Coping with an inexperienced servant girl: Victorian advice from Ella Day
Are you having trouble getting good servants?
Read this advice from Ella Day in ‘Young Woman’ Magazine (1896):
TO THE WOMAN WHO CANNOT GET ON WITH HER SERVANTS.
MY DEAR FRIEND, – Your cup of trouble certainly seems pretty full. Five different servants in eight months, and all of them, apparently, as bad as bad can be! You say they give you no help, that you would be much better without them. In that case I cannot help wondering why you have inflicted this quite gratuitous burden on yourself. It does not seem for any relief to you, and I think I can conclude with confidence that it is not for any excessive pleasure to the employed.
Has it ever occurred to you that the servants have also their point of view, that human nature is pretty much the same throughout all sections of the community, that the princess in her father’s palace, and the little scullerymaid wiping her hot face with the back of her soiled hand and wondering how she will ever get through all the work that lies before her, stand on just the same bed-rock of humanity, come into the world and quit it alike, and have just the same desire for a little happiness, the same hopes of love, the same certainty of disappointment in one way or another, while passing through this vale of tears? The princess’s troubles come to her with elegance, while even the slavey’s joys are without this, and that makes the total difference.
You are not a snob, or as little of a snob as any-one, but I cannot help thinking that the self-same “Mary Janes” whom you have found stupid, worthless, bad to a surprising degree, would, if they drove their carriages and lived in a social set somewhat above yours, seem not always and altogether objectionable acquaintances, because then, you see, you would be on the look-out for their good points.
It has probably never occurred to you that the “place” you have to offer is not a wholly desirable one, and that it would require a good deal of evident Christianity on the part of both mistress and maid to make it seem so.
I grant all you say about the bad effects of the Board school on girls intended for service. I acknowledge that teaching them to draw, and sing part songs and practice calisthenics, is not the way to fit them for washing dishes and blacking boots in an agreeable manner. But Mary Jane did not decide what she should learn at school, it was decided for her; in trying to excel there she was doing her simple duty of the moment. The law compels her to attend schools where accomplishments, unnecessary, and perhaps harmful in view of her future, are inculcated, and will punish her parents if she is allowed to neglect the educational advantages offered to her…
The best domestic servants I have ever known could neither read nor write. But the generation of these is quite over. All servants of the present day can do both; and when you think what it must have been for those who left home that they might earn their bread among aliens, to be unable to communicate with those they have loved and left, save by means of stilted phrases dictated to a stranger, your kind heart will make you glad it is over.
If your own daughter were taken fresh from school to perform a number of hard and distasteful tasks in a strange household, would you think it reasonable that her employers should expect of her the easy achievement that comes with long practice, and the patience and meekness which the best of us can show only after much discipline?
If you can look on Mary Jane, not as a person who you pay to help you, and who does her part of the bargain very badly, but as an untried creature not yet broken to the harness which all of us hate so sincerely at the outset, I think it will modify your point of view. Ruskin says,”Deal justly by others and we come to love them, do unjustly by them and we learn to hate them.” The question is not how much do you need to have done for you to make your way of life smooth and easy, but how much can one young creature do to relieve you even with all the goodwill in the world, and how much are you entitled to ask of her, in view of the small wage you pay her, and her food?
Now for a practical suggestion! Unless you are able to leave your own convenience in a subordinate place, and to think of your duty to an outsider as equally important with your duty to your household and yourself, I should advise against your ever employing an entirely inexperienced servant. Among new conditions there will always be painful things, and the girl who has never before been from home feels these with special keenness. One or two experiences with others will have enabled her to estimate the duties as well as the difficulties of her calling, and will render her more amenable, as well as more grateful, for such advantages as a considerate mistress may be disposed to offer her. Look out for a girl who has already served in one or two situations, treat her reasonably, like another human being with a heart and a conscience, and it will probably prove to your mutual benefit that she remain long under your roof.
With good wishes,
I am faithfully yours,
Ella Day.
