By
no people but the Scots, perhaps, could this jape have been taken
seriously, but, with a gravity that would have delighted Charles Lamb,
Knox denounced the skit from the pulpit as a fabrication by the Father of
Lies. The author, the human penman, he said (according to Calderwood),
was fated to die friendless in a strange land. The galling shaft came
out of the Lethington quiver; it may have been composed by several of the
family, but Thomas Maitland, who later died in Italy, was regarded as the
author, {264b} perhaps because he did die alone in a strange country.

At this time the Castle of Edinburgh was held in the Queen's interest by
Kirkcaldy of Grange, who seems to have been won over by the guile of
Lethington. That politician needed a shelter from the danger of the
Lennox feud, and the charge of having been guilty of Darnley's murder. To
take the place was beyond the power of the Protestant party, and it did
not fall under the guns of their English allies during the life of the
Reformer.

He had a tedious quarrel with Kirkcaldy in December 1570-January 1571. A
retainer of Kirkcaldy's had helped to kill a man whom his master only
wanted to be beaten. The retainer was put into the Tolbooth; Kirkcaldy
set him free, and Knox preached against Kirkcaldy. Hearing that Knox had
styled him a murderer, Kirkcaldy bade Craig read from the pulpit a note
in which he denied the charge. He prayed God to decide whether he or
Knox "has been most desirous of innocent blood." Craig would not read
the note: Kirkcaldy appealed in a letter to the kirk-session. He
explained the origin of the trouble: the slain man had beaten his
brother; he bade his agents beat the insulter, who drew his sword, and
got a stab. On this Knox preached against him, he was told, as a cut-
throat.

Next Sunday Knox reminded his hearers that he had not called Kirkcaldy a
murderer (though in the case of the Cardinal, he was), but had said that
the lawless proceedings shocked him more than if they had been done by
common cut-throats. Knox then wrote a letter to the kirk-session, saying
that Kirkcaldy's defence proved him "to be a murderer at heart," for St.
John says that "whoso loveth not his brother is a man-slayer"; and
Kirkcaldy did not love the man who was killed. All this was apart from
the question: had Knox called Kirkcaldy a common cut-throat? Kirkcaldy
then asked that Knox's explanation of what he said in the pulpit might be
given in