The surrender of Cornwallis was in effect the end of the war. The British power was now reduced merely to defensive measures, and was confined principally to the cities of New York, Charleston and Savannah. Wilmington was very soon evacuated, thus putting an end to all the hopes of the loyalists of North Carolina; and early in January, Greene approaching Charleston, so distributed his troops as to confine the British to the Neck and the adjoining islands. The news of the important victory of the allied armies in the South caused a general rejoicing throughout the Union. Nothing could equal the joy and satisfaction caused by the prospect which it afforded. Washington ordained a particular day for the performance of Divine service in the army, recommending that all the troops should engage in it with a serious deportment and that sensibility of heart which the surprising and particular interposition of Providence in their favour claimed. Congress, on receiving the official intelligence, went in procession to the principal church in Philadelphia, to return thanks to Almighty God for the signal success of the American arms, and appointed the 13th day of December as a day of public thanksgiving and prayer.[50] The official intelligence of the surrender of Lord Cornwallis reached the British cabinet on Sunday, Nov. 25th. The tidings were a blow to the minister, Lord North, who according to Lord George Germaine’s account, received them as he would have done a cannon-ball. He paced up and down the apartment, exclaiming with the deepest emotions of consternation and distress, “Oh God, it is all over!” The king was more calm, perhaps because he was of a more stolid nature. Lord George Germaine communicated the “dismal intelligence” by letter. The king replied that he “particularly lamented the unfortunate result of the operations in Virginia, on account of the consequences connected with it, and the difficulties which it might produce in carrying on the public business, or in repairing the misfortune. It would not, however,” he asserted, “make the slightest alterations in those principles of his conduct which had hitherto directed him, and which would always continue to direct him, in the prosecution of the present contest.”[51] Accordingly, the speech from the throne, on the re-opening of parliament, two days after this news had arrived, breathed the same warlike spirit as at the late close of the session. Nevertheless, a strong opposition existed in parliament; the war was extremely unpopular with the British nation at large; and from the 12th of December to the 4th of the following March, motion after motion was brought forward in the house, for the termination of the war, when, on this latter day, a resolution was moved by General Conway, “that all those should be considered as enemies to his majesty and the country who should advise, or by any means attempt, the further prosecution of the war in America.”