Walter Walter - My Secret Life

There must have been something in my face, for the nursemaid said, “What is the matter, what have you been doing to the baby?” “Nothing.” “Yes, you are colouring up, now tell me.” “Nothing, I have done nothing.” “You wakened your sister.” “No, I have not.” The girl laid hold of me and gave me a little shake. “I’ll tell your mamma if you don’t tell me, what is it now?” “No, I have done nothing, I was looking out of the window when she began to cry.” “You’re telling a story, I see you are,” said the nursemaid; and off I went, after being impudent to her.

I told Fred, and he tried the same dodge, but don’t recollect whether he succeeded or not. His sisters were some of them older, and we began to scheme how to see their cunts, when I was on a visit to his mother’s (my aunt), which was to come off in the holidays. The look of the little child’s cunt, as I described it, convinced him that the picture was correct, and that a cunt was a long slit and not a round hole. That cast doubt on males putting their pricks into them, and we clung somehow to the idea of the round hole, and we quarrelled about it.

It must have been about this time that I was walking with my father and read something that was written in chalk on the walls. I asked him what it meant. He said he did not know, that none but low people, and blackguards wrote on walls; and it was not worth while noticing such things. I was conscious that I had done wrong somehow, but did not know exactly what. When I went out, which I was now allowed to do for short distances by myself, I copied what was on the walls, to tell Fred, it was foul, baudy language of some sort, but the only thing we understood at all, was the word cunt.

Just then being out with some boys, we saw two dogs fucking. I have no recollection of seeing dogs doing that before. We closed round them, yelling with delight as they stuck rump to rump, then one boy said that was what men and women did, and I asked, did they stick together so, a boy replied that they did; others denied it, and, all the remainder of the day, some of us discussed this; the impression left on my mind is that it appeared to me very nasty; but it seemed at the same time to confirm me in the belief that men put their pricks up into women’s holes, about which I seem at that time to have had grave doubts.

After this time my recollection of events is clearer, and I can tell not only what took place, but better what I heard, said, and thought.

My godfather. – At Hampton-Court. – My aunt’s backside. – Public baths. – My cousins’ cunts. – Haymaking frolics. – Family difficulties. – School amusements. – A masturbating relative. – Romance and sentiment.

My godfather (whose fortune I afterwards inherited) was very fond of me; somewhere about this time he used perpetually to be saying, “When you get to school, don’t you follow any of the tricks yourself that other boys do, or you will die in a mad-house; lots of boys do.” And he told me some horrible tales; it was done in a mysterious way. I felt there was a hidden meaning and, not having knowledge of what it was, asked him. I should know fast enough, said he, but mark his words. He repeated this so often that it sunk deeply into my mind, and made me uneasy, something was to happen to me, if I did something – I did not know what – it was intended as a caution against frigging, and it had good effect on me I am sure in various ways in the after time.

One day talking with Fred, I recollected what I had done to the governess. I had kept it to myself all along for fear. “What a lie,” said he. “I did really.” “Oh! ain’t you a liar,” he reiterated, “I’ll ask Miss Granger.” The same governess was with us then.

At this remark of his, an absolute terror came over me, the dread was something so terrible that the recollection of it is now painful. “Oh don’t, pray, don’t, Fred,” I said, “oh, if Papa should hear!” He kept on saying he would. I was too young to see the improbability of his doing anything of the sort. “If you do, I’ll tell him what we did when the pedlar woman piddled.” He did not care. “Now, it’s a lie, isn’t it, you did not feel her cunt?” In fear, I confessed it was a lie. “I knew it was,” said Fred. He had kept me in a state of terror about the affair for days, till I told a lie to get quit of the subject.

I was evidently always secret, even then, about anything amorous, excepting with Fred (as will be seen), and have continued so all my life. I rarely bragged or told anyone of my doings; perhaps this little affair with the governess was a lesson to me, and confirmed me in a habit natural to me from my infancy. I have kept to myself everything I did with the opposite sex.

We now frequently examined our pricks, and Fred jeered me so about my prepuce being tight that I resolved no other boy should see it; and though I did not keep strictly to that intention, it left a deep-seated mortification on me. I used to look at my prick with a sense of shame and pull the prepuce up and down, as far as I could, constantly, to loosen it, and would treat other boys’ cocks in the same way, if they would let me, without expecting me to make a return; but the time was approaching when I was to learn much more.

One of my uncles, who lived in London, took a house in the country for the summer near Hampton-Court Palace. Fred and I went to stay there with him. There were several daughters and sons, the sons quite young. People then came down from London in vans, carts, and carriages of all sorts, to see the Palace and grounds (there was no railway), they were principally of the small middle classes, and used to picnic, or else dine, at the taverns when they arrived; then full, and frisky, after their early meal, go into the parks and gardens. They do so still, but times were different then, so few people went there comparatively, fewer park-keepers to look after them, and less of what is called delicacy amongst visitors of the class named.

Our family party used to go into the grounds daily, and all day long nearly, if we were not on the river banks. Fred winked at me one day, “Let’s lose Bob,” said he, “and we’ll have such a lark.” Bob was one of our little cousins, generally given into our charge. We lost Bob purposely. Said Fred, “If you dodge the gardeners, creep up there, and lay on your belly quietly, some girls will be sure to come and piss, you’ll see them pull their clothes up as they turn round, I saw some before you came to stay with us.” So we went, pushing our way among shrubs and evergreens, till a gardener, who had seen us, called out, “You there, come back, if I catch you going off the walks, you’ll be put outside.” We were in such a funk, Fred cut off one way, I another, but it only stopped us for that day. Fred so excited me about the girls’ arses, as he called them, that we never lost an opportunity of trying for a sight, but were generally baulked. Once or twice only we saw a female squat down, but nothing more, till my mother and Fred’s came to stop with us.

Fred’s mother, mine, the girls, Fred and I went into the park gardens, one day after luncheon. A very hot day, for we kept on the shady walks, one of which led to the place where women hid themselves to piss. My aunt said, “Why don’t you boys go and play, you don’t mind the sun,” so off we went, but when about to leave the walk, turned round and saw the women had turned back. Said Fred, “I’m sure they are going to piss, that’s why they want to get rid of us.” We evaded the gardeners, scrambled through shrubs, on our knees, and at last on our bellies, up a little bank, on the other side of which was the vacant place on which dead leaves and sweepings were shot down. As we got there, pushing aside the leaves, we saw the big backside of a woman, who was half standing, half squatting, a stream of piss falling in front of her, and a big hairy gash, as it seemed, under her arse; but only for a second, she had just finished as we got the peep, let her clothes fall, tucked them between her legs, and half turning round. We saw it was Fred’s mother, my aunt. Off aunt went. “Isn’t it a wopper,” said Fred, “lay still, more of them will come.”