The Quiet Craft of the Household Driver
The private driver is, in any well ordered household, far more than a chauffeur. We discuss the disciplines which distinguish the role at its best.
Among the appointments which most directly affect the principal's daily experience, none is more frequently underestimated than the private driver. The position is sometimes regarded, by those unfamiliar with distinguished households, as one of mere conveyance. That is a considerable misunderstanding. The driver is, in any properly run household, the staff member with whom the principal spends more uninterrupted time than perhaps any other. The quality of that time is shaped, in ways the principal may not consciously register, by the disposition and craft of the person at the wheel.
A capable driver does considerably more than carry the principal between addresses. They study the routes between the household's regular destinations. They learn where roadworks have begun and which junctions become difficult at school hours. They note where the road surface is uneven enough that a glass of water on the rear seat would be unwise. They prepare the vehicle in advance: the temperature inside the car correct for the season, the newspapers folded as the principal prefers them, the bottle of mineral water of the precise label the principal favours, replenished without being asked.
They observe, without ever discussing, the rhythm of the principal's day. They know when the principal will wish to take a call between appointments, and will route accordingly to avoid passing through tunnels at the inconvenient moment. They know which guests the principal would prefer to drop at their own residence first, and which would prefer the slightly longer route home. None of this is announced. It is the unobtrusive substance of the work.
The driver hears, in the ordinary course of duty, a great deal which the principal would prefer was not repeated: telephone conversations, talks with guests, and discussions with a spouse on the journey home from a trying engagement. A driver of any seriousness regards what is said in the back of the car as if it had not been said at all. We have, on more than one occasion, encountered situations in which an indiscretion by an otherwise competent driver compelled a household to make a change. It was a change which everyone, including the driver, would have preferred to avoid. The lesson is one which ought to be learned without the painful illustration.
What is heard between the front seat and the back is, in a properly conducted household, as if it had never been spoken at all.
The qualities that mark out the finest drivers are easy to enumerate and hard to find. They require mechanical competence, to recognise an issue with the vehicle before the principal notices. They must have the patience to wait, sometimes for hours, in trying circumstances. They need the composure to handle the small awkwardnesses which arise on every journey without comment: a wrong turn, an unforeseen delay, the principal's late arrival caused by matters wholly outside the driver's control. There must be a willingness to be retained for years rather than months, accumulating the knowledge of preferences which only time confers.
Where such a driver is found, they should be retained on terms that reflect the substance of the role, not just its surface. They ought to be treated as the senior member of household staff which, in truth, they are. This investment is amply repaid in the seamless quality of the principal's daily life. That is, after all, what the household exists to provide.
HeritageThe Chapel and the Spiritual Life of the House
A private chapel is not a furnishing but a quiet declaration. We consider the role of the chapel in the thoughtful residence, regardless of the principal's particular tradition.
Read essay