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ACCORDING to various prophets, the 'servant problem" is in process of solution; according to skeptics, it is in a hopeless muddle. In some periodicals appear elaborate statements of the employers' attitude and ideas of solution; in others, the employees' experiences and demands, and in still others, the opinions of theorists and students. But no one thinks it worth while to study, at first hand, all sides of the problem, with a view to ascertaining the possible points of adjustment. This is proved by the fact, that the intelligence office that great medium of exchange to which more than three fifths of the employers look for help, and which holds the balance of power, if not the key to the situation - has been utterly ig-. nored. These offices as they exist today are the places where every phase of the servant problem is presented, and oftentimes threshed out; where hundreds of thousands of employers and employees meet one another for the first time; where conditions of work are discussed and arrangements made. This gives them a special opportunity, as educational centres, and as starting points to remove some of the difficulties. But employers, unconscious of these conditions and possibilities, do not insist upon standards; and the offices, in their greed for gain, and in the face of this ignorance or indifference, pursue a policy which makes improvements from other sources difficult. This policy is a very definite one, and influences the homes in at least three vital ways, through the supply, competency, and wages of employees.

The intelligence office, as distinguished from the employment bureau, is one

which furnishes household help exclusively. Such offices are of great number and variety. New York has more than three hundred, and other cities proportionately; while many more combine domestic with other kinds of employment. They range from well-furnished, adequately equipped houses or suites of rooms in desirable localities, with good business methods and systems, down to a single room in a tenement, which is the kitchen, dining-room, parlor, and office by day, and by night the sleeping quarters, not only of the family, but of any unplaced girls. It is not unusual in such a room to find at night from five to ten people. The office with brownstone front frequently does less business than the saloon or underground offices. The former secures its clients by attractive advertisements, keeps records, gives receipts; the latter have runners with pockets full of cards, who accost girls on the streets, steal their pocketbooks, until they agree to go to the address furnished, and fight with one another over girls they claim to have discovered, until the police interfere to save the girls' clothing. All grades of honesty are found, from the offices which refuse fees, knowing they cannot furnish servants, to those which make no attempts whatever and laugh insolently when the return of fees is demanded.

The intelligence office affects the peace and happiness of homes by the kind of servants which it sends into them; the health and morals of employees, by the locations and conditions in which it compels them to wait; and the character and competency, upon which so much depends, by the training afforded while they

wait. Where good and bad, young and old, green girls and old rounders, uncleanly and disorderly, tidy and neat, and drunk and sober, are crowded together in dark, unsanitary rooms, without supervision, girls learn every form of vice, and all the tricks "old hands" consider essential to "getting on in service." The best offices, aware of these conditions, refuse to let the girls wait, drive out the rounders, and have attendants, or provide reading; but these are few compared with the whole number.

I am the more sure of the truth of the extent and nature of these conditions because of the methods used in my investigation. For two years I have visited as a patron the offices in the chief cities, to the extent of many hundreds, and my observation has been corroborated by visits from one or more of the ten people associated in the study. They have gone as employers and interviewed girls, or they have donned the rough, oftentimes conspicuous garb of the applicant for work, and waited their turn in the office; they have been called by their first names, have answered all sorts of personal questions, have submitted references, and been many times unceremoniously turned down as "green," "incompetent," "too incompetent," "too high priced," or "unattractive." I have taken positions to find out the truth of the representations made in the office, and have found that an ironing-board over a bath-tub offered for a bed, the diningroom table "made up as a bed for two,' general housework for a family of ten, wages $12 per month, and work from 5.30 to 8.30 A. M. before any breakfast was permitted, were not unusual conditions. But in contrast with this I have had comfortable rooms, a sitting-room, not enough work to furnish proper exercise, and have had employers equal in consideration and fairness with any in the factory or store. But this is not all. As an employee I have been turned out for refusing to pay fees, have been sworn at or cajoled as the occasion seemed to demand, or have been assisted by a sympathetic proprietor, who

thought me "playing in hard luck." I am convinced that if these proprietors are oftentimes the worst enemies of the employee, they are also oftentimes her only friends. Did they not offer her shelter, crowded and unsanitary as it often is (for many run lodging-houses), she would be homeless upon the city streets.

