After such an opinion from the first military authority of England, the British Ministry had no choice but to abandon its claim for territory. Wellington’s letter reached London about November 13, and was duly considered in the Cabinet. Liverpool wrote to Castlereagh, November 18, that the Ministry had made its decision; the claim for territory was to be abandoned. For this retreat he alleged various excuses,--such as the unsatisfactory state of the negotiations at Vienna, and the alarming condition of France; the finances, the depression of rents, and the temper of Parliament.[56] Such reasoning would have counted for nothing in the previous month of May, but six months wrought a change in public feeling. The war had lost public favor. Even the colonial and shipping interests and the navy were weary of it, while the army had little to expect from it but hard service and no increase of credit. Every Englishman who came in contact with Americans seemed to suffer. Broke, the only victor by sea, was a lifelong invalid; and Brock and Ross, the only victors on land, had paid for their success with their lives. Incessant disappointment made the war an unpleasant thought with Englishmen. The burning of Washington was an exploit of which they could not boast. The rate of marine insurance was a daily and intolerable annoyance. So rapidly did the war decline in favor, that in the first half of December it was declared to be decidedly unpopular by one of the most judicious English liberals, Francis Horner; although Horner held that the Americans, as the dispute then stood, were the aggressors.[57] The tone of the press showed the same popular tendency, for while the “Times” grumbled loudly over the Canada campaign, the “Morning Chronicle” no longer concealed its hostility to the war, and ventured to sneer at it, talking of “the entire defeat and destruction of the last British fleet but one; for it has become necessary to particularize them now.”[58] While the Cabinet still waited, the first instalment of Ghent correspondence to August 20, published in America October 10, returned to England November 18, and received no flattering attention. “We cannot compliment our negotiators,” remarked the “Morning Chronicle;” and the “Times” was still less pleased. “The British government has been tricked into bringing forward demands which it had not the power to enforce.... Why treat at all with Mr. Madison?” In Parliament, November 19, the liberal opposition attacked the Government for setting up novel pretensions. Ministers needed no more urging, and Bathurst thenceforward could not be charged with waste of time.