The illogicality of this letter would be amusing if it had not been so disastrous. Because war depends ultimately on money, therefore (said Dundas) the Chancellor of the Exchequer ought to control its operations and act virtually as Secretary of State for War. Then why not also as First Lord of the Admiralty? No sooner is the question formulated than we see that Dundas is confusing two very different things, namely, general financial control and the administration of military affairs. In fact, Dundas still clung to the old customs which allotted to the Secretaries of State wide and often overlapping duties. He did not see the need of a specialized and authoritative War Office, though the triumphs achieved by Carnot and the Committee of Public Safety during the past twelvemonth might have opened his eyes. Fortunately, Pitt discerned the necessity of strengthening that Department; and, as we have seen, he made Dundas and Windham War Ministers, with seats in the Cabinet. Thus from July 1794 military affairs had a chance of adequate treatment in that body; and Pitt deserves great credit for remodelling the Cabinet in a way suited to the exigencies of modern warfare. Why did he not appoint that experienced soldier, the Marquis Cornwallis, Secretary of State for War? The answer is that he designed him as successor to the Duke of York in Flanders. As has already appeared, Pitt framed this resolve in February 1794, on the return of Cornwallis from India; and, though rebuffed then, he continued to revolve the matter until the beginning of the autumn, when the opposition of George III and of Francis II of Austria prevented the appointment of that experienced soldier to the supreme command of the Allies. As for the accession of Windham to the War Department, it seems to have been merely a device to satisfy the Old Whigs. Probably the question was not even discussed until 4th July, when the Duke of Portland first named it to Windham. As it finds no place in the Pitt-Grenville letters until 7th July, we may infer that Pitt and Dundas accepted Windham with some reluctance as an ardent partisan of Burke and the _emigres_. Windham now persistently urged an expedition to Brittany; and the Quiberon and Yeu enterprises were largely due to him. Pitt and Dundas, after their experience of the _emigres_, had no great hope in these efforts; and after the defection of Spain they discerned the increasing need of concentrating their efforts on home defence and operations which safeguarded British interests in the East and West Indies. To these causes may be ascribed their decision to withdraw the British force from the island of Yeu. The indignant letters of Windham to Pitt in 1796-8 show that, after the Yeu fiasco and the beginning of the peace negotiations with France, his advice was slighted. His moanings to Mrs. Crewe over the degeneracy of the age also tell their tale. In October 1796 he merely "drags on" at the War Office until he sees what turn things will take.