Mrs. C. S. Peel

“ For many a year I have thought that the average good domesticated woman wasted far too much of her own time and that of her servants in housekeeping, while, on the other hand, many women give too little time and attention to their households.
Clever organisation will do much to lighten the work of a household. Take, for example, the ordering of meals and the cooking thereof. The average mistress orders the meals each day with no regard except for the needs of that special day, and the average cook cooks in just the same short-sighted manner. ”

“ A race of competent, sympathetic mistresses might have made domestic service one of the most sought-after of the professions open to the average woman. They might have eliminated practically all the hard and dirty work of the house, they might have organised regular hours for exercise and recreation, and by their own example shown what war is now teaching us—the incalculable value to the nation of the good housekeeper. ”

“ Ignorance of the value of light and air, cheap labour and dear land were no doubt the causes of basement houses, and to this day, although labour is dear and the cost of feeding and keeping each servant has increased, it is no uncommon thing for a housekeeper to remark, "I have to keep an extra servant because of the basement," and perhaps another maid is employed because of the coals and stairs. ”

“ Peel is universally recognized as the soundest and most sensible authority upon middle-class housekeeping; she knows her subject inside out, she has no fads, and she writes with great vivacity and verve. She is just the person whose advice the small householder needs at the present time, and this practical and business-like handbook is nothing less than a public service of the highest quality. It ought to be on every kitchen shelf throughout the length and breadth of the country.... ”

“ I have no scullery, but cook by electricity, and have a sink in the kitchen, where there is an alcove with a table and armchairs for the maids, and they have their own little piece of garden to sit in. There is a pantry, and the house-parlourmaid can sit there if she wishes. There is a buttery hatch into the dining-room, and the cook has only to hand the dishes through it. I keep an oil stove in readiness should the electric cooker go wrong, but so far it has not. The cook's work is greatly lessened when cooking by electricity. We have three bathrooms and no washhandstand bedroom work. ”

“ A child in a fairly well-to-do working home, whose mother has been a servant, goes out to service with some knowledge of her work, but as a rule the conditions in cottages and town workers' dwellings are so utterly different from those in the homes of the well-to-do that the young girl can scarcely be blamed when she breaks and spoils and makes more dust and muddle than she clears away. ”

“ When considering the question of illumination of a house, oil, gas, and electricity are the three possible alternatives; and when analysed further, bearing in mind always the question of cost of labour and the difficulty of obtaining it, and the cost of cleaning and decorating, it will be found that the most suitable and economical is electricity. ”

“ Needless to say, without a lift, telephone bells, and fitted 'washing rooms,' linoleum-covered floors, uncrowded rooms, gas cooker, and hot-water furnace, which does not require flue cleaning and needs but little attention, it would be impossible to keep a London house of the size spick and span, and run in the way in which people accustomed to a larger establishment expect. ”

“ When rebuilding a house for ourselves it was left to me to suggest a service lift, and I was only by a happy chance in time to prevent it being of such an absurd size that no good-sized joint on a dish to correspond, or a coal scuttle, could have been put into it! ”

“ Before discoursing of the labour-saving house as it might be, it is well to state that I am well aware that one man's meat is another man's poison, also that, owing to the fact that gas and electricity are not always available in the country, the labour-saving house must, more often than not, be in a town or a suburb. ”

“ Indeed, we manage most comfortably, and the saving is great. I cook well, and make the best of all we have, and the economy in gas and light and cleaning things and breakages is considerable. Our nice maid, Ethel, is quite one of the family, and says that getting out on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Fridays, 'there is always something to look forward to.' In winter I consider she should go out by daylight, so I often send her off early on the charwoman's day. If I went away from home I should engage a temporary cook, and if we wanted to have a party I should have a cook by the day, and a waitress. ”

“ These, too, must be light and airy. The kitchen should not be used as a sitting-room; it is the place in which food is prepared, and should be a place which can be kept exquisitely clean. It should have tiled walls and ceiling, a cemented floor on a slight slant with a gutter, so that it may be washed down with a hose. The larder and pantry should be arranged in a like fashion. The larder must be cool, well ventilated, and the food stored in it protected from dust and dirt. In our ideal home, both cook and mistress know something of the work of dust and flies as disease carriers. ”

“ The life of many young servants is made almost unendurable because they have to struggle along as best they may, scolded by mistress and upper-servant alike for not knowing what they have had no opportunity to learn. ”

“ We are all called by alarum clocks, and we make our early tea on the electric heater in our room, so that the maid has no hot water or tea to bring or calling to do. When dressed, she goes straight downstairs and lights the gas to heat the water, does hall, dining-room and smoking-room.
[111]
Many people live in a continual state of worry because they feel obliged to have a little more of everything than they can afford: not because they want it, but because other people think they ought to want it. ”

