This band of 1557, like those of a later date, is remarkable for the clearness, the directness, and the vigour of its language, but unlike them it can hardly be regarded as a public document. To have exhibited it then to all and sundry would have been to court persecution, perhaps death. “To those who agreed with them,” says Buchanan, “they presented bonds for their subscription. These first assumed the name of ‘the Congregation,’ which those who followed afterward rendered more celebrated.” Although there are barely two hundred and fifty words in the band of 1557, the Protestant party is mentioned in it seven times as the Congregation. It was nearly five months after the date of this band before Walter Mill was consigned to the flames. [Sidenote: Bands of 1559] The year 1559 was rendered notable in Scotland by the return of Knox, by the open rupture between the Congregation and the Queen Regent, and by the rapid progress of Protestantism. In the summer of that year the Reformers deemed it advisable to enter into at least three distinct covenants, their respective dates being the 31st of May, the 13th of July, and the 1st of August. None of the originals of these is known to have survived, but copies of all the three have been preserved. They had for their general object the advancement of the Reformation, but each had its own distinctive traits and special end. The first was entered into at Perth, the second at Edinburgh, and the third at Stirling. The second was adopted in St Andrews as the “letteris of junctioun to the Congregatioun,” and as such was taken by more than three hundred persons. [Sidenote: Rupture of French Alliance] Not the least striking result of the Reformation was the complete bursting up of the ancient alliance between France and Scotland, and the drawing together of Scotland and England—that England which Scotland had so long and so recently regarded as its “auld enemy.” The importance of this result is frankly acknowledged by Teulet, one of the most competent, careful, and candid of French historical students. He puts the matter thus: “Scotland, which was for so many ages the devoted ally of France, the rein, as our ancient kings said, with which they restrained the encroachments of England, was unwilling to abdicate its nationality and become a French province. Moreover, the unbridled excesses of the French troops in Scotland, no less than the shameless rapacity of the French agents, at last aroused a general spirit of resistance, and England soon found in the rupture of the ancient alliance between France and Scotland an ample indemnification for the loss of Calais.” [Sidenote: French Excesses]