.A., c/o The Chief Secretary

to Government, Fort St. George, Madras.

tCU1VIMING, Ian (1907-14), c/o Vernon and Company, 36 Second Line Beach,

Post Box 79, Madras.

GEORGESON, William Wares (1915-23), M.A., c/o The Madras Club, Madras.

MARR, William Alastair Lovie (1919-23), M.B.E., Mayfield Estate, Nella Cotta

P.O., Nilgiris, South India.

Travancore MARR, Donald Middleton (1919-26), Amiekudy Estate, Vandiperiyar, Travan-

core, South India.

West Bengal BARCLAY, Ian Campbell (5921-23), B.Com., c/o Macneill & Company, z Fairlie

Place, Calcutta.

CRICHTON, Francis Fairhead (1916-19), c/o Andrew Yule & Company Limited,

P.O. Box 150, 8 Clive Row, Calcutta.

DUFF, David Inglis (1915-16), c/o Barry & Company, 2 Fairlie Place, Calcutta.

DUGUID, Robert Hutton (1918-23), C.A., c/o Duncan Bros. & Company Limited,

31 Netaji Subhas Road, Calcutta.

GAULD, John French (1919-29), c/o Sathkyah Tea Estate, Mal P.O., Dooars,

West Bengal.

GRANT, John George Crichton (5908-15), Bhogotpore Tca Estate, Nagrakata

P.O., Dooars, West Bengal.

MACMILLAN, William George (I9I6-22), B.Sc., Ph.D., c/o Indian Jute Mills

Association, Research Department Laboratories, 16 Old Court House Street, Calcutta.

MILLER, John Irvine (1918-25), Sam Sing Workshop, Matelli P.O., Dooars, West Bengal.

MILNE, William (1905-13), Budge Budge Jute Company Limited, Budge Budge, West Bengal.

RAE, James Ogilvie (1912-21), c/o North British and Mercantile Insurance Company Limited, P.O. Box 203, Calcutta.

RITCHIE, James Hunter (1921-27), Lloyds Bank Limited, Netaji Subhas Road, Calcutta. tSCOTT, Herbert Brebner (1905-08), M.C., Royal Insurance Company Limited, 5/7 Netaji Subhas Road, Calcutta.

SMITH, William Garnett (1922-30), c/o Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China, Calcutta.

WHYTE, George Clark (t908-14), c/o Williamson Magor & Company, 4 Mangoe Lane, Calcutta.

WILLIAMSON, Stanley George (1922-25), c/o Chartered Bank of India,

Australia and China, Nctaji Subhas Road, Calcutta.

PAKISTAN

East Bengal ARCHIBALD, Alexander Nicol (1919-23), Chandpore Tca Estate, Chandpur

I3agan P.O., South Sylhct, East Bengal, Pakistan.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine Sind

COBB.AN, James (1925-32), c/o Burmah-Shell, Keamari, Karachi, Pakistan.

BURMA CROMBIE, George Edmond 0916-20, M.A., British Embassy, P.O. Box 638, 8o Strand Road, Rangoon, Burma.

CEYLON ALLAN, William (1899-1900, Ury Group, Badulla, Ceylon.

ANDERSON, John Douglas (1919-32), c/o Walker and Greig Limited, P.O. Box 165, Colombo, Ceylon.

COPLAND, Robert (1902-07), Mayfield, Hatton, Ceylon.

DONALD, James Alexander (1920-32), C.A., c/o Mackwoods Limited, P.O. Box 91, Colombo, Ceylon.

GRAY, Patrick Moir (1903-10, Lonach Estate, Watawala, Ceylon.

GRAY, Robert Imray Alexander (1932-35), c/o Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China, P.O. Box 27, Colombo, Ceylon.

MACKINTOSH, Alan Cardno (1914-18), Angroowella Estate, Urugala, Ceylon.

MAITLAND, Harry (1931-33), c/o Mercantile Bank of India Limited, Colombo, Ceylon.

MARR, Ernest Adiel (1899-1903), Igalkande, Elipitiya Estate, Ceylon.

ROBBIE, George Muir Glen (1930-41), Galcanda Estate, Haputale, Ceylon.

SIMPSON, Alexander James McCombie (1933-38), Dcviturai Estate, Elipitiya.

Ceylon. tSTRACHAN, Charles James (1917-20, Anglo-Ceylon General Estates Company, P.O. Box 13, Colombo, Ceylon.

WILKIE, Francis Fowlie Andrew (1921-24), Brown & Company Limited, Engineering Department, Hatton, Ceylon.

IRAQ tSTRACHAN, Ernest (1923-24 and 1929-36), Squadron Leader, Air headquarters Iraq, Royal Air Force, Habbaniya, British Forces in Iraq.

NEW ZEALAND tDUCAT, Andrew Alexander Marr (1924-28 and 1929-34), 57 Hawker Street (Flat ), Wellington, New Zealand.

GRAY, Theodore Grant (1895-1905), C.M.G., M.B., Ch.B., 38 Jubilee Road, Khandallah, Wellington, New Zealand.

KINGHORN, Alastair Harry (1905-14), c/o Mrs. Oates, Tc-mawhai, via TeAwarnutu, North Island, New Zealand.

McLAREN, William Hamish (1921-3o), 159 Queen's Drive, Lyall Bay, Wellington, New Zealand.

MURRAY, Professor Hugh Alexander (1919-25), M.A., B.A., 50A Salamanca Road, Wellington, New Zealand.

THOMSON, Alexander (1923-27), .M.R.C.V.S., clo Rangataiki Plain's Dairy Company (Private Bag), Whakatane, Bay of Plenty, New Zealand.

Old Copies of the Magazine From time to time we receive requests from members for old copies of the Magazine. To enable us to meet such requests, we should be grateful if any F.P.s who have old copies which they do not wish to retain (particularly those of 1940-46, of which a minimum number was printed) will send them to the Secretary of the Club at 220 Union Street, Aberdeen.

We acknowledge with thanks a large number of old Magazines presented to the Club by Alexander Robertson Cumming (1880-87), I.C.S. (retd.), 8, Queen's Road, Aberdeen.

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F.P. Club Consuls Benjamin Booth (1933-39) has been appointed Consul at Bombay, where he is employed with Messrs. Mackinnon, Mackenzie & Company, who are agents for the P. and O. and B. I. shipping lines. As he goes on board every passenger liner arriving in Bombay, our Consul is in an excellent position to help with customs clearance, etc. He suggests that any F.P.s going to Bombay should write to him in advance.

William Ferrier Mayor (1923-30), M.A., previously Senior Customs Officer at Kuantan, East Pahang, Malayan Union, has been home on leave this summer and has now been transferred to the Special Division, Customs House, Singapore.

He has accordingly relinquished his post as Consul in Pahang and been appointed Consul at Singapore. He will continue as Secretary of the Malayan Centre of the Club.

