There was very little work to do.
He received the ground rents of the town of Ballymoy; saw that Ballymoy House was kept in repair and the grounds in tolerable order; and let the fishing of the river every year by means of advertisements in sporting papers.

Many men would have found the life dull, but Mr.
Simpkins had a busy and vigorous mind of a sort not uncommon among incompetent people.

By temperament he was a reformer of minor abuses, and Ballymoy afforded him an almost unique opportunity for the exercise of his powers.

There were, of course, difficulties.

The inhabitants of Ballymoy, long unaccustomed to the presence of a reformer amongst them, had drifted into quiet, easy ways of living.