The tender age at which this part of education commences, generaly about the tenth year, would weigh heavily with parents in sending their sons to a school so distant as the Central establishment would be from most of them.
Some of the same concerns faced now were likely more prevalent in the past. In a period where parents could not reach their children except for letters and travel that each could possibly take multiple days. Now we cannot be detached from parents who seek us out without relent. Could this effectively be better or worse for the education of people in the past? I ask this because times have surely changed and students now likely have the same attachments that students in the past had to their parents.