parents might have resided in that house while it was the property of the Abbey. In opposition to this, we have the authorities already mentioned in support of the opinion that he was born in the village of Gifford. With respect to the _parentage_ of our Reformer, David Buchanan says that his “father was a brother’s son of the house of Ranferlie.” Life, prefixed to History of the Reformation, edit. 1644. In a conversation with the earl of Bothwell, Knox gave the following account of his ancestors: “My lord,” said he, “my great grandfather, gudeschir, and father, have served your Lordchip’s predecessours, and some of them have dyed under their standards; and this is a pairt of the obligatioun of our Scottish kindness.” Historie of the Reformatioun, p. 306, edit. 1732. Matthew Crawfurd says, that “these words seem to import that Mr Knox’s predecessors were in some honourable station under the earls of Bothwell, at that time the most powerful family in East Lothian,” Life of the Author, p. ii. prefixed to Historie, edit. 1732. The only thing which I would infer from his words is, that his ancestors had settled in Lothian as early as the time of his great‑grandfather. I do not wish to represent {338} the Reformer as either of noble or of gentle birth, and cannot place much dependence on the assertion in the preceding note, which makes his father “proprietor of the estate of Gifford.” John Davidson, in the poem written in commendation of him, says, “First he descendit bot of lineage small, As commonly God usis for to call The sempill sort his summoundis til expres.”