(Author Note: This story is the second in a series about the life and times of a young printer's apprentice living in the Colony of Virginia in the 1740s. The characters and situations were introduced in the story, "Zachary Malvern - The Printer's Devil". You might want to read that story first for best results.)

Honour thy Father and Mother, i. e. Live so as to be an Honour to them tho' they are dead. - Benjamin Franklin, 1739

Williamsburg, Virginia had been granted a royal charter as a city back in 1722. The charter authorized market days every Wednesday and Saturday. In fact the last Wednesday of the month - July 28, 1742 - would be the twentieth anniversary of the day King George I signed the charter. A special fair celebrating the anniversary was planned.

Unfortunately for 12-year-old Zachary Malvern and all the other impatient people in that part of Virginia, it was only Saturday, July 10th. With just two and a half weeks to go until the big anniversary celebration, it was one of the major topics of discussion. Not that Zachary had a lot of time to stand around listening to the discussions.

Saturday was far and away the busiest market day each week. Weather permitting, farmers, traders and craftsmen from the surrounding area crowded into the central Market Square of Williamsburg to buy and sell livestock, foodstuffs, furniture, household goods, and tobacco - the entire array of goods available in that time and place. Wednesday market days were always smaller, ranging from nearly non-existent in poor winter weather up to three-quarters the size of a typical Saturday market day in the summer.

July 10th promised to be another hot, humid day on the steaming Virginia peninsula. This meant that Zachary, along with all the other apprentices, servants, and slaves in the city of Williamsburg, would be busy from shortly after dawn until well after dusk.

The new issue of the Virginia Gazette was published on Friday each week, which meant that Saturday was also the busiest day of the week at Mr. Parks' print shop. Many folks who came into town for the market day stopped by to pick up their copy of the weekly newspaper. Others stopped by to purchase books, out of town newspapers, or stationary supplies. A third group of folks stopped by to check on any mail that might be waiting for them, or to post letters. A few did all three.

Having been banned from direct participation in the printing process after the unfortunate events of Thursday, Zachary would spend the entire day running errands for the other workers in the print shop and making the occasional delivery. This suited Zachary just fine, since it kept him out of the shop much of the day and out from under the watchful eyes of Maynard Castle, who was in charge of the shop while their master, William Parks, was up in Maryland on business.

One of the most frequent trips made by apprentices running errands for the masters and journeymen in their shops was to the local tavern to bring back beer for the thirsty workers. This was especially true on hot days like today. The weather on the peninsula had been dry for weeks, and the crowds of people attending the market day, along with their wagons and horses, stirred up dust from the roads - dust that hung like a brown fog in the completely still air. Zachary had already made three trips to the Raleigh Tavern - just one block down Duke of Gloucester Street from the print shop - to bring back beer for the thirsty printers, and it was still well before lunchtime.

After returning with the third load of beer, Zachary was sent out on a delivery to Brush House, a mansion located just south of the Governor's Palace on the east side of Palace Green. The new owner of Brush House, William Dering, was an artist. Zachary delivered a consignment of paper, ink and other drawing supplies to Mr. Dering and then headed back towards the print shop.

As Zachary walked east on Nicholson Street, he had to pass Market Square, the hub of activity for the entire region on this Market Day. Oh, the sights! Oh, the sounds! Oh, the smells! Zachary would have liked nothing better than to linger there for several happy hours, seeing all there was to see, and chatting with people he knew.

Zachary was new enough to his apprenticeship that it still grated on him a bit, the fact that his time was no longer his own, and that he had a full day's work to do. In fact he had six full days of work to do - each and every week - for the next eight long years. He shook his head and tried to clear his mind of such thoughts. Zachary Malvern was a man now - a very young man, granted, but a man - not a boy. He forced himself to walk back towards the print shop - and the neverending work - step by step.

As Zachary willed himself to continue walking east on Nicholson Street, he approached the cooperage of Jeremiah Cooper. The young printer's apprentice had a fondness for the cooperage, having grown up in his father's cooperage in the port city of Norfolk, Virginia, where Zachary had been born. He stopped by for a quick visit whenever he could, in large part because his best friend in the whole world was apprenticed to Mr. Cooper.

Zachary had met Davey Landis three years before when Zachary and his older brother Phillip became wards of their Uncle Simon and Aunt Gloria in Williamsburg. The two Malvern brothers were the only survivors of a horrific tragedy that occurred in 1739 when fire swept through their family's cooperage and attached residence in Norfolk late one night.

