Housekeeper and mistress renewed the parts
of Martha and Mary; and though with a pricking conscience, Mary reposed
on Martha's strength as on a rock. Even Lord Hermiston held Kirstie in a
particular regard. There were few with whom he unbent so gladly, few
whom he favoured with so many pleasantries. "Kirstie and me maun have
our joke," he would declare, in high good-humour, as he buttered
Kirstie's scones, and she waited at table. A man who had no need either
of love or of popularity, a keen reader of men and of events, there was
perhaps only one truth for which he was quite unprepared: he would have
been quite unprepared to learn that Kirstie hated him. He thought maid
and master were well matched; hard, handy, healthy, broad Scots folk,
without a hair of nonsense to the pair of them. And the fact was that
she made a goddess and an only child of the effete and tearful lady; and
even as she waited at table her hands would sometimes itch for my lord's
ears.

Thus, at least, when the family were at Hermiston, not only my lord, but
Mrs. Weir too, enjoyed a holiday. Free from the dreadful looking-for of
the miscarried dinner, she would mind her seam, read her piety books,
and take her walk (which was my lord's orders), sometimes by herself,
sometimes with Archie, the only child of that scarce natural union. The
child was her next bond to life. Her frosted sentiment bloomed again,
she breathed deep of life, she let loose her heart, in that society. The
miracle of her motherhood was ever new to her. The sight of the little
man at her skirt intoxicated her with the sense of power, and froze her
with the consciousness of her responsibility. She looked forward, and,
seeing him in fancy grow up and play his diverse part on the world's
theatre, caught in her breath and lifted up her courage with a lively
effort. It was only with the child that she forgot herself and was at
moments natural; yet it was only with the child that she had conceived
and managed to pursue a scheme of conduct. Archie was to be a great man
and a good; a minister if possible, a saint for certain. She tried to
engage his mind upon her favourite books, Rutherford's "Letters,"
Scougal's "Grace Abounding," and the like. It was a common practice of
hers (and strange to remember now) that she would carry the child to the
Deil's Hags, sit with him on the Praying Weaver's Stone, and talk of the
Covenanters till their tears ran down. Her view of history was wholly
ar