for the Crown enabling it to tear up the Composition.
The Lords Justices and Council in 1641 maintained that the Composition was only an arrangement as regards revenue, and that it was never intended to give legal titles to the landowners.[1] But this is contradicted plainly by the wording of the various indentures, and the intentions of the government are set out in a letter from Walsingham with reference to MacWilliam of Mayo—"to give each chief his own, with a salvo jure to all others that have right."[2]
Indentures were made with the chief lords and gentlemen of each territory, which arranged the main outlines of the settlement, what the Queen was to have, and what each lord was to get in compensation for his cuttings, spendings, and uncertain customary duties. Inquisitions were to be taken before juries of the inhabitants to ascertain what each landholder was entitled to, and then letters patent were to be made out, giving to each man what was his own.
The troublous times which followed prevented the proper carrying out of this settlement. Valid grants were not made out by the Crown, and the inhabitants often failed to fulfill the conditions of the composition. The province was greatly involved in the rising under O'Neill and O'Donnell; but all treasons and rebellions were completely wiped out by James I. on his accession.
Thirty years after the Composition, and twelve years after his accession, in July, 1615, James wrote
