forever. Had I been in my natural state it had been impossible for me to doubt thee, Jean, and if I had seen thee sin before mine eyes, I would have thought it was another. But my mind has been distraught through weariness of the body on the long rides, and nights without sleep as I lay a-planning, and the desertion of friends in whom I trusted, and the refusals of men of whom I expected loyalty, and the humiliating helplessness before William's general, my old rival MacKay. I was almost mad. In the night-time, I think, I was mad altogether. But I had always one comfort, like a single star shining in a dark sky, and that was the faithfulness of my wife. When a cloud obscured that solitary light, then a frenzy passed into my blood. I ceased to reason, and according to the measure of my love was my foolish, groundless hate."
"Take back your sword, Dundee, for I am not now minded to use it. Five minutes ago it had been dangerous to give it me. If ye fall, it shall be by another hand than your wife's, and in another place than your home. We have said words to one another this night which neither of us will lightly pardon, for we are not of the pardoning kind. I do not feel as I did: my anger has turned into sorrow; the idol of my idolatry is broken--my fair model of chivalry--and now I can only gather together the pieces. Even while I hated you I was loving you--this is the contradiction of a woman's heart--and I knew that love of me had made you mad. Whatever happens, I will always remember that you loved me, but my dream has vanished--forever."
They spent next day walking quietly in the glen, and the following morning he left for his last campaign. They said farewell alone, but after he was in the saddle Lady Dundee lifted up the child for him to kiss--which was to die before the year was out. He turned as they were riding down the road and waved his plumed hat to his wife, where she stood, still holding the child in her arms. And that was the last Jean Cochrane saw of Claverhouse.
Book 4 Chapter 1 Treason in the Camp
Since the day Dundee rode away from Glenogilvie, after the scene with Jean, he was a man broken in heart, but he hid his private wound bravely, and gave himself with the fiercer energy to the king's business. Hither and thither through the Highlands he raced, so that he was described in letters of that day as "skipping from one hill to another like wildfire, which at last will vanish of itself for want of fuel," and "like an incendiary to inflame that cold country, yet he finds small encouragement." Anything more pathetic than this last endeavor of Dundee, except it be his death, cannot be imagined. The clans were not devoured with devotion to King James, and were not the victims of guileless enthusiasm; they were not the heroes of romance depicted by Jacobite poets and story-tellers: they were half-starved, entirely ignorant, fond of fighting, but largely intent on stealing. If there was any chance of a foray in which they could gather spoil, they were ready to fling themselves into the fray, but as soon as they had gained their end, they would make for the glens and leave their general in the lurch. Whether they would rise or not depended neither on the merits of William or James, but in the last issue upon their chiefs--and the chiefs were not easy to move.
Some of them were hostile, and most of them lukewarm; and Dundee drank the cup of humiliation as he canvassed for his cause from door to door. By pleading, by arguing, by cajoling, by threatening, by promising and by bribing, he got together some two thousand men, more or less, and he had also the remains of his cavalry. His king had, as usual, left him to fend for himself, and sent him nothing but an incapable Irish officer called Cannon and some ragged Irish recruits, while MacKay was watching him and following him with a well-equipped force. Now and again the sun shone on him and he had glimpses of victory, driving MacKay for days before him, and keeping up communication with Livingstone, who had come from Dundee with his dragoons, and was playing the part of traitor in