The cook made the mush, which was boiled twice a day, the soup, and hash, and stewed the peas. She had a certain portion of the floor to scrub, and the room to keep tidy, as well as her boilers to wash.
The steam woman took care of the steam boiler, made the coffee, helped the cook slice the meat, and kept her portion of the floor clean. It was a part of her work to pile the ration pans in rows of pyramids on the centre table.
The one who tended the women's slide had one half of the floor to scrub, and the Master's furnace, which stood in the centre of the kitchen, to tend.
There were many things to be done in common, where all helped; like the carrying out of the swill, which was emptied into tubs when the ration pans came in to be washed. That was carried a long way down the yard, poured into barrels, and left for the yard man to take to the piggery.
They all helped to bring up the potatoes, four barrels at a time, wash them in the sink with a large bat-stick, and then put them in the boiler to be cooked by steam.
To make the confusion more confounded, the work was changed round, and new hands put to it, the day I went there. The bringing up of the coal, for the steam boiler, which had heretofore devolved upon the steam woman, was now required of all the rest, to be divided among them, because the steam woman had had a broken wrist, and it was not quite strong again. That gave dissatisfaction, and created grumbling, and the constant contention of shifting the labor from one to the other. The rest were constantly fretting Allen, the steam woman, because she asked it of them.
To settle the difficulty I asked the Deputy, when he came round,--"who should bring up the coal for Allen?"
That was an excellent hint to me. Allen had been in the habit of giving her own orders, which made it necessary for me to interfere continually so as to get them executed, and also to keep peace. They invariably answered her back with refusal when she asked for coal, and made altercation over every bucket that was needed.
All orders, like information, were given promiscuously. I at once gave direction that all orders were to be given through me.
"Allen, when you wish for coal, come to me for it!"