Household Administration Part 1

Household Administration.

by Various.

PREFACE

The object of this book is threefold. (1) It endeavours to define the importance and scope of household administration in the twentieth century, which, when a.n.a.lysed into its component parts, is found intimately to concern the right conduct and domestic care of individual human lives, from their inception to their close. (2) It seeks to demonstrate the necessity of an adequate preparation for all who a.s.sume the responsibility of such administration; particularly for those who, in consequence of their parental responsibilities, their wealth, their social status, or their professional duties, exercise far-reaching influence through their standard of life and example. (3) Finally, it gives prominence to the fact that the domestic arts are no collection of empirical conventions, to be acquired by imitation or exercised by instinct. It is clearly demonstrated that the group of sciences upon which they rest is more comprehensive than most people suspect, and that their contribution to the solution of pressing domestic problems has so far been but partially realised. It is, therefore, of considerable interest to observe the remarkable consensus of opinion on each of these points among the recognised experts in their subjects, to whom were entrusted the preparation of the various sections of this book. The writers of the papers, untrammelled by editorial restrictions, each writing from the fulness of her knowledge, tested by ripe experience, reached independently conclusions conspicuous for their unanimity. It will be evident to the most casual reader that, in the opinion of these thoughtful women, blind instinct must yield place to trained intelligence, if home life is to be preserved and modern conditions of existence adequately adjusted to human requirements.

Progressive changes, social, commercial, industrial, and, last but not least, educational, now require that this trained intelligence be fostered by organised instruction outside the home, adapted to the needs, present or prospective, of girls in every grade of society. Such instruction, whether in the fundamental sciences or in the applied arts, must be a.s.sociated with individual practice in laboratory, studio, workroom, and kitchen; the details to be varied as circ.u.mstances dictate.

If, however, consistent applications of such knowledge are to be made in order that desirable saving in time, labour, money, health, or happiness shall be effected, graduate women of high attainments are urgently needed for the work. It is they only who can bring to bear upon the problems of childhood and adolescence, of food, of clothing, of housing, of domestic economics, of occupation, rest, and recreation, the patient study and research in the interests of humanity, which men of similar standing have lavished upon the advancement of commerce and industrial processes. It is by their skilled labour in the almost untrodden field of domestic science that the millions of homes will benefit which are committed to the charge of women who possess neither time, opportunity, nor ability to carry out these indispensable investigations, but who can yet effectively fulfil their responsibilities, if they be supported by systematic training and organised common sense, based on sound knowledge.

It is in the hope of forwarding these objects that this book has been prepared.

ALICE RAVENHILL.

CATHERINE SCHIFF.

_Nov. 1910._

A BRIEF HISTORICAL SKETCH OF WOMAN'S POSITION IN THE FAMILY

BY CATHERINE SCHIFF

The home must always claim the first place in the large majority of women's lives. It has done so in the past, it does so in the present, it will continue to do so in the future. But woman's activities are no longer to be merely confined to her own fireside, though that must always hold a prominent place. The real problem of the day is the right conduct of the home on scientific lines.

In some ways the management of the home has never been more difficult.

The servant problem has never been more acute than to-day; the cost of living and the standard of comfort is going up by leaps and bounds, and the old recipe of "Feed the brute," as far as the husband is concerned, is no less inefficient. It is essential to-day to know something about food values, the arrangement of meals, which avoid monotony, and provide that requisite variety in nourishment, on which the good health and ultimately the good temper of the household depend.

Again we are realising the great complexities of all questions dealing with child-rearing and education. We have travelled far from the self-complacency of the woman of thirty years ago, who based her claims to a thorough knowledge of the up-bringing of children on the fact that she had buried ten. This need for wider knowledge in all branches of housekeeping is equally important to the unmarried woman, who is more and more being called upon to act as a foster-mother, whether as a teacher or in some other capacity, to the nation's children.

The care of the children is considered by all shades of opinion to be the _clou_ of a woman's life, and every day more and more responsibility is cast upon her in this respect. How can she, then, fulfil these duties as they should be fulfilled if she is utterly ignorant of the laws of health and of child-life, and how both are affected by environment and all the other grave and fundamental truths which lie at the root of the successful up-bringing and development of the child? It is now a hackneyed saying "that the child of to-day is the man or woman of to-morrow," but a whole world of truth lies enshrined in those words; the children are the a.s.sets of the nation, and if their up-bringing is not of the best they can never attain to that full heritage of development which is the right of every soul born into the world.

