CHAPTER X.
THE PARLIAMENT, THE COMMONWEALTH, AND THE PROTECTORATE.
THE FIRST DUTCH WAR.

On the 3rd November 1640 the Long Parliament commenced its sittings at Westminster, and within two years thereafter—on 22nd August 1642—Charles raised the royal standard at Nottingham, and initiated the great Civil War. During the period of strife little was heard of the claim to the sovereignty of the sea, although the Parliament continued to issue the usual instructions to the naval commanders to compel homage to the flag. But under the Commonwealth and Protectorate the English pretensions were carried to as high a pitch as ever they were under the Stuarts. The stern men who then guided the destinies of England were as jealous of the symbols of the nation’s greatness as had been the vacillating king they destroyed. In particular, the salutation of the flag was enforced with great vigour. A dispute on the point between Tromp and Blake occasioned the first Dutch war, and the result proved to the world that after all England possessed the actual dominion of the sea by reason of her naval power. In the negotiations with the Dutch which preceded the treaty of peace, we shall find that Cromwell put in the forefront of his conditions the recognition of England’s right to the herring fishery, and to the striking of the flag within the British seas.

At first, as might have been expected from the actions of the king with regard to the ship-money collections, little sympathy was shown by the Parliament for the claim to 379 the sovereignty of the sea. The necessity of maintaining that sovereignty had always been put forward as a principal argument for levying the money, and on that ground it was objectionable to many of those opposed to the king. In a work said to have been presented to the Parliament at its first meeting, forcible opinions were expressed against the pretension. It was doubtful, it was said, whether the sea really belonged to the crown, as the king claimed. Even if it did, it was not apparent that the fate of the land depended upon the dominion of the sea. That dominion might be considered as a right, an honour, or a profit. As a right it was a theme “fitter for scholars to fret their wits upon than for Christians to fight and spill blood about”; as an honour, by making others strike sails to our ships as they passed, it was “a glory fitter for women and children to wonder at than for statesmen to contend about”; as a matter of profit, to fence and enclose the sea, it was of moment, but not more to us than to other nations: by too insolent contentions about it we might provoke God and dishonour ourselves, and rather incense our friends than quell our enemies.680 If such sentiments reflected the feeling of the Parliament at the beginning of their labours, they were not of long duration. Within a few years a change was wrought, which was probably in large measure due to the part taken by the fleet in the struggle with the king, as well as to the abiding spirit of the people for predominant power on the sea.

From an early stage in the conflict the control of the fleet passed into the hands of the Parliament. In the summer of 1642, when the Earl of Northumberland, the Lord High Admiral, was laid aside by illness, the Parliament succeeded, with his connivance and assistance, in placing the Earl of Warwick in actual command; Sir John Pennington, the nominee of Charles, having to stand aside.681 Under the management of its new masters the navy rapidly became a powerful and efficient instrument for the defence of the 380 realm, as was shown at the opening of the Dutch war. The general instructions given by the Parliament to its naval officers respecting the honour of the flag and the sovereignty of the sea were almost identical with those which had been issued to the Earls of Lindsey and Northumberland, but the phraseology was sometimes a little varied. On 5th April 1643 the Parliament, in view of the attempt organised by Queen Henrietta Maria to smuggle into England military supplies from the Netherlands for the use of the royalists, ordered the Earl of Warwick, if he met with “any foreign forces, ships, or vessels, as Spaniards, French, Danes, Dunkirkers, or any other whatsoever, making towards the coasts of England, Ireland, or any other of his Majesty’s dominions,” to command them, “according to the usual manner, to strike their flags or top-sails,” and cause them to be examined and searched for soldiers or munitions of war. If they refused to strike, he was “to compel them thereunto by force of arms and surprise, and to take all such ships and vessels, or otherwise to burn, sink, or destroy them.”682 In the following year the Committee for the Admiralty instructed Vice-Admiral Batten, who was in command of the fleet, “upon all occasions, as you shall be able, to maintain the Kingdom’s sovereignty and regality in the seas.”683

