Chichester’s place in Dublin Castle was taken by his old servitor, Sir Oliver St. John. The veteran himself retired to Carrickfergus, and there awaited his opportunity, spreading his nets patiently and preparing for the future. Davies was retained as Attorney-General, and this became a great comfort to the ex-Deputy.

St. John was a Lincoln’s Inn lawyer of the Davies School. He served in the Elizabethan wars, and was a protégé of Devonshire and Cecil. After James I. came to the Throne care was taken to provide him with suitable posts in Ireland. As Deputy, St. John was not without sympathy for his old master, although formerly he had smarted under his lash. Before a year went by the position of Lord High Treasurer fell vacant through the death of the Earl of Ormonde, and St. John and Davies secured the place for their fallen friend. Chichester, greatly mollified thereby, assured the Privy Council, on 24th December, 1616, that “as matters are handled, I think Ireland is at the height of her happiness.” Probably from anything that has since occurred this was true enough.

The new post gave him control over the Crown rentals and other records serviceable to his designs. It also helped him to cloak (for the moment) the embezzlement of the rents of the fugitive Chiefs. Accusing voices as to his misdemeanours were however raised, and James I. tried in vain to fathom them. St. John (with the facts staring him in the face) hesitated to expose his former patron. Still the King was not blind; and in October, 1618, the storm broke. Sir James Balfour was dispatched to Dublin with secret orders from his Majesty to rip open the Patent scandal, and have Hamilton cross-examined in the Star Chamber by St. John.

Balfour was a Scottish “discoverer” (or informer), who ferreted for reward to lay bare the tricks of estated magnates against the Crown. Having laid informations before the King as to the orgies of the late administration, he was commissioned to unearth its misdeeds. His arrival in Ireland caused consternation. St. John sent for Hamilton; and, as his Majesty ordained, questioned him straitly. The perturbed Deputy treated Balfour’s revelations as something which had suddenly burst upon him; and Hamilton was naturally disinclined to add to his knowledge. His uncommunicativeness led to a request for the production of the originals of his Patents. No record of these had been officially kept, in order to defeat investigation; and Hamilton, aware of his advantage, demurred. He was, therefore, commanded by St. John to take down in writing, as from the King, a behest to bring them in forthwith for inspection. This was an awkward moment; and the culprit, having written out the command, asked for time, and got it.

Before the day fixed for the next heckling, Hamilton consulted Chichester; and, fortified by his courage, instead of obeying, sent an evasive letter pretending that he did not understand the royal wishes. At this St. John affected to be nonplussed; but the truth was that the task of playing inquisitor against his old confederates was distasteful to him, and ill became his past. So, instead of putting on pressure, and forcing Hamilton to produce the parchments, he weakened and suspended the inquiry.

Sir James Balfour, keen for the chase, beset him and demanded effective action in the King’s name; but the sore-pressed Deputy feared either to refuse or to comply. In his perplexity, he hit on the expedient of sending a messenger to Court, begging to be spared further part in an odious duty. His envoy was the Vice-Treasurer, Sir Francis Blundell, an underling of the Lord High Treasurer. To him the errand was entrusted of seeking out Villiers, Marquis of Buckingham, the royal favourite, and plying him with “arguments” to hush up the inquiry. Villiers (soon to be Duke of Buckingham) was all-powerful with James I.

“Those who wanted to gain the King to their ends learned that the easiest way was to approach him through his favourite.” So intimate were their relations that his Majesty would say:—“Christ had his John, and I have my George.” Buckingham took “presents” from suitors, pestered the Lord Chancellor with attempts to interfere in Chancery suits, and secured largesse for his pains. He retained his mastery at Court into the following reign, when his excesses led to his assassination. With such a courtier, no well-weighted appeal could fail, and Sir Francis Blundell set out from Dublin supplied with a letter from St. John, and other gear for the all-powerful Marquis. The only copy of this letter which has been preserved was found amongst the papers of Chichester’s relatives. It, therefore, probably was composed by the Lord High Treasurer himself. It runs:—

“It has pleased his Majesty to employ Sir James Balfour hither, for the examination of some articles exhibited unto his Majesty against Sir James Hamilton, with especial warrant, by his princely letter unto me and some of the Council here, to receive such informations as his Majesty had committed unto Sir James Balfour’s trust, to be imparted unto us. In obedience to which, we have, with all care and secrecy, proceeded therein, and given his Majesty a just account of what we have found, wherewith I hope his Majesty hath received good satisfaction. And, albeit my duty must ever tie me to obey his Majesty’s Royal commandments before all other respects, yet I have suffered much in the opinion of noble and worthy personages, as well in England as here, as if I had entered into a business unfitting the place of his Majesty’s Deputy, who ought tenderly to preserve his Majesty’s subjects in peace and contentment, and not be an instrument of blemishing the reputations and questioning the estates and fortunes of any man. The business of Sir James Hamilton is now brought to that estate as I hope I shall hear no more of it.

