e. There were thirty-eight servants in her
establishment; it was a little state all in itself, with Mrs. Robbie as
queen, and her housekeeper as prime minister, and under them as many
different ranks and classes and castes as in a feudal principality.
There had to be six separate dining-rooms for the various kinds of
servants who scorned each other; there were servants' servants and
servants of servants' servants. There were only three to whom the
mistress was supposed to give orders--the butler, the steward, and the
housekeeper; she did not even know the names of many of them, and they
were changed so often, that, as she declared, she had to leave it to
her detective to distinguish between employees and burglars.

Mrs. Robbie was quite a young woman, but it pleased her to pose as a
care-worn matron, weary of the responsibilities of her exalted station.
The ignorant looked on and pictured her as living in the lap of ease,
endowed with every opportunity: in reality the meanest kitchen-maid was
freer--she was quite worn thin with the burdens that fell upon her. The
huge machine was for ever threatening to fall to pieces, and required
the wisdom of Solomon and the patience of Job to keep it running. One
paid one's steward a fortune, and yet he robbed right and left, and
quarrelled with the chef besides. The butler was suspected of getting
drunk upon rare and costly vintages, and the new parlour-maid had
turned out to be a Sunday reporter in disguise. The man who had come
every day for ten years to wind the clocks of the establishment was
dead, and the one who took care of the bric-a-brac was sick, and the
housekeeper was in a panic over the prospect of having to train another.

And even suppose that you escaped from these things, the real problems
of your life had still to be faced. It was not enough to keep alive;
you had your career--your duties as a leader of Society. There was the
daily mail, with all the pitiful letters from people begging
money--actually in one single week there were demands for two million
dollars. There were geniuses with patent incubators and stove-lifters,
and every time you gave a ball you stirred up swarms of anarchists and
cranks. And then there were the letters you really had to answer, and
the calls that had to be paid. These latter were so many that people in
the same neighbourhood had arranged to have the same day at home; thus,
if you lived on Madison Avenue you had Thursday; but even the