“ Where the income is ample, the extra labour bill is of little importance (speaking from the employer's point of view) , but householders of moderate and small means are rapidly discovering that labour-making houses are not for them; that it is an economy to pay, if needs be, a rather higher rent and to live in a healthy, light, airy house, so planned that all unnecessary toil is abolished, and with it the cost of much cleaning material, chimney-sweeping, whitewashing, etc. ”

“ Only the cook knows the fatigue occasioned by stooping to lift heavy weights out of low-set ovens, the worry of cooking in a bad light.
The sink, too, shall be set at a reasonable height. There shall not be a scullery—why should there be a scullery? It is merely one more place to clean.
Then we will not condemn any girl or woman to stand for hours washing up. The electrically worked washing-up machine does such work well and quickly, and our pots and pans when electricity or even gas is used do not become black and sooty on the outside. ”

“ But even when all the cooking is not done by electricity, the would-be labour-saver may avail himself of a large number of labour-saving inventions and comfort-giving inventions in the shape of chafing dishes, kettles, toasters, and dish-heaters. ”

“ Of highly-paid upper servants, with under-servants to wait upon them, there is no lack, for the supply of persons wishing to fill the few "plum" posts in any profession is always adequate; but as there is a lack of under-servants, even the very rich find it difficult to secure a satisfactory household; while the mistress who needs a house-parlourmaid, a single-handed cook, a "general," or even a single-handed house- or parlourmaid finds it almost impossible to induce a suitable girl to accept her situation. ”

“ When you do not have to cook water in addition to food you need far less fuel, and for this purpose electricity or gas are at your disposal. If you feel lonely when sitting in a room warmed by a radiator, you may have a small wood fire, and this, I admit, labour-saving faddist that I am, I should desire in one or two sitting-rooms.
[33]
When by turning a tap or a switch, water, gas, and electricity become our servants, we shall have done much to solve the Servant Problem. ”

“ Well-trained girls could demand high wages, and employers could afford to give them to conscientious, capable workers, who [21] would neither break nor spoil nor waste, and who would disdain to practise the small dishonesties by which the servant often augments her wages.
But if the educated woman worker is ready to do her part in the scheme, her prospective employer must realise that she, too, has a duty to perform. It rests with her so to arrange the work of her household that the positions she has to offer shall appear desirable to the class of woman she desires to employ. ”

“ It is nice to sit with because it has the movement that one misses. Sometimes I have a friend to stay, and if I have friends to dine I engage a waitress and keep my out-worker all day. I often have friends to lunch, but more often entertain at my club. I am more comfortable than when I had two maids and my expenses are far less. I think my two young ladies must have been very hospitable, for my bills were decidedly high. Also they seemed to live on soap and dusters, and to consume incredible quantities of electric light and gas. ”

“ In the average kitchen the coal range is placed where it is difficult to see the contents of the pots and pans, and each time the cook wishes to put anything into the oven or take it out she must stoop. To stoop and then lift a weight from oven to table adds considerably to the labour of the day. In the intervals of cooking the fire must be made up, and not only must all the pots and pans be cleaned inside, but the outside becomes black and sooty, and must be scrubbed. Dampers must be pulled in and out, and the cooking of the household and supply of hot water attended to. ”

“ The house contains but five bedrooms, so that the basement cannot well be spared. Here I would use the front room (made very light and gay with paper and paint) as a combination servants' sitting-room, pantry, and store-room. The kitchen should be tiled if feasible—if not, papered with a white-tiled paper—and floored with black-and-white linoleum in order to make it as light as possible. The back area must be enlarged so as to give more light and air, and some steps should lead into the garden, where the maids can sit in hot weather. ”

“ Managing as we now do our hot food is always hot, and the saving in wages, upkeep and food considerable. On Sunday night we have supper with hot soup, and on the other nights I choose such a menu as soup, stewed oxtail with carrot and turnip, potato cake, cold sweet or cheese, celery, etc. Coffee (if we need it) we make in an apparatus in the dining-room.
"Of course, we had to have a labour-saving house, otherwise I could not have done the work with one servant and a nurse." ”

“ In almost all households gas or electric heaters are practical, because if used carefully they are not too expensive, and in small houses or flats where the mistress is her own maid, or depends upon help from a visiting worker, I should certainly recommend the abolition of either coke or coal from the labour-saving point of view alone. ”

“ Fashions filter downwards, and when the educated women of the upper classes show that they consider household work beneath their attention, why should they think it strange when they find the same opinion expressed by the working-girl? ”