Servants were given little time for personal grooming, and then were constantly accused of being dirty, which was decidedly unfair since a typical servant’s day ran from 6:30 in the morning to 10:00 at night—later if an evening social event was involved. The author of one household manual noted wistfully how she would have loved to provide her servants with nice rooms, but sadly they always grew untidy. “The simpler, therefore, a servant’s room is furnished, the better,” she decided. By the Edwardian period servants got off half a day per week and one full day per month—hardly munificent when
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