This success was not of long duration, for a body of French troops was sent to besiege the castle, and it was compelled to surrender on the 23d July, when he, along with the garrison, was sent prisoner to France, and confined in the gallies till the year 1549. On obtaining his liberty he retired to England, where he preached sometime at Berwick, afterwards at Newcastle and London, and was at last chosen one of the itinerants appointed by Edward VI. to preach the Protestant doctrine through England. Upon the death of that prince, on the 6th July, 1553, he went to Geneva, where he resided when he was chosen by the English church at Frankfort, on the 24th September, 1554, to be their pastor, a situation he accepted by the advice of the celebrated John Calvin, but which he did not long enjoy, for having opposed the introduction of the English liturgy, and refused to celebrate the communion according to the forms prescribed by it, he was deprived of his office; and, such was the malice of his enemies, that, taking advantage of a passage in his “Admonition to England,” wherein he compares the Emperor to Nero, and the Queen of England to Jezebel, they accused him to the magistrates of treason. These gentlemen perceiving the spirit by which his accusers were actuated, found means to apprise him of his danger; and on the 26th march, 1555, he left Frankfort for Geneva, from whence he proceeded to Dieppe, and shortly afterwards to Scotland, where he arrived in the month of August. On his arrival he found the reformers much increased in number, and after assisting them to rectify some errors which had crept into their practice, accompanied John Erskine of Dun to his seat in the Mearns, where he continued a month, preaching to the principle people in that country. He afterwards resided at Calder-house, the residence of Sir James Sandilands, where he was attended by a number of personages of the first rank; and, among others, by the prior of St Andrew’s afterwards earl of Moray. During the winter he visited Edinburgh; preached in many places of Ayrshire; and in the beginning of 1556, at the request of the earl of Glencairn, administered the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper to his lordship’s family, and a number of friends, at his seat of Finlayston. In this way did Mr Knox continue preaching, sometimes in one place, and sometimes in another, when his success excited so much attention that the Popish clergy summoned him to appear before them, on the 15th of May, in the church of the Black Friars in Edinburgh. He did appear, but attended by such a number of followers that the clergy deemed it prudent to desist from their intended prosecution; and that same day he addressed a much greater audience than ever he had done on any prior occasion, and continued to do so for ten days.