Good old days of Grammar schools

Interesting to read that in Russia, where "10,000 men and women a year were exiled to Siberia", and undoubtedly forced to endure some absolutely appalling conditions, the flogging of children was forbidden from 1864 onwards(Review,The House of the Dead:Siberian Exile under the Tsars,01/10/16).         Approximately one hundred years later, I and many of my fellow pupils were being flogged in our prestigious grammar school, so much so that the bruises and ridges in our bottoms would still be evident days later. Unlike the "banter between governor and the convicts" at Irkutsk prison, terms like "idiotic imbecile", and "half-witted nincompoop" were screamed in our faces, before being instructed to bend over.

Ah, the good old days of grammar schools!