Servants and service

There are some servants, and particularly those who are beyond girlhood, who regard the children of the household with anything but a kindly feeling, who bitterly resent the planting of a young foot on the kitchen floor, and deem the appearance of a curly head in its doorway as an unwarrantable intrusion.

‘Now you go out of my kitchen this minute,’ cries the ruling genius. ‘You know you’ve no business here. Be off! Quick! or I’ll tell your ma.’

The curly head vanishes. The youngster, perhaps, only came to make a private inquiry as to the forthcoming pudding, or something equally innocent. But after his disappearance, cook will probably further remark, ‘I hate to have children poking and prying about. They always tell tales and make mischief.’

I can understand the existence of such a feeling if any mistress is so injudicious, any mother so unwise towards her children, as to permit them to act the part of spies over her servants and tattlers towards herself. It is as lowering to her own dignity as it is insulting to those who serve, and injurious to her children to encourage such practices.

On the other hand, the upright, conscientious servant has no need to care who looks on whilst she is engaged about her daily duties. If she reverently carries in her mind this one thought, ‘Thou God seest me,’ and acts as in that presence, she has no occasion to trouble herself about other observers.

As a mother, I feel even more strongly than as the mistress of a home. However accomplished a servant might be in the duties of her department, I would not keep her if I thought that the morals and manners of my children would suffer by contact with her.

Speaking to servants in every department of service, I say, ‘Be kind to the children, dear girls. You can, if you are Christians, give many a hint for their good. You may whisper a word in season which may make the angry boy ashamed of his senseless passion. You may show the little one who is inclined to deceive the beauty and bravery of truth.’

Children are often inclined to gossip. They perhaps overhear something which was never intended to reach them, and, big with the thought of a discovered secret, are eager to share the newly-acquired knowledge with somebody else. A young servant is the nearest individual to the little personage who is inclined to be confidential, and to her the tale is told, if she will listen.

This gives a right-minded girl an opportunity of showing her own uprightness and honourable disposition by refusing to listen, and of pointing out to the child the impropriety of repeating what has been said by parents or guests who had either not noticed or forgotten the presence of the ‘little pitcher.’

Imagine how sweet it was to a mother’s ears when one of my children, after speaking of happy talks she had enjoyed on Sunday evenings with a young servant, said, ‘I always feel better after a conversation with her, more anxious to love and serve God, and to be good and do what is right to everybody.’

After such an instance as this, dear girls, you cannot imagine that a servant’s influence is to be lightly thought of or carelessly used. I have known an instance in another home where the religious training of the parents was rendered useless, their boy’s faith undermined, and the man’s future career hopelessly changed, by the contrary influence of an old and much-trusted domestic.

Again, if servants wish to find a common bond of sympathy between their mistresses and themselves, the little ones will furnish it. When riding in a tram-car, I one day sat opposite to a young mother, who was accompanied by a girl-nurse with a baby on her lap. It was evidently the first, and all its clothing bore traces of tasteful, industrious fingers, rather than of great expenditure. The child was a lovely creature, and its young mother and younger nurse seemed unconscious of everything else. The three made a charming picture; for the little maid, her face lighted up with love, told how her charge had been admired by different ladies, who had even stopped her in the street to look at and praise the bonny baby. The mother listened with eager ears and happy face, and I left that tram-car with unwilling feet, because I thought that in the popular carriage I had seen two human beings united by perfect sympathy, the bond between them being a few weeks’ old infant.

I had a cook once who was very difficult to manage. She was extremely clever in her own department, but determined to have her way and to rule instead of obeying a mistress who was then comparatively inexperienced in household management, and many years younger than herself. I thought I must part with her; but cook had a vulnerable point. She almost worshipped babies, and being shown into the room where I sat with a month old infant on my knee, when she first came about the place, she implored me to let her hold it whilst we talked.

‘Being in the kitchen, I hardly ever get a baby into my arms,’ she said. ‘I’m fond of cooking, but if I had to start again, I’d be a nurse.’

I am sure the baby was an unconscious source of strength to our warm-hearted, self-willed cook; and for the little creature’s sake she would often battle against a temper which was most trying to every one else in the house. Her stay was prolonged far beyond any person’s expectation, and her darling was two years old before Sarah left us. She had rendered the kitchen too hot to hold any one but herself, and it was a question of parting with her or the other three servants.

But I was almost unnerved at the sight of old Sarah weeping over the child whom she had nursed since she was in long clothes, and who was clasping her neck with one arm, while with the other hand she wiped away the tears from her friend’s face, making her pinafore corner do duty for a handkerchief!

I had done what I could to obtain a situation for Sarah in which I thought she would be as little tempted as was possible to give way to her besetting sins, and I thankfully remember that she did well in it.

Here let me say a few words about the need for mutual forbearance in the household. There is a very old story of an aged couple whose quarrels had been for many years the talk of the neighborhood, when, to the surprise of everybody, the disturbances ceased. The gossips lost their regular excitement and wonder, and curiosity took its place. Somebody at last mustered courage to ask the old man the secret of the unwonted peace. He replied with a smile, “My old woman and I have got on all right since we got two bears to live with us.” This only increased the curiosity; but it turned out that these were named ‘bear’ and ‘forbear.’

Ah, the presence of these two bears is absolutely essential to the happiness of every home. They are as much needed in the kitchen as in the drawing-room, and I would say to every young candidate for a situation, ‘Whatever else you may leave behind, take the two bears along with you.’

Mistresses often complain that one of their most serious difficulties arises from the disagreements amongst the servants themselves. One lady, when telling me of this domestic trouble, was ready to cry, because her efforts to induce her servants to be kind and friendly with each other had utterly failed.

