Wednesday, November 16, 2011

MyLadyWeb Presents The Gratitude Giveaways Hop

The Gratitude Giveaways Hop Is Now Over
But You Can Still Download Our Free Gifts.


Hello and Welcome! 


 The Old Fashioned Regency Romance
A Very Merry Chase

Now available...
 
in an easy to read oversize, large print paperback version.

  Is Happy To Participate In

The Gratitude Giveaways Hop 

 
November 17 - 27, 2011

I am providing several gifts just to thank everyone for stopping by
plus the opportunity to win a personalized PDF copy of my 
sweet, old-fashioned Regency Romance Novel, 
A Very Merry Chase 
for one lucky commenter.

To Enter To Win A Very Merry Chase
Simply Leave A Comment Here


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The Gratitude Giveaways Hop is over!



Smiles & Good Fortune,
Teresa
************************************
It is not wealth one asks for, but just enough to preserve one’s dignity, to work unhampered, to be generous, frank and independent. 
W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) Of Human Bondage, 1915

Sunday, November 13, 2011

Maidservants in the 18th Century..A Necessary Evil, According To Author Daniel DeFoe

Author Daniel Defoe Speaks Out Against The Excesses of Maidservants in the 18th century.

Women servants are now so scarce, that from thirty and forty shillings a year, their wages are increased of late to six, seven, nay, eight pounds per annum, and upwards; insomuch that an ordinary tradesman cannot well keep one; but his wife, who might be useful in his shop or business, must do the drudgery of household affairs; and all this because our servant-wenches are so puffed up with pride nowadays, that they never think they go fine enough: it is a hard matter to know the mistress from the maid by their dress; nay, very often the maid shall be much the finer of the two.

Our woolen manufacture suffers much by this, for nothing but silks and satins will go down with our kitchen-wenches; to support which intolerable pride, they have insensibly raised their wages to such a height as was never known in any age or nation but this.

Let us trace this from the beginning, and suppose a person has a servant-maid sent him out of the country, at fifty shillings, or three pounds a year. The girl has scarce been a week, nay, a day in her service, but a committee of servant-wenches are appointed to examine her, who advise her to raise her wages, or give warning; to encourage her to which, the herb-woman, or chandler-woman, or some other old intelligencer, provides her a place of four or five pounds a year; this sets madam cock-a-hoop, and she thinks of nothing now but vails and high wages, and so gives warning from place to place, till she has got her wages up to the tip-top.

Her neat's leathern shoes are now transformed into laced ones with high
heels; her yarn stockings are turned into fine woollen ones, with silk
clocks; and her high wooden pattens are kicked away for leathern clogs;
she must have a hoop too, as well as her mistress; and her poor scanty
linsey-woolsey petticoat is changed into a good silk one, for four or
five yards wide at the least. Not to carry the description farther, in
short, plain country Joan is now turned into a fine London madam, can
drink tea, take snuff, and carry herself as high as the best.

If she be tolerably handsome, and has any share of cunning, the
apprentice or her master's son is enticed away and ruined by her. Thus
many good families are impoverished and disgraced by these pert sluts,
who, taking the advantage of a young man's simplicity and unruly desires,
draw many heedless youths, nay, some of good estates, into their snares;
and of this we have but too many instances.

Some more artful shall conceal their condition, and palm themselves off
on young fellows for gentlewomen and great fortunes. How many families
have been ruined by these ladies? when the father or master of the
family, preferring the flirting airs of a young prinked up strumpet, to
the artless sincerity of a plain, grave, and good wife, has given his
desires aloose, and destroyed soul, body, family, and estate. But they
are very favourable if they wheedle nobody into matrimony, but only make
a present of a small live creature, no bigger than a bastard, to some of
the family, no matter who gets it; when a child is born it must be kept.

Our sessions' papers of late are crowded with instances of servant-maids
robbing their places, this can be only attributed to their devilish
pride; for their whole inquiry nowadays is, how little they shall do, how
much they shall have.

But all this while they make so little reserve, that if they fall sick
the parish must keep them, if they are out of place, they must prostitute
their bodies, or starve; so that from clopping and changing, they
generally proceed to whoring and thieving, and this is the reason why our
streets swarm with strumpets.

Thus many of them rove from place to place, from bawdy-house to service,
and from service to bawdy-house again, ever unsettled and never easy,
nothing being more common than to find these creatures one week in a good
family, and the next in a brothel. This amphibious life makes them fit
for neither, for if the bawd uses them ill, away they trip to service,
and if the mistress gives them a wry word, whip they are at a bawdy-house
again, so that in effect they neither make good whores nor good servants.


