The citizens of Edinburgh were naturally thrown into violent commotion by these events; and when their minds were in this inflammable condition, an incident occurred which brought the public excitement to its height, and which the Government turned to its own account in prosecuting its quarrel with the Church with still greater vigour. This incident is known as 'the Riot of 17th December' (1596). On that day a number of the ministers and of the nobles who were in sympathy with them, were assembled for consultation in one of the chapels of St. Giles', known as the 'Little Church,' when they were startled by some one near the door raising the shout, 'Fy! save yourselves,' or, as another version gives it, 'The Papists are in arms to take the town and cut all your throats.' The Assembly at once broke up, and all made for the street. The alarm spread through the city, and soon brought the people in crowds to the High Street, many of them armed; and it is said that some of them surrounded the Tolbooth, where the King was sitting at the time with the Council, crying to 'bring out Haman,' and shouting, 'The sword of the Lord and of Gideon.' On hearing of the tumult, the Provost and the ministers of the city made for the scene, and through their exertions peace was restored within an hour, and without any one being hurt. The man who raised the panic in the 'Little Church' never came to be known; but it was believed that he was one of the 'Cubiculars' (as they were called), or gentlemen of the King's bedchamber, who were annoyed at the Octavians, on account of the retrenchments made in the King's household expenditure; and that this _ruse_ had been devised for the purpose of fomenting the differences between the Octavians and the ministers. The action taken by the Court in connection with the riot would have been ridiculous had its consequences for the Church not been so serious. Next day the King removed the Court to Linlithgow, and a Proclamation was made at the Cross of Edinburgh announcing that, owing to the 'treasonable' arming of the citizens, the Courts of Law would also be removed from the city, and ordering the four ministers and several prominent citizens of Edinburgh into ward in the Castle, and citing them before the Council on a general charge. The ministers fled, as Melville and others had done in like circumstances twelve years before.