I was even asked to an assembly at Wilhelmshohe, the Elector's palace, and danced a minuet there with the Hofmarshal's lovely daughter, and lost a few pieces to his excellency the first huntmaster of his Highness.
At our table at the inn there was a Prussian officer who treated me with great civility, and asked me a thousand questions about England; which I answered as best I might.

But this best, I am bound to say, was bad enough.

I knew nothing about England, and the Court, and the noble families there; but, led away by the vaingloriousness of youth (and a propensity which I possessed in my early days, but of which I have long since corrected myself, to boast and talk in a manner not altogether consonant with truth), I invented a thousand stories which I told him; described the King and the Ministers to him, said the British Ambassador at Berlin was my uncle, and promised my acquaintance a letter of recommendation to him.

When the officer asked me my uncle's name, I was not able to give him the real name, and so said his name was O'Grady: it is as good a name as any other, and those of Kilballyowen, county Cork, are as good a family as any in the world, as I have heard.

As for stories about my regiment, of these, of course, I had no lack.