There seems a certain hardness in this method, yet it is doubtful whether it can fairly be regarded as more unreasonable than either of the two modern methods deplored by Ellen Key.

On the contrary it had points for admiration.

It was primarily a discipline, but it was regarded, as any fortifying discipline should be regarded, as a preparation for freedom, and it is precisely there that the more timid and clinging modern way seems to fail.
We clearly see the old method at work in the chief source of knowledge concerning old English domestic life, the _Paston Letters_.

Here we find that at an early age the sons of knights and gentlemen were sent to serve in the houses of other gentlemen: it was here that their education really took place, an education not in book knowledge, but in knowledge of life.
Such education was considered so necessary for a youth that a father who kept his sons at home was regarded as negligent of his duty to his family.
A knowledge of the world was a necessary part, indeed the chief part, of a youth's training for life.

The remarkable thing is that this applied also to a large extent to the daughters.