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- Herausgeber: Erotic eBooks
- Kategorie: Erotik
- Sprache: Englisch
Julian, an ill-disciplined youth, having failed to settle down at school and
having recently behaved indecently to one of the maids, is sent away to
be educated with his three girl cousins under the control of their
governess. Shortly after his arrival he is compelled to wear girls’
clothes as his normal attire. After much flagellation of all parties, and sexual interaction with all the women, Julian marries one of the cousins, but continues to wear
corsets and to remain under her dominion.
"Gynecocracy: A Narrative of the Adventures and Psychological Experiences of Julian Robinson Under Petticoat-Rule" is a classic Victorian erotic novel, published in 1893. It contains graphic sexual descriptions and themes.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2011
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Gynecocracy
A Narrative of the Adventures and Psychological Experiences of Julian Robinson Under Petticoat-Rule
AVANT PROPOS
Wholesome meats to a vitiated stomach differ little or nothing from unwholesome; and best books to a naughty mind are not inapplicable to occasions of evil. Bad meats will scarce breed good nourishment in the healthiest concoction; but herein the difference is of bad books, that they, to a discreet and judicious reader, serve in many respects to discover, to confute, to forewarn, and to illustrate.... Good and Evil, we know in the field of this world, grow up together almost inseparably; and the knowledge of good is so involved and interwoven with the knowledge of evil, and in so many cunning resemblances hardly to be discerned, that those confused seeds which were imposed upon Psyche as an incessant labour to cull out and sort asunder, were not more intermixed. It was from out the rind of one apple tasted, that the knowledge of good and evil, as two twins cleaving together, leaped forth into the world. And perhaps this is the doom which Adam fell into of knowing good and evil– that is to say, of knowing Good by Evil. As, therefore, the state of man now is, what wisdom can there be to choose –what continence to forbear without the knowledge of evil? He that can apprehend and consider Vice, with all her baits and seeming pleasures, and yet abstain, and yet distinguish, and yet prefer that which is truly better, he is the true war-faring Christian. I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race when that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat. Assuredly we bring not innocence into the world, we bring impurity much rather; that which purifies us is trial, and trial is by what is contrary. That virtue therefore which is but a youngling in the contemplation of evil and knows not the utmost that vice promises to her followers, and rejects it, is but a blank virtue, not a pure; her whiteness is but an excremental whiteness: which was the reason why our sage and serious poet Spenser (whom I dare to be known to think a better teacher than Scotus or Aquinas) describing true temperance under the person of Guion, brings him in with his Palmer through the Cave of Mammon and the bower of earthly bliss, that he might see and know, and yet abstain. Since, therefore, the knowledge and survey of vice is in this world so necessary to the constituting of human truth, how can we more safely and with less danger scout into the regions of sin and falsity, than by reading all manner of tractates and hearing all manner of reason?
Liberty of the Press
JOHN MILTON
Volume I
Chapter I INTRODUCTORY
By this time I am thirty years of age, and well aware of it.
Home-staying youths, some poet or wiseacre has said, have ever homely wit. Whether I have a homely wit or indeed any wit, I do not know. I have never endeavoured to form an opinion, deeming the question not to be one into which I could hope to enquire impartially; in fact, not one for my personal judgment. But though I have been a home-staying youth, I have had experiences; experiences of the world, that is to say, of woman, whom I regard as a complete epitome of the world–and if anyone, home-stayer or otherwise, has had experience of her in all her moods and whims, and has passed through all the psychological and physical gymnastics by which her varying caprices and lusts can conduct his soul, his passions, and his senses, and still preserves a homely wit, he must be an arrant duffer!
For Woman is a complete education.
By my own experience, I have reason to respect the petticoat and chemise, the drawers and long stockings, the high-heeled boots and tight corsets–and what they contain –and to believe that good may accrue to a young man by being disciplined by a smart girl. This may be thought a very peculiar view.
To give one instance, a young man of my acquaintance was sent at nine years of age to a fashionable preparatory school for Eton, and was expelled eighteen months afterwards. It was considered futile to send him to another school. Three tutors successively resigned on the ground that he was altogether incorrigible. At a loss what to do, his guardians enquired in all directions, and answered innumerable advertisements of persons professing to devote themselves to the reformation of backward and refractory boys, until, at last, it was suggested by a friend of the family, who had had some German anthropological experiences, that the lad should be taken in hand by a lady.
The idea was astounding! A great, rough, strong boy of fifteen who had defied the discipline of private schools and tutors, and of specialists who devoted themselves to such characters, would never yield to a lady. The friend, a person of position and reputation, pledged herself that he would be completely broken in; she had known similar cases in which the plan she advocated had proved successful beyond all possible expectations. After protracted discussion, her suggestions were adopted. A pension was quickly found, The Grafin von– stipulated that the lad should be left absolutely under her control for two years, and at the end of that period he turned out a model of docility and obedience, courtesy, and chivalry, and with remarkable intellectual development and self-possession. His friends acknowledged with wonder and gratitude the marvellous transformation which the pretty demure German Countess had wrought. Naturally, they were curious to ascertain by what magic she had worked this miracle. I do not know whether they succeeded in learning; probably not, as they were English; but having been through the same kind of discipline myself, I possessed the key. When we met, we accordingly compared notes, and he confessed that the magic was wholly feminine. She had impressed him with the subtle and subduing influence of sex, under which he was perpetually kept. She, as I guessed, employed not tutors but maids, who, notwithstanding his age, treated him in all respects as a child. She used female clothing-first a girl’s, then a young lady’s–and made the use of masculine habiliments, or even the desire for them, an offence of the deepest dye. She subjugated his rude male propensities to her softening womanly influence, to which he was compelled to do perpetual homage. She punished rebellion in the most ignominious manner, with the birch; and the same sharp instructor was used to brighten his wits, teach him his lessons, and enforce her precepts. I remember he made a particular complaint of the fact that, to his shame and disgrace, he was usually punished before girls. This he felt acutely. He described his feelings to me upon the first occasion of his shocking exposure to a bevy of laughing girls. He was held down across an ottoman by a couple of buxom country lasses.
