But on this subject it may be remarked that the policy of the British government in thus forcing the coronets of feudal nobility upon the unwilling brows of Celtic chieftains, whether in Scotland or in Ireland, has never yet been sufficiently understood. It was an essential part of the invariable British system of forcing its own form of social polity upon every part of the three kingdoms, as each part fell successively under English dominion. It was necessary, as Sir John Davies, Attorney-General for Ireland under James the First, declares, to abolish what he calls the "scambling possession" which Irish chiefs and clansmen had in their lands, and compel them to hold those lands by "English tenure;" in other words, that the chiefs should become _landlords_ or proprietors of those districts which had formed the tribe-lands of their clans, and that their clansmen should become tenants subject to _rent_, which, in the seventeenth century, had grown to be a commutation for all feudal services. In short, the problem to be solved was to force in the already corrupt and oppressive feudal polity (which had long lost its true uses and significance) upon the free system of clanship, the ancient and natural social arrangement of the Irish and Scottish Gaël. Neither did that plan, of obliging chiefs to become noblemen--and therefore both vassals and landlords--originate with Elizabeth and James, nor with Sir John Davies. King Henry the Eighth, a century earlier, offered to Con O'Neill, the chief of that day, the dignity of earl, which Con accepted as a delicate attention from a foreign monarch, but took care to be a chief in Tyrone--no vassals, no tenants, no "English tenure" _there_. The O'Brien of Thomond, however, upon that earlier occasion, did lay down at King Henry's feet his dignity of Chief _Dalcais_, and arose Earl of Thomond; his son was made Baron of Inchiquin; and the MacGilla Phadruig consented to become "Fitzpatrick" and Baron of Upper Ossory. For their compliance, they were rewarded with the spoils of the suppressed monasteries of their respective countries--places which their own fathers had founded and endowed for pious uses.