The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1877-02-22

~, however, women in the backwoocs
are as much too scarce as they are toe
plentiful at home; and women servants
are as black swans for rarity, hard to
find and harder still to keep. Under
these circumstances Janet had to be
taken in default of q better, and though
never a day passed without her receiv-
ing at least q dozen well merited re-
Dukes, and our resolving as many times
to get rid Of her before another week,
the rebukes were as "water split upon
the p ain" and the resolution went with
others to pave certain place.
The fact was we could not get anoth-
er girl in the neighborhood, and Emily s
health was too delicate either TO do
without second or to stand the fatigue
Of journey to Montreal in search of a
better. As for Janet, she seemed pro-
vOkingly satisfied both with herself and
her employers; and though making our
lives miserable, causing endless quar-
rels among the men by her coquetries
and scandalizing her fellow-servant's
notions of propriety at every turn, she
persisted in snubbing each and all of
the offers of marriage lavished on her,
and regarded herself in the light of the
guardian angel and supporter of our
household, without whom, indeed, we
should have been left helpless and des-
olate.
"If Liz were gone perhaps 1 might
think on settling," she would say, if
Emily gently reminded her of the folly,
to say the least, of her numerous fiirta-
tons; "but amt such a brute as TO
leave you to the like o. her. Don't you
fear! Why, she'd poison you right off
as soon as not; an masters that soft
he'd never see through her. Men are
so precious green, ma'am."
happened to be in the next room
when heard myself thus fiatteringly
described to the wife of my bosom; but
/ honestly believe it would have made
no difference had l been actually pres
emit. Like Alaric OF old, Janet feared
neither God nor man.
Emily used to try and excuse her
sometimes, and say she had a good
heart at bottom. The fact is, that once
when my wife was very i'll Janet nursed
her day and night, never even taking
off her clothes for three weeks, and
somehow managing to do the best part
of her work as well, and with less noise
and destruction than usual. Emily
never forgot this, and used to hold it
up as proof of underlying virtues,
even though Janet (who slept in her
mistress's room for the time) used to
avail herself of the dressing-room win
dow as a medium for holding lengthy
midnight conversations with one of her
lovers, the invalid lying all the while
with the door of communication open
between her and the cold night air.
spoke to her very sharply about it; not
on the score of propriety (Janet being
perfectly hardened there, and fond of
Boosting that she was quite capable of
"taking keer on herself against a
bushel of such poor, miserable things
as men, silly bodies!'O but simply to
remark that if she would talk to Mar
tin at that hour, she might have shut
the door into my wife's room. Janet
stared at me.
"Shut the door! Why, dear sake,
didn't l leave it open a. purpose, in
case she should want somethin'P l
aren't girl to leave Madam a-calling
for an hour; an fresh air never hurt
no one in summer yet, an didn't her
either"
1t is worthy of note that Janet never
attempted to deny or gloss over any of
her malpractices, trait which Emily
alluded to as "frankness " and l as
insolence." My wife's judgment is
apt to be biased by partiality, and she
is, besides, one of those persons who
would find some good in the Prince OF
Evil if you were to say too much against
him.
One day Janet fell in love.
The object was young Englishman,
whom 1 had recently hired as foreman,
a good-looking young fellow of very re-
spectacle parentage, and l was not dis.
pleased to see that his first impression
of our hand-maidens was decidedly in
favor of the Canadian. A little admira-
ton might do our clever, modest Felice
no harm, while Janet rather wanted q
dose of snubDing, which the men in
general did not seem inclined to give
her.
sit is really disgraceful to ourselves
to have such girl in the Kitchen"
said to Emily. "Tom Carter looked
at her as if she were wild beast wher
| told him he must mess with the WON