And indeed it is no wonder, to conclude on this subject, that the Kitchen had become the appropriated part of Palaces for serving flagellations. The Kitchen was the place of the general resort of those numerous bodies of Servants, who, in former times, filled the Houses of the Great: it was the place in which they deliberated upon every important occurrence; in which they kept their Archives; and where their General Estates were continually assembled. There Great Men were sure, upon every sudden emergency, to find a sufficient _Posse_ of Servants, ready to do any kind of mischief under the sanction of their Royal or Noble Master, and who were never so pleased as when their assistance was requested to effect a flagellation. When a Reverend Father Jesuit, or some saucy Friar Capuchin, was to be the sufferer, the contentment was, no doubt, much increased; but when the Buffoon himself, who commonly was the most mischievous animal of the whole Crew, was to be flagellated, then indeed we may safely affirm, that an universal joy and uproar prevailed over the whole Royal or Noble mansion. [68] Corrections of a flagellatory kind continue, in these days, to be looked upon as excellent expedients for insuring good order, in the houses of great people, in Russia, in some districts of Germany, and especially in Poland, where most of the feudal customs that prevailed two or three hundred years ago in other parts of Europe, are still in full force: _lower_ disciplines are, in the latter kingdom, the method commonly employed for mending the manners of Servants of both sexes. A regulation was made, a few years ago, in Poland, as it appeared from the foreign news-papers, with a view to abridge the power assumed by Masters in regard to their Servants. [69] The French word _Cuistre_, which is the common word to express a flagellator, in a public School, was the old word for a Cook: whence we may conclude, that, in large public Schools also, the people of the Kitchen were supposed to possess peculiar abilities for performing flagellations. CHAP. XIII. _The subject of voluntary flagellations among Christians is at last introduced. That method of self-mortification appears to have been practised in very early times; but it does not seem to have been universally admitted before the years 1047 and 1056; which was the time Cardinal Damianus wrote[70]._ Voluntary flagellations were not a practice that was contrived on a sudden, and then immediately diffused over the Christian world. Long before the period in which their use began to be universally adopted, they were practised by divers persons, in different times and places, as we may judge from the accounts that have been left us, of several early facts; a few of which I here purpose to relate.