Cordelia Lavington Chapter 5
By Governess

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Copyright 2009, 2010 by Governess, all rights reserved

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This story is intended for ADULTS ONLY. It contains explicit depictions of sexual activity involving minors. If you are not of a legal age in your locality to view such material or if such material does not appeal to you, do not read further, and do not save this story.
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Chapter 5

The tawse was used by many in the reformatory to maintain order in class. Mrs Lavington knew that it was a particular favourite of Mrs Fairclough who used it in the traditional manner. A girl would be made to stand with her hands outstretched with one palm placed over the other. Mrs Fairclough would then stand before the miscreant, as she reddened and bit her lip. And then after a tormenting pause, the tawse would be raised, draped over the mistress's shoulder and lashed down across the small outstretched palm. Mrs Lavington had seen how a girl crumpled as the thick leather tails stung and smarted and how she was left to howl in her misery for at least half a minute, before being told to resume position, with the hands reversed. Even a young girl might expect to receive six such strokes across each of her soft sensitive palms.

But Cordelia Lavington was not going to lay the strap across Samuel's hands. She preferred an equally soft, sensitive place for the tawse. Not that it was not an excellent discipline for a child to offer his hands for punishment. Having to keep them in position, eyes wide open, waiting for the leather to descend with a dull smack across an open palm. And to suffer the humiliation of roaring and writhing in agony under the gaze of his tormentor.

But excellent though this discipline might be, there was something even more compelling about applying the tawse to a child's bottom. And Samuel has such a round, firm bottom. Why strap the bony structure of the hand when such firm, sensitive flesh was available.

She rose from the chair.

"So Samuel, not on the hands but on the bottom. And a tawse like this will raise long thick throbbing weals that will still be visible in a week's time. Do you know why it is good for a boy to have such weals beaten on to his bottom?"

Samuel could not think there was any good in it, but he knew better to express any such reservations to his mother. Punishment was such a regular part of his upbringing and training that his child's distaste for it had been overlaid by an acceptance of its necessity and supposed benefit.

"Well? I am waiting."

"Be . . because it hurts and makes me not want to be disobedient again."

"Yes, Samuel. I am sure it will hurt. I certainly intend that it should. But the weals will last after the hurt has gone. So why is that good?"

Samuel struggled to reply, although he knew the answer.

"Because I can see them and they remind me not to . . . to disobey you again."

"Yes, Samuel. They are a reminder beaten on to your flesh that a boy should obey his mother in all things. And a reminder of how his mother will deal with him should be choose not to learn that lesson."

She sighed.

"And that lesson clearly needs to be repeated."

She pointed to the armchair. Reluctantly Samuel stepped over to it, and bent forward over the arm.

"And I will not let you off as lightly as before."

Samuel bit his lip. He had a very different recollection to his mother. The caning he had received four days ago had left him howling and distraught. He had sobbed like a small boy, covered in shame and confusion. And when he had looked in his mirror afterwards, his rump was red and swollen. It reminded him of the baboon that he had seen at the zoo the previous summer.

He watched anxiously as his mother ran the tawse through her hand.

"Yes, Samuel. At your age, you know the rules. You know how important obedience is. And if a boy of your age steps out of line, then he must accept the consequences."

She smacked the tawse across her palm.

"So, will you keep your hands forward or do I have to tie them?"

"No, mother, please. I won't reach back, I promise."

"Are you sure, Samuel?"

"Yes, Mother. Please."

"Very well. But if you reach back, then your hands will not only be tied. You will receive additional strokes. Do you understand?"

"Ye . . . yes, mother."

"Then hands forward. You may bury them down the side of the chair if that helps."

She heaved his small compact body further over the arm. And then paused and studied the round swelling of the boy's buttocks. She had started spanking him soon after his second birthday. Her potty training had been harsh, for she was anxious to have him out of nappies as soon as possible. The pot was an old fashioned china pot with a handle and a large rim. While some mothers trained by rewarding success, Cordelia Lavington preferred to punish failure. After fifteen minutes sitting on the pot, if nothing had been forthcoming, the boy would be taken off and spanked before being returned for another fifteen minutes.

Once when her back had been turned he had got up and defecated on the floor. For that he was spanked with the wooden kitchen spoon and then tied to the pot, and left there as a punishment. It had been easy to run the strong string through the pot handle and twice round the rim, then tightly around his legs and up and over his small body, finally to be secured once more to the handle. She had left him there for a full hour before releasing him. After that, he was tied each morning to the pot and left until he had gone. After three weeks she judged him trained and his nappies came off. There were the inevitable accidents but she knew how to deal with those.

She smiled at the recollection.

She ran the tawse through her hand. It was thick and hard, yet flexible. An ideal implement for chastising a boy of Samuel's age. Part of her regretted the passing of the younger years. Samuel had been her firstborn.

Even before he had been born, she had lain in bed and thought about spanking him. Planning how she would do it. Imagining his reactions. But the reality of holding that squirming little boy across her knee was a fulfilment beyond her most fervent imaginings.

She remembered his very first spanking as if it were yesterday. His surprise at having his little trousers and pants taken down and then his cries of protest as she had hauled him over her lap. He knew he had done wrong even at that early age, but the consequences of wrongdoing had still to be learnt and dreaded. His bottom was small yet soft and she had given him ten firm smacks with the back of her hairbrush. Nothing like the sound spankings he endures as an older boy, but quite sufficient to redden his tiny buttocks and elicit loud screams, first of rage and then as the spanking proceeded, of tearful smarting agony.

