HISTORY OF THE KILDARE HUNT 



hounds in the summer of 1841, and got a very bad 

 fall, which necessitated a long rest and a journey 

 abroad in the following winter, when he made a 

 tour in the Mediterranean. In an old diary of his, 

 his son once saw, he wrote enthusiastically of a fox 

 he viewed on the Rock of Gibraltar, and he was 

 in Egypt at the time of the massacre of the Mame- 

 lukes. In these circumstances it seems probable 

 to me that there was an interregnum just after 

 his taking the hounds, which was probably bridged 

 over by his brother Robert in the field, and cer- 

 tainly by Wm La Touche at the kennel. If I am 

 right in that supposition, I am brought nearer to 

 the real beginning of his active lead in the field by 

 a letter which has been very kindly placed at my 

 disposal by Colonel Tynte, to whose father, Mr 

 Pratt Tynte, Mr John La Touche wrote as follows 

 in 1843: 



Harristown, 



Sept. 17th, 1843. 



My dear Tynte, 



As my proposition of taking ^£300 a year to 

 keep hounds and horses was agreed to at the meeting 

 held at Naas last July, I have been consulting with 

 Mr Carroll and other members of the Committee, 

 and they do not think it necessary to have a meeting 

 on the 29th September, but we have divided the 

 country in the following ways, and Edward Ken- 



152 



