AN OLD SPORTSMAN. 59 



unalloyed pleasure and keen enjoyment. He 

 was the kindest soul in the world, and a dead 

 shot. His agency business was a sinecure, 

 inasmuch as a " driver " was kept to warn the 

 tenants to go and pay their rents to a solicitor 

 in the neighbouring county town ; and I be- 

 lieve that Joe's duties were never understood 

 or settled, though the country people regarded 

 him as the representative of the " master." So 

 much was he liked that there never was a place 

 better game-preserved than Glenaugh. The 

 peasantry were poor and scattered ; but they 

 never failed to send over to the Wisp to tell 

 us if a string of duck had lodged on " Carty's 

 ground," or that the plover were pitched in the 

 widow Murphy's bawn-field. A glass of 

 whisky was generally the reward for such intel- 

 ligence as this, which was received as gravely 

 by Jack Sullivan as though it related to the 

 movements of an army, or a rising of the 

 Fenians. 



In December we got up in the morning, 

 say at nine o'clock. During breakfast we dis- 

 cussed (with Mr. Sullivan, who was never 

 absent from these cabinet councils) the route, 



