the bench, passing a thick rope over his loins so as to bind him securely face downward. She then tore off his trousers completely, and wound a second stout cord round his legs, while he never ceased struggling and howling.
Catching up a strong rod, she set about flogging him with might and main, hitting him with real vigour. The lad yelled as if mad, bounding and writhing, despite his bonds. The terrible birching lady paid no attention to anything but her task. It looked to me as if she had lost her wits, for putting her entire strength, she literally covered the brat's little bottom with formidable slashing strokes.
It was a thrilling sight-this tall female, as frenzied as an enraged lioness, mercilessly cutting these palpitating boyish buttocks with practised, mighty blows of her stout birch. Her victim roared with acute pain. I trembled in every limb thinking how in a few minutes, I also should be bound down on that same bench, to be birched still more brutally, as I was older, and able to support still greater agony.
Nevertheless, the sensation that benumbed my entire being was not devoid of infinite voluptuousness. I struggled against a natural impulse prompting me to fly from such severe correction, and yet I remained as if my feet were nailed to the floor, incapable of movement. I was actuated by a furious desire to endure the torturing ordeal.
The spectacle became very thrilling; the teacher going on with her fierce birching, and her captive twisting about under the burning twigs, as he uttered heartrending cries.
Bits of birch flew about all over the room, and when at last the female executioner threw away the work stump of her rod, I breathed again. She unfastened the ropes and bundled the boy outside, without even giving him time to adjust his disordered garments.
Passing in front of me, she gave me a look that made me shudder.
“Go in the corner and undress!” she said roughly.
Just as the little boy left, a girl of about fifteen years of age came in. she brought a letter that the governess glanced over after tearing it open impatiently.
“What! More punishment?” she exclaimed. “Can I never have a moment's peace? They won't let me alone even during play-time!”
At the word 'punishment' the lass started.
“If you care, madam, to attend to this young lady before me, I can wait.”
She turned toward me in a fit of temper, and again eyed me with her cruel, piercing glance.
“I told you to strip, did I not? Have you heard what I said?”
I retreated in fear, and rapidly divested myself of coat and trousers. I felt very awkward at having to undress in the presence of the young girl, who, in the next room, could see me quite plainly.
The schoolmistress, without troubling about such a trifle, rummaged in the pile of rods, choosing a couple-the longest and strongest. She threw them on the floor near the bench, towards which she pushed me.
She tied a rope tightly round my back, winding another cord about my legs. They she bound my hands, without saying a word; her eyebrows knitted and her face distorted. Taking up the rod, she at once set it going smartly on my bare bottom. Blow succeeded blow at express rate, and I started and plunged, howling with pain. She flogged me with insensate exasperation, soon causing me to shriek in agony. I made useless desperate efforts to burst my bonds, but my struggles only caused the ropes to sink deeper into my flesh. The rod never ceased torturing me with its reiterated sting; swishing, cutting, mangling the sensitive skin of my posteriors. I groaned and choked, losing my breath under the excruciating avalanche of lashes that swept over my smarting rump like a torturing hurricane. The cruel monitress, caring nothing for my sufferings, never ceased flogging me pitilessly. Throwing down her rod, reduced to a mere stump, she grasped the second one, and my martyrdom continued without a moment's respite.
The fresh birch dug deeper than its predecessor into my raw rump, now bruised and tender. My blackened, swollen flesh quivered and pulsated at the renewed attack. I tugged at the ropes in despair, not knowing what to do to escape from such intense suffering. Each blow that flattened out the twigs with a tremendous crashing noise on my scalded stern, caused me to jump like a fish just hooked.
Blow after blow fell with regular monotony. The torture seemed to have lasted hours. When it came to an end at last, and the disciplinarian governess had loosened my bonds, I could hardly stand, so weak was I. Passing my hand over my excoriated hindquarters, I found my fingers suffused with blood. When I returned home after this thrilling experience, I met Miss Rosey in the hall.
“What ails you?” she said stopping me. “You're quite pale! You seem quite upset.”
“It's nothing,” I replied. “Just a trifling bilious attack.”
I had formed an idea that this brutal chastisement would perhaps have quenched my passionate thirst for birching torments, and even cure me entirely of my love for passive flagellation.
Nothing of the kind took place, and a night or two after this terrible punishment, my blood boiled again in my veins, carrying to every artery the burning lava that impelled me to seek for the ardent voluptuousness which can only be aroused by the influence of the rod.
