THE SECOND DUTCH WAR 



465 



eminence in this matter, especially by insisting that English 

 vessels should return the salute by lowering their flag. 1 

 Charles was saved from this humiliation by the good offices 

 of Louis, and the article in the treaty of 1662 was simply 

 repeated in precisely the same words. 2 Another of the mari- 

 time articles gave less contentment in England. We have 

 already seen how persistently the Dutch had struggled in 

 deliberating on the terms of the treaty of 1654 to restrict 

 the application of the term "British Sea" to the Channel. 

 What they were then unable to accomplish was now con- 

 ceded to them. In the usual article about the cessation of 

 hostilities on the sea, it was specified that restitution of 

 prizes should not be made if they were taken " in the Chan- 

 nel or British Sea within the space of twelve days, and the 

 same in the North Sea ; and within the space of six weeks 

 from the mouth of the Channel unto the Cape of St Vincent." 3 

 In the treaty with France, signed at Breda on the same 

 day, the French plenipotentiaries took care that the terms 

 English Channel or British Sea in the corresponding clause 

 were omitted, the neutral if indefinite phrase "the neighbour- 

 ing seas " (maria proximo) being substituted. 4 In the similar 

 treaty with Denmark, the phraseology was even less tender 

 to English susceptibilities namely, "in the Northern Ocean 



1 " Dat de scheepen van oorlois (sic) van den Coninck van Groot Brittannien door 

 die van desen staet met het strijcken van de vlagge gesalveert werdende, van haere 

 sijde vervolgens met het strijcken van haere vlagge contra salueren sullen." Extract 

 from Secret Resolution, States- General, llth May 1667, Instructions to Ambassadors. 

 Treaty Papers (Breda), 1667, Bdl. 73. 



2 Art. xix. See p. 455. Van Beuningen to De Witt, ^ April 1667. De Witt 

 to Van Beuningen, g April, |? June, ^^ 1667. Brieven, ii. 483, 487, 528, 533. 



3 Treaty of Breda, Art. vii. It may have been in connection with the interpre- 

 tation of this clause that the High Court of Admiralty asked the Trinity House 

 their opinion as to the end of the English Channel westwards, and got the following 

 answer: "We shall not presume," said the Masters, on 2nd January 1668, "to 

 determine matters that have for some ages past been controverted, and for any- 

 thing that we at present know have not had a full resolution or any precedent for 

 deciding questions relating thereunto ; " but the opinion of " the past and present 

 age," with which they concurred, was that when any commander brought Scilly 

 N.N.W. he had entered "the Channel of England." Brit. Mus. Add. MSS.. 

 30,221. 



4 Treaty of Peace and Alliance between Charles I. and Louis XIV., concluded at 



Breda, ' July 1667. Article xvii. 



2 G ,>"' *5, 



'? ffiSfci < 