George Ferguson Ritchie (1917-24) of the Lago Oil and Transport Company Limited, Marine Department, Aruba, Dutch West Indies, has been appointed Consul for that area, (See page 21.)

Frank Charles Briscoe Black (1914-17), Consul at Shanghai, has had to resign on being transferred to the Hongkong' branch of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank. During his year in Shanghai, he says, his consular activities have, unfortunately, been nil. All pre-war records of the Shanghai Centre were lost during the Japanese occupation (" probably sold for waste paper and used to make ' pokes' for dubious Chinesesweetmeats"), so when our Consul took over his task from W. E. Drummond Smith (1904-09), the exchange took the form of a handshake and a wish of " bon voyage "I Alexander Whincup Carle (1914-20), B.Sc., District Loco, Superintendent, O. and '1'. Railway, Mokamehghat, Bihar, left India in August of this year on leave prior to retirement. He has, therefore, had to resign his office as Consul for Bihar.

F.P. Club Boarding House The Twentieth Annual General Meeting of the Aberdeen Grammar School Former Pupils' Club Boarding House Company Limited is to be held on zo December 1948., In their Report the Directors state that for the past two years the Company has suffered from the uncertainty caused by the abolishing of fees payable at the School and the introduction of new tests and criteria of admission, but during this last financial year a ruling was obtained which removed some of these uncertainties, and indicated that the Boarding Houses could continue to take boarders for the School.

Despite the increase in fees brought into operation in the middle of the year, the drop in the number of boarders caused by these uncertainties, coupled with the increased expenditure which has had to be met, have resulted in a loss on the year's work amounting to f,363 7s. lid., less amount at credit of Profit and Loss Account, £177 17s. 9d.

Dr. Edward W. Watt who has been Chairman of the Company since its formation, has intimated his desire to retire from the Board at the close of the Annual General Meeting, and the Directors have most reluctantly agreed to accept his resignation. The Directors wish to put on record their very great appreciation of the services rendered to the Company by Dr. Watt for over twenty years.

There arc forty-nine boys in the boarding house this session. Those who entered in September were :— Thomas Nicholas Ducat, s. of Thomas Ducat (1919-22), Sandung Tea Estate, Doom Dooma, Assam.

Brian William Finnic, s. of Dr. Williamson Jackson Finnic (1928-31), Woodbank, Station Road, Esholt, Yorkshire.

Ronald Leslie Pyle and William Dryden Pyle, as. of Dr. T. D. Pyle, Gramount, Stronsay, Orkney.

James Bruce Roberts, s. of J. H. E. Roberts, P.O. Box No. 8, Livingstone, Northern Rhodesia.

John Robert Garnet Rust, s. of John Bruce Rust (1919-29), Bridgend, Inverbervie.

William Lee Sleigh, s. of John Lee Sleigh (1913-16), Newseat of Tolquhon, Tarves, Aberdeenshire.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Afagazine

The Annual Dinner of the Club This year's Dinner was held in the Caledonian Hotel, Aberdeen, on Friday, 29 October, and was attended by 116 members of the Club and 53 guests. The President of the Club, Sir ARTHUR LOTHIAN, K.C.I.E., C.S.I., I.C.S. (retd.), was in the chair and was accompanied at the top table by the Rector; Professor Rex Knight, Aberdeen University; Mr. Frank Scorgie, Director of Education; Dr. EDWARD W. WATT and Mr. CHARLES DAVIDSON, past Presidents of the Club; Mr. R. B. WILLIAMSON, Vice-President; Mr. D. E. Collier, Head-master, Robert Gordon's College; Chief Constable McConnach, President of Robert Gordon's College F.P. Association; Mr. R. S. Aitken, representing the Aberdeen Centre of the Watsonian Club; and Sheriff J. A. Lti.LIE, representing the Edinburgh Centre of the Club. The other official guests were Mr. W. A. Ross, representing the Aberdeen Centre of George Heriot's School F.P. Club; Mr. H. B. Scorn, President of the Bengal and Assam Centre of the Club; and Dr. KEITH R. T. MATTHEW, representing the Glasgow Centre. " THE SCHOOL AND THE CLUB" After dinner, the excellence of which won unanimous approval, the Chairman called upon Professor Rex Knight of the Chair of Psychology at Aberdeen University to propose the principal toast of the evening, which was, as usual, " The School and the Club ".

Professor Knight, after saying that he would take the two parts of the toast in the reverse order, said:— " Gentlemen, when I talk about the Club and look at you, you all seem to be looking extremely well and prosperous. You remind me of one of His Majesty's judges who, during the celebration of a Lord Mayor's Banquet, had to reply on behalf of his fellow judges and was heard in a stage whisper to ask the late Mr. Justice Avory—` What shall I say ? ' Mr. Justice Avory said `Tell them we are doing very well thank you, and that we much enjoy the universal esteem in which we arc held'. (Laughter.) " Now what has the Club been doing this last year ? First of all, I want to congratulate you on having fifteen members who have been extraordinarily successful in many parts of Scotland, in spite of varied opposition, in carrying and kicking a piece of inflated leather from one end of the rugby field to the other.

I want also to mention the fact that your hockey team is undefeated and that a Cup called the Strathmore Cup is within your reach. Now gentlemen, 1 do not profess to be an athlete, I am one of those people—well, I am like this: when I feel the need of exercise, I lie down until it passes off. (Loud laughter.) But I do congratulate you most warmly and most sincerely on the success you have had during the past year. I asked a small boy who looked like a Grammar School boy—' Who do you think have been the three most famous people in the world of sport in Aberdeen in the past twelve months ? " Och, there's nae doot aboot it', he replied, ' Tunes, Allardice and Bradman .' (Loud laughter.) " I want to say to you that I am very glad to hear that you are taking a proper interest in the School. By a proper interest I mean a moderate interest. There is the old boy who is rather a pest to a school, the chap who is always coming back and always giving advice. I think that if a man in adult life is an assiduous and too frequent visitor to his old school, that is evidence that he is not much of a success in after-school life. On the other hand, I have no admiration for a man who has no loyalty to his old school. The proper attitude of a former pupil is to steer the middle course between being a pest and being an indifferent old boy.

Therefore I am very glad to hear from Mr. Robertson, your Rector, that you have been taking a proper interest in the School during this last year—a proper interest, not too much and not ton little."

Referring to the School, Professor Knight said that H.M. Inspectors' report on the Grammar School for the past year had been, if anything, exceptionally favourable. They had been delighted with what they had found at the School and had made special mention of the excellence in the development of art and music.

I le wished to congratulate the School on this fact.

Professor Knight went on to discuss some of the many educational controversies of the moment. One of these was that which had arisen between the people

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who wanted self-expression and to let children do as they liked, and those who thought that adults were rather older and rather more knowledgeable than children.

