them above other Nations but since they break out like an Inundation and with a drawn Sword declare prodigious Principles of Enmitie against the Rights and Liberties of England it is presumed a thing unquestionable that due Defences ought to be made till they bee reduced within their antient Limits For if they should bee permitted in the least to Lord it at Sea as they want not will and advantages and have given you experience of their encroaching and ambitious temper so it 's to bee feared they would bee ever seeking opportunitie to impose a Lord upon you by Land May you go on therefore Right honorable as you have begun and do and the God of Heaven go along w th you upon terms of honor Justice in such a way that men may understand as you will do no wrong at what rate they must offend you Not onely our eies but the eies of all the world are fixt upon the carriage and conduct of this noble enterprise by Sea when you have acquitted your selvs there as no doubt you will do having alreadie given the same demonstrations of wisdom and courage that you have don by Land your Wars through God's blessing will at once bee ended It will draw such a reverence repute to your affairs that men will beware how they provoke you and your worst enemies despair of any future opportunitie The late Engagements Successes of your Fleets at Sea have shewn that the great God hath owned you there That hee hath not left you destitute of means That the old English bloud sens of honor run's still in the veins of your Sea-men and thereby given you to understand that hee who hath appeared so gloriously for you in the midst of wondrous difficulties by Land will also manifest his wonders in the Deep to make a final Accomplishment of the good VVork by Sea and beeing himself alone invested with the absolute Soveraigntie of Sea Land bee pleased to continue you and your Successors his Lievtenants in both for the establishment of this Common-wealth in a plenarie possession of its Rights and Liberties to all Posteritie I am in my praiers and endeavors RIGHT HONORABLE Your Honor 's most humble and faithful Servant Marchamont Nedham November 19. 1652. THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE SOm things there are that I thought fit here to forewarn the Reader part whereof may bee necessarie even for those who are in other things very well instructed The rest likewise not unprofitable for them who while they salute Books by the way are wont through a customarie vice of temeritie to stumble in the verie Threshold Those things concern either the place of such Testimonies as are alleged or som Circumstances of the Sea-Dominion which is proved or the Title of the Work Among Testimonies besides such as are in Print and Manuscripts reserved in private men's Libraries there are not a few especially in the second Book brought out of Records or publick Monuments whose credit I suppose every indifferent Judg of matters will as once the Senate of Rome did allow better than other Witnesses at least if there bee any difference and therefore full Those which lie in private men's Libraries you will finde where they are kept in the Margin If omitted there they are in my own But as to the Testimonies taken often out of publick Records som likewise have the Place either of the Archive or Rolls or the name of the Record-keeper's Office so noted in the Margin that thereby you may know immediately where to finde them But som of these Records that are very frequently cited have no place at all nor any name of the Record-keeper expressed but the King for the most part and the Year besides the name of the Court-Roll are only noted As many as are of this kinde do relate som to those years that pass betwixt the beginning of the reign of King John and the end of Edward the Fourth others to those years that succeed down to our time They which are of the former sort having no place nor name of the Record-keeper noted are kept in the Archive of the Tower of London but those of the latter sort in the Chappel of the Rolls It had been too slight a matter to have signified thus much here to such as are acquainted with our English Records becaus by the very name of the Court-Roll as Rotulorum Patentium Rotulorum Clausorum Rotulorum Parlâ—mentariorum Rotulorum Franciae Vasconiae Alemanniae and others of that kinde which are Records belonging to the English Chancerie and by the name of the King the very place also of the Records is sufficiently known But it is necessarie to premise this in the first place as well for the sakes of my own Countrie-men who have been Strangers to the Rolls as in the behalf of Foreiners to the end that if either of them perhaps have a minde exactly to consult the Original of any testimonie thence alleged they might when the Places are so described the more conveniently do it themselvs at their own leasure if present or if absent obtein it by the assistance of friends For the Record-keepers who have a special care to preserv them safely do usually give admittance at seasonable hours to all that pleas to consult them and have them so placed as Justinian commanded concerning the Records of the Empire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they may easily bee found by them that search As to what concern's the aforesaid circumstances of Sea-Dominion whereas there are two Propositions here so far as the term may bee born in things of a civil nature made evident The one That the Sea by the Law of Nature or Nations is not common to allmen but capable of private Dominion or proprietie as well as the Land The other That the King of Great Britain is Lord of the Sea flowing about as an inseparable and perpetual Appendant of the British Empire it is not to bee conceived that any other kinde either of Causes or Effects of Sea-Dominion are here admitted than such as have been of the Dominion of an Island Continent Port or any other Territorie whatsoëver or Province which is wont to bee reckoned in the Royal Patrimonie of Princes Nor that a less Dominion of the Sea than of the Land is derived from the nature of the Law received among Nations about the acquiring of Dominion and of Justice it self as from the Causes nor that the Effects thereof are any other than what are variously subservient to Compacts Agreements Leagues and Treaties Constitutions or Prescriptions of servitudes and other things of that nature in the same manner as the effects of Dominion by Land And therefore hee said well of old Nunc jam cessit Pontus Omnes Patitur leges The Seals now made appropriate And yield's to all the Laws of state That is to say all which are admitted in any other kinde of Territories according to the difference of things persons
form of Donation And therefore that is very vain which is objected by som That the Earth is given to the children of men but that the Sea belong's onely to God himself as if Dominion not common indeed but onely a common use of the Sea were permitted by the words of holy Scripture And as if it were not said in like manner The Earth is the Lord's and fulness thereof The tops of the Hills are his also Who know's not that such sayings as these cannot in any wise weaken the Dominion of Mankinde For whatsoëver is acquired by men still God Almightie as Father of the Univers retein's his supreme Dominion both over men as also all other Things which never was denied yet by any sober man But the Controversie is about the Dominion of man to wit that which comprehend's any enjoiment or proprietie whatsoëver saving still that right of the Dominion of God which cannot bee diminished And the distinction about this matter is very ordinarie in the Schools According to the first sort of Dominion nothing whatsoëver much less may the Sea belong unto men According to the second all things indeed are or may bee theirs which can bee apprehended seized and possessed And moreover that in the old Testament express mention is made more then once of such a Seisure possession or private Dominion as this whereof wee Treat and that as of a Thing lawfully brought in use There wee finde that the men of Tyre were Lords and Masters of the Phaenician and the Egyptians of the Alexandrian Sea Concerning the Phaenician saith the Prophet unto Tyrus All the Princes of the Sea shall com down from their Thrones c. And they shall take up a lamentation for thee and say to thee how art thou destroyed that wast inhabited of Seafaring men the renowned Citie which wast strong in the Sea Here the Dominion of the Tyrians at Sea is plainly set forth And in the following Chapter Thy Borders are in the midst or heart of the Sea as wee read it in the Hebrew and also in an Arabian Manuscript which render's it to the same purpose For both the Greek and vulgar Translation differ there from the Original It follow 's also thus All the Ships of the Sea with their Mariners were thine to occupie thy Merchandize In stead of which last words these are put in the Greek Copies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even Westward of the West or through a great part of the main or Western Sea that is the Phaenician or Syrian Again Becaus thine heart is lifted up and thou hast said I am a God I sit in the seat of God in the mid'st of the Sea Hee threaten's not the Tyrian becaus hee had gotten him a Dominion over the neighboring Sea but becaus beeing lifted up with pride hee had taken unto himself the name of God The Tyrian is called likewise in another Scripture the Sea it self and the strength of the Sea But concerning the Egyptian Sea another Prophet speak's thus unto Ninive Art thou better then populous Alexandria in the Original the Citie is called No taken here for Alexandria which is situate among the Rivers that hath the waters round about it whose Riches and strength as it is in the Hebrew or as the Greek render's it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is whose Empire or Dominion is the Sea Moreover it seem's to make mention of Kings of the Sea as well as of Islands The Kings of Tarshish and of the Isles shall bring presents For Tarshish or Tharsis in Hebrew signifieth the Sea as it is often confessed both by the Greek and Chaldee Interpreters Although Munster a man otherwise very learned speak's unadvisedly upon the fore-mention'd place and will not have Tharsis there to signifie the Sea becaus saith hee Kings have nothing to do at Sea but rule onely upon Land forgetting what wee have alreadie told you that express mention is made by Ezechiel concerning Princes of the Sea With which agree's also that saying I will set his hand in the Sea and his right hand in the Flouds upon which place Aben-Ezra note 's that God Almightie assigned the Dominion of the Sea there unto King David That hee might rule over those that sailed either through the Sea or the Rivers It is written thus likewise in the Apocrypha O yee men do not men excel in strength that bear rule over Sea and Land and all things in them But yet the King is more mightie for hee is Lord of all these things and hath Dominion over them And in another place saith the Angel to Esdras The Sea is set in a wide place that it might bee deep and great But put case the entrance were narrow and like a River who then could enter the Sea to look upon it and have Dominion over it iâ— hee went not through the narrow The Dominion of the Sea and of the Land is granted alike in both these places It is said also of King Ahasuerus That hee made not onely the Land but all the Isles of the Sea to becom tributarie which words truly do clearly shew a Dominion of the Sea for so they are expressed in the vulgar Edition out of the Hebrew Original which is lost But the Greek Copies are more plain there The King wrote to his Kingdom of the Land and Sea Nor must wee omit that of Moses when hee blessed the people And of Naphtali hee said Naphtali shall enjoy abundance and bee full with the blessings of the Lord hee shall possess or inherit the Sea and the South as the â—â—lgar and the Greek do render that place But by many others the Sea is taken there for the West-Quarter as it is often in the Scriptures Yet truly it is clear those words are meant of the Sea of Galilee or of the Lake of Tiberias not of the great or Phaenician Sea which lie's Westward becaus the Land of Naphtali was situate near that Lake which also is often called the Sea As it appear's likewise out of Onkelus his Paraphrase where express mention is made of the Sea of Genesareth called also the Lake of Tiberias or the Sea of Chinnereth and by this name it passeth with the salt Sea or the Lake of Asphaltites in the sacred description of the Eastern part of the holy Land But the former place of Deuteronomie is â—…usly rendred by Rupert the Abbot of Tuitiuâ— Maâ—e Meridiem possidebit for Mare Meridiem hee shall possess the Morning and the South for the Sea and the South However it is clear I suppose out of the places alleged such plain Testimonies are found in holy Writ touching such a Dominion of the Sea that in the mean time it must bee granted that according to the Universal Permissive Law any man may acquire it as well as the Land And truly as for those places quoted in the foregoing Chapter concerning the
Sea from the Law of Nations denie a Dominion and wrest other things by way of Argument out of the Writers of the Imperial Law which are clearly contrarie to our English Right as also to the Intervenient Law of Nations which hath continued in force for so many Ages about the Dominion of the Sea Either I say the same must bee said of them or els that they did not so much make choice of Arguments which they thought were true to serv the present occasion as of such that might seem to have the greater force and autoritie among those Civil Lawyers with whom they were in Treatie Nor is it a new thing that Civilians should speak of a natural and perpetual communitie of the Sea even where it is most certain that a Dominion thereof is admitted from all Antiquitie in the very Territorie wherein they themselvs are comprehended as I have formerly declared There are also very many Rights among us belonging either to the Exchequer or to such as enjoy the Right of the Exchequer by Grant from the King which som conceiv to bee grounded upon that Sea-Dominion whereof wee discours As the confiscation of Goods derelict in the Sea and of som of the greater sort of Fish as Wale-Fishes Sturgeons and others And for the most part that of the Satyrist hold's good Quicquid conspicuum pulchrúmque ex aequore toto est Res Fisci est ubicunque natat Goods in the sea of any worth and note Belong to th'Chequer wheresoëre they flote Besides wreckt goods cast out ashore when no living creature belonging to the ship remain's alive But these things do not onely appertain to him that is Lord of the Sea but somtimes also to others in other Nations And they for the most part depend either upon the Law or Custom of som Land as in the case of Goods cast ashore or of such as are found and imported or els upon a Right over such Persons as shall first possess them as in the case of any Goods whatsoâ—ver derelict or found in the Sea and others of that kinde Therefore I thought it not meet to draw those things here into Controversie Som antient Testimonies of less account touching the Sea-Dominion whereof wee Treat CHAP. XXV But his intent is earnestly to perswade the English that it is their main interest diligently to guard the Sea whereof the Kings of England are Lords and to defend it with all their might as the perpetual prop and support of their Empire Hee saith also that the same advice was given by the Emperor Sigismund at his enterview with our Henrie the Fifth for the procuring of on peace betwixt him and Charls the Sixth King of France Give mee leav to set down his words The true processe of English policie Of utterward to keep this region Of our Englond that no man may denie Nor say of sooth but it is one of the best Is this that who seeth South North East and West Cherish merchandise keep the Admiraltie That we be Masters of the narrow See For Sigismund the great Emperour Which yet reigneth when he was in this lond With King Henrie the fift Prince of honour Here much glory as him thought he found A mightie land which had taken in hand To warre in France and make mortalitie And ever well kept round about the See And to the King thus he said My brother When he perceivaed two towns Calys and Dover Of all your towns to chuse of one and other To keep the Sea and soon to com over To werre outwards and your reign to recover Keep these two towns sure and your Maâ—estie As your tweyne eyne so keep the Narrow See For if this See bee kept in time of warre Who can here passe without danger and woâ— Who can escape who may mischief differre What marchandie may for by be agoe For needs hem must take trewes euery foe Flanders and Spaine and other trust to me Or else hindred all for this Narrow See What is conteined more at large in these Rhythmes you have the sens of it contracted above in few words It is not worth while to render the words themselvs The same Versifier also proceeds thus But King Edward made a siege royall And wanne the town and in speciall The Sea was kept and thereof he was Lord Thus made he Nobles comed of Record Wee have also divers other very large Domestick Testimonies of this thing which are added in the next place beeing mingled together with the antient Recognition or acknowledgment of forein Nations concerning the same That the Sea-Dominion of the Kings of England is acknowledged by Foreiners whom it most concern's by their usual striking of Sails according to antient Custom Also concerning two Edicts or Ordinances that were set forth about this Thing by the Kings of France CHAP. XXVI WEe are com now to Foreiners And it is clearly evident by what wee have discoursed before either touching the limits set for Navigation by the King of England or the Licence of passage through this Sea often desired by Petition that som of them have indeed acknowledged this Dominion But there are two Testimonies more notable than the rest which shew if you consider chiefly as you ought their beeing Neighbors and such whom it concerned that they generally did the same The one is the usual striking of the Top-sails by every Ship of any Forein Nation whatsoêver if they sail near the King's Navie or any Ship belonging to the same Navie in the Sea The other is a Libel published of old or a Bill of complaint instituted wherein very many forein Nations heretofore in the time our Edward the First did all together and by common consent with the English acknowledg the Dominion of the Kings of England by Sea Whereto I shall add also a particular declaration of that kinde made by the Flemings in an Ambassie to our Edward the Second But that the striking of Sails is don not onely in honor of the English King but also in acknowledgment of his Soveraigntie and Dominion in this Sea is I suppose a thing out of question Certainly the French cannot doubt of it who by such a kinde of striking would have had themselvs heretofore acknowledged Lords of our Sea but in vain That is to say they were as much over-seen in the former Age in setting forth two Edicts or Ordinances to require and ratifie such a kinde of striking Sail to themselvs by all Foreiners as they were in so rashly vindicating the Sea-Dominion of the King of England Concerning those Edicts wee spake before in the former Book Neither of which was received as valid in any Court of Justice according to a decision made in the supreme Court of Parlament which wee have observed also in that place Yea and here I shall set down the very words used by Ludovicus Servinus Advocate general to the King of France to magnifie the Autoritie of those Edicts or Ordinances at
much of the same tenderness was expressed afterward by King James becaus as in the former Reign so in his it was counted Reason of State to permit them to thrive but they turning that favorable Permission into a Licentious Encroaching beyond due Limits put the King to a world of Trouble and Charge by Ambassies and otherwise to assert his own interest and dispute them into a reasonable submission to those Rights which had been received before as indisputable by all the world For the truth whereof I am bold to refer your Honors to the Memorials of several Transactions in those daies which I have added at the end of this Book and for which I stand indebted as I am also for many other Favors to a Right honorable Member of your own great Assembly By the same also it will appear how this People perceiving that King to bee of a temper disposed to use no other arguments but words held him in play with words again and while they trifled out his Reign in Debates and Treaties carried on their design still to such a height by a collusion of Agencies and Ventilations to and agen and a daily intrusion upon the Territorie by Sea that in time they durst plead and print Mare Liberum and after his Son Charls came to the Crown they in effect made it so For though hee were not ignorant of his own Right as appear's by his esteem of this Book his Preparations and Proclamation for Restraint of Fishing without Licence c. Yet hee never made any farther use of them than to milk away the Subjects monie under pretence of building Ships to maintein his Autoritie by Sea which end of his beeing served hee immediately let fall the prosecution of what hee pretended So that through the over-much easiness and indulgence of preceding Princes they in a short time arrived to so loftie a Presumption as to seem to forget and question and now at length by most perfidious actings to defie the Dominion of England over the Sea These things beeing consider'd it was supposed this Translation it beeing a noble Plea asserting that Dominion would bee a very seasonable Service which how poorly soëver it bee apparel'd in our English dress is bold to lay Claim unto your Honors as its proper Patrons conceiving it ought to bee no less under your Protection than the Sea it self And therefore let mee have leav here without Flatterie or Vanitie to say though in other things I may injure the eminent Autor yet in this hee will bee a Gainer that his Book is now faln under a more noble Patronage in the tuition of such heroïck Patriots who observing the errors and defects of former Rulers are resolved to see our Sea-Territorie as bravely mainteined by the Sword as it is by his Learned Pen. It is a gallant sight to see the Sword and Pen in victorious Equipage together For this subdue's the souls of men by Reason that onely their bodies by force The Pen it is which manifest's the Right of Things and when that is once cleared it give 's spurs to resolution becaus men are never raised to so high a pitch of action as when they are perswaded that they engage in a righteous caus according to that old Versicle Frangit attollit vires in Milite causa Wherefore seeing you Right Honorable have had so frequent experience of the truth of this in our late Wars wherein the Pen Militant hath had as many sharp rancounters as the Sword and born away as many Trophies from home-bred Enemies in prosecution of your most righteous caus by Land certainly you will yield it no less necessarie for the Instruction of this generous and ingenious people in vindicating your just Rights by Sea against the vain Pretences and Projects of encroaching Neighbors For what true English heart will not swell when it shall bee made clear and evident as in this Book that the Soveraigntie of the Seas flowing about this Island hath in all times whereof there remain's any written Testimonie both before the old Roman Invasion and since under every Revolution down to the present Age been held and acknowledged by all the world as an inseparable appendant of the British Empire And that by virtue thereof the Kings of England successively have had the Soveraign Guard of the Seas That they have imposed Taxes and Tributes upon all ships passing and fishing therein That they have obstructed and open'd the passage thereof to strangers at their own pleasure and don all other things that may testifie an absolute Sea-Dominion VVhat English heart I say can consider these things together with the late Actings of the Netherlanders set forth in your publick Declaration and not bee inflamed with an indignation answerable to their Insolence That these People raised out of the dust at first into a state of Libertie and at length to an high degree of Power and Felicitie by the Arms and Benevolence of England or that they who in times past durst never enter our Seas to touch a Herring without Licence first obteined by Petition from the Governor of Scarborough-Castle should now presume to invade them with armed Fleets and by a most unjust war bid defiance to the United Powers of these three Nations Had they dared to do this in the daies of our Kings I suppose they even the worst of thē would have checkt and chastised them with a Resolution suitable to their monstrous Ingratitude For however som of them were wholly busied in vexing and undermining the people's Liberties at home yet they were all very jealous of the Rights and Interests of the Nation at Sea and good reason they had for it since without the maintenance of a Soveraigntie there the Island it self had been but a great Prison and themselvs and the Natives but so many Captives and Vassals to their Neighbors round about not so much secluded as excluded from all the world beside Upon this ground it was that Kings ever conceived and mainteined themselvs as much Monarchs by Sea as by Land and the same you will finde here was received by all other States and Princes the Land and Water that surround's it making one entire Bodie and Territorie Moreover our own Municipal Constitutions every where declare the same as may bee seen by the several Presidents and Proceedings thereunto relating which manifestly shew that by the Cōmon Law of the Land our Kings were Proprietarie Lords of our Seas That the Seas of Engl. were ever under the Legiance of our Kings and they soveraign Conservators of the peace as well upon the Sea as Land Now therefore Right honorable when I look upon you and behold you more highly intrusted than Kings and far more nobly adorned upon a better Ground than they were with all the Rights Interests and Privileges of the People when I consider how God hath wrested the Sword out of their hands and placed it in yours for our Protection with the Conservation of our Peace and
Divine Natural or of Nations any thing which may so oppose the private Dominion thereof that it cannot bee admitted by every kinde of Law even the most approved and so that any kinde of Sea whatsoëver may by any sort of Law whatsoëver bee capable of private Dominion which was the thing I intended to prove The End of the first Book Touching the DOMINION OR Ownership of the Sea BOOK II. The order or Method of those things that are to bee handled in this Book The British Ocean divided into four parts CHAP. I. HAving made it evident in the former Book that the Sea is capable of private Dominion as well as the Land and that by all kindes of Law whether wee seriously consider the Divine or Natural or any Law of Nations whatsoëver it remain's next that wee discours touching the Dominion of great Britain in the Sea encompassing it about and of those large Testimonies whereby it is asserted and mainteined Wherein this Method is observed that in the first place wee premise both the distribution and various appellation of the Sea flowing about it in order to the Discours Then it shall bee shewn from all Antiquitie down to our times without interruption that those who by reason of so frequent alterations of the state of Affairs have reigned here whether Britains Romans Saxons Danes and Normans and so the following Kings each one according to the various latitude of his Empire have enjoied the Dominion of that Sea by perpetual occupation that is to say by using and enjoying it as their own after a peculiar manner as an undoubted portion either of the whole bodie of the estate of the British Empire or of som part thereof according to the state and condition of such as have ruled it or as an inseparable appendant of this Land Lastly that the Kings of Great Britain have had a peculiar Dominion or proprietie over the Sea flowing about it as a bound not bounding their Empire but to borrow the Terms used by Surveiors of Land as bounded by it in the same manner as over the Island it self and the other neighboring Isles which they possess about it The Sea encompassing great Britain which in general wee term the British Sea is divided into four parts according to the four Quarters of the World On the West lie's the Vergivian Sea which also take's the name of the Deucaledonian where it washeth the Coast of Scotland And of this Vergivian wherein Ireland is situate the Irish Sea is reckoned to bee a part called in antient time the Scythian Vale but now the Channel of S t George So that as well that which washeth the Western Coast of Ireland as that which flowe's between great Britain and Ireland is to bee called the British Sea For not onely this which of old was called great Britain and somtimes simply the Great Island but also the Isle of Ireland with the other adjacent Isles were termed Britanniae So that many times Albion and Ireland are equally called British Isles and Britannides as you may see in Strabo Ptolomie Marcianus Heracleötes Plinie Eustathius upon Dionysius Afer and others Moreover Ireland is called by Ptolomie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 little Britain And saith Ethelward an antient Writer They go to Ireland called heretofore Britannides by the great Julius Caesar. Perhaps hee had a more perfect Copie of Julius Caesar's Book For in none of his Commentaries which wee use is Ireland called by that name And it hath been observed by learned men that that book hath been maimed and alter'd by one Julius Celsus whose name wee finde now and then in the Manuscript Copies Towards the North this Sea is named the Northern Caledonian and Deucaledonian Sea wherein lie scatter'd the Orcades Islands Thule and others which beeing called the British or Albionian Isles yea and Britannides gave name to the neighboring Sea And indeed Thule which som would have to bee Island others and that with most reason do conceiv it to bee the biggest of the Shetland or Zetland Isles called â—hilensel by the Seamen and som there are again that think otherwise was of old not onely termed a British Isle but also by som expresly placed in Britain it self Mahumedes Acharranides an Arabian called likewise Aracensis and Albategnius a famous Mathematician who lived above nine hundred years ago saith Som observing the breadth of the Earth from the Equinoctial Line towards the North have found it to bee determined by the Isle Thule which is in Britain where the longest day is XX â—ours that is to say Ptolomie and his â—ollowers who by drawing a Line on the Northside of Thule or the Shetland Isles through 63 degrees and a quarter of Northern Latitude have set it down for the utmost bound of the habitable world Yea and som have used the name of Thule for Britain it self or England In times past the Emperor of Constantinople was wont to have trustie Guards called Barrangi constantly attending his person who were taken out of England as appear's out of Nicetas Choniates and Codinus also who was keeper of the Palace write's that they were wont to salute the Emperor with a loud voice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the English Tongue But in the Storie of Anna Comnena the Daughter of Alexius it is said expressly that they came 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the Island of Thule In like manner all the Islands either known or heard of in this Northern Sea were at length called by the name of British the utmost Bounds whereof as also of Thule it self som of the Antients would have to reach unto 67 degrees of Latitude or thereabout And Albategnius speaking of the Sea as it look's toward Spain saith There are XII British Isles in it towards the North and beyond these it is not habitable and how far it stretcheth is unknown Having made this preparation then wee treat first concerning the Sea-Dominion of the Britains before they were reduced under the Roman power Next touching a Dominion of that kinde belonging to the Romans while they ruled here continually and necessarily accompanying the Soveraigntie of the Island Afterwards it is made evident by such Testimonies as are found among the Antients that the English Saxons and others who enjoied the supreme Power in Britain before the Norman's Invasion had such a kinde of Dominion Lastly according to the fourfold division of the British Sea wee set forth the antient Occupation together with the long and continued possession of every Sea in particular since the Norman's time whereby the true and lawful Dominion and Customs of the Sea which are the subject of our Discours may bee drawn down as it were by a twin'd thred until our own times Moreover seeing both the Northern and Western Ocean do stretch to a very great Latitude this to America that not onely to Island and the Shores of Groenland but to parts utterly unknown and
