About the year 1449, a general rebellion against the English being apprehended, Richard, Duke of York, was sent chief governor to Ireland; and it appears that the revenue at this time was exceedingly low, since this prince, when he accepted his office, stipulated to hold the government for ten years, on condition of receiving the revenue without account, together with an immediate advance of two thousand marks, and an annual pension of two thousand pounds from England.* In the reign of Edward IV. we find money raised for the service of government, by the imposition of duties. It being found necessary, under the government of Kildare, to fit out an armament of two hundred men and thirteen officers, called the Fraternity of St. George, for the purpose of opposing and subduing the Irish enemies and English rebels; the fraternity was empowered to demand 12d. in the pound out of all merchandise sold in Ireland, except hides, and the goods of freemen of Dublin and Drogheda.+ About this period we have a singular instance of the smallness of the Irish revenue. On the restoration of the earl of Kildare to the government, as deputy to Richard, Duke of York, this nobleman was commissioned to maintain a standing force of 140 horsemen ; and if the Irish resources should prove unequal to its support, assistance was to be afforded from England. But strange as it may appear, although the annual expense of this small troop was estimated at only five hundred pounds, it was considered to be more than could at that time be raised in Ireland.+ In the nineteenth year of Edward IV., among the instructions to the lord deputy, we find it particularly enjoined, that in no parliament hereafter holden, shall more than one subsidy be demanded in a year, and this not exceeding the sum of 1,200 marks, as hath been accustomed.§ In the reign of Henry VII., under the administration of Sir Edward Poynings, a parliament met at Drogheda, anno 1495, the first care of which was to bring about an effectual reform of the English pale, and to relieve the subject from those grievous impositions called coyne and livery, by which the great lords had desolated the land. In place of these was established a tax of 26s. 8d. on every six score acres of arable land, belonging either to lay or ecclesiastical proprietors, and to be paid for five years to the king. It was forbidden, at the same time, to receive the usual contributions from the land-holders, under the name of gift or reward, and even the giver was made liable to a penalty of 100 shillings. || In the fifteenth year of this prince, a duty was granted of one shilling in the pound on all merchandise, imported or exported, wine and oil excepted, and a * Leland, vol. ii. p. 33. + Ibid. ib. p. 61. Ibid. ib. p. 65. VOL. II. 2 I Leland, vol. ii. p. 66. ||Ibid. ib. p. 102. tax of 13s. 4d., by way of subsidy, was imposed on every hide of land, for ten years. In a parliament summoned in his twenty-fourth year, this subsidy was renewed for the same term, with the remarkable provision, "that if this act, or grant of subsidy, be thought by our sovereign lord the king and his council, hurtful or prejudicial to his subjects of this land, then our said sovereign lord shall, at his will and pleasure, reform, diminish, extinct, adnull, or revoke the foresaid grant of subsidy, in part or in the whole." From this reign we may date the first revival of the English power in Ireland, which since the time of the Scottish war, in the reign of Edward II., had gradually declined into a miserable and precarious state of weakness.* Under this prince, the revenue, of which we have any certain accounts, seldom exceeded £5,000. a year.+ In the reign of Henry VIII., about 1509, we find some traces of a regular establishment, for the maintenance of the government of Ireland. At that time parliament granted a subsidy of 13s. 4d. upon every plow land, to the king, for ten years, which appears to have become the usual supply. This was attended with the revival of the law against absentees, which vested two-thirds of their Irish revenues in the king, to be applied to the purposes of the state. After Henry had introduced the reformation into Ireland, the revenue of the crown in that country seems to have been considerably increased from the changes which were made in the establishment of the church. By one act, twelve religious houses, and by another, the priory of St. Wolstans, were suppressed, and the domains belonging to the whole were vested for ever in the crown. Other acts were also passed for enlarging the royal revenues. The usual subsidy of 13s. 4d. on every plow land, was granted for ten years. The lands and honours possessed in Ireland by the Duke of Norfolk, and other absentees, were vested in the king, and the twentieth part of the annual profits of all spiritual promotions, a donation no less acceptable, was granted to him for ever.