Whcn people say that we must always appeal to the child's interest and never invite him to do anything in which he is not immediately interested, I cannot help reflecting, he said, that there arc not many jobs in this world that can be properly done, except by people who have learned to apply their minds. I am sure, he went on, that at the Grammar School there is a clear realisation that if the products of your School arc to be really valuable citizens and arc to play their part in the modern world, they must be able to apply their minds to tasks that have to he done, even when these tasks do not hold any intrinsic interest for them.

Paying tribute to Mr. Robertson, he said that the Rector was a man who knew as much about all the arguments that could be used on both sides of any educational controversy as anyone else on this side of the Border or the other, a man whose name was known all over Great Britain.

In asking the company to honour the toast, Professor Knight said that Grammar F.P.s were very fortunate in their School and that he knew they were not unappreciative of it or of those who taught them when they were there.

THE RECTOR'S REPLY

Replying on behalf of the School, the Rector recalled the succession of distinguished men who had in recent years been called to propose this toast. Surely in these days when even our lisping offspring were subjected to the full rigour of the psychologist's scrutiny it was but right that we too should stand that same grim assize, but it seemed to him that some shadow of anxiety had rested on the Grammarians' faces, until they were reassured by Professor Knight's very flattering references that they were emerging not too badly from their tests.

Mr. Robertson went on to report that all was comparatively quiet on the Grammar front. There were no alarms and excursions; no major decisions had been taken in the past year; no history had been made, save, of course, the lustrous chapter which had been added to the School's renown by certain masters of the oval ball.

'That being so, he felt free to speak of the School in general terms-of the things that gave it its own place and character.

Ile paid tribute first of all to the prescience of our forbears who in the middle of last century moved the School to its present site and gave it so much space and amenity. " How prodigal they must have seemed to their contemporaries, and yet in the event how obvious it is that they acted with highest wisdom and clearest vision. Not the least part of our good fortune is this daily approach to comely buildings in a setting so spacious and agreeable as to quicken, even in boys, some awareness of dignity and grace."

Mr. Robertson said he had two boasts to make for the School and one admission of defeat. First, the Grammar School did produce a race of scholars and men of affairs, a fact which, strangely enough, seemed to be little known in certain quarters.

It was true, he went on, that normally they did not boast of it, nor did they treat their intellectual brightest as if they were the whole school; but the School had unquestionably done well by its Elite, that long succession of boys in whom scholastic and intellectual promise had flowered in high scholarship or public eminence. Fortunately, that succession continued and boys were still going forth who bade fair to give service of the same high order as that for which they honoured the distinguished occupant of the presidential chair. " I cannot, however, claim that a like wisdom has marked our instruction of the average boy. Too often we have prescribed what is bookish for boys who are not bookish, and have offered to lads of modest parts an over-ambitious programme. But this is no charge to be brought against the Grammar School alone: in the dock along with her must stand all schools of similar type, and also the great public schools of England. Of course, there have been extenuating circumstances, and in particular we have suffered grievously from an obsession with examinations and certificates which has come near to fetishism. Our native awe before a bit of paper with marks on it is hard to distinguish at times from the primitive veneration of stone or claw, and I feel bound to say that such superstitious worship is powerfully reinforced by the educational high priests in the great central shrine of St. Andrew. " But", he went on, " if we have fallen short in the narrower sphere of instruction, we can claim to have given the average boy much more besides. The

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strength of the School has lain in these other things which, added to instruction, turn it into education and make of schooling a bit of life, meaningful in itself and significant for the years that lie ahead. " What are the threats to the spirit of the School ? Do not mistake them.

The abolition of fees need not greatly affect it, nor yet the coming of more boys with fewer pennies. One threat would be an Education Committee misguided enough to be set on a fussy, unimaginative uniformity. Of that menace I so far see no sign: indeed, I feel bound to say that, if ancient schools must have external rulers, you would go far to find a more understanding, generous and fair Authority than our own. " The other threat to the good spirit of the School would lie in a rector and staff who began to think meanly of its function and of their own—who were too much concerned with the value of the Highers and too little with the higher values. " In all this, however, your part is clear now and in the future. You must be vigilant but not despondent. Keep for your school an attachment at once staunch and critical; but when you come to assess it, do not let your judgement be confused by trivial and extraneous matters. Ask rather this simple and sufficient question— Is it still producing alert, robust, and companionable men capable of taking their place amid the complexities of these troubled times ? If so, then it is still the Grammar School, meriting all your regard, and in some measure at least worthy of the generous things that have been said of it this evening by Professor Knight."

THE PRESIDENT'S REPLY

Replying for the Club Sir Arthur Lothian said that it had given him much pleasure on his return to this country to see how prosperous the Club now was and how vigorous in all its activities. Earlier in the year he had the privilege of attending the first post-war Dinner of the London Centre and was most agreeably surprised both by the size of the attendance and the enthusiasm of those present.

He understood that Glasgow, Edinburgh and Yorkshire had equally flourishing Centres; while abroad, through the unique system of Club Consuls, F.P.s were kept in touch with other old school-fellows in their vicinity. " I myself", he said, " am a first-hand witness to the value of these Club Consuls, as when 1 made an extended tour round the Far East in 5934-33, I had a helping hand extended to me in almost every big port 1 visited. The old School tic, in fact, proved a far more useful passport than that of His Majesty's Govertunent. " We are doubly fortunate as a School and Club in having so wonderful a link with home as the School Magazine, which the late Theodore Watt, by a life-time's devotion, built up into the finest magazine of its kind in this country, and I rejoice to see that it has been maintained at the same high level by his son, the present editor. " The F.P. Club was started in 1893 by the late H. F. Morland Simpson soon after his arrival as Rector, when 1 was a small boy in the Preparatory Department; and its offshoot, the Rugby Football Club, had its origin in the same year. I well remember the heroes of those days—men like G. 0. Gauld, Freddie Fraser, Arthur Milne and others, who loomed gigantic before my youthful eyes, and the shock with which I discovered in later life that they were men no larger than myself. " The debt the School and the Club owe to Morland Simpson is immense, and its extent can only be realised by those who have some knowledge of what the School was like before he came. When he first arrived in Aberdeen, he, as an Englishman, had a very sticky passage, as he was up against the clannishness of the Scot, accentuated by resentment over the supersession of Dr. Moir, who was greatly loved locally. Was not this moreover a case of sending coals to Newcastle, and an intrusion on Aberdeen's own special field, that of supplying schoolmasters ? " Morland Simpson set himself to awaken the School to a sense of pride in its long history, and, by inaugurating the F.P. Club, he gave that cohesion and continuity to the School tradition which mere attendance at a day school would never in itself have achieved. Such a Club was, in fact, a necessary complement to the School, if the latter was to be anything more than a cramming shop ; and converted its pupils from a fortuitous collection of small boys into something resembling a family. The School, also, in its present form is largely Morland Simpson's creation, and to my mind he achieved at least as memorable work in his sphere as ever Dr. Arnold did at Rugby.

