Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1901-11-30
A Housekeeper Solves the Servant
Girl Problem.
she WANTS TIE CHINESE LET IN
Tried Both the Native and the
Imported Help.
FL DIS ALL URES

Written for The Evening Star by Kate Epson Clark.
Every woman's club and every woman's
column has discussed and dissected and dis
titled the servant question until Il has be-
come part of our very brain and nerve
and bone. IL may be safely asserted that
at this very moment. I'm four-flfths OF the
servant-keeping households OF our land.
that question dwarfs I'm Importance every
| other-possibly all others combined
Even in the time OF Theocrlutus, go B.
| c, We are told that servants were trouble
/ some. and that II was impossible to find n
/ satisfactory one He makes the Syracusan
Praxinoe call her maid "a lazy thing" eau
ton her against dropping her gown where
ever. she happens to be changing it, and
says, THE cats find II just the bed they
/ like" and in a single brief interview this
mistress calls her slave. You stupid. You
goose" and You mad girl" We dare
Praxinoe to address thus one Of our mod
ern maid servants,
In fact, it is said to be literally true In
many Of our cities, and in nearly all of our
rural districts. that there really are not
counting in all of the good, bad and indif-
ferent candidates for positions I'm domestic
service, anywhere near enough to go around
One reason why very many households are
not supplied with servants is because there
actually none for them to get. There
are plenty of charwomen, and at the same
rates as for the last twenty years. Sew
ing women abound, and their rates, too. re-
main substantially just what they have
been. There is a never-failing supply OF
factory hands and of saleswomen. willing
I to work, II is said, for almost cruelty low
wages. But domestic service is hated and
despised apparently, in spite OF efforts.
which We believe to be sincere and almost
universal, on the part OF housekeepers to
make it attractive, and there is such
dearth of home-helpers that homes are be-
ing broken up on all sides, cooperation
seems to grow no more feasible, and the
family hotel" is becoming a dangerously
large element in our so-called civilization.
Proofs OF the scarcity of servants abound
on all sides. Every one who has investi-
gated the matter can mention one or more
friends who have advertised in the most
alluring terms and have received either no
replies at all or utterly hopeless ones. Re
peated applications at well-known intelli-
gence offices have produced no result what
ever One lady asked her charwoman IL
she had daughters. Oh, yes, she had two.
why cannot one OF them come to me
and be trained for my work.
"Oh, one is in the rock-candy factory
and the other is i'm the skirt factory" An
other charwoman, who was almost break
ing her back with five or six days work
each week at washing, ironing and cleaning.
said that her daughter was not going out
to service; she was going TO be a sales
lady.
Have Plenty Ambition.
1neSe women are just as afnDlllOnS Tor
their children as We are for ours. Our
streets are full of Italian laborers who
dig and delve for mere pittance We
hear 'entrancing tales from Italy of the
neatness and efficiency and cheapness of
Italian maids. But there are no Italian
maids to be had in our market. All of
| the women in the families of our Italian
| diggers seem to find plenty of congenial EN-
ployment in selling fruit and stationery and
cigars, and in grinding hand-organs.
Looking to China.
With the expenses of living multiplying
at a rapid rate, laundry bills, ice bills.
milk, butter, gas and nearly everything else
rising, and the price OF service fairly dou-
| bling. the anguished housemother glances
from pole to pole for relief As she does
so the only oasis which she sees in all of
the awful desert bears the detested name
of China.
China! The spot where vast hordes of
willing people, each with two hands and
two feet and a quick and active brain. are
pining for America and American dollars!
How attractive is the sound! OF course,
we would rather have angels than Chinese
who said to have some traits which
differentiate them markedly from those
other and higher celestials. But even that
patriotic and unselfish public servant, Mr..
Pierpont Morgan, can hardly buy up a
transportation line between us and para
disc.
No other thickly populated region. the
inhabitants OF which seem to care to emil
CRATE, Is in sight. We repeat, let us have
the Chinese brought over hereby thou
sands. even by millions. We certainly
can ChristianiZe them more easily thus
than by sending missionaries over to them
to win souls there, at the high price OF
$4,000 and a martyr or two apiece. We
appeal to the great missionary societies to
join us in our enterprise. 1t is a movement
which ought to promote their objects far
faster than any process which they have
as yet discovered.
Let us suppose, honored Mr.. President
Roosevelt and honored Mr.. Secretary Hay.
that your desks were piled with unanswered
letters; that you had scores of errands
waiting to be done; that your whole terri
tory was crowded with articles to be
moved and to be mended; that it was all I'm
need of cleaning, and that you were ready
to pay almost any wages for having this
work done. and yet could not get anybody.
Suppose that, though you yourself rose up
early and sat up late and ate the bread OF
sorrows. you could not begin to accomplish
1t. How long do you suppose you would
bear ir? You would say, Something has
got to be done" You would bring all the
influence of your official positions to bear
you would range up and down the world
you would enlist every agency that you
could find You would get force of work.
ers, and you would not be very long about
it. either.
The Housewives Wall.
Now, the work OF every one OF our little
households is just important to us as
the work of your great Office is to you and
your constituency. We are exactly in the
situation which 1 have painted as possible
for you. The cry Of the helpless house.
mothers of this land is rising in your ears.
1t may seem funny silly to you-but It
is neither. The breaking up of countless
homes and various other undesirable social
cataelysms impend unless something radi-
cal is done, and done soon. We appeal to
the government of this great nation In our
extremity. If you really do think much
of the home" as you pretend TO. If what
you and everybody else say about that
citadel of virtue" and unit of national
strength is not mere sentimental moon
shine repeal the laws regarding Chinese
immigration. AE ill-result or two may fol-
low, but at least We shall have somebody
to help US in our homework.
Saturn. Jupiter and Mars laugh down
upon us from the depths of space. They
may be bristling with billions of ready
helpers. who for a few dollars per month
would undertake the general homework
for ten in family" with all the starched
pieces thrown in. and the bread-making TO
boot but they are as unavailable for our