k of wrecking the monasteries at Perth,
Knox provides two different answers.

In the "History" Knox says that after the news came of the Regent's
perfidy, and after a sermon "vehement against idolatry," a priest began
to celebrate, and "opened a glorious tabernacle" on the high altar.
"Certain godly men and a young boy" were standing near; they all, or the
boy alone (the sentence may be read either way), cried that this was
intolerable. The priest struck the boy, who "took up a stone" and hit
the tabernacle, and "the whole multitude" wrecked the monuments of
idolatry. Neither the exhortation of the preacher nor the command of the
magistrate could stay them in their work of destruction. {111} Presently
"the rascal multitude" convened, _without_ the gentry and "earnest
professors," and broke into the Franciscan and Dominican monasteries.
They wrecked as usual, and the "common people" robbed, but the godly
allowed Forman, Prior of the Charter House, to bear away about as much
gold and silver as he was able to carry. We learn from Mary of Guise and
Lesley's "History" that the very orchards were cut down.

If, thanks to the preachers, "no honest man was enriched the value of a
groat," apparently dishonest men must have sacked the gold and silver
plate of the monasteries; nothing is said by Knox on this head, except as
to the Charter House.

Writing to Mrs. Locke, on the other hand, on June 23, Knox tells her that
"the brethren," after "complaint and appeal made" against the Regent,
levelled with the ground the three monasteries, burned all "monuments of
idolatry" accessible, "and priests were commanded under pain of death, to
desist from their blasphemous mass." {112} Nothing is said about a
spontaneous and uncontrollable popular movement. The professional
"brethren," earnest professors of course, reap the glory. Which is the
true version?

If the version given to Mrs. Locke be accurate, Knox had sufficient
reasons for producing a different account in that portion of his
"History" (Book ii.) which is a tract written in autumn, 1559, and in
purpose meant for contemporary foreign as well as domestic readers. The
performances attributed to the brethren, in the letter to the London
merchant's wife, were of a kind which Calvin severely rebuked. Similar
or worse violences were perpetrated by French brethren at Lyons, on April
30, 1562. The booty of the church of St. Jean had been sold at auction.
There must be no mo