also his Sea-men to keep all relief of Victual from going to the Enemie by Sea Hee used the word Pirats in this place as others of that age have don not for Robbers as 't is commonly taken but for such as beeing skill'd in Sea-affairs were appointed to set upon the Enemie's Fleets and defend the Dominion by Sea Touching the derivation of the word the old Scholiast upon Sophocles his Aiax saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is Pira in the Attick Tongue signifie's craft or art and hence it is that they are called Pirats which infest the Sea But when the English-Saxons and Danes in the time of K. Alfred were ever and anon strugling for the Soveraigntie in England for Gurmundus or Guthrunus King of the Danes was at that time setled in Northumberland as a Fiduciarie Client or Vassal to Alfred and had very large Territories in the East-part of England their Fights were mostly by Sea as if they had both been of opinion that hee which could get the Dominion of the British Sea would by necessarie consequence becom Lord also of the Land or of that part of the Isle which lie's before it For this caus also it was that the Danes growing strong at Sea K. Alfred mightily augmented his Naval Forces by building ships twice as long as the Danish ships deeper nimbler and less rocking or rolling and so much more convenient for Sea-Fights Florentius the Monk saith In the same year that is to say the year of our Lord MCCCXCVII the Forces of the Pagans residing in East-England and Northumberland using Piracie upon the Sea-Coasts did grievously infest the West-Saxon's Countrie with very long and nimble ships which they had built divers years before Against whom ships were built by the Command of K. Alfred twice as long deeper nimbler and less waving or rolling by whose force hee might subdue the aforesaid ships of the Enemie It is related also in the same words by Roger Hoveden But Henrie of Huntingdon speaking expresly of the number of Oars that served for the rowing of these ships of Alfred saith King Alfred caused long ships to bee made readie to wit of 40 Oars or more against the Danish ships But there are Chronicles written in the Saxon Tongue that speak of ships of 60 Oars and larger built by him at that time out of which these Writers above-mentioned and others of the like sort have compiled theirs The words of the Chronicles are these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is to say King Alfred gave command for the building of long ships to encounter the Danish But they were twice as long as these whereof som had sixtie Oars som more They were also more nimble less rolling and deeper then the other Not built after the Frisian or Danish manner but such as hee conceived most convenient for fighting So that there is no doubt but the business of shipping was mightily advanced in his Reign among the English-Saxons in order to the defence and maintenance of their Dominion by Sea And wee very often finde that those Sea fights managed by Alfred and his son Edward with various success against the Danes and Normans were undertaken not without great numbers of Shipping But in the time of King Athelstan who was very strong at Sea upon the Irish Nation saith Huntingdon and those that dwelt in ships there fell a fatal destruction The English-Saxon words in the antient Chronicles from whence Huntingdon translated those and which agree w th these are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which fully signifie the same thing For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Scotish Nation and Scots are by the Antients often taken for the Irish. Hee also saith the same Autor led an huge Armie by Land and Sea into Northumberland and Scotland and in regard there was none appear'd to make any opposition bee marched up and down the Countrie and wasting it at pleasure returned with Triumph whereupon saith a Poët of that time Jam cubat in terris fera barbaries Aquilonis Jam jacet in campo pelago pirata relicto Illicitas torvásque minas Analavus anhelans Now is the wilde and barb'rous North brought down Now Analave the Pirat is o'rethrown Who having left the Sea on Land doth lie And spightful threats breath's out against the Skie This Analavus was King of the Irish and of many Islands who invading the Coasts of Athelstan with a Fleet of DCXV ships at the mouth of the River Humber received a great overthrow and was put to a most shameful Flight But King Edgar as saith Florentius of Worcester sailing about the North of Britain with a great Navie arrived at Chester where his eight pettie Kings met him as hee had given order who sware fealtie to him and that they would assist him both by Sea and Land Or as Huntingdon saith of the same thing they all did homage to him declaring themselvs readie at his command to serv him by Sea and Land Among these pettie Kings there was one Maccusius whom Hoveden and Florentius call a King of very many Islands and Florilegus a King of Man and very many Islands William of Malmsburie call's him an Arch Pirat Moreover the same King Edgar as if hee intended to set forth the splendor magnificence and as it were an Epitome of his whole Empire in Sea-affairs and Shipping did as say Florentius and Hoveden during his abode at Chester enter into a Boat wherein hee was rowed by those pettie Kings himself holding the Stern and steering it about the River Dee and beeing attended by all his Dukes and Peers in such another Vessel bee sailed from the Palace to the Monasterie of S. John Baptist where an Oration beeing made to him hee returned in the same pomp unto the Palace In the very Entrie whereof hee is reported to have said to his Lords that then his Successors might boast themselvs Kings of England when they should bee thus attended by so many Kings and enjoy the state and glory of such honors or as Malmsburie write's of the same thing when they should enjoy so great a Prerogative of honors So many Kings as Vassals to bee readie alwaies to assist with their Forces whensoëver they should bee required both by Sea and Land There is also a notable testimonie in the same Florentius and the Monk of Malmsburie how that this King sailed round about his Sea every year and secured it with a constant Guard and Forces Every Summer saith Malmsburie immediately after Easter bee commanded his ships upon every shore to bee brought into a Bodie sailing usually with the Eastern Fleet to the West part of the Island and then sending it back hee sail'd with the Western Fleet unto the Northern and thence with the Northern hee returned to the Eastern beeing indeed very diligent to prevent the Incursions of Pirats that is behaving himself in this manfully as say Florentius also and Hoveden for the
of the Abbie of Abingdon say of the same year 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The King commanded that 21000 should bee paid to his Armie For so that Fleet is called every where in English Saxon which rode at Grenewich Here you see is no small difference in the number of pounds But howsoever if it bee to bee conceived of the yearly Tax or Tribute then it was far less this year then it is reckoned by those Monks who speak of thirtie eight thousand pounds Four years after in the Reign of King Canutus who was a Dane a far greater summe of Monie was raised for the maintenance of this Fleet. That Florentius whom wee have often cited saith In this year that is MXVIII Seventie two thousand pounds out of all England and one thousand and fiftie pounds out of London were paid to the Danish Fleet and there remained fourtie ships with K. Canutus But the rest were returned to Denmark Of which year Hoveden speak's thus Out of all England seventie two and out of London 410 pounds were paid to the Danish Armie or Fleet. And there remained c. They differ about the Summe not the Thing wherein they agree with the English-Saxon Chronicles before mentioned Yet these altogether speak contrarie to that accompt of the certain summes as it is set down by the aforesaid Monks But Matthew Paris and Matthew Westminster say of the same Time that Cnute sent home the Danish Fleet and Stipendarie Souldiers except fourtie ships as appear's by what hath been said alreadie having paid them out of all England eightie two thousand pounds in silver Also in the second year of King Hardeâ—nute a Tax was levied for the Danish Armie or Fleet amounting to 21000 pounds and 89 pounds as Huntingdon tell 's us All which particulars do I suppose sufficiently demonstrate that the Danish Tribute here mentioned was not fixed to any certain summe of yearly paiment and also that an huge summe of monie was wont to bee paid yearly at that time to the Kings of England for the Guard of the Sea for to what purpose els was that Fleet alwaies kept and so great Taxes levied every year for the maintenance thereof But in the Reign of King Henrie the second the name of Danegeld grew out of use Tributes or Taxes beeing usually paid still notwithstanding by other names that are very well known for the Guarding of the Sea as wee shall shew by and by But they are extremely mistaken even they who agree either with John Bramton the Abbot of Jorvaux or som other Autor out of whom hee wrote it or any others of that kinde in deriving the Original of that yearly Danegeld so often mentioned every where from the former kinde of Tribute which was paid to the Danes for the procuring of a peace and they also who would have the Warr to have been undertaken by the Danes and Saxons against the Britains becaus they denied them a freedom of Navigation and that the end thereof was that this Tribute was upon that accompt imposed upon the Nation when it was subdued Now as concerning the Duties of Fiduciarie Clients or Vassals wont to bee paid in that Age for Naval Expeditions and the Guard of the Sea wee have set them down among those particulars which were spoken of King Edgar in the former Chapter The Pettie Kings or Lords of the neighboring Isles were bound to him by Oath to bee readie at his command to serv him by Sea and Land And in that famous Breviarie or Register of England called Domesday conteining very many Customs in use among the English-Saxons besides the assessment of the Provinces and written in the time of William the first wee read thus It is a Custom at Warwick if the King went by Sea against his Enemies to send him either IV. Batsueins Sea-souldiers or Rowers or els IV. pounds in monie And at Excester when hee made any Expedition by Land or by Sea this Citie served after the rate of V Hides of Land Barnestaple Lydeford and Totenais served as far as that Citie That is these three Towns paid as much as Excester alone Moreover Clocester yielded XXXVI Dicres of Iron and C iron Rods fitted to make nails for the King's ships Leicester also if the King went against his Enemies by Sea sent him four horses from that Town to London to carrie Arms or other necessaries Concerning Lewes also a chief Town in Sussex there K. Edward the Confessor had CXXVII Burgers at his service Their Custom was if the King went not himself in person but sent others to guard the Sea then they collected XX Shillings of every man of what Countrie soëver hee were and provided men who were to look to the Arms on shipboard Here very express mention is made of the defence or Guardianship of the Sea it self And in Colchester an eminent Town of Essex wee finde it was the Custom of that Age to pay out of every hous six pence a year that was able to pay it for maintenance of the King's souldiers upon an Expedition by Land or Sea c. And this ought to bee the rate if the King shall entertain souldiers or make any Expedition All these particulars are in that Register And others there are in it of the same kinde But an Expedition by Sea signified in these testimonies not a Warr to bee undertaken for subduing the Dominions of their neighbors lands but most clearly a preparation and enterprise of Warr for the guarding scouring and keeping the Sea as a part of the Empire of Britain As it sufficiently appear's out of the Histories of that time For wee do not reade that our English-Saxons or Danes had any other quarrel at that time with any of their Neighbors whatsoëver unless it concerned either the British Islands or the Sea belonging thereunto Which also is especially to bee consider'd The Testimonies of Edgar and Canutus Kings of England with others expressly declaring the Dominion which they and their predecessors had over the Sea together with an observation touching the Nations which in that age were seated upon the opposite Shore CHAP. XII THat wee may at length set an end to that fourfold distribution which wee made of the Testimonies of that Age let us in the last place add the express determinations of King Edgar and Canutus concerning their own Dominion over the Sea As for Edgar the title which hee commonly used ran thus I Edgar Soveraign Lord of all Albion and of the Maritim or Insular Kings inhabiting round about So hee make's the bodie of the British Empire to comprehend all the Maritim Kingdoms that lay about that is to say all that are Situate in the British Sea And this hee more plainly declare's in the Charter or Deed by which hee setled revenues on the Cathedral Church of Worcester in the year DCCCCLXIV if so bee the copie were rightly rendred by those who many years since printed so
much of it as concern's this title The words are these Altitonantis Dei largifluâ clementia qui est Rex Regum Ego Edgarus Anglorum Basileus omniúmque Regum insularum Oceanique Britanniani circumjacentis so John Dee a man very well seen in most parts of Learning did read it a good while since save onely that in stead of Britannian hee hath Britanniani while others reade Insularum Oceani quae Britanniam circumjacent cunctarúmque nationum quae infra eam includuntur Imperator Dominus gratias ago ipsi Deo omnipotenti Regimeo qui meum imperium sic ampliavit exaltavit super regnum patrum mâ—orum qui licèt Monarchiam totius Angliae adepti sint à tempore Athelstani qui primus regnum Anglorum omnes nationes quae Britanniam incolunt sibi armis subegit nullus tamen illâ—rum ultra ejus fines imperium suum dilatare aggressus est Mihi autem concessit propitia divinitas cum Anglorum imperio omnia regna Insularum Oceani cum suis ferocissimis regibus usque Norwegiam maximámque partem Hiberniae cum suâ nobilissimâ civitate Dublinia Anglorum regno subjugare Quos etiam omnes meis imperiis colla subdere Dei favente gratiâ coëgi By the abundant goodness of Almightie God who is the King of Kings I Edgar King of England and of all the Kings of the Islands and of the Ocean lying round about Britain and of all the Nations that are included within the circuit thereof Supreme Lord and Governor Do render thanks to the same Almightie God my King who hath enlarged my Empire thus and exalted it above the Royal Estate of my Progenitors who although they arrived to the Monarchie of all England ever since the time of Athelstane who was the first that by force of Arms subdued the English and all the Nations that inhabite Britain yet none of them ever attempted to promote their Empire beyond the bounds thereof But the divine goodness hath favored mee so far as beside the English Empire to enable mee to subdue all the Kingdoms of the Ilands in the Ocean with their most stout and mightie Kings even as far as Norway and the greatest part of Irland together with their most famous Citie of Dublin All which by God's grace and assistance I have subdued and made their necks to stoop under the yoke of my command Whereas hee saith that none of his Progenitors had attempted to enlarge their Empire beyond the bounds of Britain it must bee so understood that it bee taken for the Northern and Western bounds of the British Empire as sufficiently appear's by the mention of Irland and Norway So that then more Islands than the name of Britain did comprehend or than the Isles of that Sea together with the Sea it self were brought under his Dominion But King Canutus or Cnute hath left a testimonie also whereby hee most expressly asserts the Sea to bee a part of his Dominion Hee placing himself on a seat by the Sea side as it flowed upon Southampton Shore having a minde to demonstrate to his flatterers that Kings themselvs are but men is reported to have made trial of the obedience of the Sea it beeing flood after this manner Thou O Sea art under my dominion as the Land also upon which I sit is mine And there never was any that disobeied my Command without punishment Therefore I command thee not to ascend up upon my Land nor do thou presume to wet the feet or garments of thy Sovereign But the Tide saith Huntington and Florilegus who relate this storie swelling as at other times did very unmannerly wet not onely the feet but legs of his Majestie Whereupon the King leaping up proclaimed with his own mouth none to bee worthy the name of King but him alone who command 's both the Sea and land and they obey And from that time hee refused to wear his Crown of Gold consecrating it to a Crucifix In the mean time hee here openly professed himself to bee the Soveraign of the Sea as well as of the land Hereunto may bee added som testimonies of other Writers which although they are of a later date than the Kingdom of the English-Saxons yet they are transmitted to posteritie by the hands of such as were perfectly acquainted with the English Historie and by the Tradition of their Ancestors well infouned of the most authentick Opinions and Resolvs concerning the English Dominion over the Sea Geofâ—rie Chaucer who was not onely the most famous Poêt of his time but as Learning went in those daies a very well accomplisht Scholar in one of his Canterburie Tales bring 's in his Man of Law telling a storie which hee would have relate to the time of Alla King of Northumberland who reigned thirtie years and his Reign began in the year of our Lord DLIX In this Tale there is brought in a Ladie called Constantia the Daughter of I know not what Roman Emperor married to the King of Syria driven shee was by weather to a place which lay under the command of a Fortress upon the Shore of Northumberland and there the Ship ran aground shee was a Christian banished for her Religion and there taken Prisoner by the Commander of that Fortress In this Relation of the sad adventures of Constantia hee saith what indeed is true that Christian Religion was not received into any part of that Territorie but that Pagans had over-run and did hold those Northern Countries under their Dominion as well by Sea as Land His words to this purpose are these In all that lond dursten non Christen rout All Christen folk been fled from the Countre Through Paynims that conquer'd all about The plagues of Northumberland by land See Hee said discreetly that the neighboring Sea fell to the Conquerers of this Isle as well as the Land knowing what was the resolution and generally received opinion of his Ancestors concerning that matter Hee lived two hundred and thirtie years ago in the time of Richard the Second Nor is it any prejudice to this autoritie that the other things there related are fabulous For wee know that out of the Fables of Heliodorus Achilles Tatius Theodorus Prodromus Eustathius and such others whether of an amorous or any other strain somtimes many useful observations may bee gathered concerning the customs manners and received opinions as well of the men among whom they are feigned to bee acted as of the times to which they are related John Harding also who in the time of Edward the Fourth wrote an Historie of the affairs of England in vers when hee reckons up those Princes that sware fealtie to King Canutus for the Lands which they held of him hee adds So did the Kings of Wales of high parage And all the North-west Ocean For their kingdoms and for their lands than That is to say the same was don at that time by the greatest Kings of Wales and of all the North-western
least allow such a Dominion VIII Som antient Testimonies of inferior note All the testimonies almost that are comprehended in this Division are indeed domestick but so publick and of so approved credit that hardly any thing can bee imagined which might give a clearer proof of possession whether Civil as they call it consisting in the act and intention of the minde or Natural which require's the presence of the Bodie As it will appear to any man that pleas to make enquirie Especially if hee add hereunto the judgment or acknowledgment of such Forein Nations whom it chiefly concerned whereof wee shall treat also by and by But of these things severally and in order That the Kings of England since the coming in of the Normans have perpetually enjoied the Dominion of the Sea flowing about them is in the first place proved from the Guard or Government thereof as of a Province or Territorie that is to say from the very Law of the English Admiraltie CHAP. XIV AS concerning the Guard or Government of this Sea there are three things therein that deserv special consideration 1. The bare mention and nature of the Guard of the Sea and of the Guardians or Admirals thereof in publick Records and Histories 2. The Tributes and Customs imposed demanded or accustomed to bee paid for and in consideration of the said custodie And lastly the tenor and varietie of Commissions belonging to this Guard and English Admiraltie or Government by Sea Since the coming in of the Normans there is frequent mention of a Guard or Government instituted for the defence and guarding of the Sea Here call to minde those observations touching this kinde of Guard which have been alreadie gathered out of that Record or Breviarie of England called Doomesday And King Henrie the first saith Florentius of Worcester gave order to his Butsecarli to guard the Sea and take care that no person from the parts of Normandie approach the English Coasts The same saith Roger Hoveden in the very same words almost save onely that the printed Copies err in putting Buzsecarlis for Butsecarlis These Butsecarli or Butescarles in the old English Language are Officers belonging to the Navie or Sea-souldiers as Hutesecarli were Domestick Servants or Officers in Court And that to guard the Sea here signified to secure the Sea it self not to defend the Sea-Coasts as somtimes though seldom it did with Land-forces plainly appear's out of Henrie of Huntingdon in whom it is clear that the persons who thus guarded the Sea were emploied by the King to make Warr by Sea against Robert Duke of Normandie who was then preparing an Expedition against England Now those publick Records are lost wherein the Roial Commissions for the delegation of this Command or Government were wont to bee registred all that space of time betwixt the coming in of the Normans and the Reign of K. John But from thence through all the succeeding ages unto this present time it is as clear as day that the Kings of England have been wont to constitute Governors or Commanders who had the charge of guarding the English Sea and were the Guardians or Governors thereof in the same manner as if it had been som Province upon Land First of all there were intrusted with the Government of the Sea or the Maritimae and Marinae the Maritime and Marine part of the Empire understanding by those words not onely som Countrie lying upon the Sea-Coasts but comprehending the British Sea it self though I confess it was not alwaies so such as were to guard and keep it under the title somtimes of Custodes Navium Guardians of the ships but more frequently Custodes Maritimae or Marinae in the sens aforesaid And in the time of Henrie the third Thomas de Moleton is styled Captain and Guardian of the Sea and hath autoritie given him to guard the Sea and the Maritim parts of the Eastern Shore In the same King's Reign also the Inhabitants of the Cinque-Ports are said to guard the Coast of England and the Sea So Hugh de Crequeur was Warden of the Cinque-ports and of the Sea in those parts Afterward the title of Guardians or Wardens very often changed into that of Admirals Edward the First saith Thomas of Walsingham for the keeping of the Sea divided his Shipping into three Fleets setting over them three Admirals namely over the Ships at Yarmouth and the road thereabout John de Botetort over those at Portsmouth William de Leyburn and over the Western and Irish Ships a certain Irish Knight Moreover also that John de Butetort is in the Records of that time styled custos Maritimae as were others also After this in the Reign of Edward the Second three Admirals of the three several Coasts of England saith Walsingham had the guarding of the Sea namely Sir John Oturvin Sir Nicolas Kyriel Sir John Felton Wee finde moreover in our publike Records that the principal end of calling a Parlament in the fourteenth year of Edward the Third was De Treter sur la gard de la pees de la terre de la Marche d'Escoce de la Meer i. e. That consultation might bee had concerning keeping the peace of the Land also of the Borders of Scotland and of the Sea The same regard they had to the defence of the Sea as of the Island or Land-Province giving us to understand that the Land and Sea together made one entire bodie of the Kingdom of England Other evidences of the same nature wee finde in the Records of Parlament of the same King's time or in the consultations of the estates of the Realm had about this matter that whilst they Treat indifferently De la saufegard de la terre concerning the safeguard or defence of the Land or Island and de la saufeguard de la Mere the safeguard of the Sea they seem sufficiently to declare beeing well inform'd by their Ancestors that the Dominion of this as well as of that did belong unto the Crown of England For the business debated by them was not onely how to provide a Navie to make resistance against their Enemies by Sea but for the guarding the Sea it self as well as the securing of the Isle and so for the maintaining the antient right of their King in both In the time of Richard the Second Hugh Calverlee was made Admiral of the Sea saith Walsingham and M r Thomas Percie joined in Commission with him to scour the Roades of the Sea for one year And in the Reign of the same King and likewise of the two succeeding Henries the Fourth and the Fifth debate was had in Parlament about the Guard of the Sea In the Reign of Henrie the Sixth the Guard of the Sea was with a numerous Navie Committed to Richard Earl of Salisburie John Earl of Shrewsburie John Earl of Worcester and James Earl of Wilts to whom was added Baron Sturton and afterward to John Duke
