“I wouldn’t let them, my dear Martha,” replies Mrs. Sterling, with her sunny smile. “If evils, they are surely minor afflictions. And, after all, I imagine ‘they’ are a good deal like the rest of man and womankind—pretty much as you choose to take them. The truth is, there is no justice in wholesale denunciation of any class. You recollect the Western orator’s truism, ‘Human nature, Mr. President, nine cases out of ten, is human nature.’ When I consider the influences under which a majority of our servants have been reared—ignorance, poverty, superstition, often evil example in their homes—my wonder is, not at the worthlessness of some, but that so many are virtuous, honest, and orderly. You will allow that, as a general thing, they are quite as industrious as their mistresses, and control their tempers almost as well. And we make so many mistakes in our dealings with them!”
My old friend does not often lecture, but she has something to say now, and forgets herself in her subject.
“We err so grievously in our management, that a sense of our failures should teach us charity. Do we understand, ourselves, what is the proper place of a hired ‘help’ in our families? If it is the disposition of Mrs. Shoddy to trample upon them as soulless machines, Mrs. Kindly makes a sort of elder daughter of her maid; indulges, consults, and confides in her, and wonders, by-and-by, to find herself under Abigail’s thumb—her husband and children subject to the caprices of a pampered menial. I never hear a lady say of a valued domestic, ‘I could not get along without her,’ without anticipating as a certainty the hour when she shall announce, ‘There is such a thing as keeping a servant too long.’ The crisis comes, then, to Mrs. Kindly. In a moment of desperation she frees her neck from the yoke. Abigail packs her six trunks, having entered Mrs. Kindly’s service, seven years before, with her worldly all done up in a newspaper, shakes the dust off the neat Balmoral boots which have replaced her brogans, against the heartless tyrant who sits crying, in her own room up-stairs, over thoughts of how Abigail has been so clean, quick, and devoted to her interests; how she has nursed her through a long and dangerous illness, and had the charge of Emma and Bobby from their birth. She has prepared a handsome present for her in memory of all this, and is hurt more than by anything else when she learns that the girl has taken her final departure without even kissing the baby.
“It is not strange that the deceived mistress should, from that day, write down Abigail a monster of ingratitude, and forget the faithful service of years in the smart of wounded feeling; when the truth is that she did the maid more injury by injudicious petting, than the latter could do her mistress had she absconded with all the plate in the house. She has, as might have been expected, proved Abigail’s unfitness to be her confidante and co-adviser; but, at the same time, she has filled her brain with notions of her superiority to her fellow-servants, her heart with burnings for the higher station she can never occupy.
“I speak feelingly upon this subject,” continues Mrs. Sterling, with a laugh; “for I was once led into this very mistake myself, by the attractive qualities of a young woman who lived with me nine years as seamstress and chambermaid. She was so even-tempered, so sensible, industrious, and respectful, that she gained upon the esteem of us all. One day, while we sat together at work, I told her of some family changes in prospect, prefacing the communication by the remark, ‘I want to speak to you of something, Eliza, which you must not mention to any one else at present. The interests of an employer and a servant should be the same.’
“Then, very foolishly, I opened up my mind freely on the subject that engaged it. She answered modestly, but intelligently, entering into my plans with such cordial interest and pledges of co-operation, that I went to prepare for a walk, feeling really strengthened and cheered by the talk. At the front door I was met by a letter requiring an immediate reply. Returning to my chamber to lay off my hat and shawl, I heard Eliza talking loudly and gleefully in the adjoining sewing-room, with the cook, whom she must have called up-stairs through the speaking-tube. You cannot imagine, nor I describe, my sensations at listening, against my will, to an exaggerated account of the interview which had just taken place. Not only my language, but my tones were mimicked with great gusto and much laughter by my late confidante—the phrase ‘The interests of the employer and the servant should be the same’ occurring again and again, and forming, apparently, the cream of the joke. I was very angry. But for the rule adopted early in my married life, never to reprove a servant when out of humor, I should instantly have ordered the treacherous creature—as I named her—from the house. I sat down instead, to cool off and to think. With reflection, common sense rallied to my aid.
“‘The girl does well enough in her place, which is that of a hired chambermaid and seamstress,’ said this monitor. ‘She knew her position, and would have kept it, but for your folly in dragging her up to temporary equality with yourself. You made yourself ridiculous, and she was shrewd enough to see it. Take the lesson to heart; write it out in full for future guidance, and keep your own counsel.’
“Eliza never suspected my discovery. She remained with me until her marriage a year afterward, and we parted upon good terms.”
I have quoted from my friend at length, because I honor her excellent judgment and mature experience, and because I agree so fully with her touching the evil of so-called confidential servants. The principle of acknowledged favoritism is ruinous to domestic comfort, let who may be the object thus distinguished. Rely upon it, my dear lady, at least one third of home-wrangles and social scandal arises from this cause. Be assured, also, that if you do not perceive the impropriety of lowering yourself to the level of your subordinates, they will, and gauge their behaviour accordingly. The connection is an unnatural one, and, like all others of the kind, must terminate disastrously in time. Then the discarded favorite, aggrieved and exasperated, leaves your house to tattle in the ears of some other indiscreet mistress, of your sayings and doings. Show your servant that you respect yourself and her too truly to forget what is due to both. Be kind, pleasant, always reasonable and attentive to her needs, willing to hearken to and meet any lawful request. Make her comfortable, and, so far as you can, happy.
Excuse one more quotation from Mrs. Sterling, whom, when I was much younger than I am now, I consulted with regard to the just medium between familiarity and austerity.