THE FIRST DUTCH WAR 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 Common- 

 wealth might, by declaring the Prince of Orange himself 

 its enemy, demand his expulsion from the Provinces. 1 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 



1 Narrative of the Ambassadors (ibid.) Geddes, op. cit., 157, 159, 165, 171. 

 Gardiner, op. cit., 359, 362, 363. Tideman, De Zee Betwist : Oeschiedenis der 

 "nilfrkandelingen over de Zeeheerschappij tusschen de Engelsche Republiek en de 

 Vereeniyde Provincien v66r den ersten Zee-Oorlog, 39-47. Thurloe's Collections, 

 i. 176, 179, 181-186, 188, 193. Aitzema, Saken van Staet en Oorlogh, 657-660. 



