Good wages however are not all that a faithful servant requires; kind treatment is of far greater consequence. Human nature is the same in all stations. If you can convince your servants that you have a generous and considerate regard for their health and comfort, there is no reason to imagine that they will be insensible to the good they receive. Be careful therefore to impose no commands but what are reasonable, nor reprove but with justice and temper; the best way to ensure which is, not to lecture them till at least one day after the offence has been committed. If they have any particular hardship to endure in service, let them see that you are concerned for the necessity of imposing it. Servants are more likely to be praised into good conduct, than scolded out of bad behaviour. Always commend them when they do right; and to cherish in them the desire of pleasing, it is proper to show them that you are pleased. By such conduct ordinary servants will often be converted into good ones, and there are few so hardened as not to feel gratified when they are kindly and liberally treated. At the same time avoid all approaches to familiarity, which to a proverb is accompanied with contempt, and soon destroys the principle of obedience. When servants are sick, you are to remember that you are their patron, as well as their master or mistress; not only remit their labour, but give them all the assistance of food and physic, and every comfort in your power. Tender assiduity about an invalid is half a cure; it is a balsam to the mind, which has the most powerful effect on the body; it soothes the sharpest pains, and strengthens beyond the richest cordial. The practice of some persons in sending home poor servants to a miserable cottage, or to a workhouse, in time of illness, hoping for their services if they should happen to recover, while they contribute nothing towards it, is contrary to every principle of justice and humanity. Particular attention ought to be paid to the health of the cook, not only for her own sake, but also because healthiness and cleanliness are essential to the duties of her office, and to the wholesomeness of the dishes prepared by her hand. Besides the deleterious vapours of the charcoal, which soon undermine the health of the heartiest person, the cook has to endure the glare of a scorching fire, and the smoke, so baneful to the complexion and the eyes; so that she is continually surrounded with inevitable dangers, while her most commendable achievements pass not only without reward, but frequently without even thanks. The most consummate cook is seldom noticed by the master, or heard of by the guests, who, while they eagerly devour his dainties, and drink his wine, care very little who dressed the one or sent the other. The same observations apply to the kitchen maid or second cook, who have in large families the hardest place, and are worse paid, verifying the old proverb, 'the more work the less wages.'