The marriage was made under an evil star.  Hardly had the blessing been spoken when word came down in haste from Glasgow that the Whigs were up.  Since the Sanquhar Declaration and the deaths of Cameron and Cargill, the Covenanters had been comparatively quiet.  The work of pacification had indeed not slackened, but rather taken a fresh departure in the appointment of a Court of High Commission, or Justiciary Circuit, which in the summer of 1683 was held in the towns of Stirling, Glasgow, Ayr, Dumfries, Jedburgh, and Edinburgh.  Claverhouse was expressly ordered to attend the justices in their progress as captain of the forces, except at places where the Commander-in-Chief would naturally be present.  But though the discovery of the Rye House Plot had just then stirred the kingdom to its centre, and given fresh energies both to the Government and its enemies, only three men suffered during this circuit, of whom two were convicted murderers.  In each town members of the gentry as well as of the common people flocked to take the Test; some to clear themselves of suspicion, others only to air their loyalty, but all, in the words of the report, cheerfully.  Where time, moreover, was asked for consideration, it was granted on good security.  But from the end of July, 1683, to the day of his marriage, Claverhouse seems to have been occupied almost entirely with his duties as Councillor at Edinburgh, and only to have left the capital for brief tours of inspection through the western garrisons.

But with the day of his marriage came a change.  On the previous Sunday news had been brought to Glasgow of an unusually large and well-armed conventicle to be held at Blacklock, a moor on the borders of Lanarkshire and Stirlingshire.  Dalziel (who was in church when the message came, but who did not suffer his duty towards God to interfere with his duty towards man) put the soldiers on the track at once; but for the next eight-and-forty hours the country from Hamilton northwards to the ford of Clyde was scoured in vain.  The Covenanters marched fast, and the country folk, many of them probably still fresh from the Test, kept their secret well.  Claverhouse was sent for in haste from Paisley.  He was in the saddle and away before the bridal party could recover from their first shock of surprise.  But even Claverhouse was foiled.  His lieutenant, however, had better luck.  Colonel Buchan, as he was returning to Paisley by way of Lismahago, came upon an ambuscade of two hundred Covenanters, whose advanced post fired on and wounded one of the soldiers.[46] “They followed the rogues,” wrote Claverhouse to Queensberry, “and advertised Colonel Buchan; but before he could come up, our party had lost sight of them.  Colonel Buchan is yet in pursuit and I am just taking horse.  I shall be revenged some time or other of this unseasonable trouble these dogs give me.  They might have let Tuesday pass.”  This despatch was written from Paisley on the morning of the 13th, while fresh horses were being saddled.  By noon he was off again, and for the next three days rode fast and far, leaving “no den, no knowl, no moss, no hill unsearched.”  He could track his game from Aird’s Moss to within two miles of Cumnock town, and thence on towards Cairntable.  But there all traces of them had vanished.