In the spring of 1647, the Committee of the Admiralty, for some reason or other, appears to have devoted special attention to the question of the flag and the sovereignty of the sea. Collections were made from the Admiralty archives of precedents showing that all ships refusing to strike in English waters were to be reputed enemies, and were liable to forfeiture,—the examples beginning with the Ordinance of King John and ending with the instructions issued by Charles.684 These collections were probably made in connection with the instructions which the Committee drew up at this time for the guidance of the captains and officers of the navy, and which were essentially similar to those given 381 by Charles to his ship-money fleets. “It must be your principal care,” they ran, “to preserve the honour of this kingdom, and the coasts, jurisdictions, territories, and subjects thereof, being in amity with the Parliament, and within the extent of your employment, as much as in you lieth; that no nation or people whatsoever intrude thereon or injure any of them. And if you chance to meet in any of the seas that are under the jurisdiction of England, Scotland, and Ireland, with any ships or fleets belonging to any foreign prince or state, you must expect that they, in acknowledgment of this kingdom’s sovereignty there, shall perform their duty and homage in passing by, in striking their top-sails and taking in their flags.” If they refused they were to be forced to do so in the usual way. It will be noticed that the region within which foreigners were to be compelled to strike was greatly extended by the Parliament. Up to and including the reign of James the “acknowledgment” was confined to the narrow seas, in which it had been exacted for centuries; Charles in 1635 ordered Lindsey to compel it “in his Majesty’s seas,” and now the Parliament extended it specifically to all the seas under the jurisdiction of England, Scotland, and Ireland. From a clause in the instructions it is clear that the seas over which the Parliament claimed sovereignty reached to the coasts of the Continent; but a territorial limit was excepted on foreign coasts. The clause in question enjoined the naval officers “to be very careful not to meddle with any ships within the harbours, or ports, or under the command of any of the castles of any foreign prince or state, or within any buoys (Buoyes) or rivers, that they may have no just cause of offence.” Another feature of these instructions is of interest. The clause which was inserted in the instructions to Lindsey and Northumberland in 1635, 1636, and 1637, commanding them to prevent all hostilities between men-of-war or merchant vessels in the presence of the king’s ships, was repeated.685 382 The Parliament clearly intended to abate no jot of the pretensions which had been put forward by the king.

An opportunity soon came for putting the instructions regarding the flag into force. In May of the same year a Swedish fleet of fifteen sail, consisting of ten merchantmen bound for the Mediterranean and five ships of war convoying them, was met by Captain Owen in the Henrietta Maria off the Isle of Wight. On being called upon to strike, the Swedes refused, declaring that they had been commanded by the Queen of Sweden “not to strike to any whatsoever.” Owen, reinforced by Batten, thereupon attacked them, the fight continuing till night. The Swedes suffered much loss; the colours of their vice-admiral and rear-admiral were shot away, a “great breach” was made in the vice-admiral’s ship, and their vessels were captured and taken into Portsmouth. They were afterwards released, but the Admiralty Committee expressed the opinion that the proceedings of their officers “in order to the maintenance of the kingdom’s sovereignty at sea” were to be commended, and this resolution was reported to both Houses of Parliament.686 The question of the salute between ships of war of different nations had been brought to the front in most other maritime countries by the forcible measures taken by Charles in 1633 and later. Two years before the encounter with the Swedes in the Channel, Denmark and Sweden had regulated the ceremony, as affecting their own ships of war, in the treaty of peace then concluded between them.687

