3'^ KANSAS IMVKRSITV QIAKTKKI.V. 



while the better classes of 3'oung women prefer hard all-day work 

 with small wages in almost any other occnpation. For instance, 

 one girl, in preference to honsework with a weekl\' salar}- of S3. 00 

 at least, witlifl board and lodging, chose employment in a shop 

 where she received only $2.00 a week, and was compelled to walk 

 three miles a day. 



It is indeed hard to understand why girls hold in greater favor 

 positions in laundries, where they are required to do heavy work, 

 and of a kind which gives no chance for rest at an}' time in 

 the day, or in sweat-shops, the slow torture of which is too well 

 known to need description: or in factories where the work is posi- 

 tively injurious to health. Take for example the soap factories, 

 where, in one department, girls stand all day wrapping the bars of 

 soap in papers. It is found, after a little time, that the fingers and 

 nails actual I3' become eaten away by the caustic soda in the soap. 

 On this account one of these positions can be kept for only a com- 

 paratively short period, but there are alwaNS girls ready to take the 

 vacant places. 



One cause of suffering among working women in our large cities, 

 about which, especiallv in these hard times, we have heard so 

 much, is the fact that women crowd every industry except domestic 

 service, and seem willing to starve in the city rather than take 

 places in private families in the country. Why is this true, and 

 what has brought about this state of things? 



It is the object of this paper to discover if possible the reason 

 of this prevailing prejudice against domestic service, and the 

 remedies, if any exist. Do young women dislike to be servants, 

 because these positions are unprofitable financially when compared 

 with others? Take, for example, the position of dry-goods clerk, 

 and let us compare it with domestic service. The former is gen- 

 erally conceded by the public to be the higher of the two positions 

 in the social scale. The wages are apparentl}' much greater, ami 

 it seems, at hrst thought, to be a preferable employment in all 

 respects. 



It must, however, be remembered that a servant incurs no ex- 

 pense for board and room. Her expenses for clothing are not 

 necessarily great, for a dress appropriate to the kitchen must not 

 be of costly material, while a dry-goods clerk is obliged to spend a 

 large portion of her salary on dress. Moreover, a certain rivalry 

 in extravagance in dress is fostered among clerks, which in some 

 instances, has been so marked that proprietor's have insisted upon 

 a uniform costume. 



In order to show the relative incomes and expenses of servant 



