BLACK SERVANTS IN PARIS

Dominion, Volume 16, Issue 224, 9 June 1923, Page 15

BLACK SERVANTS IN PARIS

THE LADIES FROM HAITI. While it is far easier io find a maid in Paris than in London or the other capitals, Parisians complain bitterly that it is as impossible to get a maid as to find an apartment. This is only true in the sense that the maid insists on better terms than formerly, and that she expects to work less hard, states the “Manchester Guardian.’ She is able to secure better terms because of the great demand for women’s labour here owing to man shortage and the greater variety of occupations open to her. Thus the news that 150 young negresses from Haiti are coming to Franco as domestic servants has stirred the Paris housewife very deeply. Innumerable applications have been sent in for a black maid to Commandant Raynaud, who originated the scheme It was to be as smart to have a negress to open the door as it used to be to have the little negro servant of the eighteenth century, and with memories of the rage for the negress of jazz band persuasion, mistresses of apartments assured themselves that they had really hit upon something new.

It was a great disappointment to find that the commandant had taken the precaution to place his young negresses beforehand, and that they were, therefore, all engaged. Some indignation has been expressed against the favoured householders, who are not only, to be relieved of their domestic worries, but also to be given lustre as well. It is hoped that the young Haitians wilt be so much in demand that they will not necessarily remain long in their first situation. In the meantime they are the subject of skits in the newspapers and music-halls. The French attitude, indeed, towards the black races is curiously different from that of English and Americans. At tho moment, for instance, it is rather the thing, if not to be black, at least to patronise blacks. This is due to a certain extent to French propaganda concerning her colonies, but it is also a result of the war and the French defence of her raising of black troops. The negro novel has also increased the pro-negro feeling, though in actual fact there is hardly any of the prejudice against coloured races in France which exists in other countries. The young Haitians are assured in advance of only too much appreciation.