Page:English as we speak it in Ireland - Joyce.djvu/217

 202 When a man falls into error, not very serious or criminal—gets drunk accidentally for instance—the people will say, by way of extenuation:—‘’Tis a good man's case.’

You may be sure Tim will be at the fair to-morrow, dead or alive or a-horseback.

'You never spoke but you said something': said to a person who makes a silly remark or gives foolish advice. (Kinahan).

'He will never comb a grey hair': said of a young person who looks unhealthy and is likely to die early.

Two persons had an angry dispute; and one word borrowed another till at last they came to blows. Heard everywhere in Ireland.

The robin and the wren are God's cock and hen.

'I'll take the book and no thanks to you,' i.e. I'll take it in spite of you, whether you like or no, against your will—'I'll take it in spite of your teeth'—'in spite of your nose': all very common.

A person arrives barely in time for his purpose or to fulfil his engagement:—'You have just saved your distance.'

To put a person off the walk means to kill him, to remove him in some way. (Meath.)

A man has had a long fit of illness, and the wife, telling about it, says:—'For six weeks coal nor candle never went out.' (Antrim.)

'To cure a person's hiccup' means to make him submit, to bring him to his senses, to make him acknowledge his error, by some decided course of action. A shopkeeper goes to a customer for payment of a debt, and gets no satisfaction, but, on the