A certain Duke stood on a hill looking at his vast estate: as far as he
could see was his property. He observed to his agent: “Lovely scenery,
is it not? Yet I cannot eat or drink it, or take it with me when I
die. You, or anyone else, may look at it, and that is all I can do.”
But what would the estate look like if he had not agent, farm steward,
and labourers to look after it, and gamekeepers to protect his game,
servants to obey his every wish. The whole place would simply be a
curse to him. Later on he came across a stranger on his land, and asked
him if he knew he was trespassing on his land. “Your land,” said the
stranger; “how do you make it out to be your land?” The Duke said,
“I inherited it from my father, and have every right to it.” “And,
pray, where did your father get it?” “He got it from his ancestors,
who fought for it.” “Then,” said the stranger, “it’s about time it was
fought for again. Come on!”
These great landowners are very jealous of their estates; they would
not lose an inch of it. But they are not so particular as to the
way they add to it when they can see a chance. I will point out an
instance. When I was a boy my uncle held a small farm not many miles
from Southampton, on the borders of a rich man’s estate--a small stream
devided it from the park. My aunt was my father’s sister: they had a
few cows, pigs, a lot of chicken, an old horse or two. My uncle was
churchwarden or something of the sort. Nothing pleased me better than
to walk the five miles to visit them on a Sunday when the fruit was
ripe in the orchard; they would lend me an old muzzle-loading gun,
powder, shot and caps, and I would shoot the thrushes and blackbirds
that came to eat the cherries. I generally ate too much fruit, and got
stomach ache. It was a fine old thatched house. Its surroundings would
be a fine subject for a painter of pictures. The scene was painted
by Ward, in 1831. I have the oil painting, a sunlight effect, in my
posesion. My uncle and aunt made enough to live comfortably, in spite
of the ravages of rabbits from the rich man’s estate adjoining, also of
the phesants. They must have occupied the farm for twenty-five years
when my uncle died. My aunt carried on for some few years, hiring
extra help, employing an extra farm hand. But now came the rich man’s
chance. He turned her out of the farm, as he wanted the land added to
his park, pulled down the old farmhouse. My aunt went to a cottage
in the village, and died in less than three months. My aunt was the
only person I ever heard use the old expression, “Marry come up.” The
kitchen was lighted by diamond paned windows, the floor was red bricks,
the great wide fireplace with seats each side the fire which was on the
hearth, no grate, fire-dogs each side, a chain and hook, a three-legged
pot, sides of bacon hung up the chimney. Potatoes and cabbage, in nets,
were cooked with bacon in the three-legged pot.
I observed in the newspaper a year or so after the great war a certain
lady of prominence wrote an article saying the poor were behaving as
though they were the cream of the land, whereas they were only the
scum. It was during the time of the great labour strikes. I should like
to ask her which is the scum: the busy bee who gathers the honey, or
the drone who brings no honey to the hive? For she certainly belongs to
the latter class, who lives on what the workers produce, directly or
indirectly. Did she ever produce anything but talk, and such talk as
that simply widens the gulf between the worker and those that do not
work, the rich and the poor. Was her money amassed without the aid of
the worker? and does she not live on what the worker produced? These
things may not have been accomplished in her generation, but it must
have been done some time previously, for in all labour there is profit,
so without labour there is no profit. Did she ever do a hard day’s
work in her life? Useful work. Fancy seeing her on her knees, with
a slavey’s cap and coarse apron on, blackleading a grate, but worse
still, having to live in the same house with a person of her ideas of
human nature. Scum indeed! What is wanted in this country is a leader
whose body and soul is for the good of the workers (the parasites can
look after themselves); the busy bees, the honey makers, are the ones
to take first consideration, and everything else would follow that the
country desires, health, wealth, happiness, contentment. Whereas now it
is nothing but discontentment all round.
But where are we to find the strong man with gumption and originality?
Not at Westminster: I am afraid not. I have lived amongst the class
that Members of Parliament are drawn from, all my life: have seen their
inner life. As for intelect: God help them. All they learnt at school
and college was to act like a gentleman, but that does not prove that
they are gentlemen. Certainly they do not view the problem of life
from the same standpoint as the worker views it. Then how can they be
expected to mix a plaster to suit the workers’ case?
A man in his own district in the country may be of small importance,
but when he puts up for Parliment and gets M.P. tacked on to his name
he immediately becomes a big bug, and the way they go about it is at
least peculiar, to say the least of it.
