m he had placed with her as a kind of governess or
companion.

"Before engaging them," he says, "know whence they come; in what houses
they have been; if they have acquaintances in town, and if they are
steady. Discover what they are capable of doing; and ascertain that they
are not greedy, or inclined to drink. If they come from another country,
try to find out why they left it; for, generally, it is not without some
serious reason that a woman decides upon a change of abode. When you have
engaged a maid, do not permit her to take the slightest liberty with you,
nor allow her to speak disrespectfully to you. If, on the contrary, she be
quiet in her demeanour, honest, modest, and shows herself amenable to
reproof, treat her as if she were your daughter.

"Superintend the work to be done; and choose among your servants those
qualified for each special department. If you order a thing to be done
immediately, do not be satisfied with the following answers: 'It shall be
done presently, or to-morrow early;' otherwise, be sure that you will have
to repeat your orders."

[Illustration: Fig. 61.--Dress of Maidservants in the Thirteenth
Century.--Miniature in a Manuscript of the National Library of Paris.]

To these severe instructions upon the management of servants, the
bourgeois adds a few words respecting their morality. He recommends that
they be not permitted to use coarse or indecent language, or to insult one
another (Fig. 61). Although he is of opinion that necessary time should be
given to servants at their meals, he does not approve of their remaining
drinking and talking too long at table: concerning which practice he
quotes a proverb in use at that time: "Quand varlet presche a table et
cheval paist en gue, il est temps qu'on l'en oste: assez y a este;" which
means, that when a servant talks at table and a horse feeds near a
watering-place it is time he should be removed; he has been there long
enough.

[Illustration: Fig. 62.--Hotel des Ursins, Paris, built during the
Fourteenth Century, restored in the Sixteenth, and now destroyed.--State
of the North Front at the End of the last Century.]

The manner in which the author concludes his instruction proves his
kindness of heart, as well as his benevolence: "If one of your servants
fall sick, it is your duty, setting everything else aside, to see to his
being cured."

It was thus that a bourgeois of the fifteenth century expressed himself;
and as it is clear t