In later times, again, the Kearneys returned to the old faith of their
fathers and followed the fortunes of King James; one of them, Michael
O'Kearney, having acted as aide-de-camp at the 'Boyne,' and conducted the
king to Kilgobbin, where he passed the night after the defeat, and, as the
tradition records, held a court the next morning, at which he thanked the
owner of the castle for his hospitality, and created him on the spot a
viscount by the style and title of Lord Kilgobbin.

It is needless to say that the newly-created noble saw good reason to keep
his elevation to himself. They were somewhat critical times just then for
the adherents of the lost cause, and the followers of King William were
keen at scenting out any disloyalty that might be turned to good account
by a confiscation. The Kearneys, however, were prudent. They entertained
a Dutch officer, Van Straaten, on King William's staff, and gave such
valuable information besides as to the condition of the country, that no
suspicions of disloyalty attached to them.

To these succeeded more peaceful times, during which the Kearneys were
more engaged in endeavouring to reconstruct the fallen condition of their
fortunes than in political intrigue. Indeed, a very small portion of the
original estate now remained to them, and of what once had produced above
four thousand a year, there was left a property barely worth eight hundred.

The present owner, with whose fortunes we are more Immediately concerned,
was a widower. Mathew Kearney's family consisted of a son and a daughter:
the former about two-and-twenty, the latter four years younger, though to
all appearance there did not seem a year between them.

Mathew Kearney himself was a man of about fifty-four or fifty-six; hale,