DOMESTIC SERVICE.
[Tovaz EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] SIR, With respect to the article in your issue of June 8th and the letter of "Satisfied Mistress" of June 22nd, will you allow MO to give my opinion P I speak from an experience of fifty years of married life.
With (1) Supply I agree entirely.
With (2) Wages I absolutely disagree. I look upon her system as simply that of a bribe. I consider that " a rise in wages " should be in consequence of " having done well," and this is an encouragement. I give wages when I engage a servant in accord- ance with the wages of the time, but I invariably raise them when they are deserved. I may say that in many years I have been rarely asked for a rise. Often it has been an unexpected surprise. For a holiday I have often helped, but I make no stipulation. Parlour-maids, of course, have their livery, and I have often given dresses as a present, but it is better not to make them a part of the wages, which many mistresses cannot afford to do.
(3) Accomniodation.—If "Satisfied Mistress" has a large house, and ample means, and is able to give each of her under- servants a separate room (my upper-eervants all have one), and is able to make their rooms as pretty and as comfortable as those of her own daughters, by all means let her do so. But in how many houses is this possible ? A servants' hall is usual, and often a house- keeper's room, in -a large house.
With regard to (4) Liberty. In the heart of the country and eight miles from a town, it may be easy for the (easily) "Satisfied Mistress " to let her young girls " go out and in as they please; without my permission." She is surely doing even more for them than she would for her own young daughters, if she has any, and in any case, as her experience is only eleven years, they must be quite- children. When they are fifteen or sixteen will she let them run- wild as they like,- not only in the country, but London ? My servants have plenty of liberty, but the housekeeper is responsible, and there are rules as to going out and times for coming in about which there is no difficult•. Would "Satisfied Mistress" let pretty young girls in London go "out and in as they please " ?
Her " simple arrangements " do not seem to me " too simple," and to a young wife with a small house, and not over-large means, they will sound very far from simple, and it is in fact only spoiling the market. As I said, I speak from an experience of fifty years. I have a housekeeper who has been with me thirty years, a lady's-maid who has been over forty, and I have not one at the present time (in spite of the war) who has not been with me over eighteen months; others eleven, three, and two years. The " undere " must rise to be " uppers," but I have had servants who preferred not to leave when even advised that they ought to " get on."
I say—do the domestic servants justice, do not think it is neces- sary to bribe them. Do not talk of domestic service as a dying industry. This is a time of excitement. The high wages for munitions and what they call " war work " have carried them away. But I think the tide is beginning to turn. They are begin- ning to miss the comfort of domestic service. With the long hours, and the hard work, and the short holidays, they are too weary when the day is over to enjoy their liberty. Do not look upon faithful servants as things of the past, do not talk of hostels and only day servants, do not give up the hope of still having.the old friendship between the mistress and the maid, do not court failures by minimizing successes. This is not the way that wars are won.
A man (now out fighting) wrote a sermon when he was eight and a half years old on love, and in it he wrote (it is copied with his corrections and spelling) : " It would be very nice if every one of us could hear him say Well done thou good and faithful sew friend,' for he said in another place Hensforth I call you not servants—but—I have called you friends.' "
When the war is over, though the old grooves will be gone, and the wheels can no longer run in them, yet we may still look to the time when in domestic service there will still be mistresses and 4
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