Nooks and Corners / being the companion volume to 'From Kitchen to Garret'

by J. E. Panton

Now let us take the ideal kitchen, the kitchen as made and designed by Mr. G. Faulkner Armitage, of Stamford House, Altrincham, Cheshire, who has most kindly drawn for me the different pieces of furniture with which he decorates this charming room of his, and which, in the Manchester Exhibition, were stained green and decorated with brass hinges and locks, and see how we could adapt this to our present style of house, the house with the tiny kitchen, the smaller laundry, pantry, and scullery, and where there is not an atom of sitting-room apart from where all the work is going forward. In that case is it worth while to make a pretty room, and if we do can it be possibly kept so? I think it can, even with our present maids, whose taste for the beautiful is not largely developed; it most certainly could if we are given the maid of the future, the real lady-maid, who may come forward to the rescue of those unhappy beings who at present haunt the precincts of registry offices and spend small fortunes on advertisements which can have only the most barren results.

But before I go on to speak of the ideal kitchen and the cook of the future; who will hardly concern my readers, as she is not born at present, or if she be is certainly not ready for engagement, I should like to say a few words about the best manner to obtain servants, repeating continually that if we require good ones we must take them ourselves and train them ourselves. I am always met, when I state this fact, by the unanswerable argument, ‘I have neither time nor patience to teach my servants; I can pay good wages. I want to engage skilled labour.’ Skilled labour may be had for money, there is no doubt, but the person who engages her maids on these lines will never have good or affectionate servants. She will be waited on, dressed, cooked for admirably, no doubt, but she will obtain nothing beyond her mere bargain. For better wages, a more aristocratic place, her cook will leave her in the lurch, despite the fact that she may expect to be laid up or to have most particular and important visitors at the very period when the old maid departs and the new one comes in. Her nurse will extract her pound of flesh in the shape of holidays and outings, whether the baby is teething or not, or whether the children are all miserable with colds, or she herself long to lie down with a bad headache. The housemaid will go to her ‘church or chapel,’ to her promenade with her ever-changing young man, whether she has unexpected guests or not; and she will never know the extreme bliss and comfort of possessing friends in the kitchen, who give up their own holidays because they are sure their mistress is not fit to be left, who regard the children as if they were as much theirs as they are the mistress’s, and who finally think of her and hers, and her comfort, as she does herself. No mere hired help will do all this. You must have maidens whom you have carefully trained; you must take trouble—aye, and never-ending trouble—about them, unless you wish to join the ranks of those who are always abusing their maids and yet would not lift their fingers to assist themselves. And then, again, you must undoubtedly train yourself at the same time not to expect perfection.

Think of our own girls. Are they always to be trusted at tennis and at balls to maintain that serene and demure deportment which of course we always did, and which we naturally expect from our daughters, especially where young men are concerned?

Do they never flirt? Are they never found missing at critical moments, for example, when the carriage is at the door, and Paterfamilias is divided between anxiety for his horses and wrath at being kept waiting? Do foolish little notes never pass? Are flowers never given to the most detrimental youths of one’s acquaintance? And finally, do our own daughters always keep men at arm’s length? Are they always truthful, always obliging, always careful about their own rooms and the things which are committed to their charge?

I leave each mother to answer for her own daughters. I should not like to answer for all the girls I know, and I seem to remember episodes in my own past (was it mine, or did it belong to some one I once knew very well indeed, I wonder?) which I should rather not confide to my daughter, and indeed which I should not care to hold up to her as an example of what all girls should do, and which often make me very kind to the maids when I meet them promenading with the youth who calls for orders or the man whom I scarcely recognise out of his livery; and it is far better to know such things will happen, and to keep a kindly eye over these affairs, than to scold vigorously and declare that whatever happens no followers of any sort or kind shall enter your chaste abode. Neither should they until the engagement is a bonâ-fide one, and one that you know is allowed and smiled upon by the girl’s parents. This you should ascertain for yourself—another reason for taking your maids young and from a family of whose antecedents you know something from your own observation. And I never think much harm can happen from these promenades if great stress is laid upon the fact that all must be at home after dark, and that in winter no one must stay out after 8.30. Then the house door should be locked and the key brought upstairs, either in town or country; there is always the front door to come to, and there is no reason why everyone should not come to that.