Those who are not thus slippery in the tail, are light of finger; and of
these the most pernicious are those who beggar you inchmeal. If a maid is a downright thief she strips you, it once, and you know your loss; but these retail pilferers waste you insensibly, and though you hardly miss it, yet your substance shall decay to such a degree, that you must have a very good bottom indeed not to feel the ill effects of such moths in your family.

Tea, sugar, wine, &c., or any such trifling commodities, are reckoned no thefts, if they do not directly take your pewter from your shelf, or your linen from your drawers, they are very honest: What harm is there, say they, in cribbing a little matter for a junket, a merry bout or so? Nay, there are those that when they are sent to market for one joint of meat, shall take up two on their master's account, and leave one by the way, for some of these maids are mighty charitable, and can make a shift to maintain a small family with what they can purloin from their masters and mistresses.

If you send them with ready money, they turn factors, and take threepence
or fourpence in the shilling brokerage. And here let me take notice of
one very heinous abuse, not to say petty felony, which is practised in
most of the great families about town, which is, when the tradesman gives
the house-keeper or other commanding servant a penny or twopence in the
shilling, or so much in the pound, for everything they send in, and
which, from thence, is called poundage.

This, in my opinion, is the greatest of villanies, and ought to incur
some punishment, yet nothing is more common, and our topping tradesmen,
who seem otherwise to stand mightily on their credit, make this but a
matter of course and custom. If I do not, says one, another will (for
the servant is sure to pick a hole in the person's coat who shall not pay
contribution). Thus this wicked practice is carried on and winked at,
while receiving of stolen goods, and confederating with felons, which is
not a jot worse, is so openly cried out against, and severely punished,
witness Jonathan Wild.

And yet if a master or mistress inquire after anything missing, they must
be sure to place their words in due form, or madam huffs and flings about
at a strange rate, What, would you make a thief of her? Who would live
with such mistrustful folks? Thus you are obliged to hold your tongue,
and sit down quietly by your loss, for fear of offending your maid,
forsooth!

Again, if your maid shall maintain one, two, or more persons from your
table, whether they are her poor relations, countryfolk, servants out of
place, shoe-cleaners, charwomen, porters, or any other of her menial
servants, who do her ladyship's drudgery and go of her errands, you must
not complain at your expense, or ask what has become of such a thing, or
such a thing; although it might never so reasonably be supposed that it
was altogether impossible to have so much expended in your family; but
hold your tongue for peace sake, or madam will say, You grudge her
victuals; and expose you to the last degree all over the neighbourhood.

Thus have they a salve for every sore, cheat you to your face, and insult
you into the bargain; nor can you help yourself without exposing
yourself, or putting yourself into a passion.

Another great abuse crept in among us, is the giving of veils to servants; this was intended originally as an encouragement to such as
were willing and handy, but by custom and corruption it is now grown to be a thorn in our sides, and, like other good things, abused, does more harm than good; for now they make it a perquisite, a material part of their wages, nor must their master give a supper, but the maid expects
the guests should pay for it, nay, sometimes through the nose. Thus have they spirited people up to this unnecessary and burthensome piece of
generosity unknown to our forefathers, who only gave gifts to servants at Christmas-tide, which custom is yet kept into the bargain; insomuch that a maid shall have eight pounds per annum in a gentleman's or merchant's family. And if her master is a man of free spirit, who receives much
company, she very often doubles her wages by her veils; thus having meat, drink, washing, and lodging for her labour, she throws her whole income upon her back, and by this means looks more like the mistress of the family than the servant-wench.

And now we have mentioned washing, I would ask some good housewifely
gentlewoman, if servant-maids wearing printed linens, cottons, and other
things of that nature, which require frequent washing, do not, by
enhancing the article of soap, add more to housekeeping than the
generality of people would imagine? And yet these wretches cry out
against great washes, when their own unnecessary dabs are very often the
occasion.

But the greatest abuse of all is, that these creatures are become their
own lawgivers; nay, I think they are ours too, though nobody would
imagine that such a set of slatterns should bamboozle a whole nation; but
it is neither better nor worse, they hire themselves to you by their own
rule.

That is, a month's wages, or a month's warning; if they don't like you
they will go away the next day, help yourself how you can; if you don't
like them, you must give them a month's wages to get rid of them.

