Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1897-11-20
GERMAN SERVANTS.
SLAVERY THAT AN AMERICAN CALLS
IDYLLc CONDITIONS.

"They have solved the servant girl
problem in Germany. said a New
Yorker to a Sun man. II need not go
into the details Of all / saw in German
family economy during my year abroad
< to convince You of this. would not
even try to explain the way in which
the Germans have done it, but can
give an illustration or two of the re-
suits as / saw them.
1--WE first went to live in boarding
house in Brunswick. 1t was very
fashionable boarding house, for Ameri-
cans only, and the prices would bring
JOY to the heart of even New York
city landlady There were eight board
ers besides my wife and myself. There
were the father and mother of the fam
lily and three grown daughters We
lived in a villa with garden attach
ment and a very imposing entrance
adorned with metal that needed polish
ing daily For the work of this whole
big house and household there was just
one servant, who received just marks,
or 81. 25, week for her services. She
not only cooked all the meals, polished
all the doorknobs, made up all the
rooms and washed all the clothes, but
she cut the grass in the garden, trimmed
the grapevines, scrubbed the fence and
weeded the walks. She rose at 80
every morning, moreover, and BACKED
all the boots. Her hours of labor were
from A 80 a. M. to 10 80 p. IN. daily,
and she had just one day off a month.
"When we first went to the boarding
house, | noticed that after each dinner
the herr papa went through queer
performance He would mash down
two potatoes on plate, cut two slices
Of meat and lay them on the potato, add
a spoonful of each vegetable to the heap
and crown the collection with thick,
unbuttered chunk of black bread /
thought be must have a high bred dog
about the place For the first week or
two that was my idea of the purpose for
which the dish was prepared. Then
learned that the hodgepodge was the
servant girls allowance. She was per-
mitted to clear the plate, but not a
mouthful more was hers. From what
observed afterward 1 concluded that
any effort on her part to get more
would have had dire results. The herr
papa certainly would have had an apo
plectic fit The frau mamma probably
would have torn her hair and burst on
the spot the moment she heard such
request. The consciousness of such pos
sibilities evidently was what deferred
the girl from asking for more All the
t,, hoo no
worked her IS hours day with three
portions of coffee and black bread and
the hodgepodge I have described as her
sole nourihsment.
zone day last May we made trip in
to the Harz mountains. We went as a
big German family, carrying all of our
three meals, our beer and our wraps
with us--that is, the servant girl car
ried them with us. She had strapped on
her back deep conical basket capable
of holding about two bushels. The bas-
ket had been packed with ham, sausage
bread, beer and various other resources
of the deIicatessen shop. On top of the
provisions were packed the wraps
Loaded with the two bushels of miscel-
lany, the servant girl brought up the
rear of our procession through Bruins
wick and was showed into a seatless
fourth class car, and the rest of us got
into second class car, and away we
spun to the foot of the Harz mountains.
"Now, not wanting the reputation of
long distance liar, | shall not tell you
all the wonders performed by that serv-
ant girl on that picnic tramp. Suffice it
to say that she was with the procession,
up hill and down dale, climbing rocks
and sliding down the steep places. We
began tramping up the mountains at
$50, and at II O'Clock my wife and |
were so tired that we took TO ponies,
but the servant girl, with her wicker
cone of delicatessen, didn't turn hair.
When dinner came, she got only her
little plateful of sausage and black
bread. When supper came, she got only
bottle of beer and black bread Yet
when it was all over she stood up in
her fourth class car while the rest of us
dozed on our second class seats. She
walked home uneomplainingly behind
us, and the next day not a boot was I'M
BACKED or peg unpublished in the
whole establishment She did not be-
come suddenly lame or weak or get
call to go at once to her sick sister or
receive notice of the funeral of an aunt
or uncle In short, none of those things
that harrow the souls of American serv-
ant girls with regularity turned up to
disturb her industry She simply work
ed on.
"And that is what they all do--work,
put their money i'll the bank and get
married. Outside of marriage couldn {
see that anything was likely to move
the German servant girl to give notice.
Every girl has her book in which are
recorded all the changes which the ordi-
nary course of human life may cause
her to make, The entries are made by
her successive mistresses and she is
never engaged without her having shown
her book. A girl who started out in
city with a book recording semimonth-
ly changes throughout the whole of her
working career would have no chance
of finding employment on the face OF
the whole German empire. That may
be one reason for the idyllic conditions