ir,27.] THE EARL OF MARLBOROUGH. 5 



provide money that they may be speedily repaired. 

 Three days after, Conway wrote to Coke that on the 

 morrow they expected to leave Newmarket, and be at 

 Theobalds the following day, where they would be 

 able " to play their balls with quicker returns." * 



^^^ James Ley — sixth son of Henry Ley, Esq., of Teffont 

 Ewins, county Wilts — having been bred to the bar, and having 

 attained great eminence in his learned profession, was one of 

 the Welsh judges, and in 1603 he had a separate call to the 

 degree of the coif, probably in preparation for holding the 

 office of Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench in Ireland, 

 to which he was appointed in the following year, when he was 

 also knighted. He presided in the Irish court-house for about 

 four years, resigning in December, 1608. Returning to 

 England, he received the profitable place of attorney to the 

 Court of Wards and Liveries, at the same time establishing 

 the right of that officer to take precedence in court of the 

 king's attorney-general, for which he had a privy seal dated 

 May 15, 1609. On the elevation of Sir Francis Bacon to the 

 great seal in 161 7, Sir James was a candidate, in attendance 

 on the court at Newmarket, for the attorney-generalship, and 

 the Duke of Buckingham told Sir Henry Yelverton that he 

 offered ^^ 10,000 for the appointment. Not succeeding in this, 

 he was created a baronet on July 15, 1619. On January 29, 

 1621, he was constituted Lord Chief Justice of the King's 

 Bench. He was then about sixty-nine years of age, and in that 

 year married his third wife, Jane, daughter of John, Lord Butler, 

 by Elizabeth, the sister of the favourite, George Villiers, ist 

 Duke of Buckingham, to whose patronage he probably owed 

 his future advance in life. After performing the duties of his 

 judicial office for nearly four years, he imitated the example 

 of his predecessor, Sir Henry Montagu, by retiring from it 

 and accepting the profitable place of Lord Treasurer on 

 December 20, 1624. On the 31st of the same month he 



* State Papers, Dom., vols. Iv., W\., passim, 



