queen-mother and Arran, the Regent, were unable to reduce. Receiving
supplies from England by sea, and abetted by Henry VIII., the murderers
were in treaty with him to work all his will, while some nobles, like
Argyll and Huntly, wavered; though the Douglases now renounced their
compact with England, and their promise to give the child queen in
marriage to Henry's son. At the end of November, despairing of success
in the siege, Arran asked France to send men and ships to take St Andrews
Castle from the assassins, who, in December, obtained an armistice. They
would surrender, they said, when they got a pardon for their guilt from
the Pope; but they begged Henry VIII. to move the Emperor to move the
Pope to give no pardon! The remission, none the less, arrived early in
April 1547, but was mocked at by the garrison of the castle. {99}

The garrison and inmates of the castle presently welcomed the arrival of
John Knox and some of his pupils. Knox (born in Haddington, 1513-1515?),
a priest and notary, had borne a two-handed sword and been of the body-
guard of Wishart. He was now invited by John Rough, the chaplain, to
take on him the office of preacher, which he did, weeping, so strong was
his sense of the solemnity of his duties. He also preached and disputed
with feeble clerical opponents in the town. The congregation in the
castle, though devout, were ruffianly in their lives, nor did he spare
rebukes to his flock.

Before Knox arrived, Henry VIII. and Francis II. had died; the successor
of Francis, Henri II., sent to Scotland Monsieur d'Oysel, who became the
right-hand man of Mary of Guise in the Government. Meanwhile the advance
of an English force against the Border, where they occupied Langholm,
caused Arran to lead thither the national levies. But this gave no great
relief to the besieged in the castle of St Andrews. In mid-July a well-
equipped French fleet swept up the east coast; men were landed with guns;
French artillery was planted on the cathedral roof and the steeple of St
Salvator's College, and poured a plunging fire into the castle. In a day
or two, on the last of July, the garrison surrendered. Knox, with many
of his associates, was placed in the galleys and carried captive to
France. On one occasion the galleys were within sight of St Andrews, and
the Reformer predicted (so he says) that he would again preach there--as
he did, to some purpose.

But the castle had not fallen before the Eng