This custom of warning, as practised by our maid-servants, is now become
a great inconvenience to masters and mistresses. You must carry your
dish very upright, or miss, forsooth, gives you warning, and you are
either left destitute, or to seek for a servant; so that, generally
speaking, you are seldom or never fixed, but always at the mercy of every
new comer to divulge your family affairs, to inspect your private life,
and treasure up the sayings of yourself and friends. A very great
confinement, and much complained of in most families.

Thus have these wenches, by their continual plotting and cabals, united
themselves into a formidable body, and got the whip hand of their
betters; they make their own terms with us; and two servants now, will
scarce undertake the work which one might perform with ease;
notwithstanding which, they have raised their wages to a most exorbitant
pitch; and, I doubt not, if there be not a stop put to their career, but
they will bring wages up to 201. per annum in time, for they are much
about half way already.

It is by these means they run away with a great part of our money, which
might be better employed in trade, and what is worse, by their insolent
behaviour, their pride in dress, and their exorbitant wages, they give
birth to the following inconveniences.

First, They set an ill example to our children, our apprentices, our
covenant servants, and other dependants, by their saucy and insolent
behaviour, their pert, and sometimes abusive answers, their daring
defiance of correction, and many other insolences which youth are but too
apt to imitate.

Secondly, By their extravagance in dress, they put our wives and
daughters upon yet greater excesses, because they will, as indeed they
ought, go finer than the maid; thus the maid striving to outdo the
mistress, the tradesman's wife to outdo the gentleman's wife, the
gentleman's wife emulating the lady, and the ladies one another; it seems
as if the whole business of the female sex were nothing but an excess of
pride, and extravagance in dress.

Thirdly, The great height to which women-servants have brought their wages, makes a mutiny among the men-servants, and puts them upon raising their wages too; so that in a little time our servants will become our partners; nay, probably, run away with the better part of our profits, and make servants of us vice versa. But yet with all these inconveniences, we cannot possibly do without these creatures; let us
therefore cease to talk of the abuses arising from them, and begin to think of redressing them. I do not set up for a lawgiver, and therefore shall lay down no certain rules, humbly submitting in all things to the wisdom of our legislature. What I offer shall be under correction; and upon conjecture, my utmost ambition being but to give some hints to remedy this growing evil, and leave the prosecution to abler hands.

 Compiled From Sources In The Public Domain.


Smiles & Good Reading,
Teresa
************************************
It is not wealth one asks for, but just enough to preserve one’s dignity, to work unhampered, to be generous, frank and independent.
W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) Of Human Bondage, 1915

Monday, November 7, 2011

MyLadyWeb Presents The November Giveaway Hop

Hello and Welcome! 


 The Old Fashioned Regency Romance
A Very Merry Chase

Now available...
in an easy to read oversize, large print paperback version.

  Is Happy To Participate In

The November Giveaway Hop

 
November 8 - 11, 2011

I am providing several gifts just to thank everyone for stopping by
plus the opportunity to win a personalized PDF copy of my 
sweet, old-fashioned Regency Romance Novel, 
A Very Merry Chase 
for one lucky commenter.

To Enter To Win A Very Merry Chase
Simply Leave A Comment Here

Try Using Google's Chrome Browser If Your Browser Will Not Work.
Or Leave Me A Comment On Facebook.

ALSO
For Additional Entries

Like Our Author Page On 
 
Facebook
Where You Can Click On Our Photo Gallery To Find
Eight Complimentary Musical Jigsaw Puzzles To Download As Gifts

And/Or
Like A Very Merry Chase on  
Amazon

There are also lots of free gifts available at 
LadySilk's Regency Romance Revival 
On Our Complimentary Bookshelf
So be sure to bookmark us so you can come back after the
November Giveaway Hop is Over!


Smiles & Good Fortune,
Teresa
************************************
It is not wealth one asks for, but just enough to preserve one’s dignity, to work unhampered, to be generous, frank and independent. W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) Of Human Bondage, 1915

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Lucy Cleaver Female American Retail Worker Surviving In Poverty

Welcome to the world of Lucy Cleaver, a young American woman of twenty-five, who, in the early 20th century, entered one of the New York department stores at the age of twenty, at a salary of $4.50 a week.

In the course of the five years of her employment her salary had been raised one dollar. She stood for nine hours every day. If, in dull moments of trade, when no customers were near, she made use of the seats lawfully provided for employees, she was at once ordered by a floor-walker to do something that required standing.

