ABSTRACT
To gain a scholarship at a private school is the only form of advertisement open to those who object to figuring in the columns of the newspapers side by side with oroide gold, cheap sherry, and potent medicines. Many of the preparatory schools that existed in the early decades of the nineteenth century exist today, several of them being owned by one family over a long period, sometimes stretching back to pre-Victorian times. In the twentieth century, the geographical factor has become the most powerful of these influences. The same social forces that have increased the percentage of day boys in the preparatory schools have led parents to give preference to preparatory and public schools within travelling distance of their homes. The process has therefore continued unabated but links between particular preparatory and public schools now derive less from personal contacts than from geographical proximity and this despite the improvements in transport.