The mere narrative made my blood boil and electrified me. He detailed his efforts to repress all expression of his sufferings, in which they revelled and gloried; how he writhed; how, by degrees, his fortitude vanished through stress of pain, whilst consciousness of the youth and sex of his beholders maddened him; how, ultimately, as the cutting strokes administered by the white round arm of a woman continued to fall with cruel regularity, he was obliged to abandon himself absolutely and helplessly. He could no longer withstand the sense of abject humiliation, the necessity for yielding unreservedly to his fair mistress. He spoke of the subjugation and the galling nature of the conviction that they had, despite himself, thoroughly mastered him. But, he added, he could have held out against a man; what sapped his strength was not so much the torture of the punishment as the sorcery of gender. It was the triumph of the petticoat. He could at last have grovelled on the ground before these fair but relentless conquerors, and have begged their permission to breathe.
Enough, however, of his experiences. In the following chapters I purpose narrating my own adventures of like kind.
Chapter IIDOWNLANDS HALL, SUFFOLK
I was what women are fond of describing as a “nice youth": ruddy complexioned, fair, tall, well-made, and rather over fourteen years of age, when it was decided to send me to school.
This resolution was come to, because one fine afternoon, being on the stairs behind our pretty nursery maid, a lively and brisk piece of feminine flesh, as she was carrying the tea tray up to the nursery, in the exuberance and precocity of my animal spirits, I seized the advantage of her hands being engaged in holding the tray, and lifting her petticoats behind up to her waist, I indulged in a long look at her stalwart legs, thighs, and plump bottom. Then, my eager hands slipped through and touched something hairy between her warm legs. Whether she would have objected to this part of the performance, I do not feel sure. I believe she would have reserved the matter for private scolding and settlement at a convenient moment, but, as soon as she felt my hand, it had an altogether unexpected effect, for, blushing crimson, she incontinently dropped the tea tray, and, as the milk ran one way and the scalding tea and boiling water went drip, drip another, and the cups and saucers rolled down the flight and broke themselves quite leisurely, she exclaimed, looking a picture of loveliness in her confusion: “Oh! Master Julian! Oh, you wicked, wicked boy!”
In the midst of the clatter and exclamation, out came the head nurse. She found the girl as red as a peony, and myself looking utterly foolish. She took in the situation at a glance. No supper, but bed, and a severe application of an old slipper were my portion that night. A report was made to headquarters, and to school I was sent, and remained there for nearly two years.
I left school, because it did not agree with my health.
Delicately brought up, and accustomed to luxuries at variance with the rigour of scholastic discipline, school was found unsuitable for me. So I came home again.
My parents were a great deal too much occupied with fashionable society and parliamentary affairs to look after me. My father expected to become before long a member of the government, under which he then held a subordinate office.
His expectations were fulfilled, and he was subsequently rewarded with a seat in the Upper House and an Earl’s coronet. I was delighted to become a Lord; but, in the meantime, a large old house which had belonged to my father’s brother, who had died leaving three daughters, was my destination. It was a fine old place near Stowmarket in Suffolk, with a thousand acres of woodland and pasturage. My cousins Maud, Beatrice, and Agnes, charming girls, were being educated there by a sweet young French governess, to whose care, in consideration of an extra fifty pounds a year salary, I was also consigned.
Mademoiselle de Chambonnard was tall, svelte, possessed a beautiful little figure, with masses of black hair, large black eyes, and pallid complexion; and dressed and comported herself like a young Queen. Her air of espieglerie and mischief, and her womanliness bewitched me. But there was about her a resolution and determination, indicated by her firmly compressed mouth and beautifully shaped lips, which rather terrified me, and with reason. Her eyes laughed; her mouth never relaxed.
My cousins were equally charming, and seemed to have imbued much of Mademoiselle’s frolicsomeness and playfulness. They were all dressed in the height of fashion. Maud was just twenty, Beatrice eighteen, and Agnes sixteen. I fell in love with Beatrice at once. She was the bete noire, and I suppose we intuitively felt we were kindred spirits. I at once observed their dainty feet and shoes, their faultless deportment, their pretty short frocks, and enough of their underclothing to perceive its exquisite character. Agnes was the coldest and the favourite; Beatrice, always in scrapes, the warmest hearted and most beautiful; and Maud the provokingly faultless one. I cannot describe my sensations, when deposited by my father’s man after a drive of nearly twenty miles, amongst these young ladies, with the full knowledge that my fate was in their hands. Mademoiselle received me, and observed that she had heard of some of my doings, adding that they would all find it odd to have “a male thing” amongst them, but that she hoped I should be a good boy and very obedient. She then rang for the maid, ordered her to show me my room, and told me to join her and my cousins at the schoolroom.
Mary conducted me to the bedroom, and looked after me much more than I liked, and in a peculiar manner which I could not make out, and felt disposed to resent. She poured out the water, tempered it to the heat she considered right, helped me off with my jacket, waistcoat, and collar, asked me for my keys, told me to wash myself, and, I verily believe, had I not been quite a stranger she would not have left the room at all, which I should have found decidedly inconvenient. Then it was her good pleasure to tie my necklace for me, and when I explained that I was quite capable of doing it myself, she exclaimed: “Oh, are you, my pretty young gentleman? Perhaps you will find before long that you are not allowed to do as many things for yourself here as you like.”
On our way to the schoolroom, we met a tall, handsome young woman, who was evidently standing there purposely to see me.
