Earls of Cromartie > [NSLBLANK]

cxxxii GEORGE FIRST VISCOUNT OF TARE AT. [1630-
Queensberry, Lord Tarbat, Lord Stair, the Master of Stair, and Sir George
Mackenzie, late Lord Advocate. 1
Sir Patrick Hume of Polwarth in a letter indicates a feeling against giving
office to Lord Tarbat, which raised an objection to Lord Melville himself. 2
In a series of letters, eight in number, and several of them of consider-
able length, Lord Tarbat makes many suggestions to Lord Melville as
to the best mode of carrying on the business of the Government. In
these letters the writer shows much shrewdness and experience, both in
civil and ecclesiastical affairs, as well as in the abstruse subject of the coining
of money, the currency, exchanges, etc. The range of subjects discussed by
his Lordship is very extensive, and includes the herring fisheries, the multi-
plicity of lawyers, etc. 3
At the same time Lord Tarbat wrote a separate memorial in relation to
the Church, the object of which appears to have been the recognition or
establishment of Episcopacy as well as Presbytery. 4
Notwithstanding the exoneration, formerly cpioted, given by King William
to Lord Tarbat as Clerk-Register, a commission was afterwards granted by
the King, in January 1690, to take his Lordship's oath that he had not
embezzled the registers. The Lords of Session appointed several of their
number to inspect the registers, in the same way as was done when Sir
Thomas Murray of Glendoik succeeded Sir Archibald Primrose as Lord
Register. The Lords suggested that the King might give exoneration to
Lord Tarbat, and make an Inventory of those portions of the registers
which had been received since the former Inventory was made, and which
had been recorded in the Books of Council and Session for convenience
of reference. The former ignorance of the registers, it is added, was the
1 The Leveu and Melville Papers, p. 53. 3 The Leven and Melville Papers, p. 108,
- Ibid. p. 95. et seq. 4 [bid. p. 125.