was returned as Member of Parliament for Great Bedwyn. In October 1554 he was appointed (with the governors of Ireland) a commissioner to oversee the sale of Crown lands in Ireland, and named to receive the proceeds on behalf of the Crown. In November 1554 he obtained the seat at Dunwich, and in 1555 that of Dover where he was nominated by Sir Thomas Cheney. He remained Vice-Treasurer of Ireland in March/April 1555, when he was granted the lordship of Athlone, with custody of the castle there (newly reconstructed by Sir William Brabazon), during pleasure, provided that he found room for the Council there whenever it might visit those parts; his term had ended by September 1555 when he obtained an Order of Council to conduct a naval expedition in the north of Ireland, ostensibly for the purposes of fishing, but really as a pretext for a private-enterprise expedition against Scots intruders from Kintyre, led by one Cole. This expedition took place in 1556. This is probably related to a licence issued in October 1555 to Sir Edmund and six others, their servants, factors and attorneys, to buy and convey 300 tuns of wine in vessels of any parts in amity with the kingdom. He appears then to have maintained royal favour, for Robert Wingfield of Brantham (who calls him "a man ready in service") shows him in attendance upon Mary with Sir Nicholas Hare, Owen Hopton and John Tyrrell, and reports his appointment as submarshal when Henry Bedingfeld was Knight Marshal. This was during that interval in the long service of Ralph Hopton as Knight Marshal between 1556 and 1558, whose staunch Protestantism became irreconcileable with that position in the household. Despite his absences from Parliament Rous suffered little distraint on that account during Mary's reign, but his costs rose against him. In 1557 he was awarded 1,000 marks in respect of his rights in the manor of Okenhill at Badingham, payable by the Duke of Norfolk's executors, and this together with manors in Kent and debts owing to him in Ireland were granted by Edmund to Philip and Mary in respect of his debt to them of £3,420. Last years In 1559 he sat for the last time for Dunwich, and in the following years he was encumbered by debt, and pursued suits. It was found in 1561 that he had overvalued two of his Kentish manors when