Little could be seen of the schoolgirl. She was in any case very small - being only seven years old - but besides she was bent over with her head, forearms and elbows resting on the seat of an upright chair. As she had been ordered, her legs were straight so her tiny bottom was inescapably tightly bent. Beyond her stretched grey uniform skirt, her upper body curved away unseen by Mr Hadley, seated at his desk.

Of course, he knew what she looked like. Only a few minutes before he'd had her standing in front of his desk while he delivered a stern lecture that had already frightened the little girl close to tears. But then he had finished his scolding and imparted the awful information that he was going to cane her. After that, he had told her to remove her green blazer and take up her present pose.

Mr Hadley stood. He was a tall, well-built man who kept himself fit. He had played a lot of rugby when younger and even now, when he was in his forties, still played cricket and golf. He walked across the room and opened a cupboard door. He looked at the rack of canes inside and took his time selecting one - although he had known from the outset which one he would choose. Janet Stanton was one of the new intake to the school and as this was to be her first caning he chose the shortest, lightest cane available - though it still delivered a wicked sting. Having picked out the implement, he swung it in an arc, cutting the air to make a scary whistling sound. Little Janet twitched nervously at the sound. Mr Hadley was as firm a believer in psychological terror as he was in physical pain for punishing his pupils.

Mr Hadley moved behind the little girl. He could imagine her mounting anxiety, her heart hammering now against her ribs in her small, undeveloped chest. Looking down at her from his height, he could see the back of her small grey blouse, a short stretch of neck and a head of thick brown hair with its neat centre-parting and two chunky plaits hanging symmetrically, one on either side by her ears. He put down the cane on his desk and bent to take hold of the child's grey skirt. He lifted it over the small rotundity of her bottom and tucked the hem into the waistband so that it was kept clear of the seat of her regulation uniform bottle-green school knickers. It being 1955, these decently covered all of the little girl's cheeks. But not for long! Mr Hadley took hold of the elasticated waistband and with a brisk tug slid the knickers down over the little hump of the girl's bottom and along the short stretch of plump, pale thigh to her knees.

Mr Hadley smiled. The child's bare bottom looked almost absurdly small, the tiny cheeks poignantly vulnerable. Not that Mr Hadley felt any pity; he enjoyed this first baring of a new girl's bottom, this initial display of previously hidden flesh, as yet unmarked. He liked to imagine the tumult of emotions - fear and shame predominating - that churned in the child's mind as she waited in desperate dread.

Most of the girls who came Mallingbury were no strangers to physical punishment, but many had previously felt nothing worse than a parental hand spanking their bottoms, the cane being a terror not yet encountered. Mr Hadley wondered if Janet Stanton was one of these. Her father, he remembered, was a respected local architect who could afford to send his daughter to this prestigious private day school. He had readily approved the school's disciplinary system, which was, after all, not particularly unusual for the times, but that did not necessarily mean he had used an implement on his little daughter himself. Well, if not, it would be salutary experience for the little girl.

Mr Hadley recalled himself to his duty. This agony of apprehension was part of the child's punishment, of course, but he did not like to delay too long with these ingénues. He had once had a fretful seven-year-old nervously lose control of her bladder during this anxious prelude and pee all over the lino. He had made her - still half-naked as she was - go and fetch a mop and bucket to clear up the mess. And when she had done that, he had caned her soundly, adding extra strokes for her lack of proper British pluck. But comical though the incident had been at the time, the stink of urine had lingered for weeks in his study and he had no wish to repeat the experience. He picked up the cane and measured a suitable distance by tapping the business end against the schoolgirl's small buttocks. He was amused to see the tiny cheeks flinch nervously in response. He lifted the cane, waited a few fluttering heartbeats, and then with plenty of wristy energy swept it down across the schoolgirl's tiny bottom.

"Ow!" Janet squealed shrilly, and her small body jerked in reaction to the sudden pain. A thin red weal - broken by the crease of her bottom - appeared across her cheeks.

