Chapter XIII · (continued 2)

Hool or hooley; the same as a Black swop.

Hot-foot; at once, immediately:—'Off I went hot-foot.' 'As soon as James heard the news, he wrote a letter hot-foot to his father.'

Houghle; to wobble in walking. (Armagh.)

Hugger-mugger: see Cugger-mugger.

Huggers or hogars, stockings without feet. (Ulster.)

Hulk; a rough surly fellow. (Munster.) A bad person. (Simmons: Armagh.) Irish olc, bad.

Hungry-grass: see Fair-gurtha.

Hunker-slide; to slide on ice sitting on the hunkers (or as they would say in Munster, sitting on one's grug) instead of standing up straight: hence to act with duplicity: to shirk work:—'None of your hunker-sliding for me.' (Ulster.)

Hurling; the common game of ball and hurley or commaun. The chief terms (besides those mentioned elsewhere) are:—Puck, the blow of the hurley on the ball: The goals are the two gaps at opposite sides of the field through which the players try to drive the ball. When the ball is thrown high up between two players with their commauns ready drawn to try which will strike it on its way down: that is high-rothery. When two adjacent parishes or districts contended (instead of two small parties at an ordinary match), that was scoobeen or 'conquering goal' (Irish scuab, a broom: scoobeen, sweeping the ball away). I have seen at least 500 on each side engaged in one of these scoobeens; but that was in the time of the eight millions—before 1847. Sometimes there were bad blood and dangerous quarrels at scoobeens. See Borick, Sippy, Commaun, and Cool. (For the ancient terms see my 'Smaller Social History of Ancient Ireland,' p. 513.) For examples of these great contests, see Very Rev. Dr. Sheehan's 'Glenanaar,' pp. 4, 231.

Hurt: a whortleberry: hurts are fraughans, which see. From whort. (Munster.)

Husho or rather huzho; a lullaby, a nurse-song, a cradle-song; especially the chorus, consisting of a sleepy cronaun or croon—like 'shoheen-sho Loo-lo-lo,' &c. Irish suantraighe [soontree]. 'The moaning of a distant stream that kept up a continual cronane like a nurse hushoing.' 'My mother was hushoing my little sister, striving to quieten her.' (Both from Crofton Croker.) 'The murmur of the ocean huzhoed me to sleep.' (Irish Folk Song:—'M‘Kenna's Dream.')

Idioms; influence of the Irish language on, 4:—derived from Irish, 23.

If; often used in the sense of although, while, or some such signification, which will be best understood from the following examples:—A Dublin jarvey who got sixpence for a long drive, said in a rage:—'I'm in luck to-day; but if I am, 'tis blazing bad luck.' 'Bill ran into the house, and if he did, the other man seized him round the waist and threw him on his back.'

If that. This is old English, but has quite disappeared from the standard language of the present day, though still not unfrequently heard in Ireland:—'If that you go I'll go with you.'

Inagh´ or in-yah´ [both strongly accented on second syll.]; a satirical expression of dissent or disbelief, like the English forsooth, but much stronger. A fellow boasting says:—'I could run ten miles in an hour': and another replies, 'You could inah': meaning 'Of course I don't believe a word of it.' A man coming back from the other world says to a woman:—'I seen your [dead] husband there too, ma'am;' to which she replies:—'My husband inah.' (Gerald Griffin: 'Collegians.') Irish an eadh, same sound and meaning.

Inch; a long strip of level grassy land along a river. Very general. Irish inis [innish], of the same family as Lat. insula: but inis is older than insula which is a diminutive and consequently a derived form. 'James, go out and drive the cows down to the inch.'

Insense´; to make a person understand;—'I can't insense him into his letters.' 'I insensed him into the way the job was to be done.' [Accent on -sense´.]

In tow with; in close acquaintance with, courting. John is in tow with Jane Sullivan.

Ire, sometimes ira; children who go barefoot sometimes get ire in the feet; i.e. the skin chapped and very sore. Also an inflamed spot on the skin rendered sore by being rubbed with some coarse seam, &c.

Irish language; influence of, on our dialect, 1, 23.

Jackeen; a nickname for a conceited Dublin citizen of the lower class.

Jack Lattin, 172.

Jap or jop; to splash with mud. (Ulster.)

Jaw; impudent talk: jawing; scolding, abusing:—

Jingle; one of Bianconi's long cars.

