Domestic Servants Sharing Profits.

131

less than sixty-four persons are employed about the social palace in keeping it clean and in good order, besides the sixteen persons employed in the schools. Every part of the palace is thoroughly washed early every morning by the public servants, as I can personally testify, for I was awoke at five a.m. each morning I was there by the sound of water, mops, and brushes at work outside my bedroom door, and I naturally jumped up and peeped out to see what was going on.

These public servants of the social palace are equally entitled to a share of profits with the workers in the foundry. I had the curiosity when going through the books to turn up the ledger accounts of one of them, and see how "bonus to labour" works in the case of a co-operative charwoman. I found the following sums had been accumulated by the lady in question in six years, in addition to receiving fair wages for her work. I will call her Madame Bonnechose :

As most of the persons employed about the social palace are wives, daughters, or widows of working members, whose husbands, fathers, or sons are also earning both wages and bonus, an accumulation of £22 must come as a nice addition to the earnings of the families. I expect the principle of labour association has a good many firm adherents amongst the ladies of the Familistère, as much by reason of their

132

A Nice Addition to the Earnings.

own possible bonuses as on account of the advantages to their male relatives. If the poet was right when he said that "what all the sex desired was sovereignty," ladies must like to feel themselves partpossessors of that power of the purse which follows these accumulations of earnings and profits.

And now, please, look at the plan of the central building which illustrates this chapter. I know most people dislike plans, they look so like those oldfashioned mazes in which it is so easy to lose yourself. But if you will please imagine that this plan is simply one end of the central hall with the roof off, and that you are looking down on it from a balloon, you will soon see the utility of the plan. At all events, I require it now to explain the position of the associated dwellings.

Where you see the dotted lines in the centre with a letter A amongst the dots is all the space roofed in with glass. The little shaded squares are placed in the cemented flooring to let light into the cellars below. Ventilating fresh air comes through some of them, from passages which run through the cellars into the open air outside.

Now look for two big letters B-one at each corner. They are placed in the centre of two fan-like affairs. These letters B mark the great water-tubes I have mentioned, and the fans around them are the circular staircases we came up.

Next find the capital letter C in three places, and you are on the balconies which project out and run all round the hall. Find a fourth letter C in a passage, and you find the connecting way between the three great halls. In this passage are H, the water-tap,

Variable House Accommodation.

133

with water always on; I, P, and Q, the closets I have described; with r, s, t, and u, being what we should call sculleries, sinks, wash-basins, &c.

Not to puzzle ourselves too much at once, we will only note now capital letter D, in four places, to mark the entrances into the separate dwellings as we pass into them off the balconies. The rest of the alphabet, denoting various separate dwelling-rooms, we will con over next chapter. Only at present please observe that brick walls are marked by thick lines, doors in them being shown by two light lines thus

whilst windows are shown by three light lines thus That is sufficient for one lesson on

the builders' alphabet

CHAPTER XVIII.

MORE ABOUT THE FAMILISTÈRE.

WE must now look a little more closely into the plan, and we shall readily form an idea of the way in which tenants can have just as much house accommodation as they want and feel themselves able to pay for. Turn the plan right way up, with its title printed below it, and note the two entrances marked D at the top side of the plan. You see that one door, marked

into a room on the right marked ƒ. has a window marked

passes

This room f

,

and two

doors. One door opens into a closet marked e, the other door passes into an inner room marked g. Before going forward, however, into g, we must exhaust the details of the room we are in. There is no reason

134

Convenience for Quarrelling.

to be frightened at the mysterious-looking marks on

the plan. The figure is a fireplace. The space is a cupboard.

enclosed by double lines thus

So that this room is a complete living room, opening out of the entrance hall, and provided with a goodsized closet, a fixture cupboard, a fireplace, and a window opening into the central hall.

Now we will go forward into room g, and we find this to be a bedroom, with window opening on to the outer park. The usual position of the bed is marked by the sign

When it is remembered that closets, dust-bins, washing-sinks, wash-houses, separate storerooms in the attics, and separate cellars in the basements, are all provided independently of these living rooms, it will surprise no one to hear that a young married couple find themselves tolerably comfortable in two such rooms. If they have a tiff," the husband can sulk in one room and the wife in another, until they feel inclined to go through the delightful process of making friends. I have heard a young husband confess that he sometimes quarrelled with his wife only to have the pleasure of "making it up" afterwards. If the quarrel is too serious to be ranked under the title of a "tiff," either of them can take themselves off for a long walk in the gardens, or a long sitting in the readingroom, until the worst of the bad temper has had time to evaporate. Associated homes give ample convenience for letting off the steam of ill-humours, even for a couple compelled to live in two rooms only. In

Life in Two Rooms.

135

fact, living in two rooms in the Familistère, with its advantages, is quite a different thing to the same sort of circumscribed existence in English lodgings.

Even when the first baby intrudes itself into the two apartments the new visitor adds very little to the crowd. Is there not the co-operative nursery to receive it during the day whilst the mother is busy? Can she not leave it there, in its own sweet little cot, hour after hour, under the care of loving eyes and hands, and visit it herself from time to time? At night a cot placed near the bed, marked >< , is all that is necessary to provide lodgings for this third member of the little family.

Now what will a working man with a wife and child pay for two such rooms with closet and cupboard complete? Well, the rent varies a little according to the position. In the first building the rooms were smaller; and as new buildings have been erected, more spacious rooms have been provided for tenants whose growing incomes make them willing to pay a little more rent. The rents are estimated by the square metre, or, as we should estimate it, by the square yard, of floor space; and account is taken of the position of the rooms. Those on the first floor are the highest rented. The second floor rooms fetch the same rent as the ground floor ones. The third floor are the cheapest of all. I must therefore give examples of each kind. Beginning with the ground floor, a tenant in search of two rooms finds them of good height, not far short of ten feet six inches. The smallest sized rooms are about five yards long by four yards wide, and the closet is four feet by five feet. Such a pair of