AIBU To Think That The Chalet School Matron Would Be In Prison Nowadays

[TheShellBeach]

..........................for giving unprescribed sedatives to the girls so frequently.

(lighthearted) (in case a million people tell me that IABU)

The Chalet School Matron was forever doling out sedatives to the girls, without even asking Jack Maynard to prescribe them first.
Shocking stuff. Nowadays, she would be jailed and struck off the NMC Register.

Well if she’s going to prison then so is Jack Maynard (and other Dr husbands in the series) for sedating his wife! Jack was forever slipping something in Joey’s coffee!

Also Dr. Courvoisier, who sedated Biddy after she had one of their infants.

(see also Drs. Graves, Peters, Entwhistle et al)

Ha! I know, one of my greatest pleasures is spotting similar infractions of modern protocol in Malory Towers and St Clares.
Imagine my horror when I read the modern censored versions of Malory Towers. All the fisticuffs had been removed!
I work in a school library and I explain to the children how much things have changed. I also describe the original storyline in detail. Some of the kids are horrified by the violence and the adults condoning it, some aren't.

Jack Maynard is definitely going with her. I don’t think he’s ever handed anyone a drink without a sedative in it.

Jack was a wrong 'un.

I can see the appeal of a mug of warm milk with something soothing in it though. In 2022 she'd be doling out hash brownies. 'How awful, Matron, I'd say. I'm sure this is outside correct nursing protocols.' and then take two.

That must be how Joey had eleven DC.

But! Those very cakes could be problematic.

Matey would then have to hold one of her periodic dental inspections and march thirty unfortunate girls to Herr von Francius's dental surgery.

Perhaps Karen’s putting hash in all the cakes too. That’s why she would never give the recipes to anyone.

The person who really needed sedating (and would definitely have benefited from regular hash cakes) was that volatile nutcase art master Herr Laubach. That man has serious anger issues!

"Some of the kids are horrified by the violence and the adults condoning it, some aren't"

Yes, and in some cases the violence was actually perpetrated by the adults.

I recall Miss Annersley being horrified when Commander Christy said he wished Emerence Hope had been a boy, so that he could have thrashed her.

(Emerence had caused a million pounds worth of damage to the Commander's property IIRC - or somesuch)

I always wonder if Gaudenz ever got married.
The CS would have had serious problems without him, though. He was very handy for rescuing lost girls when they got stuck in blizzards five yards from the CS gates.

Matey wasn’t the only one playing fast and loose with the sedatives in those books!

Indeed. The pantomimes and plays had me asleep almost instantly.

Same here. I do not read the chapters on plays and pantomimes/Christmas shows. Unbearable.

See also Chapters on Half-Term Outings (yawn).

There’s one of the Chalet School books where Jem beats a boy who’s about 10 or 11. I think it’s described as a whipping IIRC.

And all the other adults take the attitude that the whipping is fine and justified because of the boy’s terrible behaviour.
It’s difficult to imagine that scene appearing in a modern children’s book.

Oh yes, the plays were dull. And I might be my imagination but they loved doing boring tableaux of famous snoozy paintings such as And When Did You Last See Your Father?. Well, I suppose Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe would have been out of the question.

Plus thrilling games like making paperclip chains with tweezers & listing rivers of the world that began with certain letters, in their fun evenings.

it’s not just the milk is it? Matey always has a special ointment or syrup to treat all manner of minor ailments with a ‘dose’. Who knows what the hell she’s been giving everybody.

Plus thrilling games like making paperclip chains with tweezers & listing rivers of the world that began with certain letters, in their fun evenings.

Those always sounded a lot more fun than the tableaux where the girls had to guess the names of obscure books etc.

I'm still recovering from camp when they thought they'd found a body in the lake.

Ha! Joan Baker (a rather common girl) was very scathing and superior about the games the girls played with the mistresses in the evenings.

She also wore a highly unsuitable dress to one on her first evening at the CS.
She had permed hair, which Matey was not happy about - oh, and make-up!

The horror.

I believe she came to a bad end, though. She failed to snaffle a doctor as a husband when she left the CS and got engaged to a man in an office instead.

Maybe she wanted to avoid the sedatives.

Maybe there was a Guide Badge ("Crime Scene Investigation") which EBD wanted Joey to get.

Yes, she was always mixing a jorum of something of other - just for yawning, sometimes.

Ooh, ooh! Oliver Twist! and "we must have The Queen!"

(glods I am sad)

it’s not just the milk is it? Matey always has a special ointment or syrup to treat all manner of minor ailments with a ‘dose’. Who knows what the hell she’s been giving everybody.

Laxatives, I reckon.

I think the 'dose' in hot milk after a traumatic experience was often no more than aspirin.