[Conferences between mistresses and servants are being held in
various parts of the country to discuss terms of peace in the
domestic world.]
_Puddleford_.
DEAR MOIRA,--We haven't got a servant yet, but we are clutching at
a new hope. There is to be a conference here between mistresses
and maids, to discuss and readjust the servants' rights and the
mistresses' wrongs--or is it the other way about? Anyhow, I shall
attend that conference. I shall bribe, plead, consent to any
arrangement if I can but net a cook-general. Ten months of doing
my own washing-up has brought me to my knees, while Harry says the
performance of menial duties has crushed his spirit.
Of course, Harry does make such a fuss of things. You might think, to
hear him talk, that the getting up of coal, lighting fires, chopping
wood and cleaning flues was the entire work of a household, instead
of being mere incidents in the daily routine. If he had to tackle _my_
duties--but men never seem to understand how much there is to do in a
house.