§ In the reign of Mary, the change which was again made in the religion of the country by the revival of popery, must have affected the revenue, as the payment of first fruits to the crown was discharged, and the church rectories, glebes, and other emoluments which had been vested in the crown since the twenty-eighth of Henry VIII., were restored, reserving only the lands granted to the laity, which no zeal for religion could induce them to resign. Under this queen, however, we find a new source of revenue, which seems a reproach on the Irish at that time for their indolence and inactivity. It was a tribute paid by Philip II. of Spain, in consideration of his subjects being allowed to fish on the north-west coast of Ireland. This per mission was granted in 1553, for the term of twenty-one years, on his agreeing to Leland, vol. ii. p. 118. + Clarendon's Sketches of the Revenue and Finances of Ireland, p. 3. il Ibid. ib. p. 211, pay £1,000. yearly; and it appears that this money was brought into the exchequer of Ireland.* In the time of Elizabeth we find a bill introduced for granting the queen a new impost on wines, which was exclaimed against as an oppressive innovation, yet it was revived and finally passed, in the fourth session of the same parliament in which it had been first proposed.+ About 1576, Ireland being in a very disordered state, Elizabeth resolved to intrust the management of it to a man of tried abilities and experience. She, therefore, made choice of Sir Henry Sydney, who having before held the office, was well acquainted with the great difficulties and arduous duties attending it: in order to overcome his scruples, and conquer his reluctance, she invested him with the most extensive powers, and promised him an annual remittance of £2,000., in aid of the ordinary revenues of the country. In 1577, the enormous disproportion between the revenue of Ireland and the expenses of maintaining the English power, induced Sydney to concert measures for obviating, or as much as possible lessening so great an evil. It had been customary, for many years, to exact from the English districts a quantity of provisions for the supply of the royal garrisons, and the support of the governor's household. But the principal inhabitants compounded with the deputy and council, by paying a contribution instead of the articles required. Sydney conceived the design of converting this occasional subsidy into a regular and permanent revenue. The consequence of this bold and arbitrary act of government, was a violent and general discontent. Agents were sent to England by the inhabitants of the pale, to remonstrate against this infringement of their ancient liberties. These agents, however, were considered as contemners of the queen's authority, and thrown into the fleet, whence they were afterwards removed to the tower. This served only to increase the opposition; and the queen, fearful of the consequences, and, perhaps, entertaining some dread of her foreign enemies, abated a little of her imperious violence, and sent instructions to Sydney to bring, as soon as possible, this unpleasant dispute to a termination. A composition for purveyance was, therefore, agreed to by the deputy and council, with the lords and gentlemen of the pale, and established to be in force for seven years.§ In this reign a considerable addition must have been made to the revenue, by the forfeiture of the enormous domains of Desmond, which were vested in the crown, to be applied as the queen should deem most expedient for the reformation of her * See Burrough's Treatise on the Sovereignty of the British Seas, p. 80. Clarendon's Sketches of the Revenue and Finances of Ireland, p. 3. + Leland, vol. iii. p. 243, 244. Leland, ib. p. 258. Leland, vol. ii. p. 263–266. Irish domains. The lands forfeited by this rebellion are said to have amounted to 574,628 acres.* Some idea of the annual expense incurred by government in this reign, in maintaining the dominion of Ireland, may be formed from the following circumstance: Sir John Perrot, the chief governor, proposed to the privy council of England, that £50,000., at which he estimated this expense, should be granted to him for three years; and he engaged on these conditions to maintain a body of 2,000 foot and 1,400 horse; to fortify seven towns, each of the extent of one mile; to build as many bridges, and to erect the like number of forts in proper situations. This he called the cheapest purchase which England had made for many a day; but the proposition, though repeated to the English parliament, was not accepted, either by the legislature or the crown.+ Clarendon remarks, on the authority of Sir James Ware, that Ireland had become such a burden to England by the time Elizabeth ascended the throne, that the charge of the first fifteen years of her reign amounted to £490,779. 