She had lovely dark eyes and an oval face. She was Miss Elise, Mademoiselle’s maid. I entered the schoolroom a little ruffled and out of temper, which Mademoiselle was quick to discern. She introduced me to my cousins, and I greeted them formally with that dignity on which I prided myself and thought becoming in a young man. But Mademoiselle, at once, made me supremely ridiculous in my own and everybody else’s eyes by insisting on my asking each of them for a kiss. That put me to great confusion, for the kisses were not readily given, and I was compelled to go on begging until, with much reluctance and great condescension on their part, I got them. Mademoiselle then rated me for being ill-mannered, and peremptorily ordered me to kiss her own hand, which she extended for the purpose. I did so with an ill grace, earnestly wishing myself anywhere but where I was, and sat down sullenly enough, in a frame of mind which provoked the immediate remark from Mademoiselle.
“Come, Master Julian, behave yourself, or I shall send for Elise to put you to bed!”
The suppressed giggle which this provoked increased my ill temper, but I resolved to pass it over and show self-control and command over my temper, trusting that my nonchalance and imperturbability would make her duly sensible of the manly manner in which I treated her indecorous freedom, and that it would convey a just rebuke of what she would evidently see I regarded as her bad taste, and I expected she would then be properly abashed accordingly.
Her maid put me to bed! The idea!
But unfortunately, Mademoiselle was not in the least abashed. On the contrary, she acted towards me with unseemly levity, and positively betrayed a disposition to treat the matter with inconsiderable impatience and anger, and although she then took no further notice of my demeanour, I felt that she intended to make a note of it, and an uncomfortable foreboding again stole over me.
The evening passed without further incident. Amidst the warmth and brightness of the room, and the pleasant chatter of the girls, my stiffness wore off; but I was destined to make an ass of myself. The pretty girlish forms, the graceful contours of which were admirably revealed and suggested by their dresses, gave me a delicious sense of voluptuous ease. I therefore became graciously condescending, although a curious twinkle in Mademoiselle’s eyes ought to have awakened me to the ridiculous figure I was cutting. My foolish serenity was, however, undisturbed until the next day, when I had a rude awakening. I had no suspicion at the time that she was only fooling me in the most finished manner.
Her conversation was easy and engaging. She drew me on to talk quite confidentially, to tell her of my likes and dislikes, and reveal my real self to her to an extent, which quite startled me when I reflected upon it afterwards in bed, with the uncomfortable doubt as to whether she was really my friend or only trotting me out and secretly quizzing me the whole time.
She reclined in a low chair with a fan with which she coquettishly played in her lovely dimpled hand–one foot on the steel bar of the fender, her seduisante attitude revealing a good deal of her slender limbs and open-work stockings, and affording occasional glimpses of exquisite lace and white under-raiment. Of course, it was my role not to appear to notice anything, and I played it to perfection, being insouciant to a degree that must have astonished and discomfited her. However, in my own mind, I thought her extremely nice, and felt I should become really fond of her.
Alas! Before long I had reason to think of that low chair in quite another manner.
Maud, as the governess and myself chatted, pored over some book, seemingly resolved not to interest herself in the least in our conversation. She had, apparently, quickly come to some conclusion. I felt, though, that her carelessness was strongly tinctured with contempt for me.
Between Beatrice and myself there had already been established, from the first, a tacit intelligence and friendliness. The dear girl was evidently much disconcerted and greatly concerned for me.
About Agnes’ mouth there played a cold but amused smile. She said nothing and gave no sign.
I found they led a delightful life, taking high tea at half-past five, dinner at half-past eight, bed at half-past eleven, breakfast between nine and ten, and luncheon at two.
I enjoyed my dinner that evening hugely. The exquisite toilettes and low dresses surprised and delighted my susceptible nature. Every one was merry and free, and lessons were not mentioned.
That night I soon fell asleep; and so ended the day of my arrival at Downlands Hall.
Chapter III MADEMOISELLE HORTENSE DE CHAMBONNARD
The next morning I woke up miserable. Since my father’s servant who had brought me here had departed, I had not seen a single male about the place. My sensation of utter loneliness at the full realization of this fact, which was vividly borne in upon me on awaking, made me completely wretched. What would become of me amidst a pack of women and girls, with no companion in an uncongenial feminine atmosphere against which I instinctively revolted?
I anticipated that I should be shorn of my manhood and made effeminate and good-for-nothing, that my strength and virility would be suppressed. I worked myself into a passion of rage and resentment against my parents for putting me to such a position, and resolved to write at once and expostulate in strong terms. I did not understand then that this was the very discipline they considered desirable. I arose with rebellion surging in my breast, and with a determination to give battle at the earliest opportunity and to assert myself.
All my surroundings felt strange and unnatural to the last degree as I indignantly dressed myself; and when Elise came to show me the way to the breakfast room, the climax was reached, and I told her roughly that I could find my way there myself. She looked angry, but merely said she was to show me the way and she whispered something to Mademoiselle when we got there.
Mademoiselle and the girls were dressed in charmingly simple dresses, and looked so fresh and beautiful that, for the time, I completely forgot my isolation and resolutions. An opportunity for battle soon arose. There were two letters for me, and Mademoiselle actually took them and opened and read them before my eyes, and would not let me look at them, or even tell me from whom they came. She merely remarked that they did not need any reply, and that I was neither to write nor receive any letters without her express permission. I protested, remonstrated, and expostulated; but it was useless. The girls looked on amused, but never uttered a word. I could, in my fury, have burst into tears and torn the letters from her. Mademoiselle remained quite collected and exasperatingly calm, gazing at me with a peculiar light in her eyes. I think she was revelling in my helpless raving and storming. She severely observed that I certainly did not know how to behave, and that she would give me a lesson afterwards in the schoolroom (at which I noticed the girls looked at each other very significantly), and bade me sit down, eat my breakfast, and hold my tongue, or that she would send me out of the room. I saw there was nothing else for it, so, very crestfallen, I at last sat down.