From this time until shortly before the war with the Dutch there is little to record about the claims to the dominion of the sea. In 1649, the instructions issued to Popham, Blake, and Dean, the commanders of the fleet, included the guarding of the North Sea and the mackerel-fishing, as well as the maintenance “of the sovereignty of the Commonwealth in the sea,” all in the prescribed form.688 In the following year the Council of State issued express commands to Blake on the subject when he was ordered to proceed against Prince Rupert and the revolted ships at Lisbon. The dominion of “these seas,” they said, had anciently and time out of mind belonged to the English 383 nation, and the ships of all other nations in acknowledgment of that dominion had been accustomed to take down their flags “upon sight” of the Admiral of England, and not to bear them in his presence. Blake was therefore, to the best of his powers, and “as he found himself and the fleet of strength and ability,” to do his utmost endeavours to preserve the dominion of the sea, and to cause the ships of all other nations to strike their flags and keep them in in his presence, and to compel such as were refractory, by seizing their ships and sending them into port, to be punished according to the “laws of the sea,” unless they, submitted and made such reparation as he required. At the same time, although the dominion of the sea was so ancient and indubitable, and it concerned the honour and reputation of the nation to uphold it, Blake was not to imperil his fleet over it in the expedition on which he was employed. If he was opposed in the question of the flag by a force so considerable as to prove dangerous, he was not to press it, but to note who they were that refused, so that they might be forced to strike at some better opportunity.689

Such were the instructions of the Government to the English naval commanders, and they were soon to bear bitter fruit. At this period the Dutch men-of-war apparently did not show unwillingness to salute the English flag, even sometimes in distant seas. Penn notes in his journal, on 13th September 1651, that on meeting with the Dutch Admiral with his vice- and rear-admirals between Cape Trafalgar and Cape Sprat, they struck their flags to him and saluted; but they then hoisted them, which would have been contrary to the custom in the narrow sea, and Penn thereupon called his captains together for advice, but they said the Dutch “had done enough.” A little later he records that young Tromp, convoying thirteen merchantmen, came into Gibraltar Road, where Penn was lying, with his flag in the main-top. The English Admiral, however, did nothing, since Tromp was in a port of the King of Spain. Shortly afterwards in the same place eight sail of Hollanders, four of which were men-of-war, all struck their flags and saluted the English fleet.690

The claims of England to the sovereignty of the seas were 384 now about to enter on a new phase, which culminated in the first Dutch war. So long as the ambitious and energetic Prince William II. of Orange was alive, the relations between the United Provinces and the Parliament were strained and menacing. The States-General, under Orange influence, refused to enter into diplomatic communication with the English Government, or to admit their ambassador, Strickland, to audience. The execution of Charles I. had raised strong feelings of reprobation and horror in the Netherlands, even amongst the Hollanders and Zealanders, who sympathised with the Puritans; and it was believed in England that the Prince of Orange was contemplating war against them for the restoration of his brother-in-law, Charles II., to the throne. The death of the Prince, on 27th October 1650, produced a great change. It was followed by a political revolution in the United Provinces, the chief outcome of which was the predominance of the States of Holland and of the party opposed to the Orange faction, and most favourably inclined to maintain good relations with the English Commonwealth.691 It was therefore agreed at The Hague to send back Joachimi, who had been dismissed by the Parliament in the previous year, with credentials as ambassador from the States-General to the Parliament.

In London the accession to power of the republican party in the Netherlands had been watched with keen interest. The time, it was believed, was come for a close alliance between the two great Protestant Republics for safeguarding their religious and political liberties; perhaps, it was thought by some, for even a closer union than was implied in the strictest alliance known to diplomacy. The Parliament accordingly lost no time in opening negotiations with the States-General. On 17th March, 1651, Lord Chief-Justice St John and Walter Strickland entered The Hague with great pomp and splendour as ambassadors from the Commonwealth, attended by an imposing retinue of 246 persons. They were greeted in the street with insulting cries from Orange partisans and royalist refugees. On the following days their suite only ventured abroad in parties, and with their rapiers in their hands. The 385 ambassadors themselves were openly jeered at, and threatened by Prince Edward, son of Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia; and though the States-General received them with ostentatious courtesy, and prompt measures were taken to suppress the disorders and insults, the conditions of their surroundings produced irritation and impatience in their minds, with important results in the sequel.692 The principal object of the Parliament was to make use of the Dutch Republic to help them to maintain the Commonwealth, and to resist any attempt to place Charles II. on the throne. In return they were willing to aid the Republic against the House of Orange or any other inclined to disturb it.

