Progress in the household

by Lucy Maynard Salmon

Other countries do not have the same difficulty.

On the contrary, the difficulty is universal. It may vary somewhat in degree, but fundamentally the problem is the same the world over. Moreover, in no country is there so intelligent an understanding of all its factors as in America, for in no other country is found so great a mass of material for a comprehensive study of the subject. Statistical investigations have been carried on through national, state, and private initiative, and the information asked for has, for the most part, been cheerfully given because of the widespread desire among household employers to coöperate in every way with those undertaking these investigations. Material of every kind, ranging from the scientific accumulations of bureaus of labor to the hysterical deductions of sentimental observers, is all at hand. In Berlin a young man who recently carried on a statistical inquiry in regard to domestic service was nearly mobbed for his presumption—so considered—in attempting to gather information that German housekeepers had guarded as sacredly as Tibet holds the Grand Lama.

When will our present household difficulty end?

The difficulty will end when every man is reasonable, when every woman is omniscient, when every child is obedient, when we discover the philosopher’s stone, when we drink of the Pierian spring, when we dig the treasure at the end of the rainbow, when we enter upon our inheritance in Spain, when the east meets the west.

Meantime?

Dismiss the cook from your attention for a moment and study the kitchen. Is the baking-table on the opposite side of the room from the baking-utensils, while the baking-materials are kept in the pantry? Does an inventory of the cooking-implements show one article for toasting and broiling, two battered saucepans for preparing a five-course dinner, and a soup-kettle with a cover that does not fit? Is the pump on the left-hand side of the sink? Is the sink three inches too low and in a dark corner where a blank wall is all that meets the eye of the one who works before it? Does the waste-pipe from the ice-chest lead into a pan that must be emptied daily? Must the ashes from the range be carried out of doors every day? Is the range-coal too large and is the kindling-wood green? Does the oven-door refuse to shut tight and has the tea-kettle sprung a leak? Do the unprotected water-pipes freeze with zero weather? Does the chimney fail to draw? The results of these investigations may be the discovery that the household engineer has been expected to run his engine with insufficient fuel. What if the skillful engineer has made the same discovery?

Occupy for a week in winter the room of the cook. Does the temperature hover near the freezing-point, while the rest of the house is warm? Is the mattress of husks and are the pillows of hen’s feathers? Does a row of hooks take the place of a closet? Try the room for a week in midsummer. Is the temperature stifling hot? Do flies and mosquitoes find joy in the screenless windows? Are the facilities for bathing a small bowl and a pitcher without a handle on the top of a triangular wash-stand? The two weeks’ vacation in an unknown part of your own home may lead to the traditional mauvais quart d’heure. What if the employee has spent a year under the protecting shelter of your roof?

Watch for a week the table conversation of your family and its guests. Count the number of times you hear the word “servant,” and remarks in regard to “household drudgery,” “menial service,” “knowing one’s place,” and “superiority to housework.” What if the household employee has also kept count?

Imagine that you can accept ten cents from a friend for doing an errand, half a dollar from a guest as he leaves the house and a dollar from another, and can flatter an unwelcome cousin in the hope of getting two dollars at his departure. Criticise mercilessly all of your friends after you have invited them to afternoon tea. Repeat at table all the gossip retailed by officious busy-bodies. Your own self-respect will be lowered. What if moral deterioration takes place in the kitchen under the same conditions?