ABSTRACT
The British public schools and the British Empire represent one of the greatest institutional partnerships in modern history. The reciprocal relationship between the two was especially striking during the late Victorian and Edwardian years, when the empire was at its height and when the schools enjoyed immense prestige. By imbuing young men with a respect for tradition, by teaching them how to excercise power, by lauding physical prowess and loyalty, and by extolling the civilising mission of the Anglo-Saxon race, the British public schools created a spirit which, as A. P. Thornton remarked, came to be ‘one of the most potent of the imperial elixirs’. 1 That elixir, in turn, vitalised the public schools in such a way that the spirit of empire and the public schools’ ethos were virtually synonomous terms.
