Chapter I: Part 1

THE AUGUSTAN REPRINT SOCIETY

[DANIEL DEFOE]

Atalantis Major

(1711)

_Introduction by_

JOHN J. PERRY

PUBLICATION NUMBER 198 WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES 1979

GENERAL EDITOR
David Stuart Rodes, _University of California, Los Angeles_

EDITORS
Charles L. Batten, _University of California, Los Angeles_
George Robert Guffey, _University of California, Los Angeles_
Maximillian E. Novak, _University of California, Los Angeles_
Thomas Wright, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

ADVISORY EDITORS
Ralph Cohen, _University of Virginia_
William E. Conway, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_
Vinton A. Dearing, _University of California, Los Angeles_
Arthur Friedman, _University of Chicago_
Louis A. Landa, _Princeton University_
Earl Miner, _Princeton University_
Samuel H. Monk, _University of Minnesota_
James Sutherland, _University College, London_
Robert Vosper, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

CORRESPONDING SECRETARY
Beverly J. Onley, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

EDITORIAL ASSISTANT
Frances M. Reed, _University of California, Los Angeles_

INTRODUCTION

_Atalantis Major_ is a thinly veiled allegory describing the November 1710 election of the representative Scottish peers. The circumstances which surrounded this election were produced by the outcome of the previous month's General Election--a landslide for the Tories--and, to understand these circumstances, the impact of that Tory victory must be seen within the context of the political events of 1710.

By early in 1710 it had become obvious that the Whig Ministry of Sidney Godolphin was unable or unwilling to negotiate an end to the long, expensive, and consequently, unpopular war with France. The quarrel between Queen Anne and her confidante, the Duchess of Marlborough, smouldered until, on 6 April 1710, the breach between them became final. The Queen's confidence in the Duke of Marlborough began to erode as early as May 1709 when he sought to be appointed "Captain-General for Life." Godolphin's decision to impeach the popular Rev. Dr. Henry Sacheverell for preaching "a sermon which reasserted the doctrine of non-resistance to the will of the monarch" was ill-advised, for not only did it give the High-Church Tories a martyr, it also gave the Administration the appearance of being against the Church. In securing the impeachment of Sacheverell on 20 March 1710, the Whigs discovered that they had lost the support and the confidence of both the Parliament and the country.

Dissention within and intrigue from without further hastened the fall of the Administration. Godolphin, a moderate, had, after the General Election of 1708, found himself allied with the "Junto" of five powerful Whig Lords--Wharton, Sommers, Halifax, Orford, and Sunderland--but it was, at best, an uneasy alliance. Throughout 1709 and into the early months of 1710, personal jealousies drove the Godolphin-Marlborough interest farther and farther away from the Junto. Robert Harley and the Dukes of Somerset and Shrewsbury, in their determination to overthrow the Administration, exploited every chance to widen the rifts between Anne and her Ministers and between the two ministerial factions. Abigail Hill Masham, who soon became an agent of Harley, replaced the Duchess of Marlborough as Anne's confidante.

When the Ministry fell, it fell like a house of cards. On 14 April 1710 Shrewsbury was made Lord Chamberlain over the unavailing protests of Godolphin. Two months later, at the instigation of Somerset, the Queen replaced Sunderland with the Tory Lord Dartmouth as Secretary of State. Finally, on 8 August, Godolphin was ordered to break the White Staff of his office and Harley was appointed Treasurer. One by one the remaining Junto Ministers were replaced by Tories. By September the work was complete. The Duke of Marlborough alone remained, in command of the army, but this was only to be until the new Ministry could negotiate a peace and his services would no longer be required.

It had been Harley's intention to govern by means of a "moderate" Administration, a "Queen's Ministery above party," but he had not reckoned on the outcome of the General Election called in October. "On the day Godolphin fell, Harley expounded his 'moderate' programme in a letter to the Duke of Newcastle: 'The Queen is assured you will approve her proceedings, which are directed to the sole aim of making an honourable and safe peace, securing her allies, reserving the liberty and property of the subject, and the indulgence to Dissenters in particular, and to perpetuate this by really securing the succession of the House of Hanover.'"[1]

Alone, either the antagonism to the war or the intensity of feeling for the High-Church cause which the Sacheverell affair engendered, would have been sufficient to sweep the Whigs from power. Together, and combined as they were with the prestige of the Queen's public support of Harley and the newly appointed Tory Ministers, these issues were irresistible. Harley found himself with an "immoderate" House of Commons. The Tories held 320 seats, the Whigs only 150, and there were 40 seats whose votes were "doubtful."[2] Many of the new Parliamentarians were High-Church zealots, and most were anxious to turn the nation away from the policies of the Whig Administration of Godolphin.

The House of Lords, however, remained a bastion of Whig strength. As an hereditary body the House of Lords was simply not subject to the same opportunity for change as the elected House of Commons. Consequently, in 1710, as a result of the Glorious Revolution, the long reign of William III, and the Godolphin Ministry, the majority of the members of the House of Lords were of Whig or Revolution Settlement policies. Therein lay Harley's problem in late October of 1710: to obtain a Lords to match the Commons he had been given.

Any early eighteenth-century Ministry--Whig or Tory--could count on having the support of those peers whose poverty made them dependent on governmental subsidies, but this number would not have given Harley even a bare majority in the strongly Whig House of Lords. And there Harley needed at least enough strength to ensure success for some of the measures designed to satisfy the demands of the newly Tory House of Commons, particularly if his Ministry was to be able to negotiate a satisfactory treaty of peace with France.

