Lord Mayo, besides his duties as President of the Council and final source of authority in each of the seven Departments, was therefore in his own person Foreign Minister and Minister of Public Works. The Home Minister, the Minister of Revenue, Agriculture, and Commerce, and the Finance Minister, were members of the India Civil Service, together with the Secretaries and Under-Secretaries in those and in the Foreign Department. Of the other two Departments, the Military was presided over by a distinguished soldier, and the Legislative by an eminent member of the English Bar. Routine and ordinary matters were disposed of by the Member of Council within whose Department they fell. Papers of greater importance were sent, with the initiating Member's opinion, to the Viceroy, who {84} either concurred in or modified it. If the Viceroy concurred, the case generally ended, and the Secretary worked up the Member's note into a Letter or Resolution, to be issued as the orders of the Governor-General in Council. But in matters of weight, the Viceroy, even when concurring with the initiating Member, often directed the papers to be circulated either to the whole Council, or to certain of the Members whose views he might think it expedient to obtain on the question. In cases in which he did not concur with the initiating Member's views, the papers were generally circulated to all the other Members, or the Governor-General ordered them to be brought up in Council. Urgent business was submitted to the Governor-General direct by the Secretary of the Department under which it fell; and the Viceroy either initiated the order himself, or sent the case for initiation to the Member of Council at the head of the Department to which it belonged.