The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1901-05-11

| The milkmen too. seem to have no
condolences offered them for their long
service. Neither do aEitatOrS aSitate
the inuuitieS of Il ten-hOur day as ap-
| piled to councilmen and politicians or
underwriters. Queer isn't it? Shows
| there are classes where the union label
| doesn't seem to stick
| The maid-of-all-work belongs to this
| class to some degree. Up to this time
| the modern family has not been listed
| in class which can be run like a mill
or factory. No scheme has been de-
vised which will promulgate iron clad
rules, ordering all people to rise at the
| same hour breakfast. lunch and dine
simultaneously and drop off to sleep
at precisely the same minute. Until
such an edict is made it is going to be
just Il little difficult for any union to
take a hand in the domestic service
and regulate its hours and its irregular
round of tasks The mistress of
home is not i'm the position of pro-
prietor of a factory or a mill. He finds
himself unable to do without his mill
hands. She can do without hers and
when disasreable situatio arise she
will do without help as she has done
many times if she has kept house in
America for II few years. When COM
plications render her present methods
of household economy too veXing she
| can board if she is unable to do the
work unaided. or she can arrange II
trust" which will have in it the bless
edness of cooperative housekeeping, I
am inclined to believe that the servant
girls union is gong to be Il very good
81
this tormenting domestic problem most
happily, in that it may result in estab-
fishing training school for house
maids ana cooks in this city where cer-
tiilcates of competence will give them
the standing ANA the Independence
which may be theirs in the community.
The amount of the whole matter is
this: There are young women in do
mestic service who are doubtless treat
ed badly-who are nagged and insulted
and put in comfortless rooms and given
not even the satisfaction of kind
words but-and this condition is in
variably distinctive and unswerying
rule-ln no other vocation is there op-
portunity for such advancement for a
young woman whose advantages OF
education and skilled training have
been meagre. The girl who is ambitious
and capable can make herself more en-
tirely Indispensable in the house of her
employer than i'm any other avenue of
labor. Competence is the only stand
ard, and the competent cook or watt
ress who is self-respecting. conscien-
tious and willing to please is sure of
such situations as the most powerful
union is too feeble to give or take
away. She can command wages and
honor and affection and privileges he
yond all the powers of organization,
for she is stronger than organization
she is often the handspring of the
home.
As for the incompetent, careless, im-
pertinent and unintelligent ones-and
they are in the domestic class as in
every other-union nor nothing else
save their own efforts can give them
coveted places and coveted privileges.
May all the working girls who help
to make the burden of housekeeping
lighter and who toll early and late, be
well paid for their faithful services and
secure all the concessions which can
be given them.
--Sauey Bess.