The citizen-Republican. (Scotland, Bon Homme County, S.D.) 1???-19??, 1909-07-22
Sinking Household Tasks.

a. woman Worker In the National Re
view, London.
Where can the fine and complicated ar,
Of housekeeping be learned as well as ir
the houses of the rich, where there il
leisure, and need for every kind OF house.
hold skill from the highest to the lowest.
But women have long ago forgotten that
they might afford In their W domain
a training given by the danes of a former
day to damsels of varying degree as vel
as to serving maids. a training which in.
cluded much ministering to and care OF
the poor, as well as valuable personal in.
tercourse between different ranks. In the
deepest sense this is the day OF the ma.
chine-made household; the old Christian
personal relationships have been abolished
William Morris spent a magnificent life.
time in one long fruitless endeavor to re.
call men to a sense of the beauty of the
old order, and the waves Of time have
closed over him. h is there left to
show that anyone understood? Are we tic
suppos that all his grain has been thrown
overheard, and the husks carefully cher
ished, the tradition of beautiful decoration
only that ministers to the qualification OF
the rich. Women AVE practiced as well
as preached their contempt for art and
craft within their own walls until the
contagion has spread from upper to low
er class. Ready as they have shown
themselves to undergo the severe techni-
cal training required Of one who aspires
to earn an income as a hired laborer in
the market, they will not train in the
same way to work in the home, neither
will they consent to earn that income, as
they easily could, In their own home. 1t
Is to be observed that although they will
submit to long hours Of close work and
even to severe discipline outside, anything
of the 4 is regarded as endurab In
justice and hardship once the necessity
fnr n tC -SarfaI b~IarH tlnI, ~r,. ..-~<
tree.
What is 1t that makes women so ayerse
from remaining within the sheltering
walls Of home, that makes the very poor
herd into bleak factories, where the pay
is wretcledly poor, where hard living re-
places the comparatively soft living Of the
private house. and apply for any arduous
unhealthy task in the rough outside
world, rather than face the chilly atmos-
phere of woman governed domesticity? Is
1t not really that women have, in very
truth. ceased to govern; they have relin-
Quished their household task to any one
who can be found for pay to perform it.
The boredom Of personal supervision will
never be endured by the luxurious modern
woman. And other not minor evils have
crept In. 1t seems not only that the up
per class women are fast losing the trick
OF homemaking, that mistresses have
shirked the difficulties there are in the
relations between those who serve and
those who are served dhere must always
be difficulties. though these should not be
insuperable even in this complex age Of
ours), by keeping at a distance and i'm
posing a rule of speechlessness on their
dependents, but that there must be, some
how, where women are the dominant fac
tor, some lack of gentleness. of respect
for the individuality and personality Of
the governed, which makes SO many
yynn1an fTnn9tj1nt of houSehnIi -Dnnfrol
not to be coaxed or coerced from their
refusal to stay at home in the houses
from which the man goes forth in the
morning only to return at nightfall. What
ever explanation lies at the root Of the
poorer women's preference for factory life
over household service, for their trans
ference to careers in which the acquisi-
ton Of household skill is impossible to
them. 1t is this disastrous want of house
hold training which account for SO much
that is deplorable today in the lives Of
the very poor.