I have been rereading James Joyce's A Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man which includes more cp than I remembered. Unfortunately, most of it involves beating on the hands, rather than on the arse.
Early in the novel, Stephen Daedelus is having Christmas dinner with his family. Looking at the turkey, Stephen thinks, "Why did Mr. Barrett in Clongowes [the public school Stephen attends] call his pandeybat a turkey?" A footnote informs me that a pandeybat is "a stiff, reinforced leather strap."
One of the boys who seems to indulge in homo_s_e_x_ual activity is Simon Moonan. Early in the novel, someone calls Moonan "McGlade's suck," and Stephen reflects, "Suck was a queer word. . . The sound was ugly. Once he had washed his hands in the lavatory at the Wicklow Hotel and his father pulled the stopper by the chain after and the dirty water went through a hole in the basin. And when it had all gone down the hole in the basin had made a sound like that, suck. Only louder. To remember that and the white look of the lavatory made him feel cold and then hot. There were two _c_o_c_k_s that you turned and water came out cold and hot. . ." All sorts of homoerotic puns hover around this stream of consciousness reverie on _c_o_c_k_s and sucking sounds.
Later in the novel, Moonan and Tusker are caught "smugging" in the "square" one night. A footnote tells me that "square" means "the school latrine or lavatory." "Smugging" is footnoted as "probably a mild sort of homo_s_e_x_ual play." What the _f_u_c_k_ does that mean? For afficionados of British public school and Irish public school argot, I would love clarification: is this purely Irish slang, or British slang as well? What sort of homo_s_e_x_ual play? Mutual masturbation? Fellatio? Intercrural copulation (rubbing between the thighs or frottage)?
One of the schoolboys Fleming asks, "we are all to be punished for what the other fellows did?"
"I won't come back, see if I do, Cecil Thunder said. Three days' silence in the refectory and sending us up for six and eight every minute."
[A footnote tells me that six and eight were "the number of blows with a strap given as punishment."]
"Yes, said Wells. And old Barrett has a new way of twisting the note so that you can't open it up and fold it again to see how many ferulae you are to get."
[A footnote tells me that "ferulae" means "strokes."]
Wells asked: What is going to be done to them?
Simon Moonan and Tusker are going to be flogged, Athy said, and the fellows in the higher line got their choice of flogging or being expelled.
And which are they taking? asked the fellow who had spoken first.
All are taking expulsion except Corrigan, Athy answered. He's going to be flogged by Mr. Gleeson.
Is it Corrigan that big fellow? said Fleming. Why, he'd be able for two of Gleeson!
I know why, Cecil Thunder said. He is right and the other fellows are wrong because a flogging wears off after a bit but a fellow that has been expelled from college is known all his life on account of it. Besides Gleeson won't flog him hard.
. . . I wouldn't like to be Simon Moonan and Tusker, Cecil Thunder said. But I don't believe they will be flogged. Perhaps they will be sent up for twice nine.
No, no said Athy. They'll both get it on the vital spot.
Wells rubbed himself and said in a crying voice: Please sir, let me off.
Athy grinned and turned up the sleeves of his jacket saying:
It can't be helped; It must be done. So down with your breeches And out with your bum.
The fellows laughed, but he felt that they were a little bit afraid. In the silence of the soft grey air he heard the cricket bats from here and from there: pock. That was a sound to hear, but if you were hit then you would feel the pain. The pandeybat made a sound too but not like that. The fellows said it was made of whalebone and leather with lead inside: and he wondered what the pain was like. There were different kinds of pain for all the different kinds of sounds. A long thin cane would have a high whistling sound and he wondered what that pain was like."
Stay tuned for more details of cp in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. I have to pause to go in search of "mild homo_s_e_x_ual play" to satisfy my "vital spot."