7s. 6d; while the whole produce of the Irish revenue, for the same period, was but £120,000. or £8,000. per annum. This account differs from that of Sir John Sinclair, who says, "that the, revenue of Ireland was reduced to the trifling sum of £6,000. per annum, and that it required £20,000. a year additional out of the exchequer of England to defray the charges of the ordinary peace establishment." He adds, "such was the weak state of the Irish government at this time, that it emboldened Tyrone to revolt; and his rebellion, which continued for the space of eight years, is said to have cost at the rate of £400,000. a year, before it was totally suppressed. In the year 1599 the sum of £600,000. was spent there in six months; and Sir Robert Cecil affirmed, that Ireland had cost in ten years' time £3,400,000."|| During the reign of James I., Ireland continued to be a load equally heavy on' the exchequer of England as it had been in the time of his predecessor. At one period an army of 19,000 men was kept up there; the maintenance of which, in consequence of the great pay given to the soldiers, amounting to eight-pence a day, was not a little burdensome. Such also was the low state of the Irish treasury, that it became necessary to transmit the money from England.¶ In this reign parliament granted a subsidy to the king, his heirs and successors, of two shillings and eight pence in the pound, from every personal estate of the value of three pounds and upwards; from aliens twice that sum; and out of every real estate of the value of twenty shillings and upwards, four shillings in the pound. A * Leland, vol. ii. p. 289. +Ibid. vol. ii. p. 295. Clarendon's, Sketch of the Revenue and Finances of Ireland, p. 3. Sir John Sinclair's History of the Public Revenue, p. 142. Hume, vol. vi. p. 59. 178, grant so bountiful seems to have called forth from James the warmest acknowledgments of the zeal and alacrity of his subjects; for in a letter addressed to the lord deputy, he says, "we now clearly perceive, that the difficult beginnings of our parliament there, were occasioned only by ignorance and mistakings, arising through the long disuse of parliaments there; and, therefore, we have cancelled the memory of them, and we are now so well pleased with this dutiful conformation of theirs, that we do require you to assure them from us, that we hold our subjects of that kingdom in equal favour with those of our other kingdoms; and that we will be as careful to provide for their prosperous and flourishing estate, as we can be for the safety of our own person."* Such, however, was the condition of the kingdom, that the necessities of James obliged him to reduce the army, which, on his accession, amounted to 2,000 men, to the inconsiderable number of 1735 foot, and 212 horse; and in 1622, it was farther reduced to 1350 foot, divided into 27 companies of 50 men each, and seven troops of horse, amounting to about 200. Nineteen of the companies and six of the troops were commanded by privy counsellors, men of great property and influence; and these captains were obliged to secure their own pay by stopping the rents which they owed to the crown, making the private men compound annually for their pay, at a third or fourth part of what was due to them by the establishment. Notwithstanding this deranged estate of the finances, an augmentation of the army was necessary; but such was the poverty of the exchequer, that the revenue of Ireland fell considerably short of the expenditure; for, through want of economy in the military department, although the number of forces was small, it amounted to no less than £52,500. Irish. The Customs had, indeed, increased in the present reign from 50 pounds annually, to 3,000, 6,000, and afterwards to 9,700. The wards of Ireland, and the profits derived from them were, till the year 1617, at the absolute disposal of the deputy. The king then took them into his own hands ; and, by erecting a special office, executed by commissioners, and afterwards by the establishment of a court of wards and liveries, contrived in a short time to raise the revenue from wardships and tenures, to £10,000. per annum.‡ Under the administration of Wentworth, in the reign of Charles I., commerce was considerably extended, and the customs are said to have amounted to almost four times their former sum.§ In this reign, we find also a voluntary contribution of £120,000., to be paid in three years, by way of three subsidies, each amounting to £40,000., which was accepted. || Four entire subsidies were afterwards granted, but they met with considerable opposition on the part of the principal lords and officers of state; because, according to Leland's Hist. of Ireland, vol. ii. p. 457, + Leland, vol. ii. p. 471. Ibid. vol. ii. p. 483, Ibid. p. 475 |