Phillip and Zachary survived only because they knew a way to get from their loft bedroom to the ground by climbing out a window and crossing the cooperage roof. The route Phillip had discovered for mischievous purposes ended up saving their lives. Both boys burned their feet because much of the cooperage roof was on fire, but they did survive the tragedy.

Overnight the two brothers had gone from being the middle sons in a large, but relatively prosperous family to being orphans who only owned the nightshirts they were wearing that fateful night. The Malvern brothers were placed in the care of their aunt and uncle in Williamsburg. Then Uncle Simon contracted cholera and died in 1740.

Aunt Gloria was a seamstress who had trouble supporting herself and two growing boys on just her meager income. Phillip Malvern eased the burden by enlisting in the Royal Navy as a ship's boy in May 1741, at the age of thirteen. Zachary remained a student in the local grammar school, where he and Davey Landis had become inseparable friends, until March 1742.

Zachary signed his apprenticeship contract with Mr. Parks on New Year's Day, which was March 25, 1742. Zachary's contract had to be approved by a colonial judge since the boy's father and uncle were both deceased. David Landis, who was two months older than Zachary, was apprenticed to Mr. Cooper by his father on the same day.

As Zachary passed the cooperage, he decided to risk a quick stop to see Davey if he wasn't too busy. He figured that he could take up to five minutes without getting in trouble with Mr. Castle for taking too long to make a delivery. It was Market Day, after all, so the streets were crowded.

As he walked around the side of the cooperage, Zachary heard a sound that made his heart skip a beat. Somebody in the cooperage yard was getting a whipping! Zachary was suddenly torn between a burning curiosity to see the whipping, not to mention who was getting it and how, and a dark dread that if he attempted to watch he might place his own backside in jeopardy. He still remembered the looks on those other boys' faces the other day when Mr. Castle threatened them with a dose of what Zachary had just been given.

He wavered for a few more seconds, then curiosity finally got the better of him. Zachary moved as quietly as possible towards the back corner of the cooperage wall, where he knew he could peek around the corner and see the activities in the cooperage yard. As he slowly moved towards his goal, he could hear the boy being whipped begin to howl. Whew! At least it wasn't his best friend, Davey. Unless his friend's voice had changed since the last time Zachary heard him being whipped.

Zachary finally peeked around the corner of the wall and was treated to an amazing sight. Mr. Cooper, a large, gruff bear of a man, was swinging a long, thick switch of some kind in a wide arc, where it connected sharply with the bare bottom of the young teenaged boy who was bucking and writhing over an unfinished barrel as he howled in pain. The scene startled Zachary, who was immediately taken back to his childhood, where he used to watch his own father whip his apprentices on their bare bottoms over a barrel in their Norfolk cooperage.

There were differences, of course. Zachary's father used a heavy leather strap to punish his apprentices, whereas Mr. Cooper used a hickory switch. Zachary suddenly remembered Davey mentioning the big man's hickory switch as something to be avoided at all costs.

The effects were different, too. Zachary remembered that the backsides of his father's apprentices ended up with a blended patchwork of red and blue marks after a strapping. The bottom currently flinching and writhing over the barrel in Mr. Cooper's yard was sporting a collection of vividly red criss-crossing stripes.

As Mr. Cooper continued to slash the hickory rod repeatedly into the twin, twitching mounds of his erring apprentice's aching backside, Zachary's mind began to sort out more of the overall scene he was witnessing. First, he finally recognized the voice - and the bottom - of the boy being switched. It was 14-year-old Tom Eisley, Mr. Cooper's second youngest apprentice. For some reason Davey was fond of Tom, but Zachary didn't really trust him.

Tom wasn't a nasty person, and he was fun to play with, since he was always ready with a joke or to laugh at the jokes told by others. The problem was, Tom always thought he could get away with anything, despite the fact that was always getting caught and punished for just about every bit of mischief he tried. Zachary admired optimism as much as the next fellow, but Tom took it to extremes, and he often got his friends in trouble, too.