The hour for assembling in the schoolroom was half-past ten, so Mademoiselle told me when I had finished and she added I might go.
“Let me have my letters,” I cried passionately. “I will have them,” I added, walking up to the head of the table where she sat with them open in her right hand.
“No,” she answered very calmly, “you shall not have them. Leave the room.”
A little after half-past ten, I sullenly made my way to the schoolroom. Mademoiselle had not arrived, but the girls were there.
“Oh, Julian!” said Beatrice, looking up from the Dante she was conning over. “You will catch it! How ever could you be so rude and violent?”
“Catch it!” I rejoined. “What do you mean? I have a perfect right to my own letters; and I call her conduct dishonourable.”
“You won’t talk like that in an hour or two, my boy,” remarked Maud from her easel in the window.
“A little smart feminine discipline will certainly make a great change,” chimed in Agnes, who was arranging some flowers.
“Nonsense,” said I, wildly. “That she can’t do!”
“Do!” they ejaculated in chorus. “What can’t she do?”
“I suppose,” added Maud, “he has never heard of a riding whip. Mademoiselle has a horridly cruel little whip. Ay! How it bites!” and she laughed.
“Or of the regime of the stay-lace, or of fifty other ways young ladies have for breaking in refractory boys,” went on Agnes. “Never mind,” in a tone of mock consolation, which maddened me, “he will soon be initiated.”
“She whip me! At my age, and before you, girls! You must be mad to think she would dare to do such a thing. You are only laughing at me. I should fight. I am much stronger than she is.”
“You will like petticoats, however,” said Maud. “You will find you have to submit to them. And she is sure to punish you in front of us. You will not have many clothes left to conceal your hidden charms: and if you turn out to have as nice a figure in reality as you seem to have now, I shall get Mademoiselle to let you pose for me as a model for an Apollo.”
“Julian,” said Beatrice, “take my advice and submit quietly, dear boy. Your resistance will only make things worse.”
“I believe you’re gone on him already, Bee,” laughed Agnes.
“Mind, you’ll have to go shares!” At which they all laughed.
I was horrified and disgusted. Could such things be? My first impulse was to fly, to rush to my own room, lock myself in, get together a few necessaries, and escape.
But, at that moment, Mademoiselle entered, very determined-looking. She spoke a few words to each of the girls about their work, and then sat down in her low chair, very elegantly and gracefully.
“Now, Master Julian,” she said, “you have to realize that I am your governess and that you are my absolute slave. Don’t interrupt! From you I shall expect and shall exact the most implicit obedience and the most abject submission. You will tremble hereafter at the mere rustle of a petticoat; by it you are to be governed. If you are sufficiently foolish to continue your insubordination and the ridiculous temper you displayed this morning, it will be the worse for you.”
“Mademoiselle,” I broke in, “I do not understand you; my father sent me here because I am too delicate for school.”
“And too unruly for home. Too indecent!” (at which I blushed). “Too inquisitive! Too anxious to know what young ladies have under their petticoats.” (I was dumbfounded, and furtively glanced at the girls who were eagerly listening.) “Yes! I know all about it. The petticoat will have its revenge now, and you will be under it in more senses than one for some time. Kneel down there at my feet.” (I hesitated, especially seeing the girls highly amused.) “Kneel down at once,” she repeated, settling herself in her chair, and assuming a more erect attitude, “and put your hands behind you.”
This was not very bad after all, and I felt so abashed and ashamed, and had so little to say for myself, that I complied somehow. Then Mademoiselle rang a hand bell.
“Elise,” she said, “strap this boy’s elbows behind his back as tightly as you can.”
Elise grasped me firmly by the upper part of the arm. I was surprised to feel her strength. The little resistance I made was soon overcome. I cannot describe the mixture of sensations I experienced with her standing over me, my head level with her waist, and at her pulling me about roughly as she delighted in executing Mademoiselle’s order.
I noticed what Zola describes as “a powerful feminine perfume"–the odor de femina.
At last two straps were buckled tightly round my arms, just above the elbows. In each strap was a small metal ring.
Elise passed a white cord three or four times through these rings, and then proceeded to pull them as closely together as possible. Oh, how she hurt! I thought she would have broken my arms. I cried out, I resisted as much as I could, but the improvised pulley was too much for me. I writhed in my endeavours to get free, but she stood over me and kept me down.
“Tighter,” said Mademoiselle.
And at last, when my elbows nearly touched each other, Elise fastened the cords and stood up, looking very pretty with the flush upon her smiling comely face caused by her exertions.
“Now, Elise, make him kneel quite close to my knees. Put that belt round his waist, and fasten his ankles to it at the back, so that he cannot get up. Now, Master Julian,” she went on when this had been done, “you are in a fit state for punishment and you shall have it. You were rude to me about those letters.” Smack, smack, in my face, one on each cheek: one with the left, the other with the right hand. How those soft, lovely, dimpled hands stung! How my cheeks tingled!
How I struggled in absolute helplessness to get free! “You object to a governess, to feminine domination, to petticoat-rule"–giving me two smacks at each enumeration. “I think I shall convert you. You see"– smack, smack–"you must endure it.”
I would not have believed two dainty little hands could have caused such pain. Kneeling at Mademoiselle’s pretty feet, in close proximity to her, and seeing her graceful figure each time she raised her arms to inflict me punishment, was I own, at first, some assuagement of my pain. But at last the smacking she gave my cheeks made my head swim and I became so silly and bewildered that I was almost unconscious by the time she put the backs of her hands alternately to my lips and made me kiss them and thank her.
“Oh, please undo my arms and let me get up.” I longed to move about and to put my hands up to my face; but she refused.
Instead, she enquired of Elise whether I had not been rude to her.
“Yes, Mademoiselle, very rude. Master Julian spoke to me most rudely when I went to his bedroom to show him the way to the breakfast room.”
