Housekeeping in Germany is reduced to a science; an accurate knowledge
of principles, gained by experiment, experience and reflection.
Personal and domestic expenditures are regulated in strict accordance
with the best theories in consumption of capital and consumption of
labor. This is especially true in the large cities where the houses
are built to accommodate eight or ten families in addition, various
people below in the basements, such as shoemakers, seamstresses, and
washerwomen, who are ready to give service to the _herrschaften_ above.
These houses are generally built of brick, stuccoed, and oftentimes
in the early years of their existence present a very handsome front,
deceiving a stranger’s eye with the impression that they are stone.
The massive front door opening to the corridor which leads to the
_porte-cochère_, is in modern houses, most ornamental. Wrought iron, in
arabesque patterns, with the monogram of the owner, serves to protect
the plate-glass behind. The panels of wood below are elaborately
carved. This door opens to the touch of a bell attached to a rubber
tube and bell which remains in the basement where the _portier_ lives.
Invariably on the inside of the door one sees in large German letters,
“_Bitte die Thür leise zu zumachen_.” Every person entering or going
out reads this request, and, while occupied with reading, naturally
lets the door slam the louder. Only sly young men returning from the
_kneipe_ in the darkness feel obliged to bear it in mind. The slamming
of the great corridor door, however, makes no impression upon the
numerous families above, and if it chanced to be a friend of Frau
Schültze who just entered the house, there is yet time for the gracious
lady (_gnädige frau_), who probably lives up the second flight of
stairs, to take off her morning cap (which a German woman is apt to
wear until she hears some one coming) before her friend has time to
ring the bell to her own apartment.
On each floor in the largest houses are two apartments, usually of
seven or eight rooms—large enough, the Germans think, to accommodate a
family of eight or nine. And if you are a foreigner, examining these
houses with a view to renting, the _portier frau_ will accompany you
around, exclaiming how comfortable it all is! There is a _salon_ in
the front, a large, finely-proportioned drawing-room, with bay-window
and frescoed ceiling, and inlaid floor. Then the smaller room to the
right, or left, as it may chance to be, looking also on the street
with two windows, and generally a balcony, is intended for the library
or sitting-room. Then throwing the folding-doors wide open, between
the _salon_ and dining-room, she explains how handsome the two rooms
look during a dinner party. The dining-room has an alcove with a
large window looking down into the court. Then you follow her through
a narrow hall, passing perhaps the bath-room, with the servants’
room above—only five feet high—coming next to the kitchen. “But the
bed-rooms, where are they?” you ask, not being able longer to suppress
your anxiety on this point. “_Ach, hier sind die!_” exclaims the
astonished _frau_, and opens the door to two small rooms, about 10x12.
You look at your companion, the significant glance is returned and you
start for the next house, or up a second flight of the same, to see
if the division of rooms be there as ridiculous. After visiting about
twenty-five houses, however, and finding them all alike, you conclude a
bed-room with a German is a secondary consideration, and as to “guest
chambers,” they have never dreamed of them! Goethe was a true German
in this respect, and no wiser than the rest of his countrymen. Lewis,
in his biography of Goethe, never fails to express astonishment at
the small, dark room, in which the great man slept and finally died.
In the handsome old house at Weimar the spacious reception rooms and
commodious dining-room contrast strangely with the dark little closet
which is called the bed-room. I heard a German gentleman, who came to
America at the time Mr. Schurz did, but who was not so successful,
and who returned to Germany, and was consequently embittered with
everything, say, “The Berlin houses remind me, with their swell fronts
and elegant drawing-rooms, of the fashion of wearing embroidered
chemisettes when the rest of the toilet is mean and contemptible.” “The
Germans,” said he, “put all the elegance on the front of their houses,
while the sleeping-rooms are miserably ventilated little holes.” This
does not apply to the houses built recently. There is no longer such
discrepancy between bed-room and _salon_—economy, convenience and
rich designing characterize many German houses now, which would have
astonished the German mind a half-century ago.
