Could Monmouth's influence have lasted, their defeat at Bothwell Bridge might have turned out well for the Covenanters. As soon as he had led his army back into quarters, he hastened to London, where he so strongly represented the brutal folly and mismanagement of Lauderdale's government, that he prevailed upon the King to try once more the effect of gentler measures. An indemnity was granted for the past, and even some limited form of indulgence for the future. But the unexpected return of the Duke of York from Holland put an end to all these humane counsels. Monmouth was himself soon again in disgrace; and Lauderdale, though his power was now past its height, was still strong enough to mould to his own will concessions for which the time had now perhaps irrevocably gone.

The twelve hundred prisoners from Bothwell were marched in chains to Edinburgh, and penned like sheep in the churchyard of the Grey Friars, the building which barely forty years before had witnessed the triumphant birth of that Covenant which was, if ever covenant of man was, assuredly to be baptized in blood. Two of them, and both ministers, were immediately executed: five others, as though to appease the cruel ghost of Sharp, were hanged on Magus Moor: of the rest, the most part were set at liberty on giving bonds for their future good behaviour, while the more obstinate were shipped off to the plantations.

Claverhouse was now sent back to his old employment. Though none of his own letters of this time have survived, it is clear from an Order of the Privy Council that shortly after the affair at Bothwell he was again entrusted with the control of the rebellious shires. There is unfortunately no record of his own by which it is possible to check the vague charges of Wodrow, who wisely declines to commit himself to particulars on the ground that "multitudes of instances, once flagrant, are now at this distance lost," while not a few, he candidly admits, "were never distinctly known." In the rare cases in which he becomes more specific in his complaints, he does not make it clear that the offences were committed in Claverhouse's presence, nor even that they were always committed by soldiers of his troop—"the soldiers under Claverhouse" seem to stand with him for all the royal forces then employed in the western shires. That what he calls "spulies, depredations, and violences" were committed on Claverhouse's authority may be freely granted: they were precisely such as a strict obedience to the letter (and no less to the spirit) of his commission would have enjoined—the levying of fines, the seizure of arms, horses, and other movable property from all suspected of any share in the rebellion who would not absolve themselves by taking the oath of abjuration, and from all resetters, or harbourers, of known rebels. It would be idle to refuse to believe that many unjust and cruel acts were not committed at this time, as we know they were committed subsequently, merely because they cannot be succinctly proved. It is unlikely that Claverhouse himself wasted over-much time on sifting every case that was brought in to him by his spies; and where he was not himself present—and it must be remembered that he was not the only officer engaged in this service, and also that his own soldiers were often employed under his lieutenants on duties he was personally unable to attend to—it is hard to doubt that much wild and brutal work went on. The whole case, in short, except in a very few instances (which will be examined elsewhere), is one solely of hearsay and tradition; and it is no more than common justice in any attempt to define Claverhouse's share in it, to give him the benefit of the doubt where it is not directly contrary to the proved facts and the evidence of his despatches. For Claverhouse, it should be also and always remembered, may be implicitly trusted to speak the truth in these matters, for the simple reason that he was not in the least ashamed of his work. We may well believe that it was not the work he would have chosen; but it was the work he had been set to do; and his concern was only to execute it as completely as possible. He was a soldier, obeying the orders of his superiors, for which they and they only were responsible. That their orders matched with his feelings, religious as well as political, for Claverhouse was as thorough in his devotion to the Church as he was in his devotion to the Crown, mattered nothing. The whole question was to him one of military obedience. Sorely as he may have chafed at the order, he halted his troopers on the banks of the Clyde when Monmouth's trumpets sounded the recall, with the same readiness and composure that he showed in leading them to the charge down the slopes of Drumclog; and he would have led them against his brothers-in-arms Ross or James Douglas, had they turned rebels, as straightly and keenly as he led them against Hamilton and Burley. At the same time both his letters and his actions show that he did his best to discriminate between the ringleaders and the crowd: between the brawling demagogues or the meddlesome priests and the honest ignorant peasants, whose only crime was that they wished to worship God after a fashion the Government chose to discountenance. It is not necessary to assume that he was moved thereto by any softness of heart: common-sense, and a sense, too, of justice, would suffice to show him where to strike. And it will hereafter be seen that, where his commission was large enough, he more than once exercised a discretion not entirely to the taste of the more thorough-going zealots of the Edinburgh Council-board.