“Very well, Elise. Out of school hours Master Julian is to be under you tomorrow and the two following days, and by that time I trust you will have made him respect you. And now, Julian, you shall be deprived of your trousers. Take a long leave of them. When you will see them again, I do not know; they teach you all sorts of resistance and naughtiness and make you assume airs of ridiculous superiority which you do not possess. We must make a girl of you. Elise, make him stand up and take them off.”
“Oh, Mademoiselle! Oh, please do not before you and the girls. Oh, don’t–” Elise, however, speedily unfastened the straps which kept me kneeling, but kept my elbows still confined, and busied herself in unfastening my buttons. Maid like, she tore open all the front first, to my intense shame, and then fumbled round my waist with both hands at once, kneeling before me.
I cannot describe what I felt at being close to a girl in this condition with her hands busy about me, the front of my principal garment opened and violated, and my person almost coming into actual contact with her swelling bosom as she proceeded with uncompromising promptitude and rapidity to unfasten my trousers, my governess and the three girls looking on with amusement. I myself felt like a fowl about to be roasted and was nearly stupefied with shame.
Presently the braces were unfastened and Elise at once pushed my trousers and drawers down to my heels, not hesitating to move her hands freely about my person, even putting her arm between my legs to effect her purpose. In the midst of my abasement, I noticed an incipient sensation of what I felt when I had lifted the nursery maid’s garments. Truly the tables were turned on me, for now, before women and girls, my own legs, from the end of my shirt to my ankles, were bared and displayed, naked. Elise next, with little ceremony and much disconcerting violence, pulled off my shoes and socks; then tore off the drawers and trousers, rolled them up, and deposited them on a chair.
My cheeks burned and I felt horridly defenceless.
“Now, Julian, how do you feel? To enforce your subjection to the petticoat, the emblem of the female sex, and to show your domination by it, you shall stand in the corner with one over your head until half-past twelve, when lessons are over. Elise, fetch one of my red flannel petticoats out of the soiled linen basket in my room.”
Elise soon returned with the garment required. “Tie it together at the top–so! Now throw it over his head. There, now he is under the petticoat! Put him in the corner; and at half-past twelve, Julian, she will come and take you to my bedroom, where I shall birch your bottom for you as smartly as ever a boy’s bottom was birched.”
I winced at her threat and at her talking so freely of my bottom. There was not much to hide it from sight and they must have caught glimpses of it as Elise hustled me sharply into the corner. What could I do, my arms fixed immovably, my head wrapped up in a red petticoat of Mademoiselle’s, and myself overcome by the pungent odour I was then quite unacquainted with, but with which I subsequently became only too familiar? I was also terrified to think of the birching in store for me.
Lessons went on just as if I had not been there. Beatrice made some blunders with her Dante and (would that I could have seen!) had to lie across an ottoman, have her petticoats turned up, and receive a dozen cuts with Mademoiselle’s little whip, and then be deprived of her drawers for the day. I heard her muffled sobs and imagined the scene, the smallest peep of which my pinioned arms and the petticoat covering my head prevented my obtaining. I trembled at the sound of the punishment and already began to repent and make resolutions of obedience. Obedience, alas! I did not know then that the infliction of punishment, whether deserved or not, was an integral part of my handsome governess’ discipline and system, and that I should be whipped merely for being a boy! A great deal of courage had left me with my trousers, and, smothered as I was, I longed for some covering for my bare legs. I wondered what on earth would happen to me during the three days I was to be under Elise.
At last, half-past twelve arrived. The girls went off and so also did Mademoiselle. In a few minutes Elise came for me.
She whipped off the petticoat, and taking hold of my ears from behind, roughly and angrily hustled me off in front of her, giving me every now and then a dreadful thump behind, first with one knee, then with the other.
“Get along, Master Julian, you bold young rascal. What! You complain of my being rough to you–I will be as rough to you as your tongue was to me. Wait till tomorrow, and the next day, and the next, when I shall have you in my power! You will have some reason to complain of my hurting you then!”
In this ignominious manner, out of breath, my ears feeling as if they were being torn out, my arms aching as though they would break, and my head in a whirl with the slapping I had had, I was bundled into Mademoiselle’s bedroom to have my bottom birched by her.
Chapter IV THE BIRCH
A sort of mesmeric influence seemed to have crept into me from that intensely feminine garment which had been in such close contact with Mademoiselle’s own person and then so long over my head and face as I stood disgraced in the corner. It seemed to have sapped my strength and all my powers of resistance, to have undermined my self-respect, to have rendered me contemptible in my own eyes; in short, to have completely emasculated me. I had felt my virility ebbing away during the hours I had stood with the red thing enveloping my shoulders, touching my eyes and nose and mouth, conscious all the while that it was a woman’s petticoat which had been worn, and that a thing so essentially feminine had, willy-nilly, been forced upon me.
I had gradually, step by step, to give in to the flood of feminine associations which rushed upon me, and yield by degrees to the power of woman. I was keenly aware that nothing could save me, that all opposition was useless and hopeless, and I was slowly drifting towards the knowledge that I must sooner or later abandon myself absolutely to it.
I stood before Mademoiselle, cowed and humiliated, not so much at the prospect of the beating as at the sense of my own helplessness in her hands, because she was feminine and could therefore do with me what she liked. Whatever it was, I knew I had no power left to resist, and trembled at the inevitable acknowledgment of this fact to myself. She seemed the embodiment of triumphant womanhood as I was hustled into her presence, shaken and pulled about by another woman, to be whipped by her.
As I stood before Mademoiselle, my hands still tied, my ears red and tingling from Elise’s rough usage, panting and out of breath, my back sore from the rude thumps of Elise’s knees, my courage gave way and my eyes filled with tears, which the poignant sense of my abasement caused to overflow.