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" He was a classical scholar without being a pedant, and did much to counteract the maleficent tradition of Melvin, with its over-emphasis on versions and grammatical correctness, which was the curse of the School in my day. As one of those who benefited most deeply from the influence of Dr. Morland Simpson, I am grateful for this opportunity of paying public tribute to his memory."

After some bantering remarks about the recent offensive in favour of the Buchan dialect as compared with the speech of the town, Sir Arthur concluded by expressing his sincere congratulations to the Rector on the honour conferred on him by the King in June of this year. " Education ", he said, " is all too often the Cinderella of the professions and a schoolmaster has to be of altogether outstanding quality, like Mr. Robertson, to receive such recognition." " THE GUESTS

The toast of " The Guests " was proposed by Mr. Charles Davidson in his own inimitable manner, his humorous comments and witty asides being greeted with hilarious delight by the whole company. Dr. A. Greig Anderson, who replied, said that he was interested to note that so many of the guests were doctors: this he took to be a mark of sympathy for the reduced circumstances in which so many of his profession now found themselves. He associated himself most heartily with what had been said about Dr. Morland Simpson. " THE CHAIRMAN "

Mr. R. B. Williamson, Vice-President of the Club, in proposing the toast of " The Chairman ", said that when the Executive came to nominate a president, they looked for someone with a combination of distinction and interest in the School and the Club. Sir Arthur Lothian, he said, was a worthy successor to those who had gone before him. It was not given to many to leave their mark to the extent that Sir Arthur had done in India and the Club was proud to bask in his reflected glory.

In his reply Sir Arthur said that it was over forty-four years since he left the Grammar School and almost forty since he left Aberdeen; to all but the older members of the Club he came as a complete stranger and he feared that to the younger members his references to the School would be rather like those of Rip Van Winkle. He had never lost touch with Aberdeen, however, because throughout his many years abroad, he used to receive every week a copy of The (Veekly Journal and he regularly received his copy of the School Magazine, whose Notes on Old Boys made all Grammar School F.P.s feel like members of one great, though scattered, family. " During my time in India ", he went on, " to my great regret I came across but few of my contemporaries at School. R. N. Gilchrist of the Indian Educational Service most kindly met me when I first landed at Calcutta, and Campbell Macrae of the I.M.S., Bertie Milne, Bill Rennie and Sandy Robb of the R.A.M.C. occasionally flitted across my horizon. Of younger F.P.s, I came across George Carroll of the Indian Police, administering most efficiently the little Rajputana State of Khetri; and I sometimes saw George Simpson of the Jodhpur State Railways when on tour. For the last two years of my service, to my great pleasure, I had Cecil Savidge working with me in Hyderabad. He is the only Grammar boy who followed my example and abandoned the I.C.S. for the Indian Political Service.

The work of the latter seemed to me infinitely more varied and interesting—it looked after the Frontier and the States, and also filled all the consular and diplomatic posts in the countries immediately surrounding India. Now, alas, like much more that was good in India, it has vanished into limbo."

Referring to the Masters at the School in his time, Sir Arthur said that " C.D." was the one surviving link with those days. " How well I remember his fingernail parades, and his tales of Spain and other countries furth of Scotland. Nothing delighted us boys more than to entice him to talk about these things and interrupt our daily work, which I suspect he found as great a bore as we did. He brought a breath of fresh air and of the more polished outside world into our circumscribed existences, and with the Rector, Morland Simpson, did much to widen our horizons beyond the Bursary Competition and the provincialism that lapped us round. . . ."

Concluding with some memories of other Masters, of the School buildings as they were in his day, and of snowball battles that used to rage round the entrance gates in winter, Sir Arthur then proposed the toast of " Bon .Accord ".

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THE COMPANY The following members of the Club were present at the Dinner, the list being arranged in order of seniority, based on date of entry to the School.

1882. Charles Davidson (1882-86).

1883. James Hay (1883-87), E. W. Watt (188 3-94).

1892. Sir Arthur Lothian (1892-94 and 1898-1904).

1893. J. A. Lillie (1893-1903), N. J. J. Walker (1893-1902).

1895. R. J. Anderson (1895-99).

1899. R. Richards (1899-1904), H. T. Sorley (1899-1909), A. L. Strunach (1899-1902).

1901. W. D. Simpson (1901-13).

1902. A. E. Bruce (1902-15), George Forbes (1902-04), G. A. Mitchell (1902-13), E. B. Reid (1902-13).

1903. A. R. Abercromby (1903-13), R. Esslemont (1903-13), A. McBain (1903-14).

1904. C. G. Kennaway (1904-56), N. S. Williamson (1904-07)1905. James Lindsay (1905-17), H. B. Scott (1905-08).

1906. G. A. Buyers (1906-08), H. J. Edwards (1906-17), J. P. Jeffrey (1906-18), H. J. Stewart (1906-12), R. B. Williamson (1906-18).

1907. A. C. Hendry (1907-14), J. L. Riddell (1907-16).

1908. A. J. M. Edwards (1908-21), E. J. Galloway (5908-18), G. N. Gordon (1908-19).

1909. J. G. Kilgour (1909-16), D. R. Thomson (1909-14).

5950. Alexander Gray (1910-22), T. K. Macdonald (1910-19), I. G. McPherson (1910-17), P. R. Wood (1910-20).

1911. W. G. Thow (1911-22).

1912. R. J. Maitland (19/2-18), K. R. T. Matthew (5912-24), E. M. Munro (1912-23).

J. G. Sellar (1912-18), N. B. Sellar (1912-21), W. N. Stewart (1911-19).

1913. J. B. Esslemont (x9x3-2.4), M. G. Gibb (2953-22), J. H. Henderson (x9 x 3-20, J. I. Scott (5913-21), N. G. Taylor (1913-23), J. S. Walker (1913-17).

1914. W. C. Bryce (1914-20, Leo Durnin (1914-17), W. G. Hutcheon (1914-23), D. L. Lamb (1954-20), John Maclennan (1914-20), D. L. Rennet (1914-26), M. C. Ross (1954-21).

1915. J. W. L. Bain (1915.22), R. D. Bain (1915-23), W. J. Duncan (1915-22), D. W. Duthie (1915-zz), Harold Esslemont (1915-19), R. L. Milne (1915-26), W. W. Porter (1915-23).

5917. D. S. Brown (1917-24), J. H. Gray (1957-29), G. A. C. Walker (1917-23).

1918. J. R. Carry (1918-30), W. M. Miller (1918-23), I. G. Minnie (1918-28), I. L. Smith (1918-30).

1919. J. G. Bisset (1919-2o and 1922-29), N. S. Clark (1959-29), S. B. Russell (1919-28), R. P. Wishart (1919-31).

1920. D. F. Middleton (5920-25), J. L. Rowton (5920-26), H. G. Stephen (5920-30).

1921. C. G. Brown (1925-24), E. H. Manthei Stott (1921-24).

1922. J. S. MacLachlan (1922-32), J. S. G. Munro (2922-28), G. Q. Murray (5922-27), H. C. Reid (5922-24 and 1925-34), A. R. Smith (1922-26), F. A. Smith (1922-28 and 1930-33).