Mr Hadley noted the schoolgirl's response; it made it seem unlikely that she had ever been beaten seriously before. He raised the cane and swished it across the defenceless cheeks a second time. Janet's "Ouch!" of pain was louder and shriller and her bottom - now marked with parallel lines - squirmed. Mr Hadley waited. And then swept the cane across Janet's buttocks again.

This time Janet screamed and burst into a flood of tears. Mr Hadley calmly watched this display of suffering. It was no more than he expected. Had she not been crying by now he would have felt obliged to increase the severity of the thrashing until she did. Not that he showed any particular mercy with the next cut that had her bawling even louder. Ignoring the noise, Mr Hadley methodically aimed and let fly with another whistling swish of the cane. Janet screamed piercingly and her tears flowed faster. Finally, Mr Hadley flicked his wrist to send the cane cracking across the very tops of Janet Stanton's thighs, making her screech like a banshee.

Satisfied, Mr Hadley told the little girl to stand facing him, which she did shakily, snot bubbling from her tiny nose, tears streaming down her face. Automatically, her trembling hands moved to try to soothe her smarting cheeks, but at Mr Hadley's snapped command, she quickly put her palms on her head. Mr Hadley bent and tucked up the front of her skirt. Whenever her punished a girl he always liked to check her little slit, which in this case was certainly small, being just an insignificant groove between her thighs. Poor Janet did not even notice this intimate examination, her attention being taken up with the searing pain in her bottom. Then, his curiosity satisfied, Mr Hadley barked an order at the little girl and she hobbled to the corner to face the wall, with her skirt still up, her knickers around her knees and her red-striped bottom on display.

While Janet Stanton cried in the corner, Mr Hadley completed the entry in the official Punishment Book. This done, he took a fresh card from his own index system and wrote the Janet Stanton's name at the top. He then filled in the details of her punishment, including her response. He kept this private record of all the punishments he administered. When he had finished, he filed it away in the little drawer and looked across at the still sobbing chastised child.

Janet's bottom was so small that the six cane strokes completely covered it, the dark weals almost touching with crimson swollen flesh between. She would keep the marks for a few days. It had been a severe thrashing, right enough, but all punishments at Mallingbury were intended to be rigorous. However, none of the lines actually crossed, he noted with a sense of pride; his aim had been excellent. Frequently the strokes did overlap, sometimes by accident or unavoidably because of the large number of cuts administered to a girl's small bottom, but often the headmaster deliberately laid the strokes across each other, leaving a criss-cross pattern that would result in great pain and considerable bruising. However, he usually reserved this sort of treatment for the hardened malefactors whose parents were unlikely to object.

Not that he received many complaints, he mused, still studying the reddened bum of the noisily weeping girl. Over the years, only two sets of parents had gone so far as to remove their daughters from the school because of the harshness of their punishments. There had been a few more who had questioned the severity of his disciplinary policy before coming, with various degrees of reluctance, to accept it, but these were rare cases; the majority of parents either silently approved his right to discipline their daughters, or, in a surprising number of cases, enthusiastically encouraged their children's' chastisement.

Janet's crying subsided to sobs. Mr Hadley told her to pull up her knickers and rearrange her clothes. When she was decent, he gave her another stern lecture and then told her to return to her lessons. Naturally, she would have a detention after school to make up the work she had missed. The theory was that when she returned red-eyed to her class to sit uncomfortably at her desk, the other girls would learn from her example and the standard of behaviour would therefore be improved. In fact, Mr Hadley could rely on his teachers to supply a steady stream of naughty schoolgirls for punishment almost regardless of their conduct

There were eight classes in the school - two for each year (7+, 8+, 9+, 10+). Each had around twenty pupils, making about a hundred and sixty girls in total. He gave around two hundred punishments a term - an average of a little over one caning for each pupil - so on a typical school day he thrashed three girls. Of course, these were only middling figures - some days he caned fewer than three girls, some days more. Similarly, some girls were caned a lot more than once a term - a few had been known to be caned two or even three times in a week - and some were rarely caned at all. However, it was unknown for any girl, no matter how scholarly or well behaved, to complete her career at Mallingbury without being bent over for a thrashing at least once. Hence Mr Hadley's card index system extensively cross-referenced. He liked to have every girl's details readily available.

