Decline
Emo Court was in its heyday in the final forty years of the 19th century. However, times were changing in Ireland and the Earls of Portarlington, like many of the old families who enjoyed lavish lifestyles based on their inherited wealth, failed to adapt. At the outbreak of the World War in 1914, the family left for England and the house was shut up. In 1920 the estate, which extended over nearly 20 square miles (52 km2), was sold to the Irish Land Commission. The house remained unoccupied, while most of the land was distributed amongst local farmers.
Read more about this topic: Emo Court
Famous quotes containing the word decline:
“My opposition [to interviews] lies in the fact that offhand answers have little value or grace of expression, and that such oral give and take helps to perpetuate the decline of the English language.”
—James Thurber (1894–1961)
“Families suffered badly under industrialization, but they survived, and the lives of men, women, and children improved. Children, once marginal and exploited figures, have moved to a position of greater protection and respect,... The historic decline in the overall death rates for children is an astonishing social fact, notwithstanding the disgraceful infant mortality figures for the poor and minorities. Like the decline in death from childbirth for women, this is a stunning achievement.”
—Joseph Featherstone (20th century)
“Or else I thought her supernatural;
As though a sterner eye looked through her eye
On this foul world in its decline and fall,
On gangling stocks grown great, great stocks run dry,
Ancestral pearls all pitched into a sty,
Heroic reverie mocked by clown and knave....”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)