THE JURIDICAL CONTROVERSIES 373 



labours to show that maritime sovereignty had been con- 

 tinuously exercised within them by the ancient Britons, 

 the Romans, and the Anglo-Saxons in succession, and then 

 by the Norman and later kings. He strove to prove by a 

 multitude of citations from records that the kings of England 

 had perpetually enjoyed exclusive dominion and jurisdiction in 

 the surrounding seas as part of their territory, and were hence 

 styled Lords of the Sea; that they had always preserved the 

 right to forbid fishing and even navigation by foreigners 

 within the British seas, or to exact tribute for that liberty ; 

 that the rights of the crown in the seas, asserted both by 

 kings and Parliaments, were in conformity with the common 

 law of England, and had been in several important respects 

 acknowledged by other nations. A great deal of the evidence 

 adduced is, as has been said, irrelevant. The long recital of 

 facts connected with the guarding of the sea, the disposition 

 of fleets, the office and jurisdiction of the admirals, the rais- 

 ing of special taxes as the Danegeld for defensive purposes 

 or the equipment of ships of war, might have been paralleled 

 in the records of other maritime states, as France or Flanders. 



The maritime sovereignty claimed by Selden for the kings of 

 England was of the most absolute kind. Speaking particularly 

 of the eastern and southern parts of the English sea, lying 

 between England and the shores of France and Germany, 

 in which Charles was especially interested, he declared that 

 the powers exercised by the kings of England from the 

 time of the Norman Conquest were as follows: (1) the custody, 

 government, and admiralty, as if it were a territory or province 

 of the king ; (2) leave of passage granted to foreigners at their 

 request ; (3) liberty of fishing in them conceded to foreigners, 

 and protection afforded to their fishermen ; (4) the prescribing 

 of laws and limits to foreigners in hostility with one another as 

 to the taking of prizes. 1 It is to be noted that Selden in 

 expounding his case expressly rejected the principle of the 

 mid-line, the limits laid down by the Italian writers, and 

 those prescribed by King James in defining the King's 

 Chambers; and he disclaimed the arguments used by the 

 English commissioners at the Bremen Conference in 1602, as 

 to the freedom of the seas, as being contrary to English 



1 Lib. ii. cap. xiii. 



