Buck!

What is buck? To the present generation it probably means the antics of a horse...or if you were American, a dollar bill - or even to pass on a problem as in "pass the buck" or "the buck stops here".

However, to the new kids on the block at Kings' (known colloquially as 'fags' - circa 1950), buck was a word dished out with gusto any time a slight transgression was perceived by the higher intelligencia and not responded to in the appropriate manner by the 'fag'. Unwritten rules made plain that no fag could talk to or approach a senior or prefect, or even someone with three or four years seniority, and speak without invitation. You literally had to "tug the forelock" which was a medieval gesture of subservience and await recognition.

Now of course young James didn't exactly appreciate this in either understanding or attitude. He hadn't been schooled in the British system. After all, he was but a colonial misfit a 'gorm' from the Raj (India) and the Antipodes (Australia).

During his first term in September 1949, he had the misfortune to have one of his first school meals at the head of one of the twenty or so long community tables - each presided over by a school prefect.

To politely open conversation, he questioned some procedure or other dealing with the food distribution - more specifically, how much each one of us should be 'dished out'. There was a monitor or prefect stationed at the end of each table and this head designated what was what - how much mashed potato, or cabbage or pumpkin or one sausage or two and so on.

The dinner plates, ladle and trays of fodder were under his command...and the fag or student at his sides were temporarily employed as 'splodgers' (ladle operators). Once a plate had been decorated with an assortment of semi-digestible representations of food, it was passed hand over hand, down the line until all had been served. I could not help noticing that under the watchful eye of the master at arms, the proportion of food at both ends was significantly larger than the portions in between - but then the 'hefties' probably had larger appetites... Thus James made his first cardinal mistake. He questioned the quantity of grub being issued.

With a bang a ladle held fist hit the table in front of this startled wretch. An indignant high pitched aggravated scream like broadside shook this bewildered fag.

"How dare you! I haven't spoken to you. Don't you dare give buck!", and without a split second's pause, "you can write a hundred lines for me from the 23rd psalm and present it to me in my study by tomorrow evening!".

What in the blazes is this 'buck'? And what was the 23rd psalm? I decided it was better not to ask as this might compound the problem. It may also be construed as 'buck', whatever that was. Shut up, say nothing. Find the answers from some other source and survive. This I did later on that evening...

"The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want..." - a very popular buck stopper!