By Governess
liviaarbuthnot1@gmail.com
Copyright 2025 by Governess, all rights reserved
[2,100 words]´
* * * * *Chapter 75
James frowned.
“So, I assume a dozen cuts would be given with one implement followed
by a dozen with the other, until each boy had been thoroughly beaten
with the full complement of four dozen strokes,”
“Well, that
is one way of doing it. But Cordelia and I are suggesting that the
strokes of the birch and tawse should be given alternately. First one
boy would receive his full complement of strokes given in that way, and
then the other. And . . .
She paused
“ . . . Cordelia would apply the tawse and I would birch him.”
“So, despite Cordelia’s conversion to the merits of the birch on these occasions, she’s still wedded to the tawse.”
“Well, James, you might look on it as a compromise. The truth is we
would be talking about ninety-six strokes of the birch. Even if a birch
is good for twenty-four strokes before degrading, that is four separate
birches, and often a birch needs to be replaced before that. Often a
birch ceases to give of its best after a dozen strokes, and that would
mean eight separate rods needing to be available and in steep. And we
need to show some consideration for Cordelia. To expect her to stay
fresh and giving of her best for a flogging of nearly one hundred
strokes, is unrealistic. Which is why I volunteered to help. And I
don’t want to press the point, James, but Cordelia is surely owed a
little more consideration and respect for her wish to use the tawse,
and, it was on that basis that she visited Crampton’s this morning to
purchase a tawse that you would regard as suitable.”
She paused.
“And which you have not even asked to inspect.”
James nodded.
“Well, then, let me see this strap you have bought from Crampton’s.”
Cordelia fetched it, and James smacked it across his palm. Diana watched, trying nut to show her irritation.
“So, James, how would you like twenty-four meaty cuts of that across your bare bottom.”
Cordelia thought that Diana, after a good start, was rather foolishly risking antagonising him.
“That, Diana, is not the issue. I prefer a boy should be birched on
these occasions, but if the punishment is to be given with a tawse, I
need reassurance that it is going to provide an equally painful and
effective correction. And, I understood, Matron, that you were
procuring both a heavyweight and an extra heavyweight belt?”
“That is correct, Sir.”
“So perhaps I may be allowed to compare each belt.”
Cordelia fetched the extra heavyweight tawse and handed it to James,
who ran it through his hand and then smacked it across his palm. He
frowned.
“I am inclined to agree that this is too severe for
use on younger boys. A birch or a less solid tawse inflames the surface
of the skin, but this is so dense and hard that it would reduce a boy’s
bottom to a bloody pulp. There might be occasions when an older boy is
guilty of such depravity that such a punishment is justified, but not,
I think, in the present case. Not that I want to minimise their sin.
But this tawse would be a step too far.”
He paused and ran the tawse through his hand again.
“Tell me, Matron, would you ever consider using a tawse like this?”
Cordelia wondered what was behind the question. She hesitated.
“I agree that such a tawse should be reserved for what you describe a
serious depravity. But what is meant by ‘serious depravity?”
James smiled.
“As always, Cordelia, I am eager to hear your response.”
“Well, it was clear from talking to Isobel Crampton that she regarded
the two boys wriggling around in bed together as ‘serious depravity’.
And recommended two dozen strokes with that extra heavyweight tawse.
But I disagreed on the ground of its severity. But I suppose that deep
down, I don’t regard two boys in bed indulging in mutual masturbation
as so depraved as to warrant such punishment.”
“And why is that? Most would consider it to be the depths of depravity.”
“Yes, I’m sure they do. But for me utter depravity is where there is a
complete absence of affection and indeed an active concern to harm and
damage another human or living being. And where that is the case, I
might indeed give the perpetrator two dozen strokes with that extra
heavyweight tawse. “
“Even a boy as young as Clough or Graham?”
“Yes, I probably would. When Samuel was ten, he went through a period
of being really nasty to William. And on one occasion he showed a
complete lack of kindness,
in fact real cruelty. He knew
William had a deep phobia about spiders and he found this large black
spider, the sort with a fat body and long hairy legs and he put it in a
jar. He showed it to William who turned quite pale and anxious and then
Samuel flicked the spider out of the jar onto William. It ran up his
body and onto his arm and by this time William was absolutely
hysterical and beside himself. It was devilish and depraved behaviour,
and I was determined to punish it with the utmost severity. And if I'd
had that extra heavyweight tawse, I’m not sure I would have restricted
myself to just two dozen strokes.”
“So what did you do?”
I secured him over my bedroom stool and caned him until both of his
buttocks and thighs were covered in long throbbing weals. I stopped to
let him recover and to give myself a rest, and then I continued until
his bottom was a mass of hot sticky soreness, so that even the
slightest brush of his shirt tails made him gasp in agony. And I let
William watch. By the end, poor William had turned quite pale, but I
thought it only right that he should have the visible assurance that I
took his well-being seriously, and that such cruel behaviour would not
be tolerated.”
“I think I remember that, Cordelia. I don’t
think you spoke about it in any detail, but I remember his being off
school for two or three days.”
