To a person who habitually uses unfortunate blundering expressions:--'You never open your mouth but you put your foot in it.'
A girl to express that it is unlikely she will ever be married says: 'I think, miss, my husband's intended mother died an old maid.' ('Penelope in Ireland.') { 129}
A young man speaking of his sweetheart says, in the words of the old song:--
'I love the ground she walks upon, _mavourneen gal mochree_' (thou fair love of my heart).
A conceited pompous fellow approaches:--'Here comes _half the town_!' A translation from the Irish _leath an bhaile_.
Billy Heffernan played on his fife a succession of jigs and reels that might 'cure a paralytic' [and set him dancing]. ('Knocknagow.')
In 'Knocknagow' Billy Heffernan being requested to play on his fife longer than he considered reasonable, asked did they think that he had the bellows of Jack Delany the blacksmith in his stomach?
Said of a great swearer:--'He'd swear a hole in an iron pot.'
Of another:--'He'd curse the bladder out of a goat.'
Of still another:--'He could quench a candle at the other side of the kitchen with a curse.'
A person is much puzzled, or is very much elated, or his mind is disturbed for any reason:--'He doesn't know whether it is on his head or his heels he's standing.
A penurious miserable creature who starves himself to hoard up:--He could live on the smell of an oil-rag. (Moran: Carlow.)
A man complaining that he has been left too long fasting says:--'My stomach will think that my throat is cut.' (MacCall: Wexford.)
'Do you like the new American bacon?' 'Oh not at all: I tried it once and that's enough for me: _I_ { 130} _wouldn't touch it with a tongs._' Very common and always used in depreciation as here.
We in Ireland are much inclined to redundancy in our speech. It is quite observable--especially to an outsider--that even in our ordinary conversation and in answering simple questions we use more words than we need. We hardly ever confine ourselves to the simple English _yes_ or _no_; we always answer by a statement. 'Is it raining, Kitty?' 'Oh no sir, it isn't raining at all.' 'Are you going to the fair to-day?' 'No indeed I am not.' 'Does your father keep on the old business still?' 'Oh yes certainly he does: how could he get on without it?' 'Did last night's storm injure your house?' 'Ah you may well say it did.' A very distinguished Dublin scholar and writer, having no conscious leanings whatever towards the Irish language, mentioned to me once that when he went on a visit to some friends in England they always observed this peculiarity in his conversation, and often laughed at his roundabout expressions. He remarked to me--and an acute remark it was--that he supposed there must be some peculiarity of this kind in the Irish language; in which conjecture he was quite correct. For this peculiarity of ours--like many others--is borrowed from the Irish language, as anyone may see for himself by looking through an Irish book of question and answer, such as a Catechism. 'Is the Son God?' 'Yes certainly He is.' 'Will God reward the good and punish the wicked?' 'Certainly: there is no doubt He will.' 'Did God always exist?' 'He did; because He has neither beginning nor end.' And questions and answers like these--from Donlevy's { 131} Irish Catechism for instance--might be given to any length.