1923. R. R. Russell (1923-35).

2924. D. G. Dempster 0924-33), J. C. Mackie (1924-27), James Reid (2 924-34), G. A. M. Saunders (1924-28), S. R. Smith (1924-30), A. G. B. Young (1924-26).

5925. William Adam (1925-37), H. W. Rankine (1925-35), A. C. R. Watt (1925-37).

1926. H. M. R. Watt (5926-38), A. D. J. Westland (x926-36).

1927. P. S. Boyd (1927-40), G. F. Chrystal (1927-38), R. G. C. Smith (5927-37), N. R. Wishart (1927-40).

1928. J. W. Irvine-Fortescue (1928-30).

2929. T. W. N. Davidson (1929-41), J. Farquharson (1929-43), D. G. Patterson (1929-36).

1930. H. F. M. Aitken (1930-33).

1931. R. J. Anderson, Jr. (1931-37), D. R. Griffiths (1931-43).

1935. G. S. Grant (1935-40), A. C. Mutch (5935-41).

1936. C. G. Masson (1936-40).

1938. A. R. Clark (1938-42).

1940. J. W. Cradock (1940-46).

Honorary Member. J. J. Robertson (Rector).

"Chrys" at the Dinner From tile luality of fil4i Est-prandial fare at the Club-Dinner, it

---------Ncoas obvious Hiat our top-table V.I P's enjoyed singing for

, their supper, every bit as much a, we enjoyed listening / ,... Professor REX KreWIT served die first course and warmed the cockles a more ti,an one tin-athletic heart by ,,..-:r remarking - with rep,arol to sportr J.T. RosER-r5oN that aken ha fell- Ike ,--- rM could see little need for exerciss - he' j ust lay dawn quietly ,,r-,,'; „--,,„.._difference between the Oriental until it passed oil! kuw-Vowing tei .,,,!Ils. a mon key-claw ,,\ ..:. . an atti fil - te co ) fri cer rain )-4--e pu ied..ii.;:it; ) towards- i -; -.2.:,* I _ , .-.1-7't '-'''''''.

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F.P. Club Cricket Section Strathmore Union XI- Season 1948 Winners of Strathmore Union Championship

Strachan.

Standing—I. M. Park (Umpire), H. S. Cardno, D. N.V. C. Smith, T. H. McCrea, J. W. Cradock, A. A. C. Edmond, N. II. Macdonald (Hon. Secretor), A. J. M. Edwards.

Sitting—J. S. Manley, Miss M. H. Inncs (Scorer), D. Stuart, T. M. Allan (Captain), L. E. Tyson, C. H. Webster (Hon. Treasurer), R. E. Wetherley.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

99

F.P. Cricket Section The season that has just finished must surely be one of the best in the history of the Cricket Section. In their second season in the Strathmore Union, the club finished champions, thus proving their ability to more than hold their own in what is the highest class of cricket to which they can be admitted. Out of the 19 games played, F.P.s won 14, drew 3 and lost 2, making 31 points and leaving one game unplayed. Their nearest rivals could have collected only 3o points if they had played all their games.

The bowling attack was very nearly up to County standard. T. H. McCrea, L. E. Tyson and A. A. C. Edmond were all in the first five of the Strathmore Union Averages, L. E. Tyson heading the list and T. H. McCrea being second.

H. S. Cardno had a fine season with the bat, and his 487 runs included a century.

D. W. C. Smith followed him with tog runs in 7 innings, but Cardno was the only F.P. batsman to obtain a prominent place in the Strathmore Averages. Batting was not always of very sound standard, but someone always came to the rescue when it seemed that a collapse would set in. One point to note regarding the comparatively low scoring of F.P.s is that, except on three occasions, F.P.s batted second and never had to get a total of more than 128 runs. On one occasion they had to get only 17 runs to win.

There was a remarkable improvement in the standard of fielding and this was in no small way due to D. W. C. Smith who took sonic catches which were up to Test Match standard. W. D. Allardice also proved himself to be a great asset to the team and closed the cover point position very well.

It is not always a good thing to remark on individual performances, but there were one or two bowling feats that deserve special mention. T. H. McCrea bowled through the Forthill XI at the end of August and finished with an average of to for r 8. He also had a hat trick against Mcigle at Rubislaw, after he had twice taken two wickets with successive balls. L. E. Tyson bowled 7 overs, 4 maidens, and took 5 wickets for 3 runs against his old team, Brechin. A. A. C. Edmond started the season in fine style and his grand bowling against Perthshire XI at Perth was commented on in the last issue of the Magazine.

Leading Strathmore XI batting averages were as follows :— Innings Times not out Runs Highest Score Average H. S. Cardno (1 92 5-39) • 19 102* 5 487 34.8 D. W. C. Smith (1930-40 . 7 log 3 27.25 35 * T. H. McCrea (School Staff) . to 2 58 20.5 164 J. S. Manley (1926-3 1) . . 15 204 5 5 2* 20.4 . 14 J• W. Cradock (1940-46) 4 157 37 15.7 *Indicates not out.

Bowling Averages :— Overt Maidens RIMS Winless Average L. E. Tyson (Coach) . . 141.83 50 220 46 4.78 T. H. McCrea (School Staff) . 162.5 48 299 54 5.5 A. A. C. Edmond (1938-43) . 121 3o 32 2 33 7.7 D. Stuart (5929-43) . . 68 15 r62 18 9 The success of the team has also been due to the captaincy of T. M. Allan, whose keenness and enthusiasm gave a great boost to the morale of the team.

It is regrettable that the Grade XI did not make a good showing in Grade 11, and were very nearly relegated to Grade III. I. Craig was the most successful batsman and in eleven innings scored 136 runs at an average of 15.1.

There is a lot of latent talent in the younger members of the Club, and, to mention only two, G. Jones plays a fine straight bat and I. Crawford can spin the ball both ways. The future of F.P. Cricket should be bright.

In conclusion, we are again indebted to I. M. Park for umpiring, Miss Heather Inns for scoring, and Mrs. Tyson, Miss Tyson and Miss Anne Inns who looked after the teas.

N. H. MACDONALD, Hon. Secretary.

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

loo

F.P. Hockey Section This season finds the Hockey Section in a much letter shape as regards playing personnel. Three teams are being regularly fielded, and games are being played on both Wednesdays and Saturdays.

The ist XI have been quite successful to date, having lost only three games.