The system by which these houses are rented or occupied is worth our
attention, since it has come to be a matter of great expense for one
family to rent or own a single house in our large cities. Let us
suppose the man who owns an apartment house in a large German city to
have a capital of $60,000 invested. He lives himself with his family
in the _parterre wohnung_, or what we would call the first floor. The
_bel étage_, or second floor, is the choice apartment, and rents,
if the house be in a desirable part of the city, for 3,000 marks (a
mark equals 25 or 24 cents). If the house be a double one, and this
is generally the case, the first _étage_ would bring 6,000 marks, the
second _étage_ 4,800 marks, and the third _étage_ 3,600. He has also
his own apartment, and below, the shoemaker, furnishes shoes for the
family; the seamstress does the sewing and the washerwoman is the
family laundress. From his capital he realizes a large percentage. The
taxes are heavy, but the outlays are not great, being in most cases
incidental, for the water, gas, and garbage, etc., are met by the
different tenants.
As to the housekeeping in one of these apartments or _wohnungs_—the
windows are casement style, with double glass, easy for washing but
difficult for drapery. The floors are inlaid with different colored
woods, and waxed. The walls are papered with rich and dark colors,
and the ceilings finished in stucco. A characteristic German house
will be furnished about as follows: Grand piano in the drawing-room
or upright if preferred; in front of the sofa, a good imitation of
Smyrna rug, (made in Silesia generally). A table stands on the rug
removed from the sofa only far enough to allow a stout matron to
squeeze in for a seat in one corner, which is her prerogative. Around
the sofa are arranged a half dozen chairs, all belonging in color and
form to the sofa. It would be unjust here not to say that the modern
craze for bric-a-brac, for elegant hangings and unique furniture has
penetrated the German mind as it has the English and American, and the
revival of house decoration is appreciated in Germany by those who
have the means to investigate the subject, but the house we describe
is “pre-æsthetical” and stands for characteristic German taste, and it
will be found compares most favorably with an American house before
the “highly æsthetical” fever developed. The dress circle of Smyrna
rug, sofa, table and chairs, is the center of attraction, but the
opposite walls and the corners of the room are not neglected. The piano
occupies a conspicuous position, and one or two pedestals, with choice
copies from the antique, are hid in the corners. A lady’s writing desk,
with delicate note paper ready for her use, a beautiful chair for
her service, and a rich robe for her feet, completes a German lady’s
drawing room. If she can not afford good pictures, she will have none.
Steel engravings from the old masters are frequently found, but seldom
oil paintings unless the parties be very wealthy or where artistic
home talent prevails. How shocking many houses in America are made, by
horrid crude pictures—in color, houses which maintain some beauty in
wood work, carpets, walls, and furniture. The portfolio of etchings
which are now sent to the farthest west and all over the United States
for inspection, are creating a higher taste, and it is a laudable
scheme, although accompanied with exorbitant prices.
The arrangement of our Teutonic lady’s drawing-room is so national that
the palace and the poor man’s house has the same link of resemblance;
for if a man owns but one table and one sofa, the table will stand
in front of the sofa, and the chairs around it. This impresses a
foreigner as being stupid and dull, and the American or French or
English woman living in Germany conscientiously avoids all proximity of
sofas and tables. There is some excuse for this stupid regularity in
the circles which still have the _kaffee klatsch_; an old and artless
entertainment which traveled women eschew, and women of high rank
long ago ignored, but which remains a blessing to women of moderate
means and unpretentious life. The hour for the _kaffee klatsch_ is
always 4 o’clock, and each guest is requested to bring her knitting
or fancy work, to take her seat at a table spread with a white cloth,
upon which the _kaffee_ stands, covered up with a quilted hood to keep
it warm, and flanked on either side by large baskets of cakes. Here
these innocent women sit for hours sipping coffee and knitting and
gossiping to their hearts’ content. It is the hour _sans-souci_ for the
genuine “_hausfrau_.” In such society one can recognize the simplicity
and ingenuousness of the German woman, and contrast the startling
differences of education and habit with her American sisters.