The only distinct evidence we have of him at this time is contained in the aforesaid Orders of Council. From these it appears that he had been charged by the Scottish Treasury with appropriating the public moneys to his use. He had been appointed for his services trustee to the Crown of the estate of one Macdowall of Freugh, an outlawed Galloway laird; and of this estate it was alleged that he would render no accounts, nor of the fines he had been commissioned to levy on the non-abjuring rebels. With characteristic fearlessness Claverhouse went straight to London, and in a personal interview satisfied Charles of his innocence, who forthwith ordered him to be reinstated in his commission and all the privileges belonging to it.[35] It is clear, however, that during the greater part of the year 1680 Claverhouse was suspended from both his civil and military employments, and this will account for the duty of punishing the authors of the Sanquhar Declaration devolving not upon him, but upon his lieutenant, Bruce of Earlshall.

The prime mover of the Sanquhar Declaration was Richard Cameron, who had now become the head of the extreme party, henceforth to be known by his name—a name which still survives as that of a distinguished regiment of the British army. It was framed in much the same language and to much the same purpose as its predecessor of Rutherglen, though it would not be right to degrade Cameron to the level of Hamilton and his ruffianly associates. It took its title from having been fixed to the market-cross of Sanquhar, a small town in Dumfriesshire, on June 22nd, 1680. Exactly a month later Claverhouse's troopers (though, as I have said, not commanded by Claverhouse himself) came upon the Cameronians in a desolate spot among the wilds of Ayrshire, known as Aird's Moss. Richard Cameron was killed at the first charge: Donald Cargill and Hackston of Rathillet were made prisoners. Both were taken to Edinburgh and executed, the latter with circumstances of needless barbarity.

Though Claverhouse was reinstated in his commission, he does not appear to have been actively employed during the year 1681, the second year of the Duke of York's administration in Scotland, and the year also of the Test and Succession Acts, which were destined to cost another Argyle his head. Early in 1682 the Duke of York returned to England, to which fact Wodrow attributes "a sort of respite of severities," notwithstanding that Claverhouse was once more commissioned for his old work in the West, and with even ampler authority than before. In addition to his military powers, he was appointed Sheriff of Wigtownshire and Deputy-Sheriff of Dumfriesshire and the Stewartries of Kirkcudbright and Annandale; and he was also specially invested with a commission to hold criminal courts in the first-named shire and to try delinquents by jury. His letters to Queensberry[36] begin in February 1682, and from this time onward his actions become easier to follow. These letters give a very full and fair idea of his method of procedure, and in one of them is a passage worth quoting as evidence how far that method as yet deserved the hard epithets which have been so freely lavished on it. The despatch is dated from Newton in Galloway, March 1st, 1682.

His remedy was to raise a hundred dragoons for a permanent garrison: the Crown was to pay the soldiers, and the country would find maintenance for the horses, he bearing his own part as "a Galloway laird," which he was as trustee of Macdowall's estate. The command of this new force he was willing to undertake without any additional pay.

It does not seem that this remedy was ever sanctioned; but at any rate Claverhouse so managed matters that a month later he was able to report to the Council that all was "in perfect peace."

For these services Claverhouse was summoned to Edinburgh to receive the thanks of the Council, to whom he presented an official report of his proceedings which is no more than a summary of his letters to Queensberry.[38]

It was not likely that a man so uniformly successful and of such high spirit would be able to steer clear of all offence to men, who probably felt towards him much as Elizabeth's old courtiers felt towards the triumphant and masterful Raleigh. Nor, conscious of his own powers and confident in the royal favour, is it probable that he was always at much pains to avoid offence, for, though neither a quarrelsome nor a wilful man, he had his own opinions, and was not shy of expressing them when he saw fit to do so. With all his constitutional regard for authority and his soldier's respect for discipline, Claverhouse would suffer himself to be browbeaten by no one. In those jealous intriguing days a man who could not fight for his own hand was bound to go down in the struggle. Claverhouse was now to give a signal proof that he both could and would fight for his when the need came.

