his friend, Mrs. Locke, wife of a Cheapside merchant: "You write that
your desire is earnest to see me. Dear sister, if I should express the
thirst and languor which I have had for your presence, I should appear to
pass measure. . . . Your presence is so dear to me that if the charge of
this little flock . . . did not impede me, my presence should anticipate
my letter." Thus Knox was ready to brave the fires of Smithfield, or,
perhaps, forgot them for the moment in his affection for Mrs. Locke. He
writes to no other woman in this fervid strain. On May 8, 1557, Mrs.
Locke with her son and daughter (who died after her journey), joined Knox
at Geneva. {73}

He was soon to be involved in Scottish affairs. After his departure from
his country, omens and prodigies had ensued. A comet appeared in
November-December 1556. Next year some corn-stacks were destroyed by
lightning. Worse, a calf with two heads was born, and was exhibited as a
warning to Mary of Guise by Robert Ormistoun. The idolatress merely
sneered, and said "it was but a common thing." Such a woman was
incorrigible. Mary of Guise is always blamed for endangering Scotland in
the interests of her family, the Guises of the House of Lorraine. In
fact, so far as she tried to make Scotland a province of France, she was
serving the ambition of Henri II. It could not be foreseen, in 1555,
that Henri II. would be slain in 1559, leaving the two kingdoms in the
hands of Francis II. and Mary Stuart, who were so young, that they would
inevitably be ruled by the Queen's uncles of the House of Lorraine.
Shortly before Knox arrived in Scotland in 1555, the Duc de Guise had
advised the Regent to "use sweetness and moderation," as better than
"extremity and rigour"; advice which she acted on gladly.

Unluckily the war between France and Spain, in 1557, brought English
troops into collision with French forces in the Low Countries (Philip II.