and the
proceedings stopped. She accuses the Duke Chatelherault--the head of the
Hamiltons, the next heir to the throne--of treasonable proceedings, and
he vindicates himself by sound of trumpet at the Cross of Edinburgh. The
correspondence grows to such a pitch that when she loses patience and
bids them be gone before a certain day, they meet in solemn conclave, to
which the preachers are called to give their advice, to discuss whether
it is lawful to depose her from her regency: and all consent with one
voice to her deprivation. The excitement of this continual exchange of
correspondence, the messages coming and going, from the Queen's side the
Lyon King himself, all glorious among his pursuivants, advancing from
Leith with his brief letter and his "credit" as spokesman, the others
replying and re-replying, scarcely ever without a response or a
denunciation to read over and talk over, must have kept the nerves and
intelligence of all at a perpetual strain. At St. Giles's and the
Tolbooth close by, which were the double centre of life in the city,
there was a perpetual alternation of preachings, to which Lords and
Commons would crowd together to listen to Knox's trumpet peals of fiery
eloquence, always upon some appropriate text, always instinct with the
most vehement energy, and consultations upon public affairs and how to
promote the triumph of religion; the lords pondering and sometimes
doubtful, the preacher ever uncompromising and absolute. A question of
public honesty had arisen in the midst of the struggle for the faith,
and the Reformers had seized the Mint to prevent the coining of base
money, which the Regent was carrying on for her necessities, and which
the Congregation, no doubt justly, considered ruinous to the trade of
the country; and the determined struggle with the Queen in respect to
her scheme for fortifying Leith and establishing a French garrison
there,--a continual check upon and menace to the freedom of the
capital,--was at least as much a question of politics as religion.

The Congregation, however, was not yet strong enough to be able to meet
the French forces, and when they attempted to besiege Leith and put a
forcible stop to the building they were defeated with shame and loss. A
curious sign of the inevitable "rift within the lute," which up to this
time had been avoided by the concentration of all men's thoughts upon
the first necessity of securing the freedom of the preachings, becomes
v