368 THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEA 



king and its favourable reception covered the negotiations 

 concerning the completion and publication of Mare Clausum, 

 which were carried on under the auspices of certain eminent 

 personages at Court, and probably of Laud. 1 He tells us that 

 the early work was very imperfect, and required to be com- 

 pletely reconstructed, and that he was able to devote some 

 months of leisure to the task. But even Selden's extraordinary 

 erudition and great industry could not have produced such a 

 book without prolonged labour; and it may be guessed that, 

 observing the trend of the king's policy and becoming desirous 

 of royal favour, he began to reconstruct his treatise very soon 

 after leaving prison. 



The political significance of Selden's work was instantly 

 recognised both at home and abroad. It appeared at the time 

 when the pretensions of Charles to the dominion of the sea 

 were astonishing Europe. While the printers were still busy 

 with it, the Earl of Lindsey's fleet was scouring the Channel 

 to force the elusive squadrons of France to strike to the king's 

 flag. The longing to compel homage to the flag burned like 

 a fever in the breasts of naval officers ; and despatches poured 

 in from them announcing that Dutch, Danish, and even occa- 

 sionally French, ships had been forced to strike, sometimes in 

 their own waters. The supposed policy of the Plantagenets 

 had been expounded in high-sounding despatches to foreign 

 Courts, and formulated in Admiralty instructions. The Dutch 

 fisheries had been threatened ; and it was known everywhere 

 that the King of England was preparing a formidable fleet to 

 sweep the seas in the following year. 



Charles did what he could to emphasise the importance of 

 the book. When a pirated edition appeared within a few 

 .months at Amsterdam, bearing the name of the king's printers 

 and the word London in imitation of the original edition, and 

 with a print of the great Burgundy treaty, the Intercursus 

 Magnus, and a tract appended by way of antidote, he com- 



Dominii privata seu Proprietatis capax, pariter ac Tellurem, esse demonstratur. 

 Secundo, Serenissimum Magnse Britannise Regem Maris circumflui, ut individuse 

 atque perpetuse Imperil Britannici appendicis, Dominum esse, asseritur. Pontus 

 quoque Serviet Illi. Londini, excudebat Will. Stanesbeius, pro Richardo Meighefl, 

 MDCXXXV. The Preface is dated at the Temple, 4th November 1635. 

 1 Vindicice, "proceres apud regem prsepollentes." 



