At the time of which I speak it was a rule of faith with all Scotch schoolmasters that flagellation was the primary and most important agent in the work of education. “Spare the rod, and you spoil the child,” should have been written over the door of every parochial school. Every boy who entered the portals of my Scotch school with a consciousness of being imperfect in any lesson, left all hope of immunity from the tag behind him. The slightest mistake in spelling, or in saying the Shorter Catechism—that hated Shorter Catechism!—was punished by one or more strokes of the tag on the extended hand. I have seen the order go down a whole class, “Hold out your hand, sir.” And crack, crack, crack went the tag on our unflinching palms. We knew if we flinched we should get a double dose, and perhaps on another and more sensitive part of our bodies. I think I may safely say that a day never passed without a flogging. Two or three times a week the “tag” was the occasion of a regular scene. This was when some spirited or big boy refused to hold out his hand or untruss. I remember one notable occasion when the master attempted to inflict the “extreme punishment” on a big ploughman of eighteen or nineteen. There was a regular fight between them: and several times master and pupil went down together on the floor, rolling and struggling with all the desperation of men engaged in a mortal combat. Both parties called upon the pupils to come to their assistance; but we, small boys, were too much alarmed to side with either, albeit our sympathies were decidedly with the ploughman. The result of this conflict was highly agreeable to us all. The dominie was laid up for a week with bruised legs, and during that time there was “no school.” The terror inspired by the tag caused the boys to frequently play the truant; in the vernacular this was called “fugieing.” Scarcely a day passed that some boy did not “fugie,” or fly the school. There was one boy who was particularly distinguished for this art. He had been punished for it over and over again, and beaten at all points until he was black and blue, but still he would “fugie.” He would come away from home in the morning with his satchel and dinner; but, instead of going to school, would betake himself to the forest, and spend the day in birds’-nesting, or in devouring “blaeberries.” When his retreat was discovered, the master started one morning in pursuit of him, followed by all the scholars in a pack. We had a regular hunt, and greatly we enjoyed the sport, not caring so much for the fate of the fugitive, as for the holiday and the exemption for a few hours from lessons and the tag. Sandy, for that was the fugitive’s name, was unearthed like a fox, and hunted like one, all through the wood, and over the burn, and up the hill-side to a clump of tall fir-trees, where, finding the dominie close upon him, with the tag vengefully waved aloft, Sandy clambered up the smooth stem of a