Returning to the furniture of the house, we find the library, or
sitting-room (_wohnstube_), for private libraries are rare, and only
found in the house of the _gelehrte_. It is true that every house has
Goethe, Schiller, Wyland, Heine, Schlegel’s translation of Shakspere,
Humbolt’s travels, and, it may chance to be, Kant, Hegel, and Strauss,
if the paternal mind cares no longer for Martin Luther. In the
neighborhood of the old _wartburg_ the memory of Luther is too sacred
to allow David Strauss to lie on the same shelf with the Reformer. If
the family taste runs to æsthetics more than ethics, a cabinet of rare
porcelain will take the place of a book-case in the sitting-room. But
in either case the inevitable sewing table stands by the window with
an easy chair by its side. If the gentleman of the house has writing
at home, or any business engagements, then the sewing table finds its
way to the big window in the alcove of the dining-room. This room is
more comfortable than an American dining-room, inasmuch as it has, in
addition to the set of dining-room chairs, a sofa and some easy seats,
two closed cabinets for the damask, on either side of the buffet,
which glistens with glass and china. Sofa pillows and footstools are
abundant, which one can not say are easily discovered in the American
home. But first of all a German house is comfortable, then ornamental.
“Wine, wife and song,” is the motto, as it was in the days of Martin
Luther, and _gemüthlich_, which may mean friendly, well-disposed,
good-natured, kind-hearted; snug, comfortable, lack-a-daisical, is
the word which expresses the tone of home life. The bed-rooms are
unattractive, as we have said. Two mahogany bedsteads, side by side,
“too short than that a man can stretch himself on them, and the
covering narrower than that he can wrap himself in it.” These German
beds are fearfully and wonderfully made, feathers below and above,
pillows hid during the day under the covers, and finally, a white
spread thrown over the entire mountain, in such a manner that it is
impossible to distinguish head from foot.
Of late the sense of the beautiful has brought to light in the shop
windows blue silk quilted spreads and lace coverings for these
monstrosities, and corresponding materials for the toilet table. But
the genuine _hausfrau_ considers them a “snare and delusion.” A German
lady who had just returned from a visit to America, said to me, “How
do the American women make up their beds? I must come and learn. But,”
added she, in the same breath, “I should think you would die under
such thin covers!” The floors of the bed rooms are painted with yellow
ochre and varnished. Small rugs lie in front of each bed, and before
each piece of furniture. A candle, matches, and water _carafe_ stand
on the table by the bed. During the Philadelphia Exposition, a German,
writing from an American hotel, observed: “How exasperating it is to go
to bed in a room with no candle, only gas in the centre of the room,
and innumerable chairs between one and the gas at midnight; and how
dreadful to awaken and find white walls staring at one and reflecting
the morning sun into one’s eyes.” Just criticism! The Germans are too
highly cultivated in art to tolerate white walls, and the Americans are
rapidly becoming so.
The kitchen is the German woman’s pride, and no wonder, with its
shining rows of brass and copper kettles and cooking utensils, hanging
so orderly against the gray wall, and the white porcelain oven,
brass-doored and brass-knobbed. Does it surprise you that she likes
to take a seat there every morning and talk over the _menu_ for the
day with Frederika, then unlock the pantry door and survey the clean
shelves, all dressed up in perforated paper, or red leather and brass
tacks, and loaded with groceries and confectioneries. What woman’s
heart would not swell at the sight of such a pantry and kitchen, and
such a capable, white-capped, white-aproned girl as Frederika? It is an
ideal picture, but one often and often seen in Germany.
