THE CASE OF FEMALE SERVANTS
SIR,—Will you permit one who feels a deep interest in the moral and religious welfare of those numerous individuals to whom this communication refers, to offer a few remarks on their condition and claims, through the medium of your valuable Journal. The Patriot has the pre-eminence of being regarded as a Domestic Journal; and, therefore, any observations on the subject of this letter, may be expected to operate more directly and powerfully.
To every benevolent and, especially, religious mind, which is most affecting to contemplate, how little the moral and spiritual condition of female sermons has been regarded by the British public. The number, in the Metropolis alone, has been estimated to be considerably more than 100,000; and, in all our cities and provincial towns, they form by no means and in considerable part of the population.
In the rural districts, where there are large families of cottagers, nearly all the girls are brought up for domestic service; and, as their number is so great, their influence is proportionate. They have the range and command, often, of the premises of their employers; they are acquainted with the manners, habits, and all the movements, of their masters and mistresses; and, in many instances, almost unlimited confidence is proposed in them.
Children are intrusted to their care; those children are coming into perpetual contact with them,—I'm listening to the conversation,—are observing their tempers and habits,—and are operated on most powerfully by their daily conduct.
How very important it is, then, that's a female servant should be persons of character; that's what they should be in the development of regular and moral, it's not of Christian habits!
It is lamentable, however, to observe, that, to a very great extent, the character of female servants is anything about moral; but their habits, in multitudes of instances, or anything but virtuous and exemplary. They have had but little parental training. They leave the domestic roof actually period. They find a few masters or mistresses who watch over their moral and religious culture. By thousands of them, no Sabbath is observed; and multitudes of them never have a word addressed to them on the importance of an elevated Standard of morals; on the desirableness and necessity of modesty, temperance, purity, honesty, and, above all, the fear of God.
Can we then wonder, Sir, that there are so few good female servants? Indeed, that so many turned out to be irregular, dishonest, and depraved? It is notorious, that, in many districts, the character of female sermons is exceedingly corrupt. In the rural parts of England, they discover marked laxity of morals; and it is palpable, that, in our towns and cities, some, (and by no means a small portion of the population,) who are mostly depraved, are female servants. It is a well-known fact, from inquiries at our various Penitentiaries, that three-fourths of their inmates have been in domestic servants.
These, Sir, are startling and appalling, but indubitable statements; and it is very necessary that female servants should not be so much and so criminally neglected as they have been. They must not be passed by a strangers, regarded as persons with whom British Christians have no concern, or over whom they are to exert no moral and divine influence. Masters and mistresses, professing Christianity, are, to a great extent, responsible for the souls of their servants. Would that this were more powerfully felt by them! Female servants must be more assiduously watched over by the religious public, before we shall have a marked change in their character and condition.
Sunday-school teachers must pay closer attention to their elder female scholars, before the moral character of female sermons will be much elevated.
Mistresses professing to fear God, must consider it an incumbent and most solemn duty to watch for the souls of their servants, as those who must give an account.
And might not Ministers of the Gospel do more to "benefit and bless" the souls of female servants? Might not tracts, bearing immediately on their character, their duties, their temptations, be procured, and more extensively circulated among them? Might not a sermon, previously announced, be delivered twice a year, specifically to female servants? I feel persuaded, Sir, that, if these, among other means, were employed, we should soon perceive a great change for the better in the moral character and condition of our servants; and they would not become, as they so often do, the prey of the designing, the seducer, the thief, and the depraved.
The religious public has yet, to a great extent, forgotten the ignorance, the irregularity, the moral degradation, and consequent misery, of multitudes of female servants. Thousands on thousands of them may say, with appalling force, _No man careth for our souls."
Hoping that these observations may be received with kindness, and that they may not be inserted without a blessing from God.
I remain, Sir, yours, with much esteem,
T. W.
Petersfield, Dec. 27, 1842