The supply of applicants for household service depends upon some things which offices cannot control, such as immigration, conditions in homes, social stigma of household work, and competition of stores and factories, but it is unquestionably true that they do divert some of the available supply. In a large percentage of offices, fortunately not in all, it was found that saloons, places of amusement, questionable houses and resorts were given the preference. Such places not only pay any fee asked, but make gifts, and the honest householder cannot compete with them. It was also found that many such offices were the places where inmates for disorderly houses were secured. Some employees are sent to these houses without a knowledge of their character; others are bribed or forced; and from others consent is won through misrepresentations. Some offices have monthly contracts to furnish a specified number of inmates, and thirty out of fifty offices, marked suspicious and visited, took such orders as a matter of course. The supply of honest workers for homes is thus very materially decreased, for there are never enough girls who are willing to accept these offers, and bribes and force must be used. In other offices, disreputable characters are permitted to loiter, and it is impossible to estimate how many girls who are looking for honest work in households are thus led astray.

Some intelligence offices encourage even the greenest girls to abandon general housework and try for the place of cook, parlormaid, etc., for this increases the fee, which in many offices is based upon the amount of wages paid. This is one explanation of the decreasing number of general housework girls. The offices are also

responsible for some of the restlessness of servants. Girls are placed in positions and removed when they are needed for others. Some use employers as training schools. They send green foreigners who, when they have learned enough English and housework, are sent to other places for higher wages, the office not neglecting to collect the extra fees. Then they inform the long-suffering employer that they understand her girl has left, and that they can supply her need. One girl said that her business was to take positions in large households, and to make all the other employees dissatisfied by tales of privileges and high wages which the office offered. She was paid a liberal commission for each one who came. Another girl said an office had placed her ten times in one year. There are a few offices which are fences. A girl is sent into a home where she remains long enough to collect the small valuables. These she takes to the office, which disposes of them, and then gets her another place. This great influence of offices may also be used for good. One said that in less than three months she had induced one hundred and eight girls to remain in positions they wished to leave for trivial reasons, and had frankly told them she could not get them positions as good or wages as high elsewhere. But of course she lost all the fees from both employers and employees.

There are so many ideas of what competency means that in many instances the offices cannot be held responsible. Two employers in an office stated their requirements thus: "I want just an ordinary waitress." After various questions it was found in one case that she must be "honest, neat, strong, quick, capable, earnest, willing, trained, good-tempered, nice-looking, not impertinent, sober, willing to renounce all attentions from men, religious, and willing to wear a uniform." The second wanted a sanctimoniouslooking waitress for a family of ten, who would be willing to quote Scripture if clerical guests were entertained, and who would sit on the back porch Sunday even

ings, Bible in hand, and turn her eyes heavenward when the mistress and her devout guests passed by. All other defects would be overlooked. Another employer wanted a maid, no matter how incompetent, who smoked cigarettes, so that she herself would not be suspected. The office only learned this after several girls had been dismissed as unsatisfactory. Offices with high standards certainly prevent questionable characters from getting into homes, and keep the failures in life from using housework as a last resort. But when they forge, alter, trade, steal, and buy references, and then sell or give them to girls who have none, or whom they do not know, they make it possible for any kind of an employee to get into the best houses. I have seen girls turned out when they refused to lend their references for a few minutes to a girl who was called in for an interview with a “particular employer." I have been recommended as "all right and known to the office for years;" and when I showed a reference which I had purposely made bad, they offered a new one, or to "fix" the old

one.

Employers complain that applicants are impertinent, deceitful, dishonest, and lazy. If they are not so by nature what can they be when they come from some offices? When they are herded in rooms, often held by force until they pay their fees, treated with familiarity, and sworn or jeered at for refusing "good places" in questionable resorts, there is little inducement to polite address. When girls are coached to lie about their ages, qualifications, last places of employment, wages, etc., they are started on a series of falsehoods which they must continue. When they are encouraged to wait daily from nine A. M. to four P. M., with only gossip for a pastime, or to work a week and then "spend their money on a good time," the intelligence offices can be looked upon as nothing but trainingschools for certain forms of incompetency. A few permit drinking, especially in their lodging-houses, which are