That was the second thing that Zachary had noticed. His friend Davey was standing near the place of execution, staring red-faced at the whipping in progress. The 12-year-old was drenched with sweat, his blonde hair matted down from it. The bad news was that one of the journeymen had his hand firmly on Davey's shoulder, obviously to keep the boy from running away. The even worse news was that Davey was holding his breeches, which had already been unbuttoned, up near his waist. Zachary groaned quietly when he realized that Davey was next in line to feel that hickory switch on his backside.

Zachary was also becoming concerned about the length of this whipping. He hadn't exactly been keeping count, but he was fairly certain that Tom had received at least 5 or 6 cuts of the switch since he started watching the proceedings. And the collection of stripes he saw when he rounded the corner had to have come from at least 8 or 10 previous cuts. How many stripes was Tom gonna get? Even more important, how many was Davey gonna get?

At last! It looked like Mr. Cooper finally finished whipping Tom. He was asking the boy if "he'd ever try something that stupid again?" That sure sounded like the Tom Eisley that Zachary knew. But Davey was smarter than that, why did keep going along with Tom's stupid ideas?

Tom slowly and painfully stood up, and he unconsciously reached back to rub the new collection of stripes inhabiting his buttocks and upper thighs. Tom yelped as the switch cracked against his knuckles.

"No rubbing, Tom!" said Mr. Cooper, sternly. "Hands on your head and keep 'em there. Those stripes are supposed to sting."

"Yes sir," gasped the miserable Tom, as the sobbing boy waddled out of the way, his tear-streaked face as red as his hair. Poor little Davey was already walking slowly - and most unwillingly - over towards the barrel, to take his turn. The sick look on the boy's face told the story - he would have been quite happy to skip his turn in this case.

Zachary was still peeking around the corner into the cooperage yard, wondering whether he should stay there to see Davey's switching, when he suddenly felt a sharp pain as somebody grabbed his right ear and dragged him from his hiding place into the cooperage yard. "Yeeeoow!" he yelped in surpise and pain as his presence was revealed.

Everyone in the cooperage yard turned to see the source of this disturbance. Even Davey Landis, who had dropped his breeches and was in the process of slowly lowering his linen drawers for his pending chastisement, turned to see what was happening.

They were met with the sight of a very startled and suddenly red-faced young printer's apprentice being held firmly by the ear by Hank Twomey, Mr. Cooper's 19-year-old senior apprentice. "Lookey here what I found, Mr. Cooper," said Hank. "I was comin' back from delivering those hogsheads to Berkeley Plantation when I spotted this little varmint spyin' on ya all."

"Zachary Malvern," said Mr. Cooper, disappointment in his voice, "don't tell me were you involved with this, too?"

Zachary gulped with fear. Involved with what? He had no idea why the two cooper's apprentices were being thrashed, other than they had almost certainly done something really stupid. He couldn't think of anything to say other than, "Involved with what?"

"Involved with what, sir!" yelled Hank, as he slapped Zachary very hard in the face with his right hand - knocking the boy's hat clear off his head - while Hank's left hand kept a firm grip on the boy's right ear.

"Ooowww!" yelped Zachary, from the pain of the slap and the force it placed on his already sore ear. He didn't try to get away, but held both hands up to shield his face and head from further attacks. He could feel himself close to tears.

"You didn't need to slap him quite that hard, Hank," said Mr. Cooper. Then the big man turned his gaze back to Zachary. "Are you trying to be clever with me, young man?"

"No, sir!" said Zachary, putting his hands back down. "You see, Mr. Cooper, I was just stopping by on my way back from a delivery to see Davey for a minute. I honestly don't know anything about why Tom and Davey are getting a whippin'."

"I see," said Mr. Cooper. "Alright, if you just had a quick message for Davey, go ahead. We can wait a minute. Then you can get back to your work for Mr. Parks while Davey gets his thrashing."

Zachary stared at Davey, who stared back at Zachary, a confused and frightened look on his face. Several seconds passed.

"Well," said Mr. Cooper, "we don't have all day to stand around here, boy. Give Davey your message."

"Message?" said Zachary, confused. He quickly added, "Sir." as he felt Hank move next to him.

"Yes, message," said Mr. Cooper, losing his patience. "You said you wanted to see Davey for a minute. It was clearly something so important that it was necessary for you stop working to come in here and say it, and for Davey to stop working to hear it. So what was it!"

Zachary felt himself near tears again. "It wasn't...... nothing...... particular....."

"Nothing particular?"

"No, sir."

