Indeed, if there was a rule about it at all, it was that those masters who used it most often needed to joke about it most constantly. Some would carry it under their gowns, some would carry it with their exercise books. Some would perform high jinks with it in the yard. The Jesuit rules designated which officials were responsible for the administration of corporal punishment. At Xavier, in practice, it seemed to have been a question of personal choice among the Jesuits as to who would use the strap. Laymasters were always excluded from its use. Perhaps, as the only non-possessors of deterrent weaponry, they were subject to some humiliation by boys in their classes.