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314 A Short History of The World EUROPEANS TIGER HUNTING IN INDIA {Fro7n the engraving of the picture bv Zoffany in the British Museum) deeply entangled in the complicated affairs of Germany to sustain effective expeditions abroad. Sweden was wasted upon the German battlefields by a picturesque king, Gustavus Adolphus, the Protestant " Lion of the North." The Dutch were the heirs of such small settlements as Sweden made in America, and the Dutch were too near French aggressions to hold their own against the British. In the far east the chief rivals for empire were the British, Dutch, and French, and in America the British, French, and Spanish. The British had the supreme advantage of a water frontier, the " silver streak " of the English Channel, against Europe. The tradition of the Latin Empire entangled them least. France has always thought too much in terms of Europe. Throughout the eighteenth century she was wasting her oppor- tunities of expansion in West and East alike in order to dominate Spain, Italy and the German confusion. The religious and political dissensions of Britain in the seventeenth century had driven many of the English to seek a permanent home in America. They struck