CHAPTER XXXV-TESTS OF SUCCESS
Intending these notations for the
instruction of posterity, it would not be altogether
becoming of me to speak of the domestic effects which
many of the things that I have herein jotted down
had in my own family. I feel myself, however,
constrained in spirit to lift aside a small bit of
the private curtain, just to show how Mrs Pawkie comported
herself in the progressive vicissitudes of our prosperity,
in the act and doing of which I do not wish to throw
any slight on her feminine qualities; for, to speak
of her as she deserves at my hand, she has been a most
excellent wife, and a decent woman, and had aye a
ruth and ready hand for the needful. Still,
to say the truth, she is not without a few little
weaknesses like her neighbours, and the ill-less vanity
of being thought far ben with the great
is among others of her harmless frailities.
Soon after the inspection ball before
spoken of, she said to me that it would be a great
benefit and advantage to our family if we could get
Bodletonbrae and his sister, and some of the other
country gentry, to dine with us. I was not very
clear about how the benefit was to come to book, for
the outlay I thought as likely o’ergang the profit;
at the same time, not wishing to baulk Mrs Pawkie
of a ploy on which I saw her mind was bent, I gave
my consent to her and my daughters to send out the
cards, and make the necessary preparations. But
herein I should not take credit to myself for more
of the virtue of humility than was my due; therefore
I open the door of my secret heart so far ajee, as
to let the reader discern that I was content to hear
our invitations were all accepted.
Of the specialities and dainties of
the banquet prepared, it is not fitting that I should
treat in any more particular manner, than to say they
were the best that could be had, and that our guests
were all mightily well pleased. Indeed, my wife
was out of the body with exultation when Mrs Auchans
of that Ilk begged that she would let her have a copy
of the directions she had followed in making a flummery,
which the whole company declared was most excellent.
This compliment was the more pleasant, as Lady Auchans
was well known for her skill in savoury contrivances,
and to have anything new to her of the sort was a
triumph beyond our most sanguine expectations.
In a word, from that day we found that we had taken,
as it were, a step above the common in the town.
There were, no doubt, some who envied our good fortune;
but, upon the whole, the community at large were pleased
to see the consideration in which their chief magistrate
was held. It reflected down, as it were, upon
themselves a glaik of the sunshine that shone upon
us; and although it may be a light thing, as it is
seemingly a vain one, to me to say, I am now pretty
much of Mrs Pawkie’s opinion, that our cultivation
of an intercourse with the country gentry was, in
the end, a benefit to our family, in so far as it
obtained, both for my sons and daughters, a degree
of countenance that otherwise could hardly have been
expected from their connexions and fortune, even though
I had been twice provost.