To obtain a Tory majority in the House of Lords commensurate with the one in Commons, Harley could have seen to the creation of a sufficient number of new peerages; but this would have alienated too many factions and the recently completed Union with Scotland (1707) offered what appeared to be a far simpler expedient. The Act of Union provided for the election of sixteen Scottish peers who would represent all of the Scottish nobility in the House of Lords.[3] If he could ensure that all sixteen of these peers were Tory, Harley would be certain of a large block of loyal votes in the upper house, or, at worst, he would have to arrange for the creation of only a few new peers to neutralize the Whigs' strength. To John Campbell, the second Duke of Argyll, Harley assigned the task of orchestrating a Tory sweep in this election.

The Duke of Argyll sat in the House of Lords as the Earl of Greenwich (an English title), not as one of the elected peers, and, as such, he was not elegible to stand as a candidate or to vote in this election. Argyll had supported the Whig Junto and held the rank of Lieutenant General under Marlborough in France, but in 1710 (seeing the direction the political tide was taking) he abandoned his support of Godolphin's Ministry. So that, "by the time the [Sacheverell] Trial was finished, it was known that the great chief of the Campbells and of the Scottish Whigs had gone into opposition to the Government [of Godolphin] in league with Harley, although he voted for the Doctor's condemnation...."[4]

Argyll and the sixteen representative peers (if they were all Tories), together with the votes of those peers who were dependant upon Government subsidies would give the new Ministry of Harley enough votes in the upper house for almost any eventuality--even the impeachment of Marlborough. It is possible to speculate that this was the plum--command of the British armies in Europe--that induced Argyll's change from Whig to Tory in 1710. Argyll's jealousy and resentment of his commander had been a well known bit of gossip for some time, and it is very possible that Argyll saw a new Government as his chance to steal a march on Marlborough. Although Harley's Ministry did give the Order of the Garter to Argyll on 20 December 1710, he was never promoted over Marlborough, but that was not due to any lack of success in assuring a Tory victory in the election of the peers. Argyll's heavy-handed management of that election is the subject of Defoe's _Atalantis Major_.

By birth and education Daniel Defoe was a member of the mercantile middle class. He was a Dissenter and his political and economic sympathies generally coincided with those of the moderate Whigs. A limited monarchy, the destruction of France's commercial empire, liberty of conscience for Dissenters and Nonconformists, and a Protestant (that is, Hanover) Succession were the imperatives which lay behind much of his political and economic thinking and writing. From as early as 1694 he had served William III as a pamphleteer-propagandist for the vigorous prosecution of the war with France. After his five-month imprisonment in 1703 for writing _The Shortest Way with Dissenters_, Defoe was employed as an agent and pamphleteer of the Government. First, in the service of Robert Harley, Godolphin's Secretary of State during the early moderate years of the Godolphin Administration (1704-08), and thereafter working for Godolphin himself, Defoe's _Review_ preached the gospel of national unity above party faction. When Harley replaced Godolphin as Treasurer in 1710, Defoe returned to his service.

Although it may appear from this that Defoe's pen was for hire by whichever party was in power, in point of fact, Defoe's political views were remarkably congruent with those of both Harley and Godolphin. All three were staunch supporters of England's commercial interests, the Hanoverian Succession, liberty of conscience for Dissenters and Nonconformists, and the terms of the Revolution Settlement. It must be remembered that Godolphin and Harley were both moderates, each trying to chart his course between the extremes of the parties. They, like Daniel Defoe, saw their loyalty being to England and to the Queen, not to a party. Like Defoe, they both discovered that politics often make strange bedfellows. Godolphin, faced with a large Whig majority in the House of Commons after the General Election of 1708, found that his fortunes were bound to those of the Junto. Harley, after the General Election of 1710, discovered the necessity of courting the High-Church Tories far more than he would have liked.

Argyll's slate of Scottish peers for the November election included men who were even more extreme in their Toryism than the majority of High-Church English Tories. Most of the sixteen were High-Church, many had strong Catholic leanings; all of them were against increasing the religious liberties of the Scottish Presbyterians (and thus those of the English Dissenters and Nonconformists). Several of these peers had been openly professed Jacobites and all were, in some degree, sympathetic to France. To have men with such beliefs in Parliament meant, to Defoe, the chance that Marlborough's victories in France would be negotiated away, the loss of what the Toleration Act of 1689 had gained, and finally, the spector of the Pretender on the throne. In short, such men could mean the loss of all that the Revolution and the war with France had won. Yet, in the late autumn of 1710, Defoe found himself in Edinburgh, the agent and propagandist of the man on whose behalf Argyll had engineered the election of men of such politics.

Defoe's mission in Edinburgh that autumn was to allay the fears of the Presbyterian clergy and Whig merchants about the new Tory Ministry. His message to them was, in Professor Sutherland's words, that

What the country needed ... was steady, moderate men, whether they
called themselves Whig or Tory, men who would uphold the Protestant
succession and avoid extreme measures; and that on the whole was
what it had now got [appearances to the contrary notwithstanding].
The Ministry was not going to give way to the clamours of the High
Tory rank and file; and the Queen would certainly not countenance
any form of persecution.[5]

In short, Defoe was charged with convincing his Scottish friends and associates (and, by means of the _Review_, the nation at large) the opposite of all that Argyll's actions and words bespoke of Harley's intentions.

