It is a serious
grievance if a gentleman's butler or footman performs his duties
about his master's table or carriage in such unformed style as to
suggest that his habitual occupation may be ploughing or
sheepherding. Such bungling work would imply inability on the
master's part to procure the service of specially trained
servants; that is to say, it would imply inability to pay for the
consumption of time, effort, and instruction required to fit a
trained servant for special service under the exacting code of
forms. If the performance of the servant argues lack of means on
the part of his master, it defeats its chief substantial end; for
the chief use of servants is the evidence they afford of the
master's ability to pay.
What has just been said might be taken to imply that the offence
of an under-trained servant lies in a direct suggestion of
inexpensiveness or of usefulness. Such, of course, is not the
case. The connection is much less immediate. What happens here is
what happens generally. Whatever approves itself to us on any
ground at the outset, presently comes to appeal to us as a
gratifying thing in itself; it comes to rest in our habits of
though as substantially right.
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