The old notion was, that a servant was engaged for a year, and that a servant could not leave, nor a master discharge a servant, under a quarter's notice. The servants within a house were recognized by law as menials, from the Latin intra menia, within walls. As late as last century, all single men between twelve years old and sixty, and married ones under thirty years of age, and all single women between twelve and forty, not having any visible livelihood, were compellable by two justices to go into service of some sort. The apprentice, from the French apprendre, to learn, was usually bound for a term of years, by indenture, to serve the master, and be maintained and instructed by him. Landowners and farmers had their apprentices as well as their menials. Orphan children were apprenticed by the parish, and an almost filial relation and affection grew up between master and mistress and their apprentices. This was specially noticeable among farm-servants. I knew an old man who had been apprenticed to my great-great-grandmother, that died at the end of last century, and he always spoke of her with the tenderest respect, and was proud to the last hour of his life that he had been apprenticed to the old madame.
The farm-servants and the inferior servants to the gentry were hired at certain fairs, generally at Martinmas; in the west of England these are called giglet fairs, but they exist in Yorkshire, and indeed in many other parts of England. The word giglet means a girl. The girls and young men were wont to stand in rows in the market-place, to be looked at and selected. They wore ribands according to the sort of service they desired to enter upon. A carter carried in his hat a tuft of white ribands, a cook wore a red riband, and a housemaid a bunch of blue. The giglet fairs continue, and are attended by all the labouring population of the country side, especially by the young of both sexes, but there is very little hiring now done at them.
One of the most perplexing facts to the student of genealogy, in making out the pedigree of an important family from registers of births, deaths, and marriages in a parish, is that wherever a great family was seated, there are found also a shoal of individuals, distinctly of an inferior social class, bearing the same patronymic. That these were no blood relatives is almost certain, for they are not mentioned in the wills of those belonging to the aristocratic family; and we find no evidence in registers or elsewhere of any family relation. It has often been conjectured, that these individuals and families did really derive from the main aristocratic stem, perhaps not legitimately but left-handedly. But the evidence for this is wanting—it may be forthcoming here and there in individual cases, but there is no proof that this was generally so. To this day we find among the labourers names of historical and great landed families, and we are disposed to think that these are actual lineal offshoots from such families, and sometimes fancy we trace a certain dignity of bearing and aristocratic cast in their features. But I believe that these humble Courtenays, Cliffords, Veres, Devereux, &c., have not a drop of the blood in their veins belonging to these great families, that, in fact, they are descendants of menial servants, who were once in the castle or manor-house of these barons and knights and squires, and that they ate their beef and drank their ale, but drew no blood from their veins. In the fifteenth century surnames were by no means general, and even in the sixteenth were not of general adoption. To this day in the western hills of Yorkshire, separating that county from Lancashire, persons are known by their pedigrees, and very often their surnames are generally unknown. Tom is not Tom Greenwood, but Tom o' Jakes, that is, Tom the son of Jack; and if there be two Toms in a parish both sons of Jack, then one is distinguished from the other by carrying the pedigree further back a stage. One is Tom o' Jakes o' Will's, and the other is Tom o' Jakes o' Harry's. In early parish registers such an entry as this may occur—
"1596, 3 July. Buried, William, servant to Arthur Carew, Esq., commonly called William Carew."
Later than that—in 1660-1—Pepys enters on Feb. 14, "My boy Wareman (his servant lad) hath all this day been called young Pepys, as Sir W. Pen's boy (servant) is young Pen."
At the end of last century and the beginning of this it was a common custom for servant men to assume the titles of their masters, and to address each other under their master's names. This was not an affectation, it was a survival of the old custom of every servant taking his master's surname, as he wore his livery.
In High Life Below Stairs we have this scene—
"The Park.
Duke's servant. What wretches are ordinary servants, that go on in the same vulgar track every day! eating, working, and sleeping!—But we, who have the honour to serve the nobility, are of another species. We are above the common forms, have servants to wait upon us, and are as lazy and luxurious as our masters. Ha!—my dear Sir Harry—
(Enter Sir Harry's Servant.)
How have you done these thousand years?
Sir H.'s serv. My Lord Duke!—your grace's most obedient servant!
Duke's serv. Well, Baronet, and where have you been?
Sir H.'s serv. At Newmarket, my Lord.—We have had dev'lish fine sport.
After a while they retire, then enter Lady Bab's Maid and Lady Charlotte's Maid.
Lady B.'s maid. O fie, Lady Charlotte! you are quite indelicate. I am sorry for your taste.
Lady C.'s maid. Well, I say it again, I love Vauxhall."
The Spectator (June 11th, 1711) says, "Falling in the other Day at a Victualling-House near the House of Peers, I heard the Maid come down and tell the Landlady at the Bar, That my Lord Bishop swore he would throw her out at Window, if she did not bring up more Mild Beer, and that my Lord Duke would have a double Mug of Purle. My Surprize was encreased, in hearing loud and rustick Voices speak and answer to each other upon the publick Affairs, by the Names of the most Illustrious of our Nobility; till of a sudden one came running in, and cry'd the House was rising. Down came all the Company together, and away! The Alehouse was immediately filled with Clamour, and scoring one Mug to the Marquis of such a Place, Oyl and Vinegar to such an Earl, three Quarts to my new Lord for wetting his Title, and so forth.... It is a common Humour among the Retinue of People of Quality, when they are in their Revels, ... to assume in a humorous Way the Names and Titles of those whose Liveries they wear."