work is inversely as the increase of wages. Nowadays, if a
housekeeper visits a prison, he envies the whiteness of the floors and
the brightness of the coppers he sees there, and thinks, with a sigh,
how well it might be for his _subscalaneans_, if they could be made to
take a course of neatness for a few months in some such an institution.

Vain wish! The future is theirs, and they know it. Their services will
become gradually more worthless, until we shall find them only in grand
establishments: mere appendages kept for fashion and for show; as
useless as the rudimental legs of a snake, which he has apparently only
to indicate the distinguished class in animated nature he may claim to
belong to. We shall live to say, as Perrault sang:

'J'apercus l'ombre d'un cocher
Tenant l'ombre d'une brosse
Nettoyant l'ombre d'un carrosse.'

Alas! I fear that even these shadows of servants will one day vanish and
disappear from us altogether.

Time was when classes in society were as well defined as races still
are. The currents ran side by side, and never intermingled. Some were
born to furnish the blessings of life, and others to enjoy them. Some to
wait, and others to be waited upon. The producing class accepted their
destiny cheerfully, believed in their 'betters,' and were proud to serve
them. The last eighty years have pretty much broken down these
comfortable boundary lines between men. The feudal retainer, who was
ready to give his life for his lord, the clever valet, who took kicks
and caning as a matter of course when his master was in liquor or had
lost at cards, even the old family servants, are species as extinct as
the Siberian elephant, or the cave bear, or the dodo. And now the
advance of the Union armies southward has destroyed the last lingering
type of the servant post: the faithful black.

In this country there never was much distinction of classes. The
unwillingness of New England _help_ to admit of any superiority on the
part of their masters has furnished many amusing stories. Later, when
the Irish element penetrated into every kitchen, farmyard, and stable,
floating off the native born into higher stations, service became
limited to immigrants and to negroes. But the immigrant soon learned the
popular motto, 'I'm as good as you are,' and only remained a serving man
until he could save enough money to set up for himself: not a difficult
matter in the United States; and never so easy as at this mome