The victory at Dunkirk increased his reputation, while Louis XIV.
North of that river the coast is low-lying and bordered by sand-lunes, to which succeed on the Strait of Dover the cliffs in the neighborhood of the port of Boulogne and the marshes and sand-dunes of Flanders, with the ports of Calais and Dunkirk, the latter the principal French port on the NOrth Sea.
Flax, Hemp, Jute, &c.The preparation and spinning of these materials and the manufacture of nets and rope, together with the weaving of linen and other fabrics, give occupation to 112,000 persons chiefly in the departments of Nord (Lille, Armentires, Dunkirk), Somme (Amiens) and Maine-et-Loire (Angers, Cholet).
Of the coast defences the principal are Toulon, Antibes, Rochefort, Lorient, Brest, Olron, La Rochelle, BelleIsle, Cherbourg,St-Malo, Havre, Calais, Gravelines and Dunkirk A number of the older fortresses, dating for the most part from Louis XIV.s time, are still in existence, but are no longer of military importance.
Cromwell furnished 6000 men with a fleet to join in the attack upon Spain in Flanders, and obtained as reward Mardyke and Dunkirk, the former being captured and handed over on the 3rd of October 1657, and the latter after the battle of the Dunes on the 4th of June 1658, when Cromwell's Ironsides were once more pitted against English royalists fighting for the Spaniards.