the states. May I cease to exist if I
do not desire to render good service to the very least of these
gentlemen. Your Majesty knows that, when they do any thing for the
benefit of your service, I am never silent. Nevertheless, thus they are
constituted. I hope, however, that this flurry will blow over, and that
when your Majesty comes they will all be found to deserve rewards of
merit."

Of Egmont, especially, he often spoke in terms of vague, but somewhat
condescending commendation. He never manifested resentment in his
letters, although, as already stated, the Count had occasionally
indulged, not only in words, but in deeds of extreme violence against
him. But the Cardinal was too forgiving a Christian, or too keen a
politician not to pass by such offences, so long as there was a chance of
so great a noble's remaining or becoming his friend. He, accordingly,
described him, in general, as a man whose principles, in the main, were
good, but who was easily led by his own vanity and the perverse counsels
of others. He represented him as having been originally a warm supporter
of the new bishoprics, and as having expressed satisfaction that two of
them, those of Bruges and Ypres, should have been within his own
stadholderate. He regretted, however; to inform the King that the Count
was latterly growing lukewarm, perhaps from fear of finding himself
separated from the other nobles. On the whole, he was tractable enough,
said the Cardinal, if he were not easily persuaded by the vile; but one
day, perhaps, he might open his eyes again. Notwithstanding these vague
expressions of approbation, which Granvelle permitted himself in his
letters to Philip, he never failed to transmit to the monarch every fact,
every rumor, every inuendo which might prejudice the royal mind against
that nobleman or against any of the noblemen, whose characters he at the
same time protested he was most unwilling to injure.

It is true that he dealt mainly by insinuation, while he was apt to
conclude his statements with disclaimers upon his own part, and with
hopes of improvement in the conduct of the seignors. At this particular
point of time he furnished Philip with a long and most circumstantial
account of a treasonable correspondence which was thought to be going on
between the leading nobles and the future emperor, Maximilian. The
narrative was a good specimen of the masterly style of inuendo in which
the Cardinal excelled, and by which he was o