Cincinnati daily press. [volume] (Cincinnati [Ohio]) 1860-1862, 1860-05-23
An Approprlato sermon to Partisan Cooks.

An ApurOpflnle SCFnkon 20 Eufhbtau OO0kb.
N. Leon Gozlan has preached, through the
Paris Pays, sermon TO the cooks Of Paris,
from which the New York Tribune trans
lated the following extracts. With few
changes ofnames, it is equally applicable to
this country: ..-.-.. I'D
What incredible carelessness is this The
Partisan never takes the poorest clerk into
his employ at salary of twenty-five francs
per month, without finding ont what his an
tecedents are, without finding out his gene
alogy; he never buys horse without con-
sulting several experts; he takes all possible
safeguards against impossible or imaginary
dangers; but he never takes the slightest
trouble to know anything about the witness
of his private life, the spy which he takes
into his house, the shadow which is to walk
in his shadow. And there are of these spies
nearly hundred thousand in this Paris.
which has the folly to believe that it is SO
well defended.
Let us raise the curtain little. Paris draws
her servants from the provinces of the center.
the East and the West. Most of her domes-
tics come from Alsace and Lorraine, DOOR,
iron, untamable provinces, undisciplinable
except for war; the Alsatian domestics are
artillerymen in the disguise of women, to
create the illusion that there are two sexes
along the banks of the Moselle. The Bretons
are characterized by Druidic flthiness, filth
iness which has been immortalized by Victor
Hugo. And if the Bretons, themselves are
not the flower of neatness, what must the
Breton. domestics be? Certainly they are not
its perfume.
Their morality, If indeed they have any
idea of morality, is deplorable. The tree
has been allowed to take the proportions of
the banyan. These ignorant women who
were chartably paid but few years ago two
or three dollars month as servants, now,
under the pretext that all articles of food are
higher-which does not concern them in the
least-ask not less than eight or eleven dol
lars month. What is singular in this is,
that nothing is better for them; no matter
how high rent, bread. wine, meat or oil may
be, it makes no difference to them; they eat
and drink the more--that is all.
Logically, the contrary should be the
case. In proportion as material life becomes
more difficult, the wages Of domestics should
naturally diminish. Not only is this not so
but many Partisan families now find il a very
difficult problem for them TO provide their
servants; in more than one family-I ought
to siy in more than a thousand--the eldest
daughter has sbecome the domestic of the
family, at the expense of her beauty, her
health and her future. Continue this for GER
tain number of years, and you will find the
social change to be enormous. Here are two
IL.
daughters of the bolrgeoisie will fall in the
scale, while the cows of the Moselle and the
swine Of Normandy will have nobody to keep
tlem. .....'-......a- sa-.l ~ ~
Tue passion for luxury, this leprosy of un-
healthy civilization is, 1t is true, a great ele-
ment Of corruption and decentralization for
Partisan servants. The example Of the mis-
tresses is not lost upon the servants when
there are poor tonnes who sell the honor of
their house for the sake of wearing a thou
sand-dollar cashmere shawl, what is there to
astonish us in seeing a servant steal from her
mistress enough to buy fifty-dollar French
cashmere. The difference is very slight l,a
The cook, through the contagion of luxury,
aspires TO become the equal of the femme de
chambre and the femme de eham6re in tnrn
aspires to be the lady. So she becomes
lorette The seraglios of the Breda Quarter
are filed almost entirely with cooks who have
made bnt one leap from the range TO the bou-
doir, not having passed through the drawing
room, but only having seen what is done |
there. -. .... taiI WI |
We pass over that portion which shows
how the disinterestedness of cooks toward
their masters in their bargains with trades
men extends to and corrupts all classes of
society. We are informed that this produces
but little effect upon the audience; that but
few Of them promised to reduce their pecu-
lations one-half during Lent, and in short,
that the result was by no means what honest
people had Alright to expect. The following
piece of testimony proves what everybody
knows: ..-., .--
This malversation is not only tradition
among the generality of domestics; it has
passed into a habit with them; il is hardened
into law. Some years ago a great house
OF the Faubourg st. Honore brought a com
plant against its naitre dkoteI,
Among the considerable thefts of which he
was accused, it was remarked that during
several years he had stolen ten bottles of wine
per day. And such winel From all the
points OF the accusation the prisoner defended
himself with more or less ability, but when
it came to the ten bottles Of wine per dlay. he
argued generally with 50 much earnestness
and assurance that the tribunal somewhat
surprised, called in several mditres a hotel to
clear up the point
Most of them declared that perhaps the
prisoner had gone little too far in taking
ten bottles per day, that is, about four thou
sand bottles per year. but that in reality, this
tax had been for centuries laid upon the eel
lars of the rich by their maityes dhoteL and
their principal employees without the slightest
suspicion Of crime. g yeR J
The Court was confounded--but not with
admiration.