In the old days it was considered to betoken a lack of fidelity for a servant to change her situation; and many girls remained in the same family until they were grown-up women. In such cases the master would find for them suitable husbands or, if they were married through others’ good offices, give them the means to set up for themselves. The servants, too, looked upon it as a great honour to be so assisted by their master as it was a conclusive proof of their faithful service. This close mutual understanding is now less common, because there has been, so their employers complain, a serious falling off in the quality of the servants; but their masters, or rather their mistresses, are also to blame in the matter, for their attitude towards their subordinates has also changed. They no longer look upon them as permanent members of their household, and consequently take them less into confidence than formerly; which, however, is unavoidable since the good behaviour of the servants is not now guaranteed so securely as it used to be. In the old times servants were almost as much under their master’s authority as a vassal under his liege’s. To disobey a mistress’s order or to contradict her was considered an act of disloyalty, and the servant was kept in a state of complete subjection. On the other hand, a conscientious mistress had also on her part a sense of duty towards her servant, and looked after her and cared for her as for her own family. Nowadays, however, this bond between mistress and maid has been loosened except in rare cases, at least in Tokyo. If the mistress has no definite knowledge of the servant’s antecedents, the latter has as vague an idea of the real standing of the family. Formerly, reputable families remained permanently settled in the same locality for generations, so that their social position was well known in the neighbourhood; while as for the samurai who came up to town with their lord, the name of the daimyo whom they followed was a sufficient guarantee of their respectability though they themselves might not be personally known. Hence, the servants could without difficulty obtain any information they desired respecting the family whose service they proposed to enter, and they had only themselves to blame if they were not, upon being installed therein, satisfied with its ways. But there is now in every grade of society such a large proportion of families from the country that the servant is often unable to find out their standing, past or present. She may not suffer from arrearage of her wages, though such a thing is by no means rare; but she does not feel quite so much at home as she would if she entered a family whose history is known to her. There is then mutual reserve, not to say distrust, when neither the employer nor the employee knows anything of the other’s antecedents. The servant may be dismissed one fine morning at a moment’s notice, or she may obtain leave to visit a sick