During the week before Christmas, Lucy worked standing over fourteen hours every day, from eight to twelve-fifteen in the morning, one to six in the afternoon, and half past six in the evening till half past eleven at night. So painful to the feet becomes the act of standing for these long periods that some of the girls forego eating at noon in order to give themselves the temporary relief of a foot-bath. For this overtime the store gave her $20, presented to her, not as payment, but as a Christmas gift.

The management also allowed a week's vacation with pay in the summer-time and presented a gift of $10.

After five years in this position she had a disagreement with the floor-walker and was summarily dismissed.

She then spent over a month in futile searching for employment, and finally obtained a position as a stock girl in a Sixth Avenue suit store at $4 a week, a sum less than the wage for which she had begun work five years before. Within a few weeks, dullness of trade had caused her dismissal. She was again facing indefinite unemployment.

Her income for the year had been $281. She lived in a large, pleasant home for girls, where she paid only $2.50 a week for board and a room shared with her sister. Without the philanthropy of the home, she could not have made both ends meet. It was fifteen minutes' walk from the store, and by taking this walk twice a day she saved carfare and the price of luncheon. She did her own washing, and as she could not spend any further energy in sewing, she bought cheap ready-made clothes. This she found a great expense. Cheap waists wear out very rapidly. In the year she had bought 24 at 98 cents each. Here is her account, as nearly as she had kept it and recalled it for a year: a coat, $10; 4 hats, $17; 2 pairs of shoes, $5; 24 waists at 98 cents, $23.52; 2 skirts, $4.98; underwear, $2; board, $130; doctor, $2; total, $194.50. This leaves a balance of $86.50. This money had paid for necessaries not itemized,--stockings, heavy winter underwear, petticoats, carfare, vacation expenses, every little gift she had made, and all recreation.

She belonged to no benefit societies, and she had not been able to save money in any way, even with the assistance given by the home. So much for her financial income and outlay.

After giving practically all her time and force to her work, she had not received a return sufficient to conserve her health in the future, or even to support her in the present without the help of philanthropy. She was ill, anemic, nervous, and broken in health.

Before adding the next budget, two points in Lucy Cleaver's outlay should, perhaps, be emphasized in the interest of common sense. The first is the remarkable folly of purchasing 24 waists at 98 cents each. In an estimate of the cost of clothing, made by one of the working girls' clubs of St. George's, the girls agreed that comfort and a presentable appearance could be maintained, so far as expenditure for waists was concerned, on $8.50 a year. This amount allowed for five shirt-waists at $1.20 apiece, and one net waist at $2.50.

In extenuation of Lucy Cleaver's weak judgment as a waist purchaser, and the poor child's one absurd excess, it must, however, be said that the habit of buying many articles of poor quality, instead of fewer articles of better quality, is frequently a matter, not of choice, but of necessity. The cheap, hand-to-mouth buying which proves paradoxically so expensive in the end is no doubt often caused by the simple fact that the purchaser has not, at the time the purchase is made, any more money to offer. Whatever your wisdom, you cannot buy a waist for $1.20 if you possess at the moment only 98 cents. The St. George's girls made their accounts on a basis of an income of $8 a week. Lucy Cleaver never had an income of more than $5.50 a week, and sometimes had less. The fact that she spent nearly three times as much as they did on this one item of expenditure, and yet never could have "one net waist at $2.50" for festal occasions, is worthy of notice.

The other point that should be emphasized is the fact that she did her own washing. The more accurate statement would be that she did her own laundry, including the processes, not only of rubbing the clothes clean, but of boiling, starching, bluing, and ironing. This, after a day of standing in other employment, is a vital strain more severe than may perhaps be readily realized. Saleswomen and shop-girls have not the powerful wrists and muscular waists of accustomed washerwomen, and are in most instances no better fitted to perform laundry work than washerwomen would be to make sales and invoice stock. But custom requires exactly the same freshness in a saleswoman's shirt-waist, ties, and collars as in those of women of the largest income. The amount the girls of the St. George's Working Club found it absolutely necessary to spend in a year for laundering clothes was almost half as much as the amount spent for lodging and nearly two-thirds as much as the amount originally spent for clothing.

Where this large expense of laundry cannot be met financially by saleswomen, it has to be met by sheer personal strength. One department-store girl, who needed to be especially neat because her position was in the shirt-waist department, told us that sometimes, after a day's standing in the store, she worked over tubs and ironing-boards at home till twelve at night.

It is worth noting, as one cause of the numerous helpless shifts of the younger salesgirls, that, living, as most of them do, in a semi-dependence, on either relatives or charitable homes, it is almost impossible for them to learn any domestic economy, or the value of money for living purposes.


