I spent the early part of the week in Utrecht, and rather fell in love with the place. It’s everything that Amsterdam should be (and isn’t) – beautiful merchants’ houses lining quaint canals, yet quite unspoilt.
I went for a stroll before dinner, and imagined the histories behind the attractive water-side facades – a girl, freshly arrived from the country, standing before the stern mistress of the house in which she hoped to be a maid.
“You’ll understand that we expect you to work hard?” the lady would enquire.
“Yes, madam.”
“And that we expect the highest standards.”
“I shall try my hardest, madam.”
“And your hardest had better be up to scratch, young lady. I can tolerate a member of staff making a genuine mistake. Once. But if she repeats her error – or is wilfully at fault – then she must pay the consequences.”
“Yes, madam.”
The merchant’s wife would take out a cane, and flex it before the girl’s terrified eyes. “I find that I only have to bare a girl and chastise her once or twice before she learns to concentrate. Don’t make me have to teach you the hard way…”
And then her newest employee would be shown out of the room by the housekeeper, taken to a bath tub and scrubbed (in cold water, naturally) – and then presented with the formal, starched black dress in which she would serve…
Now THAT would have made “The Girl with the Pearl Earring” watchable!
I shall never look at that painting in the same way again…
Not that I’d ever thought that she looked spankable. Honest.
Haha. Dutch prohibited whipping servants in 17-th century, any household breaking this law would pay an enormous fine. So this fantasy is a bit far-fetched
Pretty much all of our fantasies are very far-fetched indeed, but it doesn’t stop them being fun
!!!
I’ll just have to insert 16th century Dutch girls into my thoughts – or later ones too scared of their masters / mistresses (or of being thrown out for causing trouble) to report matters to the authorities… 😉
funnily enough I’ve always quite fancied being a 16th Century Dutch girl…not one of those modern 17th century ones, always wondered why, until now! 😉
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@S.K. – how interesting! What were the reasons given at the time? A nascent appreciation of human rights?
@iwasrobert I don’t know, actually I’ve found out right after the Girl with the Pearl Earring, i thought, this story could liven up with a couple of severe canings, but they were strictly prohibited. They were a republic of free men, so their women were kind of free too, which is a shame of course