‘Two of them,’ said she, ‘are pleasant-tempered enough; but the cook and nurse are always either squabbling or sulking. We have had an interval of peace recently, for these two gave up speaking to each other about a fortnight since, and both are too proud to make any advance towards resuming friendly relations. The others are made extremely uncomfortable, and the children cannot help observing what is going on. It is a shocking example for them.’

‘And are these quarrelsome girls good servants in other respects?’ I asked.

‘Excellent. Indeed, all four fulfil their duties to my entire satisfaction, are respectful to their employers, attentive to guests, good to the children. If it were not for the wretched contrariness of the cook and nurse towards each other, I should esteem myself uncommonly fortunate.’

In this case, you see, the comfort of a home was largely interfered with, and not only the offenders themselves were miserable, but every member of the family suffered, more or less, for want of a little of the ‘bear and forbear spirit’ in two of the household.

As a rule, servants are extremely reluctant to tell tales of, or to lodge complaints against, one another. This is much to their credit; though amongst such a numerous class there are sure to be some tattlers. All honour to those who, in things which affect their own comfort only, show that ‘charity which suffereth long, and is kind.’

But there are cases in which it is right both to speak and act promptly and boldly. For instance, when the conduct of one makes all the rest miserable, as in a particular instance which occurs to my mind as I write.

A cook in a family where several servants were kept, was for years feared and disliked as a perfect tyrant in her own domain. She was so jealous and suspicious, that an expression of kindness and approval from the mistress to one of the other servants was resented as a personal injury to herself. The recipient would be harassed with taunts, accused of hypocrisy, and of wanting to undermine her in the good opinion of their mutual employers. Or, as the others remarked, ‘Let the mistress praise one of us, and cook will blaze like her own kitchen fire, and give us a hot time of it for days to come.’

This mistress was particularly anxious for the comfort and happiness of all under the roof. She was careful to have respectable servants, and to satisfy herself also about the character of their friends and connections. This done, she personally invited them to visit their young relatives and friends, and never had to complain that the privilege was abused.

But, to her surprise, visitors rarely came a second time during the reign of this kitchen tyrant. It was only after long endurance, and when a new cook had succeeded, that the mistress, who wished her house to be a home to her servants, found out why it was not so. Simply because they could not endure that their friends should be made uncomfortable by taunts and rudeness, and they preferred to send them from the door, or to see them anywhere or nowhere, rather than under the roof of their employers.

The cook was an excellent servant in other respects, but for years she nullified the efforts of her employers for the comfort of her fellow-servants by her jealousy, and by practicing all the petty tyrannies which a mean and suspicious nature, combined with fertility of invention, could contrive.

How much the servants endured would be difficult to tell. But they did bear, and in silence, rather than be blamed for tale-telling. They would not complain, lest their unkind fellow-servant should lose her place; though she had not scrupled to rob them of comfort, domestic peace, and the family intercourse which the mistress both permitted and encouraged.

In this case too much forbearance was shown. I think that the right thing would have been for the servants, first, to join in remonstrating with the kitchen tyrant, stating at the same time their intention of laying the matter before their mistress should cook still refuse to hear reason. By such a course they would have saved great discomfort to themselves, have taught a much-needed lesson to one who was not fit to be trusted even with kitchen government, and they would have prevented the commands of the mistress from being a dead letter in her home.

Perhaps some of you may like a little advice as to when it is right to appeal to the mistress, and when it is wise to be silent. In this, as in every other difficulty, you will find all the guidance you can possibly need in the Bible. Go on the grand principle of doing what God’s Word and your own conscience impel you to do.

If you are aware of a wrong done to your employers, or have good cause to suspect that they are being robbed or wilfully deceived by those in whom they place confidence, you ought to speak. If through your silence the innocent would be blamed, or the guilty escape detection, you should tell what you know.

The person who, seeing wrong done, keeps silence, and lets another be injured, becomes a partaker in evil-doing. Sooner or later those who, by hiding the wrong, tacitly consent thereto, will certainly be involved in the blame also. Some may blame you for speaking; but it is better “that ye suffer for well-doing than for evil-doing.” So mind you suffer as a Christian should, for doing right, if you must be blamed at all.

Take another piece of advice from St. Peter’s first Epistle, which is full of practical teaching for the guidance of Christians in their relations one towards another, and to their Divine Head. ‘But let none of you suffer as a thief or as an evil-doer.’

Remember the value of a good name. If yours is unjustly attacked, spare no pains to remove the false impression, and to regain the good opinion of those who have misjudged you.

‘Or as a busybody.’ See how carefully both sides are given! We are warned against keeping silent, where doing this would injure others, hide wrong-doing, or hurt our own good name. We are equally warned against tattling or busying ourselves about what does not concern us. In so many cases where a mere love of gossip would induce us to speak, it is wiser, kinder, more becoming a Christian, to be silent. A few sentences from God’s Word will be the best comment on this side of the subject, and show us the propriety of silence where we should serve no good end by speaking.

‘He that coveteth a transgression seeketh love.’ ‘He that refraineth his lips is wise.’ ‘He that uttereth a slander is a fool.’ ‘The words of a tale-bearer are as wounds.’ ‘A tale-bearer revealeth secrets, but he that is of a faithful spirit concealeth the matter.’ ‘A whisperer separateth chief friends.’

To what does all this advice tend? Surely to teach us that, as witnesses, we should be faithful ones, telling the simple, unvarnished truth. That our lips should be ‘righteous lips.’ That we should not gossip about the faults and failings of others, from a love of talk, and that our daily and hourly prayer should be:—

‘Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips!’