ese
duties should not be paid till six months after the merchandise should
be landed and sold, and merchants giving security for the customs. It
was agreed that the whole commerce of the Spanish West Indies should be
carried on by a joint company of Spanish and British merchants; and in
the interim, as the greater part of that country was in the hands of
Philip, his competitor consented that the British subjects should
trade freely in all the ports of the West Indies with ten ships of five
hundred tons each, under such convoy as her Britannic majesty should
think fit to appoint.]

[Footnote 154: Note 2 E, p. 154. Before the opening of the campaign, a
very daring enterprise was formed by one colonel Queintern, a partisan
in the Imperial army. This man laid a scheme for carrying off the
dauphin of France from the court of Versailles. He selected thirty men
of approved valour for this undertaking. He procured passes for
them, and they rendezvoused in the neighbourhood of Paris. On the
twenty-fourth day of March, in the evening, he and his accomplices
stopped a coach and six, with the king's liveries, and arrested the
person who was in it, on the supposition of his being a prince of the
blood. It was, however, M. de Barringhen, the king's first equerry.
This officer they mounted on a spare horse, and set out for the Low
Countries; but, being little acquainted with the roads, they did not
reach Chantilly till next morning, when they heard the tocsin, or
alarm-bell, and thence concluded that detachments were sent out
in pursuit of them. Nevertheless, they proceeded boldly, and would
certainly have carried the point, had not Queintern halted three
hours for the refreshment of his prisoner, who complained of his being
indisposed. He likewise procured a chaise, and ordered the back of it to
be lowered for his convenience. These acts of humanity retarded him
so much, that he was overtaken by a detachment of horse at Ham, within
three hours' ride of a place of safety. Finding himself surrounded, he
thought proper to surrender, and M. de Berringhen treated him with
great generosity, for the civilities he had experienced at his hands.
He carried him back to Versailles, and lodged him in his own apartments.
Madame de Berringhen made him a considerable present; and the king
ordered him and his companions to be discharged, on account of the
courage and humanity they had displayed.]

[Footnote 173: Note 2 F, p. 173. Lord Compton a