Compiled From Sources In The Public Domain.


Good Reading & Good Fortune,
Teresa
************************************
It is not wealth one asks for, but just enough to preserve one’s dignity, to work unhampered, to be generous, frank and independent. W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) Of Human Bondage, 1915

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

The Ballad of the Clever Maid Who Outwitted The Unscrupulous Outlandish Knight

The Clever Maid Who Outwitted The Unscrupulous Knight

This is the common English stall copy of a ballad of which there are a variety of versions, for an account of which, and of the presumed origin of the story, the reader is referred to the notes on the Water o’ Wearie’s Well, in the Scottish Traditional Versions of Ancient Ballads, published by the Percy Society. By the term ‘outlandish’ is signified an inhabitant of that portion of the border which was formerly known by the name of ‘the Debateable Land,’ a district which, though claimed by both England and Scotland, could not be said to belong to either country. The people on each side of the border applied the term ‘outlandish’ to the Debateable residents. The tune to The Outlandish Knight has never been printed; it is peculiar to the ballad, and, from its popularity, is well known.

An Outlandish knight came from the North lands,
And he came a wooing to me;
He told me he’d take me unto the North lands,
And there he would marry me.
‘Come, fetch me some of your father’s gold,
And some of your mother’s fee;
And two of the best nags out of the stable,
Where they stand thirty and three.’
She fetched him some of her father’s gold,
And some of the mother’s fee;
And two of the best nags out of the stable,
Where they stood thirty and three.
She mounted her on her milk-white steed,
He on the dapple grey;
They rode till they came unto the sea side,
Three hours before it was day.
‘Light off, light off thy milk-white steed,
And deliver it unto me;
Six pretty maids have I drowned here,
And thou the seventh shall be.
‘Pull off, pull off thy silken gown,
And deliver it unto me,
Methinks it looks too rich and too gay
To rot in the salt sea.
‘Pull off, pull of thy silken stays,
And deliver them unto me;
Methinks they are too fine and gay
To rot in the salt sea.
‘Pull off, pull off thy Holland smock,
And deliver it unto me;
Methinks it looks too rich and gay,
To rot in the salt sea.’
‘If I must pull off my Holland smock,
Pray turn thy back unto me,
For it is not fitting that such a ruffian
A naked woman should see.’
He turned his back towards her,
And viewed the leaves so green;
She catched him round the middle so small,
And tumbled him into the stream.
He dropped high, and he dropped low,
Until he came to the side, -
‘Catch hold of my hand, my pretty maiden,
And I will make you my bride.’
‘Lie there, lie there, you false-hearted man,
Lie there instead of me;
Six pretty maids have you drowned here,
And the seventh has drowned thee.’
She mounted on her milk-white steed,
And led the dapple grey,
She rode till she came to her own father’s hall,
Three hours before it was day.
The parrot being in the window so high,
Hearing the lady, did say,
‘I’m afraid that some ruffian has led you astray,
That you have tarried so long away.’
‘Don’t prittle nor prattle, my pretty parrot,
Nor tell no tales of me;
Thy cage shall be made of the glittering gold,
Although it is made of a tree.’
The king being in the chamber so high,
And hearing the parrot, did say,
‘What ails you, what ails you, my pretty parrot,
That you prattle so long before day?’
‘It’s no laughing matter,’ the parrot did say,
‘But so loudly I call unto thee;
For the cats have got into the window so high,
And I’m afraid they will have me.’
‘Well turned, well turned, my pretty parrot,
Well turned, well turned for me;
Thy cage shall be made of the glittering gold,
And the door of the best ivory.’
**************************
I have a graduate degree in history and I love history in all it’s forms–especially women’s history. A graduate degree in women’s studies was not an option at the university where I received my MA in History so I had to make do with a more generalized degree. However, in every class I made up for the lack by researching the condition of women in each age that I studied. I have always been fascinated by women’s history, so I thought I would start sharing some of the lost treasures that I uncover. I believe that most people have curious minds and like glimpses of how the world was, and how things were perceived in the past. I firmly believe in the idea that we must remember history in order to learn from it, grow and hopefully cut down on the number of stupid mistakes that random impulse and intellectual curiosity and greed and a thousand other human motivators lead us to make.

Smiles and Good Fortune,
Teresa Thomas Bohannon


****
It is not wealth one asks for, but just enough to preserve one’s dignity, to work unhampered, to be generous, frank and independent.
– W. Somerset Maugham (1874 - 1965) Of Human Bondage, 1915