f Mr. Seigne, one of the best known and most highly
esteemed agents in this part of Ireland.

My jarvey from Borris had an unusually neat and well-balanced car. When
I praised it he told me it was "built by an American," not an Irish
American, I understood him to say, but a genuine Yankee, who, for some
mysterious reason, has established himself in this region, where he has
prospered as a cart and car builder ever since. "Just the best cars in
all Ireland he builds, your honour!" Why don't he naturalise them in
America?

All the way was charming, the day very bright, and even warm, and the
hill scenery picturesque at every turn. We looked out sharply for the
hunt, but in vain. My jarvey, who knew the whole country, said they must
have broken cover somewhere on the upper road, and we should miss them
entirely. And so we did.

The silting up of the river Nore has reduced Thomastown or
Ballymacanton, which was its Irish name, from its former importance as
an emporium for the country about Kilkenny. The river now is not
navigable above Inistiogue. But two martial square towers, one at either
end of a fine bridge which spans the stream here, speak of the good old
times when the masters of Thomastown took toll and tribute of traders
and travellers. The lands about the place then belonged to the great
monastery of Jerpoint, the ruins of which are still the most interesting
of their kind in this part of Ireland. They have long made a part of the
estate of the Butlers. We rattled rapidly through the quiet little town,
and whisking out of a small public square into a sort of wynd between
two houses, suddenly found ourselves in the precincts of Grenane House.
The house takes its name from the old castle of Grenane, an Irish
fortress established here by some native despot long before Thomas
Fitz-Anthony the Norman came into the land. The ruins of this castle
still stand some half a mile away. "We call the place Candahar," said
Mr. Seigne, as he came up with two ladies from the meadows below the
house, "because you come into it so suddenly, just as you do into that
Oriental town." But what a charming occidental place it is! It stands
well above the river, the slope adorned with many fine old trees, some
of which grow, and grow prosperously, in the queerest and most
improbable forms, bent double, twisted, but still most green and
vigorous. They have no business under any known theory of arboriculture
to be beautiful, but beautiful