One Minister was now, however, to display a rare courage, and to oppose both the King and his Minister on a critical point. In the middle of August, after the conversation with Hardwicke, the treaty of subsidy with Hesse-Cassel arrived for the necessary confirmations. When it came before Legge as Chancellor of the Exchequer, he, no doubt with the connivance of Pitt, flatly refused his signature. Newcastle had always distrusted Legge, as, indeed, he distrusted everybody, and had given him the seals of the Exchequer with great reluctance. He was now aghast. War was imminent; the King would soon return with his pockets full of odious treaties of subsidy; Fox was still a malcontent; Legge was in open revolt; it was evident that he must face the formidable interview with Pitt. So he expressed the necessary wish, though one may guess his reluctance, and Pitt saw the Duke on September 2 (1755) for two hours and a half. The record of this interview is contained in a long letter from Newcastle to Hardwicke,[283] couched in the quavering notes of a distracted Minister. It begins with a wail of despair, the reluctant acknowledgment of the paramount importance of Pitt. 'I never sat down to write to your lordship with more melancholy apprehensions for the Publick than at present. I see nothing but confusion and it is beyond me to point out a remedy.' This was the result of Pitt's verbal refusal to join him, made by a Minister who held the great mass of the House of Commons in the hollow of his hand, who clung to office as to life, and yet, though he knew Pitt was indispensable to its retention, would not once more, as in 1746, face his Sovereign and say so. Nothing can better illustrate the trembling plank on which the Duke was content to walk, wavering and helpless, depending only on Hardwicke's counsel and his own jobs. He did not dare face the King, he was bullied by the disorderly chiefs in the House of Commons, and he was always chaffering, but always afraid. So he and his like are satisfied to bear the yoke for the semblance of power. All began smoothly between Pitt and the Duke, all was apparently open, friendly, and civil; but when Newcastle referred to the conversation with Hardwicke, he was taken aback by finding that Pitt declared that nothing had passed that was material. He thus compelled Newcastle to recapitulate the points of policy, no doubt for purposes of comparison.