Scientific training in Household Administration can alone save the sorely taxed housewife of to-day from becoming more than a slave to her domestic responsibilities. It is only by being a mistress of her craft, "whether China fall or no," that she can make sufficient time to devote herself to necessary self-culture and recreation as well as to those ever-growing outside duties which the twentieth century is imposing upon her in the shape of public and social work. If there is one thing which is becoming increasingly obvious, it is that the help and advice of scientifically trained women are absolutely necessary in the management of hospitals, the administration of the Poor Law, and the general solution of social problems.

At no other epoch in the history of mankind has woman stood on the same high plane as she does to-day, and at no other period has so much been demanded of her, intellectually, morally, and physically. It is only within recent years that Science has attempted to come to the aid of woman in helping her firstly to obtain, and then to maintain, the position for which she was originally designed, as the complement of man and as the chief element of preservation in human society.

If the history of mankind is traced back to primordial times, we find that it was the female who possessed power over the emotional nature of man, and it is becoming increasingly evident that the family owes its origin as a social factor to the Mother, not to the Father.

Lippert is convinced "that the idea of an exclusively maternal kins.h.i.+p at one time extended over the whole earth," and McLennan says, "We shall endeavour to show that the most ancient system in which the idea of blood-relations.h.i.+p was embodied was a system of kins.h.i.+p through the females only."

Occupation seems to have been the main factor in determining that the mother rather than the father should be the founder of the family.

Agriculture originally appears to have been entirely the woman's industry, while the men were engaged in hunting or looking after the cattle, and wherever agriculture was the predominant feature of life we find that relations.h.i.+p is traced through the mother; while on the other hand those tribes who were chiefly pastoral had a paternal system of relations.h.i.+p--that is to say, that descent was counted through the males.

Drummond, in his book on the "Ascent of Man," places the Evolution of Motherhood long before that of Fatherhood. "An early result, partly of her s.e.x, partly of her pa.s.sive strain, is the founding through the instrumentality of the first savage Mother of a new and beautiful social state--Domesticity--while Man, restless, eager, and hungry, is a wanderer on the Earth, Woman makes a Home!" And according to the same authority we find "that to Man has been a.s.signed the fulfilment of the first great function--the Struggle for Life--Woman, whose higher contribution has not yet been named, is the chosen instrument for carrying on the Life of Others." Nature took many aeons to make a mother, whose gift to the world was Love and Sympathy; the evolution of the Father came still later. "It was when man's mind first became capable of making its own provision against the weather and the crops that the possibility of Fatherhood, Motherhood and the Family were realised."

"The Mother-age, with its mother-right customs, was a civilisation, as I have indicated, largely built up by woman's activity and developed by her skill; it was an age within the small social unit of which there was more community of interest, far more fellows.h.i.+p in labour and partners.h.i.+p in property and s.e.x, than we find in the larger social unit of to-day."[1]

In connection with this theory of the "Mother-age" it is interesting to note that the Etruscans traced their descent through the female line, and it was from the Etruscans that the Romans derived nearly all their inst.i.tutions; thus many of the "initiative forces of civilisation" have come down to us from women.

It is believed that the patriarchal system--where the man was the head of the family, as amongst the Jews--which succeeded the Mother-age, grew out of the custom of capturing women belonging to other tribes, this being succeeded later on by purchase, and "as soon as the woman ceased to be protected by the force of ideas, as soon, that is to say, as she lost her position as head of the family, her downward path was certain."

But even among primitive people we find that it was an almost universal custom that a woman should be provided with an independent property, "Mitgift," though as time went on and the patriarchal system became more firmly established, it appears that this Mitgift became the husband's property, and that every bride was expected to bring a dowry to her husband, whose property she became, thus losing all independence.

