A Complete Encyclopaedia of the Correction of the Fair Sex THE FEMALE DISCIPLINARY MANUAL is just what its name suggests: a complete guide to the correction and chastisement of young ladies. Nearly a hundred sections deal with every variety of punishment. The art of spanking is taught in loving detail; the use of the cane expounded to a depth never before attempted in print. The intricacies of the strap are laid before the reader in all their charm and severity. The division on non-corporal punishment is subtler but perhaps even more powerful than that on physical chastisement. The refinements of disciplinary suffering that lie in expertly administered detentions and impositions will be a revelation to most readers. The book is written by ladies who have long practical experience of the disciplinary arts. What Mrs. Beeton did for household management, they have done for the gentle craft of punishment. Every paragraph is alive with a sensual aestheticism -- with the tingling sensibility of feminine discipline at its most elegantly severe. The celebrated introduction to the book, despite its fantasy setting, is a seminal essay on the philosophy of discipline which shows that the authoresses of the book mean what they say very seriously. Far from regarding themselves as part of the "perverted" sado-masochist fringe, they feel that genuine discipline is the only way forward for a decaying civilisation. A fascinating afterword tells how the book came into being; -- originally written as a series of occasional papers writen by disciplinariennes within an all-female disciplinary society for private circulation to other members who wished to learn about such things as administering a sound, never-to-be-forgotten caning or setting a truly tear-inducingly tedious and frustrating imposition for the benefit of the young ladies in their charge. The story of how these private papers grew into the definitive how-to book on the subject of feminine discipline is a delightful bonus to this handsome new clothbound edition. Daring, intelligent, unremittingly strict, and yet profoundly compassionate, we do not hesitate to say that this is one of the two or three really great books on the subject of discipline.