It was perhaps through the influence of Swift, who spoke warmly with the Tory Ministry on behalf of Addison, that the latter, on the downfall of the Whigs in the autumn of 1710, was for some time suffered to retain the Keepership of the Records in Bermingham's Tower, an Irish place which had been bestowed upon him by the Queen as a special mark of the esteem with which she regarded him, and which appears to have been worth £400 a year.[24] In other respects his fortunes were greatly altered by the change of Ministry. "I have within this twelvemonth," he writes to Wortley on the 21st of July, 1711, "lost a place of £2000 per ann., an estate in the Indies worth £14,000, and, what is worse than all the rest, my mistress.[25] Hear this and wonder at my philosophy! I find they are going to take away my Irish place from me too; to which I must add that I have just resigned my fellowship, and that stocks sink every day." In spite of these losses his circumstances were materially different from those in which he found himself after the fall of the previous Whig Ministry in 1702. Before the close of the year 1711 he was able to buy the estate of Bilton, near Rugby, for £10,000. Part of the purchase money was probably provided from what he had saved while he was Irish Secretary, and had invested in the funds; and part was, no doubt, made up from the profits of the _Tatler_ and the _Spectator_. Miss Aikin says that a portion was advanced by his brother Gulston; but this seems to be an error. Two years before, the Governor of Fort St. George had died, leaving him his executor and residuary legatee. This is no doubt "the estate in the Indies" to which he refers in his letter to Wortley, but he had as yet derived no benefit from it. His brother had left his affairs in great confusion; the trustees were careless or dishonest; and though about £600 was remitted to him in the shape of diamonds in 1713, the liquidation was not complete till 1716, when only a small moiety of the sum bequeathed to him came into his hands.[26] CHAPTER V. THE _TATLER_ AND _SPECTATOR_.