ish Antilles, condemned by the
Navigation Laws to confine themselves to agriculture and a passive trade
with the home country, had no recourse but to traffic with their Spanish
neighbours. Factors of the Assiento established at Cartagena, Porto
Bello and Vera Cruz every year supplied European merchants with detailed
news of the nature and quantity of the goods which might be imported
with advantage; while the buccaneers, by dominating the whole Caribbean
Sea, hindered frequent communication between Spain and her colonies. It
is not surprising, therefore, that the commerce of Seville, which had
hitherto held its own, decreased with surprising rapidity, that the
sailings of the galleons and the Flota were separated by several years,
and that the fairs of Porto Bello and Vera Cruz were almost deserted. To
put an effective restraint, moreover, upon this contraband trade was
impossible on either side. The West Indian dependencies were situated
far from the centre of authority, while the home governments generally
had their hands too full of other matters to adequately control their
subjects in America. The Spanish viceroys, meanwhile, and the governors
in the West Indian Islands, connived at a practice which lined their own
pockets with the gold of bribery, and at the same time contributed to
the public interest and prosperity of their respective colonies. It was
this illicit commerce with Spanish America which Charles II., by
negotiation at Madrid and by instructions to his governors in the West
Indies, tried to get within his own control. At the Spanish court,
Fanshaw, Sandwich and Godolphin in turn were instructed to sue for a
free trade with the Colonies. The Assiento of negroes was at this time
held by two Genoese named Grillo and Lomelin, and with them the English
ambassadors several times entered into negotiation for the privilege of
supplying blacks from the English islands. By the treaty of 1670 the
English colonies in America were for the first time formally recognised
by the Spanish Crown. Freedom of commerce, however, was as far as ever
from realisation, and after this date Charles seems to have given up
hope of ever obtaining it through diplomatic channels.

The peace of 1660 between England and Spain was supposed to extend to
both sides of the "Line." The Council in Jamaica, however, were of the
opinion that it applied only to Europe,[159] and from the tenor of Lord
Windsor's instructions it may be inferred that