"So, let me get this straight. You were gonna take time out from the work you owe Mr. Parks, and have Davey here take time out from the work he owes me, to talk about nothing particular?"

Zachary desperately tried to think of something useful to say. Any explanation to save himself - and Davey - from the horrible direction this was heading. In the end all he could say was, "Yes, sir," his voice hardly more than a whisper.

"I see," said Mr. Cooper, his voice dripping acid. "I wonder what Mr. Parks will say when he hears about this?"

"Oh, sir..." began Zachary.

"Mr. Parks is up in Maryland," said Matt Harper, one of the journeymen. "Maynard Castle is running the shop for him."

"Oh, ho!" said Mr. Cooper. "That's even better. We all know what an understanding and considerate fellow Maynard is, don't we?" The assembled workers all shared a laugh at that jest.

"Bring the boy over here, Hank," said Mr. Cooper as the laughter subsided.

"Yes, sir!" said Hank as he led Zachary firmly by the ear until the boy was standing in front of the huge, angry master cooper. Then Hank released his ear, much to Zachary's relief.

Mr. Cooper glared down at the shivering boy in front of him and said, "Do you want me to tell Mr. Castle about your plan to steal time from your master, and from me?"

"No, sir," said Zachary, desperately looking for any way out of this situation that would let him eat lunch sitting down. "Please, sir! I'm new to being an apprentice. I'll never do it again!"

"Alright, Zach," said Mr. Cooper. "I'm in a mood to be lenient. I heard about the show you put on for everyone Thursday morning over at the print shop." There was general chuckling at this, and Zachary felt himself blushing at the thought that everyone in the city knew about his strapping by now.

"So I'll give you a choice. Hank can escort you back to Mr. Castle and tell him what you were planning, and you can get another very public strapping in the print shop. Or, you can unbutton your breeches and take a nice, private little bare-bottomed switching here in the cooperage yard once I'm finished with Davey. It's up to you."

Zachary looked up at the big man... looked at the switch in his hand... looked around the cooperage yard at the journeymen and apprentices. Then he gulped and started fumbling with his breeches buttons.

Soon he was standing where Davey had stood a few minutes before, his hands holding up his unbuttoned breeches as he watched the horrible hickory switch connect time and time again with his best friend's backside. Zachary had never seen a hickory switch in action before, and now he had a ringside seat.

As he watched the vivid red stripes appear on Davey's twin cheeks and heard his friend howl, Zachary's own bottom globes were twitching and clenching in his drawers, literally tingling in anticipation of the fact that they were about to be similarly decorated.

Davey got twelve cuts of the switch for whatever mischief he and Tom had been up to. Then Mr. Cooper stated that his naughty young apprentice would get four extra cuts for all the time he had wasted talking to Zach the past three months when he was supposed to be working. Zachary flinched at each of the four extra cuts and the piercing howls they elicited from his closest friend.

As the sobbing Davey limp-shuffled away from the barrel, impeded by the breeches and drawers still puddled around his ankles, he kept his hands firmly on his head. As the boy shuffled along his swollen, red-striped bottom twitched, obviously aching to be rubbed. Davey moved to stand next to the still slightly sobbing Tom, whose boyhood had risen "to attention" as he watched Davey get his whipping.

Then it was Zachary's turn. Without being asked, he approached the barrel, dropped his breeches and lowered his drawers. Then he bent over the top of the barrel, presenting himself to receive his very first dose of the hickory switch.

Although Zachary had seen boys whipped while lying over barrels many times, he had never been beaten this way himself. He was really wishing he had gone back to the print shop instead of stopping off to see his friend. Davey got four extra cuts of the switch because of him, and who knew how many Zachary himself was about receive? He was going to find out soon.

Mr. Cooper pulled up Zachary's shirt, to get the shirt tail out of the way and give the hickory switch a clear path to the trembling boy tail. Soon the owner of that boy tail could feel the light touch of the switch as Mr. Cooper took aim. He closed his eyes.

Thwwwwppp. Craaacckk! "Ooowwww!" yelped Zachary in surprise. He could not believe how much the hickory switch burned his bare bottom.

Thwwwwppp. Craaacckk! "Ooowooch!" It usually took several whacks of the strap or hairbrush to get him to make noise. This hickory switch was horrible!

Thwwwwppp. Craaacckk! "Ahhh! Ssssssss" Zachary gasped. He started praying for the strength to get through this whipping without needing to be held down like a baby.

