[Footnote 1: Prime Minister of Charles XII.]
[Footnote 2: exactly]
[Footnote 3: In the Spring of 1698.]
[Footnote 4: or]
[Footnote 5: has]
* * * * *
No. 137. Tuesday, August 7, 1711. Steele.
At hæc etiam Servis semper libera fuerunt, timerent, gauderent,
dolerent, suo potius quam alterius arbitrio.
Tull. Epist.
It is no small Concern to me, that I find so many Complaints from that
Part of Mankind whose Portion it is to live in Servitude, that those
whom they depend upon will not allow them to be even as happy as their
Condition will admit of. There are, as these unhappy Correspondents
inform me, Masters who are offended at a chearful Countenance, and think
a Servant is broke loose from them, if he does not preserve the utmost
Awe in their Presence. There is one who says, if he looks satisfied, his
Master asks him what makes him so pert this Morning; if a little sour,
Hark ye, Sirrah, are not you paid your Wages? The poor Creatures live in
the most extreme Misery together: The Master knows not how to preserve
Respect, nor the Servant how to give it. It seems this Person is of so
sullen a Nature, that he knows but little Satisfaction in the midst of a
plentiful Fortune, and secretly frets to see any Appearance of Content,
in one that lives upon the hundredth Part of his Income, who is unhappy
in the Possession of the Whole. Uneasy Persons, who cannot possess their
own Minds, vent their Spleen upon all who depend upon them: which, I
think, is expressed in a lively manner in the following Letters.
_August_ 2, 1711.
_SIR_,
I have read your Spectator of the third of the last Month, and wish I
had the Happiness of being preferred to serve so good a Master as Sir
ROGER. The Character of my Master is the very Reverse of that good and
gentle Knight's. All his Directions are given, and his Mind revealed,
by way of Contraries: As when any thing is to be remembered, with a
peculiar Cast of Face he cries, _Be sure to forget now_. If I am to
make haste back, _Don't come these two Hours; be sure to call by the
Way upon some of your Companions_. Then another excellent Way of his
is, if he sets me any thing to do, which he knows must necessarily
take up half a Day, he calls ten times in a Quarter of an Hour to know
whether I have done yet. This is his Manner; and the same Perverseness
runs through all his Actions, according as the Circumstances vary.
Besides all this, he is so suspicious, that he submits himself to the
Drudgery of a Spy. He is as unhappy himself as he makes his Servants:
He is constantly watching us, and we differ no more in Pleasure and
Liberty than as a Gaoler and a Prisoner. He lays Traps for Faults, and
no sooner makes a Discovery, but falls into such Language, as I am
more ashamed of for coming from him, than for being directed to me.
This, Sir, is a short Sketch of a Master I have served upwards of nine
Years; and tho' I have never wronged him, I confess my Despair of
pleasing him has very much abated my Endeavour to do it. If you will
give me leave to steal a Sentence out of my Master's _Clarendon_, I
shall tell you my Case in a Word, _Being used worse than I deserved, I
cared less to deserve well than I had done_.
_I am, SIR_,
_Your Humble Servant_,
RALPH VALET.
Dear Mr. SPECTER, I am the next thing to a Lady's Woman, and am under
both my Lady and her Woman. I am so used by them both, that I should
be very glad to see them in the SPECTER. My Lady her self is of no
Mind in the World, and for that Reason her Woman is of twenty Minds in
a Moment. My Lady is one that never knows what to do with her self;
she pulls on and puts off every thing she wears twenty times before
she resolves upon it for that Day. I stand at one end of the Room, and
reach things to her Woman. When my Lady asks for a thing, I hear and
have half brought it, when the Woman meets me in the middle of the
Room to receive it, and at that Instant she says No she will not have
it. Then I go back, and her Woman comes up to her, and by this time
she will have that and two or three things more in an Instant: The
Woman and I run to each other; I am loaded and delivering the things
to her, when my Lady says she wants none of all these things, and we
are the dullest Creatures in the World, and she the unhappiest Woman
living, for she shan't be dress'd in any time. Thus we stand not
knowing what to do, when our good Lady with all the Patience in the
World tells us as plain as she can speak, that she will have Temper
because we have no manner of Understanding; and begins again to dress,
and see if we can find out of our selves what we are to do. When she
is Dressed she goes to Dinner, and after she has disliked every thing
there, she calls for the Coach, then commands it in again, and then
she will not go out at all, and then will go too, and orders the
Chariot. Now, good Mr. SPECTER, I desire you would in the Behalf of
all who serve froward Ladies, give out in your Paper, that nothing can
be done without allowing Time for it, and that one cannot be back
again with what one was sent for, if one is called back before one can
go a Step for that they want. And if you please let them know that all
Mistresses are as like as all Servants.
_I am
Your Loving Friend_,
PATIENCE GIDDY.
These are great Calamities; but I met the other Day in the five Fields
towards _Chelsea_, a pleasanter Tyrant than either of the above
represented. A fat Fellow was puffing on in his open Waistcoat; a Boy of
fourteen in a Livery, carrying after him his Cloak, upper Coat, Hat,
Wig, and Sword. The poor Lad was ready to sink with the Weight, and
could not keep up with his Master, who turned back every half Furlong,
and wondered what made the lazy Young Dog lag behind.
There is something very unaccountable, that People cannot put themselves
in the Condition of the Persons below them, when they consider the
Commands they give. But there is nothing more common, than to see a
Fellow (who if he were reduced to it, would not be hired by any Man
living) lament that he is troubled with the most worthless Dogs in
Nature.
It would, perhaps, be running too far out of common Life to urge, that
he who is not Master of himself and his own Passions, cannot be a proper
Master of another. Æquanimity in a Man's own Words and Actions, will
easily diffuse it self through his whole Family. _Pamphilio_ has the
happiest Household of any Man I know, and that proceeds from the humane
regard he has to them in their private Persons, as well as in respect
that they are his Servants. If there be any Occasion, wherein they may
in themselves be supposed to be unfit to attend their Master's Concerns,
by reason of an Attention to their own, he is so good as to place
himself in their Condition. I thought it very becoming in him, when at
Dinner the other Day he made an Apology for want of more Attendants. He
said, _One of my Footmen is gone to the Wedding of his Sister, and the
other I don't expect to Wait, because his Father died but two Days ago_.