[238] “In advertising recently for a general housework girl twelve answered the advertisement. Advertising the same week for my former servant, twenty-two ladies applied personally and twelve others wrote that a girl was wanted. Although I told each of the twenty-two that if the girl were even fair I would keep her myself, only two hesitated on that account to try to secure her.” The report of a large employment bureau for the year 1889 is as follows: Number of employers registered 1,512 Number of employees registered 1,541 Number of employers supplied with servants 1,366 Number of employees supplied with situations 1,375 The number of employees registered exceeds the number of employers, but many register who are incompetent to fill the position they seek, and therefore many employers are without servants. The bureau regrets “its inability at times to supply with competent help the large number of patrons.” Another bureau reports 2,659 applications from employers, only 2,099 of which could be filled. Still another bureau filling about three thousand positions annually reports that at times it has had six hundred applications from employers in excess of the number that could be filled with competent applicants for work. The domestic employment bureau connected with the Boston Young Women’s Christian Association reports for the year ending 1890: Orders registered 2,120 Orders filled 1,753 [239] “Our committee have been greatly puzzled to know how to supply the constantly increasing demand for good and efficient workers in small households, where fair compensation is offered for moderate requirements. This demand is great in the city, but more so in the suburbs and country. It is very difficult to find a woman willing to take service in a family living out of sight of Boston Common. It is still more difficult to find any one who will go twenty miles into the country.”—_Report of the Women’s Educational and Industrial Union_, Boston, 1888, p. 29. One employer in an inland city of twenty-five thousand inhabitants, who has a family of eight, and employs sixteen servants, writes: “It is impossible here to secure competent servants.” Another employer, employing thirteen servants, in a city of twelve thousand, writes: “It is very difficult to secure servants, since women here prefer to work in the factories.” One employer with seven servants and a family of two, in a large manufacturing city, says: “It is impossible to find well-trained employees.”