THE JURIDICAL CONTROVERSIES 367 



Progenitors in the seas which encompass these our Realms and 

 Dominions of Great Britain and Ireland." l 



Selden, as is well known, had taken a prominent part in the 

 Parliament of 1629, in the majority which resisted the king's 

 wishes, and was for a time imprisoned in consequence of his 

 share in the historic disturbances with which it had ended, 

 when the Speaker was held down in the chair. He was 

 released on bail under sureties for good behaviour, and he was 

 bound to present himself, on the motion of the Attorney-General, 

 in the Court of King's Bench, on the first day of each term, as 

 a person under surveillance. 2 Selden was not of the stuff of 

 which martyrs are made. After his release, we find him among 

 the lawyers of the Inns of Court arranging for the masque 

 which was performed before the Court, at Whitehall in Feb- 

 ruary 1634, as a token of the detestation in which they held 

 Prynne's innuendo concerning the queen in his Histriomastix* 

 Towards the end of the same year, in a humble petition to 

 the king ("prostrating myself at the feet of your sacred 

 Majesty"), he begged that the royal displeasure might be 

 removed and the bail discharged, assuring Charles of his 

 readiness to serve him with gladness and affection. In 

 February 1635 the king forwarded to the Judges of the Court 

 of King's Bench a mandate, the draft of which had been 

 prepared by Selden himself, instructing them to discharge 

 him of their recognisances; 4 in August we find the Dutch 

 ambassador writing to The Hague that the book was being 

 printed; 5 and in December of that year it was given to the 

 world. 6 There is little doubt that Selden's petition to the 



1 A Proclamation concerning a book intituled Mare Clausum, 15th April 1636. 

 Padera, xx. 12. 

 3 State Papers, Dom. , cclxxiii. 30 ; cclxxvi. 58. 



3 Gardiner, Hist., vii. 330. Poor Prynne, who lost both his ears on this 

 occasion, and had his books burned under him in the pillory, became later an 

 ardent defender of the king's dominion in the seas in the reign of Charles II., 

 when he held the office of Keeper of the Records. 



4 State Papers, Dom., cclxxvi. 58 ; cclxxxiii. 96-98. 



5 Brit. Mus. Add. MSS., 17,677, 0, fol. 367. Joachimi to the States-General, 



j5 Aug. 1635. " Het boeck Seldeni getituleert, soo ich hoore, mare clausum, is 

 onder den druck deur ordre van den Coningh." 



' Joannis Seldeni Mare Clausum seu de Dominio Maris, Libri Duo. Primo, 

 Mare, ex Jure Naturce seu Gentium, omnium hominum non esse Commune, sed 



