t 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 often enabled to convince his
master of the truth of certain statements while affecting to discredit
them. He had heard a story, he said, which he felt bound to communicate
to his Majesty, although he did not himself implicitly believe it. He
felt himself the more bound to speak upon the subject because it tallied
exactly with intelligence which he had received from another source. The
story was that one of these seigniors (the Cardinal did not know which,
for he had not yet thought proper to investigate the matter) had said
that rather than consent that the King should act in this matter of the
bishoprics against the privileges of Brabant, the nobles would elect for
their sovereign some other prince of the blood. This, said the Cardinal,
was perhaps a fantasy rather than an actual determination. Count Egmont,
to be sure, he said, was constantly exchanging letters with the King of
Bohemia (Maximilian), and it was supposed, therefore, that he was the
prince of the blood who was to be elected to govern the provinces. It was
determined that he should be chosen King of the Romans, by fair means or
by force, that he should assemble an army to attack the Netherlands, that
a corresponding movement should be made within the states, and that the
people should be made to rise, by giving them the reins in the matter of
religion. The Cardinal, after recounting all the particulars of this
fiction with great minuteness, added, with apparent frankness, that the
correspondence between Egmont and Maximilian did not astonish him,
because there had been much intimacy between them in the time of the late
Emperor. He did not feel convinced, therefore, from the frequency of the
letters exchanged, that there was a scheme to raise an army to attack the
provinces and to have him elected by force. On the contrary, Maximilian
could never accomplish such a scheme without the assistance of his
imperial father the Emperor, whom Granvelle was convinced would rather
die than be mixed up with such villany against Philip. Moreover, unless
the people should become still more corrupted by the bad counsels
constantly given them, the Cardinal did not believe that any of the great
nobles had t