Mrs Warren’s plan of economy is the general one; or rather, she follows the general idea of what economy consists of, namely, in exercising a constant supervision over servants, and straining every nerve to make the leg of mutton last a day longer than it does with other people. And I for my part believe that the women of England will never know the secret of true economy until they have dropped all such petty interference with the kitchen, and learned to guard their husbands’ interests with their heads instead of their eyes. There is no doubt that in order to be thrifty it is necessary in a great measure to limit one’s expenses, and it is a good plan habitually to ask oneself before completing a purchase, ‘Can I do without it?’
In nine cases out of ten debts and difficulties are incurred unnecessarily, for articles which added neither to our respectability nor our comfort, and which, if seriously asked, we should have acknowledged we could have done just as well without. Take the generality of English families, cut off all the superfluities in which they indulge, all the things which are necessary neither to their existence nor their position as gentle-people, and, as a rule, it will be found that such absorb a third at least of their income.
It is not only men who have interested themselves in the questions which have lately sprung up respecting the general rise in prices, and the increasing difficulties which assail the householder. Women are constantly comparing notes with each other; wondering ‘where on earth’ the money can go to, and lamenting the exorbitant weekly bills they are called upon to pay.
Some have tried to meet their increased expenses by diminishing their number of servants; others by curtailing the kitchen fare (the worst and most unprofitable species of domestic economy); a few have gone another way to work, and simply tried with how many superfluities they could dispense; and I think these few have succeeded the best.
It was much the fashion a short time back for women to write to the papers complaining of the worthlessness of their servants, and it was not until more than one impertinent letter reflecting on their mistresses had been published from the pens (or the supposed pens) of servants themselves, that the correspondence was perceived to be infra dig., and dropped. We all know that we are very much in the power of our servants, both as regards comfort and economy; and to regulate their actions, we must sway themselves.
As a class, they are much what they have ever been; their characters varying with the authority placed over them. If ignorant, they are bigoted; if educated, presumptuous; they regard their superiors as their natural enemies, and not one in fifty of them is to be entirely trusted. They no longer look upon the house they enter as their home; they think of it more as a boarding-house which they can vacate at their convenience, and themselves as birds of passage, here to-day and gone to-morrow.
To deal with and to control such minds effectually, it needs to show them that ours is infinitely the superior. If we let them perceive that we have no means of keeping watch over them except we do it personally, we lower ourselves to their level, and fail to gain their respect.
Make your servants admire you; make them wonder at the clearness of your perception, the quickness of your calculations, and the retentiveness of your memory, and inwardly they will acknowledge themselves the inferior, and be afraid to disobey.
You will always hear servants speak with admiration of a mistress who has (to quote their own phraseology) ‘eyes in her back;’ the fact being that it requires a mind not only educated in the popular sense of the word, but sharpened by friction with the world, to enable one to perceive without seeing; and that is a state to which the lumpish minds of the mass never attain, and which consequently commands their wonder and respect.
The ‘excellent housekeeper’ who trots round her kitchen every morning as a rule, opening each dresser-drawer, and uncovering the soup-tureen and vegetable-dishes, to see that no ‘perquisites’ are concealed therein, may occasionally light on a piece of unhallowed fat, but she loses a hundred-fold what she gains. While she imagines she has made a great discovery, her servants are laughing in their sleeves at her simplicity; for they have a hundred opportunities of concealing to her one of finding, and are doubtless as cunning as herself. And for such a mistress—for one who is for ever prying and trying to find out something—the lower classes have the greatest contempt; they will neither obey nor save for her; they will even go the length of wasting in order to annoy.