However, in Greece the position of woman, during the Heroic times was to a certain extent an independent one, as is clear from the poems of Homer and the treatment of Homeric and Heroic themes by the Athenian dramatists. But one has only to compare the "Nausicaa" of Homer or the "Electra" of the Tragedians with the women of the time of Pericles, to see how much the status of the female s.e.x had deteriorated. The Athenian wife of that time was treated as a mere "Hausfrau," expected to spend her whole time at home in the managing of the household, while the husband satisfied his intellectual tastes by intercourse with the "Stranger-women" attracted to Athens from other towns. "Thus arose a most unnatural division of functions among the women of those days. The citizen-women had to be mothers and housewives--nothing more; the stranger-women had to discharge the duties of the companions, but remain outside the pale of the privileged and marriageable cla.s.s."[2] To this artificial condition of domestic and social life may be partly attributed the downfall of Athens, for it is impossible to divide the functions of woman without serious risk to State and race.

In ancient Rome the patriarchal system was the prevailing custom. Under the Roman law the husband was the only member of the family possessing legal rights. "The family (_familia_) in its original and proper meaning is the aggregate of members of a household under a common head; this head was the paterfamilias, the only member of the household who possesses legal rights."[3] It is true that there were many honoured women under the Roman Republic, such as Cornelia and Portia, the daughter of Cato, but the lot of the majority was not an enviable one.

Gradually, however, the tutelage of women became less severe, and Justinian in revising the whole Roman code placed married and family life on an altogether new basis, "the husband lost his absolute control over his wife's dower, and in case of separation he had to restore it entire."

Women had been for so long under such strict tutelage that they were unfit to benefit by these new laws. Doubtless it will be remembered that the corruption of the women of the period is practically unparalleled in history, but it must be also borne in mind that the whole system of Imperial government was so vicious that it was almost impossible for women to escape from the widespread influence of vice and corruption.

Christianity as a force began to make itself felt while woman was yet in this low moral state, and it is not therefore surprising that to the leaders of Christianity the freedom which women then enjoyed and the easy method of divorce obtainable were in a large measure responsible for the vitiated state of Roman life. In their eyes the only means of producing a more salutary state of affairs was to put a check on what they considered a menace to a Christian society.

It is of interest to notice how the att.i.tude of the Early Fathers towards women differs from that of Our Lord as recorded in the Gospels.

There indeed are women highly honoured, and it is to a woman that Christ often gives a message of the highest import. It was to Mary Magdalen that the Risen Lord first appeared and bade her tell the others, and again it was the woman of Samaria who became the instrument of salvation to her people. But to the Early Fathers the ascetic ideal was the predominant one, and in consequence thereof women were treated as the chief source of temptation to man. "Woman was represented as the door of h.e.l.l, as the mother of all human ills. She should be ashamed at the very thought that she is a woman. She should live in continual penance on account of the curses she has brought upon the world. She should be ashamed of her dress, for it is the memorial of her fall. She should be especially ashamed of her beauty, for it is the most potent instrument of the demon."[4] In fact a decree of the Council of Auxerre (A.D. 578) forbade women to receive the Eucharist in their naked hands owing to their impurity.

Unfortunately "the bigotry of the Early Christian teachers gave the first check to the tendency to freer inst.i.tutions, the next was given by the fall of the Empire."

With the influx of the Teutonic tribes we find a new code of ideas and morals, but eventually a compromise was effected between the Germanic and Roman laws. Thus from very early times we find that it was a German custom to provide every bride with a dower, and this is remarked upon by Tacitus. Afterwards the Church adopted this custom, which was strangely enough both Roman and Teutonic in origin.

From the time when the Empire went down in a cataclysm which shook the foundations of the world, until the beginning of the Middle Ages, we hear but little of woman. It was the Sturm and Drang period in the world's history, in which woman had no real position. The women of the upper cla.s.ses were of necessity confined either to the castle or the convent, and woman's sphere was therefore a small one; man demanded nothing more than that they should minister to his physical wants in the short periods of peace he then enjoyed. Hallam says, "I am not sure that we could trace very minutely the condition of women for the period between the subversion of the Roman Empire and the First Crusade ...

there seems however to have been more roughness in that social intercourse between the s.e.xes than we find at a later period."[5]

