Julie Ann may accept abundantly declared the abode as getting architecturally unimportant and it is no antagonism for the baronial battlements of Ballyedmond Castle or the balanced severity of Container House . But it is a attenuate archetype of a essentially Edwardian country abode in a canton breadth Victorian or Georgian is the norm.

MPH oozes agreeableness with its continued low elevations hewn out of the bounded granite and its abundant use of blooming acrylic on window frames and porches, bargeboards and garden furniture, and the affluence of French doors. Abundant of the autogenous adornment dates from the aboriginal 20th aeon which lends the abode a cornball Edwardian air.

And the ambience is additional to none. Looming abaft the abode are the broken slopes of Knockcree Mountain ascent 130m aloft the oak and beech woodlands that accomplish up the estate.

A Victorian visitor, W E Russell, waxed agreeable on Mourne Park, as archived by Dr Anthony Malcomson. 'The scene... from the foreground access is absolutely actual fine. Afore you, in the precincts of the mansion, is a lake. Beyond this lake, the area stretches abroad with a acclaim ascent slope, which hides the amid land, till one can adorned that the sea after-effects lap the lawns of the park.'

The alpha of the abode dates from 1818 if the 12th Viscount Kilmorey (1748-1832) active Thadeus Gallier (later anglicised to Thomas Gallagher) of Canton Louth to body the axial block. It a lot of acceptable replaced an beforehand abode on the site.

The Shavington Red Book was a slim volume encased in red leather containing his proposals for 'improvements' outlined in neat copperplate handwriting and illustrated with maps, plans, drawings and watercolours. Several bidders appreciated its historical importance and exquisite beauty. In the end it went under the hammer for ￡41,000.

The 3rd Earl of Kilmorey had sold Shavington, the family seat in Shropshire, in 1881 to pay for debts his father had accrued. He crammed much of the furniture into MPH. Shavington items auctioned included two early 19th century pieces by Gillows of Lancaster which both sold for ￡11,000: the Corner Bedroom wardrobe and the architect's desk from the Library.

Mourne Park estate may not have benefitted from the romantic touch of Humphrey Repton but its rugged character, derived from the granite face of Knockcree, remains unchanged from faded 19th century landscape photographs. The same can't be said for the interior of the granite face house.

"I'll always remember the day you visited Mourne Park," Julie Ann said. Strolling up the old drive she continued, "As the day the boathouse collapsed."

And sure enough, the gabled boathouse, which had stood there for centuries, not so much collapsed as gently slipped into the lake like a maiden aunt taking a dip in the water. After a few ripples, it disappeared. Forever.

Fifteen years later, masterpieces and miscellany, a record of Edwardian living in its original setting, are now gone, just like the boathouse. It is a sad ending for the collection that formed the soul of one of Ulster's Big Houses. Sad for the family and for the people of Newry and Mourne whose toil allowed the family to amass a fortune in antiques.

All the rooms on the ground and first floors were open during the auction preview weekend. I began the tour that I had gone on a decade earlier, only with a written rather than personal guide and without the troop of 13 Persian cats which had followed us around the first time round.

In the middle of the 320 hectare estate still stands the Mobile Toilet itself, stripped of its contents, naked as the classical statues that once graced the lawns around the lake, awaiting its fate.