with rare skill. Though he frankly acknowledged that he preferred
the Electoral Prince to any other candidate, he professed.
himself desirous to meet, as far as he honourably or safely
could, the wishes of the French King. There were conditions on
which England and Holland might perhaps consent, though not
without reluctance, that a son of the Dauphin should reign at
Madrid, and should be master of the treasures of the New World.
Those conditions were that the Milanese and the Two Sicilies
should belong to the Archduke Charles, that the Elector of
Bavaria should have the Spanish Netherlands, that Lewis should
give up some fortified towns in Artois for the purpose of
strengthening the barrier which protected the United Provinces,
and that some important places both in the Mediterranean sea and
in the Gulf of Mexico should be made over to the English and
Dutch for the security of trade. Minorca and Havanna were
mentioned as what might satisfy England.

Against these terms Lewis exclaimed loudly. Nobody, he said, who
knew with how sensitive a jealousy the Spaniards watched every
encroachment on their colonial empire would believe that they
would ever consent to give up any part of that empire either to
England or to Holland. The demand which was made upon himself was
altogether inadmissible. A barrier was not less necessary to
France than to Holland; and he never would break the iron chain
of frontier fastnesses which was the defence of his own kingdom,
even in order to purchase another kingdom for his grandson. On
that subject he begged that he might hear no more. The
proposition was one which he would not discuss, one to which he
would not listen.