ured from Murray the pardon of the assassin. St. Giles's was full of
the sound of weeping when the old man, worn with labour and trouble,
pronounced those beautiful words which have breathed like the tone of
the silver trumpets over so many a grave: "Blessed are the dead that die
in the Lord." It was one of the last of his appearances in that great
cathedral which he had made his own, and to which he had given the only
compensation and adornment which could make up for its old sanctities
and decoration sacrificed--the prodigious crowd of eager and sympathetic
listeners, the great voice not without discords and broken notes, but
full of natural eloquence and high religious feeling, of an orator and
prophet.

A few months after Knox was prostrated by a fit of apoplexy, it is said;
but it would rather seem of paralysis, since his speech was affected. He
recovered and partially resumed preaching, but never was the same again;
and the renewed troubles into which Scotland and Edinburgh were plunged
found the old leader of the Church unequal to the task of making head
against them. The curious complication of affairs which had already
existed on several occasions in the capital when the castle and its
garrison were hostile to the city at their feet, ready to discharge a
gun into the midst of the crowded streets or threaten a sally from the
gates which opened directly upon the very centre of the town, was now
accentuated to the highest degree by the adoption of the Queen's cause
by its Captain, Kirkaldy of Grange. We cannot pause now to give any
sketch of that misplaced hero and knight of romance, the Quixote of
Scotland, who took up Mary's quarrel when others deserted her, and for
much the same reasons, because, if not guilty, she was at least supposed
to be so, and at all events was tragically unfortunate and in
circumstances wellnigh hopeless. These views brought him into desperate
opposition to Knox, once his friend and leader; and though it is
impossible to believe that a man so chivalrous and honourable would have
injured the old Reformer, yet there were many partisans of less repute
who would no doubt have willingly struck a blow at Knox under shelter of
the Captain's name. As was natural to him, however, the preacher in
these circumstances redoubled his boldness, and the more dangerous it
was to denounce Mary under the guns of the fortress held in her name,
was the more anxious with his enfeebled voice to proclaim, over