Page:Walks in the Black Country and its green border-land.pdf/444

430 wooden wheels, one leader and two abreast at the heavy axle. It is truly a massive affair, and must have been drawn by a donkey or full-sized horse. Above the two hind wheels a kind of rocking-chair is geared into the axle beams; not a rocking-chair in the sense of ease and comfort but a kind of perpendicular trap-door of very hard wood, to which evidently the subject of the salutary discipline was bound very fast. There is a tradition kept afloat with characteristic pertinacity that the subjects of this mode of correction were always women, such as scolds and other female. The more is the shame and wrong if this be true; for the discipline was equally and even better fitted for confirmed wife-beaters and drunkards. Well, when the subject, male or female, was bound fast to the back of the chair, the wooden chariot was drawn down to the river or pond, and backed into the water up to the proper depth. Then the bolt or other fastening was withdrawn, and the prisoner was "rocked in the cradle of the deep" for half a minute or so, or long enough to cool down the fiery tempers or appetites which had led to such correction. It is a unique and interesting machine, and we studied its structure and working with great curiosity. It evidently had done the town some service for several generations; for the stout wooden wheels were much worn by use.