The Act of Grace, however, which was dated May 6th, was slow in taking effect――especially in the cases of the peers. It was not till September that a pardon passed the seals――for Lord Duffus. In November, Lords Carnwath and Widdrington, and in December Lord Nairn, pleaded their pardon, on their knees, at the bar of the House of Lords, and were discharged. Provision was made for them, out of their own estates, to Widdrington, 400_l._; to Carnwath, 200_l._; and to Lord Nairn, 150_l._ a year. To Lord Duffus, having nothing, nothing was given. Lord Nairn’s case will show how slowly liberty, with confiscation of estates, was effected. When Lord Nairn walked, a comparatively free man, across Tower Hill, in August, to a messenger’s house, he had been in confinement a year and eight months. He was committed to the Tower in December, 1715, and was liberated in August, 1717. During that time, he was obliged to pay 3_l._ a week for his chamber, and 1_l._ as wages for the warden who waited on and guarded him. Eleven months more were spent before Lord Nairn got back again to Scotland. He was in London under a sort of _surveillance_. Six months after his enlargement, he had to appear before the House of Peers, ‘to get up his bail and make his recognizance,’ so that he did not return to his own home till July, 1718, all which cost him about 4,000_l._ Much of the money went to legal advisers and Court ladies. Lord Nairn set this down in his account book, in this blunt fashion, ‘Gave to Lawyers and Bitches, during that time, 1,500_l._’ [Sidenote: _BISHOP ATTERBURY, THE CHEVALIER’S AGENT._] At the very time Lord Nairn, by effect of the Act of Grace, left the Tower, Atterbury, as his published correspondence now reveals, was conspiring in the interest of James III. To this prince, the bishop addressed a letter from London, in which is the following passage:――‘My actions, I hope, have spoken for me better than any letters could do.… I have for many years past neglected no opportunity (and particularly no advantage my station afforded me) towards promoting the service.… My daily prayer to God is that you may have success in the just cause wherein you are engaged. I doubt not but He will at last grant it, and in such a manner as to make it a blessing not only to your fast friends and faithful servants, but even to those who have been and are still averse to the thoughts of it. God be thanked, their numbers increase daily.… May I live to see that day’ (of success to the Stuarts) ‘and live no longer than I do whatever is in my power to forward it.’