Defoe wrote Harley from Edinburgh on 18 November (eight days after the election of the peers) to voice his dismay at the tactics that had been used by Argyll. By them his own mission on Harley's behalf had been impaired:

I hint this Sir to Confirm my Censure of the Conduct aforesaid as
Imprudent and as what has rendred [sic] the quieting these people,
which was Easy before, Very Difficult now.[6]

Further, he suggests that Harley's heretofore moderate allies, the Squadrone, have been pushed by Argyll into league with the old Court Party that had supported the Godolphin Ministry. This letter also contains a brief summary of the main events which were to form the plot of _Atalantis Major_, but it does not attack Argyll with the same bitterness that the longer work does. Defoe writes:

In the late Election, the Conduct of the D of 60 [Argyll], the E of
163 [Islay], and the Earle of 194 [Mar] is Very Perticular....
[They] Declared Openly [that] the Quallification of those to be
Chosen ... [was] their agreeing to Impeach 140 [Godolphin] and 193
[Marlborough], Nor did the Impudence End there, but On all
Occasions to Say in So Many Words They had her Majties Orders to
Choose Such and Such and it must be don: This was So abandonning
all Reserves, that it has disgusted the Generallity, and has Put
them Upon Measures of Uniteing, which may shut the door upon all
future Measures, what Ever the Occasion may be....

Now they have Returnd their Number, it were to be Wished they Could
have Avoided a few who are Declar'd profest Jacobites, Such as 197
[Marischal], Kilsyth, Blantire, Hume &c. who are known to aim in
all they do at the Pretender, and whose being Now Chosen has many
ill Effects here What Ever may be as to Over-ruleing them in
England, I mean as to Encreasing the Insolence of Jacobitisme in
the North, where its Strength is far from being Contemptible.[7]

What Defoe hoped to obtain from Harley by this and succeeding letters on this subject is not clear. He may have been seeking Harley's public repudiation of the Jacobite peers, or at least some private assurances that what Argyll had told the peers did not represent the new Ministry's policies. Whatever it was he sought, by late December it was obviously not forthcoming from Harley or his Ministry. And on 20 December Argyll was made a Knight of the Garter. It was during this December that the bulk of _Atalantis Major_ was written, most probably between 30 November and 26 December. On 26 December 1710 Defoe wrote Harley of the existence of "Two Vile Ill Natur'd Pamphlets ... both of which have fallen into My hands in Manuscript, and I think I have prevented both their Printing. The first Was advertised in the Gazette here and Called the Scots atalantis[8] ... The Other Pamphlet is called _Atalantis Major_." The letter concludes with a short description of the work, a disavowal of any knowledge of its authorship, and the hope that he can suppress its publication:

The Other Pamphlet is called _Atalantis Major_; and is a Bitter
Invective against the D of Argyle, the E of Mar, and the Election
of the Peers. It is Certainly Written by Some English man, and I
have Some Guess at the Man, but dare not be positive. I have
hitherto kept this also from the Press, and believe it will be
Impossible for them to get it printed here after the Measures I
have Taken. The Party I Got it of pretends the Coppy Came from
England, But I am of Another Opinion. I shall Trouble you no
farther about it because if possible I can get it Coppyed, I will
Transmit the Coppy by Next post, for I have the Originall in My
hand. They Expect I shall Encourage and assist them in the
Mannageing it, and Till I can Take a Coppy I shall not Undeciev
them.[9]

There is no evidence to suggest that Harley doubted Defoe's disclaimer or that Defoe sent the copy to Harley.

Since Defoe was back in London on 13 February 1711, _Atalantis Major_ must have been seen through the press sometime between 26 December and the end of January, not, as Moore lists it, "before 26 December 1710."[10] Internal evidence suggests an even narrower range of probable dates of publication. The last four pages of _Atalantis Major_ deal with the Duke of Argyll being given command of the English forces in Spain and the singular lack of grace with which he undertook this command. Since Argyll was not given command of the Peninsula campaign until 11 January 1711, it could not be until after this date that the manuscript could have been finished and printed.

The work bears few signs of being hastily printed. There are only nine typographical errors,[11] and four of these are catchwords. There is no evidence to suggest that there was more than one printing of the pamphlet,[12] and the use of several Scotticisms[13] seems to offer support for the contention that the pamphlet was intended for a primarily Scottish audience.

William Lee was the first to ascribe the work to Defoe, and this ascription has been accepted by both Dottin and Moore.[14] The evidence for assigning this work to Defoe seems to rest on the two letters to Harley quoted above. Another proof of Defoe's authorship of _Atalantis Major_ is to be found in the remark it contains, "That the Southern Part of the Island [that is, England] was the most remarkable of any, as to the Policy of their Government, and the Character of the People; and excepting _Englishmen_ and _Polanders_, there is not such another Nation in the World" (p. 12). In 1704 Defoe had written _The Dyet of Poland_, a poem in which he had made a similar unflattering comparison between England and Poland. A far more substantial case for Defoe's authorship can be made from the existence of the anecdote of John White, Edinburgh's hangman, in both a letter to Harley (18 November 1710) and the _Review_ (for 30 November 1710), as well as in _Atalantis Major_ (pp. 22-3).

Key to Names and Characters in _Atalantis Major_

In the thinly disguised allegory of _Atalantis Major_, _Atalantis_ is, of course, Britain. _Olreeky_, or _Old Reeky_, or simply _Reeky_, is still used as an affectionate local term for the city of Edinburgh, prone as it is to be enshrouded in mists and smoke in the early morning. _Tartary_ is France, and the French are referred to as either the _Tartarians_ or the _Barbarians_. Jacobites are also indicated by the name _Tartarians_, since the Pretender's cause was actively supported by Louis XIV. _Japan_ is Spain and _China_ stands for Holland. The characters who appear in _Atalantis Major_ are (in the order that they are mentioned):

_The Duke de Sanquarius_ (p. 14) is James Douglas, second Duke of
Queensberry and Duke of Dover (1662-1711);

_The Earl of Stairdale_ (p. 15) is John Dalrymple, second Earl of
Stair (1673-1747);

_The Earl of Crawlinfordsay_ (p. 16) is John Lindsay, nineteenth
Earl of Crawford (d. 1713);