Thwwwwppp. Crraaaacckk! "Uuuuuhhhhh! Sssssss" Zachary couldn't help hissing in pain again.

Thwwwwppp. Crraaaacckk! "Nnooaaaaa!" The sting was unbelievable! He was gonna cry if this didn't stop real soon.

Thwwwwppp. Crraaaacckk! "Ooooocccchh!"

"Okay," said Mr. Cooper. "That was for trying to waste Davey's time today - and yours - when you should have been working." Zachary started silently thanking God for getting him through it. Then Mr. Cooper continued, "Now you get four more cuts for wasting Davey's time, and your own, over the past three months."

Zachary was just realizing what this meant when.... Thwwwwppp. Crraaaacckk! "Oooowwww!" He started sobbing, no longer able to hold back his tears.

Thwwwwppp. Crraaaacckk! "Ooooohhhh!" Zachary's mind refused to believe how much the hickory switch hurt.

Thwwwwppp. Crraaaacckk! "Uuuuuccchhhhhh! Sssssss" Zachary hissed again. One more to get through - he hoped. In his agony the boy was no longer sure of the count.

Thwwwwppp. Crraaaacckk! "Aaaaaaahhhhhchh!" Dear God, let that be the last one!

"Alright," said Mr. Cooper. "Get up, Zachary."

Zachary painfully rose from the barrel, his hands immediately moving to his head. They desperately want to rub his flaming bottom - anything to get rid of that maddening sting! But he didn't want to get his hands swatted with the switch or - heaven forbid - more cuts of the switch on his ruined backside.

Later on, when Zachary was able to rub himself, and check himself out in the privy, he was shocked to not see any blood on his hands, or the backs of his legs. His bottom felt like it had been sliced wide open by the switch, and he had been certain that blood was streaming down the backs of his legs. How could he possibly be in that much pain and not have any cuts in his skin?

As Zachary started to deal with the effects of his whipping, Mr. Cooper motioned to Davey, who shuffled over to stand next to his best friend. As the two 12-year-olds stood there pants-down, sobbing, hands on their heads, shifting uncomfortably, desperate to massage the horrible sting from their throbbing stripes, they were completely oblivious to the fact that their dangling boy parts were on display for all to see.

"Now, I want you two brats to listen real close," said Mr. Cooper. "You hear?"

"Yes, sir!" chorused the two sobbing boys, as they looked intently at the big man through their tears, while wanting nothing more than to rub their flaming posteriors for all they were worth.

"I know you two are friends, and friendship is a fine thing. But you're not school boys anymore. You are both apprentices, with responsibilities. Zachary, I don't expect to see you in here again on a workday unless your master sends you here on business, understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good. And Davey, I don't expect you to dawdle at the print shop if I send you over there for any reason, understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"All right, then," said Mr. Cooper. Then his expression softened and he smiled. "Now on Sundays after church, you boys are free to do all the nothing particular together that you feel like. Okay?"

"Yes, sir!" came the dual replies.

"Now you two get yourselves dressed and get back to work! You've wasted enough time this morning!" Mr. Cooper didn't even wait for their reply, but strode back over to his workbench, tossing the switch lightly in a corner as he moved.

As Zachary walked back to the print shop he wiped his tears on his sleeves and tried to hide the fact that he had been crying. He was still walking stiffly, his aching bottom throbbing hotly inside his breeches. He knew he'd have trouble sitting down for lunch. He prayed that he wasn't too late already, and that Mr. Castle wouldn't find out about his whipping at Mr. Cooper's hands, and why. If Mr. Castle found out Zachary had been wasting time with Davey on the job, he would surely give the guilty young apprentice another public strapping.

As he tried to rub his desperately sore bottom through his breeches seat, without it looking like that was what he was doing, Zachary once again cursed the fact that he had decided to move forward and actually see the whipping in progress in the cooperage yard, rather than minding his own business and going back to work. What was that thing Aunt Gloria always said, about curiosity and the cat?

(Technical Note: Great Britain and her American Colonies operated on the Julian calendar up until September 1752, when they switched over to the Gregorian calendar still in use today. So New Year's Day really was celebrated on March 25 each year up until 1752. Servants were traditionally hired on New Year's Day, Midsummer's Day (June 24th), Michaelmas (September 29th) or on Christmas Day (December 25th).)