CHAPTER IV.

THE SECOND DUTCH WAR.

ENGLAND, when passing the Navigation Act, may be compared to a nobleman desperately resolved to free his estate from severe embarrassments which his ancestors had entailed upon it. Instead of relying upon those natural resources which are not liable to fail, England had placed herself at the mercy of foreigners. Upon the plea of cheapness, the Dutch had been permitted, directly or indirectly, to obtain an enormous hold upon our commerce, and had thereby absorbed much of that wealth which might, under a different system, have remained at home. Such being the posture of affairs, Charles found himself with ships which he had neither money to fit out nor sailors to man, unless by placing an embargo upon the whole mercantile navy. Trying as the predicament was, there seemed to be no other means by which the country could escape from its enthralment. The struggle was severe, but ultimately its results were all that the most sanguine could have anticipated.

The first Dutch war lasted a year, and although England proved so eminently victorious, yet its immediate effect was a drawback upon commercial pursuits. The honour and glory were ours, but our rivals were still our superiors in

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wealth. While this state of things continued, the Dutch were content to pay to England the barren homage of the flag, and seemingly to acknowledge our superiority; but no sooner did our commerce appear to make head, and show a probability of rivalling their own, than their animosity was made apparent. Finding, by the treaty of commerce which Charles had made with Spain, that England had been admitted to a preference in the Spanish trade, and the possession of Jamaica secured, the Dutch engaged their East and West India Companies to throw all the difficulties within their reach in the way of our trade. The Dutch East India Company delayed the liquidation of the damages which the English were to have received under the treaty of commerce entered into with them, and peremptorily refused to deliver up the island of Poleron, in the East Indies, which had been thereby ceded to England. In addition to this, they dictated the terms, and ports, on and at which our ships should trade in India. The Dutch West India Company, on the other hand, took possession of Cape Coast Castle, upon some dispute with the African Company.

Although at one time the professed admirers of MARE LIBERUM, the Dutch began to consider that MARE CLAUSUM possessed more substantial charms; and having, as they thought, the power, so they determined, if they could not claim or enforce the sovereignty of the " narrow seas," to erect their maritime throne in the Southern hemisphere.

Mr. Pepys, Secretary of the Admiralty, whose "Diary" throws considerable light upon this period of our history, furnishes the following:

"Feb. 9, 1664.-Great talk of the Dutch proclaiming themselves in India lords of the Southern Seas, and denying traffic there to all ships but their own, upon pain of confiscation, which makes our merchants mad. Feb. 15.Great news of the arrival of two rich ships, the Greyhound and another, which they were mightily afraid of. This afternoon Sir Thomas Chamberlain came to the office to me and showed

me several letters from the East Indies, showing the height that the Dutch are come to there; showing scorn to all the English, even in our own factory there of Surat, beating several men, and hanging the English standard, St. George, under the Dutch flag in scorn; saying that whatever their masters do or say at home, they will do what they list, and be masters of all the world there; and have so proclaimed themselves SOVEREIGN OF ALL THE SOUTH SEAS, which certainly our King cannot endure if the Parliament will give him money. But I doubt (and yet do hope) they will not yet, till we are more ready for it.

"April 21st.—I find that the House this day has voted that the King be desired to demand right for the wrong done us by the Dutch, and that they will stand by him with their lives and fortunes, which is a very high vote and more than I expected." England's first struggle with the Dutch was for national rights her second, for commercial independence; and it was only by pursuing a steady, uniform, course that this latter object could be achieved, as well as the former one. The proceedings of the Dutch, with reference to Africa, rendered it necessary to send a squadron thither, under the command of Sir Robert Holmes, in 1661; but as that squadron did not succeed in obtaining possession of Cape Coast, a second expedition, under the same commander, proceeded thither in 1663, and effected that and other objects, but was defeated at St. George D'Elmina. These disputes terminated in war; but it will be seen, by the annexed extract from Pepys, how great were the difficulties with which Charles had to contend, and to what a miserably low ebb our maritime resources had been reduced by permitting the relaxation of the wise restrictions imposed by the Navigation Laws.