The Dalrymples of Stair had been settled in Galloway for many generations. Sir James, the head of the house, was one of the first lawyers of the day, and had held the Chair of Philosophy in the University of Glasgow: the son, Sir John (afterwards to earn an undying name in history as prime mover in the Massacre of Glencoe), was heritable Baillie in the regality of Glenluce. There had been bad blood between them and Claverhouse for some time past. The father had not profited sufficiently by his studies either in law or philosophy to recognise the folly of a man in disgrace venturing to measure swords with one of fortune's favourites. And Sir James at the time of his quarrel with Claverhouse was in disgrace. At the close of 1681 he had been dismissed from the office of President of the Court of Session for refusing the Test Act; and for some while previously he had been coldly regarded for his advocacy of gentler measures than suited Lauderdale and his creatures. The Dalrymples were strict Presbyterians; and though the men were too cautious to meddle openly with treasonable matters, their womenfolk were notoriously in active sympathy with the rebels. All through Claverhouse's letters of this time run allusions to some great personage whom it might be wise to make an example of, and he himself had taken an early opportunity of impressing on Sir James the necessity of caution.[39] But the latter would not be warned. He set himself against Claverhouse at every opportunity, both openly and in secret. He wrote long querulous letters to Edinburgh, complaining of the latter's disrespect. Finally, when he found it prudent to leave the country for a while, his son carried the business to a height by bringing a formal charge against Claverhouse of extortion and malversation. The latter saw his opportunity, and at once carried the war into the enemy's country. He preferred a specific bill of complaint against Sir John, in the course of which it came out that he had been offered a bribe both by father and son not to interfere with their hereditary jurisdictions; and, notwithstanding the exertions of Sir George Lockhart and Fountainhall, the most eminent counsel of the Scottish bar, utterly defeated him on every point. The Court found that Sir John Dalrymple had been guilty of employing rebels and of winking at treasonable practices: of not exacting the proper fines by law ordained for such misdemeanours: of stirring up the country-folk against the King's troops; and, finally, of grossly misrepresenting Claverhouse to the Council. For these offences he was sentenced to pay a fine of five hundred pounds and the whole costs of the proceedings, and to be imprisoned in the Castle of Edinburgh till the money should be paid. Claverhouse, on his side, received not only a full and most complimentary acquittal from all his adversary's charges, but also a signal proof of the royal favour in the presentation to a regiment of cavalry raised especially for this purpose. His commission was dated December 25th, 1682, and in the following March he was sent into England with despatches from the Council to the King and the Duke of York, who was still nominally Commissioner for Scottish Affairs.[40]

Hitherto Claverhouse may be said to have stood conspicuous among the men of his time for his persistent refusal to enrich himself at the public cost. He had certainly had many opportunities, as had a still more famous captain after him, of wondering at his own moderation, yet his enemies had been unable to bring home to him a single instance of malpractice. But we have now come to an episode in his life for which an extremely virtuous or an extremely censorious moralist might, were he so minded, find occasion to re-echo the popular epithet of rapacious. Claverhouse was in no sense of the word an avaricious man; but, like all sensible men, he had a strong belief in the truth of the maxim, the labourer is worthy of his hire. He had laboured long and successfully; and the time, he thought, had now come for his hire.

Lauderdale was dying, and from every side the vultures were flocking fast to their prey. In those days politicians looked for promotion mainly to the death or disgrace of their comrades, and the death of any powerful statesman generally meant the disgrace of his family. All parties were now busy in anticipation over the rich booty that was so soon to come into the market. His brother and heir, Charles Maitland of Hatton, was attacked before the breath was out of the old man's body. Among the many lucrative posts he enjoyed, the most lucrative was that of Governor (or General, as the style went) of the Scottish Mint. At the instigation of Sir George Gordon of Haddo, who had become in quick succession President of the Court of Session, Lord Chancellor, and Earl of Aberdeen, a Commission was appointed to inquire into the state of the coinage, with the result that Maitland (by this time Earl of Lauderdale, for the dukedom began and ended with his brother) was declared to have appropriated to his own use no less than seventy thousand pounds of the revenue. In the general division of spoil which this verdict gave signal for, Claverhouse saw no reason why he should go empty away. Eleven years previously, when the old statesman was at the height of his evil power, his brother had been appointed Constable of Dundee and presented with the estate of Dudhope, lying conveniently near to Claverhouse's few paternal acres. A bargain, which would have seemed in those days no disgraceful thing to any human being, was accordingly struck between Claverhouse and the various claimants for the dead man's shoes. Queensberry, though but lately advanced to a marquisate, had set his heart upon a dukedom: the Chancellor was in want of money to support his new honours. And there were other petitioners for the good offices of the ambassador to Whitehall: Huntly and the Earl Marischal and Sir George Mackenzie had each marked his share of the general prize. To one and all Claverhouse promised his services; and they on their part were to advance by all means in their power his designs on the fat acres of Dudhope. All this, no doubt, sounds very contemptible to us now, who manage these matters so much more circumspectly; but it must be remembered that Lauderdale, though his offence was probably greatly exaggerated, and though a large part of the fine in which he had been originally cast was in fact remitted, had certainly been guilty of gross carelessness, if not of actual malversation; while Claverhouse on his pact offered to pay, and did pay, whatever sum might be legally fixed as due for his share of the booty.[41]

