214 THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEA 



effort was made to suppress the use of injurious appliances; 

 the strict observance of Lent was repeatedly enjoined. But 

 what proved most attractive was the notion which had haunted 

 men's minds since the time of the Great Queen, and had always 

 eluded realisation. Charles became convinced that the forma- 

 tion of a grand national fishery association would wrest from 

 the Dutch their predominance in the fisheries, drive their busses 

 from our seas, and transfer to the English people the herring- 

 fishing, with all the blessings which flowed from it commerce, 

 wealth, and maritime power. The last attempt which had been 

 made in this direction, in 1623, had, as we saw, signally failed, 

 the Lord Mayor and the opulent aldermen of London 

 "absolutely refusing" to have anything to do with it. The 

 scheme was now, however, to be launched by the king himself, 

 who undertook to favour it with important privileges and im- 

 munities, and intended at a suitable time to aid it by pro- 

 hibiting foreigners from fishing on the British coasts. 



Shortly after Charles began to reign, the old proposals to 

 tax the Dutch were renewed. In 1626 a petition was presented 

 to the House of Commons praying that a duty of 10 per cent 

 might be laid upon all Dutch or foreign ships fishing in the 

 narrow seas; with what result the records are silent. Two 

 years later the proposal got a step further, for in 1628 a Bill was 

 drafted to empower the king to levy two shillings in the pound 

 on all herrings or fish exported in foreign vessels, and the tenth 

 of the fish taken by foreigners in the British seas, the revenue 

 so obtained to be employed for the king's use. The latter sug- 

 gestion looks almost satirical in view of the failure of the many 

 attempts of James to get revenue from that source, and in the 

 midst, too, of the squabbles then occurring between Charles and 

 the Parliament, which refused supplies and was abruptly pro- 

 rogued ; especially as the House " humbly beseeched " him, " in 

 recompense of the great sums which your Commons have thus 

 cheerfully granted," " yearly to provide and maintain a strong 

 fleet of able ships upon the Narrow Seas." 1 



The original plan of the new fishery association was drawn 



1 State Papers, Dom., dxxiii. 74, dxxix. 73. The proposal to utilise the tenth 

 herring for maintaining a navy had been long before put forward by Dr Dee. 

 See p. 101. 