Right from the beginning she had never hurried a spanking. She allowed him plenty of time to smart between strokes and to feel the firm resolute will of her discipline. Later as Samuel grew older, she appreciated the fuller rounder contours of his bottom and its soft resilient firmness. Then, she began to spank him in real earnest, sparing him nothing. The hairbrush was brought down with all her strength across his firm bottom flesh and he received never less than a dozen hard strokes. Often twice that number. He quickly learned not to fight the spanking, for in the face of resistance his mother had no compunction in doubling the punishment. But even though he knew the consequences, such was the agony inflicted by the smooth hard back of the brush that his hands would often reach back.

She drew the leather tails through her hand. Samuel's eleven year old bottom was goose-pimpled and clenching as he anticipated the first stroke.

She raised the tawse, draping it over her shoulder. And then with a deep whoosh, it descended to impact with a solid smack across the boy's flesh. The shock to the sensitive nerve endings in his buttocks was for a moment numbing, but then as though a blowtorch had been applied to his skin.

And yet the boy had been well trained. Like Susannah Wesley's sons he had been taught to fear the rod and cry softly. He jerked forward and dug his hands even deeper down the gap between the chair seat and the arm, pinching his fingers painfully together.

Cordelia Lavington looked at the red inflamed band that the tawse had raised on the boy's skin. Again the heavy punishment strap was lifted, rested on her shoulder, and then brought down with all her strength. The boy gave a deep throated, gasping roar. His feet kicked and his head went back. Cordelia Lavington stepped back and admired her handiwork. She appreciated how the heavy flexibility of the tawse had an even more disastrous effect on a boy's bottom than the cane. As it smacked the soft bottom flesh, it hugged the contours of the buttocks, inflaming every inch and raising long throbbing weals. It was, thought, Cordelia Lavington, a most efficacious implement for chastising a boy.

Again the two thick leather tails were lashed down. Samuel bit his lip hard, struggling to contain the pain.

Another stroke. And this time his mother laid it across the tops of his thighs. The boy roared in his agony, rearing up, tearing his hands free. He clutched backward at his buttocks. His mother waited for a moment, allowing him to regain a little composure.

"Stand up, Samuel."

The boy struggled off the arm of the chair and stood clutching the tops of his thighs. His cheeks were wet and she could see the place where he had chewed his lips and broken the soft red skin. He hung his head, avoiding her eyes.

"Well, Samuel?"

"I . . . I'm . . . I'm sorry, mother."

"And what are you sorry for?"

"F . . . for putting my hands back."

"But you promised me you wouldn't put your hands back?"

"Please, Mother.".

"But why did you put your hand back and resist when you promised not to?"

"I couldn't help it. It hurt so much. Please, mother."

His hands were twitching by his side and there was a look of desperate concentration on his face.

"But that is not true, is it, Samuel? You could have helped it . . . "

She paused.

" . . . if you had let me tie your hands."

He cast his eyes down, chewing his lip as he did so.

"Samuel, look at me, when I am talking to your. If I had tied you hands, you would have been unable to resist. And would not be in the trouble you are in now."

She waited.

"Yes, mother."

"And what did I say would happen if you put your hands back?"

"Y . . . you said I would get extra strokes."

"Yes. Additional strokes."

She went across to the left hand drawer of the dresser and pulled it open. It slid out easily. Samuel had watched when, several days ago, she had rubbed candle wax on the runners to stop the drawer sticking. She took out a ball of twine.

"Hold out your hands. And wrists together."

She cut a long length of twine and wound it tightly five or six times around his two thumbs, knotting the ends securely. He stood there naked and ashamed. Sometimes a boy can be in a state of undress and be full of bounce and life, as when ready for a dip in the stream or when ready to race into the sea. But Samuel had no such pleasure in prospect. His nervous, tear stained face and bound hands left no doubt about that.

"So, Samuel, back over the chair arm. And I suggest you take that look of your face. Just remember you are being punished for your own good. Stand in front of the chair."

This was not the first time Cordelia Lavington had restrained a child's hands for a whipping. Both Samuel and Elizabeth had on occasions needed to be controlled in this way. And with particularly obstreperous behaviour, she had also found it helpful to apply further restraint to the small wriggling body. But such behaviour was rare for the children had been taught to accept the necessity of discipline. But when there was resistance, she was ready and prepared.

When Samuel had just passed his seventh birthday, and after an unacceptable display of such resistance the previous day, she had made him lie across the chair arm so that she could mark the width of his body with a piece of chalk. Then she had sewn two loops on to the strong material of the arm. The children had watched as she had done this. Elizabeth, who was then five had asked what they were for. "Wait and see," was her mother's reply.

And Elizabeth had not long to wait. Three days later, Samuel had again resisted his mother's discipline. He knew better than to throw a tantrum, and his resistance was more a modest struggle to avoid the unpleasantness of punishment. Mrs Lavington had immediately gone to the drawer of the dresser and taken out a long soft leather strap. She had threaded it through the recently sewn loops and with the boy placed over the arm and with his body pressing down on the strap, had tightened and buckled it around him. She had turned to her small daughter.

"You were asking what I was doing the other day, Elizabeth, sewing loops to the arm of the chair. Well, as you see, they are for holding down a naughty boy who is unwilling to be whipped for his disobedience"

The girl had watched wide-eyed as the punishment had proceeded. Mrs Lavington smiled at the memory and returned to the reality of administering the tawse to the boy who was now four years older. Since sewing on the original loops, she had added two more to accommodate his growing body. The previous loops were now used on those rare occasions when Elizabeth needed restraint. She was rarely as uncooperative as Samuel, but she could display a surly spirit that her mother was not prepared to tolerate.

(To be continued)