special dining room is given them. This is not all, for the
rooms must be furnished and kept clean and warm, and supplied with an
unlimited amount of gas and electricity. In many families the boarding
and lodging of household employees cause as much anxiety and expense to
the housewife as to provide for her own family.

And why does she do it? Why does she consent to take upon herself so
much extra trouble for nothing? For, although she offers good food and
a bed besides excellent wages to all who work for her, she is the most
poorly served of all employers to-day.

In the great feudal castles of the Middle Ages it was not deemed
safe for women to venture forth alone, even in the daytime, and so
those engaged in housework were naturally compelled to live under their
Master's roof, eating at his table and sitting "below the salt." But
the Master and the Serf of feudal times disappeared long ago, only the
Mistress and her "servants" remain.

To-day, however, "servants" no longer sit at their employer's table;
they remain in the kitchen, where as a rule they are given to eat what
is left from the family meals. Some housewives, from motives of kindness
and consideration for the welfare of those in their employ, have special
meals prepared for them and served in a dining-room of their own at
hours which do not conflict with the meals of the family. But this does
not always meet with gratitude or even due appreciation; the disdainful
way in which Bridget often complains of the food too generously provided
for her is well known.

A chambermaid came one day to her employer and said she did not wish to
complain but thought it better to say frankly that she was not satisfied
with what she was getting to eat in her house: she wanted to have roast
beef for dinner more often, at least three or four times a week, for she
did not care to eat mutton, nor steak, and never ate pork, nor could
she, to quote her own words "fill up on bread and vegetables as the
other girls did in the kitchen."

Then, and only then, did her employer wake up with a start to the
realization of the true position every housewife occupies in the eyes
of her household employees. They evidently regard her in the light of
a caterer; she does the marketing not only for her family but for them
too. She pays a cook high wages, not only to cook meals for herself and
family, but for her employees also.

For the first time in her life, this housewife asked herself