Saki summarised the modern servant problem when he lamented that "she was a good cook, as cook go; and as cooks go, she went." If anybody thinks, however, that the problem is new, he ought to turn to Samuel Pepys.
There he will find that it was as bad nearly 300 years ago as it is today. The Pepys first maid, Jane, was apparently a treasure, but she left them after three years, and from that time on, the "diary" records a long series of domestic worries.
There was an uninterrupted succession of Nells, Hannahs, Besses, other Janes, Susans and Marys. On September 10th, 1663, the entry runs: "We have no luck in maids nowadays. This evening the girle that was brought to today, being cleansed by my wife and good new clothes put on her back, she ran away and we heard no more of her."
She was not the only one who departed on the day when she arrived, and at least three left after four days' service. There is a modern touch about a later entry: "This day our girle, Mary, did go away, declaring that she must be where she might earn something one day and spend it and play the next", while the alcoholic delinquencies of one, Lucy, the cook, have found many subsequent imitators.
The Irish Times, June 13th, 1931.