"I was a very naughty boy, much given to play, in so much that Master Cheever openly declared, 'You, Barnard, I know you can do well enough if you will, but you are so full of play you hinder your classmates from getting their lessons, therefore if any of them cannot perform their duty, I shall correct you for it.' One day one of my classmates did not look at his book, and could not say his lesson, though I called upon him once and again to mind his book. Whereupon our master beat me.... The boy was pleased with my being corrected and persisted in his neglect for which I was still beaten and that for several days. I thought in justice I ought to correct the boy and compel him to a better temper; therefore after school was done I went to him and told him I had been beaten several times for his neglect and since master would not correct him, I would, and then drubbed him heartily." The famous Lancasterian system--that of monitorial schools--discountenanced the rod, but the forms of punishment were not wholly above criticism. They were the neck-and-hands pillory, familiar up to that date in England and America as a public punishment of criminals; wooden shackles; hanging in a sack; tying the legs together; and labelling with the name of the offence against rules. [Illustration: 12. Falsehood Punished. Illustration from _Early Seeds to Produce Spring Flowers_] I have found nothing to show that Dutch schoolmasters were as severe as those of the English colonies. Dr. Curtius, the first master of the Latin School in New Amsterdam, complained that "his hands were tied as some of the parents of his scholars forbade him punishing their children," and that as a result these unruly young Dutchmen "beat each other and tore the clothes from each other's backs." The contract between the Flatbush Church and schoolmaster, dated 1682, specifies that he shall "demean himself patient and friendly towards the children." The discipline of Master Leslie, a New York teacher of the next century, is described by Eliza Morton Quincy in her delightful _Memoirs_. The date is about 1782:-- "His modes of punishment would astonish children of the present day. One of them was to hold the blocks. They were of two sizes. The large one was a heavy block of wood, with a ring in the centre, by which it was to be held a definite number of minutes, according to the magnitude of the offence. The smaller block was for the younger child. Another punishment was by a number of leathern straps, about an inch wide and a finger long, with which he used to strap the hands of the larger boys."