In praise of … what Eton doesn't teach

For an expensive school, Eton leaves some huge gaps in its alumni's knowledge. At least, if David Cameron's appearance this week on David Letterman's Late Show is anything to go by. Not knowing that Thomas Arne wrote the music to Rule Britannia is forgiveable – it is, after all, the most unbearable bit of musical bombast. But drawing a blank on the meaning of the Magna Carta? What a 30-grand-a-year school can't teach you, Wikipedia can, and for free (Great Charter – but you knew that). In their low-cost, high-value 1066 and All That , Sellar and Yeatman provide the classic explanation of the constitutional document's significance: "The chief cause of Democracy in England, and thus a Good Thing for everyone (except the Common People)." The subjects that a top public school doesn't teach you. As television's favourite pleb, Tony Hancock, put it, " Does Magna Carta mean nothing to you – did she die in vain? "