THE PEACE NEGOTIATIONS 423 



' were also interested, who would condemn the English Govern- 

 ment for their extravagant claims to special maritime rights 

 and to the fishery. Their conclusions were embodied in a 

 paper which was submitted to the Council of State on 22nd 

 November. In this they said that the visiting and searching 

 of merchant vessels and ships of war was contrary to the 

 practice of the United Provinces, was subject to innumerable 

 disorders and disputes, and was injurious in point of sover- 

 eignty, since it was not reciprocal. As to the fishery, they 

 declared that they had been in immemorial possession of 

 complete liberty of fishing. They denounced the article 

 concerning the limitation of the number of their ships of 

 war, which they said they could hardly persuade themselves 

 had been put forward seriously, since it struck at the root 

 of their existence as an independent sovereign state, and 

 they declined to discuss it. 1 



Cromwell throughout the whole negotiations, until he became 

 Lord Protector, acted as spokesman for the Council at the 

 conferences; and he now stated that the visitation of Dutch 

 ships was an undoubted right of sovereignty possessed by the 

 English Commonwealth. The limitation of their ships of 

 war passing through the British seas was also a consequence 

 of the same right of dominion ; and the English had now 

 more than ever reason to maintain it, both on account of their 

 ancient prerogative and the recent injuries committed by the 

 Dutch. The right to the fishery was of the same nature. No 

 other nation in Europe had attempted to carry it on without 

 the consent of England; the Dutch were the only people, he 

 said, who sought a separate interest in it a statement which 

 was quite inaccurate. But the deputies took their stand on 

 the obnoxious article which proposed to clip their naval power 

 and interfere with their liberty of navigation, and threatened 

 to return home unless it was withdrawn. After standing firm 

 for a time Cromwell withdrew the article, asserting at the 

 same time that England had jurisdiction on both sides of the 

 sea, and that it was perilous to allow a fleet of sixty or eighty 

 men-of-war to come into our rivers or ports without our know- 

 ledge or consent, a reference, no doubt, to Tromp's action 

 before the war. 



1 Verbael, 216, 219. 