charge Which indeed is a thing wee hear not of in later times but that so it was in the Reigns of King Henrie the third and Edward the first the Records of those times do testifie But afterwards the Universal Custodie of the Sea excepting onely what was extraordinarie was committed by our Kings to the high Admirals of England and to them alone or their Deputies and apperteineth unto them now by an unquestionable right But when any person is intrusted with that Guardianship or Custodie the possession and dominion of the King who intrust's or give 's him the Autoritie is comprehended in that Government or Command which also is confirmed by words most express and home to the business in hand that are to bee seen in a Libel or Bill of Complaint hereafter mentioned which was exhibited by a great number of the neighbor-Nations to the Commissioners of our Edward the first and Philip the fair King of France The Dominion of the English Sea asserted from those Tributes or Customs that were wont to bee imposed paid and demanded for the Guard or Protection thereof after the Norman Conquest CHAP. XV. COncerning the Tributes or Customs that were wont to bee imposed paid and demanded for the Guard of the English Sea there are very ample antient Testimonies all along since the Reign of the Normans And those things which have been alreadie mentioned touching the Guard of the Sea do not a little confirm it It is manifest that the Tribute imposed in the time of the English-Saxons for the Guard of the Sea which was called Danegeld of whose Original and use wee have alreadie spoken was wont now and then to bee paid heretofore under the Norman Kings After the words there cited out of the antient Dialogue touching the Exchequer about the paiment thereof before the Norman Conquest it immediately follow 's thus in the same Dialogue In his Reign that is to say the â—â—igâ— of William the first the Danes as well as other Robbert of Land and Sea restrained the Invasions of Enemies knowing this to bee true which is written When a strong man armed keep 's his hous hee possesseth his goods in peace For they were not ignorant that resolute and valiaâ—â— men would not let injuries pass unrevenged Therefore whereas the Laâ—d had paid it along time in the same King's Reign they were unwilling to pay that every year which had been exacted upon urgent necessitie in time of warr But yet they would not have it wholly cashiered becaus of sudden occasions Therefore it was seldom paid in his Reign or the Reign of his Successors that is onely then when they either had or suspected a warr with Foreiners And among the old Laws of England wee finde that William Rufus requiring aid of the Barons for the regaining of Normandie out of the hands of his brother Robert sirnamed Cortehole who was upon a Voiage to the Holy Land Danegeld was granted to him not established nor confirmed by a Law that is to say four shillings upon every Hide of Land which were paid for defending the Dominion by Sea For that was the intent and end of Danegeld according to its nature and original Moreover Roger Hoveden saith expresly that it was usually paid until the time of King Stephen Hee speaking of the promisses which hee made at the time of his Coronation saith Thirdly hee promissed that hee would remit Danegeld for ever that is two shillings upon an Hide which his Predecessors were went to take every year The same also is affirmed by Matthew Paris and Roger of Wendover out of whom the Chronicles set forth by Matthew until the nineteenth year of Henry the third or the year of our Lord MCCXXXV were wholly taken They say of King Stephen Tertiò vovit quòd Danegeld id est qualibet ydâ terrae duos solidos quos Antecessores ejus consueverant accipere in aeternum annis singulis condonaret So indeed wee read it in the Manuscript Books of this Matthew whereby the Printed ones are to bee amended who render it onely thus Tertiò vovit quòd Antecessores ejus accipere consueverant in aeternum annis singulis condonaret But this also is added by Hoveden These especially and divers other things hee promissed before God but kept none of them as wee are told likewise by Paris and Wendover So that this Tribute was wont to bee paid in the Reigns of William the first and the second Henrie the first and King Stephen also for the guard of the Sea And it appear's by the accompâ—s of the Exchequer that it was paid somtimes in the time of Henrie the second And after that it grew out of date another cours was wont to bee taken very frequently and used as the Custom of the Land that Pay and Provisions might not bee wholly wanting to maintain the Dominion of the Kingdom of England by Sea Mention is made touching this particular in the Court-Rolls of Edward the first Terrarum ad Custodiâ—â— Maris agistatarum that is of such Lands as were charged with a Paiment or Tribute for the guard of the Sea Wee know indeed also that it was in the same manner collected at that time under pretence of the Sea for the pay and maintenance of Land-Forces neer the Shore But certain it is that the Sea it self was guarded then with Naval-Forces as well as the Shore by Land-Forces and so that that Paiment belong'd either to the Sea it self or els to the Shore as well as the Sea Moreover Subsidies have been demanded of the people in Parlament Pour la salvation du Royalme de euâ— Mesines auxint de la Meer de la March dâ— Escoce de Gascoign des Isles that is for defence of the Kingdom the Sea belonging thereunto the Scotish Border Gasooign and the Isles Thus the Sea and its defence and Dominion is reckoned in an equal right and condition with that of the Kingdom the Borders and the Isles Several other instances there are of that kinde But that especially is to bee observed in this place which wee finde in the Parlamentarie Records of King Richard the second concerning a Tribute or Custom that was imposed upon every ship that passed through the Northern Admiraltie that is in the Sea which stretcheth it self from the Thames mouth along the Eastern shore of England towards the North-East for the pay and maintenance of the Guard or Protection of the Sea Nor was it imposed onely upon the ships of such Merchants and Fisher-men as were English but also by the same right in a manner upon those of any Foreiners whatsoëver no otherwise than if a man that is owner of a Field should impose a yearly Revenue or Rent for the libertie of Thorow-fare or driving of Cattel or Cart through his Field Paiment was made at the rate of six pence a Ton upon every Vessel that passed by except such ships onely as
to bee presented touching that business unto the King as hee was at that time King of France but onely as King of England that is as Lord of the whole Sea flowing between And it is very improbable and not in reason to bee admitted that they would so upon deliberation for both Lords and Commons use to debate such matters a long time before they pass a Bill that they would I say so upon deliberation require an imposing of Customs by the Act of an English Parlament in a place that was not subject as a part of the Roial patrimonie to the King of England as King of England From hence it was also that our present King Charls did this last year declare that himself and his progenitors the Kings of England have in all times hitherto by an antient and most just title been Lords of this Sea to wit in his Letters Patents sent to the Maritim Counties of England whereby ship-monie was imposed for the defence of his Dominion by Sea Add moreover hereunto that in the agreement made betwixt our Edward the first and Guie Earl of Flanders about the wearing of Colors or Flags in every ship and punishing offendors by Sea William de Leyburn is called Admiral de la mier du dict Roy d Engleterre or Admiral of the Sea of the said King of England Other Testimonies of the same kinde there are in Records touching the Dominion of the Sea as it hath been received and acknowledged according to the Common Law and Custom of our Countrie which I shall discours of in the next place and after that concerning the Testimonie of Foreiners Of divers Testimonies in our own Law-Books and the most received Customs whereby the Sea-Dominion of the King of England is either asserted or admitted CHAP. XXIV THE seventh of those Heads according to the former Division which manifest the aforesaid Dominion of the Kings of England relate's to our Law-Book's and the received Customs therein which prove it from the most antient times There are also in them many Particulars that may relate hereunto which are explained now and then touching the Guard of the Sea the English Admiraltie and other things alreadie handled But in this Chapter wee shall use either the determinations and Commentaries of our own Lawyers or chiefly such Court-Records as explain their opinions I confess indeed in som of the Authors of our Law who wrote above CCCL years ago or thereabout after they had as the manner then was read through the Civil Law also they were so strict in following those determinations word for word which they found concerning the Sea in that Law that when they treated de acquirendo Rerum Dominio of the manner of acquiring the Dominion of things they tranferr'd them into their own writings From thence it is that Henry Bracton who was a very famous Lawyer at the later end of the reign of Henrie the Third saith Naturali jure communia sunt omnia haec aqua Profluens aër Mare litora Maris quasi Maris accessoria By the Law of Nature all these things are common running water the Aër and the Sea and the shores of the Sea as accessories or dependants of the Sea Also aedificia si in mari five in litore posita fuerint aedificantium sunt de Jure gentium If Buildings bee raised in the Sea or upon the shore they becom theirs that build them by the Law of Nations And a little after Jus piscandi omnibus commune est in portu in fluminibus a Right of fishing is common to all in a Haven and in Rivers Which wee finde likewise in som other of our Law-Books of that Age as a passage that fell from som Writers of whom I spake at large in the former Book that were more affected than was meet with the words of Ulpian and Justinian in the general division of things But these very men in other places shewing the Customs of our Countrie do sufficiently admit the King's Dominion by Sea For Bracton himself afterward speak's of them that by the King's grace and favor quieti sint de Theolonio consuetudinibus Dandis per totum regnum Angliae in terrâ mari per totum Regnum tam per terram quà m per mare Were exempted from paying Tolls and Customs throughout the whole Kingdom of England in the Land and in the Sea and throughout the whole Kingdom both by Land and by Sea And in the same King's time a freedom from som paiments was granted to the Citizens of London per totum Regnum tam per mare quà m per terram throughout the whole Kingdom as well by Sea as by Land And so Bracton when hee return's to speak of the Customs of our Countrie acknowledged that the Dominion of the Sea belong'd to his King no less then the Land And hence it came to pass also that inter Capitula Coronae as they call them that is to say those Articles or chief Heads whereof enquirie was to bee made according to the usual custom by Judges delegated throughout England for the conservation of the publick peace wee finde this also de Purpresturis factis super Dominum Regem sive in Terrâ sive in Mari c. Of Pourprestures made upon our Lord the King either on Land or in the Sea or in sweet waters either within the Libertie or without or in any other place whatsoëver And it is placed among the Articles of this kinde recited by Bracton himself and in the Autor of the Book called Fleta But in the language of the Law wee call those things Pourprestures whereby detriment is don to any publick place belonging to the Patrimonie of the Crown as a publick thorow-fare a River and the like So that according to the nature of this ordinarie Article touching Pourprestures in the general form of enquirie the Dominion or Ownership of the Sea is ascribed to the King no less than of the Land or of publick Road or thorow-fare and River agreeable hereto is that Article about any kinde of salt-waters beeing inclosed by any subject or possessed in any other manner which in the antient Records of our Court of Admiraltie is said to bee don to the disherison of the King The words are there Item soit enquis de ceulx qui acrochent à eulx eaves salees en desheretison du Roy. And at this day enquirie is wont to bee made about that business by Autoritie of the high Admiral Robert Belknap also an eminent Judg in the time of Richard the Second saith that the Sea is subject to the King as a part of his English Kingdom or of the Patrimonie of the Crown His words in the Norman tongue run thus Le Mere est del ligeans del Roy come de son corone d' Angleterre Hee added to his words in a remarkable way as belonging to the Crown of England or as belonging
Sea That the Kings of England never had prohibited Navigation and Fishing in the Irish Sea between England and Ireland as if they would have had it proved from thence that the Dane ought not to bee prohibited Fishing or Navigation between Island and Norway becaus neither were Lords of the Sea but had possessed the Shores onely on both sides by an equal Right There were other particulars also no less rashly spoken touching a communitie of the Sea as wee observed before Concerning Navigation and Fishing in the Norwegian Sea I shall add more by and by But as it was ill don of those Commissioners in that Treatie to make use of an Argument drawn from a necessarie communitie of the Sea so there is no truth in that which they let fall concerning the Irish Sea For wee know that not onely those pettie Potentates bordering near the Sea heretofore that were in Rebellion and had usurped the Kings Right in many places of Ireland did exact grievous Tributes of Foreiners for the very libertie of Fishing but also it was expressly provided by Act of Parlament that no Foreiner should Fish in the Irish Sea without leav first obteined to this purpose from the Lord Lievtenant or som other lawsul Deputie or Officer of the King of England yea and that all Foreiners should pay yearly for every Fisher-boat of XII Tons or upward thirteen shillings and four pence and for everie lesser Vessel two shillings upon pain of forfeiting their Vessels Furniture and all Goods whatsoëver if so they refused this kinde of paiment or did not acknowledg this Soveraignite of the Lord of the Sea But I shall insert the whole Act touching this business that wee may understand what was the most received Opinion of all the Estates of Ireland touching this Right here of the King Item at the requeste of the Commons that where divers vessels of other landes fro one daie to other goynge to fish amongst the kings Irish enemies in divers partes of this sayd land by which the kings said enemies bee greatlye advanced and strengthened aswell in vitualles harneys armor as dyvers others necessaries also great tributes of money given by every of the said vessells to the said enemies from day to day to the great augmentation of their power and force against the King's honor and wealth and utter distruction of this said land thereupon the premisses considered it is enacted and ordeined by aucthoritie of the said Parliament that no manner vessell of other landes shall bee no time nor season of the yeere from henceforth from the feast of the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christs next comming go in no part of the said land betwixt the said Irish enemies to no manner fishing without one special licence of the Lieutenant his deputy or Justice of the land for the time being or licence of another person having the kings power to grant such licence upon paine of forfaiture of the shippe and goods to the king And that whatsoever person or persons that find or impeche any of the said vessells rumpants or forfaites against this act by the auctoritie of the same it bee lawfull to them so making any claime in behalfe of the King and approving the said forfaytures by any of the said vessels to be made that the king shall have th' one moitye of the said forfeyture and the said person or persons shall have th' other without anye impechment and that all manner vessells of other lands comming in the said land of Ireland a fishing being of the burden of twelue tunnes or lesse haveing one Drover or boate everye of them to paye for the maintenance of the Kings warres there xiii s. iiii d. by the yeer And all other small vessells as scarfes or boates not haveing Drover nor lighter being within the said burden of twelve runnes every of them shall paye twoe shillings goings a fishing in the like manner Provided alwayes that no vessell fyshing in the North parte of Wicklo be charged by reason of this art and that the Lieutenant his deputy or Justice of the land for the time being shall have the foresaid summes and duties of mony so paid to be imployed in the Kings warres for the defente of the said land and that the Customers and Collectors of the same summes shall accoumpt before the said Justice Lieutenant or Deputy for the time being or such Auditors that shall be for the same appointed by the king or them and not before the Barons of th'exchequer in the said lande and that none of the saide vessels so comming from other parts in the saide lande shall not depart out of the saide lande till every of them pay their said duties upon pain of forfeiture of the vessels and goods to the King There are som also who affirm that the King of Spain obteined leav by request from our Queen Marie for XXI years to fish in the more Northerly part of the Irish Sea and that thereupon a Revenue of one thousand pounds per annum was advanced to the Exchequer in Ireland A Proclamation also was set forth by James King of great Britain prohibiting any foreiner without leav first obteined to fish in this Irish Sea But as to what concern's that Controversie about the Isle of Man although it bee remember'd by Giraldus who wrote in the Reign of Henrie the Second nevertheless it is to bee conceived that it arose in the more antient times of the English-Saxons when all that lie's betwixt England and Ireland was in subjection either to the Kings of Ireland or Britain that is when both of them had in this Sea distinct Territories of their own whose Bounds were in question Certain it is as Beda write's that Edwin the most potent King of the Nortbumbrians or rather of all the English-Saxons subdued the Mevanian Isles to the Dominion of England about the year DCXXX That is to say both that Mevanian which wee call Anglesey the other also which is Man whereof wee discoursed But in the later time of the Anglo-Saxon Empire the Norwegians or Danes who exceedingly infested both this and the North-east Sea with very frequent Robberies at length seized both this Isle and the Hebrides and held them almost two hundred years So that in the mean time this of Man could not in a Civil sens bee ascribed either to Ireland or Britain But that the Kings thereof were at that time Lords as well of the neighboring Sea as of the Isles may bee collected out of their Annals where we find that Godred whose sirname was Crovan King of Man in the year of our Lord MLXVI brought Dublin and a great part of Laynster under his subjection And so throughly subdued the Scots that no man who built a Ship durst drive in more than three Nails So that hee gave both limitation and Law to the Shipping of his Neighbors which is all one as to enjoy the very Dominion of the Sea as I have shewn in
com the Hollanders should keep at least fourscore miles distance from the Coasts of Scotland And if by accident they were driven near through violence of weather they paid a certain Tribute at the Port of Aberdene before their return where there was a Castle built and fortified for this and other occasions and this was duly and really paid still by the Hollanders within the memorie of our Fathers until that by frequent dissentions at home this Tribute with very many other Rights and Commodities came to nothing partly through the negligence of Governors and partly through the boldness of the Hollanders So you see how limits were by agreement prescribed heretofore in this Sea to the Fishing of Foreiners But the more Northerly Sea which lie's against Scotland was for the most part in subjection heretofore to the Norwegians and Danes who were Lords of the Isles there So that the people of the Orcades speak the Gothish Language to this day Robertus de Monte tell 's us that hee who was called King of the Isles was possest of XXXII Islands in that Sea above four hundred and sixtie years ago paying such a Tribute to the King of Norway that at the succession of every new King the King of the Isles present's him ten marks in Gold and make's no other acknowledgment to him all his life long unless another King succeed again in Norway And Giraldus Cambrensis writing of these things saith that in the Northern Sea beyond Ulster and Galloway there are several Islands to wit the Orcades and Inchades or Leucades which som would have to bee the Hebrides and many other over most of which the Norwegians had Dominion and held them in subjection For although they lie much nearer to other Countries yet that Nation beeing more given to the Sea usually preferr's a Piratick kinde of life above any other So that all their Expeditions and Wars are performed by Sea Fight This hee wrote in the time of Henrie the second So that somtimes those Sea-Appendants of the Dominion of Britain in the Northern parts were invaded by Foreiners Hence also it is that Ordericus Vitalis speaking of Magnus the son of Olaus King of Norway saith hee had a great power in the Isles of the Sea which relate's unto the time of William the Second King of England The same Ordericus also saith that the Orcades Finland Island also and Groênland beyond which there is no other Countrie Northward and many other as far as Gothland are subject to the King of Norway and wealth is brought thither by shipping from all parts of the world So wee have here a clear description of the Dominion of the Norwegians heretofore as well in this neighboring Sea of Scotland as in the more open But in after time when as by agreement made between Alexander the third King of Scots and Magnus the fourth of Norwaie as also between Robert Bruce King of Scotland and Haquin of Norwaie it was concluded touching these Isles that they should bee annexed to the Scotish Dominion this could not bee don but there must bee a Cession also of that Sea-Dominion which bordered round upon the Coast of Norwaie Yet the Norwegian King possessed it for the most part and afterwards the Dane by an union of the two Kingdoms of Denmark and Norwaie until that Christiern the first King of Norwaie and Denmark upon the marriage of his daughter Margarite to James the third King of Scotland made an absolute Surrender of these Islands and in the year of our Lord MCDLXX transferr'd all his right both in the Isles of Orcades and Shetland and the rest lying in the hither part of the Northern Sea upon his Son in law and his Successors And as concerning this business I shall here set down the words of Joannes Ferrerius who was indeed Native of Piedmont but supplied with matter of Historie out of the Records of Scotland by Henrie Sainclair Bishop of Ross. Moreover in the Deucaledonian Sea toward the North-East there are the Isles of Orcades seated next to the Coast of Scotland whereof onely twentie eight are at this daie inhabited and above an hundred miles beyond the Orcades towards Norway are the Shetland Isles in number eighteen which are at this daie inhabited and in subjection to the King of Scotland concerning which there was a great quarrel in former Ages between the Scots and Danes yet the Dane kept possession All these Islands did Christiern King of Denmark peaceably surrender together with his daughter in marriage to James King of Scots until that either hee himself or his posteritie paid to the Scotish King or his Successors in lieu of her Dowrie the summe of fiftie thousand Rhenish Florens which were never discharged to this daie For so much I my self have seen and read in the Deeds of marriage betwixt Ladie Margarite daughter of the King of Denmark and James the third King of Scotland drawn up and fairly signed with the Seals of both Kingdoms Anno Dom. 1468. c. But afterwards when Ladie Margarite beeing Queen had been delivered of ber eldest son James Prince of Scotland the Danish King willing to congratulate his daughter's good deliverie did for ever surrender his right in the Islands of the Deucaledonian Sea to wit the Isles of Orcades Shecland and others which hee deliver'd in pledg with his daughter upon her marriage to the Scotish King I hear the deeds of this surrender are kept among the Records belonging to the Crown of Scotland And so at length those Isles and the Dominion of this Sea returned to the Kings of Scotland which they enjoy at this day The Kings of Scotland have a pledg of Dominion also in this Sea that is to say Tributes or Customs imposed upon Fisher-men for Fishing of which by the way you may read in their Acts of Parlament Touching that Right which belong's to the King of Great Britain in the main and open Sea of the North. And the Conclusion of the Work CHAP. XXXII COncerning that Neighboring Sea which is a Territorie belonging to the Scots I have spoken in the former Chapter But I must not omit to treat here of that Sea which stretcheth it self to a very large extent toward the North washing the Coasts of Friesland Island and other Isles also under the Dominion of the King of Denmark or of Norway For even this Sea also is asscribed by som to the King of Great Britain Albericus Gentilis applying that of Tacitus The Northern Coasts of Britain having no Land lying against them are washt by the main and open Sea you see saith hee how far the Dominion of the King of Great Britain extend's it self toward the South North and West As if almost all that which lay opposite to the Isles of Britain in the open Sea were within the Dominion of the King of Great Britain And concerning the Northern Sea also which reacheth there to parts unknown the very same
or singularitie especially when it is besides most apparant that the King of Denmark doth not onely pretend to the Sovereigntie of the Sound but causeth all such Ships as pass through it to pay what toll hee pleaseth The great Turk prohibit's all Nations saving his own Vassals to enter the black Sea or Pontus Euxinus the like hee doth to the red Sea whch contein's at the least 1200 miles in length beginning from the streits of Babelmandel which give 's entrance thereinto and ending at the Town of Sues which is seated at the bottom thereof The King of Portugal opposeth to the utmost of his power any but his own subjects to sail into the East-Indies affirming those Seas to bee intirely under his dominion as well by Conquest as the Pope's donation insomuch as the smallest vessel even of the natives of those parts cannot sail from Port to Port without the pass-port of the Vice-Roy of Goa or of som other by him deputed thereto styling himself amongst others his Titles to bee King of the Conquest Navigation and Commerce or Traffick of AEthiopia Arabia Persia India c. which hath been hitherto so punctually observed as no Castilian or Spaniard might at any time or for any occasion sail into the East-Indies though both those Nations were for many years together united under one King Secondly if the Dominion of these Seas dotruely and properly belong to the Commonwealth of England as hath been so sufficiently cleared and proved to the whole world by that learned Book entituled Mare Clausum why may not or ought not the People of England by all lawful waies procure that the Dominion of these Seas that so justly appertein's unto them may bee secured from any force violence or opposition how great soever of their most powerful neighbors whenas wee see the Venetians to bee so jealous in preservation of the title they pretend to their Seas as rather then to suffer it to bee in the least sort questioned they do upon all occasions oppose themselvs by force or otherwise against the most potent Princes of Europe and Asia Vale. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dominium Maris OR THE DOMINION OF THE SEA AFter a long peace betwixt the Progenitors of the Emperor Maximilian the first and the Republick of Venice in the year 1508 there began certain slight differences which concluded in a notable and most memorable war insomuch as the Republick for 22 years following were with the said Prince and with his Posteritie for divers respects somtimes in war somtimes in peace and somtimes in truce until in the year 1529 all differences betwixt them were composed and a peace concluded in Bolonia which continued all that Age with the Emperor Charls the Fifth together with his brother Ferdinando King of Hungarie and Archduke of Austria But becaus by the division made betwixt the said brethren seven years before all the Austrian lands which confined with the Venetians were laid by agreement unto the part which belonged unto King Ferdinand the confines of which as they had conjuncture with the lands of the Republick were very intricate and of great difficultie to conclude unto whether partie they did belong as well for the publick reasons of the said Princes as for those of their private subjects To end all which in quiet it was agreed that there should bee an arbitrarie Tribunal erected in Trent for the deciding of these doubts which in the year 1535 pronounced sentence whereby all the differences beeing more then an hundred were definitively concluded Here notwithstanding the difficultie ceased not becaus som did travers the execution of the sentence so as in progress of time new quarrels did arise from both sides each one pretending new wrong◠offered by the advers partie Whereupon to put an end to all these differences there was by the common consent as well of Ferdinando who succeeded in the Empire by the resignation of his brother as of the Republick a convention appointed in Friuli 1563 of five Commissaries one Procurator and three Advocates for each part who should treat of the differences as well old as new and should have power to conclude them under the ratification of the several Princes And this so great a number of Judges was desired by the Emperor the better to give satisfaction to his subjects of several Provinces interessed in the caus Of the Imperial side the Commissaries were Andrew Preghel a Baron of Austria Maximilian Dorimbergh Elenger de Goritia Stephen Sourz and Anthonie Statemberger the Procurator was Giacomo Campana Chancellor of Goritia the Doctors or Advocates were Andrea Rapicio Gervasio Alberto and Giovan Maria Gratia Dei For the Venetians the Commissaries were Sebastian Venier Marino de Cavalli Pietro Sanudo Giovan Baptista Contarini and Augustin Barbarigo The Procurator was Giovan Antonio a secretarie the Advocates Marquardo Susanna Francesco Gratiano and Giacomo Chizzola At this Convention the complaints on both sides were opened which beeing argued and the other publick differences partly composed and partly decided there was taken into consideration a Petition of the Imperial Procurator in this form Ejusdē Majestatis nomine requiritur ut posthac illius subditis atque aliis in sinu Adriatico tutò navigare ac negotiari liceat Item ut damna Tergestinis Mercatoribus atque aliis illata restituantur It is required in the name of his Majestie that hereafter it may bee lawful for his subjects and others to traffick and navigate safely in the Adriatick Gulf. Likewise that recompence bee made for the damages susteined by the merchants of Trieste and others And Rapicio the advocate did accompanie this demand with saying that this was not a caus to bee handled with any subtiltie it beeing a thing most notorious that navigation ought to bee free notwithstanding the subjects of his Majestie had been constrained to go with their ships to Venice and there to pay custom at which his Majestie was aggrieved and made instance that it might bee remedied To this Chizzola Advocate of the Republick made Answer saying that it was a clear case indeed that Navigation ought to bee free but yet those things whereat they were aggrieved were no waies repugnant to this freedom forasmuch as in countries which are most free those who have the dominion thereof receiv custom and order by which way all Merchandise shall pass and therefore no bodie should bee grieved if the Venetians for their own respects did use so to do in the Adriatick Sea which is under their dominion and hee added that if they intended to dispute of the business in question hee was to advertise them that this caus could not by any pretens bee brought into judgment at that convention which was onely instituted for the execution of such things as were formerly sentenced and for righting of such new wrongs which succeeded after the sentence it beeing besides a thing most notorious that the Republick as Lord of the Adriatiok Sea did exercise that dominion at the present