Johnny Magorey; a hip or dog-haw; the fruit of the dog-rose. (Central and Eastern counties.)

Join; to begin at anything; 'the child joined to cry'; 'my leg joined to pain me'; 'the man joined to plough.' (North.)

Jokawn; an oaten stem cut off above the joint, with a tongue cut in it, which sounds a rude kind of music when blown by the mouth. (Limerick.) Irish geocán, same sound and meaning.

Jowlter, fish-jowlter; a person who hawks about fish through the country, to sell. (South.)

Just: often used as a final expletive—more in Ulster than elsewhere:—'Will you send anyone?' 'Yes, Tommy just.' 'Where are you going now?' 'To the fair just.'

Keenagh or keenagh-lee: mildew often seen on cheese, jam, &c. In a damp house everything gets covered with keenagh-lee. Irish caonach, moss; caonach-lee, mildew: lee is Irish liagh [lee], grey. (North and North-West of Ireland.)

Keeping: a man is on his keeping when he is hiding away from the police, who are on his track for some offence. This is from the Irish coiméad, keeping; air mo choiméad, 'on my keeping.'

Keeroge; a beetle or clock. Irish ciar [keer], dark, black, with the diminutive óg: keeroge, 'black little fellow.'

Kelters, money, coins: 'He has the kelthers,' said of a rich man. Yellow kelters, gold money: 'She has the kelthers': means she has a large fortune. (Moran: Carlow.)

Kemp or camp; to compete: two or more persons kemp against each other in any work to determine which will finish first. (Ulster.) See Carleton's story, 'The Rival Kempers.'

Keolaun; a contemptible little creature, boy or man. (South and West.)

Keowt; a low contemptible fellow.

Kepper; a slice of bread with butter, as distinguished from a dundon, which see.

Kesh; a rough bridge over a river or morass, made with poles, wickerwork, &c.—overlaid with bushes and scraws (green sods). Understood all through Ireland. A small one over a drain in a bog is often called in Tipperary and Waterford a kishoge, which is merely the diminutive.

Kib; to put down or plant potatoes, each seed in a separate hole made with a spade. Irish ciob, same sound and meaning.

Kickham, Charles, author of 'Knocknagow,' 5, &c.

Kiddhoge, a wrap of any kind that a woman throws hastily over her shoulders. (Ulster.) Irish cuideóg, same sound and sense here.

Kilfinane, Co. Limerick, 147.

Killeen; a quantity:—'That girl has a good killeen of money. (Ulster.) Irish cillín [killeen].

Killeen; an old churchyard disused except for the occasional burial of unbaptised infants. Irish cill, a church, with the diminutive ín.

Kimmeen; a sly deceitful trick; kimmeens or kymeens, small crooked ways:—'Sure you're not equal to the kimmeens of such complete deceivers at all at all.' (Sam Lover in Ir. Pen. Mag.) Irish com, crooked; diminutive cuimín [kimmeen].

Kimmel-a-vauleen; uproarious fun. Irish cimel-a'-mháilín, literally 'rub-the-bag.' There is a fine Irish jig with this name. (South.)

Kink; a knot or short twist in a cord.

Kink; a fit of coughing or laughing: 'they were in kinks of laughing.' Hence chincough, for whooping-cough, i.e. kink-cough. I know a holy well that has the reputation of curing whooping-cough, and hence called the 'Kink-well.'

Kinleen or keenleen, or kine-leen; a single straw or corn stem. (South.) Irish caoinlín, same sound.

Kinleen-roe; an icicle: the same word as last with the addition of reo [roe], frost: 'frost-stem.'

Kinnatt´, [1st syll. very short; accent on 2nd syll.: to rhyme with cat]; an impertinent conceited impudent little puppy.

Kippen or kippeen; any little bit of stick: often used as a sort of pet name for a formidable cudgel or shillelah for fighting. Irish cip [kip], a stake or stock, with the diminutive.

Kish; a large square basket made of wattles and wickerwork used for measuring turf or for holding turf on a cart. Sometimes (South) called a kishaun. Irish cis or ciseán, same sounds and meanings: also called kishagh.

Kishtha; a treasure: very common in Connaught, where it is often understood to be hidden treasure in a fort under the care of a leprachaun. Irish ciste, same sound and meaning.

Kitchen; any condiment or relish eaten with the plain food of a meal, such as butter, dripping, &c. A very common saying in Tyrone against any tiresome repetition is:—'Butter to butter is no kitchen.' As a verb; to use sparingly, to economise:—'Now kitchen that bit of bacon for you have no more.'

