Her wedded life was one of great happiness. Blest in the husband of her fondest affection, and encircled with all the endearing delights of domestic enjoyment, the union was a delightful one; the husband and wife lived as joint-heirs of the grace of life; one in the family, in the social circle, and in the house of God; singing the same song, joining in the same prayer, and feasting on the same comforts. The sun seldom rose on a happier habitation. An only child, William, was born in 1808.
Mrs. Nairne seems to have judged correctly as to her true vocation. Shocked with the grossness of the songs in popular use, she determined to purify the lyrics of her country; and while doing this she contrived carefully to conceal the worker. First she sent some verses to the president of an agricultural dinner held in the neighbourhood. They were received with great approbation, and set to music. Thus encouraged, song followed song,—some humorous, some pathetic, but all vastly superior in simple poetic power, as well as moral tone, to those she was anxious to supplant. Soon her lyrics were scattered broadcast over the land, carrying pure and elevated sentiments, and even religious truth, into many a neglected home. Through the influence of a lady, who knew her claims as a poetess, she was induced in 1821 to contribute to a collection of national songs, which was being published by Mr. Robert Purdie, an enterprising music-seller in Edinburgh. Her contributions were signed “B. B.” and Mr. Purdie and his editor, Mr. R. A. Smith, were under the impression that the popular authoress was Mrs. Bogan, of Bogan. The songs of “B. B.” were sung in all the chief towns by professed vocalists, and were everywhere hailed with applause. Public curiosity was aroused as to the authorship, and the question was debated in the newspapers, to the great alarm of the real authoress.
In 1822, George the Fourth, who had considerable intellectual ability, and some virtues as well as frailties, although no man of Mr. Thackeray’s abilities has set himself to look for the former, visited Scotland, and heard Mrs. Nairne’s song, “The Attainted Scottish Nobles” sung: this circumstance is generally supposed to have led to the restoration of the peerage to her husband. At all events, in 1824, the attainder was removed by Act of Parliament, and the title of his fathers bestowed on Major Nairne.
On July the 9th, 1830, Lady Nairne became a widow. The trial was ill to bear. But she had one availing consolation, she knew his star had set on this world, to rise and shine in brighter skies: vital Christianity was as visible in her departed husband, as the broad black seal that death had stamped upon his brow. He had gone before to the presence of that Saviour whom they had loved and served together.
Her son, now in his twenty-second year, succeeded to the title of his father. With that wondrous solicitude which fills a mother’s heart towards her only child, Lady Nairne had watched the training of her boy; and she had a rich reward. He grew up no mere devotee of mammon, or fashion, or fame, but a youth of good intellectual powers, high moral qualities, and sound religious principles—all that a Christian mother could desire. But alas! this gourd was doomed to perish also. In the spring of 1837, the young baron suffered much from influenza, and for the benefit of his health he went to Brussels, accompanied by his mother. There he caught a severe cold, and after an illness of six weeks, died on the 7th of December, 1837. Her heart bled for her son, but no murmur escaped her lips. She was content that Christ should come into her garden and pluck the sweetest flower. Yet she deeply felt her loss. “I sometimes say to myself,” she wrote to a friend, “this is ‘no me,’ so greatly have my feelings and trains of thought changed since ‘auld lang syne,’ and though I am made to know assuredly that all is well, I scarcely dare to allow my mind to settle on the past.”
“Hast thou sounded the depth of yonder sea,
And counted the sands that under it be?
Hast thou measured the height of heaven above?—
Then mayest thou mete out a mother’s love.”
After this sad event Lady Nairne might have been seen taking her walk in a cool anteroom, “passing and repassing the bust of her darling son, and stopping as often to gaze on it, then replacing the white handkerchief that covered it to keep it pure.”