"January 15th, 1664-5.-With Sir William Penn in his coach to my Lord Chancellor's, where, by-and-by, Mr. Coventry, Sir William Penn, Sir John Lawson, Sir George Ascue, and myself were called in to the King, there being several of the Privy Council and my Lord Chancellor lying at length upon a couch (of the gout I suppose), and there Sir William Penn spoke pretty well to dissuade the King from letting the Turkey ships go out, saying, in short, the King having resolved to have 130 ships out by the spring, he must have above twenty of them merchant-men. Towards which he,

in the whole river, could find but twelve or fourteen, and of them the five ships taken up by the merchants were a part, and so could not be spared. That we should need 30,000 sailors to man these 130 ships; and of them in service we have not above 16,000, so that we shall need 14,000 more. That these ships with their convoys carry about 2,000 men; and those the best men that could be got, it being the men used to the southward that are the best men for war, though those bred in the North, among the colliers, are good for labour. That it will not be safe for the merchants, nor honourable for the King, to expose these rich ships, with his convoy of six ships, to go, it not being enough to secure them against the Dutch, who, without doubt, will have a great fleet in the Straits. This Sir John Lawson enlarged upon. Sir George Ascue chiefly spoke, that war and trade could not be supported together. Mr. Coventry showed how the medium of the men the King hath, one year with another, employed in his navy, since his coming, hath not been above 3,000 men, or at most 4,000; and now having occasion of 30,000, the remaining 26,000 must be found out of the trade of the nation. All ended with a conviction that it was not fit for them to go out, though the ships be loaded."

An officer of the British navy told the Parliamentary Committees appointed to investigate the policy and operation of the Navigation Laws, that the navy was independent of the merchant-service for a supply of sailors. Mr. Ricardo darted upon the equivocal expression with the eagerness of a starving man catching at a bone, and, having secured the prize, triumphantly exclaimed, "There is an end, "therefore, in all its branches, of the Nursery question!" The opinion at the early period to which I allude, was different, and the result of the course pursued will be shown. hereafter. A fleet was fitted out, the magnitude of which was considerable. It consisted of 110 sail, carrying 23,000 men, and armed with 4,500 guns. The Dutch fleet was superior in most particulars, and a series of hotly contested actions ensued. The war was carried on with the utmost vigour, and with variable results, for two years; and, in 1667, while a treaty of peace was negotiating, due care not having been taken to keep a naval force available, the attack upon the ships in the Medway took place. Surely,

if history is of any use, we may draw from the portion of it to which I have referred a most impressive lesson, that England, to be exempt from foreign insult and imposition, must have no corrival on the ocean. It proves to us that for this purpose a large reserve of sailors is imperatively necessary; and further shows that, unless those sailors can find eligible employment in the mercantile marine of their own country, it is an actual impossibility that such a resource can be available in a time of need. It may, moreover, be gathered from the events of the past that, unless England ensures general freedom of commerce, other powers will league together to destroy it. England has long been famed as the great bulwark of liberty, in its truest sense, and of every other blessing; but if the means of enforcing her authority were withdrawn, it would be seen that her high character for strict and impartial justice would do little even to ensure her own immunity from insult. And as well might we expect a ship to fight a good action without guns, or other offensive or defensive weapons, as England to hold her high place among nations when deprived of the mainspring of her power-her navy. Arguing from the past, if our navy (of which the merchant-service is essentially a component part) were insufficient, and we attempted to defend ourselves from the insolence of other powers, we should again feel the force of Sir George Ascue's observation, that "war and trade cannot both be supported." The interests of ships, colonies, and commerce have, by all sound statesmen, been heretofore considered indivisible; let not, therefore, what the "wisdom of our ancestors" joined together be lightly put asunder by crazy theorists.