All these bargains were in time brought to a successful issue. Claverhouse was in England from the beginning of March to the middle of May. He was with the Court at Newmarket, Windsor, and London, always in high favour, but at the former place finding the King more eager for his company at the cockpit and race-course than in the council-chamber.[42] Early in May he returned to Scotland, and shortly after his return he took his seat at Edinburgh as a Privy Councillor. This was his present reward: Dudhope and the Constabulary were to follow later, with Queensberry's and Huntly's dukedoms and the other honours. But Dudhope was not destined to drop into his lap. The Chancellor, whom he counted as his particular friend, had played him false. Lauderdale's fine had been reduced by Charles from seventy thousand pounds to twenty thousand, sixteen thousand of which were granted to the Chancellor and four thousand to Claverhouse. But should Lauderdale and his son agree to assign to the Chancellor under an unburdened title the lands and lordship of Dundee and Dudhope, then the whole sum was to be remitted, Lauderdale binding himself to discharge the fines inflicted on his subordinates. Power was also given to Claverhouse to redeem this property from the Chancellor at twenty years' purchase; and it seems also to have been privately agreed between them that the purchase-money was not to be exacted, on condition of the former buying certain other lands in the neighbourhood that the latter wished to dispose of. But the crafty Chancellor saw an easier and quieter way to get hold of his money. For the sum of eight thousand pounds he privately relinquished all his rights to Lauderdale, thus leaving the latter free to deal with Claverhouse on his own terms. This bit of sharp practice was effected in August 1683; and it was not till the following March that the business was finally settled, after a long and tedious wrangle before the Court, in the course of which Claverhouse seemed to have found occasion to speak his mind pretty sharply to the Chancellor. On the question of the former's right to demand Dudhope on the terms of twenty years' purchase Lauderdale had to give way; but on the other question of clearing the title he was so difficult to deal with that the King himself had to interfere; and not till a peremptory order had gone down from Whitehall, cancelling the royal pardon till all the terms of the original agreement had been satisfactorily settled, was the affair finally closed, the title cleared, and Claverhouse established as master of the long-coveted estate.

It was not till the autumn of 1684 that Claverhouse found himself master of Dudhope and Constable of Dundee. Meanwhile one of the few domestic events of his life that have come down to us had taken place. On June 10th he had been married to the Lady Jean Cochrane, granddaughter to the old Earl of Dundonald.

This young lady was the daughter of William, Lord Cochrane, by Catherine, daughter of the Presbyterian Earl of Cassilis and sister to that Lady Margaret Kennedy whom Gilbert Burnet had married. Her father had died before Claverhouse came on the scene, leaving seven children, of whom Jean was the youngest. Her mother, whose notoriously Whiggish sympathies had brought both her husband and father-in-law into suspicion, was furiously opposed to the match; though worldly prudence may have touched her heart as well as religious scruple, for Claverhouse, though he had risen fast and was marked by all men as destined to rise still higher, was hardly as yet perhaps a very eligible husband for the pretty Lady Jean. But in truth it was a strange family for him to seek a wife in, and many were the whispered gibes the news of his courtship provoked at Edinburgh. Was this strong Samson, men asked, to fall a prey at last to a Whiggish Delilah? Hamilton, whose own loyalty was by no means unimpeachable, and who was no friend to Claverhouse, affected to be much distressed by the Lady Susannah's partiality for the young Lord Cochrane, and made great parade of his disinclination to give his daughter to the son of such a mother without the express consent of the King; and this Claverhouse chose to take as a hit at him, who had not thought it necessary to ask any one's permission to choose his own wife. Affairs were still further complicated by the backslidings of Sir John Cochrane, Lady Jean's uncle, a notorious rebel who was then in hiding for his complicity with Russell and Sidney, and was even suspected of knowing something of that darker affair of the Rye House. Claverhouse was furious at the gossip. "My Lord Duke Hamilton," he wrote to Queensberry,

"has refused to treat of giving his daughter to my Lord Cochrane, till he should have the King and the Duke's leave. This, I understand, has been advised him, to load me. Wherefore I have written to the Duke, and told him that I would have done it sooner, had I not judged it presumption in me to trouble his Highness with my little concerns; and that I looked upon myself as a cleanser, that may cure others by coming amongst them, but cannot be infected by any plague of Presbytery; besides, that I saw nothing singular in my Lord Dundonald's case, save that he has but one rebel on his land for ten that the lords and lairds of the south and west have on theirs; and that he is willing to depone that he knew not of there being such. The Duke is juster than to charge my Lord Dundonald with Sir John's crimes. He is a madman, and let him perish; they deserve to be damned that own him. The Duke knows what it is to have sons and nephews that follow not advice. I have taken pains to know the state of the country's guilt as to reset; and if I make it not appear that my Lord Dundonald is one of the clearest of all that country, and can hardly be reached in law, I am content to pay his fine. I never pleaded for any, nor shall I hereafter. But I must say I think it hard that no regard is had to a man in so favourable circumstances—I mean considering others—upon my account, and that nobody offered to meddle with him till they heard I was likely to be concerned in him.... Whatever come of this, let not my enemies misrepresent me. They may abuse the Duke for a time, and hardly. But, or long, I will, in despite of them, let the world see that it is not in the power of love, nor any other folly, to alter my loyalty."