_The Prince of Greeniccio of the ancient Blood of Argyllius_ (p.
17) is John Campbell, second Duke of Argyll, Baron Chatham and Earl
of Greenwich (1678-1742);

_The Earl of Marereskine_ (p. 18) is John Erskine, eleventh Earl of
Mar of the Erskine line (1675-1732);

_The Prince de Heymuthius_ (p. 18) is John Churchill, first Duke of
Marlborough and Baron Churchill of Aymouth (1650-1722);

_The Earl of Dolphinus_ (p. 18) is Sidney Godolphin (1645-1712);

_Bellcampo, Lord of the Isles_ (p. 19) is Archibald Campbell, first
and only Earl of Islay (pronounced "Isle-ah") and brother and heir
of the second Duke of Argyll (1682-1761);

_One of the Ministers_ (p. 22) is Thomas Miller of Kirkliston;

_John ----, his Majesty's Hangman_ (p. 22) is John White;

_Bradalbino_ (p. 24) is John Campbell, first Earl of Breadalbane
(1635-1716);

_Leslynus_ (p. 24) is David Leslie, third Earl of Leven
(1660-1728);

_One of the family of Boiilio_ (p. 24) is David Boyle, first Earl
of Glasgow (1666-1733);

_The Prince de Rosymonte_ (p. 34) is James Graham, fourth Marquis
and first Duke of Montrose (d. 1742).

The fact that, in several cases, the names used by Defoe are developed from family names and not the title seems to offer support for the contention that _Atalantis Major_ was intended primarily for a Scottish audience. Further, Defoe's name for Marlborough--_Heymuthius_--comes from his one Scottish title, Baron Aymouth (now Eyemouth, a fishing town on the southeast coast of Scotland), and not from his better-known English title, the Duke of Marlborough.

State University College Brockport, New York

NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION

1. George Macaulay Trevelyan, _England Under Queen Anne_ (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1948), III, 68.

2. These are Trevelyan's figures (_op. cit._, 73). W. A. Speck (_Tory and Whig_ [London: Macmillan, 1970], p. 123) gives the Tories 332 seats and 181 seats to the Whigs in this election.

3. In point of fact, Harley's concern for the loyalty of the representative peers is unique in the history of these elections. In subsequent Parliaments, the Scottish peers seldom, if ever, voted against the Government--even at the trial of Lord Lovat in 1745-6. For one thing, almost without exception, the representative peers were dependent on governmental subsidies and this dependence increased during the course of the eighteenth century (see J. H. Plumb, _The Growth of Political Stability in England_ [London: Penguin, 1973], p. 180; and Geoffrey Holmes, _British Politics in the Age of Anne_ [London: Macmillan, 1967], p. 393). The practice of electing a representative peerage for Scotland was discontinued after 1782 (see Trevelyan, _op. cit._, 235).

4. Trevelyan, _op. cit._, 58.

5. James R. Sutherland, _Defoe_ (London: Methuen, 1950), p. 179.

6. _The Letters of Daniel Defoe_, ed. by George Harris Healey (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1955), p. 296.

7. _Ibid._, pp. 294-295.

8. Healey reports that "in such issues as I have been able to find of the _Scots Postman, or the New Edinburgh Gazette_, there is no mention of the _Scots Atalantis_" (_Letters_, p. 306, n. 1). The title of this work and of Defoe's _Atalantis Major_ are derived from Mrs. Manley's _New Atalantis or Secret Memoirs and Manners of several Persons of Quality of both Sexes from the New Atalantis, an island in the Mediterranean_ (1709). The OED records that the word _atalantis_ enjoyed a brief currency in the eighteenth century with the meaning, "a secret or scandalous history."

9. _Letters_, p. 307.

10. John Robert Moore, _A Checklist of the Writings of Daniel Defoe_ (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1960), p. 82.

11. Page 12, line 5: _do_ is omitted before _this_; page 16, line 24: _an_ for _on_; page 17, line 6: _Grandfathers_ for _Grandfather's_; page 19, the catch-word, _the_ for _this_; page 20, line 5: _run_ for _ran_; page 22, line 22: _of_ for _off_; page 28, the catch-word, _they_ for _the_; page 36, the catch-word, _Cha-_ for _Courage_; page 37, the catch-word, _Lansd_ for _Lands_. In addition, there are several places where the printer uses eighteenth-century variant spellings such as _ballances_ (pp. 5, 8), _mannaged_ (p. 2), _quallifie_ (p. 8), _Soveraign_ (p. 41) and _steddy_ (p. 15). Eighteenth-century orthographic practice would have permitted such spellings. The word _entitled_, however, appears on page five as both _entituled_ and _intituled_.

12. None of the various copies I have examined contains typographical differences--even in the case of the typographical errors.

13. On page 38, line 25, the word _Big_ is used where _Large_ would have been the English usage; on page 42, line 3, the word _Bann'd_ is used for _Swore_ and defined in the text as an "Atalantic word"; on page 43, line 4, the word _evite_ is used instead of _avoid_.

14. William Lee, _Daniel Defoe: His Life, and Recently Discovered Writings_ (London: Hotten, 1869), I, 177; Paul Dottin, _Daniel Defoe_, trans. Louise Ragan (New York, Macaulay, 1929), p. 155; John Robert Moore, _Daniel Defoe, Citizen of the Modern World_ (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958), p. 191; and Moore, _A Checklist of the Writings of Daniel Defoe_(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1962), p. 82.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

_Atalantis Major_ is reproduced from a copy of the first edition (1711) in the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library (Shelf Mark: *PR/3404/A851). A typical type-page (p. 4) measures 158 x 82 mm.

Atalantis Major.

