Top Shelf Books #12 – The Duties Of Servants

This is a pretty sneaky edition to The Top Shelf, because I am only keeping it because I might use it for research purposes some day, but I am keeping it nonetheless so technically it is a top shelf book.

The Duties Of Servants, 1894 (this edition of the book doesn’t list an author)

‘The important duty of engaging and dismissing servants devolves upon various individuals according to the scale on which each household is regulated.’

I don’t know where I picked this up. Many years ago, when I was a teenager I guess. It must have been in the gift shop of a museum or stately home and for whatever reason it caught my eye.

It is a facsimile of a Victorian guide book on servants, both how the mistress should treat them and how they should behave, though it is mostly aimed at the mistress.

When a footman has not been informed whether his mistress is at home to visitors or not, he either leaves them at the door, or ushers them into the drawing-room, on the change[sic] of her being at home to them, and if not inclined or able to receive visitors, some little awkwardness is occasioned both in giving and receiving such message; the servant looks foolish, the visitor looks and feels annoyed that the answer of “Not at home” was not at once given.

“Not at home” is the received formula in society to express a lady’s inability or disinclination to receive visitors; some persons not understanding it in this light, take it to mean a direct untruth, and will not allow their servants to make use of it, but it is in reality the recognised mode of insuring privacy without entering into explanations as to the why and the wherefore. For instance, if a mistress of a house were but slightly indisposed or overtired, and she were to be denied to visitors on the pleas of not being well enough to see them, she would doubtless have callers the next day to inquire after her health.

Too much engaged to see visitors is also not a polite answer to give to a caller, but when a lady occupied with domestic matters, going into her household accounts, examining the wardrobes of her children, or giving directions about her own, a servant has no alternative but to say that his mistress is engaged, if the formula of “not at home” is objected to. In all cases when the answer of “not at home” is returned, whether the mistress of the house is really out, or simply “not at home” to visitors, a well-mannered servant enters into no particulars as to when she went out, where she has gone, and when she may be expected to return, but restricts himself to this formula, and receives the cards left, or the message, if any, the one in silence, and the other with “yes, ma’am.”

It is interesting, because I don’t know any of this stuff, but I also don’t understand how anyone could ever have learned all of this. There are so many ridiculous rules of behaviour that it sometimes reads like a riddle. Even worse, the books tries to cover every home situation one might have encountered in the Victorian age, so every time it goes into detail over what duty a particular servant has to perform, it adds about six alternative versions depending on the size and location of the property and how many servants are employed. Basically, the book is practically unreadable because of this. Still though… maybe I’ll write a historical novel one day and this information will become invaluable… I could have a scene in which a new footman is brought to tears reading this book and not knowing what the hell his duties are supposed to be.

You can read my three star review on Goodreads here.