St John had with him two series of propositions,—one relating to a strict alliance and union; the other, private and never fully disclosed, included a novel scheme for the coalescence and fusion of the two states and peoples, on the lines propounded by the Council of State in the following year. He brought out his propositions one by one, requiring categorical acceptance of each before dealing with the next, the design being to lead step by step to the proposals for coalescence and fusion. His first proposition was in substance for “a more strict and intimate alliance and union” than any before, by which there might be “a more intrinsical and mutual interest of each in other” for the good of both.693 After some fencing and much hesitation and delay—the Dutch proferring a qualified acceptance, which the ambassadors rejected—a guarded assent was 386 given. St John, though not satisfied, thinking the “manner of penning the answer was dark and doubtful,” “determined to proceed into some further thing which might come nearer to make a discovery of their temper and inclination in point of their neutrality, than stay any longer upon general terms,” and he accordingly at the same meeting submitted another proposition requiring the confederation of the two states for the defence and preservation of the freedom and liberty of the people of each against all that might attempt to disturb them, or that were declared to be enemies to the freedom and liberty of the people living under either Government.694 The Dutch commissioners, however, declared that this was a general proposition, and they insisted on a request they had made from the first, to be furnished with the “particulars”—they wanted the particulars, simul et semel, that were intended to be insisted upon.

The negotiations had been protracted. By this time a month had elapsed since the ambassadors arrived, and St John, now conscious that his mission for coalescence would fail, and irritated by the indignities to which he had been subjected, obtained an order from the Parliament for his recall. At the urgent entreaty of the States of Holland the Parliament allowed their ambassadors to stay for other forty days, and also gave them authority to treat on the basis of the old Intercursus Magnus of 1496, which the Dutch had suddenly proposed. The States, in truth, had totally different aims from the Commonwealth. They were thinking about their commerce, their navigation, and their fisheries, rather than about the repression of “rebels”; and they desired that their alliance with England should confirm and extend the benefits conferred upon them in these respects by the old treaty. The Intercursus Magnus had for generations been the sheet-anchor of Dutch policy towards England. It gave them the utmost freedom of commercial intercourse, and complete liberty of 387 fishing on the English coasts. But it contained other clauses appropriate in spirit to the political conditions of 1651. The treaty had been concluded by Henry VII. in the year in which apprehensions were entertained that Perkin Warbeck would effect a landing in England; it provided for mutual military aid against the enemies of either country, and the expulsion of rebels and fugitives from the territories of the other. St John naturally took the clauses embodying these stipulations as the basis of his new draft articles, which he submitted to the Dutch commissioners on 10th May. They were seven in number. The first required that the proposition made on 17th April for mutual defence of the freedom and liberty of each people should be an article of the treaty. The second provided that neither party should afford any aid or favour to any one whomsoever to the injury or prejudice of the other, but should expressly oppose “and really hinder all whomsoever,” abiding in either commonwealth or under its power, that should do or attempt anything against the other; and the remaining articles were of similar tenour, relating to “rebels” and enemies. They were, in short, political articles of the most comprehensive scope, aimed against the royalists; so comprehensive and thorough that the English Commonwealth might, by declaring the Prince of Orange himself its enemy, demand his expulsion from the Provinces.695 St John’s articles were by no means to the liking of the Dutch; and though he pointed out that they were “but a translation of the old treaty, only enlarged for the better assurance of performance,”—the treaty which they themselves had proposed as the basis for the new one,—they insisted on sending the articles to the various Provinces for their opinion. For a full month the English ambassadors waited without an answer to their articles—a delay which they believed was meant “to spin out the treaty until the Scotch mist was over” and the result of the struggle in Scotland apparent. But the Dutch, though slow, had not been idle. On 14th June, when 388 only four of the forty days allotted by the Parliament remained, the Dutch produced counter-proposals in the form of draft articles, thirty-six in number, which were paraphrased from the Intercursus Magnus, the treaty with King James VI. of Scotland in 1594, the treaty of Southampton with Charles in 1625, and the marine treaty with Spain in 1650.