Seven of the ist XI members were selected for the local trials ; R. P. Wishart (1919-31) and A. H. Innes (1933-45) were selected to play for North district against Inverness district at Inverness on 27 November 1948 ; and Innes has been selected to play for the North and Highlands against the West and South-West at Perth on 29 January 1 49.

The and XI have also done well and have registered wins over some of the senior clubs. The 3rd XI arc extremely enthusiastic and should, as the players gain experience, develop into an excellent team.

New members are still required as there is a continual wastage of players.

Any F.P. wishing a game should contact the Secretary.

The Section is not yet financially strong, due to the high cost of equipment.

We hope, however, to improve our financial position sufficiently to be able to continue running three Xls. tst XI Results . . 5-2 Won. Sept. 25. v. Murray Royal at Perth .

Oct. 2. v. Sand Med. Regt. at Bridge of Don . 1-i Drawn. . . 3-1 Won. 16. v. Gordonians at Rubislaw . v. 'Varsity at King's College . . t- t Drawn.

3 . . . a- o Won. 3o. v. Centralians at Rubislaw . . 1-1 Drawn.

Nov. 6. v. Morgan Academy at Rubislaw . . . 1-4 LOU. • .

2O. v. Perth at Perth „ 5-2 Won. . .

27. v. Brcchin at Brechin . . . 4-5 Lost.

Dec. 4. v. Gordonians at Seafield . .

1-2 Lost.

I1. v. Training Centre at Hilton R. P. WISHART, Hon. Secretary.

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F.P. Golf Section are pleased We have now come to the close of our 1948 season and the Committee of members at our meetings in to record the regular attendance of a large number and out of town.

Bieldsidc, one to During the season we had six outings, two to Ballater, two toOn each occasion enjoyable.

Aboyne and one to Murcar, all of which were most forty there was an attendance of between twenty-five and Hotel, members. when Colonel J. Patrick The season finished with a Dinner in the Royal competition among members for Jeffrey presented a silver tankard to the Section was J. J. Donald. Dr. Maxwell G. whose handicap is ten or over. This year's winner Cup ". The Annual Gibb has, for the second successive year, won the " Walker General Meeting will be held in the early Spring. a Happy New Year.

The Committee wish all our members a Merry Christmas and Hon. Secretary.

WALKER, G. A. C.

F.P. Tennis Section hope that it will " get into The Tennis Section was revived this year and weshould communicate before interested its stridc" next summer. F.P.s who are Aberdeen. (Telephone 3931.)

April with the Secretary at 74 Burns Road, A. H. INNES, Hon. Secretary.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

sot

F.P. Rugby Section It is my pleasant duty to record once again that the Rugby Section continues to flourish. The playing strength is adequate for the running of three teams and the " hit the results of all sides have been satisfactory. Perhaps the 1st XV have notlast season headlines" in quite the same manner as they did last season, but whereasexpected. it is F.P. success was a novelty for the press to grasp hold of, this year find a " centre of As far as the ist XV are concerned, the main difficulty has been to abundance, but centres the field" trio. Wing three-quarters of quality there are in playing D. W. C. Smith and stand-offs just do not seem to exist. The experiment of that in consecas a centre, however, fully justified itself and it was most unfortunate has utive weeks, he left for the Army and Ronnie Buthlay sustained an injury which kept him out of the game since the middle of October. The pack have on all occasions played a sound game, but behind the scrum, owing to continual changes because of injuries and other reasons, the backs have never been able to get properly together, although individual ability there has been in plenty. W. D. Allardice has on all occasions been a successful captain.

The early defeat by Hcriot's was disappointing in its extent, but, as in so many defeat of games nowadays, 14 of their points came from goal kicks, and the decisive Hillhead High School F.P.s and Edinburgh Academicals sufficiently atoned for the lapse. This is the first occasion on which F.P.s have ever beaten the Academicals.

Owing to many injuries and the calls of trials, many of our younger players have have had their chance in the ist XV, and it is very pleasant to record that theyPerthwithout exception done well. Particularly heartening was the game against shire Academicals who were held to a draw by an F.P. XV with seven reserves.

The and XV have done very well indeed. Two of the four defeats suffered so to be as far have been at the hands of Heriot's znd XV—a side which is reckonedwhen our strong as the ist XVs of many clubs—and R.N.A.S, Arbroath tat XV, team had to play with only fourteen men for most of the game.

The 3rd XV as usual have had to suffer on account of the injuries to players in the ist and and XVs, but they also have been very successful and have on all occasions played with the greatest enthusiasm.

The following players have been chosen for the various trial matches this season:— North v. Midlands at King's College, on 6 November 1948.

E. Buthlay, F. R. Paterson, J. M. Milne, W. D. Allardice, A. H. Tawse, J. C. Hunter. (Reserve in attendance—W. L. Connon.) v.

North South at Perth, on 13 November 1948.

E. Buthlay, F. R. Paterson, W. D. Allardice, A. H. Tawse, J. C. Hunter.

North and South v. Anglo-Scots at Hawick, on it December 1948.

F. R. Paterson, W. D. Allardice, J. C. Hunter.

Scotland v. The Rest at Murrayfield, on 18 December 1948.

W. D. Allardice (Scotland), F. R. Paterson (The Rest).

There have been so many changes on account of injuries that very many players have turned out for the ist XV, but those who have played most regularly are as follows : Full-Back—E. Buthlay (1928-40), J. S. Sutherland (1935-48).

Three-quarters—E. Hunter (School Staff), F. R. Paterson (1927-40), J. M. Milne I. C. McLean (1934-46), D. W. C. Smith (1930-41), J. A. McGregor (1935-44), (1930-43).

Stand-off Hdf-R. F. Buthlay (1925-38), K. G. Buthlay (1930-42), C. R. Cruickshank (1925-39).

Scrum Half—W. D. Allardice (1934-39) (Captain), I. Donald (1935-48).

Forwardr—W. L. Connon (1930-40), J. S. G. Munro (1922-28) (Vice-Captain), T. G. Smith (1936-43), A. H. Tawse (1930-43), P. K. Booker (1933-45), D. N. Georgeson (1929-39), K. W. Hunter (1928-41), J. C. Hunter (School Staff), A. G. Craig (1933-46), J. D. Chalmers (1 935-40), A. D. Lyall (1932-45).

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

102

1st XV Results . . .

18. v. George Heriot's School F.P.s at Rubislaw 25. v. Highland Select XV at Elgin • • 27. v. Hillhead High School F.P.s at Rubislaw .

Oct. 2. P. Allan Glen's School F.P.s at Bishopbriggs 16. v. Edinburgh Academicals at Newfield .

23. v. Stirling County at Rubislaw . . .

30. v. St. Andrews University at St. Andrews .

Nov. 6. v. Dundee High School F.P.s at Rubislaw .

13. v. Perthshire Academicals at Perth . . zo. v. Gordonians at Rubislaw . . .

27. v. Aberdeenshire at Rubislaw . . .

