Not long after Mary's accession Knox fled to the Continent, spending a few years at Frankfort and Geneva.

He was much impressed by "that notable servant of {359} God, John Calvin" whose system he adopted with political modifications of his own.
In the meantime things were not going well in Scotland.

The country had suffered another severe defeat [Sidenote: September 10, 1547] at the hands of the English in the battle of Pinkie.

The government was largely in the hands of the Queen Dowager, Mary of Lorraine, who naturally favored France, and who married her daughter, the Queen of Scots, to the Dauphin Francis, [Sidenote: April 24, 1558] both of them being fifteen years old.

By treaty she conveyed Scotland to the king of France, acting on the good old theory that her people were a chattel.