During all this time the armaments had been carried on in spite of repeated offers and requests from Spain to disarm mutually. As early as May 18, on receipt of the British memorial presented two days before, Floridablanca had proposed to Merry mutual and proportionate disarmament.[338] This was repeated in the Spanish memorial of June 4.[339] The British Cabinet rejected the proposition. In his instructions of July 5 Leeds cautioned Fitzherbert to be particularly careful not to give the smallest encouragement to this idea. His Majesty could not consent to discontinue preparations until he should have secured freedom of commerce, navigation, and fisheries in the districts in question.[340] After the declaration and counter declaration had been signed, Floridablanca proposed limiting the operations of the fleets to prevent the possibility of an encounter.[341] On August 10 Campo, the Spanish ambassador in London, repeated the proposals for disarming.[342] In reply, four days later, Leeds gave assurance of England’s desire for peace, but declared that Great Britain refused to disarm until the matter in question should be settled for the future.[343] On the same day that Leeds gave this decided answer to Campo in London, Floridablanca, in Madrid, had again proposed to Fitzherbert a mutual disarmament. On September 10, Leeds sent a formal reply, repeating what he had said to Campo on August 14.[344]
Far from yielding to the Spanish proposals, Great Britain was continuing her preparations and calling on her allies to do the same. On the day that Leeds rejected Campo’s proposition to disarm, he instructed Auckland, the British ambassador at The Hague, to ask that Dutch preparations should not be relaxed. The national honor had been satisfied, but the question of peace or war had not been settled. It was requested that the Dutch fleet be ordered home for supplies and reënforcements.[345] August 19 this request was granted, and England was reassured of the support of Holland.[346] Baumgarten says that early in September the English and Spanish fleets were both hovering off Cape Finisterre, and were dangerously near to each other.[347]
In his instructions to Auckland of August 14, referred to above, Leeds had suggested that with a slight additional expense the Dutch and English fleets could be used to give weight to the representations already made by England for bringing about a pacification in the north and east of Europe. The Dutch Government assented that the general state of Europe, as well as the Spanish negotiations, warranted a continuance of their armament.