Here I must make a short digression. It is well known that ladies of a certain age, good mothers and good housekeepers, whose social position does not allow them to leave their servants to themselves--who, for instance, have only one servant, who has to be both cook and lady's maid,--it is well known that such ladies often talk for hours on this subject. The conversations are always the same--of insupportable defects, insolence that they have had to endure, impertinent answers, dishonesty in buying the things needed for the kitchen, of waste, untruthfulness, immense pretensions, of discharges, of the annoyance of searching for new servants, and other such calamities; the refrain always being that the honest and faithful servants, who became attached to the family and grew old in the same service, have ceased to exist; now one is obliged to change them continually, and there is no way of getting back to the old order. Is this true or false? Is it a result of the liberty and equality of classes, making service harder to bear and the servants more independent? Is it an effect of the relaxation of manners and of public discipline, which has made itself felt even in the kitchen? However it may be, the fact remains that at home I heard this subject so much discussed that one day, before I left for Spain, I said to my mother, "If anything in Madrid can console me in being so far from my family, it will be that I shall hear no more of this odious subject." On my arrival at Madrid I went into a hostelry, and the first thing the landlady said was that she had changed her maids three times in a month, and was driven to desperation: she did not know which saint to pray to: and so long as I remained there the same lamentation continued. On my return home I told my family about it; they all laughed, and my mother concluded that there must be the same trouble in every country. "No," said I, "in the northern countries it must be different."--"You will see that I am right," my mother answered. I went to Paris, and of the first housekeeper with whom I became acquainted I asked the question, "Are the servants here the everlasting torment of their mistresses, as they are in Italy and Spain?"--"_Ah! mon cher monsieur_," she answered, clasping her hands and looking above her, "_ne me parlez pas de ca!_" Then followed a long story of quarrels, and discharging of servants, and of trials which mistresses have to endure. I wrote the news to my mother, and she answered, "We shall see in London." I went to London, and on the ship which was bearing me to Antwerp I entered into conversation with an English lady. After we had exchanged a few words, and I had explained the reason of my curiosity, I asked the usual question. She turned away her head, put her hand to her forehead, and then replied, emphasizing each word, "They are the _flagellum Dei_!"