A person not succeeding in approaching the house or spot he wants to reach; hitting wide of the mark in shooting; not coming to the point in argument or explanation:--'Oh you didn't come within the bray of an ass of it.' This is the echo of a very old custom. More than a thousand years ago distance was often vaguely measured in Ireland by sound. A man felling a tree was 'bound by the Brehon Law { 181} to give warning as far as his voice could reach,' so as to obviate danger to cattle or people. We find a like measure used in Donegal to this day:--[The Dublin house where you'll get the book to buy is on the Quays] 'about a mountain man's call below the Four Courts.' (Seumas MacManus.) The crow of a cock and the sound of a bell (i.e. the small hand-bell then used) as measures of distances are very often met with in ancient Irish writings. An old commentator on the Brehon Laws defines a certain distance to be 'as far as the sound of the bell or the crow of a barn-door cock could be heard. This custom also prevailed among other ancient nations. (See my 'Smaller Soc. Hist. of Anc. Ireland,' p. 473.)
_The 'Duty'._ Formerly all through Ireland the tenants were obliged to work for their landlords on a certain number of days free, except that they generally got food. Such work was commonly called in English the 'duty.' In Wicklow for example--until very recently--or possibly still--those who had horses had to draw home the landlord's turf on certain days. In Wexford they had in a similar way to draw stones for the embankments on the Barrow. The tenants commonly collected in numbers on the same day and worked all together. The Irish word used to designate such gatherings was _bal_--still so called in Connaught. It was usual to hear such English expressions as--'Are you going to the duty?' or 'Are you going to the bal?' (Kinahan.)
(N.B. I do not know the Irish word _bal_ in this sense, and cannot find it in the Dictionaries.)
'Duty' is used in a religious sense by Roman { 182} Catholics all through Ireland to designate the obligation on all Catholics to go to Confession and Holy Communion at Easter time. 'I am going to my duty, please God, next week.'
'I'll return you this book on next Saturday _as sure as the hearth-money_': a very common expression in Ireland. The old English oppressive impost called _hearth-money_--a tax on hearths--which every householder had to pay, was imported into Ireland by the English settlers. Like all other taxes it was certain to be called for and gathered at the proper time, so that our saying is an apt one; but while the bad old impost is gone, its memory is preserved in the everyday language of the people.