unto them by God and therefore that those Precepts are to bee observed in that vast Ocean as in the Territorie of Israël The chief Autor of this opinion was an antient and very famous Interpreter of the Law by name Rabbi Jehuda who also from the express words of the Holie Law above-mentioned conclud's that the western Ocean thus bounded on both sides was assigned His Doctrine is deliver'd after this manner as wee finde it in the most antient Digests of the Jewish Law Whatsoëver lie's directly opposite to the Land of Israël it is of the same account with the Land of Israël according as it is written As for your West-Border let your Border bee or you shall have the great Sea Also let this bee a Border to you or your Border To wit the Border of the Sea or of the West Also the Collateral Islands situate on both sides in the same direct line fall under the same accompt with the sides themselvs So that if a line were drawn from Cephaloria through the Isles to the main Ocean and from the River of Egypt to the Ocean then that which is within the line is to bee taken for the Territorie of Israël and that which lie's without the line to bee out of the Dominion of Israël The line drawn from Cephaloria was directed by the Promontorie of mount Hor or Amanus as is said before For that Citie was seated on the top of that mountain which is here the North-east Border as it is observed in the Gloss upon the place alleged and in many other There also this opinion is thus explained According to this opinion of Rabbi Jehuda all that Sea which lie's opposite to the length of the Land of Israël even to the main Ocean West-ward where the world it 's self is bounded is to bee reckon'd within the Territorie or Dominion of Israël even as it is written the great Sea and your Border the whole place wee gave you a little before out of Numbers where and your Border is added the more fully and plainly to intimate that the great and wide Sea is contained also within it's Border And it follow 's there thus Between those little Cords or Lines directed as wee said on both sides to the main Sea there are Islands belonging to the Territorie of Israël the Islands and waters have both the same Law c. Hence also the ordinarie Jewish Gloss upon those words in Numbers And you shall have the great Sea saith The Isles that are in the middâ—st of the Sea even they also are part of the bound or Border But the Jewish Paraphrase is more plain there And let your Border bee the great Sea that is the main Ocean and it's Isles and Cities and Ships with the principal waters that are in it Nor was it upon any other ground that Rabbi Aben-Ezra Rabbi Bâ—chai and others conceived so great a part of the Sea did belong to the Israëlites by this assignation that they interpret the great Sea also to reach through the Sea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the Spanish Sea distant so many miles Westward from the Continent of Israël In both the forenamed places the words are The great Sea to wit the Spanish And your Border as if it had been said The great Sea shall bee your possession which of it self also is your Border But in the mean while it is to bee consider'd that the whole western Ocean as far as the narrow channel of Cadiz is by the Arabians and so by the modern Jews who were their Disciples indifferently called the Romane Sea mare Al-shem or the Sea of Damascus that is the Syrian Sea mare Al-Andalús or the Spanish and lastly the mediterranean Sea the whole beeing denominated from the Coasts of som particular Countries As it may bee clearly collected both out of the Nubian Geographie as also out of the Geographical Abridgment of Abu Elchasen Hali an Arabian But this is most certain that the name of the Spanish Sea hath been used here by the Rabbins not from such a promiscuous or common denomination of the Sea but according to the explanation of such an antient Assignation of the Dominion of Israël as wee have mentioned And so this first opinion would have the whole Western Ocean as far as the streights of Cadiz which the Antients thought the utmost bound of the world to bee reckoned for that part of the Territorie of Israël which is included within the lines drawn from the Promontorie of mount Hor or Amanus and the entrance of Pelusium into the West But by the other opinion which seem's much more agreeable to reason it is determined that the Divine Assignation of the Territorie of Israël is comprehended indeed within more narrow Bounds of this Sea but yet Sea-room large enough so that according to this opinion the North and South-Borders do end at the very shore or at the utmost point of the said Promontorie North-East and at the entrance of Pelusium towards the South not stretching any farther into the West But indeed the Autors of this opinion would have a streight line drawn from that Promontorie to the entrance of Pelusium to wit from the North-East into the South thereby to limit and bound the Western part of the Dominion of Israël so that what portion soëver either of the Sea or the Isles should bee comprehended within such a line or lie on the East side of it the whole were to bee reckoned a part of the Territorie of Israël as well as any Coast upon the Continent or main Land And so after this manner the aforesaid line included within the nooks and windings of the shore of that Territorie possessed by the Tribes of Asher Ephraim Dan Zabulon and Simeon was situate before very large spaces of of the Sea for above two hundred miles and supposed to bee of the same accompt with the shore it self In the Digests of the Jewish Law this opinion is explained thus That it may bee known what com's under the name of the Territorie of Israël and what is to bee reckoned out of that Territorie as to the North-East and Western bounds whatsoëver is stretcht forth on this side and within Mount Amanus is the Territorie of Israël And that which is placed beyond that Mountain is without this Territorie And so by the same reason it is to bee determined touching the Isles of the Sea that are seated over against that Mountain Let a small Cord or Line bee drawn over those Islands from Mount Amanus to the river of Egypt that is conteined within the Line is the Territorie of Israël but that which lie's without the Line is no part of that Territorie With this agree's that of Ezekiel concerning the Sea-Coast of the holy Land after hee had described the South part which is near the Sea The West side also shall bee the great Sea from the border till a man com over against Hamath This is the West
the word appear's sufficiently ridiculous whil'st they derive a Syrian or Phenician name from the Greek fountain But the very thing which I suppose they would have is this That Atergatis was Queen or Sovereign Lady not only of Syria or Phenicia which is the Sea-cost of Syria but also of the Sea lying before it in such a manner that it was not lawful for any one to fish freely therein at least not to enjoy the benefit of fishing without her consent From whence it was a Custom to consecâ—aâ—e fishes of Gold and Silver to her after shee was placed among â—he Deities IX NInthly after the Phenicians the AEgyptians possessed the Sea under their Kings Psamnitis and Bocchoris who lived immediately before the beginnings of the Olympiads Mention is made of them also in Marianus and Florentius X. IN the tenth place the Milesians were Lords of the Sea The books of Eusebius do not shew the number of years But both in Marianus and Florentius wee read that the Milesians possessed the Sea XVIII years Stephanus concerning Cities saith Naucratis a Citie of AEgypt was built by the Milesians then possessing the Sea And Eusebius also mention's the building of that Citie together with their Dominion at Sea about the time of Romulus In like manner they built Sinope seated by the Euxine Sea which as Strabo saith commanded that Sea which flow's within the Cyanean Islands XI ELeventhly the Carians possessed the Sea Their Sea Dominion is remembred by Diodorus Siculus It was about the time of Hezekiah XII TWelfthly and next to the Carians the Lesbians held the Sea in possession LXIX years So it is in the Latine of Eusebius But Marianus rendreth it LVIII years XIII THirtenthly the Phoceans possessed the Sea about the Captivitie of Babylon Their Dominion lasted XLIV years So saith the Greek of Eusebius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Phoceans were Lords of the Sea XLIV years Before which words the number 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or of twelve is prefixed whereby it is signified that they were the twelfth after the Lydians and the thirteenth from Minos XIV FOurteenthly the Corinthians were Lords of the Sea I do not finde that they were thus ranked But it appear's clearly out of Thucydides that they were very potent ar Sea and did so repress Piracies by their strength in shipping that they gained themselvs a very large command by Sea as well as by land The same autor also mention's their extraordinary industry in restoring the affairs of Navigation Nor doth time gainsay but that wee may well place them here as also the Iönians next But wee do not as yet finde that these fourteenth and the fifteenth are received by writers into the Catalogue of those who have thus held the Sea in possession XV. FIfteenthly the Iönians were neighboring Lords of the Sea Concerning them Thucydides saith A good while after to wit after the power of the Corinthians by Sea the power and interest of Navigation was in the hand of the Iönians in the time of Cyrus the first King of the Persians and of his son Cambyses And contending also with Cyrus they injoyed their own Sea for som time where the old Scholiast add's by way of observation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the neighboring Sea but not all XVI SIxteenthly the Naxians were Lords of the Sea Eusebius saith In the fifteenth place the Naxians possessed the Sea ten years About the time of Cambyses It is spoken of the Naxians named from the Island Naxos which is one of the Cyclades or Isles in the Archipelago XVII SEventeenthly the Eretrians succeeded into this Sea-Dominion Eusebius when hee speak's of the Naxians saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. And after them the Eretrians in the seventeenth place held it VII years Eretria was heretofore a famous and wealthy Citie in the Island of Euboea XVIII And lastly the last or eighteenth Lords of the Sea in this Catalogue were the People of AEgina The Latine of Eusebius saith the People of AEgina possessed the Sea XX years even until Xerxes his passage which is noted in the fourth year of the sixtie seventh Olympiad But Xerxes made his passage in the seventy fift Olympiad and in first year thereof Therefore there passed XXVIII years between But truly Joseph Scaliger observe's here from this carelesness in counting of years that those are meer triflings which are found in the Latine And hee saith they are s discovered by the Greek wherein wee read onely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The people of AEgina held possession of the Sea X years Which truly wee finde as well in the former Chronicle of Eusebius as in his Canon nor is it otherwise placed then in the Latine Also Strabo and AElianus make mention of their Sea-Dominion Touching the Sea-Dominion of the Lacedemonians and Athenians Moreover also that it was acknowledged not onely by the Greeks but also by the Persians in a Treatie of Peace CHAP. XI NOr are those Particulars which are to bee applied hither out of the East found onely in the Customs and Sea-Dominion of so many famous Nations thus continued one after another the years of whose Empires have usually been reckoned from their subduing the Sea but in the Customs of others also who truly were more famous though they bee not registered any where in such a kinde of Catalogue It is written of Polycrates that renowned King of the Samians who about the beginning of the Persian Empire vanquished the Lesbians and Mâ—lesians in a Sea fight that hee so earnestly aspired after a Soveraigntie of the Sea that it was manifestly acknowledged to bee capable of Dominion Herodotuâ— saith Polycrates is the first of those that wee have known who had an intent to acquire the Dominion of the Sea unto himself except Minos of Crete and if there were any other that enjoyed the Sea before him Hee speak's I suppose of Kings For those Greeks in whose hands the Dominion of the Sea was as wee before have shewn you so often changed were commonly govern'd either by a Popular or an Aristocratical form of Government Nor could Herodotus I think bee more ignorant of their Dominion then of King Minos For hee lived after the fore-mentioned Dominion of the People of AEgina was ended or about the eightieth Olympiad Therefore either hee spake onely of Kings or was extremely mistaken About the eightieth Olympiad and the times following unto the Grecian Monarchie those most renowned People of Greece not onely the Athenians but the Lacedemonians also did somtime enjoy a Dominion of the Sea flowing about them Demosthenes saith of the Lacedemonians They had Dominion over the Sea and the whole Land Others also have testified as much Concerning the Athenians either the same man or Hegisippus in that Oration touching Halonesos making mention of Philip K. of Macedon's affecting a Dominion of the Sea speak's thus De Praedonibus aequum esse aït Philippus
c Concerning Pirates Philip saith it is meet that both hee and you should by common consent drive away such as offend upon the Sea requiring no other thing than this that hee may bee put in command over the Sea by you and that you would confess your selvs unable to defend and guard the Sea which hitherto hath been yours without the help of Philip. They did also by League impose a certain size and proportion upon all sorts of Bottoms both for qualitie and quantitie which their neighbors should have leav to use It is an Article of the Treatie made with the Lacedemonians That the Lacedemonians and their Consederates might indeed use the Sea but not sail in a long ship but any other kinde of vessel which beeing rowed with Oares should not exceed the freight of five hundred Talents That is to say not in a vessel with one range of Oares much less in one of two or three ranges or others that were men of War but in vessels to bee rowed nevertheless with certain pairs of Oars beeing vessels onely for carriage and those small enough other passages of this kinde there are in Thucydides Hereunto belong's that of AEmilius Probus touching Timotheus a famous Captain of the Athenians Hee brought Corcyra saith hee under the command of the Athenians and made the people of Epirus the Athamanians Chaonians and all those Nations which border upon that Sea to bee their Confederates Whereupon the Lacedemonians desisted from long contentions and of their own accord yielded a pre-eminence of Sea Dominion to the Athenians and setled Peace upon this condition that the Athenians should bee chief Commanders at Sea Which Victorie was received with so much joy among the Athenians that Altars were then erected unto PEACE and a Temple appointed for that Goddess And Demosthenes concerning Archebius and Heraclides who when they had deliver'd Byzantium to Thrasybulus they made you saith hee speaking to the men of Athens Lords of the Sea so that yee might sell the Tenth To wit the Customs of the Merchandize of such Merchants as should trade in the Hellespont which is noted there by Ulpianus the Rhetorician From hence also Cicero would have that barbarous Decree of this Nation to have had its rise concerning the people of AEgina somtimes Lords of the Sea The Athenians saith hee dealt very cruelly who passed a Decree that the AEginetans who were powerful in Shipping should have their thumbs cut off to the end that they might not grow strong in Shipping hereafter or by force enter upon that Sea then possessed by the Athenians For in som Books wee read quia classe valebant becaus they grew strong in Shipping as it is noted by Carolus Langius Though it bee conceived by AElian the Decree was therefore made that they might not bee able to use a Spear and yet to handle Oars This crueltie is detested by Writers But it is evident that by this means they were deprived of a free use of the Sea Nor was such a Dominion of the Sea approved onely among those people of Greece but also by the Persians who at that time ruled the East as appear's in that notable League made after the Victory at Eurymedon For truly Cimon Captain of the Athenians having vanquish't the Naval Forces of Artaxerxes Longimanus King of the Persians which had infested the Sea about the Chelidonian Islands the King's courage was so broken That as Plutarch saith and Aristides almost the same hee concluded that notable Peace upon such terms that hee was to keep the distance of an hors-race from the Greek Sea and that hee should not have a Ship built long or beaked within the Cyanean and Chelidonian Islands So that the King was to keep out of every part of the AEgean Rhodian Carpathian and Lydian Sea and that which bend's thence into the West towards Athens Becaus the Athenians were clearly Lords thereof For the Greek which of old was called the Carick Sea spread its self to a very great latitude from Caria or the shore of the Western part of Asia Moreover subjection was imposed upon the Sea of Pamphylia and Lycia as also the Euxin Sea that no Ship of the King 's which should bee long-built or beaked that is to say a man of War could according to the League bee admitted either in this beyond the Cyanean or in that beyond the Chelidonian Islands This certainly was the very meaning of Isocrates when making mention of the Athenian Dominion hee saith it was not lawful to sail in long Ships or Gallies beyond Phaselis For Phaselis a Town either of Lycia or Pamphylia is situate in the same direct line with the Chelidonian Islands But Suidas tell 's us that Castor Rhodius an antient Writer had compiled an Historie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of such as have enjoied a Dominion of the Sea Learned men are upon very good ground of Opinion that those Lords of the Sea reckoned up in the former Chapter were taken by Julius Africanus and Eusebius out of that Autor It is almost out of question too that hee added the Soveraigntie both of the Athenians and Lacedemonians by Sea Castor lived about the time of Augustus Caesar. That work of his is utterly lost Other Testimonies which are found scatter'd up and down touching the Dominion of the Sea in the Customs of the Eastern Nations CHAP. XII MOreover very many things are found scatter'd up and down in those Writings that concern the Customs of the Eastern Nations which clearly prove it to have been a most received opinion touching private Dominion of the Sea Antiochus Epiphanes King of Syria saith speaking of the Syrian Sea Are not both the Sea and the Land mine And Xerxes that Persian King when in a ridiculous humor hee scourged the Hellespont stigmatized it and cast a pair of Fetters into the Waters said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thy Lord inflict's this punishment upon thee Also whereas Agatharcides following the storie of Boxus the Persian write's that the red or Erythrean Sea was so called from King Erythras or Erythrus that is from Edom bordering thereupon who also was Esau and signifieth the same that Erythrus or Rubrus doth in Ebrew hee add's also this Exposition doth imply 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A man enjoying the Dominion of that Sea And truly wee read in Philostratus that there was an old contract touching the Red-Sea which King Erythras had contracted when hee had Dominion over that Sea that no Egyptian ought to enter that Sea in a long Ship but to imploy there onely one of Burthen And Quintus Curtius saith of the Citie of Tyre that beeing built by Agenor shee made not onely the neighboring Sea but what Sea soëver her Ships sail into to bee of her Dominion From whence also Tyria Maria Tyrian Sea's became a Proverb to signifie a Sea so possessed that free passage could not bee
had without leav of the Lord or Possessor There was also a very antient Custom used in the Fast that when great Kings having designs to bring any Nations under their power commanded the pledges of Empire and Dominion to bee deliver'd to them they were wont to demand Water and Earth together That is to say there quired them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to bring earth and water and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to prepare Earth and Water They conceived that their Dominion of the Sea as well as the Land was signified by such a kinde of pledg or token Thus Darius demanded Earth and Water from Indathyrsus King of the Scythians Thus Xerxes from the Lacedemonians and thus both of them from the People of Coos which is witnessed by the Coans themselvs in a publick Decree or Epistle in answer to Artaxerxes his most imperious demand that Hippocrates should bee rendred up to him wherein the Coans slighting the threats of that great King decreed that what hazzard soêver they might seem to run Hippocrates should by no means bee rendred They added also to that Decree 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. How that when his Predecessors Darius and Xerxes had by their Letters demanded Earth and Water the people of Coos did in no wise yield it forasmuch as they were satisfied that those who had sent unto them were mortal as well as other men And in the Greek Copies of the Historie of Judith Nabuchodonosor beeing about to denounce War against the neighbor-Nations saith expresly the form of submission which hee expected was that they should provide for him Earth and Water Unless they conceiv themselvs to bee Lords of the Waters as well as the Land I do not well see wherefore they should demand Earth and Water as tokens of universal Dominion Moreover also Achmes Ben Seirim an Arabian writing of the Sea saith that according to the Doctrine of the Indians Persians and Egyptians in expounding of dreams If any one in a dream seem to himself to bee made Lord of the Sea hee shall bee heir of the whole Kingdom and shall reign Add hereunto that Oracle of Delos concerning the Sea-Dominion of the Athenians The men of Athens offering sacrifice in Delos a Boy that drew water to wash their hands poured Fish out of the pot together with the water Hereupon this Oracle was delivered by the Priests 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That they should becom Lords of the Sea The Autor is one Semus an antient Writer in Athenaeus where Phylarchus also relate's how that when Patroclus a Captain of Ptolomie the son of Lagus had sent fish and fresh figs together unto King Antigonus and those that stood by were in doubt what was meant by that present Antigonus said hee himself very well apprehended what might bee the meaning of Patroclus For saith hee either Patroclus mean's That wee must get the Soveraignty or Dominion of the Sea or els gnaw figs. Or that hee must seem slothful and effeminate or becom Lord of the Sea Therefore hee made no doubt touching private Dominion of the Sea And there also the Glutton in Antiphanes the Comedian saith it is neither profitable for life nor to bee endured That som of you should claim the Sea as peculiar to themselvs and spend much monie upon it but no victual for Navigation not so much as a bit Add also that of Theocritus touching the Dominion of Ptolomeus Philadelphus King of Egypt over the Sea as well as the Land 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hee is Lord of much Land and also of much Sea And a little after hee speak's of the Pamphilian Lycian and the inner part of the remaining Sea that the whole Sea and Land and Rivers were subject to King Ptolomie Also Philo Judeus saith let not Princes glory in that they have conquer'd many Nations or that they have brought all the rivers and Seas so exceeding vast both in Number and magnitude under their power Moreover though Isocrates in his Oration concerning Peace seem's to hint that the Sea-Dominion and Soveraignty which the Athenians endevored to maintain brought many mischiefs upon them and also that it somtimes occasioned them to use Tyrannie against the Neighbor-Cities of Greece yet hee dispute's it as a thing that may com into examination under the account of profitable and unprofitable and by accident of unjust but hee doth not in anie wise endeavor to prove it unjust from the nature of the thing it self Yea in another place hee sufficiently commend's that Dominion though not all things in preserving it And the same Autor saith expresly of both Cities the Lacedemonian and Athenian It hapned that both Cities did enjoy a Command of the Sea which when either of them held they had most of the other Cities obedient thereto Wee read also a dispute in Aristotle concerning a Communion or common enjoyment of the Sea to wit whether it may bee convenient or not for a well order'd City whether it were better it should remain common to all men so that no man might in any wise bee denied passage traffick merchandise and fishing Or that the use of it may bee so restrained that it might bee received into the Dominion of any Citie so as to exclude forreiners Hee dispute's this point whether it bee profitable or unprofitable but question 's it not at all as unjust having been abundantly instructed out of the Customs of the Nations round about touching a propriety of the Sea as well as the Land Also his Scholar Alexander the Macedonian beeing victorious in the East prepared for an expedition against Europe that Hee might becom Lord of the whole Land and Sea as saith the Emperor Julian And truly among the People of Greece especialy such as border'd upon the Sea and others of that nature in the East to hold supreme power and Soveraigntie above others and to enjoy a Soveraigntie of the Sea were acoounted almost one and the same thing Nor did they conceiv that could bee obteined without this From whence arose that Council of Themistocles which Pompey the great also followed at Rome Qui mare teneat eum necesse esse rerum potiri c. Hee which can possess the Sea must need 's have Command of all So also saith Jsaac Casaubon upon Polybius To have Dominion of the Sea which is expressed by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is wholly and ever hath been a great strengthning and as it were a pledg of extraordinarie power Therefore the old writers of Chronicles among the Grecians seeing before the institution of the Olympiads there was no Sovereign power of any People of Greece in beeing upon whose actions a knowledg of times might bee grounded therefore among the other times that they made use of for the computing of times they omitted not that particular but carefully kept an accompt of those People who had once enjoyed a Dominion of the Sea and
