The magnificent residence was designed and erected similarly to East Comer Castle (by Nash, who remodelled Windsor) for Lord Gort, the head of the Vereker family, at a cost of L70,000. The black hand of the famine of 1847 fed on this property, like many another in Ireland, and it passed from its owners under the Encumbered Estates Act. Cove Park, the residence of Lady Gregory, is just outside Gort. Her Ladyship has found a way to the hearts of the country people by her sympathy with the Irish language movement. Her volume, "Mr. Gregory's Letter Box," is a valuable contribution to the history of Ireland in the first three decades of the nineteenth century. Sir William Gregory's Memoirs it is that contain the circumstantial version of the Cabinet scandal, in which the name of the Hon. Mrs. Norton (George Meredith's "Diana of the Crossways") figures. The story of the leakage of the State secret is as follows:-- "When Sir Robert Peel determined to repeal the Corn Laws he consulted a portion of his Cabinet. They were Sidney Herbert, Lord Lincoln, Sir Jas. Graham, and Lord Aberdeen, all of whom determined that the repeal of the Corn Laws should be kept a profound secret until the whole of the Cabinet had assembled. That same evening Sidney Herbert dined _tete-a-tete_ with Mrs. Norton, the well-known object of his attachment, and with whom he was infatuated. Before dinner was over she wormed out of him the secret of the Cabinet. After dinner she pretended to go to see a sick friend for a short time, and returned in half-an-hour. In the meantime she had taken a cab and driven down to the _Times_ Office, and saw Barnes, the Editor, and told him the Government were going to repeal the Corn Laws. Barnes said to her, "If you have no proof I shall not detain you, but if you have you shall have L500." She gave him the chapter and verse, and returned to poor Sidney Herbert with the cheque in her pocket. The next day the announcement was made in the _Times_ which astounded all England. This was on the 5th December, 1845. The other papers disbelieved it. Lord Derby and the Duke of Richmond left the Government."