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Since then four years have passed, during which the monotony of his duty in hunting Covenanters had been relieved by the office of Provost of Dundee, in which it is said he ruled severely, and the sameness of Jean's life at Dudhope by a visit to the Court of London, where she produced a vast impression, and was said to have been adored in the highest quarter.
Claverhouse to Queensberry, March 5th, 1682. Napier, ii. 285-309. "I must beg your Lordship's assistance in that business of the lands of Dudhope. My Lord Chancellor designs nothing but to sell it, and buy lands in the north, seeing he is to get Stirling Castle to dwell in.
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.
"Were not you, sir, seen, on the 21st of December of the late dynasty of time, in the company of one of these denizens of Rougedom in the Overgate, that disgrace of the last world, for which it has very properly been burnt up like a scroll of Sandy Riddoch's peculations?" "I was." "Then down to the pit." And Dudhope even he the representative of Graham of opprobrious memory disappeared.
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.
Something, he said, had vexed him, but now she must not be afraid, but must tell him some things that he wished to know. Had everything been going well at Dudhope since he left, and had her ladyship and my little lord been in good health? That was excellent. He hoped that the dragoons had not been troublesome or come about the castle? They had not? Well, that was satisfactory.
Surely it was the doing of the Lord that Dundee should have left Dudhope, where he was in stronghold, and come up to Edinburgh, where his friends were few.
But the men I mean are of the other kind; they speak like gentlefolk, and micht, for the manner o' them, sit wi' her ladyship in Dudhope Castle." "Broken gentlemen, very likely, Jock. There have always been plenty in our ranks. Surely you are not going to make that a crime at this time of the day.
It will be enough to say that in an incredibly short space of time he beat up for recruits the greater part of the counties of Aberdeen, Inverness, and Perth, while the bewildered Mackay, whose training and troops were alike unfitted to this sort of campaigning, toiled after him in vain. He also found time for a flying visit to Dudhope, where his wife had been safely delivered of a son.
She gave him her hand, over which he bent, and which he seemed to kiss, but did not. "We left Perth two days ago," he replied, with a cold, clear voice, which did not quite hide the underlying emotion, "and we have this day paid our visit to Dundee to get a chill welcome and find Dudhope empty.
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