State), prospected for copper and alum in Ireland, and in 1584 published A Short Discourse of the most rare Vertue of Nitre (Gerald Dewes, London), a practical work in advance of the age. Having a great interest in the study of plants, he recognised that certain plants grew wherever the minerals responsible for the formation of alum were present in the soil. From this he recognised that the rock from which the alum was made was similar to that abundant in several areas in and around his cousin's Guisborough estate, in present day Redcar and Cleveland. In 1606-07 Sir Thomas went into partnership with Sir David Foulis and with Lord Sheffield and Sir John Bourchier, obtaining a monopoly for 31 years of manufacture in northern England. In time an industry was developed, but the tradition that Chaloner secretly brought some of the Pope's workmen to England for this purpose may be unfounded. Once the alum industry around Whitby had taken root, the English Crown imposed its own monopoly – imports from abroad were banned. Although the methods were laborious, England became self-sufficient in alum. In James I's time Chaloner's works suffered from acute unprofitability, frequent changes of management and claims of corrupt dealing. The king prohibited the importation of foreign alum. Under Charles I the crown claimed them as royal mines, and they were granted to Sir Paul Pindar for £12,500 a year to the king and £2,240 to Edmund, Earl of Mulgrave and another, and after paying eight hundred workmen still produced an immense profit. Jacobean period Towards the end of Elizabeth's reign, at the instance of Sir Robert Cecil, afterwards Earl of Salisbury, Chaloner went into Scotland, where he became so great a favourite with King James VI of Scotland that even Sir Francis Bacon sought his recommendation. Chaloner attended James on his journey to take possession of the English throne, and on the arrival at York headed the deputation to the mayor. Queen Anne gave him the management of her private estate, and the king appointed him governor of the king's eldest son Prince Henry in 1603. Chaloner was to form the household into what the king called "a courtly college", and no gentleman could take the prince out without his consent. For his services as the head official of the 420 servants of the prince his "wages and diet" were £66 13s. 4d. a year. In