I will give an instance. I was living in the service of the gentleman
who was “entering the lists,” for a constituency in the North of
England. It was several years before the war, at the time there was a
great outcry about so many foreigners being employed in this country,
and so many Britishers walking about without a job. At the election
speeches this question was brought forward. My Bos said he would give
the matter his special attention should they give him their votes and
put him in Parliment, which eventually they did. Now at that very
moment he employed in his house a German housekeeper, a French chef,
a German under housemaid, and a Swiss under housemaid, and a French
ladies-maid. There is no length they will not go with safety to get the
M.P. tacked on to their names.
I was staying in another large house where another seat in Parliment
was to be contested. The would be member’s wife was helping him by
visiting all the people’s houses who had a vote. The party were ready
to start, the carriage being at the door, when the lady sent for her
maid upstairs for some extra pairs of white gloves, then, turning to
the other visitors, observed: “To shake hands with common herd.” If
there happened to be a baby in the voter’s houses the lady would
exclaim, “Oh, what a lovely child,” and would kiss the child all over
if only votes were promiced her husband at the election. And the
husband on his part has all of a sudden become extremely affable. On
meeting a voter he shook hands and said, “Well, Jiles, how are things
going with you?” Yet, whether that gentleman got into Parliment or
did not, one thing is very certain: when he meets Jiles, or any of
the voters who put him where he is, they have grown so darned small
that neither he or his wife can see them. If I were asked what I am, a
Conservative, a Liberal, a Wee Free, or all the rest of it, I could not
tell them. I am just what a life lived amongst the Aristocracy has made
me. I certainly do not believe in Socialism in its crude state.
It lies in the power of upper servants either to make the younger ones
lives livable, or a perfect hell. When one considers that in a large
house there are servants whose dispositions are all different. They
have got to live peacably with one another. There may be Swiss, French,
Italian, Belgians, Irish, Scotch, Welsh, English, and before the war,
Germans galore. It resembles a lot of squirrels in a cage with a wheel.
The employer says, “There you are, then; spin away, you devils.” It is
simply a matter of temperament in the individual, whether he or she
can adapt themselves to the conditions or not. In some situations
the servants are very happy, in others just the reverse. There is
this difference: In any trade or other profession, one has to be with
objectionable people only during working hours. In service one has to
be with them, living always in the same house, night and day, Sundays
and weekdays.
It is an old saying that Like likes Like. No honest, truthful,
straightforward man or woman likes a lying, two-faced person. Neither
does a lying, deceitful person like a straightforward, trustworthy,
truthful man or woman. But they think them fair game to be shot at.
The lying deceiver gets on well in gentleman’s service, for a time,
perhaps a long time, untill they are found out. They can always spin a
plausible tale, pleasing to their employers, to whom the truth is often
distasteful. But consider the damage they have done to others in the
house before they _are_ found out.
Jealousy, backbiting, slandering is only natural where a lot of
servants are shut up in a house together, with the same hum-drum duties
to do day after day. There is not enough variety of thought to distract
their attention from it, during the long day, without amusements or
freedom. The shop girl, or factory girl may have to work hard, but she
does not have to begin work at five-thirty and keep on more or less
continually till ten-thirty at night, as I know of some housemaids who
do it in the winter. The outdoor girl can look forward to the time she
will finish for the day, probably at five or six in the evening.
The employer does not trouble himself what they do or where they go; as
soon as they are outside the place they are free. All that is required
is that they shall be back to time on the following morning.
The National Insurance scheme is a farce as far as servants are
concerned. If a servant does not feel well, can he or she leave their
work and join up in the queue to see the doctor at 9 A. M. or at 6 P.
M., the surgery hours? Most likely be away an hour. They may do it
once, but will soon get the order of the “Boot,” as the gentry will
not have unhealthy servants in their houses. Most of them are most
unnatural on this point. For instance, a noble Lord I served, whose
butler fell ill with pains in the stomach. The butler saw a doctor but
got no better and could not do his work. The Noble Lord said, “Is not
that fellow any better?” As he did not appear to wait at table after
the second day the Noble Lord called in his own doctor, who ordered him
to be taken (after consulation with the Noble Lord) to St. George’s
Hospital, on a Sunday afternoon.
The butler died there in less than a week. The same Noble Lord treated
his valet, who had been with him over twenty years, in a similar way.
The valet fell ill. The Noble Lord had his own doctor to examine him.
Said it was heart disease. The valet was at once turned out of the
house. He took a quiet, single-handed butler’s place. He died in less
than a month. The Noble Lord would not allow a servant to die in his
house. Now, if this had been one of his hunters that was sick, there
would have been no end of a fuss.
