The Expert Maid-Servant

every new maid she assumes more responsibilities. She has to reconstruct the system to which she had become accustomed when she employed but one servant

herself to the new conditions. As in all other circumstances where she must make plans for her domestics, she should have her scheme of action clear in her own mind before she gives it to her servants. Vacillation and uncertainty

is likely to criticise the way in which her late duties are performed, and perhaps to feel that the lion's share still falls to her. So, unless it is an exceptionally co

ifications of any general outline. Therefore, the schedule of ordinary household duties following must be subordinate to the conditions mentioned, and also to the capabilities of the individual servant. In a household where more than one servant is employed it is desirable that there should be from the beginning as clear as possible an understan

ress said she did not hire to do outside work, and the coachman said it had nothing to do with his work. It was not the gardener's business, and they were all so strenuous about it that I told my husband I seemed to be the only one to whose lot it really fell by rights to keep that platform clean. There was so much discussion ove

n she engages her that she may have to perform other tasks than those which lie exactly within an o

s take care of the furnace (this would be her first duty when she came down-stairs), and it is also possible that she may brush off the front steps and sidewalk, but with that her extra kitchen-work ceases for the moment. She gets the breakfast and s

ing the rooms. All this should be done before breakfast, and in order to achieve this, the waitress must rise as early as the cook.

at she may go about her chamber-work and be ready to come down to her breakfast by the time the family has finished. Be

ess delegate the care of her linen-closet to a servant. She herself should lay out the linen that is to be used, taking it out in a certain routine so that it may all be worn alike. On the days when the beds are to be changed, she should select the sheets, pillow-slips, spreads, etc., before she goes down to breakfast, that the chambermaid may not be hindered in h

hen after her own breakfast she should have scraped the dishes and put them in soak. This will lessen the work of washing-up when she comes down. If there is a special arrangement by which the cook washes the dishes, the waitress is free for other work. Sometimes the dish-washing is divided, the cook taking charge of the dishes in which the food has been served, while the waitress looks a

e is a preference for what some one has called "unexpurgated meals," and the freedom of conversation that is not possible when servants are present. If this is the case, it is an easy matter for the waitress to wash the soup-plates while the heaviest course of the meal is being eaten, and to get some of the dishes of the second course out of the way while the family is discussing the salad. In a large family all the china may not be washed then, but the silver at least and some of the smaller pieces may be clean and out of the way by the time the meal is at an end

ay on which she goes up-stairs and gives the bedrooms a thorough sweeping. Again, it may be stipulated when she is engaged that she is to wash the windows. If one set of these tasks devolves upon her it leaves the waitress more free for her special duties. These vary, according to the size of the family. When this consists of b

pull down the shades, and make the living-rooms ready for the evening. It is also the work of the second maid to put the bedrooms in order for the night, cl

o see that the house is in spick-and-span order. She has the charge of the silver, keeping it clean and polishing the brasses. For each of these especial duties she should have a regular time, and the mistress should see that the system she put into practice when she had but one servant is followed out after she has added to her h

e family assumes the care of the infant while the nurse is otherwise employed. Nor can she be held responsible for all the details that would fall to her were she waitress, pure and simple. When a nurse is employed as well as a waitress, her work is usual

ny with the mistress of the house, and reigns supreme in the lower realms. In small families where two servants are employed the cook usually is laundress as well. In that case the waitress generally takes part of the cook's work on washing and ironing days, preparing the luncheon on those days, washing all the dishes, and kee

ion is usually due to increased elaboration in the way of living, and this, of course, subdivides specialization still more as well as raises the scale of wages. The "professed cook," who does nothing but cook and demands a helper or scullery-maid, gets higher pay than the general cook who does the washing and ironing or the one

I have said, or a laundress, who, besides her washing and ironing, does the chamber-work and thus leaves the waitress free for her especial tasks in the dining-room and for the duties of a parlor-maid. The laundress may also wash w

r to touch upon the possibilities of change latent in the introduction of Japanese and Chinese service. That all has it