A few miles from Carra Lodge, at the foot of the mountains, stood one of the largest houses in Connaught, Ardcumber House, the family seat of one of the oldest Elizabethan families in Ireland, and probably the finest sporting demesne in the west. The great house, full of Sheraton and Chippendale furniture, commanded wonderful views of mountains and moors; while in front runs the Owenmore river, famous for its salmon fishing, through a valley which in winter time can show more snipe, duck, geese, and wild game of all sorts than any other valley of its size in the British Isles. One would have thought that the above sporting attractions would have satisfied any man; but the owner was one of those queer Irishmen who preferred any country to his own, and divided his time between London and Continental watering-places, leaving the management of his estates to an agent, who lived in Ballybor. When reading the ‘Field’ one evening, Evans came across an advertisement of Ardcumber House to let to a careful tenant at a nominal rent. Realising that the agent feared the house would be burnt if left empty, he drove into Ballybor the following day, took Blake with him to interview the agent, and drove home with a lease of Ardcumber House in his pocket, at a rent which the sale of game and salmon would cover twice over. The best of the fishing being now over, Evans crossed to England, nominally to collect his kit, in reality to have a large still made, which he had packed in large cases, labelled furniture, and brought over by long sea to Ballybor. At the same time he arranged with a sugar agent in England to ship treacle in paraffin barrels to Ballyrick and Ballybor as he required it. When at home in Wales he induced a cousin, John Evans, to join him, and the two set out for Ireland. In Dublin they purchased a Ford truck, which they had fitted up as a shooting waggonette with a hood like a boxcar, and in this, after obtaining the necessary police permit through Blake, they drove straight down to the west, and took up their quarters at Ardcumber. They found the house in charge of an old woman, who lived in one of the gate lodges, and arranged with her to cook for them and look after the few rooms they used, allowing her to go home every evening at six o’clock. At the top of the house they found six large rooms shut off from the rest of the house by a heavy door at the head of the stairs. Here they erected the still, using a fireplace as a flue; in a second room they erected wooden fomenting vessels, and in a third stored the treacle and poteen. In order to obtain a supply of water they fitted a pipe to the main water-supply tank, which was in the roof above the attics. They now settled down to a regular routine of shooting by day and distilling for a greater part of the night, living entirely to themselves. Once a week they drove into Ballybor in the Ford to obtain provisions.