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"Or, maw be," resumed Gaffer Solomons, encouraged to a fourth suggestion by the success of its predecessor, "maw be some o' the misseses ha' been making a rumpus, and scolding their good men. I heard say in my granfeyther's time, arter old Mother Bang nigh died o' the ducking-stool, them 'ere stocks were first made for the women, out o' compassion like!
Your sex are in general suspected by ours, of being too much addicted to scandal and defamation; a suspicion, which has not arisen of late years, as we find in the ancient laws of England a punishment, known by the name of ducking-stool, annexed to scolding and defamation in the women, though no such punishment nor crime is taken notice of in the men.
We have different modes of restraining evil. Stocks for the men, a ducking-stool for women , and a pound for beasts. If we require more perfection from women than from ourselves, it is doing them honour. And women have not the same temptations that we have: they may always live in virtuous company; men must mix in the world indiscriminately.
A bridle, something like a bit for a restive horse, was in use for the curbing of scolds; but this was a later invention than the cucking-stool, or ducking-stool.
It was really astonishing that John Stokes, a man of sagacity in all other respects, never could understand that scolding was of all devisable processes the least likely to succeed in carrying his point with one who was such a proficient in that accomplishment, that if the old penalty for female scolds, the ducking-stool, had continued in fashion, she would have stood an excellent chance of attaining to that distinction.
I laid her enormities clearly before her, and I threatened her, in sae mony words, that I would have her to the ducking-stool; and she, on the contrair part, miscawed me for a forward northern tyke and so we parted never to meet again, as I hope and trust.
The Leominster ducking-stool is still preserved, and this implement was the latest in use, having been employed in 1809 for the ducking of Jenny Pipes, alias Jane Corran, a common scold, by order of the magistrates, and also as late as 1817; but in this case the victim, one Sarah Leeke, was only wheeled round the town in the chair, and not ducked, as the water in the Kenwater stream was too shallow for the purpose.
The pond and ducking-stool were in sight, and Ann Linkon, with a persistence and strength that was marvellous, began to pull back, and when she had set her heels firmly in the ground it required the united strength of both guards to move her. "I won't go! I won't be ducked! I won't! I won't!" she screamed at the top of her voice.
In old times, a woman who was convicted of being a common mischief-maker and scold, was sentenced to the punishment of the ducking-stool; which consisted of a sort of chair fastened to a pole, in which she was seated and repeatedly let down into the water, amid the shouts of the rabble.
This last Court, I learn from mine uncle, did not condemn her, as some of the evidence was old, and not reliable. Uncle saith she was a wicked old woman, who had been often whipped and set in the ducking-stool, but whether she was a witch or no, he knows not for a certainty. November 8. Yesterday, to my great joy, came my beloved Cousin Rebecca from Boston.
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