where with stubborn enthusiasm we battered each other as if we had not
been sufficiently battered by the teacher. When we were so fortunate
as to finish a fight without getting a black eye, we usually escaped a
thrashing at home and another next morning at school, for other traces
of the fray could be easily washed off at a well on the church brae,
or concealed, or passed as results of playground accidents; but a
black eye could never be explained away from downright fighting. A
good double thrashing was the inevitable penalty, but all without
avail; fighting went on without the slightest abatement, like natural
storms; for no punishment less than death could quench the ancient
inherited belligerence burning in our pagan blood. Nor could we be
made to believe it was fair that father and teacher should thrash us
so industriously for our good, while begrudging us the pleasure of
thrashing each other for our good. All these various thrashings,
however, were admirably influential in developing not only memory but
fortitude as well. For if we did not endure our school punishments and
fighting pains without flinching and making faces, we were mocked on
the playground, and public opinion on a Scotch playground was a
powerful agent in controlling behavior; therefore we at length managed
to keep our features in smooth repose while enduring pain that would
try anybody but an American Indian. Far from feeling that we were
called on to endure too much pain, one of our playground games was
thrashing each other with whips about two feet long made from the
tough, wiry stems of a species of polygonum fastened together in a
stiff, firm braid. One of us handing two of these whips to a
companion to take his choice, we stood up close together and thrashed
each other on the legs until one succumbed to the intolerable pain and
thus lost the game. Nearly all of our playground games were
strenuous,--shin-battering shinny, wrestling, prisoners' base, and
dogs and hares,--all augmenting in no slight degree our lessons in