"almost thrust out by the authority of the church court,"[224] as another of them has it, he, on the 5th May 1571, took farewell of Edinburgh for a time, and crossing the Firth of Forth at Leith moved on by short and easy stages through Fife to the city in which "God had first opened his mouth" to proclaim His truth, and for which to the last he, as well as the Good Regent, cherished a special affection. As Mr John Davidson, then a teacher in one of the colleges, has expressed it in homely Scotch:-- "Thou knawis he lude the by the lave, For _first_ in the he gave the rout Till Antechrist that Romische slave, Preicheing that Christ did only save. Bot _last_ of Edinburgh exprest, Quhen he was not far fra his grave He came to the by all the rest."[225] [Sidenote: His preaching in St Andrews.] In St Andrews the reformer was sure to be free from personal danger, and on the whole to have the sympathy of the citizens; though it was not to be supposed that--in the city and university where the late Archbishop Hamilton had been long supreme, and had recently been claiming to exercise the authority of Chancellor of the University, and new founder of St Mary's College,[226] and where he had left behind several relations and dependents more compliant with the new order of things than himself--there were not to be found in this crisis several influential persons who had more sympathy with their late chief and with the selfish and crooked policy of the Hamiltons than with the straightforward course and steadfast fidelity of the dauntless reformer, and who would have little relish for his earnest warnings and stern reproofs. The notices preserved to us regarding this last and, so far as is yet known, longest visit of Knox to St Andrews are both detailed and interesting. From the simple and loving Memorials of his attendant, Richard Bannatyne, we learn that all the time he was there--_i.e._, from the beginning of July 1571 to the 17th of August 1572--he preached every Sunday, and expounded the prophecies of Daniel to the middle of the ninth chapter, applying the words of the prophet to the circumstances of Scotland at the time, and inveighing in the strongest terms against "the bloody house of Hamilton" and its abettors for their deceit, treachery, and turbulence, their base murder of the Good Regent, and cunning plot to restore a popish queen.[227] These themes, to which in the applications of his sermons he ever and anon returned, woke up all the fire and fervour of the old man eloquent; and if it might not be said, as in earlier days, that every sermon was of more value to the cause he defended than five hundred armed men, yet the report of his untiring zeal and unswerving fidelity would still contribute greatly to animate and cheer the adherents of the young prince and of the new regent in all parts of the land.