Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2

"It is now some fifteen years since if it wasn't for O'Shaughnessy's wrinkles, I could not believe it five we were quartered in Loughrea. There were, besides our regiment, the Fiftieth and the Seventy third, and a troop or two of horse artillery, and the whole town was literally a barrack, and as you may suppose, the pleasantest place imaginable. All the young ladies, and indeed all those that had got their brevet some years before, came flocking into the town, not knowing but the Devil might persuade a raw ensign or so to marry some of them.