I could only hold my head and yield in silent resignation and despair.
Let not the reader, however, imagine that I was subdued at once. No, there was many a reaction. A constant revolt of all my manhood which required many severe lessons to quell and conquer finally.
But I must confess that as time went on, my disgust lessened, these revolts were divided by longer intervals, and at last I became a wretched petticoat-slave.
Mademoiselle looked on haughtily. Her form dilated and expanded with the sense, so agreeable to a woman, of power over something male. She looked like a magnificent bird of prey, a regal and feminine eagle, about to swoop upon her victim. She stood erect, her head thrown back, consciously displaying her well-developed bust and elegant figure; her air of determination and pretty wilfulness much enhancing her charms. There was something arch about her manner as she quizzed me upon my first introduction into a lady’s bedroom.
She asked me, as she significantly handled a light, long, and elastic birch, how I liked the prospect of my first assignation. She remarked that I had been introduced in all due form by her maid to whom she proceeded to give a guinea out of my pocket money (which Mademoiselle had charge of) in recognition of her services. Mademoiselle produced a sovereign and a shilling and gave them to Elise before my eyes, to my intense and ill-concealed annoyance, which increased her merriment, and Elise thanked me with mock politeness and gratitude.
Mademoiselle promised me by way of consolation, that the maid should be sent out and that consequently I should have the advantage of an entirely private tete-a-tete with her, and enquired whether I was not rejoiced at my good fortune?
I do not know what it was, but something or other in these words, or what they suggested, quite changed my mood, and I let my eyes rest on her affectionately and admiringly, and said that I indeed appreciated the favour; a remark which brought me a sound slap in the face. Again disconcerted, I determined that nothing should allow me to be made a further fool of, and resolved not to utter another word.
The room was a large one and very handsomely furnished. The extremely pretty bed stood under a heavy silk canopy across the angle of the room farthest from the fireplace, the canopy suspended from the ceiling and the carved oak bedstead standing clear of the walls. There were several quaint, cosy-looking chairs about, and bowls of spring flowers.
Mademoiselle stood between me and the light, tall and graceful in her severely simple black mousseline de laine dress, displaying her womanly figure to the fullest advantage. As I contemplated her in my wretched condition I felt yet more abjectly humiliated. A novel sensation of awkwardness again replaced my habitual self-possession, an inveterate stupidity my ordinary sprightliness and vivacity.
There I stood, a great boy, trussed like a fowl, with nothing to conceal my bare legs but a shirt, which did not reach to my knees.
Mademoiselle ordered Elise to place a long carved bench of black oak, about a foot wide, in the middle of the room, and to put upon it a feather bolster which Elise, by means of tapes, tied to the bench. I was then compelled to stand across one end while Elise strapped my ankles close together underneath and then left the room. Mademoiselle went to the door, shut and locked it, and then turned full upon me. I could not but note as I trembled how her whole form glowed with smiling and triumphant satisfaction. She walked deliberately up to me, lifted my shirt up behind, and, to my intense shame, intently contemplated my back for some seconds; then, still holding up this undergarment and standing a little way off, she took up the birch and gave me some stinging lashes with it. I had never felt anything like it before. I had no idea that it would hurt one-tenth as much as it did, and was compelled to cry out.
Mademoiselle then, to my horror, unbuttoned my waistcoat and lifted my shirt with both hands high up in front. I could not move. I was speechless, as she stood facing me and examining my most secret possessions over which and along the front of my things she several times passed her dimpled hand. Then she let the shirt fall, untied my elbows, and taking up a lady’s jewelled riding whip, she remarked that I should be flogged naked. Standing at my left side she ordered me to take off my jacket and waistcoat. I hesitated and fumbled. Looking round she gave me a touch of the whip on my bare legs. If the birch smarted, that vicious little thing bit like fury.
I yelled and clapped my hands to my legs, but only to get them lashed also. She went on until, in desperation, I tore off my jacket and waistcoat.
“Now your shirt! Quick!”
Up went the whip, her eyes sparkling savagely. This time, without an instant’s hesitation, and without thinking about it, I whipped off my shirt more quickly than ever I had done before. And there I was, perfectly naked before her, red and overwhelmed with shame and smarting with pain. She leisurely regarded me, evidently intending not to spare me a single pang. She moved her hand along my back and shoulders, remarking that she thought the whip would mark my skin easily, and, by way of experiment, she gave me several more smart cuts with it on various parts of my body, each stroke causing me intense anguish. I cried out, and implored her to desist; but she merely gloated the more over my torture.
“Now,” she at length said, “your bottom must be put in a proper position for me to punish.”
“Oh, Mademoiselle, forgive me! Oh, I am sorry for my disobedience and folly! Do forgive me!...”
“I never forgive! Lie down on your face.”
I saw there was nothing for it but compliance; so, with a sigh like a gasp of despair, I obeyed her. She placed her hand on the back of my head and pressed it into the bolster.
The wide bench separated my thighs, pressing my most sensitive parts cruelly. She fixed a strap round my neck and passed it under the bench, placed another round the seat and my waist, and lastly fastened my hands together underneath the bench. My posture and the soft bolster (which soon became pleasantly warm) gave me a certain voluptuous feeling soon, however, to be dispelled by my sufferings.
“Now we shall see whether a girl can properly punish a boy’s bottom!!” How she dwelt on the shameful word! “Whether a youth is or is not to be subject to feminine discipline and rule and to his governess.” And, putting her hand from behind between my legs, she caught hold of what I was ashamed she should know I possessed, and pulled it about until I confessed to myself that I was her slave body and soul. Then, for the first time, was revealed to me the secret source whence woman’s power springs. A keen sense of the difference of sex was communicated to me through her taper fingers. Her skirts caused me an electric shock each time they touched me. The feminine characteristics of her form, as she stood over me, became indelibly stamped upon my being, and acquired for her and for the rest of her sex an absolute dominion from that moment over me. A look or the rustle of petticoat is enough for me now. At either I tremble.
