The next great event in their lives was the birth of their first-born son, John, afterwards Lord Amberley.
On the 10th of December, 1842, our dear little baby boy was born. He has been thriving ever since to our heart's content. It has been a happy, happy time to me, and to us all. And now I am a mother. Oh, Heavenly Father, enable me to be one indeed and to feel that an immortal soul is entrusted to my care.
On the 10th of December, a year later, she expressed the same thought in the following lines:
Rough winter blew thy welcome; cold on thee
Looked the cold earth, my snowdrop frail and fair.
Again that day; but wintry though it be,
Come to thy Mother's heart: no frost is there.
What sparkles in thy dark and guileless eye?
Life's joyous dawn alone undimmed by care!
Thou gift of God, canst thou then wholly die?
Oh no, a soul immortal flashes there;
And for that soul now spotless as thy cheek--
That infant form the Almighty's hand has sealed--
Oh, there are thoughts a mother ne'er can speak;
In midnight's silent prayer alone revealed.
After Lady John had recovered, they went down to Woburn, and later to stay with Lord Clarendon at The Grove. At both houses large parties were assembled, and Greville notes in his diary that Lord John was in excellent spirits. "Buller goes on as if the only purpose in life was to laugh and make others laugh," and he adds, "John Russell is always agreeable, both from what he contributes himself and his hearty enjoyment of the contributions of others."
One of the principal events which had interested Lady John in the past year had been the secession from the Scottish Church and the establishment of the. Free Church of Scotland. Her feelings about it are expressed in this letter to her sister, Lady Mary Abercromby:
ENDSLEIGH, September 11, 1842
The divisions in the Kirk distress me so much that I never read anything about them now. It is disagreeable to find people with whom one cannot agree making use of the most sacred expressions on every occasion where their own power or interests can be helped by them. You used not to be much of a Kirk woman; but surely you would regret seeing many of her children come over to the English. I have just been reading the Thirty-nine Articles for the first time in my life, and am therefore particularly disposed to prefer all that is simple in matters of religion. They may be true; but whether they are so or not, is what neither I, nor those who wrote them, nor the wisest man that lives, can judge; that they are presumptuous in the extreme, all who read may see. In short, I hate theology as the greatest enemy of true religion, and may therefore leave the subject to my betters.... I need hardly tell you that we are leading a happy life, since we are at Endsleigh and alone. Did I ever tell you that we are becoming great botanists? I have some hopes of equalling you before we meet, as I feel new light breaks upon me every day, and every night too, for I try so hard to repress my ardour during the day for fear of being tiresome to everybody, that my dreams are of nothing else. John, of course, is very little advanced as yet, but he finds it so interesting, to his surprise, that I hope even Parliament will not quite drive it out of his head.
Early in February she was back again in London, where social and political distractions, together with the care of a young family of stepchildren, were soon to prove too much for her strength.