“Yet, lest his Majesty may, by information given unto him in the like nature, be drawn to employ my services again in that kind of examination concerning the lives and estates of any of those who are, by his Majesty’s princely favour, committed to my charge and government, I hope his Majesty will be graciously pleased to join to mine assistance his principal servants and councillors of this kingdom, and that his warrants and commissions may be open, and the proceedings in them fair and legal. Otherwise, if I be commanded to handle them in a private manner myself alone, or with some only, whatever misfortune shall light upon any, I shall be reputed the causer of it, and cast myself into general hatred, and shall be unable to do his Majesty that service in this kingdom which he may expect from an officer employed in so weighty a charge.

“I humbly pray your lordship to hearken to Sir Francis Blundell, whom I have entreated to wait upon your lordship in this particular, and to vouchsafe unto me your honourable care for my preservation.”

This could only mean that Buckingham was to get the secret procedure (which the King had ordained) quashed; and allow St. John to hold any future inquiry in public before the Privy Council, where Chichester’s creatures held the majority. Blundell’s “arguments” were so powerful that Buckingham prevailed on the King to drop the proceedings, and Balfour’s mission ended in smoke. The “articles exhibited” by him, and the correspondence between the English and Irish Executives, are not given a place in the State Papers. Only for disjointed entries and letters in the family archives of Hamilton and Chichester, posterity would never have heard of the perils they ran or the struggles of St. John to rescue them. The official records must have been made away with. Balfour before long was consoled for the abandonment of the investigation. To keep his mouth shut he was presented with lands in Ulster after his return to England, and therewith rested content. Amongst his papers printed in 1837 by the Abbotsford Club (Edinburgh) were copies of Hamilton’s “Thomas Irelande” Letter of the 6th December, 1604, and that of the 16th April, 1605, granting Sir Con O’Neill’s estate. These evidently formed part of his “brief” for the Discovery.

Even if Balfour’s inquiry had been pressed home, the resourceful Chichester would not have been taken unawares. He had skilfully tampered with the State ledgers to prepare a bulwark of defence if challenged as to his part in the seizure of the fisheries. On becoming Lord High Treasurer, the rent-rolls of the Exchequer lay under his hand, and these were manipulated with clerkly art. An insertion in them in 1618 correlates with the period of Balfour’s inquiry. It casually records that Lord Chichester is owner of the Bann and Lough Neagh, although everyone knew that the river had been granted to the Londoners in 1610—apart from the “surrender” by the ex-Deputy in 1611. The entry seemed quite business-like, and reads:—“Arthur, Lord Chichester, assignee of James Hamilton, knight, holds the entire fishery of the lake called Lough Neagh, and the river Bann—per annum 12s. 6d.” A casual scribe might have ledgered it; yet the words amounted to a royal recognition of his title. No earlier Crown rent-roll contains such a record, and it was made seven years after the Bann had been awarded to the Londoners, by Charter, rent free.

Chichester’s “surrender” disclaimed the river and acknowledged the receipt of compensation. Still, embedded in the Crown rental, by way of a scrivener’s note of the trifling rent of 12s. 6d., lurked an official declaration that the Bann and Lough Neagh belonged to him. The humblest clerk in State employ knew that no rent for the Bann was due by anybody. Yet a ledger in Government custody was burdened with this falsehood in the year in which Balfour “exhibited articles unto his Majesty against Sir James Hamilton.” No reason can be assigned for the entry save one—an attempt to build up a defence to meet an expected attack by the “discoverer.”

The “cooked” ledger consorts with the Lord Treasurer’s past, and with what remains to be told of his future. The sequel unfolds the same unending game of grab. Each development reveals a fresh crime, and evokes renewed wonder at the miscreant’s resourcefulness. As fertile in the closet as he was ruthless in the camp, Chichester may be regarded as the embodiment of those vices which, amongst the people he oppressed, made a byword of the rule he represented and the creed he sought to spread.