This sway was established and emphasized by the cruel punishment of the most secret portions of my body which I then underwent at her hands. Regularly and deliberately was the birching given; the methodical administration of which I could not interrupt. I protested and swore; but I had to learn how cruelly women can punish–how relentlessly they slake their vengeance–what a lust they have to satisfy, when they have a male at their mercy, to deal unmitigated torture out to him. How they exercise that dominion over him which is so real, although often unacknowledged. Men are not subject to these motives and never punish so cruelly as women.
Only once was my torture stayed. Mademoiselle had flogged me from my right side and from my left. My sobs had given place to screams and yells; but Mademoiselle said she should insist on my taking punishment quietly, at which threat I gave a delirious laugh. She calmly opened a drawer, and took out a plum-shaped piece of wood with a leather loop at its thickest end, through which loop she slipped one of her scented handkerchiefs. Then she forced the plug into my mouth, and tied the ends of the handkerchief tightly behind my neck. I was nearly choked, and effectually gagged.
Perfectly indifferent to my sufferings, she resumed the punishment, merely remarking that I should have ten minutes more of it for making the gagging necessary.
When the ten minutes had expired there came an interval when the strokes, which had fallen with the even regularity and swing of a pendulum, the swing of which I had ascertained to the fraction of a second, ceased. I hoped it was over. I could not express the hope in words, so I groaned.
Mademoiselle had been whipping me across both ways. She now came to the top of the bench at my right, daintily lifted her skirts, and put her right leg across me. Then, almost sitting upon my neck and smothering me with her petticoats, the back of which fell to the floor over my head, she proceeded to flog me lengthwise. She was looking down my back, and I knew that behind me the wardrobe mirror reflected my open thighs. Although the strap had been loosened I could scarcely move my head; when I tried to do so, however, she pressed me more closely. I can give no idea of what I felt at my novel posture underneath a young woman.
She now struck lengthwise, more slowly but more viciously; the strokes cut like hot iron, and, as the pliant ends of the birch hit what lay between my thighs, I felt I was being murdered. The anguish was maddening, and if I recollected what she could see by lifting her eyes to the glass, it was with utter recklessness to the exposure.
“There, Master Julian, that’s enough for the first time. I think I have whipped you pretty severely. You will not care to set me at defiance again,” she complacently remarked, throwing herself into a great saddle-back easy chair, apparently somewhat exhausted.
I lay utterly prostrate, powerless to speak even had I not been gagged; all my strength was gone, and I smarted as though I had been scared with red hot wires. Presently she unstrapped and ungagged me, I could scarcely move. I was in a cataleptic or comatose state and only semi-conscious.
She resumed her seat, and bade me kneel at her feet. I obeyed mechanically. Had she bade me walk into a fire, I think I should have done so. I was thoroughly exhausted, my head sank upon her lap, and my tears flowed softly, but I soon began to feel better. She then bade me kiss her hands and the remains of the rod, and thank her humbly, but sincerely, for whipping me. Whatever she ordered I at once obeyed, deprived altogether of my own volition. She made me stoop down and kiss her feet and legs; for one delicious moment she held my head in soft imprisonment between her thighs. Beside myself from the effect of the pain, I am astonished still at the recollection of how my feelings towards Mademoiselle then underwent a most unreasonable but complete alteration. I loved her as violently as I had detested her before. I fell hopelessly in love with my cruel governess. I loved her because of her cruelty and became suddenly enthralled by a strong and anxious desire to press and fondle her. I worshipped the very ground on which she walked. Why was this?
Chapter V METAMORPHOSIS AND LUNCHEON
Mademoiselle reclined for some minutes in her chair, whilst I knelt between her knees with bowed head, drinking in, as it were, the luscious radiance which I had suddenly discovered encompassed her. She did not speak; she allowed the influence of her being and spirit to silently overcome me.
At last she rose, and pouring some wine into a large bohemian glass, she bade me drink; then, pointing to some clothes Elise had left behind her, told me to put them on.
I suppose the red grape juice made me defiant, for, on perceiving them to be a girl’s dress, I protested.
Mademoiselle simply said she was sure I should obey her.
Strange to say, that was enough, and I complied, only remarking that for her sake I wished to be a boy. She smiled and promised that I should tell her all about it after luncheon in her boudoir. With her help I then put on a chemise, long stockings, drawers, petticoats, a corset which did not fit, and I was buttoned up in a bodice. How strangely embarrassed I felt. But these feelings were swallowed up by a sense of disgrace when I found that outside all, I had to wear a pair of Mademoiselle’s own laced drawers, the waistband being tied round my neck, and my arms thrust through the legs as though they were sleeves.
These were fastened with garters at the wrists. In that guise I was to appear before the girls at luncheon in token of my subjugation and defeat, and of the rout and discomfit of my virility. Petticoats were difficult enough to put up with; this addition of a pair of drawers completed my abasement. However, the novelty and discomfort of the attire served somewhat to divert my attention from the intense humiliation I suffered, as did also the effort necessary to walk at all decently; for what with the high heels of the girls’ boots, which buttoned high up my legs and which felt like mountains under them–and what with the agitation of my nerves and my soreness from the severe whipping I had received at Mademoiselle’s hands–walking was no easy matter.
I blushed like a girl as I felt the feminine garments against my legs and saw the drawers about my arms. The delicate, minute, ladylike handkerchief, all laced and of no practical use whatever which I had to hold in my hand, made me feel really girlish; and when ushered into the luncheon room and introduced to my cousins as–"Miss Julia, instead of that very naughty boy Master Julian, who has been sent home"–I began positively to wonder whether I was not actually a girl. They made great fun of me in a quiet and exasperating way, saying the sleeves reminded them of a bishop under his wife’s thumb, and Agnes slyly suggested a cushion when she noticed that it hurt me as I sat down.
