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150 ON THE CHOICE OF A BUSINESS*
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
¦ • ^ Useful [We And Are Indebted Practi...
folished in London , a person can at once begin at the top of tne professionand thus cooking * becomes a trade fitted to a much
higher-, class of persons than it used to be . Cooks' wages are never low and are sometimes very high ; they
may be said to range from £ 16 _eu year to £ 60 , according to the skill of the performer . These cooking schools will also be useful to
women who belong strictly to what are called the labouring classes , for many of them have not sufficient strength to go through the
apprenticeship otherwise necessary in farm-houses and such-like hardworking places to prepare them for service in gentlemen ' s
houses , but now , by paying a fee , they can be taught to cook and can at once be made capable of taking good places .
There is another plan hj which this useful profession might be made accessible to numbers now excluded from it . At present
families are generally supplied with cooks from the kitchens of " le who keep larger establishments than they do ; thus the
peop duke's kitchenmaid goes to the squire as cook , and the squire ' s kitchenmaid becomes cook to the village doctor or clergyman .
But as there are many more small than large establishments , the lis insufficientand though nobody goes without cooks ,
women suppy -who know very , little about cooking are often engaged , and ill-dressed dinners are the consequence .
This might be remedied by introducing the apprentice system common on the Continent . It now often happens that a cook
doesnot choose to teach her kitehenmaid much . Perhaps she is afraid that she miht be engaged in her own stead if she grew skilful
or perhaps she g is simply ill-natured and does not choose to take , the trouble and so the poor maid gets little instruction . But if
the cook was allowed to take an apprentice and to receive a fee for teaching her , she would take pains to teach , and at the end works of the
year would send her out an accomplished cook . This system ¦> . well abroad , and there does not seem to be any reason why it should not in England . It would cost the mistress of the house nothing but
the food of the apprentice , and the use of an extra hand in the kitchen would be worth that . The cook would be glad to receive a feethe
, apprentice would be glad to learn , the kitchenmaid would hear the instructions the cook was giving the other girl and pick up- a
little knowledge by this means . Thus all parties would be benefited and the race of cooks multilied and improved . Two grades
of cooks would then exist ; those p who began as _scullerymaids and gradually worked up from the lowest ranks , and those who became
cooks hy purchase , paying a fee to learn . These latter would belong to a higher class than the formerand be more fit to become
house-, keepers . Industrial schools will be of use in enabling many girls to
become servants who would otherwise have found it impossible , for gentlefolks will not engage untrained girls ; they must therefore
get their training either in industrial schools , or in hard places-
150 On The Choice Of A Business*
150 ON THE CHOICE OF A BUSINESS *
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Nov. 1, 1862, page 150, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01111862/page/6/
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