o upon this question had views as clear as a crystal,
waiting for the moment when they could be set forth. But George
Buchanan, though he held office in the Assembly, had no warrant to claim
a hearing between such men as the learned and lively Lord Secretary and
the great prophet and preacher John Knox.

The discussion ended in nothing, as may be supposed, except a deepened
offence on the part of the Court with the impracticable Reformer, and an
additional bitterness of criticism on the part of the Congregation
touching all that went on at the abbey--the gaieties, and the beautiful
dresses, as well as the mass, and now and then a whisper of scandal,
unproved but taken for granted with that miserable eagerness which such
opposition brings. Edinburgh, between these two conflicting powers, was
no doubt able, with the wonderful impartiality of common life, to carry
on its usual existence much less affected than we could imagine possible
by any of the disorders, which almost reached the height of civil war
when Murray and the other lords were banished, and the tide of Mary's
fate began to rise darkly between the unhappy fool she had chosen for
her husband, and all the wild conflicting elements which had been enough
to tax her strength without that aggravation. Even Knox acknowledges
that "the threatenings of the preachers were fearful," though he himself
had been the first to warn the people of national judgments to be looked
for because of the offences in costume and other matters of their Queen.
We lose, however, here the picturesque and dramatic scenes which added
so much interest to the history during the brief period when she and he
were friends. The debate with Lethington, indeed, is the conclusion of
the brilliant and vivid piece of history in which we have been made to
see all that was going on in the centre of Scottish life--the continual
tumults, the great gatherings in the Church, the sermons, daily orations
full of burning eloquence and earnestness in which every occurrence of
the moment was discussed, as well as the sacred subjects which were
familiar in the mouths of all. That vigorous and trenchant pen falls
from the hand of the preacher. The fifth book of his History is prepared
it is said from his notes and under his eyes, but it is no longer the
same as when the very diction was his own, and his vivid memory, to
which all these incidents were present as when he acted in them, was the
storehouse upon which he