It begins with Tisdall's coming into his inheritance during the most unfavorable climactic circumstances of 1740 when Ireland was devastated by frost, famine, disease, and death. It ends in 1751, when the country was experiencing significant economic growth.

It details Tisdall's extensive travel on the Grand Tour, explores his expenditure on material acquisitions, his lifestyle and leisure pursuits, and it provides a vivid glimpse into his privileged and fashionable world.

The book considers the management structure he established on his Meath estate and his relationships with his tenants. An early proponent of the 'improving' ethos, Charles Tisdall's legacy is indelibly imprinted on the Meath landscape in the Richard Castle-designed Charlesfort House, the two demesnes with their large plantations of trees, and the extensive surviving stone-work.

Although he rubbed shoulders with the great and the good, he was neither titled nor a member of parliament. He was a middling-sized country landowner. A consideration of just three aspects of Tisdall's life suggests that he fits into a pattern identified by other historians of the eighteenth-century elite.

Charles Tisdall occupied a middle position; lower than the aristocracy, but higher than the large tenant farmer. (Series: Maynooth Studies in Local History -- Vol. 114)