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Updated: June 2, 2025
In one of the colleges of an Indian University in a large manufacturing town, fourteen young men very agreeable and frank, outspoken fellows met at random in one of the hostels, were asked what, on completing their college course, they intended to do; twelve answered to become "pleaders," and two hoped for something in the Government service.
For the purpose for which they are intended, however, these little hostels are well fitted and have a river charm that is indescribable. I could speak, too, of excellent hotels set in the grounds of ruined castles or abbeys; but the attractions of the latter interfere with the repose of the visitor.
The terrible miseries of the time find expression, feeble as yet, in the 'Complaint of the poor Commoner; and of the poor Labourers. It comprises a mixture of lamentations and threats; the starving wretches warn the Church, the King, the Burgesses, the Merchants, the Seigneurs above all, that 'fire is drawing nigh to their hostels. They appeal to the king for help.
Sometimes we rested in large hostels in cities, and then our walk began with some old cathedral, which could not but be admired, Gothic though it were, and continued in the market-place, where the piles of fruit, vegetables, and flowers were a continual wonder and delight to me.
It was one of those lovely old wayside hostels along the main road to the west, which, with the decline of coaching days, found its way into the market, and had fallen to the hammer for the education of youth. Exactly how the adaptation had been accomplished I never quite understood. The building formed the end of a long avenue of trees and was approached through high gates from the main road.
The half-timbered hall of the Drapers' Guild, some old houses in Frankwell, including the inn with the quaint sign the String of Horses, the ancient hostels the Lion, famous in the coaching age, the Ship, and the Raven Bennett's Hall, which was the mint when Shrewsbury played its part in the Civil War, and last, but not least, the house in Wyle Cop, one of the finest in the town, where Henry Earl of Richmond stayed on his way to Bosworth field to win the English Crown.
Doubtless a town of that age might be, in point of population, not beyond a village now; still a town implies continuous houses, which is just what Mortemer now does not possess. The French occupied Mortemer because of the convenient quarters to be had in its hostels. It is now one of the last places in the world to which one would go for quarters of any kind.
In Calcutta, for instance, out of 4,500 students barely 1,000 live in hostels, and not all hostels are by any means satisfactory. In the Indian Universities there is no collegiate life such as English Universities afford, and in India most of the secondary schools as well as colleges are non-residential.
At a public meeting the writer heard one of the most learned and respected Hindus of Calcutta respectfully protest to the Lieutenant-Governor against the public recognition in the Census Report of such irrational social grading. Similarly in the provision by Government of Caste Hostels for students.
At periods of danger therefore spies were set to watch the gates of the hostels, and mark who entered them. Governments took great pains to ascertain the secret life of the collegians.
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