Note 867 — Chapter XII · CHARLES II. THE SECOND DUTCH WAR.

Treaty of Breda, Art. vii. It may have been in connection with the interpretation of this clause that the High Court of Admiralty asked the Trinity House their opinion as to the end of the English Channel westwards, and got the following answer: “We shall not presume,” said the Masters, on 2nd January 1668, “to determine matters that have for some ages past been controverted, and for anything that we at present know have not had a full resolution or any precedent for deciding questions relating thereunto;” but the opinion of “the past and present age,” with which they concurred, was that when any commander brought Scilly N.N.W. he had entered “the Channel of England.” Brit. Mus. Add. MSS., 30,221.