is Highness about a ship of theirs, called _The Unicorn_,
which had been seized in the Mediterranean as long ago as 1650 by
the Admiral and Vice-Admiral of the French fleet, with a cargo
worth L34,000. The capture was originally unfair, as there was then
peace between England and France, and express promises had been
recently given by Cardinal Mazarin and the French Ambassador, M. de
Bordeaux, that amends would be made as soon as the Treaty with
France was complete. That happily being now the case, his Highness
expects from his Majesty the indemnification of the said merchants
as "the first-fruits of the renewed friendship and recently formed
alliance."

(LXVII.) To LOUIS XIV. OF FRANCE, _Jan._ 1655-56:[1]--His
Highness has been informed of very extraordinary conduct on the
part of the French Governor of Belleisle in the Bay of Biscay. On
the 10th of December last, or thereabouts, he not only admitted
into his port one Dillon, a piratic enemy of the English
Commonwealth, and assisted him with supplies, but also prevented
the recapture of a merchant ship from the said Dillon by Captain
Robert Vessey of the _Nightingale_ war-ship, and further
secured Dillon's escape when Vessey had fought him and had him at
his mercy. All this is, of course, utterly against the recent
Treaty: and his Majesty will doubtless take due notice of the
Governor's conduct and give satisfaction.

[Footnote 1: Not in the Printed Collection nor in Phillips; but in
the Skinner Transcript (No. 46 there), and printed thence in
Hamilton's Milton Papers (p. 4).]

(LXVIII.) TO THE EVANGELICAL SWISS CANTONS, _Jan._ 1655-6. To
understand this important letter it is necessary to remember that
in 1653 there had broken out, for the second or third time, a Civil
War of Religion among the Swiss. The Popish Cantons of Schwytz,
Uri, Zug, Unterwalden, Luzern, &c., had quarrelled with the
Protestant or Evangelical Cantons of Zurich, Basel, Schaffhausen,
Bern, Glarus, Appenzell, &c.; and, as the Popish Cantons trusted to
help from surrounding Catholic powers, the Confederation and Swiss
Protestantism were in peril. It had been to watch events and
proceedings in this struggle that Cromwell had sent into
Switzerland, early in 1654, Mr. John Pell and Mr. John Durie, as
his agents (ante p. 41). Durie had remained only about a year; but
Pell was still there, reinforced now by Morland, who, after his