"How the child can suffer in a well-off British public school, unless they have become complete crap, is a mystery to me."

Hi Peter, I thought that comment of yours was interesting for two reasons. Firstly, I am given to wonder whether British public schools ever were any good anyway. Secondly, it has long been my belief that children were sent to these schools because the parents did not wish to live with their own children.
My own first hand experience of the British public school system was near disastrous. By the age of fifteen I was pretty close to being mentally ill. It is not the same for everyone, I know. However, I like to be careful about the assumption that these institutions actually do any more good than a well run state school.