SIX-FEET ROYAL SERVANTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15551, 7 March 1914, Page 5 (Supplement)

SIX-FEET ROYAL SERVANTS.

Buckingham Palace, like nearly every other household, has recently been feeling -the dearth of maid-servants. Royal registry offices are now a necessity, and those so honoured are generally conducted by persons who have lived in the Palace, or have other high connections. The late stewards to the Marquess of Dufferin and the Earl of Crewe, for instance, regularly supply Buckingham Palace and Marlborough House with both men and maidservants.

They are held responsible for the people they supply to the Royal Household, and no one is ever sent who has not lived in good houses, and has at least two years' character. Footmen, under-butlers— deed, all men in livery—must be six feet in height, and the better-looking they are the better chance they have of securing a post. Footmen who have served at Embassies in other countries, and can speak one or two foreign languages, are favoured. Only British servants are engaged. The men must be between the ages of twentytwo and twenty-eight, and the women between eighteen and twenty-two. The wages are not better to begin with than in other households, but there are better allowancesin liveries and in plain clothes. There is the chance, too, of promotion to something better. A head housemaid might get £50 a year, and. of course, there is a pension for every servant who has served a certain number of years. Ten years is generally considered the minimum time for a pension, but when a case of misfortune occurs an application is made to the King, who approves a special grant. The servants have plenty of work to do in the Palace, but ample leisure and very good quarters and living. The maids are required to dress alike — coloured prints. The State porters and marshal men axe engaged directly by, the King on warrant. When a vacancy occurs everyone holding an office in the Palace has a right to- name a candidate to the Lord Steward. . The i latter sifts the applications, and submits til® result to the King. , The ordinary household servants are resident) with the exception of a personal housemaid, who. travels, with the Royal Family. j