Mr Hadley continued to work away at his desk for some time before he was interrupted by a nervous knocking at his door.

"Enter!" he declaimed like the voice of doom. Mr Hadley recognised the incomer as Denise Gardiner, a tall ten-year-old with a mop short, dark blonde hair. Denise nervously handed over a folded sheet of paper.

"Please sir, Miss Montjoy told me to give you this." Mr Hadley unfolded the note, but did not bother to read the schoolgirls' offence. Denise was a regular visitor to his study.

He gave his customary lecture on discipline, but he doubted Denise listened, she had heard it all before. She was certainly much more concerned with what she was going to get when he had finished. For the occasional culprit, the normal punishment was between four and ten strokes of the cane, depending on the gravity of the transgression, but for frequent offenders, like Denise, a heavier ration of between eight and fifteen was customary. Today, Mr Hadley decided to give this girl a dozen strokes.

"Step over by that chair," he directed when he had come to the end of his reprimand. Denise obeyed, taking up a position still facing him by the chair over which little Janet had recently bent. "Take off your blazer and hang it on the back," he instructed.

Denise did so. She now stood in her grey blouse, green and gold striped tie, grey skirt, grey knee-high socks and black lace up shoes. Take off your skirt," the headmaster ordered curtly. Denise obeyed without question; she was used to this ritual. Mr Hadley looked where her bottle-green school knickers pulled tight across her groin outlining the split bulge of her vulva.

"Tuck your blouse up," he told her. She obeyed and her saw the small swell of her tummy up to her navel. "Now take off your knickers," he said coldly.

The schoolgirl's pale complexion suddenly glowed warmly with a blush of embarrassment, although she had expected nothing else. With only the merest hint of hesitation she slid the knickers down her long legs and stood first on one foot and then the other to pull them over her shoes, then she put them tidily on the seat of the chair with her skirt. Her hands twitched to cover her groin, but she forced them to her sides and stood awaiting the headmaster's further instructions.

Mr Hadley looked at the child. He had seen her like this many times during her time at the school as she had early on warranted a reputation with the teachers as one of the more obstinately difficult girls and was consequently never given the benefit of any doubt, but was sent immediately to him for punishment for the slightest breach of rules. She was now one of the oldest girls in the school - nearly eleven - but he was pleased to see that her prominent pudendum remained as bald as it had been when he had first seen her as a little girl of seven. How many canings had he given her since then? He'd need to consult his index, but well over fifty, he reckoned.

She had grown even taller during the holidays. Her legs were coltishly long and, another sign that she was growing up, the front of her grey blouse was pushed out by two small but obvious points. He would like to have told her to take that off as well, but although she would undoubtedly have obeyed, in the unlikely event of her complaining it could lead to trouble. Although parents accepted that the indecent exposure of their daughters was necessary for proper chastisement, they were liable to object if their children were denuded for no good reason. Never mind, he consoled himself, he would make it his business to inspect a gym lesson in the near future. Showers after physical exercise were obligatory for the girls and the sight of two-dozen wet, naked girls was always amusing and would give him a chance to check on their development. Meanwhile, he had an entertaining duty to perform here.

Mr Hadley cleared his papers from the top of his desk and told Denise to bend across it. While she stretched herself across the polished wood, Mr Hadley went to his cupboard to select a suitable cane. This time he made no pretence of testing different possibilities, but immediately chose the longest, swishiest, most severe weapon in his armoury. He swept it through their next to the unfortunate girl. Whereas the cane he had used on Janet had whistled, this one made a deeper whooping sound as it cut the air. After a few more terrorising sweeps, he turned to his victim. "Tiptoes," he instructed succinctly.

From familiarity born of long experience, Denise went up on her toes. This had several good effects from the headmaster's point of view: it made her more uncomfortable, it raised her bottom so that it jutted out at a better angle, and it stretched the skin. He looked down at her tightly rounded buttocks. Luckily, although she was slender, Denise had a well-developed bottom. This was a result not only of her being the best athlete in the school, but also because she had been frequently spanked with a variety of implements since early infancy.

