Page:English as we speak it in Ireland - Joyce.djvu/47

32. But 'he laid up a supply of turf against the winter' is correct English as well as Anglo-Irish.

'And the cravat of hemp was surely spun Against the day when their race was run.' ('Touchstone' in 'Daily Mail.')

A very common inquiry when you meet a friend is:—'How are all your care?' Meaning chiefly your family, those persons that are under your care. This is merely a translation of the common Irish inquiry, Cionnos tá do chúram go léir?

A number of idiomatic expressions cluster round the word head, all of which are transplanted from Irish in the use of the Irish word ceann [cann] 'head'. Head is used to denote the cause, occasion, or motive of anything. 'Did he really walk that distance in a day?' Reply in Irish, Ní'l contabhairt air bith ann a cheann: 'there is no doubt at all on the head of it,' i.e. about it, in regard to it. 'He is a bad head to me,' i.e. he treats me badly. Merely the Irish is olc an ceann dom é. Bhi fearg air da chionn, he was vexed on the head of it.

A dismissed clerk says:—'I made a mistake in one of the books, and I was sent away on the head of that mistake.'

A very common phrase among us is, 'More's the pity':—'More's the pity that our friend William should be so afflicted.'

'More's the pity one so pretty As I should live alone.' (Anglo-Irish Folk-Song.)

This is a translation of a very common Irish expression as seen in:—Budh mhó an sgéile Diarmaid