CHAPTER XIV.

JAMES II. AND AFTER.

Gradual decline of the pretension to the sovereignty of the sea--England and the United Provinces allied against France--Louis’ ordinance regarding the salute--William III. claims the sovereignty of the narrow seas--The question of striking becomes of little international importance--The Admiralty instructions concerning--Disputes about it less common--Encounter with a Swedish man-of-war--The case of the _Gironde_--The naval historians on the sovereignty of the sea--Articles regarding striking in later treaties--The ceremony abandoned after the battle of Trafalgar--General claims to maritime dominion give place to international arrangements--Sir Philip Meadows--His treatise against the dominion of the seas--Definite boundaries begin to be fixed for fisheries--Fishery disputes between Denmark and the United Provinces--Great Britain sides with the Dutch in opposing claims to _Mare Clausum_--The North American fishery treaties of the eighteenth century--The claim to the sovereignty of the seas dies out--Decay of the Dutch fisheries and rise of the British 517

SECTION II.--THE TERRITORIAL WATERS.