“Yes, I sent him straight
upstairs to lie face down on his bed and I sponged his bottom with a
saline solution. He wanted to go around with a bare bottom, but I made
him wear clean underpants and that was an additional discipline for
they rubbed and caused him a great deal of discomfort. And although he
pleaded to stand for meals, I made him sit on his usual hard wooden
chair.”
“And did this have a salutary effect?”
“Yes.
The caning brought home to him, in a way words never could, just how
shameless and depraved his behaviour had been. And afterwards, I made
him go across to William and ask for his forgiveness, which, I am
pleased to say, William gave.”
“And did he behave in that way again?”
“Not to William. But I had to give him a similar caning some months
later when I caught him throwing a beautiful Peacock butterfly into a
spider's web and watching it helplessly fluttering in the sticky mesh.
I really hate that sort of insensate cruelty, and I was absolutely
furious. He never did anything like that again.”
James nodded.
“I admire your determination to punish the boy so severely and so
successfully. And your understanding of childish depravity is most
compelling. That is not to minimise what the two boys have done. But I
can understand your point that despite the serious moral lapse there is
an element of affection there which in another context would be
commendable. Whereas spitefully hurting someone or purposefully making
them unhappy is quite different and has no saving grace whatsoever. And
such a boy stands on the very threshold of Hell and cries out for the
saving grace of severe punishment if he is to be snatched as a brand
from the burning, But that sort of severity is not, I think, indicated
in the present case. Let me see the other tawse you purchased from
Crampton’s.”
He ran it through his hand and smacked his palm with it several times.
“Yes, this I am sure would provide the appropriate level of severity
taking account of the offence and the age of the two offenders.”
Cordelia smiled.
“So, you approve of this tawse and for Diana and me to be the angels of their deliverance?”
James nodded.
“Yes, but I doubt that the two boys will recognise either of you as angels, even though some have entertained them unawares.
Diana smiled.
“When you were a small boy, James, did you regard Miss Ravenscourt as an angel of deliverance?”
James didn’t look too pleased at her question.
“There’s no need to look so disapproving, James, Cordelia has bee
reading Laura Ravenscourt’s book while I slipped back to the house to
support Mary. “
“Well, there’s no secret about my having had
Miss Ravenscourt as my governess. To answer the question. I certainly
did not regard her in any sense as an angel of deliverance. In
retrospect, I came to appreciate the contribution she made to my
academic life and my character development. But at the time, I feared
her, and I dreaded those rods steeping in a pail in the corner of the
schoolroom. I don’t know how much you have read, Cordelia, but her
commitment to the birch and its efficacy in training a small boy was
absolute.”
“But later did you come to regard her in that way, as an angel of deliverance?”
He frowned.
“As you will have gleaned, she was appointed because of my expulsion
from school and in order to have me mend my ways through severe and
unremitting discipline. However, I knew that I was innocent of the
crime of which I had ben accused and therefore I resented her
appointment with a more than usual vehemence. No small boy wishes to
have a governess to rule over him, but I am sure that feeling was
greatly strengthened by my particular situation. And I’m equally sure
she sensed this and regarded it as part of the challenge facing her;
and responded to it with a vehemence more than equal to my own. Did I
regard her as an angel of deliverance? My parents had appointed her to
deliver me from the sins of acquisitiveness and deception of which i
was no more guilty than the average boy. To me she was more an avenging
angel than an angel of deliverance.”
“But did that view change over time?”
James clearly was uncomfortable with the question.
“Well, Cordelia, I suppose it would be strange if it hadn’t. What she
gave me above all was a great love of classical literature and a sense
of historical depth: that the past has to be understood and appreciated
on its own terms. But yes, her regime was severe, but I undoubtedly
benefited from it; and being headstrong and of a lazy disposition her
reliance on the rod was understandable and necessary.”
He gave a wan smile.
“I matriculated with the marks of the birch cut into my flesh.”
Cordelia frowned.
“You mean you were flogged by her right up to the time you went up to varsity?”
“Well, I went up to Balliol at seventeen and was still subject to the
birch well past my fifteenth birthday. That I was still being beaten by
my governess at that age may seem strange to many, but for me it was
simply a continuation of a well-established disciplinary process. There
was nothing odd about it. That doesn’t mean that being stripped and
flogged by my governess at such an age was not deeply shameful. But I
accepted it as an inevitable consequence of my lack of effort or
disrespect for her word.”
“And you never resisted or opposed her in any way?”
“My dear Cordelia, any spirit of resistance had been well beaten out of me by then.”
“But earlier? Did you never resist her?”
James raised his eyebrows.
“As a younger boy?”
“Yes.”
“From the outset, she regarded every mistake, every failure to comply
with an instruction as resistance. Resistance to her will. Evidence of
a recalcitrant spirit. And never was there a verbal remonstrance
without the accompaniment of a thorough beating.”
Cordelia could see there was a reluctance to continue"
“But we’re not here to discuss my early discipline, but the punishment of the two boys that are to be flogged tomorrow.”