New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1871-06-09
A NATIONAL WOE.


uttcrance 10 q lugubrious wall from the very
bowels of the South on the universal, peren-
nial woe of servant irlism" The heart of
every hOuseSeeper in the land will doubtless
echo the groan. For long time Southern
women smiled complacently at the miseries of
their Northern sisters; but now it appears
| one croons and the other lamentS, turn by
turn, like Irish "keeners" at a wake. House
holds disrupted at the basement, ignorant
Biddy and insolent Chloe, are a common
basis of woes upon which they and Sorrow
| can sit in harmony together. The complain
ant, however, on this occasion is q
man, who, with a mnutiB of detail
| amazing TO Northern men who live
so far away from their kitchens, calls off a
| long roll of satterny and vicious cOffee-col-
Ored Lucindas and Pollys, tells us how this one
could not wash and that one could not cook,
but all of them could steal together. Our
cor passion for our friend is mitigated by the
reflection that he and his class have had the
sole responsibility Of the moral doctrines and
habits of the said Lucindas. Our ardent
Southern patriarch proposes to return to the
cowhide as the only proper mode of treatment
for the ignorant mass of women left available
as servants. We are quite content to leave
him with his antagonist and cOwhide, confident
that the eternal fitness of things will vindicate
itself through Lucinda
But what have we in the North done that
the Servant Plague should be let loose upon
usR We may joke and sneer at it as we would
at a swarm of musketOes, but none the less
does it render life miserable. What use is
there in toiling for money or culture If they
will not insure harmonious, beautiful
home-lifeP What do books in the library
or marbles in the hall avail when we
know that Biddy is hidden below them
like demon Jack -in-the-box ready to be
loosed upon us at critical moment,
red faced nexorable. Humans palace or regal
banquet counts for but little so long as this
Mordecai from Cork sits waiting to fOut him
at his gate. A man, if he loses in Erie, can
hedge In gold he can fight his enemies, or
summon religion to his aid if Death meet him
by the way; but how is he to struggle against
the ill-coOked dinner in his stomach, the I'M
tidy house, the wOeful frOwn fast becoming
ingrained in his wife's forehead9 VIII coop
eratve societies bring us relief Is there
Balm of Gilead in the coming chOp-sticks and
pig-tailf
One great root of the evil we believe to
be a certain almost unconscious sentimen-
talsm which influences women in their deal
ings with their servants. Jones employs his
clerks or mechanics or laborers on purely
money bass-so much work, so much wages.
Mrs. Jones, however, always looks upon Biddy
as a human being in need There is a certain
sense of beneiicence on her part in giving
the other woman chance to wash and bake
for her. She is apt to be either friendly or
imperious. She has vague remembrance of
faithful servants in English novels who in
variably offered their hfe's savings to their
ruined masters; or she recalls perhaps some old
Norry raised" by her mother in country
village as part of the family. She looks, par
ticulary if she is young housekeeper, for
gratitude, affection, at the least some human
interest in herself, from Biddy. She looks in
vain. If sickness or misfortune overtakes the
family, Bddy does not bring her pittance, but
before noon strikes for higher wages. Toward
her own people she is tender, loyal, sensitive
to fault; toward her employers, hard, greedy, in
solent Yet nothing can be more natural, or even
excusable, than that she should be so. German
and Irish women come to this country simply to
make money, to lift themselves. Their mistress
is their bench of brokers' their market their
exchange, her necessities are the sole stocks in
which they can trade. They play for fifty
cents as you for thousands. Their love and
emotions they keep for their own home
life. When employers are content to under
stand this, and to make simple business
traffic of domestic work and wages, there will
be greater mutual content. Let us talk OF
justice instead of generosity and faithfulness.
1t is as absurd and unjust for us to look for
gratitude and lifelong adherence from Biddy,
on the ground of three dollars a week, as for
our Southern friend to watch for tears of
affectionate devotion in Lucinda's eyes on be-
half of the cowhide in the past or the future.
GEN BARLOW'S LETTERS IN PAMPHLET FoRM
q. of he Tri