I call to mind an event that occurred at a small place in the North
of London, where a butler and five maids were kept. The cook took the
place as her sweetheart was a chaffeur living within walking distance,
and naturally wanted to see each other sometimes, as sweethearts have
done since the world began. Having finished her work after supper, she
popped up to the side gate for a few minutes’ chat, and to rub noses,
as he was not allowed in the house. Some of the girls gave her away to
the “Missus,” who sent all the other maids to bed, and told the butler
to stand by, in case of a disturbance. The cook appeared, well before
the time the house was usually locked up, and was met by the “Missus”
at the side door. They bundled her out of the house that night, and
sent her boxes after her next day. She was a capable cook, and a well
educated girl, but what humiliation. In another place, on the opposite
side of London, cook after cook left because “No visitors allowed”
was the order. So the employers gave in at last: they had to allow the
girls’ sweethearts in or cook their own food. Consequently when the
Lady went into the kitchen there sat the man in the arm chair, and did
not even stand up and make his observance of respect, but told them if
he was not to be allowed in he should take the cook away. This sort of
thing frequently occurs in small places.
I have not written much about maidservants, for they can generally
speak for themselves. As regard cooks, I have met those who has been
plesant to work with, also the reverse. Some of them ought to have
a piece of red ribbon tied on behind, similar to that on a horse
in the hunting field, or racing paddock. For one never knows when
they are going to “lash out.” As regards ladies-maids, they would be
disappointed if, when they have “got ’em all on,” with a touch of the
powder puff, they were not taken for real ladies. They abhor having to
go in and out of the area gate, but would much rather use the front
door. In fact it would be difficult to tell now-a-days which was the
ladies-maid and which was the Lady of the house, when out walking. Even
the scullery maid must dress herself in the height of fashion, when it
is her Sunday out. Forty years ago servants were not allowed to wear a
hat, but only a demure bonnet.
It would be difficult to tell that a char lady was a char lady, for she
too must dress in the fashion when out of doors, as far as her pocket
will permit. I have seldom met one that has not seen better days. Life
must be hard for them to have to do it. Probably she has to pay a
neighbour a shilling a day to see that her children get their dinner
when they come home from school. Her husband perhaps out of work. Did
anyone see a crosseyed servant? No, they are as scarce as dead donkeys.
A servant must be absolutely perfect in form, disposition, and action.
He must have no sweaty, smelly skin, or feet, which a great many
people have. There used to be an old titled lady in Eaton Place who
was very prowd of her two tall matched footmen. When she was engaging
them she would make them walk backwards and forwards across the room
to see if she liked their action, just as though she was buying a
horse; the footman also had to open the door, go out, and come into
the room again, to show if he did it properly. No, a servant must not
be knock-kneed, flat-footed, humpty-backed, or idiotic, neither do
they like the bald headed ones, they must be properly thatched. In
some places they will have all their men with hair of the same colour,
either all light or all dark.
Of course a tall man has the preference, and advantage of a shorter
man in service. Had I been three inches taller, a six-foot man, I
could easily have got to the very top of the tree. The experience was
there. The first-class character was there, but in a first-class place
a six-foot man would be taken in preference to me. Though I have never
had to borrow a penny in my life, I cannot say I am much better off
than when I began in gentleman’s service.
When my brother kept the shop in the Fulham Road an old butler, who
was in the workhouse, used to leave an old private coat and hat with
my brother to take care of. When it was his day out he came there
and changed his workhouse clothes, and no wonder, after being in
gentleman’s service, among the Aristocracy all his life. People remark,
why did he not take care and save his money when he was in service?
But I say, if a man has a family and wife to keep, and house rent to
pay, there is not much left out of a wage of seventy or eighty pounds a
year, finding his own clothes. If a servant is an honest man and has to
do the above, he will be worse off at the end of thirty years’ service
than when he began. He may, if he is a single man all his life, manage
to keep out of the workhouse at the end, but he would have to be lucky,
and have found good situations. Perhaps one in a hundred butlers gets a
sort of pension, enough to keep him out of the workhouse.
I have had chances of taking valuable things in my time, that would
never have been missed, because no one knew they were there, but a
clear conscience is of much more value, and if I must die in the
workhouse, I must. After having had fifty years of it, I still keep the
old flag flying, and feel as fit as most men at thirty, and say:
“It’s easy enough to be pleasant
When life goes by like a song,
But the man worth while, is the man with a smile
When everything goes dead wrong.”
Au Revoir
Transcriber's Notes:
Italics are shown thus: _sloping_.
The author's unconventional spelling is retained.
Variations in spelling and hyphenation are retained.
Perceived typographical errors have been changed.