His favorite amusement was to invent some story or adventure in which, mixing up his own name with that of some friend or companion, the veracity of the whole was never questioned.

Of this nature was the pedigree he devised in the last chapter of Vol.

I.to impose upon O'Malley, who believed implicitly all he told him.] "You know the west, O'Mealey, so I needn't tell you what the Galway girls are like: fine, hearty, free-and-easy, talking, laughing devils, but as deep and 'cute as a Master in Chancery; ready for any fun or merriment, but always keeping a sly look-out for a proposal or a tender acknowledgment, which--what between the heat of a ball-room, whiskey negus, white satin shoes, and a quarrel with your guardian--it's ten to one you fall into before you're a week in the same town with them.
"As for the men, I don't admire them so much: pleasant and cheerful enough when they're handicapping the coat off your back, and your new tilbury for a spavined pony and a cotton umbrella, but regular devils if you come to cross them the least in life; nothing but ten paces, three shots apiece, to begin and end with something like Roger de Coverley, when every one has a pull at his neighbor.

I'm not saying they're not agreeable, well-informed, and mild in their habits; but they lean overmuch to corduroys and coroners' inquests for one's taste farther south.

However, they're a fine people, take them all in all; and if they were not interfered with, and their national customs invaded with road-making, petty-sessions, grand-jury laws, and a stray commission now and then, they are capable of great things, and would astonish the world.
"But as I was saying, we were ordered to Loughrea after being fifteen months in detachments about Birr, Tullamore, Kilbeggan, and all that country; the change was indeed a delightful one, and we soon found ourselves the centre of the most marked and determined civilities.