The order of the Privy Council, in accordance with which Claverhouse again proceeded to the Western Counties, to begin his ‘circuit,’ as Wodrow styles it, a few days after the engagement which had proved so disastrous to the Covenanters has disappeared. It may, however, be assumed that the powers conferred upon him were wide; and there is no reason to suppose that he was instructed to deal leniently with those who had been in arms against the royal troops. Although no proof can be adduced in support of Wodrow’s statement, that Claverhouse ‘could never forgive the baffle he met with at Drumclog, and resolved to be avenged for it’; and although it would be rash to accept, except on the very strongest evidence, the further assertion that he was one of those who solicited Monmouth ‘to ruin the West Country, and burn Glasgow, Hamilton and Strathaven, to kill the prisoners, at least, considerable numbers of them, and to permit the army to plunder the western shires, who, they alleged, had countenanced the rebels,’ the principles which he unhesitatingly set forth in subsequent despatches, and in accordance with which in the following July, he consented to go to London, as an envoy from the Privy Council, to represent to the King the unwisdom of adopting Monmouth’s more conciliatory policy, and of granting the Covenanters favours, ‘to soften the clamour that was made upon the Duke of Lauderdale’s conduct,’ quite justify the assumption that he fully approved of severe measures against the actual rebels, and felt neither scruple nor compunction in carrying them out. But, when this has been admitted, it is only fair to bear in mind that there were others besides Claverhouse, and ‘more bloody and barbarous than he,’ engaged in the odious work of hunting down and punishing the Bothwell outlaws, and preventing their friends and sympathisers from harbouring and concealing them. If, instead of indiscriminately attributing to him every alleged act of cruelty and rapacity, as partisan writers have not unfrequently done, care had been taken to ascertain whether he was even indirectly concerned in it, and whether he was so circumstanced that he could prevent the perpetration of it, there can be but little doubt that the list of atrocities imputed to him at this date would assume less terrible proportions. Nor should it be forgotten that many of the instances of severity recorded against Claverhouse, harsh as they may have been, did not go beyond the letter, or, indeed, the spirit of the law. It was his duty to yield implicit obedience to the commands of his superiors. To condemn in him that loyalty which has always been looked upon as the essential quality of a soldier, and to hold him personally responsible for carrying out with all the zeal and energy of his nature the policy of the Government to which he owed allegiance, is inconsistent and unjust.