Book excerpt: Excerpt from Fights for the Flag And yet the fighting quality of these clumsy eets was of a very high order. These Dutchmen, heavy footed, solid, grim, were in the seventeenth century, to use the phrase of a French writer, the Phoenicians of the modern world, the waggoners of all seas. They were the commercial heirs of Venice. The fire of their long struggle for freedom had given to the national character the edge and temper of steel. They had swept the Spanish ag from the seas. The carrying trade of the world was in their hands. They fished in all waters, traded in all ports, gathered the wealth Of the world under all Skies, and, as far as marine qualities were concerned, might almost have been web-footed. Holland to-day is a land Without ambition, comfortable, fat, heavy-bottomed. In the middle of the seventeenth century Holland proudly claimed to be the greatest naval power in the world, and by daring seamanship, great eets, famous admirals, and a world-encompassing trade, it went far to ustify that boast. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works."