THE SERVANT GIRL IN SOCIAL LIFE.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3739, 10 July 1883, Page 4

THE SERVANT GIRL IN SOCIAL LIFE.

Shortly after the flood, as Aye are informed, Abram's Avifo turned her domestic, Hagar, out of the houso on account of her arrogant conduct, Avhich is perhaps the first authenticated instance on record in trouble between mistress and servant girl. This sort of trouble, Avhich began so early, still survives in forms so various and often as exasperating as to raise tho impatient question whether the servant class is tho only dark part of creation Avhich improvement has failed to reach. The question is, no doubt, full of aggravation and discouragement, yet thero has been improvement, but it has been of slow attainment, forming no exception to tho groat law of progressive social amelioration.

Social changes, it is to be remembered, especially of tho alleviating and elevating kind, aro ahvays sloav. AA r e are beginning to talk about social evolution, and the now science of sociology Avhich treats of it; but ws havo to take ages into account before avc can realize any positive conception of advance. Much of tho barbarism of early society clings tenaciously to the domestic relations, Avhilo tho modification ef human nature and the corresponding mitigation of social imperfections go on but very gradually, tardily, and partially. A still further reason for the slowness of improvement in the present case arises from tho peculiarity of the relations involved. In times of early violence, it avhs tho Aveak that Avere subjugated and enslaved, and, as civilisation advances, it is ever tho lowest and most ignorant class of any society that falls into the condition of menial servitude. Tho feeblest, the least competent, the least providont, naturally sink to the bottom of the social scale, and become the helpers, the dependents, the drudges, and the servile appendages of tho classes avlio have Avealth, intelligence, and power. In domestic life these relations become organised with tho abject class at the base of the social structure. ImproA'ing agencies -will obviously not take effect alike upon the higher and IoAA-er elements. Many causes Avill operate powerfully to maintain separate interests, to favor the superior classes, and to hinder their inferiors, so that servants -will be the last to be reached by elevating agencies.— Popular Science Monthly.