We shall make the acquaintance of German servants presently, but first
some reference to the German ovens will be necessary, for it is with
these that the servant’s time is first engaged in the morning and last
at night. Next to the Dutch stove, the German oven is probably the
most economical, and as far as mere temperature is concerned, the most
effective of all warming arrangements. They are built of brick covered
with porcelain and are part of the house, being built in with the
walls. The cost is about seventy-five dollars for those finished with
plain white tiles; but frequently the tiles are colored like majolica,
and are highly decorated. In the Gewerbe Museum, of Berlin, there is
a collection of tiles used in Nürnberg on the old ovens—some are most
curious and beautiful. Since the spirit of decorative art is reviving
in Germany, as elsewhere, the artists of highest rank do not consider
it beneath their dignity to paint tiles or panels, or anything that
can ornament the “house beautiful.” These ovens are generally built
in the corner of a room, and are oftentimes eleven feet high. The
fire is burned in a furnace near the bottom, and the heated smoke is
made repeatedly to traverse the structure from side to side along the
winding passage before it reaches the top, where a pipe conveys it,
when comparatively cold, into a flue in the wall. The heated mass of
brick continues to warm the room long after the fuel is burned. The
same quantity of fuel which heats a German oven for a day is consumed
in an open grate in three hours. In Northern Germany the poorer classes
burn turf and charcoal, the better classes use the turf to mix with
the stone-coal. Wagons of turf are brought to the front of the house
early in the morning, the horses unhitched and taken away. The fuel is
then carried basket by basket full, on the backs of old women, to the
attic or fifth story of the house, which is divided into store rooms
for the different _herrschaften_. On this floor is stored the wood, the
coal, the turf. Early in the morning the back stairs are crowded with
the various servants, from the different apartments, going up and down
with their baskets of fuel. The fire must be lighted one hour before
the rooms become comfortable. While the fires are beginning to burn
the waxed floors are being polished, which is the time in our American
or English economy for cooking the breakfast. If our German friends
however prefer polished floors to gladden their sight on rising,
to heavy beefsteaks to warm their stomachs, what reason have we to
criticise? Frederika is lighting not the kitchen fire, but a little
spirit lamp underneath the “coffee machine,” or boiler, and carrying
in the fresh (but cold) rolls which she has just received from the
baker’s wife at the back door, and in ten minutes she will formally
announce to the _gnädigen herrn_ and the _gnädiger frau_ (gracious
lord and gracious lady) that “_frühstück ist fertig_” (breakfast is
ready). The _gnädiger herr_ will appear wrapped up in a heavy morning
wrapper (made of gray cloth, trimmed in mazarine blue) with newspaper
in hand, and the _gnädige frau_ will take her seat at the table where
the coffee is sending up its smoke. She looks, in her morning cap and
white apron, surely as healthy as her English sisters, and much more
so than the beautiful but frail American woman, who sits eating her
mutton chops and warm muffins. Who shall settle the question if doctors
disagree? Continental Europe has existed on coffee and cold bread and
eggs and never had dyspepsia, while England and America have grown fat
or nervous on the beefsteak and muffins.
The German washing is so well-known, and has afforded so much
amusement, that I would not overthrow the traditions; yet after a long
residence in Germany, and an experience of years in keeping house in
a German apartment, I learned to regard the “_grosse wäsche_” as a
necessary development of the apartment system of keeping house. For
instance, there is one common wash-room, and one drying-room; the
family in the _parterre wohnung_ engage it the first two days in the
week, then it belongs to the family on the opposite side of the house,
and successively to the other inmates of the house, so that weekly
occupancy is out of the question. But a foreigner can escape this
egregious imposition by sending the washing out of the house every week
and waiting patiently for it to return in ten days.
