PREFACE xi 



be also the protesting King of Denmark. It was 

 Elizabeth not Grotius that first gave support 

 to the doctrine of the Freedom of the Seas 

 in the true and literal sense of the words. But 

 the meaning of the words as used by the jurist is 

 entirely different from that implied by our 

 enemies in 1917. German and Austria are 

 in fact employing the phrase " Freedom of the 

 Seas " in a manner diametrically opposed to the 

 meaning put upon it in the sixteenth and 

 seventeenth centuries, possibly with the inten- 

 tion of confusing the issue at an opportunity 

 convenient to themselv^. Until war was 

 declared in 1914 the high seas were perfectly 

 free to the passage of all in the precise sense 

 of the words ''''Mare liberum,^' as understood 

 and used by Elizabeth and Grotius and by 

 the French in the time of Napoleon. Now, 

 as far as Britain is at all events concerned, 

 the phrase " Freedom of the Seas " is for the 

 most part endowed by our enemies with a 

 meaning contrary to the original sense. Let 

 there be no mistake about it. It is beyond 

 dispute that the sense in which the words 

 were understood by Grotius obtained till the 

 outbreak of the war, but it seems that 

 since then the expression is intended by our 

 enemies to include their right to sow mines 

 in the seas in time of war, and this view of 

 their case is supported by the reports of the 

 proceedings at the Second Hague Conference 

 in 1907. Our enemies would also force us to 



