In my youth, it was the custom for servants to remain much longer in families than it is at present; and my mother was so kind and gentle a mistress that her domestics did not consider they would be likely to “better themselves” (that most ambiguous expression!) by mere change of situation.
First in love and consideration came the nurse, Brooks, or “Brookey,” who had already spent many years under my parents’ roof before I was born. She was the idol of the nursery, a beautiful, dignified old lady, full of quaint sayings and original notions, rendered still more racy by frequent lapses into “Malapropisms,” for “she was no scholard, my dear,” and would call Albemarle Street “Foldemol Street,” and assured us all that her “nevvy” who lived at “Brummerzer” (Bermondsey) was very clever in “edicating” young men, and teaching them “’Mathics,” (mathematics). When told of the marriage of one of our cousins, she inquired if there were “no chance of any gentleman paying his ‘distresses’ to her sister”? Brookey could never forget that she had been a beauty, and when on the wrong side of seventy she sat for her portrait, to a friend of mine, I found she was not well pleased with the execution, but it was some time before I could discern the reason. At last, however, it became evident that she objected to a stick which the artist had placed in her hand.
“Just as you please, my dear, but I should have thought a rose would have looked nicer!”
Dear old soul! my youngest brother and I shed bitter tears at parting from her, but we never lost sight of her until her death, as she paid us frequent visits both in London and at Hampton Court.
Another prominent person in “Our Household” was Rachel Day, the lady’s maid, a most consequential and important character in her own eyes, even before she was advanced to the rank of a courtier, by leaving my mother’s service for that of my sister, the Maid of Honour. During a visit we paid at Longleat, Day was found on one occasion by the head housemaid, wandering about the corridors.
“Can I be of any use?” said the housemaid, in a patronising tone; “I daresay you feel lost in such a large house.”
“Oh dear no,” replied the Abigail, with an air of offended dignity, “we live in a much larger one at home.”
The housemaid was bewildered and humiliated, but
Day had reason, as our French cousins would say, for that “home” was the Palace of Hampton Court. When my sister became Maid of Honour to Queen Adelaide, Day assumed, as in duty bound, an extra dignity and courtliness of manner, and invariably talked of when “We go to Windsor,” when “Our waiting begins,” and the like, and indeed to the end of her life she considered herself one of the pillars of the throne.
ETIQUETTE BELOW STAIRS