The Berkley Horse

This is a quote from "The Possessions of a Lady" a Lovejoy antiques-and-
murder mistery by Jonathan Gash - Copyrighted 1996
 
  "People nowadays think that we invented sexual oddity. Wrong.
Establishments near Bury St. in Regency London's St. James's were busily
proving that two centuries back. The women's flagellation club met in
fashionable Jermyn Street, Piccadilly, Thursday nights. It allowed only
a dozen women. They drew lots to decide batting order. Six would strip.
The chairwoman dished out rods, and they would flagellate the passives.
Magazine accounts of the time say 1792 was a hit year (sorry about the
pun). Lectures on eroticism preceded every club (sorry) session. The aim
(I'm getting embarrassed about these puns, but can't keep them out) was
to gratify, expiate, and turn milk-white skin to red."
 "The culmination, that century's diligent observers reported, came
in Theresa Berkley's flagellation house in Portland Place. Theresa was a
game girl. She had ambition. True blue capitalist, she reasoned that it
was wrong to restrict this thrill to women. Also, why use only stiff
Jermyn Street rods? Serious thinking was required here. Madam Berkley
therefore set up her own code. Green birch wands, kept whippy in warm
water, were always available. Leather cat-o'-nine tails, adorned with
needles and fine wire nails, also proved popular. Slender canes from
Long Acre's furniture makers, green nettles, coach-harness thongs, broom
faggots, God knows what else, were ready for males and females alike.
Remember, it was the age when sin was front-page stuff, notions of guilt
and torment were the rage, life one enormous religious porridge."
 "Theresa's establishment flourished."
 "One problem, though. La Berkley saw that a support was necessary.
Thrashing clients to ecstasy had a certain transcendental quality, but
proved messy. Bed laundry cost, as the clients became bloodily replete.
Her business expenses ate profit. Luckily, Georgian London was
inventive, and proved equal to the task. Why not, some unknown artisan
suggested, create a flagellation frame? Custom-built, faced with kid
leather, covered with a single replaceable sheet. Adjustable, on a
rachet with mahogany stretchers, you could thrash from any angle. Make
sure there was space for the weapon, for different types of stroke, and
Bob's your uncle. No beds needed! Cheap quick turnover, strong,
eminently re-usable, desirable..."
 "The famed Berkley Horse was born."
 "Theresa ordered a set, and life's rich pageant rolled on just
that little bit richer for the Berkley Flogging Establishment of
Portland Place."
 "See one, you can't mistake it, unless you're as daft as the
average dealer. It reminds you of an easel, a leather-covered wooden
support about sixty-five inches tall. Later models extend or shrink with
wooden holding pegs that screw in. There's an arched space for your
head, and two rectangular openings for your belly and knees, slots for
your feet. Three pairs of ornate brass rings for binding your head,
chest, calves. That's it."
 "And Aureole had one on her stall, pristine, so genuine it chimed
in my chest. God knows who'd made it. The great furniture makers of that
golden age had lived only a stone's throw beyond Piccadilly. Tom
Chippendale, eldest son of his immortal dad, was beavering away nearby
at 60 St. Martin's Lane, though plummeting downhill to bankruptcy...I
felt my divvy's malaise as Aureole's Berkley Horse clanged in me.
Chippendale? I moaned inwardly."
 
 
  by Jonathan Gash