These articles had been submitted by Holland to the convocation of the States-General on 15th May, and were under the consideration of the provincial states for nearly a month. They provided for a “perpetual friendship, unity, correspondence, and a further and nearer alliance, confederation, and union” against all who should attempt anything derogatory to the liberties of the two peoples, their commerce, and common interests; mutual defence and mutual assistance with men and ships against “notorious or known” enemies of the other, and the prohibition of assisting rebels. But there was no article under which the royalists could be expelled from the United Provinces, or which prevented the House of Orange from aiding or harbouring declared rebels of England; and it was expressly stipulated that the States should in no way be drawn into the disputes and war between Scotland and the Parliament. Having thus whittled down the proposals of the Parliament for a close alliance directed against the royalists, the Dutch propounded a whole series of articles providing for the freest commercial intercourse between the two countries, for freedom of navigation and of fishing. The trade to Virginia and the Caribbean Islands, which had been closed by the Parliament, was to be thrown open to both nations; ships were to be free to anchor without seizure of goods; the subjects of one state were not to be taxed higher in the territories of the other than the natives, and they were to be free to carry on their business or profession with the same liberty. A number of articles dealt with questions relative to the sovereignty of the seas, in such a way as to show clearly that the design of the Dutch was to render harmless a pretension which had caused them so much trouble. They had not forgotten the declarations of Charles sixteen years before, or the forceful operations of Northumberland against their herring-busses. With regard to fishing, they wished the subjects of either state to be at liberty to go to any part of the sea to fish for herrings and all other kinds 389 of fish, great or small, without any license or pass being required. If the fishermen were forced by storms, pirates, enemies, or any other cause, to go to land, they desired that they should be courteously received and well treated in the ports of either country, and permitted to depart with their ships and cargoes, and if they had not broken their cargoes, without paying any customs or dues.696 These stipulations paraphrased corresponding provisions in the Intercursus Magnus, and rather more favourably to the Dutch. If they had been accepted, they would have destroyed the English policy which had been pursued, though fitfully, from 1609 to the outbreak of the Civil War, of requiring foreigners to pay tribute and take out licenses for fishing on the British coasts.

Some of the other articles proposed by the Dutch were directed against the claims put forward in Selden’s Mare Clausum, and by Charles himself, to a special dominion and jurisdiction of England in the surrounding seas. If the freedom of commerce and navigation was to be assured, it would be necessary, it was said, for both countries to equip fleets to secure the safety and liberty of the subjects of both, to purge the sea of pirates and sea-rovers, and to preserve the security of commerce and of fishing. The proposition was that each state should set forth a fleet yearly, its strength to be fixed by mutual agreement, and the ocean as well as the North Sea and the Mediterranean, with their straits and channels, were to be patrolled by the two fleets, each under its own admiral and flag. This was in effect asking the Commonwealth not only for equality of sovereignty on the sea, but for the assistance of England in protecting the immense commerce and shipping of the United Provinces. They desired that each nation should shield and defend the merchant vessels of the other, and help to recover them if taken by an enemy.