Printed in _Olreeky_, the Chief City of the North Part of _Atalantis Major_.

_Anno Mundi_ 1711.

Atalantis Major.

There having been a large Account given to the World of several remarkable Adventures which happened lately in the famous _Atalantis_, an Island, which the ingenious Authors found placed in the _Mediterranean_ Sea; the Success of which Accounts, but especially the Usefulness of the Relation, to the Ends for which they were designed, having been very remarkable, I thought it could not be unacceptable to the World, (especially to those who _have been Already so delighted_ with News from that Island) to give a particular Historical Narration of some remarkable Transactions which happened in the Great Island, called, _Atalantis Major_, a famous well known Island, tho' much farther North, lying in the _Ducaledonian_ Ocean, which Island it was my good Fortune to winter at, the last time I returned North about from _China_, by the Streights of _Nassau_ and _Wygates_, and the Eastern Coast of _Grand Tartary_.

I have nothing to do to enquire, whether our late Authors mistook or not, in placing the Island _Atalantis_ in the _Mediterranean_ Sea, or, whether they might find some small Island of that Name among the infinite Crowd of Islands of the _Egean_ Sea: But as the mighty Transactions of which my History shall be the faithful Relator, are of too great Consequence in the World to be brought forth on so mean a Stage; so the Place, and the mighty People, and by whom this Revolution of Affairs have been mannaged, are all suitable to the Greatness and Glory of the Actions themselves.

As Geographers have no doubt given a full Description of this famous Island, and allowed it due Place in the Globes, where it stands noted for the biggest of the Kind in the Northern World, I need spend none of your Time in the Description of the Place, excepting such as shall fall naturally in my Way, as I come to treat of the People, and historically of their Behaviour.

The Island is possest by a brave, generous, powerful and wealthy Nation, truly Great in their natural Gallantry of Spirit, terrible in the Field, rich in the Product of their Lands, more in their general Commerce, most of all in their Manufactures, Industry and Application: They have some few Errors in their Conduct, which seems owing to the Climate, which is cold and moist, or to their Diet, which is strong and luxurious, and particularly to their way of Living, which in Eating and Drinking, is high, to an Excess.

This makes them Cholerick, Envious, and above all Contentious, so that the Nation is ever divided into Parties and Factions: They pursue their Feuds with the most eagerness imaginable in their Turns, commit all Kinds of Errors even on both Sides alternately, as they get uppermost.

This occasions much Heat, tho' the Country is Cold, little Charity, and above all, (which the Climate has the blame off) they are by their own Confession, of short Memories, partly as to Injuries, but especially as to Kindnesses, Services and inherent Merit. Hence, Gratitude is not the national Virtue, nor is encouraging Virtue any Branch of the Manufacture of the Place; long Services often meet here with unjust Censures; overgrown Merit with necessary Contempt: He must be a bold Man that dares oblige them; he is sure to provoke them by it to use him very severely.

If they are reduc'd to any extreme Distress, he must be weary of his Life that Attempts to rescue them from the Danger; he is as sure to Die for it as they are sure to be Unjust: It is Natural to the Blood of the Race, if they are obliged beyond the Power of Payment, they presently hate, because they scorn to be in Debt. Hence also Benefactors are the most abhorr'd People in the World, they Walk always alone, for every Man keeps at a distance from them.

If a Man happens to be bound Apprentice to his own generous Spirit, and resolves to do them good, he must do it to God, to do it to them is to work to the Devil; he must be sure to run the Gauntlet, and bear the Lashes of Ten thousand Tongues, the Reproach of all those he serves, and will Die unpitied.

If ever they do relent, if ever they acknowledge Services, 'tis always after the Man is dead, that he may not upbraid them with it. An eminent great Man among them, and rich to a Prodigy, had been almost drowned, but was taken up in the Interval by a poor Man; when he came to himself, he gave the poor Man Six-pence, but could never abide the sight of him after: The poor Man afterwards had the Dissaster of being drowned himself, and then the rich Man bewail'd that he had not made him a better Return, wherefore, in abundant Gratitude, he settled upon the Widow and her Six Children, a noble Pension of 20 _s. per Annum_.

It was a saying of One of their great and wise Men, of a poor Servant that had saved his Life; he saved my Life, _said he_, and therefore I hate to see him, for it is an intolerable Life to have always a Creditor in my Sight that I cannot ballance Accounts with.

But all this is by the By. The Inhabitants of this Great Island are, those things excepted, a Noble, Gallant, Ancient, Wealthy People; and a Stranger may very well winter among them. I could say more in their Praise but the ensuing History calls me off from that Subject.

There happen'd in that famous Island, when I was last there, an Occasion upon some State Affairs to assemble an extraordinary Council of the Nobility, to consult together with the Sovereign; whole Hereditary Councellors they were by the Constitution of the Place: These were not chosen by the Inhabitants, as in such Cases among us our Parliament Men are chosen; but were by Birth and Blood, or by Dignities, High-Offices, _&c._ entitled to sit in the aforesaid Council, except one Part of the Island, who had by some former Constitution been a several distinct Government, and had a certain Number of Nobility of their own. This Part having by some ancient Treaty been join'd to the other, their whole Nobility were not intituled to the Right of sitting in Council as above; but they usually met by themselves upon such Occasions, and chose a certain Number to represent the whole Body. This Number was, as near as I can remember, Sixteen or thereabouts, not reckoning some who were singled out by the Sovereign to be advanc'd by new Titles, to be Members of the Great Body of the Hereditary Nobility; a Favour, which by the Stipulations of the said Agreement, was reserv'd to the Sovereign of that whole Island.

