However, unless you were with a teacher, the garden was out of bounds. For any pupil found to be there without permission, the punishment was severe. A minimum of four strokes of the cane, depending on circumstances.
Our headmistress, Mrs Hamilton [name changed – Ed], was a softly spoken woman with a warm smile. She had two daughters at our school. Mrs Hamilton had only used the cane twice, to my knowledge, and both boys had cried. I knew one of the boys as a real tough kid, so the cane must have hurt a lot to make him cry.
One day, I found a carrot in the street that I assume someone had dropped. So I sneaked into the school garden and fed the rabbits.