I was asked repeatedly by my German lady friends, “Where is your
wedding chest of linen?” meaning a carved cedar chest containing a
wedding dowry of linen, enough to last through four generations, which
is quite the thing to be inspected by one’s intimate friends, more than
the _trousseau_. How should an American woman answer such a question,
or place herself in the favorable estimation of her good German friends
again after shocking their education and hereditary taste by confessing
that her house linen was only sufficient for present use. There is a
sense of pride in the monthly washing in Germany little dreamed of by
the general observer.
A cook, a house-girl, or _kindermädchen_, and a man-servant (_diener_)
are the usual number of domestics employed by a well-to-do German
family where there are children. If there are no children, a cook and
_diener_ are sufficient help, even in a large city. In the country one
girl is enough. She is “Jack-of-all-trades,” and gets poor pay and less
praise for her proficiency. Her brawny arms and rosy cheeks are only
found admirable by some wandering artist, who makes a hasty sketch of
her carrying water from the village fountain. Among people who keep up
any social style a _diener_ in livery is indispensable. He opens the
door, serves at table, sets the table, polishes the floors, does the
errands, carries the invitation, walks behind the ladies when they go
out, or sits on the box with the coachman when they are driving. Above
all, he keeps Frederika in a good humor by polishing the doors of her
oven, and sipping coffee with her while the _herrschaften_ are sipping
theirs. She learns to call him her “_lieber Schatz_,” and by and by,
Frederika’s head becomes turned, and the cooking is not so perfect.
The wages of this _diener_ are not large according to American ideas;
he receives, according to his ability, per month, twenty thalers, ten
thalers, five, or even two and a half, if he is young, and has never
served outside a restaurant. In addition to his wages, he gets good
food, or the equivalent in money, which he generally prefers, for he
can then go to the _bier garten_ and get his meals, or eat with the
family of the porter below. A servant must understand his or her work
distinctly before entering into an engagement. Each must have a book
in which the employer can read the date of birth, place of birth, the
occupation of parents, the character of the employe, the recommendation
or condemnation of the last employer. This book is kept by the lady
of the house as long as the servant remains in her service, and when
leaving, if the person has been faithful, she is expected to write a
good recommendation in the book. There are two classes of cooks in
Germany—the finished cook (_die fertige köchin_), and the cook who is
willing to do any kind of work. _Die fertige köchin_ is an educated
queen in her department, and like every autocrat, her power renders
her unaccountable for her actions. She prefers to do the marketing,
and is in league with all the grocers and butchers. This coalition
of butchers, bakers, grocers, and cooks in Germany is a confederacy
which threatens the _hausfrau_, the baroness and royal household
alike. Socialism is a ubiquitous monster, and who feels it more than
the helpless woman with her account books before her, knowing there is
no remedy if the cook says “Meat has risen, and the butcher would not
take less.” An unending task in a European kitchen is dish washing,
for six dozen plates in serving the dinner there go no farther than
one dozen in the ordinary American way. The _diener_ is expected to
help the cook in this work, and once a week a _schauer frau_ (scouring
woman, or woman inspector), comes to help. It is a distracting day in
the _wirthschaft_, and serves as a weekly reminder of what is to come
before Christmas and Easter. This _schauer frau_ comes early in the
morning, tears down all the kitchen utensils, takes off the brass oven
doors, sets all the copper kettles and tin ware in a row, and goes to
work scouring them as bright as we would think necessary for a spring
cleaning. Then she washes the windows, scrubs the floors, and returns
with her fifteen silver groschen in the evening as contented as a
woman in America would be with a dollar. Christmas and Easter are the
seasons above all other times of the year for thorough cleaning. Then
the floors are so highly polished, and the brass knobs and doors of
the porcelain ovens made so brilliant that the servants go around in
felt slippers and old gloves, for fear of dimming the luster before
the dawn of the sacred days. Christmas is an expensive season for the
_herrschaften_—so many presents expected: the cook, the _diener_,
the porter and the _portier frau_, the lamp lighter, the gas man,
the butcher, the baker, and candlestick-maker, and above all, the
letter carrier. Eight and five dollars are small amounts for the cook
and _diener_. But we must remember the cook’s small wages during the
year (from five to twelve dollars is the usual monthly wages), before
pronouncing the Christmas gift too much.
