 On a trip back to Edinburgh, Davidson married Jane Emily Davidson, daughter of the sheriff of Midlothian, in October 1873.In 1878 the Canterbury and Otago Association amalgamated with James Morton's other venture, the New Zealand and Australian Land Company, and now incorporated over a 10,000 km2 between the two countries.However, when Morton was implicated in the collapse of the City of Glasgow Bank the following year, and bankrupted, the banks liquidators (holding nearly half the new company's stock), attempted to sell the land to realise their assets.