of Citizens for the conveniencie of larger Fish-ponds bringing the Sea into their grounds made it their own and became Masters thereof with as good a Title as they had to their adjacent Land There beeing saith Varro two kindes of Fish-ponds one of Fresh the other of salt water the former sort are ordinarie and little worth such as our Countrie Fish-ponds that are supplied with water by little streames but those saltwater-Ponds are to bee found in the possessions of Noblemen and are supplied by the Sea as well with Fish as water yet they yield more delight then profit the filling of those Ponds beeing commonly the draining of the Owners purs Now what was this but to becom proprietaries of the Sea so far forth as it was derived or inclosed in their possessions And Columella who lived in the time of Claudius relate's that the Romanes in antient times for the most part used none but in-land Fish-ponds storing them with Spawners of the larger size presently adding Not long after that good husbandrie was laid aside when the wealth and luxurie of the succeeding age made inclosures of the Ocean and Seas themselvs And the yearly Revenue of such Demains which bordered upon the Sea was advanced by those Ponds or Inclosures of the Sea as well as by any Lands Lakes or Vineyards appertaining thereunto The same Columella discoursing hereupon hath this passage But seeing the custom of the times hath so far prevailed that these things are not onely in use but have gotten the reputation of magnificent and noble contrivances wee also least wee should seem morose and importune reprovers of so long and settled a practice will show what profit may redound from them to the Lord of the Manor how hee may rais an incom by the Sea if having made a purchase of Islands or Lands bordering upon the Sea hee cannot reap the fruits of the Earth by reason of that barrenness of the soil which usually is near the Shore So that wee see the Revenues of a Manor were improved by managing the Sea as well as Land and the Possessor was counted Lord of the one no more then of the other This usual right of Dominion over the Sea is mentioned also by S t Ambrose For the serving of their prodigious luxurie saith hee the Earth by digging of channels is forced to admit the Ocean for the making of artificial Islands and bringing litle Seas into their own possessions They challenge to themselvs large portions of the Sea by right and boast that the Fishes like so many bond-slaves have lost their former libertie and are subjected to their service This Creek of the Sea saith one belong's to mee that to another Thus great men divide the Elements among themselvs For Examples there are the Fish-ponds of Lucullus famous for his expensiveness in this kinde Hee having made way through a Mountain near Naples inclosed the Sea and became master of those water-courses which Plutarch call's Sea-Courses and Chases for the breeding of Fish Whereupon Pompey the Great in merriment saith Paterculus was wont to call Lucullus the gowned Xerxes in regard that by damming up of Chanels and digging down Mountains â—ee took the Sea into the Land The same Lucullus saith Plinie digging down a Mountain near Naples at greater charge then hee built his Villa took an arm of the Sea into his Manor which gave occasion to Pompey the Great to call him the gowned Xerxes The same conceit in Plutarch is attributed to Tubero the Stoick That concerning Xerxes is very famous Hoc terrae fiat hâc Mare dixit eat Here run the Sea hee said There let firm Land bee made When hee commanded the Sea to bee brought round about the Mountain Athos And Valerius saith of Caius Sergius Orata That hee might not have the serving of his palate depend upon the pleasure of Neptune hee contrived Seas of his own intercepting the waves with his trenches and so inclosing divers sholes of Fishes with dams that what tempestuous weather soëver happened Orata's Table was never unfurnished with varietie of Dishes The same libertie was used upon the Formian shore by Apollinaris of whose Fish-pond Martial speak's Si quando Nereus sentit AEoli regnum Ridet procellas tuta de suo Mensa Piscina Rhombum pascit Lupos vernas When winds do Lord it o're the Sea fright The Fisher his Table laugh's at their spight By its own private store secur'd from need While captiv'd Pikes and Turbot's Fish-ponds breed All the varietie of Fish which the wider Sea afforded Apollinaris had readie at hand in his Fish-pond which was nothing els but the Sea let in from the shore into his possession Contracta pisces AEquora sentiunt Jactis in altum molibus Such dams are cast into the main The Fish for want of room complain So saith Horace and in another place Caementis licèt occupes Tyrrhenum omne tuis Mare Ponticum though thou thy walls do rais Through all the Tuscan and the Pontick Seas And saith Salust To what purpose should I relate those things which cannot seem credible to any but those who have been eie-witnesses how Mountains have been removed by severall private persons and Seas brought into their places Of this sort were the Fish-ponds of Philippus Hortensius and others all made by taking in the Sea Moreover wee finde that Soveraigntie and Dominion over the Sea hath been somtimes conferred by the Patents of Princes The Emperor Trajan when hee endowed the Citie of Tharsus with Immunities and Privileges besides the Territorie of Land lying about added also a grant of Jurisdiction and Dominion over the river Cydnus and the adjacent Sea as may bee seen in Dion Chrysostom And it is very probable that the Maritimate rights of Neocesarea which Theodorus Balsamon saies were compiled by the Metropolitan of that Citie had respect unto the like Original as also those privileges in the Sea which the Emperor Comnenus granted to a great number of Monasteries according to the same Author The ancient Lawyers also are not silent as touching the Dominion of particular persons in the Sea Paulus one of greatest note among them declare's himself expresly thus Verily whensoëver a proprietie in som part of the Sea belong's to any person that person may sue out an interdict of uti possidetis in case hee bee â—indred from the exercise and enjoyment of his right becaus this matter concern's a private not a publick caus seeing the suit is commenced for the enjoying of a right which ariseth not from a publick but private Title For interdicts are proper to bee used in private cases not in publick Nothing could have been more plainly spoken to show that beyond all controversie hee admit's a private Dominion in the Sea even of single persons Yea Ulpian himself who was so fondly inclined to favor the opinion of a perpetual communitie of the Sea doth sufficiently
that in it which may seem to import that hee call's himself King of the Ocean especially if you consider those words which wee finde somtimes among Germane Writers in the Title of Charls the fifth Emperor and King of Spain In the Preface to the constitution concerning publick Judicatories in the Empire hee is called King of the Canarie Ilands also of the Islands of the Indies and of the Continent and of the Ocean Archduke of Austria c. And in the Imperial Sanctions published in high Dutch Konig-under Jnsulen Canariae auch der Jnsulen Indiarum und Terrae firmae des Maers Oceant c. as you may meet with it at least six hundred times The word Ocean is added as if hee entitled himself King of the Ocean But this is a mistake for the same in Spanish is Rey c. de las Islas y terra firma del mar Oceano c. that is King of the Islands and of the Terra firma of the Ocean namely the Islands or Continents of or lying in the Ocean which Pope Alexander the Sixth gave to Ferdinand the Fifth King of Spain all of them lying Westward from the very first Meridian of those hee entitle's himself King not of the Ocean it self How far private Dominion over the Sea is admitted according to the Customs or opinion of the French CHAP. XVIII AS concerning Dominion of the Sea according to the Customs of the French som perhaps may seem to have met with verie ancient evidences thereof in those Officers deputed for the guard of the Sea-Coasts whom wee read of in the Statute-Books and in that Rotlandus Governor of the British that is the Aremorican shore mentioned in the life of Charle-maign by Eginhartus a Writer of that time But those dignities have relation not so much to the Sea it self as to the shore and Sea-Coast or the border of the Land confining with the Sea notwithstanding that Rotlandus is by the French-men of this and the former Age promiscuously styled Governor both of the Sea and Shore as if there were no difference But it cannot bee denied that Princes heretofore upon the Shore of Aremorica or Bretaign as the Veneti of whom wee spake before did upon the same Shore impose Custom upon Ships as for the use of the Road upon their Coasts and challenge to themselvs other Rights of the like nature called Nobilitates super navibus So it is to bee read in an ancient Record made in the time of Duke Alanus in the year MLXXXVII concerning Precedence of Place among the Nobles of Bretaigne In that Record the second place is assigned to the Viscount of S t Pol de Leon who as the very words of it are had verie many of those Customs called Nobilitates super navibus imposed on such as passed the Ocean upon the Coasts of Osismer or Leon which as it was said Budicius an antient King of Bretaign did give and grant to one of his predecessors upon Marriage in reward of the virtue fidelitie and valor of that Viscount but with the consent of the Prelates Counts Barons and Nobles of Bretaign What these Nobilitates were and whence they had their original is partly declared by Bertrandus Argentraeus somtime President of the Province of Renes where hee discourseth also of the right of giving Pass ports which they call brefs de conduicte at this time in use on that shore That saith hee whereas till then it had been a right peculiar to the Princes beeing given by way of Dowrie to the Barons of Leon of which wee have alreadie spoken out of the aforesaid Record remained an hereditarie and proper right to that Familie until Joannes Ruffus the Duke redeemed it for a vast sum of monie of Guynomarius Baron of Leon after that Peter Mauclerc of Dreux Duke of Bretaign had in vain attempted to re assume it by force of arms It had its original they say upon this occasion When our Princes and antient Kings considered the daily Shipwracks made upon that shore where there were many Rocks and but few Havens they made a Law that none should set to Sea without their leav Such as did set out paying a certain rate had passes and guides appointed them that were well acquainted with the Sea and Shores They that refused forfeited their ships with all their tackling and furniture thereof and if the Ship were cast away their goods also were confiscate They that had leav were in no danger of confiscation and if they suffered Shipwrack had libertie to recover as many of their goods as they could And these guides were paid their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Conduct-money which wee have mentioned elswhere called by them droit de salvage These Tickets or Passes are given out now as heretosore at a certain price And among other Revenues of the Exchequer they also were rented out to the Farmers of the Custom So far Bertrandus from whom Renatus Choppinus borroweth almost the very words But Petrus Berlordaeus Advocate of the Parlament of Reines tell 's us that the Custom of taking forfeiture in that manner of all shipwrack't goods was abolished there by an Edict in the year MDLXXXIII But in the mean time for so much as concern's any part of that Western Sea lying next the Shore these are manifest evidences either of Dominion or of subjection in the Sea which indeed sufficiently prove by the Customs of that people that the Sea is capable of Dominion Moreover upon occasion of these Passes there have been controversies raised somtimes between the Dukes of Bretaign and the Kings of England as may bee seen in certain memorials of the affairs of Bretaign which have relation to the times of our Richard the second and John the Fourth Duke of Bretaign But this wee know for certain that in the agreement made between our Edward the Fourth and Francis the second Duke of Bretaign in the year MCCCCLXVIII concerning mutual traffick and free passage to and fro for the subjects of each Nation during a truce of thirtie years there is an express proviso concerning Wrecks but such a one as left an equal right to both of them not altogether unlike that which for many ages hath been in use upon the English Shore No mention at all beeing made in the Articles of the Truce either of the right or use of these aforesaid Passes as beeing a thing in no wise admitted by the English But som modern Lawyers among the French do vainly affirm that their King is Lord not onely of a part of the Sea neighboring upon the Territorie of Bretaign but of the whole Sea that is adjoyning to any part of France and so of the British or English Sea also By which very Assertion of theirs they sufficiently declare their judgment that there may bee a soveraign over the Sea The King saith Charondas Caronaeus is supreme Lord of the Seas which flow about his
Grant of the use of the Northern or Norwegian sea for a certain time to our Merchants of the Muscovie Companie in such a manner as if hee had rented out any Land whereof hee stood fully seized and possessed Hee limited the Grant also with such conditions as hee thought fit The publick Instruments or Records about this Particular are yet extant whereby the King had an annual Tribute in recompence other Merchants were excluded and the Grant it self was to continue no longer then the Peace made between that King and the Moscovit Wee read also in the ancient Histories of Denmark of King Harald Hildetan that no man did presume to usurp a Domination in the Sea without his consent And that which follow 's next ought especially to bee taken notice of as to this Particular becaus the Empire of Land and Sea was once divided in the Republick of Denmark And Olo who afterwards was King succeeding his Father in the Dominion of the Sea vanquish't LXX Kings of the Sea by Sea-Fight Which things are written by Saxo Grammaticus and other also of that kinde And in the Treatie held at Koppenhagen betwixt Christiern the fourth of Denmark and Gustavus Adolphus of Swedland the King of Swedland renounceth the right Soveraigntie and Dominion of the Sea and the other Roialties by him formerly claimed over the said sea in Norway Norland and in the Jurisaiction of Wardhuisen But touching the Sea of Norway as it lie's more Northward wee shall add more at the latter end of the second Book Mention is made likewise of the Sea belonging to the Reâ—lm of Poland and the Dominion thereof in that Promise which was made by the French Ambassadors in the name of Henrie III of France when hee was elected King of Poland The aforesaid Ambassadors do promise in the name of the most illustrious King now chosen that assoon God willing as hee shall com to his Kingdom hee will at his own charge maintain a convenient Navie sufficient to defend the Ports and the Soveraigntie of the Sea belonging to the Kingdom and the Provinces adjoyning even to the utmost bounds of the whole Dominion of Poland as it is recorded by Janus Januszowskius in his Syntagma of the statutes of Poland But the Turkish Emperor who by Conquest succeeded in the right of the Emperors of Constantinople and so purchased both the AEgean and Euxin sea calling this the black the other the white sea is wont solemnly to intitle himself Lord both of the white and black sea as you may see in the League betwixt Achmet the Ottoman Emperor and Henry the IV. of France made above thirty years since and printed both in the French and Turkish Tongue Moreover in the same League the Turk grant's the French free leav to Fish and search for Coral in certain Streits and Creeks of the African Sea within his Kingdoms of Algier and Tunis And hee farther confirm's all that had been granted to them by his Predecessors for freedom of Fishing in those parts In like manner Coriolanus Cippicus relating the Actions of Pietrâ— Mocenigo General of the Venetians saith The Ottoman Emperor built two Castles very well fortified over against each other on both sides the Hellespont in its narrowest passage which hee stored with Ordnance of an extraordinary bigness and charged the Governors of the Castles to shoot and sink any ship that should endeavor to pass without leav Which is plainly to domineer over the Sea and agreeable to his Title of Lord of the white and black Sea Neither is that to bee sleighted here which wee finde in the Letters of David Emperor of Ethiopia or the Abassins to Emmanuël King of Portugal Hee entituleth him Lord of Africa and Guinee and the Mountains and Island of the Moon and of the Red Sea Arabia and Persia and Armutia great India c. Hee useth here an Hyperbole after the manner of the African Princes and attribute's those things to Emmanuël which were none of his But in the mean time hee admit's that hee might have been Lord of the Red Sea as well as of any other Territorie and that that Title doth not intrench upon the Law of Nature or Nations any more then this Now that wee may at length conclude this part touching the Dominion of the Sea as admitted among those things that are lawful and received into the Customs of Nations there are not onely very many Testimonies every where as hath been shewn you concerning it but nothing at all I suppose can bee found to impugn it in the Customs of those Nations that have been of any note in later times unless it bee where som of them that are Borderers upon the Sea-Dominions of others do strive to violate or infringe the Rights of their Neighbors under pretence of that Natural and perpetual communitie so often insisted on out of Ulpian by such Writers as too much prefer that obsolete Opinion before the Universal and most antient Customs of Nations Of which kinde truly the first Article of that League seem's to bee which was made above twentie or about thirtie years past betwixt the States of the United Provinces and som of the Hans-Towns as it was translated out of Low-Dutch by a Dutch-man to this effect That this Conjunction or Union ought not to bee intended for the offence of any but onely for the preservation and maintenance of the freedom of Navigation Commerce and Merchants in the Eastern and Northen Seas and also in all Rivers and Streams running into the Eastern and Northern Seas nor ought any other thing to bee meant in this place so that their Citizens and Subjects joyned in this League respectively may according to the Law of Nations use and enjoy the Liberties acquired and obtained together with the Rights Privileges and Customs received from their Ancestors throughout the Eastern and Northern Seas aforesaid and in the aforesaid Rivers Streams and waters without any Let or Impediment They promise also to aid each other in opposing any that should hinder such a freedom of Navigation in that Northern and Eastern Sea that is to say the Baltick and that which washeth the Coasts of Denmark Lituania Pomerania and the Dominions of the King of Poland where it seem's they pretend not onely Rights and Liberties peculiarly granted to them long since but also to the very Law of all Nations It is no hard matter to guess what the Intent of that League might bee For about that time the King of Denmark had raised his Toll in the Baltick Sea and in like manner the King of Poland within his Territories by Sea And that for the maintenance of that Dominion which they enjoyed which that kinde of League betwixt the States of the Hans Towns and United Provinces did seem to oppose But to pass over these things seeing a private Dominion of the Sea which is the point in Question is founded upon such clear Testimonies out of the Customs
XXII THe Objection touching the defect of Limits and and Bounds follow 's next And truly where Dominions are distinguished nothing can bee more desirable then known and certain Bounds in every place Nor was it without caus that Terminus the God of Bounds was received heretofore among the Romanes for the God of Justice But the nature of Bounds is to bee consider'd either upon the Shores or in the open Sea And why Shores should not bee called and reputed lawful Bounds whereon to ground a distinction of Dominion in the Sea as well as Ditches Hedges Meers rows of Trees Mounds and other things used by Surveyors in the bounding of Lands I cannot fully understand Nor is Sylvanus any whit more a Guardian of Bounds then Neptune But yet a very learned man saith there is a Reason in nature why the Sea under the aforesaid consideration cannot bee possessed or made appropriate becaus possession is of no force unless it bee in a thing that is bounded So that Thucydides call s a Land unpossessed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unbounded and Isocrates the Land possessed by the Athenians a Land bounded with Limits But liquid things becaus of themselvs they are not bounded cannot bee possessed save onely as they are conteined in som other thing after which manner Lakes and Ponds are possessed and Rivers also becaus they are conteined within Banks But the Sea is not conteined by the Earth it beeing of equal bigness or bigger then the Earth so that the Antients have affirmed the Earth to bee conteined by the Sea And then hee bring 's divers Testimonies of the Antients whereby it is affirmed more then once that the Sea is the girdle or Bond of this Globe of Earth and that fetching a compass it incloseth all the Parts thereof together and it is very often said by the Antients that the Land is conteined and bounded by the water or Sea as if the whole Earth made as it were one Island beeing surrounded by the Sea But admit it were to bee granted which I suppose neither that learned man nor any other will grant yet I do not well see why the thing conteining should not in truth bee bounded by the thing conteined as well as this by that May not a lesser bodie that is spherical or of any other form beeing conteined by a greater which is every way contiguous to it bee said to bound and limit the Concave of the greater Bodie as well as this to limit the Convex of the lesser But Julius Scaliger saith very well of the Sea and Land That the one is not so conteined by the other but that it may also contein Nor are they so disjoyned from each other but that they may both encroach upon each other and retire by Turns The Sea and Land mutually imbrace one another with crooked windings and turnings this with Peninsula's and Promontories butting forth and Creeks bending inward that working up its waves about all the Passages of its vast Bodie Thus it is evident that the one indifferently set's Bounds to the other no otherwise than Banks and Lakes or Rivers which also appear's more evident in the Caspian Sea that is encompassed with Land And in like manner in the Mediterranean before that Hercules or as the Arabians say Alexander the great did by cutting the Mountains let in the Atlantick Ocean through the streights of Cadiz And thereby it is made up one single Globe wherein divers Seas are bounded as well as the Isles or main Land as it is more clearly proved out of holy Scripture There the waters are gathered together and limited by their Places and Bounds And saith the Lord himself of the Sea I encompassed it with my Bounds and set Bars and Doors and said hitherto shalt thou com but no farther And in another place Hee gave unto the Sea his Bounds his Decree unto the waters that they should not pass their Bounds So that it cannot bee doubted every Sea hath its Bounds on the Shore as the Land it self Nor had I made mention of this Particular had I not found it impugned by so eminent a person And truly there is but a very little more difficultie to finde out Limits and Bounds in the main Sea for distinguishing of private Dominions Wee have high Rocks Shelvs Promontories opposite to each other and Islands dispersed up and down from whence as well direct Lines as crooked windings and turnings and angles may bee made use of for the bounding of a Territorie in the Sea Mille jacent mediae diffusa per aequora terrae Innumeri surgunt Scopuli montésque per altum A thousand Lands within the main do lie Rocks numberless and Mountains rise on high Throughout the deep The antient Cosmographers also reckon up the Seas of the world no otherwise then Towns Rivers Islands and Mountains as beeing no less distinguished from each other by their respective Bounds AEthicus saith Every Globe of Land hath XXX Seas CCCLXX Towns LXXII Islands LVII Rivers and XL Mountains c. After this also hee reckon's the Seas of the Eastern Western Northen and Southern Ocean one after another after the same manner as hee doth the Provinces and their Isles How truly I dispute not but in the mean time hee made no question but that the Seas are sufficiently distinguished by their Names and Bounds Add hereunto that useful invention of the sea-man's Compass and the help of Celestial degrees either of Longitude or Latitude together with the doctrine of Triangles arising therefrom Also in those Plantations that in our time have been carried out of Europe into America the degrees of Latitude and Longitude do serv the Proprietors in stead of Bounds which with as little difficultie are found in the Sea In like manner som would have had the Tropick of Cancer and the Equinoctial Line to have been the Bounds in the Sea for the limiting of that Agreement which was to have been made in the year MDCVIII between the States of the United Provinces and the Hous of Austria And in the late Agreement betwixt the Kings of Great Britain and Spain the Equinoctial Line is the bound appointed in the Sea Other Instances there are of the same nature Eor Sarpedon and Calycadnus two Promontories of Cilicia were designed as Bounds for distinguishing the Dominion of the Sea in that League made betwixt the Romanes and Antiochus King of Syria Also by Decree of the Emperor Leo of which wee have alreadie spoken the Fishing Epoches or Fish-pens that were by men placed in the Sea lying over against their Lands were limited to certain number of Cubits The case was the same likewise touching the Cyanean and Chelidonian Islands in the League made by the Athenians with the King of Persia which hath been mentioned also before Moreover Pope Alexander VI and his Cardinals or the King of Spain's Agents made no scruple touching Bounds of this
nature when the King obteined that famous Bull whereby hee had a Grant of the Western world but so to bee limited that the thing given should in the hither part of it bee bounded by an imaginarie Line drawn from the Artick to the Antarctick Pole which should bee distant from each of those Islands called de Los Azores y cabo verde one hundred Leagues towards the West and South which are the verie words of the Bull. Whereupon Hieronymus de Monte saith Bounds were set in Heaven and in the Aër in the time of Pope Alexander VI between the Portugals and Castilians in dividing the Indian Isles then newly discover'd by the degrees of Heaven and so all that was found Eastward was allotted to the Portugals and that which lay Westward to the Castilians Certainly in this place no more regard was had to the portions of Land whether Islands or continent in the measuring of Bounds then to the spaces of the Sea Moreover it is ordinarie among the Lawyers even those who are most earnest for a Communitie of everie Sea to limit an hundred miles jurisdiction to the Lord of the adjacent Coast. Somtimes wee finde sixtie It is in a manner received saith Bodin by the common custom of all Princes bordering upon the Sea that for sixtie miles from the shore any Prince may give Law to those that sail near their Coast and it was so adjudged in the Case of the Duke of Savoy Which hee observeth out of Cacheranus his decisions of Piemont Yea and it is mainteined by very eminent Professors of the Civil Law that an Action at Law may bee allowed for regulating of Bounds in the Borders of the Sea Therefore they sufficiently acknowledg the Custom of measuring and setting Bounds even in the Sea But as to what concern's that saying of Ambrose Geometram audivimus Thalassometram nunquam audivimus Wee have heard of a Geometrician one that measureth land but never of a Thalassometrician or one that could measure and lay out Bounds in the Sea This truly is rather a quibling of words then any Argument against the point in hand And the holy man speak's in that place of the various lurking-holes or holds of divers Fishes which God hath appointed for them in the Sea not touching a civil distribution of the Sea Nor was there any reason why hee should speak thus of a Thalassometrician as a thing never heard of before For wee know that even Thalassometricians were ordinarie among the Grecians who had Dominions by Sea with very frequent and various distinctions of those Dominions And that the Sea was measured according to the Rules of Geometrie no less then the Land Proelus a famous Mathematician treating about the excellencie of Geometrie saith It hath discover'd the Situations of places the measures also of Voiages by Sea as well as journies by Land Moreover they had Instruments to measure the Sea which the Grecians or at least the modern Greeks called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 measures of Sea-voiages and have written that Hero Anthemius and other antient Mathematicians learn't the Art from Archimedes and transmitted it to Posterity Yea it is said by Joannes Tzetzes that those men discover'd both water and winde-instruments out of the Books of Archimedes and Engines to move things of weight and instruments called Thalassodometrae for measuring of Sea-voiages so that as concerning the business of measuring the sea there is nothing to hinder but that both matter and instruments may bee had for the distinguishing of its Dominions Lastly that which is objected touching the vast magnitude of the Sea and its inexhaustible abundance is of very little weight here Suppose it bee inexhaustible so that hee which shall appropriate it to himself can receiv no dammage by other men's using it what more prejudice is this to the right of Ownership or Dominion then it is to the Owner of a Fire or Candle that another man's should bee lighted by his Is hee therefore less Master of his own Fire or Candle But truly wee often see that the Sea it self by reason of other men's Fishing Navigation and Commerce becom's the wors for him that own 's it and others that enjoie it in his right So that less profit ariseth then might otherwise bee received thereby Which more evidently appear's in the use of those Seas which produce Pearls Coral and other things of that kinde Yea the plentie of such seas is lessned every hour no otherwise then that of Mines of Metal Quarries of stone or of Gardens when their Treasures and Fruits are taken away And it is a custom of the Mahometans who are very great and Potent Nations to estimate their seas no less upon this accompt then by the Revenue either of Fishing or Navigation as wee may see in that their fals Prophet when speaking of the most holy God hee saith It is hee that hath prepared the Sea for your use that thence yee may take fresh Food and use Fishing and also that out of it yee may draw ornaments to adorn you Mahomet Ben Achmed the best Expositor of the Alcoran interpret's those ornaments by Coral and Pearls which words also are used in another place of the Alcoran for the chief Commodity of the Sea From whence also it is that a special Licence to search for Coral hath somtimes been granted in Leagues made by the grand Seignieur as is observed before Yea and Pliny speaking especially of the more Easternly Seas saith It had been counted a small matter that men swallowed whole Seas into their throats if both men and women also did not wear them up and down upon their hands ears heads and all parts of the Body But it is well known to us that precious Stones and Pearls are very often found also in the Western Seas and hee tell 's us they were frequently found in antient time Moreover saith hee It is certain that in Britain they are produced though small and ill colored as wee all see at this day forasmuch as Julius Caesar would have it understood that the breast plate which hee consecrated to Venus in her Temple was made of British Pearl Yea it is written by many and testified by Suetonius that Caesar went to Britain in hope of Pearls It is obvious therefore to every man that the gain of such a Voiage into Britain may bee lessned and that the abundance either of Pearls themselvs or of those shell-fishes which produce them may through a promiscuous and common use of the Sea bee diminished in any Sea whatsoêver Where then is that inexhaustible abundance of Commodities in the sea which cannot bee impaired There is truly the same reason also touching every kinde of Fishing But what need many words about this Matter Do wee not at this day finde it pressed home to the utmost every where by Lawyers especially those of the Empire and was it not a thousand times said of old when the