Now there happening, as I have noted, an Occasion to assemble this Great Council; the Nobility of that Part of the Island which were thus particularly constituted, behoved to meet, _as said is_, to elect the Number that were to represent them in the great Assembly; and the History of that Meeting having so many strange Circumstances in it, and making so much Noise in that Country, it cannot but be useful for us to be inform'd of it.

The Nobility of that Island, as I find it too much the Fate of all the Nobility in the World, were unhappily divided into Factions and separate Interests, and therefore before I proceed to the Relation, it will be necessary to give you a brief Account of these several Divisions, and as to the Characters of the Persons, it will necessarily fall into the Course of the Story.

The Divisions and Animosities which, as I say, were among the Nobility, were very unhappily occasion'd upon two several Foundations, and therefore consisted of two several Kinds.

This Island, it seems, was govern'd by a very glorious Queen, who however she was of the ancient Royal Blood of that Country, was yet for Reasons more especially respecting the Safety of the Country, plac'd upon the Throne by the Suffrage of the Nobility and People, without Regard to her Father or his Male Children, who for like Reasons of Safety they had Depos'd and render'd incapable: There being, it seems a Power reserv'd by the Constitution of that Place, to the said Nobility and People so to do a thing so like what we call in _England_ Parliamentary Limitation, that it gives me great Reason to think the Power of Parliaments limiting the Crown is a natural Principle, and founded upon meer Original Light, since it should be so exactly establish'd in a Country so remote and so entirely excluded from Correspondence with _Europe_, as this of the Island of _Atalantis_.

The Queen of this Island, by the Assistance of exquisite Councellors, Punctual Management, and a mild merciful Administration, had obtain'd the entire Affection of Her Subjects at Home, and as long as she continued the Administration in those Hands she preserv'd that Affection very entire to herself; She had also, by the Conduct of eminent and most glorious Commanders, rendered her self Victorious abroad, in a long, terrible and expensive War, against the barbarous _Tartarian_ Emperor, whose growing Greatness, had forced her Predecessor, in Conjunction with several neighbouring Nations, to have recourse to Arms, to keep up a Ballance of Power in that Part of the World, as long as those fortunate Generals commanded, her Affairs were blest by Sea and Land; till the _Barbarians_ began to stoop their Pride, to be humbled, and they sought Peace, made great Offers of restoring the Kingdoms they had usurped, and of establishing a lasting Tranquillity in those Parts of the World.

How the Face of Affairs there altered, how some Factions prevailing at Home, made a Breach in all this blessed Harmony, how the faithful Councellors at Home were dismiss'd and disgrac'd, the victorious Generals Abroad ill used and ungratefully treated, by which the Publick Credit sunk at Home, the great Confederates of this glorious Queen were discouraged and allarmed, the _Barbarians_ encouraged to hold out, carry on the War, and reject the Terms of Peace, they would before have complied with: These are Things perhaps my stay in that Place not permitting me to get a full Account of, much less see the Issue of, I shall for the present omit, perhaps my next Voyage may more fully quallifie me to inform you.

My present Relation refers more especially to the Affair of the Election of those representing Nobles, which, as before, the Northern Part of the Island, by a late Treaty of Coalition, were obliged to send up as often as the Soveraign of the Country thought fit to Summon her Hereditary Council to meet, which Summons was generally once in Three Years.

To let you into the Nature of the unhappy Strife which is the Subject of my present Relation, it may be necessary to descend to a Historical Relation of some Facts for a few Years past, and to give the Characters of some Persons who have the principal Conduct in the present Affairs.

There had been a Contention in the last Election in the same Place, (we shall go no further back) of something of the like Nature with this; wherein the same Heat was unhappily breaking out against the Friends and Favourites of the great Queen of the Island, as had now come to a full height; it is too true, That the Factions which then agitated the Nobility being between the Court-Party then so called, and a flying Squadron of Noblemen, who were of the same general Denomination with themselves, that Breach tended so much to the dividing their Interest, that they could never effectually joyn it again, they made that Seperation of Affection then which they could never unite, let in those Enemies then which they could never get removed again, brought those Charges and Accusations against one another then which their Enemies have since made use off, and which they cannot now deny but are fatal to them.

The Parties are so naturally resembling our unhappy Divisions in _Britain_, have been so exactly pursued by our Methods, are so properly adapted to Persons as well as Things, so alike in Temper, Manners, Management and Design, to our Parties, of _Tory_, _Whig_, _High Church_, _Low Church_, _Old Whig_, _New Whig_, _High Flyer_, _Dissenter_, _Jacobite_, _Court_, _Country_, _Revolution_, _Union_, and the like. That to give the more lively Representation of them to your Minds, and to avoid the barbarous Words used in the Country, where the Language is altogether unknown to us, and unlike ours, I shall even call them by the same Names, giving a brief Description as I go on, and always desiring you to add a Subintelligitur for the word _Atalantick_ to them all; as the _Atalantick Whigs_, _Atalantick Tories_, _Atalantick High Church_, and so of all the rest: And whenever you meet with the Names or Distinctions of _Whig_, _Tory_, _High Church_, _Low Church_, _&c._ in this Discourse, the Author provides against any other Suggestion or Meaning, than that of the _Whigs_, _Tories_, _High Church_, _Low Church_, _Old Whig_, _New Whig_, _High Flyers_, _Dissenters_, _Jacobites_, _&c._ who are Inhabitants of the famous Island of _Atalantis Major_, situate beyond the North Cape, between the Degrees of 42 and 80 of Northern Latitude, as you sail from _China_ into _Europe_, by the Streights of _Nassau_, the Island of _Nova Zembla_, (if it be an Island) and the like, being what we call the North-East Passages: And you cannot blame me for being thus Particular in this early Protestation, if you consider how ready the Men of this Age are to Censure, Condemn and Reproach, the Meaning of Authors, whether they themseves have any meaning or no. If any Man shall presume to say, there is no such Place, I may as readily answer their Presumption, by another less Criminal, _viz._ That they never have past that Way to _China_, and consequently cannot demonstrate the Truth of what they say.

