ell try if
you can gain admittance among the other auditors, to hear their
deliberations; afterwards come again to me, and report what takes place;
by that time I shall be advised whether to send you back to Glencairn or
elsewhere."

My grandfather, after this and some farther discourse, retired to the
hall, and took breakfast with the household, where he was much edified
with the douce deportment of all present, so unlike that of the lewd and
graceless varlets who rioted in the houses of the other nobles. Verily,
he used to say, the evidences of a reforming spirit were brightly seen
there; and, to rule every one into a chaste sobriety of conversation, a
pious clerk sate at the head of the board, and said grace before and
after the meal, making it manifest how much all things about the Lord
James Stuart were done in order.

Having taken breakfast, and reposed himself some time, for his long ride
had made him very weary, he rose, and, changing his apparel, went to the
Greyfriars church, where the clergy were assembling, and elbowing
himself gently into the heart of the people waiting around for
admission, he got in with the crowd when the doors were opened.

The matter that morning to be considered concerned the means to be
taken, within the local jurisdictions of those there met, to enforce the
process of the summons which had been issued against the reformed
preachers to appear at Stirling.

But while they were busily conversing and contriving how best to aid and
further that iniquitous aggression of perfidious tyranny, there came in
one of the brethren of the monastery, with a frightened look, and cried
aloud, that John Knox was come, and had been all night in the town. At
the news the spectators, as if moved by one spirit, gave a triumphant
shout,--the clergy were thunderstruck,--some started from their seats,
unconscious of what they did,--others threw themselves back where they
sat,--and all appeared as if a judgment had been pronounced upon them.
In the same moment the church began to skail,--the session was
adjourned,--and the people ran in all directions. The cry rose
everywhere, "John Knox is come!" All the town came rushing into the
streets,--the old and the young, the lordly and the lowly, were seen
mingling and marvelling together,--all tasks of duty, and servitude, and
pleasure, were forsaken,--the sick-beds of the dying were deserted,--the
priests abandoned their altars and masses, and stood pale and t