lie And after shee had said that shee came to claim a publick gift shee add's Quae tamen ut detis supplex peto Which notwithstanding I humbly beg you would bestow Nothing in that place opposeth a Dominion of the waters more then of any other things whatsoëver whereto that saying of Ennius may have relation Nihilo minùs ipsi lucet quum illi accenderit His own light is not the less when hee hath lent light to another And as Cicero tell 's us all things of the same kinde seem common to men Which communitie notwithstanding derogate's nothing at all from the Dominion here in Question unless any will bee so unadvised as to affirm that the Laws of friendship wherein Philosophers say all things are common with those of Charitie and Liberalitie may overthrow private Dominion Nor is there any more weight in that which is objected out of Virgil. What is this to the purpose Virgil or Ilioneus speaking of the Tyrrhen Sea said That the water is open to all Ergò by Law the water must lie open at all times to all men A verie trifling Argument There was no Land that was omitted in the first distribution of things which did not remain open to all before it came under particular possession But in that passage of Virgil there is no demand made of Right but onely an Office of humanitie requested from the King of Latium Yea and a promiss made of recompence saying Non erimus regno indecores nec vestra feretur Fama levis tantique abolescet gratia facti Wee 'll not disgrace your Realm nor lightly set Your Fame and so great courtesie forget Therefore in the Poëts sens the benefit was to bee received and acknowledged from the grace and favor of the Prince not claimed by any Law of nature common to all Yea wee know that in many places an excise or paiment is made somtimes for the very use of water As among the Hollanders they have in Delph-land a Custom called Jus Grutae which hath ever been under the care of those Officers called in Latine Comites Plumarii in Dutch Pluymgraven and whereby the Beer-brewers as Hadrianus Junius tell 's us are bound to pay them the hundreth part for the use of water Other instances there are to bee found of the same nature Lastly as to that saying of the Jewish Rabbins concerning Alexander it shew's onely they were of Opinion that Alexander had not gotten a Dominion over the Sea They do not say at all that hee could not lawfully get it nor truly could they say it without gross indiscretion unless they would renounce their own Right which wee have alreadie mentioned out of their determinations in the great or Phaenician Sea And whatsoëver those Rabbins may lightly say of Alexander yet truly Flavius Josephus a Jew and if wee may believ himself the most eminent Lawyer of his time among the Jews call's the Emperor Vespasian Lord both of Sea and Land And Julian saith that Alexander aspired after an Empire by Sea as well as by Land which hath been mentioned also by Seneca But all these Objections are brought out of Writers treating of other matters which ought also to bee consider'd And therefore in the last place let us take such opinions of the Lawyers into consideration as are opposed against it An Answer to the Objections taken out of Antient Lawyers CHAP. XXIV OF those Lawyers that are of the contrarie opinion som are antient som modern If wee look into the most notable Testimonies of the Antients this onely is to bee collected from them touching the Communitie of the Sea that som of the most eminent were indeed of Opinion that by the Law natural and of Nations the Sea is perpetually and necessarily common to all men which nevertheless most clearly appear's to bee far otherwise if a diligent survey bee made of the Laws and Customs either Civil or Intervenient of most Ages and Nations As wee have verie abundantly proved in what hath been alreadie shewn you And that not onely out of the most approved Historians whereof there is verie oftentimes most use in searching out the most common Customs of Nations and other things relating to the Laws themselvs but also out of the verie Leagues or Intervenient Law of divers Nations yea and other Lawyers of no less note together with the principal Edicts in the Eastern Empire besides manie other from whence any one may easily learn what according to the Natural Permissive Law ought to bee determined in this matter Som of the Antients have been of Opinion that according to the Law Natural or of Nations it is lawful to hunt and hauk in another man's wood or Ground and to Fish in another man's Pond or Lake much more in a River except it were prohibited by the Owner in possession These things saith Cujacius were so determined by the prudent Romans who adhered most to the Law of Nations But Custom hath now over-ruled the Law of Nations so that it is not lawful to Fish so much as in a publick River nor to hunt or hauk freely in the Fields And saith the same Autor in another place The Exchequer is to bee justified onely by Custom in laying claim to the Fisheries in a private manner contrarie to the Law of Nations Whereas notwithstanding in the Feudal Laws the Revenues of Fisheries are counted among the Regalia or Royalties of the Prince and reckoned by learned men among the Antients belonging to the Romane Exchequer or Treasurie who cite Ulpian himself for a witness For hee among the publick Customs or Revenues numbreth the Revenues Piscariarum as som would have it read of Fisheries Others instead of it put Picariarum Pitch-pits for those places from whence Pitch is digged Surely even Ulpian himself reckon's Fish-ponds among those things that are liable to assessments But howsoëver the later Customs of Nations have subverted or over-ruled that more antient Law of Fishing Hunting and fouling freely whether it were the Law natural as they term'd it or of nations as sufficiently appear's by the Law of those places which they call Forests de wildt bahne or Bannum ferinum and of Rivers as it is variously established in several Countries And so without any prohibition of the Owner in Possession that antient Freedom hath been abrogated many Ages since by most received Custom which may bee said in like manner of the Sea whatsoêver those Antients and their Followers have written to the contrarie Moreover the Emperor Leo hath as wee have shewn you expressly declared by Edict that the antient Right concerning a necessarie communitie of the Sea was not without injustice pretended in the Eastern Empire Wherefore Michaël Attaliates truly did ill and so hath any other Lawyer of the East if any there bee since the daies of Leo that hath opposed its private Dominion Nor indeed hath that eminent man dealt any better who
defence of his Kingdom against Foreiners and the training up of himself and his people for warlike emploiments Thus the Guardianship or maintenance of the Dominion by Sea is evident But as concerning the Fleets aforementioned they each of them consisted of MCC ships and these as Writers say expressly very stout ones so that in the time of his Reign the British Navie consisted of such ships to the number of Three thousand six hundred Sail as Florentius and Hoveden speak expressly But others write that these Fleets amounted to Four thousand ships as John Bramton Abbot of Jorvaux others adding to these Three a Fourth Fleet whereby the number is increased to Four Thousand Eight hundred Sail as you may see in Florilegus So as Florentius also saith Hee by the help of God governed and secured the bounds of his Kingdom with Prudence Fortitude Justice and Temperance as long as hee lived and having the courage of a fierce Lion hee kept all the Princes and Lords of the Isles in aw Wee read also in Ordericus Vitalis of King Harold or Herald that hee so guarded the Sea with a force of soldierie and shipping that none of his Enemies could without a sore conflict invade the Kingdom So that wee cannot otherwise conceiv but that these Naval Forces were at that time disposed and the Sea-Fights undertaken for the defence and guard of the Sea as an Appendant of the English-Saxon Dominion in this Island Especially if wee duly compare these things alreadie manifest with those which are added by and by to this particular touching the same age The Sea-Dominion of the English-Saxons and Danes during their Reigns in Britain observed in like manner from such Tributes and Duties of their Fiduciarie Clients or Vassals as concerned the maintenance of the Navie Also concerning the Tribute or Paiment called Danegeld which was wont to bee levied for the Guard of the Sea CHAP. XI HEre follow next the Tributes and Duties of Vassals concerning the maintenance of the Navie or Guard of the Sea which are evidences also of that Sea-Dominion which was in the time of the English-Saxons I call those Tributes which were wont to bee levied for the re-inforcing of the Navie and for provision of Victuals for the Sea-men Of which kinde were those that were levied according to the value of men's estates in Land for the setting forth of ships in the time of King Ethelred For at that time whosoever possessed CCCX Cassatos or Hides of Land was charged with the building of one ship And they were all rated proportionably after this manner who were owners of more or less Hides or of part of an Hide as Marianus Scotus Hoveden and Florentius do all tell us in the very same words Ethelred King of England say they gave strict command that one Gallie should bee charged upon CCCX Cassati but a Coat of Armor and an Helmet upon nine and that ships should bee built throughout all England which beeing made readie hee victualled and manned them with choice souldiers and appointed their Rendezvous at the Port of Sandwich to secure the Bounds of his Kingdom from the irruptions of Foreiners But Henrie of Huntingdon as also Matthew Paris and Florilegus speaking of the same thing say The King charged one ship upon three hundred and ten Hides of Land through all England also a Coat-Armor and Helmet upon eight Hides Then Huntingdon tell 's what an Hide doth signifie But an Hide in English saith hee is so much Land as a man can till with one Plow for a year Others there are that determine otherwise touching the quantitie of an Hide And most certain it is that it was very various according to the different Custom of Countries but the same with Cassata and Carucata Indeed the English-Saxon Chronicles of the Abbie of Abingdon do likewise mention Hides here expressly In the year MVIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 say they 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hund 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tynumaenne 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 helm 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is to say the King gave command for the building of Ships carefully throughout all England to wit that one Gallie should bee charged upon CCCX Hides of Land but a Coat-Armor and Helmet upon eight Hides And it was usual according to the Laws of that Age that the richer sort should bee taxed by the number of Hides as wee see also throughout that Breviarie of England or the Book of Rates called Domesday which was first written in the time of King William Huntingdon add's also that there never had been so great a number of Ships in the time of any one in Britain which is testified in like manner by the Saxon Chronicles before cited So that that most numerous Navie of King Edgar mentioned in the former chapter was not to bee compared with this But yet that most learned man and great Light of our Island M r Camden hath so cast up the number of Hides throughout England out of the antient Records of that Age that they do not exceed 243600. If this had been so then they could have set forth no more then 785 Ships by this Tribute which is a lesser number then that of King Edgar by som thousands So that som other account is to bee made concerning Hides which is not to bee handled in this place Hereunto belong's that of Huntingdon touching King Canutus and his Son Harald In the daies of Harald saith hee as also in the time of his Father eight Marks were paid by everie Port for XVI Ships In the like manner Hoveden saith there was a Tax imposed which was paid for the maintenance of the Navie when King Canutus and King Edmond made an agreement in an Isle in the midst of Severn called Oleney Moreover Huntingdon write's that 11048 pounds were raised by Hardecanute King of England before hee had reigned two years for thirtie two Ships that is to say for the building of two and thirtie Ships Hee gave Command also as Matthew Westminster saith that eight marks should bee paid to everie Rower of his Navie and ten marks to each Commander out of all England Hee saith again also of the same King that hee appointed Officers through all parts of the Kingdom to collect the Tax imposed without favouring any and therewith to provide all things necessarie for his Forces at Sea And Florentius saith Hee gave command for the paying of eight marks to every Rower of his Navie and twelve so wee read it in that Autor to everie Commander out of all England a Tax indeed so grievous that scarce any man was able to pay it But these things spoken of Canutus his son Harald and Hardecanute relate perhaps unto that Tribute or Tax called Danegeld which was paid yearly for the maintenance of the Navie and guarding the Territorie or Dominion by
Sea Among the old Laws of England it appear's that the paiment of Danegeld was first imposed becaus of Pirates either Robbers or others invading the Sea For they infesting the Countrie wasted it as far as they were able Therefore for the repressing of their insolence it was determined that an yearly paiment should bee made of Danegeld that is to say twelve pence upon every hide through the whole Land for the pay of those that should bee imploied to hinder the eruption of Pirates So wee read it in som Copies others render it Irruption But the other reading seem's to signifie that this Tax was imposed for the raising and mainteining of Naval Forces so to guard the Sea that Pirates or Enemies might not bee able to make any eruption from the Shore on the other side of the Sea Nor can the word Eruption otherwise bee well put in that place So that even that antient Dignitie of the Count of the Saxon shore whereof wee have alreadie spoken is therefore not obscurely represented by him who commanded as Admiral over the Fleets of that Age. This Tribute or Tax had its beginning under King Ethelred For hee beeing brought into miserable streights by Swane King of Denmark beeing forced to buy a Peace of him hired XLV Danish Ships also by Agreement for the guarding and securing of his Dominion in the Sea who were to receiv their pay yearly out of this Tribute for their maintenance For the right understanding whereof it is to bee observed out of the English Saxon Storie that the Tribute or Tax usually paid at that time to the Danes was of more kindes then one There was one Tribute or sum of Monie wherewith the English-Saxons were forced somtimes to buy Peace of such as grievously infested the Island But another was levied to pay the Danish Navie which was hired to guard the Sea and defend the Sea-Coasts The first kinde of Tribute appear's by that of Florentius and Hoveden in the year MVII Ethelred King of England by the advice of his Lords sending Embassadors to the Danes gave them Commission to declare that hee was willing to defray their Charges and pay them a Tribute upon this condition that they would desist from rapine and establish a firm Peace with him To which demand of his they yielded And from that time their charge was defraied by all England and a Tribute paid which amounted to 36000 pounds That is hee effected this onely for the present that hee obteined a peace for a time by monie which hee could not by Arms as Florilegus saith well Four years after also all the great Lords of England of both Orders met together at London before Easter and there they staid so long till paiment was made of the Tribute promised to the Danes amounting to fourtie eight thousand pounds which wee reade of likewise both in Florentius and Hoveden But this was paid to the intent that all Danes which were in the Kingdom should in every place dwell peaceably by the English and that both People should have as it were one heart and one soul as it is expressed by Florilegus Other passages of the same kinde there are in the storie of that Age yea and som of an elder date Yet this first kinde of Tribute was not wont to bee paid yearly but levied now and then as occasion required Notwithstanding it may bee true perhaps which som write that Ethelred in the aforesaid agreement of the year MVII yielded to pay every year a Tribute of Thirtie six Thousand pounds to the Danes for a longer continuation of the peace Wee read here that hee yielded or granted but no where likewise that hee paid it But as for the second kinde of Tribute which was to bee paid as wee have told you for hire of the Danish Navie it was a yearly Tribute and levied at the same time at least in the same year to wit of our Lord MXII wherein these fourtie eight thousand pounds were paid to procure a peace Nor was it limited by any set-summe of monie but so much as would serv for victualling and clothing the Forces at Sea Florentius and Hoveden in the aforesaid year say After these things upon paiment of the Tribute meaning that of fourtie eight thousand pounds and a confirmation of the peace by Oaths the Danish Navie which was before in a Bodie was disposed and dispersed abroad afar off But XLV ships remained with the King and sware fidelitie to him and promised to bee readie to defend England against Foreiners upon condition that hee would provide them Victuals and Clothing This is related likewise in the English-Saxon Chronicles of the Abbie of Abingdon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is the Tribute beeing paid and Oaths of Amitie taken the Armie or Navie which was before in a Bodie was dispersed abroad But fourtie five ships of that Navie remained with the King and promised upon Oath to be readie for the defence of this Land upon condition the King did finde them Victuals and Cloathing Swane was at that time King of Denmark with whom Ethelred made this agreement But both the kindes of paiment aforementioned were called Danegelo Danegeld or Danageld that is to say Danish Tribute The first kinde is expressly intimated by this name in Joannes Sarisburiensis where hee saith Swane wasted and spoiled the Island of Britain the greatest part whereof hee had in his possession and afflicted the Members of Christ with many persecutions by an imposition of Tribute which in the English Tongue they call Danageld But the second kinde which was paid for the maintenance of the Forces by Sea was called likewise by the same name both becaus it was occasioned by the agreement with the Danes as also becaus it was wont to bee paid to the Danish Fleet that was hired to guard the Territorie by Sea For which caus also it reteined the same name not onely under these Danish Kings Canutus Harold the first and Hardecanutus but also under the English-Saxon or English And that this which wee have spoken was the Original hereof is affirm'd also by Ingulphus the Abbot of Crowland a witness beyond all exception who lived at that time Hee speaking of the affairs of Edward the Confessor saith In the year MLI which was the tenth of King Edward in regard the Earth did not bring forth its Fruits in such plentie as it was wont but devoured very many people by famine insomuch that many Thousands of men died through the scarcitie of Corn and want of Bread therefore the most pious King Edward beeing moved with compassion towards the people released that most grievous Tribute called Danigeld to all England for ever It is reported by som that this most Religious King beeing brought by his Officers into the Exchequer to see the Danigeld that was collected and to take a view of so vast an heap of treasure stood amazed at the first sight
of Excester And in those daies it was usual to procure King's Letters commonly called in the language of the Law Protections whereby Privilege and exemption from all suits was granted to those that were emploied in this kinde of Guard or Defence of the Sea or that spent their time super salvâ custodiâ defensione Maris For the safeguarding and defence of the Sea as the form of the words hath it which wee frequently finde in the Archives Moreover in the Acts of Parlament of the same King's Reign mention is made of the safeguarding of the Sea or de la saufegard de la mier as of a thing commonly known and for which it was the Custom of the English to make as diligent provision as for the Government of any Province or Countrie And in the twentieth year of the same King the Commons preferr'd a Bill that a strong and well accomplished Navie might bee provided for the defence of the Sea becaus It is thought fit be all the Commens of this Land that it is necessarie the See be kept Verie many other passages there are to the same purpose Geoffrie Chaucer who lived in the time of Richard the Second and was a man verie knowing in the affairs of his Countrie among other most elegant and lively characters of several sorts of men written in the English Tongue describe's the humor of an English Merchant of that time how that his desire above all things is that the Sea bee well guarded never left destitute of such protection as may keep it safe and quiet Which hee speak's to set out the whole generation of Merchants in that age whose custom it was to bee sollicitous for traffick above all things and consequently about the Sea it self which would not afford them safe Voyages did not the Kings of England as Sovereigns thereof according to their Right and Custom provide for the securitie of this as a Province under their Protection The words of Chaucer are these His reasons spake hee full solemnely Shewing alway the encreas of his winning Hee would the See were kept for any thing Betwixe Middleborough and Orewel Orewel is an Haven upon the Coasts in Suffolk Middleborough is in Zealand The whole Sea that floweth between Britain and Zealand the English Merchants would have secured this they were wont solemnly and unanimously to pray for knowing that the Sea was part of the Kingdom and the Protection of them part of the dutie of the Kings of England For as concerning any Protection herein by any forrein Princes any farther then in their own Harbors or at the most within the winding Creeks between those Islands which they possessed upon the Coasts of Germanie or Gallia Belgica there is nothing as far as wee can finde to bee gathered from any Testimonies of former Ages In the succeeding Ages likewise there is frequent mention of this kinde of Guard Defence and Government of the same Sea as will hereafter more fully appear when wee com to speak of Tributes and of the tenor and varietie of the Commissions given to our Admirals But now it is to bee observed that both the name and nature of this Guard is very well known not onely by the use of the word both in the Imperial and Canon Law wherein it denotes that the Guardian ought to take a diligent care of that thing whereof hee is owner who doth either lend it or commit it to his over-sight but also by the common and obvious use which the English make of the same word in other Offices or Governments For in those daies of old when the title of Guardians or Wardens of the Sea was more usual there were appointed Wardens of the Ports even as at this day there are Wardens of the Counties who are those Commanders of Counties called Sheriffs and in the usual form and tenor of their Writ have custodiam comitatûs the Guard or Defence of the Countie committed to their charge Wardens or Keepers of the Marches or Borders Keepers of Towers or Castles Parks Houses and the like Yea and the Lord Lievtenant of Ireland was especially in the time of King John and Henrie the Third styled usually Warden or Keeper of Ireland and his Office or dignitie commonly called the Keepership of Ireland after the same manner as John Duke of Bedford and Humphrey Duke of Glocester whom Henry the fift during the time of his absence in France deputed to govern the Kingdom of England by turns were called Custodes Angliae Keepers of England as wee very often finde both in Histories and Records So Arthur Prince of Wales was made Keeper of England while Henry the seventh was beyond the Seas So Piers Gaveston was keeper of England while Edward the second remained in France So were others also in like manner The Governors also of the Islands of Jarsey and Garnesey and the rest that are situated in this Sea who now are styled Governors Keepers or Captains were in antient times called onely by the name of Guardians or Keepers This then beeing so what reason have wee to think that our Ancestors did not use the same Notion of Guardian or Keeper and of guarding or keeping in the name of the Guardian and the Guard of the Sea which they were wont to use in the Guard and keeping of the Island and in the other dignities or offices before mentioned Doubtless in all these the peculiar Dominion and Soveraigntie of him that conferr'd the Dignities is so clearly signified and included that his Dominion or Ownership of the thing to bee kept and guarded as well as Autoritie over the person dignified is plainly implied in this Title Nor is it to bee omitted that in antient times before the autoritie of the high Admirals of England was sufficiently established by our Kings and setled so distinct that the Command and Government of the Sea did belong onely to them the Governors or Keepers of the Provinces whom wee call Sheriffs of the Counties by virtue of their Office had also som Custodie or Command of part of that Sea which adjoined to their respective Provinces as of a part of the Kingdom of England Which truly to let pass other proofs is sufficiently evident by this that many times in those daies they who by the Common Law of the Land were wont as at this day to put in execution the Commands of the King in those places onely that were committed severally to their charge and custodie did do the same also in the Sea it self as well as in any Land-Province belonging to him from whom they received their autoritie For by virtue of their ordinarie power derived from the King and such as was founded upon the very same right by which they held the Government of the Countie or Province they did oftentimes remove the King's Ships and Fleets from one Port to another by Sea as through the Territorie of the Province that was committed to their
There are saith hee four Governors of the French Sea who bear an equal command under a different title and upon several Coasts of the Sea For in antient time Aquitain was possessed by the English Bretaign by its Dukes Provence by Hereditarie Earls not by the Kings of France And therefore at that time the Admiral of France had command onely over the Belgick Sea of Picardie and Normandie as far as the Coast of Bretaign But then all the other bordering Princes chose Governors of the Sea or Admirals peculiarly for themselvs And therefore the English beeing driven out of Aquitain and the Countries of Provence and Bretaign beeing brought into subjection to the Crown of France the King supposing it not fit to innovate any thing appointed a Lievtenant and Admiral of Aquitain likewise a Governor of Bretaign with the government of the Sea as also in the Prouince of Gallia Narbonensis in a manner distinct and apart from the rest But the chief Courts of Judicature belonging to the French Admiral are setled at Paris and Roan So hee And a little after hee write's that there were Princes not a few who held the Sea-Coasts as Beneficiaries that enjoied the power of Admiral in their Territories But wee have Edicts and Decrees concerning the Admiral 's Jurisdiction over the Maritim Forces Affairs and Persons in the times of Charls the fift and sixt Lewis the 12 th Francis the first Henrie the 2 d 3 d and other Kings of France as also touching the Tenths of Spoils taken from Enemies and other things of that kinde which relate unto the Goods and Persons of such as are subject to the Crown of France upon the account of any manner of Navigation whatsoêver And in these Edicts hee is somtimes called by the King Nostre Lieutenant general per la mer greves d'icelle that is our Lieutenant general throughout the Sea and the shores thereof But this Lieutenant or Governor as they pleas to call him of the Sea was never at all in command over any part of the Sea flowing between France and Britain as over a Province or Territorie to bee defended for the King of France after the same manner as the Admiral of England but in the Sea onely over the Naval Forces Persons and Affairs belonging to the French Jurisdiction much after the same manner as a Soveraign Prince take's cognizance of Offendors of his own Retinue in a Forein Territorie and rule 's them as at home but without any pretence of his to a right of Dominion in that Territorie Which truly there is no man but will conceiv that shall in the first place observ the defect and deep silence of antient Testimonies touching such a kinde of Dominion among the French besides the Qualitie of that Government among them and at length the entire and most ample Power alwaies exercised throughout the Sea and the shore lying about it under the sole command of the English and will but compare it for so many Revolutions of years with those so long broken and divided Dominions upon the opposite shore of France and with the late addition of the Sea-Coast to the Kingdom of France according to those things which have been alreadie spoken about it It is clear that there are no Testimonies before our time concerning any Dominion of this sea belonging to the King of France Nor are there any in our time except certain Lawyers who speak of it either by the By or in a Rhetorical flourish onely not in a way of asserting it by strength of Arguments Of these things I have spoken alreadie in the former Book where also other matters are alleged of special observation which confirm what is handled in this particular But now let us add hereunto that the very French Historians both of the past and present Age do affirm that in antient times the Kings of France therefore either had no Admirals at all or els that they were constituted now and then onely as occasion required becaus they had no Empire over the Sea as Tilius saith expresly in the place above-mentioned In vain therefore doth Popellinerius reprehend those Historians in saying it is fals becaus Normandie Picardie and Flanders were heretofore under the French Dominion For not to mention this that the Kings of France reigned a long time without the possession of Normandie and Flanders and reteined not any other shore besides that of Picardie as appear's by what hath been alreadie shewn and by the frequent Testimonie of Historians and the consequence doth not appear to bee good that they had any command over the Sea becaus they were in possession of som Sea-Coast no more truly than it may bee concluded that a man is Lord of a River in France becaus hee hath Lands lying by it whereas by received Custom according to the Law of France the King is Owner of all Rivers that are Navigable where they belong not to som subject by a particular prescription of possession or som other title besides the possession of the adjacent Land as the Custom is not unusual also in other places But as to what concern's the Qualitie of this Maritim Government among the French it is to bee considered that as every one of the more eminent Offices or Governments hath a peculiar place in their high Court of Parlament and that according to the nature of the Government as it chiefly respect's any Province or Government within the limits of the French Dominion as the Constable the Grand Escuyer or Master of the Hors the Grand Master and others yet the Admiral of France hath no place at all upon that account As it was determined in the time of Henrie the second when such a place was plainly denied to Gaspar Collignie Admiral of France as hee was Admiral or had the Maritim Government but it was granted him as Governor of the Isle of France as they call it under the King For by the title of Admiral hee had no Government in Chief within the limits of the Kingdom but becaus beeing Admiral of the Fleets and Sea in the aforesaid sens which is out of the King's Dominion hee exercised Jurisdiction over Persons and Affairs onely upon the Accompt of the Sea therefore in this respect hee was to bee denied any place For which caus likewise it came to pass as it seem's that those four distinct Admirals before-mentioned have in like manner also a Government of Provinces from which they are wont to bee denominated as wee understand by these passages alreadie cited out of Choppinus and others that write of this matter So they that have any principal command within the limits of the Kingdom that is within the shores of France do enjoie an equal privilege with the other more eminent dignities of the Realm Moreover also the Regulation of those Rivers whereof the King of France is Lord are not under the Admiral 's Government but under the special charge of those
