business world; and it is the ambition of every American to live in some
such house as the New York house; and as soon as a village begins to
grow into a town, such houses are built. Still, the immensely greater
number of the Americans necessarily live so simply and cheaply that such
a house would be almost as strange to them as to an Altrurian. But while
we should regard its furnishings as vulgar and unwholesome, most
Americans would admire and covet its rich rugs or carpets, its papered
walls, and thickly curtained windows, and all its foolish ornamentation,
and most American women would long to have a house like the ordinary
high-stoop New York house, that they might break their backs over its
stairs, and become invalids, and have servants about them to harass them
and hate them.

Of course, I put it too strongly, for there is often, illogically, a
great deal of love between the American women and their domestics, though
why there should be any at all I cannot explain, except by reference to
that mysterious personal equation which modifies all conditions here. You
will have made your reflection that the servants, as they are cruelly
called (I have heard them called so in their hearing, and wondered they
did not fly tooth and nail at the throat that uttered the insult), form
really no part of the house, but are aliens in the household and the
family life. In spite of this fact, much kindness grows up between them
and the family, and they do not always slight the work that I cannot
understand their ever having any heart in. Often they do slight it, and
they insist unsparingly upon the scanty privileges which their mistresses
seem to think a monstrous invasion of their own rights. The habit of
oppression grows upon the oppressor, and you would find tender-hearted
women here, gentle friends, devoted wives, loving mothers, who would be
willing that their domestics should remain indoors, week in and week out,
and, where they are confined in the ridiculous American flat, never see