When they urged that Naples was already in possession of the house of Austria, he restricted the provision to Sicily and Sardinia.

He offered to deliver up four cautionary towns in Flanders, as a security for Philip's evacuating Spain; and even promised to supply the confederates with a monthly sum of money, to defray the expense of expelling that prince from his dominions, should he refuse to resign them with a good grace.
The substance of all the conferences was communicated to lord Townshend, and count Kinzendorf, the Imperial plenipotentiary; but the conduct of the deputies was regulated by the pensionary Heinsius, who was firmly attached to prince Eugene and the duke of Marlborough, more averse than ever to a pacification.

The negotiation lasted from the nineteenth day of March to the twenty-fifth of July, during which term the conferences were several times interrupted, and a great many despatches and new proposals arrived from Versailles.

At length the plenipotentiaries returned to France, after having sent a letter to the pensionary, in which they declared that the proposals made by the deputies were unjust and impracticable; and complained of the unworthy treatment to which they had been exposed.

Louis resolved to hazard another campaign, not without hope that there might be some lucky incident in the events of war, and that the approaching revolution in the English ministry, of which he was well apprized, would be productive of a more reasonable pacification.