to the Royal Patrimonie of England to the end that no man might question whether the Sea belong'd to his King by the Right of the Kingdom of England or of the Dutchie of Normandie or of any other Province in France Another also who wrote in the time of Henrie the Eighth saith it hath been received by antient custom that it is a dutie lying upon the King of England as Lord of the British Sea to scour the Sea of Pirates and to render the use thereof as of a publick Road or Thorow-fare whose soil is within his Patrimonie safe for Shipping For hee expresseth himself in English thus The King of the ould Custome of the Realme as the Lord of the narrow Sea is bound as it is said to scoure the Sea of the Pirates and petit robbers of the Sea So much also as to what concern's Dominion is without controversie admitted by our Lawyers of later time And it appear's by publick Records conteining divers main points touching which the Judges were to bee consulted for the good of the Common-weal in the time of King Edward the Third that the King's Sea-Dominion which they called the antient superioritie of the Sea was a matter out of question among our Lawyers of that Age. But consultation was had for the more convenient guarding of it For the whole Bench of Judges were advised with to the end so wee read it in the Records and that is especially to bee observed which wee finde here about the first beginning of the Naval Laws of the Isle of Oleron seated in the Creek of Aquitain at the mouth of the River Charente that the form of proceeding heretofore ordained and begun by Edward the first grandfather of our Lord the King and his Council at the prosecution of his Subjects may bee resumed and continued for the reteining and conserving of the antient superioritie of the Sea of England and the Autoritie of the Office of Admiraltie in the same as to the correcting expounding declaring and conserving the Laws and Statutes long since made by his Predecessors Kings of England for the mainteining of Peace and Justice among all people of what Nation soëver passing through the Sea of England and to take cognisance of all attempt to the contrarie in the same and to punish Offenders and award satisfaction to such as suffer wrong and damage Which Laws and Statutes were by the Lord Richard heretofore King of England at his return from the holy Land interpreted declared and published in the Isle of Oleron and named in French le ley Olyroun Here you have it declared as a thing most received and certain that the King of England hath by antient right been Lord of the Sea of the same name or that which flow's about it But that whereof the Bench of Judges were to consult was onely about the orderly maintenance of this right Nor is it truly a small sign of this Dominion that Richard the First King of England beeing in the Isle of Oleron which hee possessed as seated in his own Sea not so much for that hee was Duke of Aquitain as King of England whereof wee have alreadie spoken did as sole Ruler and Moderator of Sea-affairs first publish those Naval or Sea-Laws in that his Island which hold in force to this day and from that time gave them so large and perpetual an Autoritie by that name that as the Rhodian Naval Laws as the case stand's do prove that the Rhodians in antient time were Lords of the Grecian Sea so the Laws of Oleron having obteined such a kinde of Autoritie by Sea from their first Institution must ever declare the King of England as the Autor to bee Lord of the neighboring Sea round about But som printed Copies of these Laws make them about sixtie years later than the Reign of that Richard by what autoritie I cannot tell For they relate them to have been made in the year MCCLXVI which is the fiftieth year of our Henrie the third Also in the Law of the Land it is reckoned among the Privileges of such as are absent that they who shall bee out of the Realm of England at the levying of a Fine of any Land and making Proclamations thereupon are not so bound either by a yearly prescription as heretofore or by a five years prescription as is usual of later time but that their Right remain's entire to them upon their return home if they make their claim within the like spaces of time But intra regnum within the Kingdom is by the same Law taken and that in the usual phrase for that which is intra or as it is wont to bee barbarously render'd infra Quatuor Maria within the four Seas to wit the Southern Western Eastern and that Northen Sea which washeth both the sides of that neck of Land whereby Scotland is united to England That is to say within the outmost bounds of the English Empire in those four Seas or within the opposite Shores of the Eastern and Southern Sea or Ports belonging to other Princes and within the bounds of the Northern and Western Sea which indeed are to bee bounded after another manner but yet to bee bounded that is accordirng to the extent of possession West-ward beyond the Western Shores of Ireland and by the first beginning of that Sea which is of the Scotish name and jurisdiction But that which is opposed to this Particle intra quatuor maria within the four seas is that extra quatuor Maria without the four seas or to bee in the parts so beyond the Seas that they bee beyond the bounds of the Sea-Dominion of the King of England from whence wee are to determine of the bounds or exterior limit of the Seas And although the Land of England bee somtimes used for that which is the whole Realm or English Empire as signifying the same a more ordinarie and indeed more brief expression beeing applied as is usual in stead of a more large yet it certainly appear's that extra quatuor maria without the four seas and extra Regnum without the Realm do in our Law-Books signifie the very same thing that is to say so far as the extent and latitude of the whole English Empire is comprehended in the name of Realm not as the Realm of England is now and then distinguished in our Law from Ireland which also is a distinct Dominion of the same Empire or from the other Islands which are reckoned in the Roial patrimonie of the Kings of England For it is usual in the Language of the Law so to describe him who in that sens shall bee out of the Realm And whereas in the Reign of Richard the second to an objection made against one that would avoid the yearly prescription as not bound by it for that hee was not in England it was excepted that hee was in Scotland and so within the four Seas It was thereupon answer'd and rul'd
by the Court that the Exception was of no force for that Scotland was not within the Bounds and Limits of England So that within the four Seas and within the Realm signified one and the same thing from whence these terms out of the Realm and without the four Seas becom one and the same also To bee out of the Realm is very often repeated in this â—enâ— also by Littleton the most excellent of all our Law-Writers signifying no other thing than what hee renders it in another place by one who ala oustere le mere crossed the Sea or went beyond sea â—rom thence also it seem's to have proceeded that whereas with us among the several temporal excuses of Defendants who are summoned to appear in Court in our Law wee call them Essoins there are two alleged whereof the one is intitled de ultra Mare the other De Malo veniendi and this latter is allowed to him that is hindred by any kinde of misfortune whatsoever within the Seas or on this side of the more remote bounds of those Seas which belong to England but the former to him who live's without or beyond the Seas belonging to the English Empire From thence it seem's I say to have proceeded that in former times when there was a more frequent use in Court of this kinde of excuses a Defendant beeing absent in Ireland might lawfully make use of the latter form of Essoin but not of the former Nevertheless if through ignorance hee did make use of this it took on the nature of the latter that is wholly quitting all its own nature it depended upon this that the Defendant according to the more vulgar sensâ— or acception lived beyond-Sea For according to received Custom the nature of them both was such that when any one might lawfully use the former hee might also after a while likewise enjoy the benefit of the latter But in the said kinde of Essoins or Excuses the former not beeing lawfully made use of but yet turned into the latter by construction of Law lest it should becom of no use there was no place for the latter to the end it might not bee iterated contrarie to Custom The matter it self was thus decided in the time of K. Henrie the third as it is described by Henrie Bracton after this manner Esto saith hee quòd quis se Essoniaverit de Ibernia quasi de ultra Mare attornatur Essonium illud ad simplex Essonium de Malo veniendi ut coram Martino de Patteshul in Banco anno Regis Henrici Sexto de Gilberto Mariscallo Ceciliâ uxore ejus Allano de Hyda qui vocavit ad Warrantum Willielmum Mariscallum in Comitatu Pembroke qui se essoniavit de Ibernia non fuit allocatum postea fecit de hoc quòd aliud essonium de malo veniendi ad alium diem non fuit allocatum So much wee finde also in the antient Autor of that Book entitled Fleta Doubtless Ireland is no less seated beyond sea than either France or Spain unless you take that decision as relating onely to the Civil notion of this kinde of situation to wit that it is not situate beyond that Sea which is a part and Territorie of the English Empire but placed therein and comprehended under one and the same Supreme Power with England and so that an Excuse or Essoin de ultra mare is not in that kinde to bee admitted In the antient Records also concerning the Customs of our Court of Admiraltie wee read it was an usual Custom in the time of King Henrie the first who died Anno Dom. MCXXXVI and of other Kings both before and after him That if any man accused of a capital crime don by Sea beeing publickly called five times by the voice of the Crier after so many several daies assigned did not make his appearance in the Court of Admiraltie hee was banished out of England de mer appurtenant au Roy d Angleterre or out of the Sea belonging to the King of England for fourtie years more or less according to the pleasure of the Admiral Other particulars there are that relate hereunto about Actions for matters arising in this Sea that were wont to bee entred in express terms heretofore in the ordinarie Courts of our Common Law whoâ—e Jurisdiction was ever esteemed of such a nature that an Action instituted about a matter arising in any other place than within the bounds of the Realm was by the antient strict Law alwaies to bee rejected by them After which manner as it hath been a Custom now for many years that an action ought to bee rejected unless the matter have its rise within the Bodie as they call it of the Countie that is within som Province or Countie of the Island usually given in charge to certain Governors or Officers known to us by the name of Sheriffs So also is it in this Sea-Province belonging by the antient received Custom to the high Admiral or his Deputies not onely so far as concern's its defence and guard but also as to matter of Jurisdiction So that at length it is manifest that the Sea-Dominion of the King of England is without controversie admitted and asserted also both by the Determinations and Customs of the Law of the Land and by the express words of the Writs and Forms of the Actions themselvs Nor is that of any force at all to the contrarie which either our Countrie-man Bracton the Lawyer as hath been said or som others of late as well as antient time that are Followers of him but in too careless a manner while they set down the Institutions of our English Law have unadvisedly utter'd by the way touching that antient communitie of the Sea and of Fishing also in Rivers according to the Books of Justinian as if such a kinde of communitie were admitted in our Law Truly that which they have so let slip is not so much to bee taken as contrarie to the known Law of the Land in this particular for even Bracton himself as I have shewn hath divers other passages that signifie this Dominion of the King as it is to bee reckoned for som of the reliques of Ulpian or of the School of the Imperial Law too slightly and carelesly added by the way in writing And the like may bee said of one or two more of our Writers who after the manner of reasoning received for the most part in the Imperial Law touching the middle of a River and an Island risen therein do by the way but ignorantly make the middle of the Sea flowing between to bee the bound of this Sea-Dominion of our Kings Moreover the same may bee said likewise of the Commissioners of Queen Elisabeth who treating at Bremen with the Commissioners of Christiern the fourth King of Denmark about a freedom of Navigation through the Northern Sea object a perpetual communitie of every kinde of
that Libel by so many Nations Moreover truly it is worthie observation that about the very same time to wit a little before the making of the League the King of England did homage to the French King for the Dutchie of Aquitain the Earldom of Pontois and other Provinces that hee held in France that hee was also wholly deprived of them som time before by decree of the Parlament of Paris yea and that about one hundred years before King John was outed of Normandie and yet afterward that the King of England now and then regained a possession of it and that before the time of the League and of the publication of this Libel which serv all to this end that wee may observ that when the aforesaid famous controversie arose about the use and Soveraigntie of the Sea flowing between France and Britain and the absolute Dominion thereof was asscribed by so many Nations upon a Title derived time out of minde to the King of England and his Predecessors yet in the mean time no title at all was pretended in right to their possession either of Normandie or Aquitain whereupon a Dominion of any part of the Sea might in any sort bee grounded but claimed upon the sole right of the English Empire And it appear's evident by the thing it self that the things complained of by those Nations in the Libel were don by that Governor of the French Navie chiefly in the Sea near the shores of France and Flanders which were in hostilitie with each other And so certainly they all unanimously affirm that the whole Sea whereof they speak is under the Dominion of the King of England and that upon the sole Account and right of the English Empire And as for Grimbald hee did not defend himself either by a pretence of any Dominion of the King of France or by disproving of that Prescription whereupon the English Title depend's as a thing not declared according to Truth or antient Right nor did hee at all pretend that the Right which the Kings of England had in the Sea borde ring upon France did belong to them either upon the account of Normandie or any other French Province whatsoêver as Fiduciarie Clients or Vassals of the King of France though it had been convenient and very seasonable for him to have alleged all these Particulars if the Truth had been so indeed Whereby also that is not a little confirmed whereof wee discoursed before about taking the names of the shore over against us in the later Commissions of the Office of high Admiral of England for limits onely of the Sea-Dominion of the Kings of England and of the Province thereof under their protection Moreover also about seven years before the exhibiting of the aforesaid Libel to the Commissioners when as the King of France by reason of divers heinous injuries don to his Subjects by the English in this Sea required that the King of England as hee was the Fiduciarie Client or Vassal becaus of Aquitain and other Provinces that hee held under him in France should bee questioned not onely for wrong don but also for his right to those Lands which hee held and bee summoned to appear in the Parlament of Paris the matter beeing set down at large in the Letter of Summons hee inserted nothing therein whereby hee might seem to arrogate any Sea-Dominion at all to himself or diminish that which belong'd to the King of England as you may see in I lorilegus who hath set down an entire Copie of them in his Annals The same Autor also speaking of the same Time saith At that time there was neither Lord nor Law over the Sea men but what every man was able to catch or snatch hee called his own which plainly denote's an extraordinarie Licence or of Depredation and infesting the Sea yet so to bee understood that in the mean time the incomparable power of the English in Shipping which guarded their Dominion by Sea according to the Custom of their Ancestors was chiefly signified thereby the King very freely permitting his Subjects to use depredations by Sea as long as the war continued For Florilegus himself relate's that great numbers both of French and Spaniards were then taken at Sea by the English Yea and about that time Thomas of Walsingham write's that either a French or Norman Navie of two hundred Sail which roved about this Sea to rob the English were overcom by a Fleet of sixtie English Ships and brought into England There is also another antient Autor of the same time when these affairs were acted who saith That in the Month of May MCCXCIV there fell out a Quarrel between the Sea-men of the Cinque-Ports of England and the Sea-men of France and it was determined by a fight at Sea wherein the English with a Fleet of one hundred Sail took two hundred Ships of France and drowned or killed almost all the Sea-men of France for which caus Philip King of France endeavored to take away Gascoign from the King of England Others there are likewise that have other expressions touching these things whereby it is easie to collect what is meant by that of Florilegus when hee saith that there was neither Lord nor Law over Sea-men at that time that is to say the King of England had let the reins loos to his Subjects as Moderator of this Sea and this hee did that they might not onely restrain his enemies but them also that should reliev his enemies in any manner whatsoêver or that should use the Sea otherwise than at his pleasure who was Lord thereof But as concerning the like acknowledgment made singly and apart by the Flemings of the Dominion of the Kings of England over the Sea I shall Treat by and by after that I have in the next place set before you the Libel it self in its own that is the Norman Tongue as it stand's recorded in the Tower of London A Copie or Transcript of the Libel or Bill of Complaint mentioned in the former Chapter CHAP. XXVIII IN the Archives of the Tower of London where Records of above four hundred years are kept there is a bundle of Parchments which contein som affairs relating to the times of Henrie the Third and of Edward the First and Third The first contein's an agreement made between Edward the First and Guy Earl of Flanders touching their Ships bearing of Colors about this Sea to the end that they might bee the more easily known Then there are annexed three either Originals or Copies of the said Libel written at the same time For as it seem's the several Procurators of those Nations that were parties in the Complaint had their several Libels though expressed in the name of all together So that one is endorsed thus De Baiona as if that Libel had been exhibited singly by the men of Bayonne but the title run's thus De Superioritate Maris Angliae Jure Officii Admirallatûs in eodem
him out of the Catalogue of the Admirals of France yet Joannes Tilius placing him among the Governors of the French Navie call's him Roverius Grimaldus Hee also is that Admiral of the King of France who as Joannes de Beka saith had command of three hundred and fiftie Gallies that were sent by Philip the Fair in the year MCCCIV to aid the Hollanders against the Flemings There are also several particulars in the Records of France which relate to the differences then on foot between the English and French And although that Libel or any Copie of it bee not found therein if wee may credit Tilius who set forth a Catalogue of that kinde of Records yet there is that Commission among them whereby the aforesaid Auditors or Commissioners were autorised to determine of things don contrary to the League It is described by Tilius after this manner Pouvoir donè par le Roy Edovard à deux nommez accordez de sa part pour avec les deux eleuz de la part du dit Roy Phelippe d' enquerir amendir les forfaictes durant lour trefue le Dernier Juin MCCCIII Ou tresor layette Procurationes posse potestates Angliae K. Power was given by king Edward to two persons named and appointed on his part to meet with two persons chosen on the behalf of the said king Philip to make enquiry and give remedy touching Injuries committed during the Truce betwixt them the last of June MCCCIII in the Treasury in the Box intituled Procurationes posse potestateâ—s Angliae K. The Commissions bear date the same day and year whereby these Auditors or Commissioners were appointed for this purpose as wee observed before out of our own Records Nor is it of any force here to the contrarie that Commissioners were somtimes deputed in the same manner by the Princes of the shores on both sides of the Sea as also by the aforesaid Kings to determine complaints about robberies and other injuries usually don by private persons to one another by Sea and Land For if any one will collect thence that the Princes which deputed them had both an equal right in the Sea it may as well bee concluded upon the same ground that they were but part-owners of their own Countries and had an equal interest in each other 's Land Besides in such a kinde of deputation as that there is more regard had of the persons offending that are to bee tried than of the Dominion of Territories which truly is wholly to bee discovered som other way A Recognition or acknowledgment of the Sea-Dominion of the Kings of England made by the Flemings in an Ambassy to Edward the Second CHAP. XXIX TO these let us add now the assent and voluntarie acknowledgment of the Flemings in the Parlament of England in the Reign of Edward the Second When as the Ambassadors of Robert Earl of Flanders complained of the taking of their Goods away at Sea imploring remedie of the King of England they said more than once that they were taken upon the English Sea towards the parts about Crauden within the power of the King of England and brought into England but that it appertained to the King of England to take cognisance of the crime for that hee is Lord of the said Sea and the aforesaid depredation was committed upon the aforesaid Sea within his Territorie and Jurisdiction which are the words of the Record but I shall set down the whole so far as it relate's to this business Memorandum That whereas for the reformation of certain injuries in an amicable way don by the Subjects of the Earl of Flanders to the Subjects of the Kingdom of England and by the Subjects of the said Kingdom to those of Flanders since the time that our said Lord the king undertook the Government of his kingdom several Treaties had been held between the Council of our said Lord the king and the Ambassadors of the said Earl often sent into England upon the aforesaid occasion which Treaties by reason of som impediments that happened did not aâ—tem the desired effect at length in the Parlament of our said Lord the king held at Westminster in ocâ—abis Sancti Michaâ—lis in the fourteenth year of his Reign there appeared certain Ambassadors of the said Earl to treat about reforming the aforesaid injuries in the form aforesaid And when as the said Ambassadors had been admitted by our said Lord the king to treat anew of this kinde of Iniuries these Ambassadors as other Ambassadors of the aforesaid Earl in the aforesaid Treaties did among other particulars that they required before all things make supplication That the said Lord the king would at his own sâ—â—t by virtue of his Roial Autoritie caus enquirie to bee maâ—â— and do Justice about a certain depredation laâ—ely made by the Subiects of England as they said upon the English Sea of Wines and divers other Merchandises belonging to certain men of Flanders towards the parts about CRAUDEN within the Territorie and Jurisdiction of our said Lord the king alleging that the aforesaid Wines and Merchandises taken from the said Flemings were brought within the Râ—â—â—m and Jurisdiction of the said Lord the king and that it belong'd to the king himself so to do for that HEE IS LORD OF THE SAID SEA and the aforesaid depredation was made upon the said Sea within his Terrâ—â—orâ—â— and Jurisdiction In conclusion after diligent consideration had of the Premisses in the same Parlament with the Prelates Earls Barons and other Peers of the said Realm beeing there present it was concluded upon their advice by the said Lord King that to preserv the benefit of Peace between the Subjects of England and â—landers the said Lord king do by his Roial Autoritie caus enquirie to bee made about the Goods taken at that time upon the aforesaid English Sea towards the said place of CRAUDEN and brought within the said Realm in those places where the Malefactors went with the goods so taken to the said Land of England and caus the same depredation to bee heard and determined according to Law and Reason and that the Owners of the Ships who had a hand in the said depredation and others who knowingly received the said Offendors with the Goods so taken in whole or in part may bee charged and punished thereupon as partakers of the aforesaid depredation So far that Record And Commissioners were appointed with power of Jurisdiction by the King's Commission through most of the Maritim Counties to make reparation of damages But becaus there are upon the shores over against us especially those of Zealand and there are also upon other neighboring shores besides Inlets of Rivers very many windings and turnings of the Sea flowing in whereby the land is so interwoven up and down that it cannot well bee but that the Sea also which flow's in and oftentimes remove's Banks and make's Harbors there in the same manner almost
