Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 3.djvu/69

Rh But the new favourite found, as Bolingbroke had found before him, that it was quite as hard to keep the shadow of power under a vagrant and mendicant prince as to keep the reality of power at Westminster. Though James had neither territories nor revenues, neither army nor navy, there was more faction and more intrigue among his courtiers than among those of his successful rival. Atterbury soon perceived that his counsels were disregarded, if not distrusted. His proud spirit was deeply wounded. He quitted Paris, fixed his residence at Montpellier, gave up politics, and devoted himself entirely to letters. In the sixth year of his exile he had so severe an illness that his daughter, herself in very delicate health, determined to run all risks that she might see him once more. Having obtained a licence from the English Government, she went by sea to Bordeaux, but landed there in such a state that she could travel only by boat or in a litter. Her father, in spite of his infirmities, set out from Montpellier to meet her; and she, with the impatience which is often the sign of approaching death, hastened towards him. Those who were about her in vain implored her to travel slowly. She said that every hour was precious, that she only wished to see her papa and to die. She met him at Toulouse, embraced him, received from his hand the sacred bread and wine, and thanked God that they had passed one day in each other's society before they parted for ever. She died that night.

It was some time before even the strong mind of Atterbury recovered from this cruel blow. As soon as he was himself again he became eager for action and conflict; for grief, which disposes gentle natures to retirement, to inaction, and to meditation, only makes restless spirits more restless. The Pretender, dull and bigoted as he was, had found out that he had not acted wisely in parting with one who, though a heretic, was, in abilities and accomplishments, the foremost man of the Jacobite party. The bishop was courted back, and was without much difficulty induced to return to Paris, and to become once more the phantom minister of a phantom monarchy. But his long and troubled life was drawing to a close. To the last, however, his intellect retained all its keenness and vigour. He learned, in the ninth year of his banishment, that he had been accused by Oldmixon, as dishonest and malignant a scribbler as any that has been saved from oblivion by the Dunciad, of having, in concert with other Christ Churchmen, garbled Clarendon's History of the Rebellion. The charge, as respected Atterbury, had not the slightest foundation; for he was not one of the editors of the History, and never saw it till it was printed. He published a short vindication of himself, which is a model in its kind, luminous, temperate, and dignified. A copy of this little work he sent to the Pretender, with a letter singularly eloquent and graceful. It was impossible, the old man said, that he should write anything on such a subject without being reminded of the resemblance between his own fate and that of Clarendon. They were the only two English subjects that had ever been banished from their country and debarred from all communication with their friends by Act of Parliament, But here the resemblance ended. One of the exiles had been so happy to bear a chief part in the restoration of the royal house. All that the other could now do was to die asserting the rights of that house to the last. A few weeks after this letter was written Atterbury died. He had just completed his seventieth year.

His body was brought to England, and laid, with great privacy, under the nave of Westminster Abbey. Only three mourners followed the coffin. No inscription marks the grave. That the epitaph with which Pope honoured the memory of his friend does not appear on the walls of the great national cemetery is no subject of regret, for nothing worse was ever written by Colley Cibber.

Those who wish for more complete information about Atterbury may easily collect it from his sermons and his controversial writings, from the report of the parliamentary proceedings against him, which will be found in the State Trials; from the five volumes of his correspondence, edited by Mr Nichols, and from the first volume of the Stuart papers, edited by Mr Glover. A very indulgent but a very interesting account of the bishop's political career will be found in Lord Stanhope's valuable History of England. 

ATTICA, the most famous district of ancient Greece, is a triangular piece of ground projecting in a south-easterly direction into the Ægean Sea, the base line being formed by the continuous chain of Mounts Cithæron and Parnes, the apex by the promontory of Sunium. Sketch Map of Attica. It is washed on two sides by the sea, and this feature seems to have given rise to the name; for, notwithstanding the unusual letter-change, probably stands for, since Strabo and other ancient writers inform us that the country originally bore both this name and that of. The latter designation was frequently used by the Greeks to describe an extensive tract reaching into the sea, especially when, as in the case of Attica and the Argolic Acte, it was joined to the continent by a broad base. The coast is broken up into numerous small bights and harbours, which, however, are with few exceptions exposed to the south wind; the irregularity of the outline accounts for its great length in comparison of the superficial area of the country. The surface of Attica, as of the rest of Greece, is very mountainous, and between the mountain chains lie several plains of no great size, open on one side to the sea. On the west its natural boundary is the Corinthian Gulf, so that it would include the district of Megaris; and, as a matter of fact, before the Dorian invasion, which resulted in the foundation of Megara, the whole of this country was politically one, being in the hands of the Ionian race. This is proved by the column which, as we learn from Strabo, once stood on the Isthmus of Corinth, bearing on one side the inscription, "This land is Peloponnesus, not Ionia"

and on the other, "This land is not Peloponnesus, but Ionia"—

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