Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, 1920-01-14

Excerpt

THE DOMESTIC PROBLEM.

"Well, I've been to see three of them now," she said. "The first is at Shepherd's Bush—"

"What pipes!" I ejaculated. "What music! What wild ecstasy!"

"—four hundred yards from the Central Tube, to be exact; and there's a large roller skating-rink next door. You never rolled, did you? Three sessions daily, the advertisement says."

"I'm afraid I sat oftener than that when I rolled," I confessed. "'Another transport split,' as the evening papers say. I wonder whether Sir Eric Geddes is the rink-controller. But tell me a little about the house. I suppose there's a high premium and a deep basement?"

"There are."

"Next, please."

"The next is at Chiswick; very damp and miles and miles to catch your bus. And there's a basement again."

"You might grow mushrooms in the basement," I said hopefully, "while I hunted my Pimlico on the shore. What about the third?"

"The third is at Hampstead, very high up and very salubrious. The agent says we should be able to overlook the whole of London."

"Impossible," I protested; "you can't ignore a thing like London."

"I don't think he meant that exactly," she explained. "He said that from the top bedroom window on bright days one could catch a glimpse of the dome of St. Paul's."

"That will be rather fine," I agreed. "We can have afternoon receptions in the top bedroom, and print 'To meet the Dean and Chapter' on the card. People love meeting Chapters in real life. What is the rental of this eyrie?"

She told me. It was as high as the site; and, again, there was a dug-out underneath.

"You haven't tried Ponder's End?" I said at last. "I've often seen those words on a bus, and a lot of sad-looking people on the top, pondering, I suppose, the inevitable end."

"Well, which of them are we going to choose? It's the servant problem that's the real trouble, you know. They simply won't cope with a basement nowadays."

"I think you overestimate the help crisis," I said. "There are two things that they really want. The first is to have employers absolutely dependent on them, and the second is a gay life. To take the first. I remember that when I was in digs—"

"Do you mind if I knit?" she asked.

—"when I was in digs it was my landlady's fondest delusion that I could do nothing to help myself. And, of course, I was bound to foster the idea. Every night I used to hide my pipe behind the coal-scuttle or my latchkey in the aspidistra, just for her to find. There was rather a terrible moment once when she came in unexpectedly and caught me losing half-a-crown underneath the hearth-rug; but I pretended to be finding it, and saved the situation. It will be just the same with you. You will go down into the basement and pretend to mistake the flour for the salt, and the cook will love you for ever. It's all done by kindness and incompetence."

"I suppose it is," she said doubtfully.

"And then there's amusements," I went on. "We will have Charles in once or twice a week. No servant who has ever heard Charles trying to sing would prefer a night out at the cinema or the skating-rink....