With the end of this stormy period comes the dawn of the Age of Chivalry, and from that time forward until the Reformation, woman enjoyed a portion at least of her rightful position. It is said that "Chivalry not only bestowed upon the woman perfect freedom in the disposal of hand and heart, but required of the knight who should win her, devoted and lengthened service"; this may be, however, a rather idealised view of the situation; but there is no doubt that the Court and the Cloister became the two centres of women's lives, and an intimate connection was maintained between the two. Nearly all women of gentle birth were educated in nunnery schools, and by the eighth century we find that these schools had attained a high standard of learning, which increased and developed in the succeeding centuries. The convent afforded a shelter to the woman who did not marry and to whom the marriage state did not appeal; there she was able to a certain extent to follow the career she desired, at the same time her personal safety was a.s.sured. "The scholar, the artist, the recluse, the farmer, each found a career open to him; while men and women were prompted to undertake duties within and without the religious settlement, which make their activity comparable to that of the relieving officer, the poor law guardian, and the district nurse of a later age."[6] It is perhaps of interest to us to note that the first hospital for lepers in England was founded by a woman, "good Queen Maud," in 1101 at S. Giles' on the East.

The rule of an abbey or a priory called for no mean business capacity on the part of their heads, and as a rule the abbess and prioress were women of great business and administrative ability. Before the Norman Conquest nearly all the nunneries founded in England were abbacies, subsequently priories were the most usual foundations, as according to feudal law women were unable to hold property.

The latter half of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries are renowned throughout history for their women, who, occupying foremost positions in the government, were clever, cultured, and liberal-minded. One has but to mention the names of Margaret, Countess of Richmond, the "Lady Margaret" of Oxford and Cambridge; of Leonore d'Este, the mother of equally famous daughters, Isabella and Beatrice d'Este; Marguerite de Valois, sister of Francis I., and Isabella of Castile, to conjure up before one's eyes the whole procession of the proud and capable women of these days.

"One and all have been fruitful as successive stages of growth, yet they can never recur, and only the fanatic or visionary could wish that they should recur, for each is narrow and insufficient from the standpoint of a later age."

In England "the women who were the mothers of the men who created the great Elizabethan epoch were almost without exception brought up in nunnery schools"[7] and, alas, the destruction of the nunneries and the rise of the Puritan spirit sounded the death-knell of women's education.

After the Reformation the position of woman was peculiarly degrading; in the eyes of the law she possessed practically no status, and "the old chivalrous feeling for woman seems to have faded out with the romance of the Middle Ages--she now figured as the legal property of man, 'the safeguard against sin,' the bearer of children _ad infinitum_."

So woman was left once more to sink back into a slough of despond, until with the end of the eighteenth century there arose the humanitarian movement and the gradual awakening of woman to the sense of her responsibility, with the inevitable corollary of her rightful position as the social equal of man.

If these ideals are to be realised, woman must recognise her responsibilities and act accordingly. She has proved herself a more than apt student in all the liberal studies, she has practically forced the door of nearly all the professions, now she must realise that she must apply her higher learning to what is probably the most difficult profession of all, the management of the home, or in other words she must see that the knowledge she has acquired be adapted and turned to practical aims.

Up to the present time the conduct of the home has been regulated purely by rule of thumb methods; if however in the future it can only be administered with the same method and scientific exact.i.tude as prevail in other great business enterprises, the drudgery of housekeeping will diminish and woman will cease to be a slave to household duties. She will have more time to devote to the cultivation of her own mind, and thus, while becoming a more real companion to man, she will be free to take a more enlightened interest in the education and development of her children.

"Incidentally this may go to prove that a sound knowledge of the household sciences and arts may serve, not to tie a woman more to the storeroom and kitchen, but to enable her to get better results with the expenditure of less time and energy, by enabling her to apply to everything simple and complex within the household the master-mind, instead of the mind of the uncertain amateur."

Her responsibilities are great not only as an individual but as a member of the community to which she belongs; and if she is to fulfil these responsibilities in respect to the home, she cannot do so without a thorough scientific preparation.

The home is the "cradle of life," it was the birthplace of those industries which to-day form the great centres and const.i.tute the means of livelihood for millions. In some of these there is reason to believe that woman took her share as originator. With the process of time, these primitive practices have grown into the great industries and arts of to-day, yet it is still to the woman that the call comes to cultivate and use her taste in these matters, so that when it falls to her to be responsible for the decoration and furnis.h.i.+ng of a house, she may be able to choose in all departments of life what is _the best_, to the everlasting benefit of herself and her family, both physically and morally.