The headmaster stood a little to Denise's right side and tapped her firmly muscled cheeks with the further length of the cane. He raised it, and with twist of the wrist swooped it down to land with a sharp crack across her bottom. The flesh dented for an instant where the cane bit before springing back into shape, a raised red weal marking the line of livid pain. Denise gasped, but otherwise did not betray her suffering. The headmaster paused to allow the full impact to register in the child's mind and then struck again. Denise's gasp was sharper now as a second ridge of agony was imprinted on her skin.

So it went on as a third, fourth, fifth and sixth stroke cut across the child's vulnerable cheeks and new lines of torture were placed parallel with the others and Denise's gasps became half-stifled squeals. Then, on the seventh stroke, Mr Hadley deliberately brought the cane down a slight angle so that it cruelly cut across several of the existing weals. Denise jumped and let out was high yell as her tortured nerve endings registered the extra agony. The next stroke also made on the diagonal. Denise's bottom jumped and jerked uncontrollably as even that stubbornly gutsy girl began to cry. The next two strokes went straight across Denise's buttocks, but of course, these now cut across the two diagonal weals and one of them also landed right on top of an existing welt making Denise scream loudly. The last two strokes the headmaster aimed at the schoolgirls' thighs. He didn't mind leaving visible marks on this girl; it would scare some of the other pupils and inform her parents who, he was sure, would want to take action themselves.

After the thrashing, Denise spent a good ten minutes crying in the corner before being allowed to dress and resume her place in class. He knew she would be badly bruised and would not sit comfortably for days.

When Denise had left his study, Mt Hadley continued with the multitude of tasks a headmaster had to fulfil, but in the middle of the afternoon there came a lightly tremulous knock on his door.

"Enter!" he boomed sternly, wondering who would answer his summons. He was surprised to see it was Maureen Gibson, who was not only a swot but also one of the best-behaved girls in the school. The nine-year-old stood before his desk snivelling, her brown eyes glazed with tears.

"Miss Roswell told me to give you this," she sobbed, handing over a note.

The headmaster scanned it rapidly. It said Maureen had been talking in class and had then insolently lied. He guessed it was all a mistake. This teacher was notoriously shortsighted and quick to misunderstand any situation. But teachers had to be backed up if discipline was to be maintained and anyway he welcomed the chance to beat this paragon who had already been at the school for two years without deserving any discipline. However, he could expect the possibility of a complaint from her parents. Both were earnest academics and he doubted if they had ever so much as raised their hand to their virtuous daughter. Nonetheless, he had every right to chastise any child under his control and he was determined to do so.

He began by giving Maureen a stern scolding that alone reduced her to tears. Of course, he gave her an even angrier telling off for that. While he went through this customary procedure, at least half his mind was on what he was going to do with the girl after that. Although certainly not fat, Maureen was a normally robust nine-year-old and he had no qualms about giving her a sound thrashing no matter how much her parents might later object. And then there was the matter of indecency. The Gibsons were strict churchgoers and would definitely be prudes where their daughter's modesty was concerned. Nonetheless, he was determined to take this chance to expose her private parts.

When he had finished telling her off, Mr Hadley stood and went behind Maureen. He reached forward, unbuttoned her blazer and slipped it from her shaking shoulders. He put it on the chair back and sat on the seat. He turned Maureen around so that she faced him. He bent, untied her shoelaces and slipped her shoes from her feet. Next, he turned his attention to the hook and eye fastenings of her skirt.

"Oh please don't," she sobbed as her grey uniform skirt fell to the floor, and then squealed as he slapped her leg and told her to be quiet. After that, he hooked his fingers into the waist of her green knickers and pulled them down while she gave a long moan of mortification as she was shamefully exposed. He tucked back her grey blouse so that his view should not be obscured and made a close examination of her genital cleft.

