Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 16.djvu/141

Rh the dresser, so as to have it ready to pull by pieces as you have occasion for it.

If you have a silver saucepan for the kitchen use, let me advise you to batter it well, and keep it always black; this will be for your master's honour, for it shows there has been constant good housekeeping: and make room for the saucepan by wriggling it on the coals, &c.

In the same manner, if you are allowed a large silver spoon for the kitchen, let half the bowl of it be worn out with continual scraping and stirring, and often say merrily. This spoon owes my master no service.

When you send up a mess of broth, watergruel, or the like, to your master in a morning, do not forget with your thumb and two fingers to put salt on the side of the plate; for if you make use of a spoon or the end of a knife, there may be danger that the salt would fall, and that would be a sign of ill luck. Only remember to lick your thumb and fingers clean, before you offer to touch the salt.

OUR employment, being of a mixed nature, extends to a great variety of business, and you stand in a fair way of being the favourite of your master or mistress, or of the young masters and misses; you are the fine gentleman of the family, with whom all the maids are in love. You are Rh