SIR JOHN KENNEDY, 1814-1841 



potatoes, any quantity of butter, and a large jug of 

 new milk. This temperate fare did not prevent the 

 whips from getting all the liquor of another kind 

 they could find; they were indeed a notoriously 

 thirsty pair. For one week during every month the 

 hounds were taken to Bunlbo Hall, near Grange- 

 con, and met each day at Ballintore Inn, where the 

 whips were lodged. On one particular evening the 

 men, after a heavy supper and deep potations, were 

 got with difficulty to their bed, where they slept 

 together, and were soon in a drunken slumber. It 

 then occurred to some humorist at the inn to 

 connect each man's great toe to that of his bed- 

 fellow with a piece of wire, the wire in turn being 

 tied to a line of whipcord passed through the 

 keyhole of the door. A sharp tug on this string 

 woke the men, and each feeling a torturing pain in 

 his great toe, which was increased at every move- 

 ment of his companion, attributed the cause to the 

 other, and the pair fell into a furious encounter and 

 were so mauled before they were parted that neither 

 could appear during that week at the meets. 



Mr Robert Kennedy's valuable recollections 

 enable me to record some pleasing vignettes of his 

 father, and of life at Johnstown during the earlier 

 years of his long reign as Master. The old Irish 

 custom of hard drinking at table was never in 

 vogue during Mr Kennedy's time; excess was never 



125 