Among other proposals were that men-of-war, but only in small numbers, should be allowed freely into the ports and havens of the other, and were not to be subjected to visitation and search, the showing of the commission to be sufficient; and that no sea-rovers were to be tolerated in harbours, and no 390 ships with letters of marque allowed to leave without first providing security that they would not exceed their commissions. One of the provisions went much further, and seems to smack of Dutch humour, when we think of the action of James and Charles. For the sake of liberty, both peoples were to use their fleets, not only against pirates, but against all and sundry, whomsoever they might be, who should attempt to molest, hinder, or—“against the right of all peoples”—impose exactions on their commerce, navigation, or their fishery. In such an event, if amicable remonstrances failed, the whole sea forces of each nation were to attack the depredators and wage war against them until complete satisfaction had been obtained.697

So resolved were the Dutch to have a general clearing-up with England on all points concerning the sovereignty of the sea, that they at first proposed to insert among their draft articles one relating to the striking of the flag and similar ceremonies, which frequently gave rise to differences. The States-General, however, considered the matter “too delicate” to be raised at that time, and the article was not inserted.698 Two or three months before this, as elsewhere mentioned (p. 398), the question of striking the flag to the English had been raised and debated in the States-General in connection with Tromp’s expedition to the Scilly Islands.

With the foregoing proposals before him, it is not to be wondered at that St John was dissatisfied, and longed more than ever to get away from The Hague. The Commonwealth had asked for a strict and close alliance at the very least, for the security of religious and political liberty and the common interests of both Republics, but in reality and above all for aid against the royalists. The Dutch also desired security for liberty, but it was chiefly for the liberty of commerce, navigation, and fishing; and they were anxious, if they could, to get rid of the troublesome English pretension to a sovereignty of the sea. The proposals of the two sides were incompatible, and St John left The Hague a few days 391 later with the unuttered plan for the fusion of the nations in his pocket and with bitterness in his heart. His disappointment was to cost the Dutch dear. Within a few months of his return the Navigation Act was passed, mainly by his impulse, and it dealt a serious blow to the commerce of the United Provinces.699 It was the retort of the English Commonwealth to the rebuff of the States. If the Dutch put their commerce and fisheries above everything else, the Parliament would show them how they could injure them and at the same time foster English shipping and fisheries.

But much more than the Navigation Act, some other proceedings of the Parliament increased the tension between the two countries. In November they renewed certain letters of reprisal against the Dutch, under which a few of their vessels were captured. More serious were the actions of English men-of-war and of some privateers who held letters of reprisal against the French. An informal maritime war with France began in 1649 and continued till 1655, and though there was nominally peace, the English captured French vessels, and vice versa. They then began to seize Dutch ships, suspected of having French goods on board, and brought them into English ports for trial in the Admiralty Court. This was an interference with freedom of commerce which the States could not tolerate, and an embassy to England, which had been decided upon after St John left The Hague, was despatched thither.700 The three ambassadors, Cats, Schaep, and van de Perre, arrived in London on 15th December 1651. 392 They were instructed to renew negotiations for a treaty on the basis of the thirty-six articles, to endeavour to get the Navigation Act repealed, the captured vessels released, and the letters of reprisal withdrawn, with compensation for the losses suffered by reason of them. The question of adding another article to their instructions, about the striking of the flag, which had been omitted from the thirty-six articles, had again been considered. But, for the same reason as before, it was withheld. “The carrying or striking of the flags by the one side or the other” was judged to be “very delicate”; and it was decided (on 10th November 1651) that the States-General should deliberate further on the matter, and send later to the ambassadors such instructions “as should be found suitable for the removal of misunderstandings and hostilities.”701 We thus see that in 1651 the Government of the United Provinces was fully alive to the risks and difficulties about the flag. But from their proceedings at this time it would seem that they were unwilling to acknowledge unreservedly the claim of the Commonwealth to the salute, which was looked upon as a symbol of England’s sovereignty of the sea. The question was only rendered “delicate” because of certain qualifications and conditions of reciprocity which they desired to attach to it, and for which they struggled hard with Cromwell during the subsequent negotiations for peace.