When Mr Hadley's curiosity regarding Maureen's vulva was satisfied, he stood and went to the cupboard where he kept his canes. Most of the whippy rods of rattan hung along a rail by their curly handles. They varied in length between about twenty-eight and thirty-six inches and were of differing diameters. These were the canes he mostly used, preferring to stand to deliver with the girl bent before him so that he gained the extra leverage from his height and the cane's length. But this time he decided to cane the terrified Maureen across his knees and use one of the shorter, straight sticks he kept in a stand on the floor. He selected a whippy length of rattan measuring about twenty inches that would be suitably severe, but easily manageable in that position. He picked it up and returned to the shaking child.

Mr Hadley sat down and pulled the wailing Maureen across his knees. He knew that she would struggle violently and so he made sure to keep her close to his body so that her left hand was trapped behind it. He twisted her right arm up her back and held it there in his left hand, which also served to pin her down. Her crotch pressed against his right thigh and her fat little bottom was bent across it. Her legs dangled, her feet not reaching the floor - altogether, a very satisfactory position!

Maureen was still protesting her innocence desperately begging to be let off the caning, but he ignored her babbling and raised the cane for a hearty swipe across her squirming buttocks. She shrieked as if he had branded her with a red-hot poker, and the sudden weal that marked her cheeks certainly gave that appearance. As usual, he waited a few moments, partly to let her injured nerve endings receive the full impact of their agony and partly to heighten her anxiety, then he swept the rattan rod across her tender cheeks again.

"YEEAEIOU!" Maureen screamed. Her hips rocked from side to side as she writhed across him and her little legs pumped the empty air as if she was trying to escape the hideous torment of her beaten bottom. It did her no good. The cane swished down and cracked across her wriggling rear making her scream again.

"STOPPIT! STOPPIT! PLEEEEASE!" Maureen screeched, and her struggles became even more frantic. It was just as well he had not relied on her maintaining a bent position herself, he mused, as he whacked the cane across her jumping buttocks.

Unfortunately for Maureen, her frenzied attempts to avoid the blow made the headmaster miss his aim slightly and the cane cut slantwise across the lower part of her bottom so that the tip bit into the top of her right thigh. That made her screech like a soul in torment - which she no doubt was, especially when Mr Hadley deliberately aimed the next stroke to run along side the last.

The headmaster suddenly realised that he had not decided on how many strokes to give this little girl. In fact, he was not even sure how many he had given her already. His eyes traced the separate weals - one, two, three, four, five. He decided to give her four for talking in class and another four for denying it: eight, which meant three more to come.

Maureen's ear-splitting scream made Mr Hadley's head ring as he cracked the cane across the schoolgirl's sorely inflamed buttocks. She was certainly not one to suffer in silence, he thought to himself with a smile. To judge by this response, she had never been so much as smacked seriously in her life before, which was most unusual for Mallingbury girls and made a parental protest inevitable. No matter, Maureen would have her allotted punishment regardless of any repercussions. And so, for a seventh time the cane cut across the child's striped cheeks and again she howled her torment. Mr Hadley made sure that the last stroke of Maureen's punishment landed squarely across the very meatiest part of her bottom, making her shriek again.

The headmaster stood the bawling girl on her feet and led her to the corner where he told her to stand still with her hands on her head. In fact, he ignored the fact that she jigged from foot in a futile attempt to ease her tortured bottom. It took much longer than was usual for Maureen to calm down enough for her to be returned to her classroom. While he waited, Mr Hadley made detailed notes on what he though might well be her only beating.

As he watched the howling, wriggling schoolgirl, it occurred to Mr Hadley that although he generally used this over the knee position only for girls like Maureen, it might be a humiliating arrangement for the habitual culprits like Denise. He imagined the athletic girl's pudendum pressed against his leg as he thrashed her. Yes, it could be interesting he thought.

Eventually, Mr Hadley sent off the sore-bottomed schoolgirl, even though she was still weeping miserably. He leaned back in chair at his desk. He felt sorry for those unfortunate people who were not contented in their work. For himself, he was a very happy headmaster!