Dec. 4. v. Watsonians at Rubislaw . . . i i. r. Aberdeen University at Rubislaw . .

Sept. 15. v. Aberdeenshire at Rubislaw

ft

. .

.

. . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . .

•

and XV Results Sept. 18. v. George Heriot's School F.P.s and XV at Rubislaw . „ 22. v. Gordonians and XV at Seafield . . . .

25. V. School 1st XV at Rubislaw . . . . .

Oct. 2. v. R.N.A.S., Arbroath ist XV at Rubislaw . .

• >, 16. v. Harris Academy F.P.s sat XV at Rubislaw . .

Moray ist XV at Elgin . . . . .

30. v. Highland ist XV at Rubislaw . .

Nov. 6. v. Dundee High School F.P.s and XV at R.ubislaw . . ,, zo. v. Gordonians and XV at Scafield . . . .

Panmure and XV at Dundee . . .

Dec. 4. v. E.P.T.C. ist XV at Rubislaw . . . „

23.

V.

52

27.

V.

61— o Won. 3—zo Lost.

52— 3 Won. 30- 6 Won. 12- 3 Won. 16- 5 Won. 13- 3 Won. o— 6 Lost. zo— 3 Won. it—ix Drawn.

9— 3 Won. 26- 5 Won. 6— 8 Lost.

5— 5 Drawn.

0-18 19- 3 30- 8 3-15 t9—x2 12— o 13-11 55- o 3-14 30- o o- 8

Lost.

Won. Won. Lost.

Won. Won. Won. Won. Lost.

Won. Lost.

3rd XV Results Played-1o ; Won-5 ; Lost-5 ; Pts. for—i2o ; Pts. against-9o. *

N. I. W. MELDRUM, Hon. Secretary. * *

Three F.P.s have been playing for the London Scottish ist XV this season.

They are C. R. Watson (1923-30), D. W. C. Smith (i930-41), and W. T. H. Hay (1928-38). Hay was chosen to play at scrum half for the Anglo-Scots against the North and South in the trial match at Hawick on 11 December 1948. His opposite number in the North and South team was W. D. Allardice (1934-39).

The Glasgow Centre At the Annual General Meeting of the Glasgow Centre held on 5 November 1948, Henry G. Edwards (1905-14) intimated his resignation from the office of Secretary and Treasurer which he had held since the formation of the Centre in 1930.

Cordial reference was made to his services to the Centre during his period of office and it was unanimously decided to recognise them by appointing him President of the Centre for the ensuing two-year term. Basil D. D. Emslie (1929-35) was appointed to succeed him as Hon. Secretary and Treasurer. James Stirrat (1911-21) was re-appointed Vice-President and the following were elected to the Committee : C. S. Buyers (t 89 5 -98), II. M. Morgan (1914-20), Douglas C. Sangster (1906-13), James A. N. Watt (1 92 7-39) and Keith R. T. Matthew (1912-24).

The Annual Dinner of the Centre is to be held on Friday 28 January 1949.

Members of the Club coming to the area of the Glasgow Centre are invited to get into touch with the Hon. Secretary, t3 Lochaber Road, Killermont, l3earsden, Glasgow. (Telephone No. BEArsdcn 3627.)

B. D. D. EMSLIE, Hon. Secretary.

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Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

103

The London Centre The Centre's season opened on Thursday, 14 October 1948, with an Informal Dinner in The Albert Tavern, S.W. r. The occasion, happy enough in any case, was made notable by the return to activity of Lord Alness, the Centre's President.

Having in the past year overcome a serious illness that would have overtaxed most men far junior to him, he was able none the less to come up from Bournemouth, and, in the course of other public engagements, to preside at the Dinner with dignity and grace and to greet personally every member and guest present. One felt that the Centre had now really been re-chartered and that on the charter a very distinguished seal had been set.

The Annual General Meeting followed the Dinner, and the Centre expressed its joy at its President's return by re-electing him for a further term. The Committee members retiring by rotation were T. D. H. Brown, V. N. Dean, J. Ross Esson and T. J. Wilson : of these gentlemen more must be said when they are joined in limbo by the remaining members of the 1940 Committee, which took in January 1947 the first steps to revive the Centre. Suffice it now to say that they have deserved well of the Centre, to which they have given many years of excellent service.

To replace them and to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of A. G Sharp, another man of 1940, the Centre elected J. W. Benzie, G. M. Cochran, A. G. Esslemont, W. M. Ewen and A. R. H. Kellas. The Hon. Secretary's term was renewed and then the members listened to him explain how it had been contrived to have a balance of approximately 410 on the year's working. Finally G. W. Bowes outlined his ideas for a Centre Golf Meeting in the Spring and the meeting concluded with members voting (rather ungallantly in the opinion of some) that no lady guest should be introduced at the Annual Dinner.

As already announccd, this Dinner will take place on i6 December 1948, in the Connaught Rooms ; a detailed report will appear in the next issue of the Magazine.

The Centre has been pleased to renew social contacts with other N.E. school bodies and to record with satisfaction the invitation received by the President to join the London Branch of the Mackie Academy F.P. Association at their Annual Dinner.

The list of members who attended the Informal Dinner on 14 October 1948, is as follows :—Lord Alness (1884-85), A. A. Barnet (r9it-r9), K. M. Bell (1928-;4), J. W. Benzie (1912-19), G. W. Bowes (1915-28), D. P. Bruce (1929-35), G. M. Cochran (19o9-22), J. I. C. Crombie (1908-21), V. N. Dean (1913-20), A. S. Durno (1922-30), A. G. Esslemont (1908-20), J. Ross Esson (1893-97), W. M. Ewen (193_2-.14), C. W. France (1922-31), G. M. Giles (1895-1900), E. F. Hall (5925-26), J. H. L. Inncs (1919-23), A. R. H. Kellam (1926-32), J. C. O. Lawrence (1898-99), Ninian Mackie (19 27-37), W. G. Marshall (1919-23), C. W. Matheson (1925-34), Colin H. Miller (190o-04), J. W. Milne (1884-95),W. H. P. Minto (5925-27 and 592836), I. F. Roberts (1925-37), L. Don Robertson (1915-16), Thomas Robertson (1953-19), A. L. Scott (1908-54), G. T. Simpson (1910-20), A. H. K. Slater (1923-35), B. H. Smith (1932-35), J. L. S. Thomson (1920-27), G. P. Wallace (1920-29 and 19303 0, D. H. W. Williamson (1894-1902).

Redvers Ironside (1907-17) and D. S. S. Marr (1919-32) were unavoidably prevented from being present.

A. H. K. SLATER, Hon. Secretary.

The Yorkshire Centre The Centre has completed the first year of its existence and the Committee have arranged for the Annual Dinner to be held at the Great Northern Hotel, Leeds, on so December 1948. Subject to any last minute alterations, the speakers will be Professor W. P. Milne (1897-99), Professor E. J. Wood (1908-21), and Dr. Ian G. Innes (1905-o8). The Dinner will be an informal one and the Committee are hoping to see a large gathering of F.P.s resident in the County. The Annual General Meeting will be held during the course of the same evening.

