THE ELUSIVE DOMESTIC. Will She Become Extinct ?

Free Lance, Volume IX, Issue 455, 20 March 1909, Page 6

THE ELUSIVE DOMESTIC. Will She Become Extinct ?

THE domestic may well be pardoned if she gives way to a,n aggravated attack of swelled head. You see, she is so scarce now-a-days that every lady m the land has got time to talk about her. The housholder may not have time to cook hubbies dinner. There are so many increasing demands upon her time in these strenuous days of guilds, ladies' political committees, kindergartens, etc. Why, no mam. thinks of going for a seat on the local Council to-day without first "swearingin" his wife and her nearest and dearest friends as a canvassing committee. • • • And so the dinner is uncooked, and they "dine out." The lady may not. have time to discuss fashion, art, sport,. 01 any of those things, but you just whisper that magic word, "Domestic," and you are exposed at once to a bat-tery-fire of questions: "Where ?" "When?" "How?" The truth is, the domestic is the rarest human plant in God's Own bit of Land. The question is : Will she become extinct ? It would appear that this evil threatens us. And it is an evil. The household arrangements are all suffering by reason of her non-appearance. Jones says that his food is never cooked as it used to be. There was a time when he didn't talk of "the pies his mother used to bake." But he reminds hi* wife of them three times a week now. • • • The household temper is becoming, spoiled. Yes, our domestic happiness is out on tfhe rocks, and the tide islow. Even the members of the Cabinet are up against it on this issue. They can. deal shrewdly, forcefully, hedgingly, boldly, with a hundred political problems. But you will have noticed that tie Hon. Geo. Fowlds has scarcely uttered a public word since that deputation of ladies at Qhristchurch presented that — how many feet long? — petition asking him tohave domestics imported f.0.b., or ia any way possible. But get us domestics ! Poor man, he has his limitations,, and this clamorous appeal for the girl who can cook, scrub, clean tlhe house, and not have too many followers, is. beyond the limit even of a Cabinet Minister. • • • Now, the February returns are out from the Women's Employment Bureaux at Wellington, Christchurch, and Auckland. There's one universal note of sadness from each of the three centres. You know what it is — "Domestics." Can't get 'em. Auckland during February asked for 228 ; she got 92. Christchurch asked for 182, with any amount of other seekers in the offing, but GhristchuTch only got 66. And the Christchurch Departinserted the plaintive mote: "We are quite unable to meet the demand for girls." Dunedin is in the same fix. As for Wellington — it keeps asking and receiving not. The Government haye been asked to give immigrating domestics free passages from Home. That is a large and unreasonable request. But there is much wisdom behind the suggestion to subsidise a training home for domestics locally. The scheme is worth fostering.