Weekend detention is a serious matter, only awarded to girls whose behaviour falls well short of the expected standards – without being serious enough for them to be sent to their housemaster to be caned.
It does, however, start with a sharp stroke of the tawse to each hand – before a girl is made to copy some learned textbook. In this case, Kay knew that already, for this was the second weekend in a row in which she’d found herself facing such punishment.
She was handed a 1929 copy of Bernard Darwin’s “The English Public School”, and made to transcribe the first four pages of the chapter on “The Monitorial System”. The original – and Kay’s neat copy – are shown below:
This being her second detention in a row, an additional punishment was, however, called for once she had completed her work. Six strokes of the cane on the bare, as she bent over, and Mr Jenkins lectured her on the likely consequences should she find herself in trouble again during the rest of term. (A trip to the headmaster; a more severe caning; suspension). And it was a very chastened girl who left the room, sent to change out of her uniform and to rejoin her friends for the rest of the weekend.
I could brave my way through the caning and probably even the tawse on the hands but the copying text would totally undo me. I get really upset every time I catch myself making a mistake. I have the worst handwriting ever and am incredibly slow. Four pages would take me hours. If faced with the option, I’d probably go for extra strokes for each page cut off the punishment.