T. C. YOUNG, Hon. Secretary.

104

Aberdeen Grammar School Magazine

F.P. Club Office-Bearers 1948-49 (Abbreviated List) C.S.I., I.C.S. (retired).

President: Sir ARTHUR LOTHIAN, Vice-President and Chairman of Executive: R. B. WiLLIAmsost, D.S.O., T.D., M.A., LL.B. Vice-Chairman of Executive: ALEXANDER GRAY, M.A., LL.B. Secretary and Treasurer: J. Scorn MAGLACHLAN, M.A., LL.B., zzo Union Street, Aberdeen.

Editor of Magazine: ALAN C. R. WATT, M.A., tz Bon-Accord Crescent, Aberdeen.

Secretaries of Centres Bengal and Assam—R. H. DUGUID, C.A., c, 0 Duncan Bros. & Co. Ltd., Netaji Subhas Road, Calcutta. (Interim.)

Edinburgh—J. H. Roan, 31 St. Andrew Square, Edinburgh 2.

Glasgow—B. D. D. EMSLIE, 13 Lochaber Road, Killermont, Bearsden, Glasgow.

London—A. H. K. SLATER, M.A., 2 Newton Grove, London, W.4.

Malaya—W. F. MAYOR, M.A., c/o Customs House, Maxwell Road, Singapore.

Yorkshire—T. C. YOUNG, C.A., 35 Gledhow Wood Road, Leeds 8.

Secretaries of Sections Cricket—N. H. N1ACDONALD, 50 Albury Road, Aberdeen.

Golf—G. A. C. WALKER, 39 Rubislaw Park Crescent, Aberdeen.

Hockey—R. P. WISHART, 21 John Street, Aberdeen.

Rugby—N. I. W. MELDRUM, M.A., LL.B., to Carden Place, Aberdeen.

Tennis—A. H. INNES, 74 Burns Road, Aberdeen.

(Note.—The full list of office-bearers was given on pp. 207-8 of the July 1948 issue of the Magazine.)

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You will find the Restaurant an ideal

m s

place to bring your friends for Luncheon or Tea. Meals are quickly and daintily served by a courteous

iYek

Pi?

Pk

and efficient staff

Watt & Grant Ltd., Union St., Aberdeen

0: ,r

kigx4,r-i---"'-‘,$`14rtr.43r4,$'431‘;-"g$'4,r--`4;$girlii

"Bon-Record" A toast to set memories a-jingle and

unobtrusive and all male service which

reminiscences a-flowing with "do you

does nothing to hinder the flow of

and " saw old so and

talk—an occasion demanding the new

tripping off tongues in spate.

Gentlemen's Lounge in the " Caley ".

remembers " so's "

A time for all good men to come to

More

the aid of the party and an occasion

shape of Dinners, Cocktail Parties and

definitely labelled " Men Only ".

Receptions are taken care of in the

An

formal

get-togethers

in

the

occasion calling for deep, solid, easy

new extensions known respectively as

chairs and glasses at the ready with an

the Burns Room and the Square Room.

THE CALEDONIAN HOTEL •• A.A **

R.S.A.C.

R.A.G.

ABERDEEN

UNION TERRACE r

TELEPHONE

29 I 6

4

CORPORATION OF ABERDEEN - EDUCATION COMMITTEE

ABERDEEN

GRAMMAR

(FOUNDED BEFORE

RECTOR .

SCHOOL

I256)

JAMES J. ROBERTSON, O.II.F.., M.A., B.D., F.R.S.E.

HE GRAMMAR SCHOOL provides a complete course of Prima ry Tand Secondary Education for Boys.

The School is organised as follows :—Nursery Class (4-5), Kindergarten (5-7), Lower School (7-1z), Middle School (12-15), Upper School (15 -18).

The School, which occupies an extensive site in the West End of the City, has, in addition to ample classroom accommodation, an Assembly Hall with Stage, a spacious Library and Reading Room, five well-equipped Laboratories, three Art Rooms, two Music Rooms, three Workshops, two Gymnasia, a Dining Hall, a Museum, and a Botanical Garden.

While the School has a Classical tradition, it offers considerable variety of courses, the subjects of the Secondary Department being (in addition to Religous Education, Music, Physical Exercises and Games), English, History, Geography, Latin, Greek, French, German, Spanish, Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Art and Crafts, Technical Subjects, and Commercial Subjects.

Boys are prepared for the Universities, the Civil Service, the Professions, Commerce and Industry. The Examinations normally taken are the Senior Leaving Certificate of the Scottish Education Department and the Bursaries Competitions of the Scottish Universities.

The School has spacious Playing Fields at Rubislaw, the games played being Rugby Football, Cricket, Hockey, and Tennis.

There are two Boarding Houses run in conjunction with the Grammar School.

ABERDEEN HIGH SCHOOL FOR GIRLS (ALBYN PLACE)

HEAD MISTRESS . MISS B. M. ROSE, M.A. (OXON.) HIGH SCHOOL provides a complete course of education for THE girls between the ages of 5 and 18 years. It is organised in three

Departments—Infants, Primary and Secondary. There is, in addition, a Nursery Class. The girls in the Secondary Department are prepared for the Leaving Certificate of the Scottish Education Department and the Bursary Competition and the Preliminary Examination of the University : and those pupils who take Music, for the Examinations of the Associated Board. The subjects studied comprise Scripture, Physical Training, Class Singing, English, History, Geography, Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Latin, Greek, German, French, Music, Art and Craft, Needlework, Cookery and Laundry. There is considerable variety possible in the choice of subjects and courses.

At least one afternoon a week and Saturday mornings are set aside for organised games at the School Playing Field of eleven acres situated at Hazlehead.

Information as to Scholarships, Courses of Study, etc., at the Grammar School and the High School for Girls is given in the School Prospectuses, which may be had free on application to the Director of Education, Education Offices, Municipal Buildings, Castle Street, or to the Rector or Head Mistress respectively.

ABERDEEN SAVINGS BANK TOTAL

FUNDS

EXCEED

£36,000,000 Deposits accepted up to

a

over a

period of years

total of £2,500 and,

in addition,

Government Stock and Bonds may be purchased through the Bank

Interest 2f per cent. per annum

Money repayable on demand

RUGGER AND FOOTBALL BOOTS correct ftting by X-RAY pedoscope

JOHN A. DUNN LTD. FAMILY BOOT AND SHOE MAKERS

46 UNION STREET, ABERDEEN also at PETERHEAD, ELGIN, FORFAR, TURRIFF Phone 158 PRINTED AT THE ABERDEEN UNIVERSITY !WAS