as a River or Brook must bee conteined under the same Jurisdiction as an entire Bodie with the Land therefore somtimes mention is made also of this kinde of Sea flowing in as of a Sea reckoned within the Jurisdiction Current of the Sea of the opposite shores as for example of the Sea Flanders or as I finde it in som antient Manuscripts which seem to bee the Originals of certain Letters of King Henrie the Fift to the Earl of Carolois and to the Governors of Ypres Gaunt and Bruges deins la Jurisdiction l'estrem de la meer de Flandres within the Jurisdiction and stream of the Sea of Flanders which is all one For setting aside the Sea so flowing in or making an in-let or harbor before the opposite shore all that which remain's or the Sea flowing between those opposite Countries and England was ever esteemed to bee of the English Dominion according to what I have formerly shewn So that a late Writer doubtless was in a dream when upon the repairing of the Dock at Mardike hee write's that hee saw the Empire of the British Sea restored to the King of Spain And so I have don with this point touching the Declaration and acknowledgment of the Sea Dominion of our Kings made by those Forein and Neighbor-Nations who were most concerned in the Business Of the Dominion of the King of Great Britain in the Irish and Western Sea consider'd singly and apart by it self CHAP. XXX I have alreadie spoken in general of the English or British Sea which is a part of the Patrimonie of the Crown of England but chiefly as it lie's either East or South It rest's now that wee treat of the Western as also the Scotish and Northern and in a word of the whole British Sea that remain's It is evident to all that part of the Western Sea lying before England is understood as well in that Libel which was exhibited by so many Nations to the Commissioners deputed by the Kings of England and France above three hundred and thirtie years ago wherein wee so often read le mer d' Angleterre or the sea of England as in the King 's Commission-before mentioned wherein our Kings are expressly-declared Lords of the English Sea on every side and therefore I shall forbear to repeat what is cited out of Bracton about the Essoyning or excusing of a man absent in Ireland and other things of that kinde alleged before which make to this purpose Moreover also wee read every where that all the Isles in this neighboring Sea were called British as wee observed at the beginning of this Book just as if the narrow Seas flowing between like Rivers or turnings of Rivers did disjoin those Banks or Shores from great Britain as Fragments of the same Whereby it appear's that the narrow Seas themselvs with the Isles even as Rivers with their Banks are to bee reckoned a part of the British Territorie And hereunto especially relate's also that expression in the Libel so often cited to wit that the Kings of England have ever been Lords both of the English Sea or of the British so far as it stretcheth before England and also of the Isles situate therein par raison du Royalme d' Angleterre by right of the Realm of England So that the Isle of Man which as Giraldus Cambrensis saith stand's in this Sea in the very midst betwixt the Northern Parts of England and Ireland was if I understand any thing reckoned of old among the Land-Provinces of England even as the Isle of Wight Lundie and others of that kinde Nor doth it seem to bee understood otherwise by those men of antient time who upon occasion of a dispute whether this Isle ought by right to bee taken for an appendant of England or Ireland beeing placed in the midst of the Sea flowing between determined the controversie on this manner They brought venemous serpents and observing that the Isle did entertain and cherish them as well as England and the rest of great Britain but on the contrarie that Ireland destroied them it was concluded saith Giraldus Cambrensis who lived under Henrie the Second by the common censure of all that it ought to bee ascribed unto England For if they had so thought the Territorie either of Ireland or England as it consisted of Land and Sea to bee dis-joined from this Isle of Man that they had conceived the Sea lying between either common to all men or by antient right subject to other than the Kings either of Ireland or Britain they might seem to have raised a very ridiculous Controversie For I suppose the Question could bee no other than touching the bounds of England or great Britain and Ireland But that a Question about bounds may bee admitted between Owners that are Neighbors where the Territories of both are not continual or contiguous is beyond my understanding It is well said by Paulus that if a publick Thorow-fare or publick River intervene which belong's to neither of the neighboring Owners an Action cannot bee brought upon that Title of the Law Finium Regundorum And truly after that Quintus Fabius Labeo beeing appointed Arbiter by the Senate betwixt the Nolans and Neapolitans about the bounds of a Field had so craftily perswaded both of them to retire backwards apart from each other that a portion of the Field was left in the middle which hee adjudged to the people of Rome there could not any Controversie arise farther between them about the bounds of this Field becaus there ceased to bee any confine betwixt them But if any Question arose afterwards they were both to contend with the people of Rome Even so it is to bee conceived of that Question to which of the two Countries the Isle of Man ought by Right to bee ascribed it arising chiefly upon this ground becaus it lay in the midst between the Territories belonging to Ireland and Britain and at the confine of both For by an Argument drawn from the nature of the very soil onely without a civil consideration of Dominion though they would have here the very nature of the soil to bee the evidence thereof as a Lot for decision it ought no more to bee ascribed either to Britain or Ireland than to Norway Spain or France where every man know's that venemous Creatures are bred as well as in Britain Therefore to bee ascribed to England or Britain in that antient Decision is so immediately to bee annexed to the British Territorie that the Isle of Man may truly and in a civil sens bee called a Land-Province of England or Britain seeing the English Territorie is so continually extended as far as its Western Coasts that which bend's Westward from the very Confine beeing ascribed to Ireland And therefore Queen Elisabeth's Commissioners let fall those words too unadvisedly in the Treatie held at Bremen with the Danish Commissioners about free Navigation and Fishing in the Norwegian
by your own Instructions you may fully understand But withal considering that Peace must bee mainteined by the arm of power which onely keep 's down War by keeping up Dominion his Majestie thus provoked finde's it necessarie even for his own defence and safetie to re-assume and keep his antient and undoubted Right in the Dominion of these Seas and to suffer no other Prince or State to encroach upon him thereby assuming to themselvs or their Admirals any Soveraign command but to force them to perform due homage to his Admirals and Ships and to pay them acknowledgments as in former times they did Hee will also set open and protect the free Trade both of his Subjects and Allies And give them such safe Conduct and Convoie as they shall reasonably require Hee will suffer no other Fleets or Men of VVar to keep any guard upon these Seas or there to offer violence or take prizes or booties or to give interruption to any lawful intercours In a word his Majestie is resolved as to do no wrong so to do Justice both to his Subjects and Friends within the limits of his Seas And this is the real and Roial design of this Fleet whereof you may give part as you finde occasion to our good neighbors in those parts that no Umbrage may bee taken of any hostile act or purpose to their prejudice in any kinde So wishing you all health and happiness I rest Your assured friend and Servant JOHN COOK Whitehall 16 April 1635. our style In this Letter you see first how it was held for an undeniable principle that the King was King by Sea as well as by Land That neither the honor nor safetie of this Island and Ireland could bee maintained but by preserving the Dominion by Sea and that it is an argument that they that encroach upon us by Sea will do it also by Land when they see their time Hee declare's also how our unthankful neighbors are risen to this hight and insolence partly by grant partly by connivence but principally through their many injurious abuses of our Patience and Indulgence And lastly you may observ here what resolutions were then taken to prevent the lilâ—e injuries and preserv our English Interest in time to com But how those Resolutions were followed in the succeeding part of his Reign I shall not stand to examine onely it sufficeth here to take notice that the Claim of Sea-Dominion was made by him as well as by his Father and for a time strenuously asserted though afterward hee slackned his hand in the prosecution whereof the Netherlanders taking advantage and of our late commotions which were their Halcyon-daies and time of Harvest are now advanced to such a monstrous pitch of pride malice and ingratitude that they dare bid defiance to those antient Rights which wee have received from all Antiquitie and justifie their actions by a most unjust and bloudie war in the view of all the world What remain's then but that the Parlament and People of England should lay these things to heart with an indignation answerable to so prodigious violations and invasions They have now an opportunitie and strength given them by God O let not hearts bee wanting to make good the Claim and accomplish that work of establishing our Interests by Sea beyond the possibilitie of future impeachments Let it not bee said that England in the state of Monarchie was able to hold the Soveraigntie of the Seas so many hundred years and then lost it in the state of Libertie It is as now established with its Appendants the greatest and most glorious Republick that the Sun ever saw except the Roman God hath made it so by Land and will by Sea for without this the Land is nothing It was ever so apprehended by Kings yea by the last and worst of our Kings And shall the Founders of this famous structure of Government now in beeing who have cashiered Kings and vindicated the Rights and Liberties of this Nation upon his head and his whole posteritie and partie not assert them against perfidious Neighbors It were unpardonable in any to harbor a thought of that nature or to yield that such a blemish should bee brought upon all those glorious actions and atchievements whereby God hath freed and innobled our Land and Nation But that the people of England may bee excited to a valuation maintenance and improvement of their interest by Sea it is necessarie to let them understand what advantages are to bee made thereby and are made by others who of Usufructuaries by permission have in design now to make themselvs absolute Lords of the Fee And therefore it is very convenient here to set down an excellent Discours which was written in the time of the late King and presented by the following Title The inestimable Riches and Commodities of the British Seas THE Coast of Great Britain do yield such a continual Sea-harvest of gain and benefit to all those that with diligence do labor in the same that no time or season in the year passeth away without som apparent means of profitable imploiment especially to such as apply themselvs to Fishing which from the begining of the year unto the latter end continueth upon som part or other upon our Coasts and therein such infinite sholes and multitudes of Fishes are offered to the takers as may justly move admiration not onely to strangers but to those that daily bee imploied amongst them The Summer-Fishing for Herring beginneth about Midâ—ommer and lasteth som part of August The Winter-Fishing for Herring lasteth from September to the mid'st of November both which extend in place from Boughones in Scotland to the Thame's mouth The Fishing for Cod at Alamby Whirlington and White Haven near the Coast of Lancashire from Easter until VVhitsontide The Fishing for Hake at Aberdenie Abveswhich and other places between VVales and Ireland from VVhitsontide to Saint James tide The Fishing of Cod and Ling about Padstow within the Land and of Severn from Christmas to Mid-Lent The Fishing for Cod on the West part of Ireland frequented by those of Biscay Galicia and Portugal from the begining of April until the end of June The Fishing for Cod and Ling on the North and North-East of Ireland from Christmas until Michaëlmas The Fishing for Pilchers on the West coast of England from Saint James-tide until Michaëlmas The Fishing for Cod and Ling upon the North-East of England from Easter until Midsummer The Fishing of great Staple-Ling and many other sorts of Fish lying about the Island of Scotland and in the several parts of the British Seas all the year long In September not many years since upon the Coast of Devonshire near Minigal 500 Ton of Fish were taken in one day And about the same time three thousand pound worth of Fish in one day were taken at S t Ives in Cornwal by small Boats and other poor provisions Our five-men-Boats and cobles adventuring in a calm to launch out amongst the
the persons and goods belonging to their use at the request of divers Princes who had their Possessions upon the shore of the Adriatick Sea and that as well by sundrie Popes Legates Vicars Governors and Commonaltie of the Land of Romania and Marca as by the Kings of Naples for Puglia of which many were granted som denied and others yielded to but in part But it beeing superfluous to allege the Acts of those the Successors of whom do not so much as question this Title hee descended to particularize onely the Predecessors of his Majestie as Kings of Hungarie and Arch-Dukes of Austria Hee recited a Brief of Pope Urbane the sixt directed to Antonio Veniero the Duke of Venice bearing date Luca 14 Junii 1388. where hee give 's him thanks that with his Gallies deputed for the keeping of the Gulf Marie Queen of Hungarie had been inlarged who had been kept prisoner in Castel-novo with two other congratulatorie Letters the one to the said Queen the other to King Sigismund who after was Emperor beeing her Husband rejoicing with them likewise of the said enlargement made by means of the Captain of the Venetian Gallies deputed to the custodie of the Gulf. Afterwards hee caused to bee read a safe Conduct granted at the Petition of Rodulph Earl of Sala in the name of Ladislaus King of Naples and of William Arch-Duke of Austria anno 1399. 12 Decembris that the sister of the said King espoused to the aforenamed Arch-Duke might bee conducted by Sea from Puglia to the Coasts of her Husband with Gallies and other Vessels in all to the number of about twelv with condition that there should not bee suffered to pass upon them any Bandito or banished person of Venice who had don any thing against the Republick which did merit death which safe-conduct should bee available to the Austrians as well in going as in coming so as by the same they might also re-imbark at Trieste and return unto Puglia But yet this safe Conduct was not made use of becaus the King having deferred the departure of his sister for a small time in the interim shee died Also hee produced two letters of the Emperor Frederick unto Duke Giovanni Mocenigo the first dated in Gratz 24 Sept. 1478. the other 2 Apr. 1479. from the same place where hee tell 's him that hee having taken order that there should bee brought from Puglia and Abruzzo to his castles of Castro and of Istria a certain quantitie of corn hee request 's that it may bee permitted him to do it freely which beeing to him a great pleasure hee shall acknowledg it with many thanks This hee seconded with a letter of Beatrice Queen of Hungarie to Giovanni Mocenigo Duke of Venice dated the last of Jan. 1481. whereby desiring for her proper use to have divers things from the parts of Italie which shee could not bring from thence by Sea without the permission of the Republick shee desired that for curtesie sake and friendship it might bee granted her which shee should take for a great favor and correspond upon the like occasion And another of Matthias King of Hungarie to the said Duke dated 26 Febr. 1482. where relating how the Republick was accustomed to give Licence every year to Count Frangipani Patron of Segna and other Maritim places to bring from Puglia and Marca a certain quantitie of victuals and that after the said places were passed over into his hands hee had omitted to desire it wherefore hee now praied that the same grace might bee shewed unto him and that concerning this hee would write his letters and give them to a person which hee had sent expressly to receiv them which hee should acknowledg as a favor and correspond accordingly And another of the same King to Augustino Barbarigo the Duke dated 18 Oct. 1487. in the which relating that hee having need of wood for the reparation of a fortress standing in the mouth of Narenta hee praied that hee might have leav to carrie it unto Segna by Sea and that there might bee Letters Patents made thereof offering to gratifie him in a greater matter Hee added to this a Letter of Anne Queen of Hungarie 30. Aug. 1502. in the which recounting the sterilitie of the Countrie of Segna shee desire 's leav to bring certain victuals from Puglia and Marca and that hee would give to the bearer who was sent on purpose Letters of Licens for the same promising to acknowledg it as a great favor and courtesie Lastly hee produced a Letter dated 3 Sept. 1504. of Giovanni de Dura Captain of Pismo servant to the Emperor Maximilian which hee writ unto the Duke Leonardo Loredano importing that Giacomo Croato a subject of his Majesties parting from Fianona entered into the Sea which is under the Dominion of the Republick for to go to Segna and was there assailed by an armed Bark of Pirates in contempt of the Signorie or Republick and supplicate's that som order might bee taken therein Upon all which particulars hee weighed most that which ought best to bee considered having respect to the times persons and qualities of the several Princes and for greater confirmation of their assent hee remembred the yearly Cerimonie used at Venice where the Duke in presence of the Ambassadors of other Princes particularly of his Majesties did use to espous the Sea by the casting of a Ring into it with these words Desponsamus Te Mare in signum veri perpetui Dominii Wee do marrie the Sea in sign of our true and perpetual Dominion over it VVhich Cerimonie as the foresaid writers do affirm had beginning when Pope Alexander the Third was in Venice notwithstanding they add withal that it was instituted in sign of the Dominion which the Republick had formerly gotten jure belli To the 400 complaints of the Emperors Subjects and to the sentence of Liesina hee answered giving thanks for the remembring of them as a thing brought in much to his favor becaus the complaints do presuppose the prohibition and the sentences either condemning or absolving do prove the jurisdiction And to the salt-barks hee said that they were not suffered to go to Venice as never any are suffered to go all forrein salt beeing prohibited to enter into that Citie and if it were not cast into the Sea it was a courtesie which ought not to bee imputed to them to their prejudice Hee concluded that hee had delivered the true sens of the Capitulations and proved the immemorable possession of the Adriatick Sea that hee could have said much more but it seemed to him superfluous and these two points were made most clear First That this pretence of the Austrians was but new And secondly That their Petition at this Convention could have no place The Imperialists after they had conferred together took a resolution not to persevere in the demand of Justice and the Baron with Suorz said openly that the Republick was Patron of the Gulf and might impose what Customs
our Isles of Gernesey Jersey Serk and Aureney in the Sea between Easter and Michaelmas is according to the Custom of those places acknowledged to belong unto Us at a reasonable rate to bee paid therefore and that the said Fishermen are bound to carrie all the Fish by them taken between the Times aforesaid unto certain places in those Isles appointed that the Officers under our Governor of the aforesaid Isles may take thence for our use at what price they shall think fit and reasonable Nor is that to bee slighted which wee finde in the Chronicles of the Abbie or Monasterie of Teuxburie concerning Henrie Beauchamp Duke of Warwick who was invested by Henrie the sixt with the Title and Dignitie of King not onely of the Isle of Wight but also of Gernesey and Jersey whereunto the other Isles in this Tract do in a civil sens belong The same thing is recorded of the Isle of Wight by that Learned man William Camden and that out of the same Book The Book it self speak's after this manner But the noble Lord Henrie Duke of Warwick and first Earl of England Lord Le Dispenser and de Abergeveney King of the Isles of Wight and Gardsey and Jardsey Lord also of the Castle of Bristol with the appurtenances thereunto belonging died 3 Idus Junii Anno Dom. 1446. in the twentie second year of his Age at the Castle of Hanley and was buried in the middle of the Quire at Teuxburie And a little before it is said of the same man that hee was Crowned King of Wight by the King 's own hand no express mention beeing made in that place of the other islands but they reckoned in the same condition with this as they were part of the patrimonie of the Kings of England But it is not to bee believed that those Isles which lie before the shore of Normandie had been so turned into a Kingdom though subject to the Crown of England unless even they also who made them a Kingdom had conceived that they possessed them before by a Title superior to that of the Dutchie that is to say by a Kingly Title As King Richard the second when hee had determined that Robert Earl of Oxford who also was Marquiss of Dublin and Duke of Ireland should bee creâted King of Ireland questionless did not doubt but that hee himself in the mean time possessed that Island by no less a Title and Dignitie than of King although the name of Lord was wholly used there at that time in stead of King as also until the latter end of the Reign of Henrie the eight So it is conceived upon good ground that those Isles and the Sea lying about them did though they used different Customs constitute one entire Bodie of Empire with the Kingdom of England Whereunto also that special privilege of theirs doth relate whereby through the favor of the Kings of England they enjoie the benefit of freedom from hostilitie by Sea though there bee a Warr on foot between the Neighbor-Nations round about but of this more hereafter And in their Court-Records which contain the Acts or Decrees of the aforesaid Justices Itinerant wee very often finde Pleas of the Crown which phrase is an Evidence of the English Government Also in their Trials those Forms In contempt of our Lord the King his Crown and Dignitie and Our Lord the King was seised of the aforescid Advousen in time of Peace as of his Fee and in Right of his Crown and others not a few of that kinde wee meet with which savor not of any Right of the Dutchie Add moreover that the King of England so held the Right heretofore not onely of the Isles over against the shore of Normandie but of those also which are opposite to Aquitain as a pledg or concomitant of his possession of that Sea so far as it belong'd to the patrimonie of the Kingdom of England that though our Henrie the third renounced his claim to no small part of Aquitain yet that Isle lying before it called Oleron no less famous in the West for Naval Laws than Rhodes was of old hee granted to his eldest son Edward to bee held in time to com as a perpetual Appendant of the English Crown For this Claus was added to the Grant so that the said Isle may alwaies remain to the Crown of England and never bee alienated from the same Also in his Letters granted to the Inhabitants of Oleron hee saith Wee will not in any wise sever you from the Crown of England Som years before also hee in like manner made a Grant of Gascoign or those parts which lie upon the shore of Aquitain near the Sea to Prince Edward upon condition it should remain entirely and for ever to the Crown of England So without doubt his intent was that both the Sea-Coasts and this Isle should in a special manner bee possest by the said Prince but by no means bee disjoined from the English Empire any more than the Sea its self which washt their shores And although after a while both this and som other neighboring Isles did many Ages since for divers reasons follow the fate of those French shores which lie next to them yet in the mean time the Dominion of the Sea remained entire as it did before to the Kings of England as it sufficiently appear's by those other passages which wee have shewn The Dominion and possession of the Sea asserted on the behalf of the Kings of England from that leav of praeter-Navigation or passage which hath been usually either granted by them to Foreiners or desired from them CHAP. XX. THose things which wee have hitherto alleged concerning this possession and dominion are confirmed by several Passports that have been obteined from the Kings of England for leav to pass through this Sea whereof wee have clear Testimonies in Records that is to say granted at the intreatie of Foreiners Our Henrie the fourth granted leav to Ferrando Urtis de Sarachione a Spaniard to fail freely from the Port of London through our Kingdoms Dominions and Jurisdiction to the Town of Rochel It is manifest that in this place our Dominions and Jurisdiction do relate to the Sea flowing between And when Charls the sixt King of France sent Ambassadors to Robert the third King of Scots to treat about the making of a League they upon request made to the same Henrie obteined Passports for their safe passage par touz noz povoirs destrois Seigniories par Mer par Terre that is through all places under our Power Territories and Dominions as well by Sea as by Land There are innumerable other Letters of Passport called safe Conducts in the Records especially of Henrie the fift and sixt whereby safe Port and Passage was usually granted as well by Sea as by Land and Rivers that is to say throughout the whole Dominion of him that made the Grant And it is
worthie of observation that this kinde of Letters were usually superscribed and directed by our Kings to their Governors of the Sea Admirals Vice-Admirals Sea-Captains to wit the Commanders appointed by the King to take care of his Territorie by Sea whereas notwithstanding wee finde no mention at all of any such Commanders in those Passports of that kinde which were granted heretofore by the French King to the King of England when hee was to cross over into France Letters of that kinde were given to our Edward the second by King Philip the Long superscribed onely thus Phelip par la grace de Dieu Roy de France A touz noz Justiciers subgies salut Philip by the grace of God King of France To our Judges and Subjects greeting But the reason is evident why the K. of England was wont to direct his Letters to his Commanders of the Sea and the French King at that time onely to his Judges and Subjects in general To wit becaus the King of England had his Sea-Commanders throughout this whole Sea as Lord of the same and therefore when hee crost over it was not reasonable that the French K. should secure him by Sea it beeing within the bounds of the English Territorie And yet the King of France might perhaps have an Admiral at that time but onely upon the shore of Normandie and Picardie For that of Aquitain Bretaign and Narbonne were not as yet added to the patrimonie of that Crown And it was about that time or a little before that they are placed who are first ranked in the Catalogue of the Admirals of France But of later time it is true indeed that in those Passports or Letters of safe Conduct which have been granted even by the French King and other Princes bordering upon the Sea Admirals are usually named in express terms among the other kindes of Roial Officers to the end that they to whom the Passports are granted may bee secured in every place and part of their Dominion But as touching the English Command over such as pass or sail through their Sea there are many other Arguments taken as wee shall shew by and by from the manner of our King 's prescribing limits to such as sail in this Sea as also from those passages which wee have alreadie cited out of Records concerning the Tributes or Customs imposed by the English upon such as passed through the Sea And truly it is very considerable also that the Kings both of Denmark and Sweden together with the Hans-Towns very often and earnestly begg'd of Queen Elisabeth that they might have free passage through the English Sea with Provisions towards Spain during the Warr betwixt her and the Spaniard I know indeed that such a Licence was denied them not onely in respect of the Dominion of the Sea but chiefly to prevent the conveying of Provisions to the Enemie For which caus also divers Ships belonging to the Hans-Towns laden with Corn were taken by English men of Warr in the very Streights of Lisbon without the Sea-Territorie of England which went by the Scotish Sea and the West towards Portugal which was don doubtless that they might not presume to use the English Sea without the leav of the Queen But the Hans-Towns cried out thereupon that the Laws of Nations Commerce and Leagues were violated becaus their ships were so taken by the English onely upon this account that they carried Provisions to the Enemie that is in a Territorie where the English did not in the least pretend to any Dominion And concerning this particular there is a notable Question controverted by very Learned men How far they that are not enemies or would not bee called enemies may by the Law of Nations afford supplies unto an enemie But som years before the taking of these ships when the Hamburgers who in the name also of the rest of the Hans-Towns desired leav to pass through this Sea to Portugal and Spain were more than once denied any kinde of libertie to transport either Corn or Warlike necessaries they did not at all suggest that their Petition at that time was grounded upon the Law of Nations or Commerce nor that the Queen's denial was contrarie to this kinde of Law That is to say they were by her first Answer enjoined to abstein from transporting Arms with other Warlike Necessaries and Corn but saith the Queen in transporting other commodities wee shall not hinder you at all but shall with all favour permit the ships of your Subjects to abide and pass after the accustomed manner that they may perform their Voiage This Answer they did not seem to take amiss But two years after they sent into England Sebastian à Berghen their Ambassador with Petitionarie Letters desiring that the Exception in the Licence formerly granted might bee taken away and a freedom to transport all kindes of Merchandise permitted Their Petition was denied again and this moreover added That such as should presume to do the contrarie should for their bold presumption suffer the loss of all their Goods and Merchandise so carried against her Majestie 's will and pleasure if they fell into the hands of her Men of Warr or any other of her Majestie 's Subjects Thus they ever addressed themselvs by Petitions and the Queen gave Answers according to her pleasure They did not so much as pretend the Laws of Nations or of Commerce before that they understood their ships were seised in another Sea to wit that of Portugal which they conceived free for themselvs by the Law of Nations and Commerce without leav from the Queen of England Then it was they began to plead that Libertie ought not by any Law to bee denied even these men who but som years before had humbly Petitioned the Queen of England more than once for free passage through the English Sea So that that principal point as som would have it of the Law of Nations that relief ought not to bee conveyed to Enemies by a Friend was not onely the ground either of the Hans-Town's Petition or the Queen's denial but her right of Dominion by Sea was concerned also which the Hans-Towns well knew they should violate if they should pass the Queen's Seas without her leav Hereunto for the same reason those particulars relate which wee finde concerning this matter in those points that were to bee insisted on in the year MDXCVII by Witfeldius and Bernicovius Ambassadors from Christiern the fourth King of Denmark to the Queen of England Wee were say they strictly enjoined by our King to mediate with her Majestie that our Countrie men may bee permitted a freedom to transport Corn or Provision towards Spain even as wee have don formerly and do now again with all earnestness desire especially since it is supposed that the same Licence of transporting Corn is granted somtimes both to English and Dutch that our Countrie-men may not bee used in a wors manner than your own