Henry Clinton at Charleston; the land forces to remain
prisoners of the United States, and the naval forces prisoners of
France. The soldiers were to be kept in Virginia, Maryland, or
Pennsylvania, and as much by regiments as possible. The general staff
and other officers not left with the troops to be permitted to go to New
York, or to Europe, on parole."[53]

The battle of Yorktown, and the surrender of Lord Cornwallis to the arms
of the French and the Americans, may be regarded as the last battle of
importance of the civil war in America. American writers and orators are
fond of saying that here was brought face to face on the battle-field
the strength of Old England and Young America, and the latter prevailed.
No statement can be more unfounded, and no boast more groundless than
this. England, without an ally, was at war with three kingdoms--France,
Spain, and Holland--the most potent naval and military powers of Europe;
while were also arrayed against her, by an "armed neutrality," Russia,
Prussia, Denmark, and Sweden. England was armed to the teeth for the
defence of her own shores against threatened invasion, while her navies
were maintaining in sundry battles the honour of the British flag on
three seas.

A small part only of the British land and naval forces was on the coast
of America; yet there were garrisons at Savannah and Charleston, and a
much larger military force at New York, under the command of Sir Henry
Clinton, than that of Yorktown, under Lord Cornwallis. In the following
campaign the English fleet was victorious over the French fleet in the
West Indies, capturing the great ship _Ville de Paris_, and taking Count
de Grasse himself prisoner. In the siege of Yorktown there were about
18,000 of the allied army of French and Americans, besides ships of the
line and sailors, while the effective men under command of Lord
Cornwallis amounted to less than 4,000. It was a marvel of skill and
courage that with an army so small, and in a town so exposed and so
incapable of being strongly fortified, and against an allied force so
overwhelming, Lord Cornwallis was able to sustain a siege for a
fortnight, until he despaired of reinforcements from New York.

Be it also observed, that the greater part of the forces besieging
Yorktown were not Americans, but French, who supplied the shipping and
artillery; in short, all the attacking forces by water, and a duplicate
land enemy--the one part under the command of