Mrs. Weir abounded in commonplace replies.

"No, I canna see it," reiterated Archie. "And I'll tell you what, mamma,
I don't think you and me's justifeed in staying with him."

The woman awoke to remorse; she saw herself disloyal to her man, her
sovereign and bread-winner, in whom (with what she had of worldliness)
she took a certain subdued pride. She expatiated in reply on my lord's
honour and greatness; his useful services in this world of sorrow and
wrong, and the place in which he stood, far above where babes and
innocents could hope to see or criticise. But she had builded too
well--Archie had his answers pat: Were not babes and innocents the type
of the kingdom of heaven? Were not honour and greatness the badges of
the world? And at any rate, how about the mob that had once seethed
about the carriage?

"It's all very fine," he concluded, "but in my opinion, papa has no
right to be it. And it seems that's not the worst yet of it. It seems
he's called 'the Hanging Judge'--it seems he's crooool. I'll tell you
what it is, mamma, there's a tex' borne in upon me: It were better for
that man if a milestone were bound upon his back and him flung into the
deepestmost pairts of the sea."

"O my lamb, ye must never say the like of that!" she cried. "Ye're to
honour faither and mother, dear, that your days may be long in the land.
It's Atheists that cry out against him--French Atheists, Erchie! Ye
would never surely even yourself down to be saying the same thing as
French Atheists? It would break my heart to think that of you. And O,
Erchie, here arena _you_ setting up to _judge_? And have ye no forgot
God's plain command--the First with Promise, dear? Mind you upon the
beam and the mote!"

Having thus carried the war into the enemy's camp, the terrified lady
breathed again. And no doubt it is easy thus to circumvent a child with
catchwords, but it may be questioned how far it is effectual. An
instinct in his breast detects the quibble, and a voice condemns it. He
will instantly submit, privately hold the same opinion. For even in this
simple and antique relation of the mother and the child, hypocrisies are
multiplied.

When the Court rose that year and the family returned to Hermiston, it
was a common remark in all the country that the lady was sore failed.
She seemed to lose and seize again her touch with life, now sitting
inert in a sort of durable bewilderment, anon waking to feverish and
weak activity. She dawdl