The young man soon showed such talent for business, and such shrewd insight into character, as, combined with the stores of learning he had at his command, made his services of great value to his father. He accompanied the chancellor on some of his public missions, among others to the Council of Trent, where the younger Granvelle, who had already been promoted to the see of Arras, first had the opportunity of displaying that subtle, insinuating eloquence, which captivated as much as it convinced. [Sidenote: RISE AND CHARACTER OF GRANVELLE.] The emperor saw with satisfaction the promise afforded by the young statesman, and looked forward to the time when he would prove the same pillar of support to his administration that his father had been before him. Nor was that time far distant. As the chancellor's health declined, the son became more intimately associated with his father in the counsels of the emperor. He justified this confidence by the unwearied toil with which he devoted himself to the business of the cabinet; a toil to which even night seemed to afford no respite. He sometimes employed five secretaries at once, dictating to them in as many different languages.[422] The same thing, or something as miraculous, has been told of other remarkable men, both before and since. As a mere _tour de force_ Granvelle may possibly have amused himself with it. But it was not in this way that the correspondence was written which furnishes the best key to the events of the time. If it had been so written, it would never have been worth the publication. Every evening Granvelle presented himself before the emperor, and read to him the programme he had prepared of the business of the following day, with his own suggestions.[423] The foreign ambassadors who resided at the court were surprised to find the new minister so entirely in the secrets of his master; and that he was as well instructed in all their doings as the emperor himself.[424] In short, the confidence of Charles, given slowly and with much hesitation, was at length bestowed as freely on the son as it had been on the father. The two Granvelles may be truly said to have been the two persons who most possessed the confidence of the emperor, from the time that he took the reins of government into his own hands. When raised to the see of Arras, Granvelle was but twenty-five years old. It is rare that the mitre has descended on a man of a more ambitious spirit. Yet Granvelle was not averse to the good things of the world, nor altogether insensible to its pomps and vanities. He affected great state in his manner of living, and thus necessity, no less than taste, led him to covet the possession of wealth as well as of power. He obtained both; and his fortunes were rapidly advancing when, by the abdication of his royal master, the sceptre passed into the hands of Philip the Second.