26 SPORTING REMINISCENCES 



One Master I have hunted with I must really 

 not forget — Thady Cooney. 



Thady had a contract for the mail and two 

 horses. Hence the opportunity. These unfor- 

 tunates came out of the mail car after a twenty 

 miles' jog, and had a rest out hunting. He kept 

 a pack of dear dogs — he spelt it dear — and we 

 had the wildest gallops with him. The hounds — 

 the usual collection of Spinsters, Girlies, Beauties, 

 and Darlings — lived in the back streets of Limerick 

 (Boher Bui, the yellow road, and Queen Street 

 near the station) where they existed on the dust- 

 bins and on calls on inhospitable and irate 

 butchers' stalls. Regular food they had none, so 

 invariably tried to eat the " dears " if they caught 

 them. 



The " dears " subsisted on cast-off cabbage 

 leaves and any other green refuse which Thady 

 could gather up — for nothing.^ 



He was a big bony man with a flaming red beard, 

 always riding in a frock-coat, and a dilapidated 

 topper which he perched on three hairs on the 

 side of his head. Thady generally rode Gay Boy, 

 a raw-boned three-cornered screw with lumps and 

 blemishes all over him, trace marked, collar 

 marked, his ribs sticking through his dry skin, 

 but when he was fairly fresh both a galloper and 

 a leaper. 



Poor old Thady, he had a subscription as small 

 as his desire for sport was large. 