I am no advocate either of very hard and fast rules, and I maintain that it is very difficult to make, and still more difficult to keep, set regulations which circumstances may alter at any given moment. The only thing that must be insisted on is punctuality; without punctuality no household can go on, no establishment can be in the very least degree managed or carried on. The servants become slovenly; and it is impossible to get through the work, because no one knows when the meals are to be, or when the beds can be made. Therefore, the first rule, and indeed the only really important rule, is that which makes the meals regular, and the attendance thereat compulsory on all members of the family, children and temporary members, such as visitors, alike. After that, and when we have demonstrated how the work is to be done, we should stand aside and not interfere unless it is absolutely necessary; then a few quiet words are enough. Whatever you do, do not ‘nag;’ a servant that requires acrimonious scolding and continual ‘telling’ had better go, and another should be had at once.

The best way to find a servant (if your ‘place’ has a good name) is to inquire among the tradesmen. If a good servant is leaving her place, she always tells the butcher and baker; she never goes to a registry office. If she is leaving to better herself, her mistress can soon find her a place among her own friends; there would be no need for her to go elsewhere, and I do not think a really first-rate maid ever goes anywhere except to her mistress or to the tradespeople, who are all delighted to help her to find what she wants. An advertisement in the ‘Guardian’ or ‘Morning Post’ is another excellent means of obtaining a recommended servant, and I hope some day to find that the clergyman’s wife in each country parish will turn herself into an amateur registry office for all the young girls under her husband’s charge. She should teach them in the kitchen and nursery and train them in nice ways, and be always possessed of some maiden she can send out into a better place. Of course the Girls’ Friendly Society does something of the kind, but the good that it does is largely discounted by the evil ways of many of the ‘associates,’ who cannot help interfering egregiously and stupidly, and so bringing what ought to be an absolutely perfect organisation into contempt.

In London there is only one way of finding good servants, and that is by advertising in either of the papers I have suggested, saying ‘Apply by letter only,’ or else the advertiser will be inundated with a class of persons who apply on the chance of picking up something in the hall, or of getting their ‘expenses’ paid. No unknown person should ever be left alone for a moment in the hall, and on no consideration should anyone pay the ‘expenses,’ which often exist in the imagination only, and would be amply recouped were twopence handed over to the applicant to cover her omnibus fare; that even should be given with caution, for, absurd as it may sound, there are people who exist on applying for situations, which they accept and give excellent references to empty houses, and promise to come in at once, to commence the duties required immediately. The mistress, overjoyed at the idea of securing such a treasure, gladly pays the fare to some country station, to be refunded, of course, out of the first quarter’s salary, and goes off for the treasure’s character, when she promptly discovers she has been done, and that if such a house does exist at all it is either closed entirely or lived in by someone who has never heard of the treasure, who naturally is also not to be found at the home address, that was given so glibly and written down so very carefully.

A written character should also never be taken. The most exquisite handwriting, the best of all note-paper, duly embellished with a crest, address, and monogram complete, are no safeguard, for servants have been known to steal note-paper, and in these days of universal education a good hand is not to be trusted in the least. Even if the family with whom the servant lived has gone abroad—and this is the favourite reason always given when a written character is produced—there must be some relation or friend of the last employer still left in England who would not object to speak for a maid, who if worth anything at all must be known to someone outside the mere inner circle of the house itself; and this should be insisted on, especially in London, where an unknown servant is often the friend of the gentle burglar, and can do an immense amount of mischief. Indeed, when I thoroughly sift the numerous complaints which reach me about servants, I invariably find them caused by the fact that the maid has either been procured by a registry office or taken with only a written character in the most careless way, and with not half the precautions we should take before we engaged ourselves to call on a new comer to our especial district. We demand very strict credentials from anyone we admit to our house as a mere acquaintance; we let anyone into the house to live as a servant who can produce any scrap of writing, or procure any registry-office keeper to speak for her capabilities and character.

I am not speaking without due thought on the matter. Of course there are absolutely trustworthy registry offices, and some written characters may be genuine; but as a rule neither is to be trusted, and it is far better to do one’s household work oneself than to engage someone of whom we know no more than can be told us by an individual eager for the hiring fee, or from a bit of paper probably written on by the applicant herself.