ii. 44). Nothing is known of the last misfortune. It is singular, however, that in the same year (1711) he bought the estate of Bilton in Warwickshire for 10,000l. (Ireland, Beauties of the Avon, p. 70). In 1735 it was valued at about 600l. a year (Egerton MS. 1973, f. 107). It has been generally said that he was enabled to make this purchase by inheriting the fortune of his brother Gulston, who, through Addison's influence (Wentworth Papers, 75, 6), had been appointed to succeed ‘Diamond’ Pitt as governor of Fort St. George. A correspondence preserved in the British Museum (Egerton MS. 1972) shows this to be a mistake. Gulston, who died 10 Oct. 1709, made Addison an executor and residuary legatee. The difficulty, however, of realising an estate left in great confusion and in so distant a country, was very great. The trustees were neglectful, and Addison declares that one of them deserved the pillory, and that he longs to tell him so ‘by word of mouth.’ It was not till 1716 that a final liquidation was reached; and the sum due to Addison, after deducting bad debts and legacies, was less than a tenth part of the whole estate, originally valued at 35,000 pagodas, or 14,000l.: the sum, doubtless, to which Addison's letter refers. Addison, however, was not poor. He had, besides his lodgings, a ‘retirement near Chelsea,’ where Swift dined with him (Journal to Stella, 18 Sept. 1710), which had once belonged to Nell Gwyn, and whence he could stroll through fields to Holland House, then occupied by Lady Warwick. He abandoned the large profits of ‘Cato’ in 1713, and had resigned his fellowship in 1711.
Steele, more impecunious, started the ‘Tatler’ on 12 April 1709. Addison, who was absorbed in his official duties, and had just started for Dublin, which he reached on 21 April (letter to Swift, 22 April 1709), was not concerned in the venture. He recognised Steele's hand by a remark, borrowed from himself, in the number of 23 April. He contributed a paper or two soon afterwards; but it was not till the 81st number (15 Oct.) that his papers became frequent and important. He wrote frequently during the following winter, which he spent in London, and again in the latter part of 1710, after an interruption caused by a residence at Dublin during the spring and summer. The effect of Addison's papers was very great. ‘I fared,’ said Steele in the preface to the final volume, ‘like a distressed prince who calls in a powerful neighbour to his aid. I was undone by my auxiliary; when I had once called him in, I could not subsist without dependence on him.’ Forty-one papers are attributed to Addison, and thirty-four to Addison and Steele in conjunction. The paper began by including articles of news, mixed with dramatic criticism and short essays and novels in the older sense of the word. With Addison's co-operation the essay became more important, and the article of news declined. Steele's acknowledgment in the last number seems to imply that the religious reflections in Addison's more serious papers and allegorical visions were popular at the time. Some of the purely humorous papers, such as the ‘Political Quidnuncs’ in No. 155, the ‘Virtuoso's Will,’ No. 216, and the ‘Frozen Words,’ No. 254, show the unrivalled vein of playful humour soon to be more brilliantly manifested.
The last ‘Tatler’ appeared 2 Jan. 1711. The first ‘Spectator’ appeared on the following March 1, and it was published daily till No. 555, 6 Dec. 1712. The ‘Spectator’ carefully abstained from politics in a time of violent party spirit. It consisted entirely of essays on the model gradually reached in the ‘Tatler,’ and it made an unprecedented success. The sale was lowered to a half by a stamp duty imposed 1 Aug. 1712, and Steele says in the last number that the duty paid weekly was over 20l. This would give a daily sale of only 1,600. Addison says in No. 10 that the sale already amounted to 3,000; and in the ‘Biographia Britannica’ it is said that of some numbers 20,000 were sold in a day. Steele tells us that the first collected edition was of 9,000 copies. From an agreement preserved in the British Museum (Add. MS. 21110), it seems that Addison and Steele sold their half-share of the ‘Spectator,’ when first collected in volumes, to a stationer named Buckley for 575l. Whatever the precise numbers, the ‘Spectator’ made a mark in English literature, and fixed a form which was adopted with servile fidelity by many succeeding periodicals till the end of the century.
Addison wrote 274 ‘Spectators,’ distinguished by a signature of one of the letters in CLIO. General opinion has attributed to him the greatest share of the triumph. Johnson observed (Boswell, 10 April 1776) that of the half not written by Addison, not half was good. Macaulay says that Addison's worst essay is as good as the best of any of his coadjutors. The judgment has been called in question by Mr. Forster (see Essay on Steele), and differs from that of Hazlitt (Round Table, No. 6, and Lect. V. on Comic Writers), who thought Steele more sympathetic than the urbane and decorous Addison. As a plain matter of fact, however, there can be no doubt that Addison's essays were those which achieved the widest popularity, which