Having thus premised what I think necessary, to fence this Work against the Malice of the Times, I am next to tell you, That I shall confine this Part of my Account to the Transactions of the Northern Part of this great Island, and therein to what happened in this Case of the Election of their Noble Councellors only; yet I must Hint a little at what had been transacting in the Southern Parts of the Island; and this is absolutely necessary, in order to make the other Accounts intelligible.

In order to this, you are to understand, That the Southern Part of the Island was the most remarkable of any, as to the Policy of their Government, and the Character of the People; and excepting _Englishmen_ and _Polanders_, there is not such another Nation in the World: Here they reckoned about Fifty three several Sects, Divisions, and espoused Opinions in Religion, upon most of the Heads whereof the People actually seperated from one another; such as, (1.) _Churchmen_, and among them _High Church_, _Low Church_, _Non Jurors_, _Prelatists_, _Socinians_, _Arians_, _Arminians_, _Deists_, _Atheists_, _Immoralists_, _Flyers_, _Soul-Sleepers_, _Prophets_, _&c._ (2.) _Presbyterians_, and under that head all kind of Dissenters, _Cameronians_, _Independants_, _Anabaptists_, _Baptists_, _Seventh-Day-Men_, _Sabatarians_, _Donatists_, _Gnosticks_, _Antiprelatists_, _Muggletonians_, and various undistinguishable _Quakers_ both wet and dry, _Sweet Singers_, _Family of Love_, _Christian Jews_, _Jewish Christians_, and the like. In the State, the Divisions were no less Fatal, or the variety greater in Proportion, these we may, as I said before, call by the Names which the like Factions are distinguish'd by here; such as _Tory_, _Whig_, _Low Church_, _Hot_ _Whig_, _Old Whig_, _Modern Whig_, _High Flyer_, _High Church_, _High Tory_, a _Gillicranky_, a _Tantivy_, _Tackers_, _Non Jurors_, _Assassinators_, _Junto's_, _Squadroni_, _Court_, _Country_, _Revolutionists_, _Non Resisters_, _Passive Obedience Men_, and the like.

You may understand, that the Queen of the Island had thought fit to change Hands in the Administration just before I came there, and tho' it was given out that the change would not be from what we call here a Whig to a Tory Ministry, in effect it past for no other, especially for that the Whigs were generally laid by in every publick Matter, and the Tories, or at least such as had appear'd with them were all taken in.

Among the Persons turn'd out of Employ, or very much envy'd in it, we find two great Personages, Men of the greatest Eminency in their Station that the Age had produc'd in that Island, their Country had no Error to find in their Conduct except it were that it was so much in debt to their Services, that they could not be capable of rewarding it, therefore like the corrupted Nature of the whole Race of Man, they hate the Men, as a late Author says, because they hate to be in debt beyond the Power of Payment.

One of these presided over the Treasure, the other over the Army, and except what may have happen'd since those days, their very Enemies had not been able to assign any Reason from their own Behaviour, why they dismist them. Of these more in the Process of the Story.

For the present it shall suffice to tell you, without other Preamble, both these were by the Artifice of their Enemies, dispossess'd of the Queen of the Island's Favour, and that with them fell the Juncto's and Squadrons of their Friends in most Part of the Southern _Atalantis_.

In the North Part of the Island the Divisions of the Court had not extended so far, at least they had not been push'd so vigorously, the great Officers kept their Posts, whether Civil or Military, not the least Alteration was made, except of a few inferiour Officers, and those but casually; all seem'd to stand at a Stay till the Election of the noble Councellors aforesaid, and till the sitting of the great Council, as above.

There were some of the Nobility of these Northern Parts that had very much the Favour of their Prince, and by whom she had always been directed in those things that related to that Part of Her Dominions, These were,

1. The Duke _de Sanquarius_, a Northern Prince of great Reputation who had the principal Trust in the Management of the late Coalition, which, as is noted already, had formerly been made between this Northern Part of the Island and the Southern. This Prince was a Person of great Prudence and Policy, perfect Master of the Interest, Temper and Constitution of the Country and People; great and as a Master of his own Passions, that had an Insight into Persons as well as things, and was, without Dispute, the best qualify'd to manage that uneasy People, of any Man in that Part of the Island: He had a leading Interest among them, and us'd it with such Temper and such Clearness of Judgment, as seldom failed to bring to pass whatever he undertook. He was Viceroy in the great Meeting of the States of that Country, several times; in which he behav'd to the Satisfaction of his Sovereign and the general Good, even to the Confession of his Enemies, after the separate Government of that Part of the Island ceas'd he was receiv'd very graciously by the Queen, and made principal Secretary of State.

2. The Earl of _Stairdale_ was another, a Nobleman of extraordinary Merit, distinguish'd for a thousand good Qualities; affable, generous, exceeding curteous, steddy in a sound Principle, wise above his Age, brave above his Neighbours. His Family had been famous for the Gown, he was like to make it more so by the Sword: He had at this time a very honourable Command in the Armies of _Atalantis Major_, and being the same thing as we call a Lieutenant General, was employed against the _Tartarians_.

3. The Earl of _Crawlinfordsay_ a Nobleman of a most ancient Race, being the first of his Degree in the whole _Atalantis Major_, an honest, bold, gallant Person; he had so much Goodness in his Temper, Courage in his Heart, and Honesty in his Face, that made all Men love him; he was true to his Sovereign, and tho' his Fortunes too depended upon the _Court_, being Captain of the Queen's Guards, yet so true to his Honour, that he scorn'd to sacrifice his Principle to his Interest; had too much Courage to be bully'd, and too much Honesty to be brib'd; too much Wit to be wheedl'd and too much Warmth to forbear telling it in the Teeth of those that try'd all those ways to bring him into their Party.