The ambassadors had an audience with the Parliament on 19th December,—Cats treating the members to a long and flowery oration in Latin,—and with the Council of State on 1st January 1652; but it was not until the 16th that commissioners were appointed to deal with them. The English commissioners702 showed no anxiety to facilitate the negotiations. The spirit with which they were animated was evident from their eagerness to bring forward all imaginable reasons for dispute,—the interest taken by the Dutch in the fate of Charles I.; the partiality of some of their ambassadors at foreign Courts; their refusal to receive Strickland; and so forth. In the end, the Dutch ambassadors failed to get what they wanted. The English refused to cancel or modify the Navigation Act, to release the captured ships before the cases 393 had been tried in the Admiralty Court, or to make reparation. They suspended the letters of direct reprisal against the Dutch, but not those against the French, which were by far the more important.

It was felt in Holland that such interference with their trade could not be endured. There were loud complaints about the seizure of the ships, and the opinion was growing in the Netherlands that it was the intention of the Commonwealth to force a war upon them. As a precautionary measure the States-General decided on 22nd February to add 150 ships to the existing fleet, “for the security of the sea and the preservation of the shipping and commerce of the United Provinces”; and the ambassadors were requested to inform the English Council of their intention, which was done on 5th March, with the explanation that it was not with the object of doing the slightest harm to any nation, and least of all to England, that the increase in the fleet was to be made, but only to preserve their freedom of navigation.703 As this extraordinary addition to the navy of the Dutch Republic would raise it to the formidable number of 226 ships, it is not surprising that the proceeding was viewed in England as a preparation for war. The Council, on their part, put forward a series of more or less provoking claims. They demanded reparation for wrongs and losses suffered by the English at the hands of the Dutch at “Greenland” in 1618, in the East Indies since 1619, and at Brazil; and they complained of various other wrongs and affronts they had suffered. But pending an answer from the States-General to their complaints and requests, they agreed, on 3rd May, to discuss with the ambassadors the thirty-six articles.

These articles had been previously considered by the Council of State, which had prepared a commentary on them; and now both documents were taken up together. On the proposals concerning the sovereignty of the sea many differences arose. With regard to the right of the English to visit and search vessels, men-of-war as well as merchantmen, the ambassadors referred to the edicts of the States forbidding warships to take merchandise on board, and to the certificates of their Admiralty to the same effect; but it was argued on the other side that 394 these measures had not stopped the abuse, and that the visitation was not prejudicial; and no agreement on this clause was reached. The commentary of the Council on the fishery article (see p. 388) was that, saving and asserting the right of the Commonwealth, they would be willing to proceed to such an agreement as should be found fit and reasonable; while the Dutch took their stand on the provision in the Intercursus Magnus, and urged that it would be unjust to deviate from an agreement which had endured for a century and a half. It was admitted by the English commissioners that the treaty gave liberty of fishing, but they asserted that long before the time of Henry VII. the right to the fisheries and to the sovereignty of the sea belonged to England. It had, moreover, been impeached by succeeding kings and especially by James, to whom, as King of Scotland, the right to the fishery pertained; while after the union of the crowns he pursued the same policy as King of England, and now that Scotland had been brought under the dominion of the English Republic, it was thought that the best course was to make a new treaty about the fisheries.704 The ambassadors could obtain no definite information as to the nature of the treaty proposed, but it would not be difficult for them to comprehend its general tenour, for they had to listen to the recital of the “evidences” that England had constantly made use of her rights in the fishery, and of the care she had always exercised as to the sovereignty of the sea. The Dutch endeavoured to avoid mixing up these two questions, pleading that the fishery concerned the lives of a multitude of poor fishermen; but the commissioners retorted that it was a very valuable industry, the right to which belonged to England, and this, they said, had been acknowledged by neighbouring nations paying taxes for liberty to fish in their seas, adding that all peoples had been accustomed to recognise in them the masters of the sea by striking the flag to them, and that the Dutch themselves had earlier instructed their naval officers to salute English ships “cum debita reverentia,” and it was also expressly ordered in the commissions issued by Prince William and Maurice. From 395 the language of the English commissioners, it appears probable that they were acquainted with the proceedings of the States-General as to the proposed article on the striking of the flag, and with the debates in the previous year concerning Tromp’s instructions (see p. 398). The negotiations on the fishery question were not carried further at this st............