154 THE BEST OF THE FUN 



Ballincollig, in fact, was originally pitched upon by 

 the Government of the day as a desirable site on which 

 to isolate a gunpowder factory ; and a cavalry regiment 

 has ever since been told off to keep guard upon it. There 

 being no likelihood of a grateful country recognising with 

 a subsidy the necessity for a pack of watchdogs within the 

 barracks, it devolved upon the officers themselves to find 

 kennels, which they did by purchase of an '' evicted farm " 

 across the river, and the buildings thus adapted are handed 

 over from regiment to regiment. And seven days a fort- 

 night is the present programme upon which they take the 

 country. 



Monday the 17th, on which hounds were taken to 

 Cloghroe, was not a good scenting day, either in the open 

 or in the woods of Ardrum, for which the fixture was 

 mainly intended. And Cloghroe is more miles from Cork 

 than a Saxon understanding was likely to have gathered 

 from current report. Still, a car worthy of the county 

 ought to have carried one thither within the hour, by the 

 riverside route, and in spite of the forbidding steam tram- 

 way that slices the road in half. 



So I pass over the few minutes' scurry of the morning, 

 that brought a cub to hand amid stony-backed paddocks 

 such as constitute much of the farmland of Cork county. 

 And I pass over the vanishing of an old fox among the 

 falling leaves of Ardrum's plantations (Ardrum being a fine 

 old mansion and demesne belonging to Sir George Colt- 

 hurst of Blarney, but to all appearance left to a caretaker, 

 and uncared for). And I take my stand late in the after- 

 noon upon the Kennel Hill, with a gorse almost underfoot, 

 with the lower ground occupied by the river, the Ballin- 

 coUig Powder Mills, the Barracks, and the Kennels, and 

 with a wide vista of small enclosures and glistening stone- 

 banks extending southward and beyond into far distance. 

 The broad river is hereabouts checked and spread by a 

 weir, over which two canoes were now shooting. Two 

 powder-barges were being towed up below, like nothing 

 else than floating hearses. Cork and its picturesque sur- 

 roundings gleamed in the sunlight down stream ; and the 

 shining water wended its way beyond, to Queenstown and 