4. The Prince of _Greeniccio_ of the ancient Blood of _Agyllius_. This was a young Nobleman of great Hopes, and from whom great things were expected, an account of the very Race he was descended from. Had he inherited the Principles of his Family as he did the Honour and Estate, he must have been the Head of that very Party he now acted against, being the same for whose Cause two of his greatest Ancestors at least had both ventured and lost their Lives, but Grace not going by Generation, nor Vertue by Inheritance any more in that Country than in ours. He neither own'd their Cause or imitated their Vertue, but gave himself up first to all Manner of Vice, and then with his Morals abandoned his Principles, flew in the Face of his Grandfathers injured _Grave_, join'd with his Murtherers, and the abhorr'd Betrayers of his Country, and plac'd himself at the Head of that very Party who had trampled on the Blood of his Family as well as Nation. He was in Temper brave but rash, had more Courage than Generosity, more Passion than Prudence, and more Regard to his Resentment than to his Honour; he was proud without Merit, ambitious without Prospect, revengeful without Injury; he would resent without Affront, and quarrel without Cause, would embroil himself without Reason, and come out of it without Honour: His Courage was rather in his Blood than in his Head, and as his Actions run often before his Thoughts, so his Thoughts often run before his Reason; yet he was pushing and that supply'd very much his Want of Policy; but he discover'd the Errors of his Judgment by the Warmth of his Behaviour in every thing he did he sought no Disguise, every Man knew him better than himself, and he never could be in a Plot because he conceal'd nothing.

He was a General in the Armys of _Atalantis Major_ and excepting the chief Command of an Army, was very well fitted for the Field: He had behav'd himself very well on several Occasions against the _Tartarians_, and unless his ill Fate should place him above being commanded, he might in time be a great Man; at present, having all the Fire of a General without the Flegm, his great Misfortune and the only Thing that can ruin him is, That he thinks himself qualifyed to Command, and cannot bear the Lustre of their Merit that excel him.

5. The E. of _Marereskine_: This was a Nobleman whose Character is not so easy to describe; he appear'd in the Service of the Queen of the Island, but was suspected to lean to the _Tartars_, whose Interest he was known formerly to espouse; He was proud, peevish, subtle and diligent, affected more the Statesman than the Soldier, and therefore aim'd at the Place the Duke _de Sanquharius_ enjoy'd of Secretary of State, but had not yet had his Ambition gratifyed.

You are to note also that the Queen of the Island had for several Years committed the Administration of her Affairs to two extraordinary Persons, Natives of the South Parts of the Island. The Prince _de Heymuthius_ and the E. of _Dolphinus_, their Characters may be confin'd to this: In short, the first commanded all the Armies of _Atalantis Major_, and was Captain General and Commander in Chief; the other, High Keeper of the Treasury of the Island, the greatest General and the greatest Minister of State the Island ever knew, who had raised the Glory of their Mistress, and the Honour of their Country, to the greatest Pitch the Age has ever seen; whose Merit I can no more describe than the Nation can requite.

Tho' these Characters seem to take up too much room in this Tract, yet it could not be avoided, it being impossible to let you into a true Notion of the Farce that was acted afterwards if the Actors had not been thus described.

_Greeniccio_ was a Peer of the whole Island, and therefore had no Vote in the Northern Election, being one of the Hereditary Council aforesaid; but taking upon him the absolute Direction of the Affair, tho' he had really, as above, nothing to do with it, he rendred himself at the City Reeky, the Capital of that Part of the Kingdom a few Days before the Election.

_Marereskine_, who had really a Voice in the Election, was there before him, and had busily embark'd _Bellcampo_, Lord of the Isles, and Brother to _Greeniccio_, to make Parties, and prepare Parties, sollicite Votes, get Proxies, and the like, about the Countries.

This _Bellcampo_, Lord of the Isles, was an insinuating self-interested Man, had little Fortune of his own, but resolved to raise himself which side soever got upmost: He run with every Stream, kept fair with every Side, spoke smoothly to all, meant Service to none, his dear Self excepted. By this means he got up from one Step to another to some good Employments, which his Interest and Diligence procured for him rather than his Sincerity; for he was first made a Peer on the Side he now acted against, and now a Judge acting against the Side made him a Peer, and the like.

These were the Instruments of the Fate of North _Atalantis_; _Marereskine_ acted one Part, _Greeniccio_ another: And here it is, as I said before, that the differing Parties, appeared so like our _Whig_ and _Tory_, _Episcopal_ and _Presbyterian_, that I cannot better describe them to you than by the same Names, only with this Difference, That all the _Tories_ and _Episcopal_ People in North _Atalantis_ were _Tartarians_ profestly, and boldly owned themselves for the _Tartarian_ Emperor.

And now the two last mentioned Engines, having acted covertly for some time, which they had the better opportunity to do, because they had both appeared among the other Party, _which now I'll call Whigs_; before, the first of these carried it stiff and forward when he talked with the great Officers, or such Lords as had some Dependance upon the Court: He told them of what the Queen expected from them, what was their Duty to do, that they would find it their Interest to do so and so, that they might consider in Time what they had to do, and the like: When he talk'd with any of the _Whig_ Lords, for there was a Squadron of them left, that had a great sway yet in the Country, then he would talk of him, and Party and Queen, as one Knot, in the plural Number, most haughtily, thus: We are resolved to do so and so, and we must have none but such or such.