[Illustration:  JOHN KNOX.]

Mary heard of this furious attack upon her, which Knox admitted had offended both Papists and Protestants, and he was again summoned to Holyrood.  As soon as Mary saw Knox she was greatly excited, and exclaimed:  “Never was prince handled as I am.”  “I have borne with you,” she said to Knox, “in all your vigorous manner of speaking, both against myself and my uncles; yea, I have sought your favour by all possible means—­I offered unto you presence and audience whenever it pleased you to admonish me, and yet I cannot be quit of you.  I vow to God I shall be once avenged.”

Knox answered, “True it is, Madam, your Grace and I have been at divers controversies into the which I never perceived your Grace to be offended at me; but when it shall please God to deliver you from that bondage of darkness and error in the which ye have been nourished for the lack of true doctrine, your majesty will find the liberty of my tongue nothing offensive.  Without the preaching-place, Madam, I am not master of myself, for I must obey Him who commands me to speak plain, and flatter no flesh upon the face of the earth.”

The Queen asked him again, “What have ye to do with my marriage, or what are ye in this commonwealth?” “A subject born within the same, Madam,” was the stern reply; “and albeit I be neither Earl, Lord, nor Baron within it, yet has God made me, how abject soever I may be in your eyes, a profitable member within the same.”

He was entering into some personal explanations, when the Queen ordered him to leave the Cabinet, and remain in the ante-chamber till her pleasure should be intimated.  Here Knox found himself in the company of the Queen’s Marys and other ladies, to whom he gave a religious admonition.  “Oh, fair ladies,” he said, “how pleasing is this life of yours if it would ever abide, and then in the end that you pass to Heaven with all this gay gear!  But fie upon the knave Death, that will come whether we will or not, and when he has laid on his arrest, the foul worms will be busy with this flesh, be it never so fair and tender; and the silly soul, I fear, shall be so feeble, that it can neither carry with it gold, garnishing, targetting, pearl nor precious stones.”

Several noblemen had accompanied Knox when he went to see the Queen, but only Erskine of Dun was admitted to the Cabinet, and Lord Ochiltree attended Knox in the ante-room while Queen Mary held a consultation with Lord John Stuart and Erskine lasting nearly an hour, at the end of which Erskine appeared and accompanied Knox home.  Knox must have been in great danger of losing his life owing to his fearless and determined daring in rebuking those in high places, and indeed his life was afterwards repeatedly aimed at; but Providence foiled all attempts to assassinate him, and in the end he died a peaceful death.  On November 9th, 1572, a fortnight before he died, he preached his farewell sermon, the entire congregation following