round
their cabins. To their agricultural pursuits many joined the more
profitable but hazardous business of making potheen, and they were
generally speaking, a lawless, reckless set of people--paying, some
little, and others no rent, and living without the common blessings
or restraints of civilization: no road, or sign of a road, came
within some miles of them; Drumshambo, the nearest village, was seven
or eight miles distant from them; and although they knew that neither
the barrenness of their locality, nor the want of means of approach
would altogether secure them from the unwelcome visits of the Revenue
police or the Constabulary, still they felt sure that neither of
these inimical forces could come into their immediate neighbourhood,
without their making themselves aware of their approach, in time to
guard against any injury which they might do them, either by removing
all vestiges of their trade, or by sending those who were in fear of
being taken up, into the more inaccessible portions of the mountain.
On the western side of Aughacashel, immediately over Loch Allen, and
about half way between the lowlands and the summit, a kind of rude
limekiln had been made, apparently for the purpose of burning lime
for the neighbouring land; but the very poor state of the rocky
ground about, which gave signs of but little industry, afforded
evidence that the limekiln had not added much to the agricultural
wealth of the country. It was now at any rate made use of for other
purposes, for it was in here that Joe Reynolds at present usually
worked his still. There were only two cabins immediately close to it;
one of which was occupied by a very old man and his daughter, but in
which Corney Dolan and Reynolds resided, when they were away from
Drumleesh; and the other belonged to another partner in the business,
who considered himself the owner of the limekiln, and the head of the
party concerned in it. This man's name was Daniel Kennedy, and to the
reckless, desperate contempt of authority and hatred of those who
exercised it, which characterized Reynolds, he added a cruelty of
disposition, and a love of wickedness, from which the other was much
more free.

This was the place to which his two guides were now conducting Thady,
and where it was proposed that he should, at any rate for some time,
conceal himself from those, who, it was presumed, would soon be
scouring the country in search of him. It was now a bright moonlight
nig