When I looked at Beatrice’s girlish figure, I felt I was a boy dressed up, and feared she would despise me forever.
She, however, said nothing; but when I handed her a plate and upset her wine glass in so doing, Mademoiselle bade her smack my face. She did so with a severity that startled me.
Whatever her real feelings towards me were, it was evident I need look for no mitigation of my punishment from her.
“You clumsy hussy,” exclaimed Mademoiselle, flushing angrily, when the leg of that damned linen thing upset Beatrice’s glass, sending the red wine all over the tablecloth, on to her pretty frock, and I stood dumbfounded by her.
“Beatrice, smack her face. Stand still, Miss, and keep your hands down!”
And Beatrice, with a half-vexed and half-amused air, who was rubbing out with her napkin the wine which had stained her gown, gently put the napkin down, and calmly stretching out her right arm to free her hand from its cuff and sleeve, she smilingly opened her pretty plump hands and looking full into my eyes gave my left cheek a stinging slap delivered straight from the shoulder.
Before I had time to recover she repeated the process on my other cheek.
“Resume your place, Miss Julia,” Mademoiselle directed in calm tones, “and remember, if you are so clumsy again, she shall slap you elsewhere.”
At this remark, Beatrice slowly lifted her eyes to mine, a little mocking smile playing about her mouth, and, by her expression, she plainly enquired how I liked the prospect, which prospect I can safely say I did not relish.
Quite cowed by my own awkwardness and its prompt punishment I sat down in disgrace and confusion, my cheeks tingling terribly. I should not at all have desired to be exposed to the tender mercies of Maud or Agnes, who seemed to be very contentedly awaiting an opportunity, and of the arrival of which, sooner or later, they evidently had no manner of doubt. And I am sorry to say that they were quite right as it happened in the sequel.
But Beatrice was the one who silently, as far as circumstances would allow, took me into her own irresponsible charge and whipped me whenever she thought I deserved it, or she had a mind to do so, at her own sweet pleasure. At odd times she gave me private instructions and lessons on various details as to how she wished me to behave and how to conform to the discipline I was subjected to. Of its relaxation she would not hear a word.
Thus it was that I soon found I had more governesses than one. Mademoiselle ruled by a mixture of sex and force-force which her sex made irresistible; but I could evade and escape her to some extent. Beatrice ruled by love, and her pains were sweet though sharp. My relations with her were too tender and too intimate to make it possible for me even to wish to elude her. From her I could not keep a secret, and from the very first she took it for granted that her wishes would be my law, and I tacitly assented. I had still a great deal to learn and have much to describe before reaching that period of my life to which what I have just written relates.
Chapter VI A LESSON IN PSYCHOLOGY
This afternoon, which I well and vividly remember, was full of novel and startling revelations and experiences for me. I had no real knowledge whatever, nor did I recognise the character of my passions and instincts. Although now wide awake, they were then totally blind, and perplexed me with doubts and curiosity as to their significance.
Of a subtle and indefinable influence I was very conscious, but its source was still a mystery to me, and its sway a puzzle. The company of a young woman affected me very differently from the companionship of men; why, I knew not.
I supposed Mademoiselle’s hand had excited me only because she had touched and played with an organ of which for some reason I felt ashamed, especially in connection with a woman. Why the drawers and petticoats kept me in a perpetual and delicious tremor of excitement, and made that organ grow inconveniently and painfully large and distil in an altogether unusual manner a pellucid essence, I did not know either.
To think of all this in connection with the propagation of our race never once struck me. How the human race propagated seemed to me like one of those dry matters to be found at the commencement of geographies with the explanation of the seasons, the revolution of the earth round the sun, &c.
The pretty boudoir was trimmed and pranked with rose-coloured silk and exquisite water colours, until it looked a perfect feminine thing. Its statuettes were feminine. A bust of Omphale; a replica of Hercules in the Borghese Casino, in her clothes; an Aurora conquering a reluctant Cephalous, who was on one knee, his arms bent back in her hands, and his shoulders entangled in and imprisoned by pretty legs.
The high priestess of this charming sanctuary, sunlit, rosy-coloured, perfumed, and delicious, was Mademoiselle.
Never had I seen her so alluring! She had promised to let me tell her “all about it” in her boudoir after luncheon and was keeping her word. She had given directions that we were not to be disturbed. She told me with winning softness that I had her now all to myself. My faults were all ignored or forgotten. Luncheon had revived her. Her spirits had lost that archness which had so disconcerted me, and she had become affectionate and gentle; yet I did not feel towards her as if she were my sister.
There were cravings which unconsciously affected me but the magic secret had not yet been imparted and I was content to admire as I reclined upon the luxurious divan. Her masses of black hair had become loosened, and its thick rolls contrasted with her white skin in a marvellous manner. Her ruby lips and white teeth, her pink ears, and lovely head so admirably poised upon an adorable bust, dazzled me with their beauty. Her body was thrown back in her big dormeuse, her ankles and even higher being exposed to my view. She had been pretending to read, and was sipping black coffee, and petted me with cake and red Burgundy, rich as nectar.
When suddenly I called to mind how she had treated me, and what she had seen, my cheeks burned more than they did from Beatrice’s slapping, and I noticed that the thought produced a strange medley of sensations on the organ violated by that beautiful hand and those taper fingers. I thought that some of my remarks brought a tinge of colour to her cheeks, but it may have been only the reflection of the rose-tender light of the apartment. She spoke in soft melodious tones, and although only twenty-three years of age, she appeared a complete woman of the world and entirely free from girlish ignorance.
“Now, Julian–for you wish to be a boy for me, and I will not now call you Julia, you have many things to tell me and here you have me in an amiable mood, all to yourself. What is it you have to confess? Begin.”
