SCOLDS AND THEIR PUNISHMENTS.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 4, Issue 1014, 4 March 1882, Page 2 (Supplement)

SCOLDS AND THEIR PUNISHMENTS.

Our forefathers were men of mettled They -grappled with-this social, evLof,.B«>ldiflg,,, .and they found a possible remedy handy in tho Cuokirigl.Stopl, which certainly had come to them from Saxon times, as itjs mentioned in Domes-day Book, although it seems then to have been used to punish offenders of different, description. In speaking of r the city of. Chester, it. says:-" Vir aive mulier falsam monsuram in oivitate faoiensdeprehensuß, iiii, solid, emendab. Similiter •malam cervisiam faoiens, aut in Cathedra ponebatur Stercoris, aut iiii. solid, dab' prepotis." Hore we see it was then used for the exposition of those giving false measures, or selling bad beer. But it was a convenient and. harmless punishment, It invoked'no physioal hardsnip, and was applied ,'jto a scold in a very simple mariner. She, was only placed in it (being, of course, ''My' fastened in) and exposed outside her house;' or in some other place, for a given time, and so left to the gibes and insolent, remarks of the crowd, This was the first and gentlest' treatmeutof the disease. It gave no['personal'pain,', as did tho stocks, and rather shows the wish of our ancestors to Begin with moral suasion; hut finding .still, |thafe "her clam'rous tongue strikes pity deaf," they invented the tumbrel, on whioK. she was drawn round the, town, seated on tho ohalr, For instance, in the Common Hall accounts of the borough of Leiceotar, 1467, it was ordered " that sobldes be.puniihe'd.by the mayor on a cuok-stool before their own door, and then carried to the four gates of the town," And this failing,, the tumbrel was turned into the trebucket or movable ducking stool, and this, in its time, 'yielded l to the permanent ducking stool, which, mcording to Gay,' Beams at all events to' have I had terror for some:—

"I'll speed mo to the pond where the liiih stool, On the long plank, hangs on the muddy pool; That stool, the dread of every scolding queen,'' oil- '" i "■

Several old ouoklng stools, are yet in, existence,, and might, even if not used, be! of great service as warnings to ladies of intense and impassioned verbosity. There is one at Leicester, and in the old town records before quoted we find some curiouß facts relating to these stools. One was made in 1518 at a cost;of five shillings;, but could not have been very strong, as in 1852 there is; an entry " Paid for mending of the cuokstole tow tymes, vlijd." In 1558 and 1563 it was repaired at a cost each time of Is. 4d. In 1566 it required much mending. In 1578 a new one was made at a cost of 145,, and another in 1646 coat 16s. 6d., and the last one seems to have been in 1768.69: "Paid Mr. Elliott for a cuckstool by order of Hall, £2," There is another chair at VVootton Basset, which bears the date of 1686, which was also used on wheels, booked into ihe pond, and tipped up. There is one in the museum at Scarborough, in which jthe patient is fastened by an iron pin fastened through the arms, aftor the manner of a baby's chair. At Neath there used toibe one; but the scold had to be found guilty by six men before she could be punisfied. There was a fine one at Sandwich previous to 1792, on whioh .were a man and woman calling each other names; whilst on the cross-bar were the words:- . ; "Ofmemberayetongelsworstorbeat, i An yll tonge ofte doethe brcede unreste.'J Of themovablo stools, or tumbrels, which wore sometimes used for ducking, there is & very fino example at Leominster; it is a low platform on four wheels, having at one end two upright posts, through the top of whjich goes a pin, which pierces a long horizontal bar, having a chair at one end and a rope at the other, This seems to have been last used for the purpose of ducking in 1809,' when a somewhat notorious character, bne. Jenny Piper, was ducked. It was brought out again in, 1817, in order to punish Sarah Leeke, bnt she escaped, the water beingjtoo low.— All the Year Round, .