about eleven o’clock
We dined with the __ th , and , as customary before going to an evening party , took the `` other bottle '' of claret that lies beyond the frontier of prudence . In fact , from the lieutenant-colonel down to the newly-joined ensign , there was not a face in the party that did not betray `` signs of the times '' that boded most favourably for the mirth of the sheriff 's ball . We were so perfectly up to the mark , that our major , a Connemara man , said , as we left the mess-room , `` a liqueure glass would spoil us . '' In this acme of our intellectual wealth , we started about eleven o'clock upon every species of conveyance that chance could press into the service . Of hackney coaches there were few -- but in jingles , noddies , and jaunting-cars , with three on a side and `` one in the well , '' we mustered strong -- Down Barrack-street we galloped , the mob cheering us , we laughing , and I 'm afraid shouting a little , too -- the watchmen springing their rattles , as if instinctively at noise , and the whole population up and awake , evidently entertaining a high opinion of our convivial qualities . Our voices became gradually more decorous , however , as we approached the more civilized quarter of the town ; and with only the slight stoppage of the procession to pick up an occasional dropper-off , as he lapsed from the seat of a jaunting-car , we arrived at length at our host 's residence , somewhere in Sackville-street . Had our advent conferred the order of knighthood upon the host , he could not have received us with more `` empressement . ''