26 i ' 
OUR DOMESTIC SERVICE. 
as domestic servants, who were born in the 
United States, not less than 353,275 are 
found in the former slave States and the 
District of Columbia, nineteen-twentieths 
of them being colored. This would leave 
but 351,059 from the old free States, includ- 
ing the Territories. But of the total num- 
ber of domestic servants in these States, 
53,532 are males, while 34,099 are females 
under 16 years of age, nearly all of whom 
were bom here. Making deductions on 
these accounts, we have, in round numbers, 
280,000 females, 16 years of age and up- 
ward, natives of the country, among our 
domestic servants, against a somewhat 
smaller number of all other nationalities. 
But can it be true that more than one-half 
our adult female domestic servants in the 
Northern States are native, are American ? 
It is true, and it is not true. According to 
the strict sense of the word native, the 
sense in which the Census uses it, it is tme ; 
according to its popular meaning, nothing 
could be further from the truth. These Irish 
and German girls, as we are accustomed to 
call them, who are in our families as second 
girls, as nurses, and even as general ser- 
vants, what proportion of them ever saw 
Ireland or Germany ? They are, in fact, of 
the second generation. They are one re- 
move from foreigners. Yet, though born 
among us, our general instinctive feeling 
testifies that they are not wholly of us. So 
separate has been their social life, due alike 
to their clannishness and to our reserve ; so 
strong have been the ties of race and blood 
and religion with them ; so acute has been 
the jealousy of their spiritual teachers to- 
ward our popular institutions, — that we 
speak of them, and we think of them, as 
foreigners. 
It must be remembered that, so far back 
as 1850, there were resident in the United 
States 573,225 Germans, and 961,719 Irish, 
while the total number of persons of foreign 
birth was at that time 2,210,839. Many 
of these had then been residing long in the 
country. It is from the descendants of this 
class, scarcely less than out of the directly 
immigrating class, that our domestic service 
is supplied. It is clear that it will not be 
long before these home-made foreigfiers will 
far outnumber the direct immigrants, in the 
ranks of our domestic service. Already the 
children born in this country of foreign par- 
ents nearly equal those who were bom 
abroad. Another Census will see the bal- 
ance strongly inclined to the side of the 
former class ; while their preponderance in 
our households will undcJubtedly be elected 
even earlier by the preference naturally given 
to them over new arrivals. 
Of those domestic servants who were born 
in foreign countries, the Census assigns to 
Ireland, 145,956; to Germany, 42,866; to 
British America, 14,878; to England and 
Wales, 12,531; to Sweden, Norway, and 
Denmark, 11,287; to China and Japan, 
5,420 ; to Scotland, 3,399 ; to France, 
2,874 ; to all other countries, 7,343. 
The States of the North and West, in 
which the Irish, as compared with the do- 
mestic servants of any other foreign nation- 
ality, are in excess, are Maine, Massachu- 
setts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode 
Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylva- 
nia, Ohio, Illinois, and California; those in 
which the Germans are in excess, Indiana, 
Iowa, Nebraska, and Wisconsin; those in 
which the Scandinavians are in excess, 
Kansas and Minnesota ; those in which the 
British Americans are in excess, Michigan 
and Vermont ; those in which the Chinese 
are in excess, Nevada and Oregon. The 
Chinese, however, very nearly approach the 
Irish in California, the numbers being 4,343 
against 4,434. Illinois has 3,950 Scandi- 
navians, and 5,603 Germans, against 6,346 
Irish. Michigan has 1,755 Germans, and 
1,748 Irish, against 2,456 Scandinavians. 
Ohio has 5,270 Germans, against 5,587 
Irish. In Indiana, the Irish very nearly 
approach the Germans. In Maine, the 
British Americans nearly equal the Irish. 
In the remaining States, the preponderance 
of the foreign element first specified, is gen- 
erally decided. 
Considering the number of “ French 
cooks” we have in this country, it may 
seem surprising that so few of our domestic 
servants should have been born in France. 
It is known, however, that French cooks 
differ from the cooks of other nationalities 
in this, that they may be born anywhere, 
and speak English with any sort of accent. 
Of the real Frenchmen and Frenchwomen 
who have entered our domestic service, the 
great majority, as might be anticipated, are 
found in towns, obeying, even on our happy 
soil, the strongest instinct of their people. 
Thirty cities have the honor to comprise 
1,630 out of the total of 2,874 domestic 
servants born in France. Of these, 449 are 
found in New York; 368 in New Orleans; 
and 286 in San Francisco. 
Two foreign elements which are likely to 
make an even greater proportionate showing 
in the domestic service of 1880 than in that of 
