The times., 1899-05-26
Abduction and Unknown Maids.

Inc abduction OF little Marion Clark
from her home in New York is one of the
crimes which must arouse horror and in
dignation wherever the news may pene-
trate. Every father or mother who has
| been for an hour uncertain as to the
Whereabouts of child will remember the
anxiety of that hour and sympathize with
| the distracted parents in their terrible ex-
perience. When the elemental feelings
of human nature are touched, the rich
and the poor are alike.
| There is one feature of this situation
! which should receive partio llar attention,
and that is the entrusting of children to
a servant of whom little or nothing is
known. This is so common a thing in the
present stage of our society that its dan
ger is seldom realized. Fortunately for
both children and parents in such fami-
lies the person who would deliberately
injure a little child is rare Sometimes
children who are as the phrase is, left
to servants" receive care as tender and
unselfish as their own relatives could give
them. 1t all depends on the nurse
This is phase of the servant question
in America which is different from that
in any other country. In lands where
there is class permanently dependent and
untitled by education and capacity for any
thing but manual labor, there comes to be
distinct servant type, with faults and
virtues of its own. In such a state OF So
ciety we find the motherly. kind old nurse,
and the faithful butler or gardener, but
We also find peculiar dangers springing
from the existence of the peculiar type.
this country during the first half of the
century, there was no servant class, and
people were nominally if not really on an
equal footing, those who were hired to
assist in the household work had to be
treated as if they were relatives. They
could not be ordered about, or required to
wear uniform, or forbidden TO sit at the
table. They did their work in the house
exactly as they would if clerks in an Of
flee, and expected the same consideration.
AT present we are in sort of transition
state. Except in a few localities we have
not the settled state OF society which re-
suits in the development OF the old fam
lily servant, nor have we help, as they
were once euphemistically called, whom
we can treat as equals. The outcome of
it all is that people take into their houses.
on slight recommendation or none at all,
people of whom they know absolutely
nothing, and trust to their own powers of
observation to keep the house in order.
If the new servant goes away with the
spoons, or teaches the children things
which they should not know, or keeps
everything below stairs in state of dis
order and uncleanliness. the mistress has
no remedy except TO get another to take
her place and rail against the whole ser
want class.
The only solution at present in sight for
middle-class people is one toward which
we seem to be. gradually working. The
time may come when the servant will be
engaged, like the carpenter or seamstress.
for special service, her duties defined, and
her time, outside of business hours, her
own. Then there will be no reason why
girl of independence and executive abil-
ity should not be willing TO cook or scrub
rather than stand behind counter. But
SO long as she is required to submit to
the whims of her employer, and engage in
half a dozen trades for an indefinite num-
Der OF hours each day. she will not do
housework if she can find anything else
to do.