“For the Sake of Liberty” 1652–1654Milton also translated several letters for the council to Ferdinand II, Grand Duke
of Tuscany, who had proclaimed neutrality in the Anglo-Dutch war and opened
the port of Livorno (Leghorn) to both fleets on condition that they refrain from
hostilities within sight of Livorno’s lighthouse. On July 29, 1652 the council thanked
the duke profusely in Milton’s Latin for allowing English ships that refuge against
Dutch warships and sent him a copy of the Scriptum Parlamenti; on September 16
they again expressed profound gratitude for the safe harbor.^15 On January 14, 1653,
however, Milton had to render the council’s profound apology for two egregious
English violations of Livorno’s neutrality: seizing within sight of the lighthouse a
captured English warship, and offering violence to Tuscan sentinels while pursuing
an escaping prisoner onto shore.^16 Milton produced several other letters to various
states for various purposes, among them letters to Hamburg and the Hanseatic
towns to protest violence against English merchants (March 12), to decline their
requests for relaxation of the Navigation Act (April 8), to welcome officially their
envoy Lieuwe van Aitzema, and to express England’s desire for continued friend-
ship and trade (April 13).^17
Milton also had major responsibility for correspondence between the council
and the Spanish Ambassador Cardenas, much of it concerning his tentative propos-
als for a treaty. Milton produced Latin versions of two council letters to him, com-
plaining of his failure to propose articles for a treaty (March 31, 1652), or to specify
the changes he would make in a former treaty (August 10); the August letter com-
plains again about Ascham’s still unpunished murderers.^18 Milton probably trans-
lated some of Cardenas’s proposals and replies into English, including the draft
treaty of 24 articles Cardenas offered on September 2; and he probably turned into
Latin the council’s substitute draft (dated November 12) of 35 articles, one of which
would protect English Protestants in Spain from the Inquisition when they practiced
their religion in private places.^19 As treaty negotiations dragged on without result,^20
a council letter of January 14, 1653 warned the ambassador not to allow English
citizens to attend mass at the houses of his ambassadorial staff (649–50). Milton
seems to have had little connection with the renewed negotiations over the stalled
treaty with Portugal, save for one instance on October 7, 1652, when the council
ordered that a paper from the newly arrived Portuguese ambassador be “translated
by Mr Milton into English and brought in to the Council to morrow in the after-
noon” (LR III, 258).
Milton was centrally involved with the complex and ultimately fruitless negotia-
tions for a commercial treaty with Denmark proposed by King Frederick III. He
translated parliament’s gracious response (April 13, 1652), affirming England’s de-
sire to preserve the ancient friendship and trade and inviting ambassadors to Lon-
don.^21 They arrived in May and Milton likely translated some of the documents
exchanged: Denmark’s treaty proposals (June 14), the council’s reply to these arti-
cles and proposal of others (July 8), and the ambassadors’ response (July 28).^22 He
almost certainly translated the council’s letter (July 8) acknowledging Denmark’s