_Feiertage_, or holidays for servants in Germany, are a great annoyance
to the order of domestic life. They are so importunant in their
demands, and so obstinately disagreeable if not gratified, that it
is better for the family to go to the restaurant for dinner and “eat
bitter herbs where there is peace,” than to remain at home for “a
stalled ox,” with angry servants to serve it. While they demand so much
for themselves, they are equally disappointed if the _herrschaften_
do not celebrate every birthday of their own. The extra work is no
consideration, and by touching little ways they show their pleasure
when extra company is expected. Bouquets are placed on the coffee
table by the plate of the member of the family whose birthday has
arrived; a cake, with the number of candles to indicate the age of the
person is found burning, and Frederika and August have broad smiles on
their faces as they come in and rattle off some poetry which they have
committed to memory for the occasion, wishing the person whose birthday
they are celebrating _glück_ and _heil_.
Dinner parties are the most frequent and most formal entertainments in
Germany. They are stereotyped, but the type belongs purely to Germany.
When the ladies enter the room, after the introductions they are
invited to be seated on the sofa and chairs of the “dress-circle” which
we have described. The gentlemen stand around the fair ones, bending
or breaking their backs in the effort to talk, or the more unconcerned
stand off in groups, learning from the hostess at the earliest moment
which ladies they are to escort to the table. The seat on the sofa is
the seat of honor, and if a lady of inferior rank has arrived first and
occupied that place, she rises immediately and resigns it on seeing
her superior enter the room; so that a captain’s wife will offer the
seat to a major’s wife, and a major’s wife to a general’s wife, and so
on. The white-gloved _diener_ throws open the doors of the dining-room
ten minutes after the arrival of the guests, and the guests have the
privilege of speaking to each other at the table if an introduction has
failed in any case in the _salon_. The dinner is served entirely from
the buffet; the snowy damask, flowers and glass are only presented upon
the table for the guests to feast their eyes upon. The meats are all
carved in the kitchen, and handed around by the servants. A good _menu_
resembles the French taste and order somewhat, although a discerning
eye will detect the German element in the following:
Bouillon (consommé).
Caviar (caviare).
Lobster.
Salmon du Rhin.
Turbot d’Ostende.
Poulets Santés aux Truffes.
Pâté de Foie Gras.
Filet de Bœuf Garni, Remouladen Sauce.
Rehbraten, } Salad Compotes.
Petit Pois,}
Butter und Käse und Radieschen, mit Pumpernickel.
Pudding d’Orange.
Dessert.
Café et Liqueurs.
There is much leisure, much conversation, and much “toasting,” at a
German dinner. Instead of the ladies retiring when the cigars and
coffee are served, as they do in England, the gentlemen and ladies
leave the table at the same time, and upon entering the _salon_ each
guest goes to the host and hostess and offers his or her hand, saying
in the most gracious manner, “_gesegnete malzeit_.” The guests all
shake hands with each other and repeat the same, and then the gentlemen
go into the library to smoke, and coffee is taken to them, as it is
also brought to the ladies in the _salon_. The German hostess does
not dress for her dinner parties as much as the English women. She is
never _décolleté_—generally appears in light or black silk, square
neck and half sleeves, with long white gloves. When the hour for
departure comes, the _diener_ goes down to the street corner, orders
a _droschke_ (cab) for those who have not private carriages, for one
mark (twenty-five cents), the old _kutcher_ will drive away the happy
or weary guest, and the _diener_ returns with a bright countenance and
full pocket, having received from each guest in the corridor below
enough “five silver _groschens_” to take Frederika to twenty concerts,
and buy as many glasses of beer as they want. And so goes life in the
“Vaterland!”