Kitthoge or kitthagh; a left-handed person. Understood through all Ireland. Irish ciotóg, ciotach, same sounds and meaning.

Kitterdy; a simpleton, a fool. (Ulster.)

Knauvshauling [the k sounded distinctly]; grumbling, scolding, muttering complaints. (Limerick.) From Irish cnamh [knauv: k sounded], a bone, the jawbone. The underlying idea is the same as when we speak of a person giving jaw. See Jaw.

'Knocknagow ': see Kickham.

Kybosh; some sort of difficulty or 'fix':—'He put the kybosh on him: he defeated him.' (Moran: Carlow.)

Kyraun, keeraun; a small bit broken off from a sod of turf. Irish caor, or with the diminutive, caorán, same sound and meaning.

Laaban; a rotten sterile egg (Morris: for South Monaghan): same as Glugger, which see. Irish láb or láib, mire, dirt, with diminutive.

Lad; a mischievous tricky fellow:—'There's no standing them lads.' (Gerald Griffin.)

Lagheryman or Logheryman. (Ulster.) Same as Leprachaun, which see.

Lambaisting; a sound beating. Quite common in Munster.

Langel; to tie the fore and the hind leg of a cow or goat with a spancel or fetter to prevent it going over fences. (Ulster.) Irish langal, same sound and meaning.

Lapcock; an armful or roll of grass laid down on the sward to dry for hay. (Ulster.)

Lark-heeled; applied to a person having long sharp heels. See Saulavotcheer.

Larrup; to wallop, to beat soundly. (Donegal and South.)

Lashings, plenty: lashings and leavings, plenty and to spare: specially applied to food at meals. (General.)

Lassog, a blaze of light. (Morris: South Monaghan.) From Irish las, light, with the diminutive.

Lauchy; applied to a person in the sense of pleasant, good-natured, lovable. Irish láchaiidhe, same sound and sense. (Banim: general in the South.) 'He's a lauchy boy.'

Laudy-daw; a pretentious fellow that sets up to be a great swell. (Moran: Carlow; and South.)

Launa-vaula; full and plenty:—There was launa-vaula at the dinner. Irish lán-a-mhála (same sound), 'full bags.'

Lazy man's load. A lazy man takes too many things in one load to save the trouble of going twice, and thereby often lets them fall and breaks them.

Learn is used for teach all over Ireland, but more in Ulster than elsewhere. Don't forget to 'larn the little girl her catechiz.' (Seumas Mac Manus.) An old English usage: but dead and gone in England now.

Leather; to beat:—'I gave him a good leathering,' i.e., a beating, a thrashing. This is not derived, as might be supposed, from the English word leather (tanned skin), but from Irish, in which it is of very old standing:—Letrad (modern leadradh), cutting, hacking, lacerating: also a champion fighter, a warrior, a leatherer. (Corm. Gloss.—9th cent.) Used all through Ireland.

Leather-wing; a bat. (South.)

Lee, the Very Rev. Patrick, V. F., of Kilfinane, 148.

Lebbidha; an awkward, blundering, half-fool of a fellow. (South.) Irish leibide, same sound and meaning.

Leg bail; a person gives (or takes) leg bail when he runs away, absconds. (General.)

Lend; loan. Ned came 'for the lend of the ould mare.' ('Knocknagow.') Often used in the following way:—'Come and lend a hand,' i.e., give some help. 'Our shooting party comes off to-morrow: will you lend your gun': an invitation to join the party. (Kinahan.)

Leprachaun; a sort of fairy, called by several names in different parts of Ireland:—luricaun, cluricaun, lurragadaun, loghryman, luprachaun. This last is the nearest to the Gaelic original, all the preceding anglicised forms being derived from it. Luprachaun itself is derived by a metathesis from Irish luchorpán, from lu, little, and corpán, the dim. of corp, a body:—'weeny little body.' The reader will understand all about this merry little chap from the following short note and song written by me and extracted from my 'Ancient Irish Music' (in which the air also will be found). The leprachaun is a very tricky little fellow, usually dressed in a green coat, red cap, and knee-breeches, and silver shoe-buckles, whom you may sometimes see in the shades of evening, or by moonlight, under a bush; and he is generally making or mending a shoe: moreover, like almost all fairies, he would give the world for pottheen. If you catch him and hold him, he will, after a little threatening, show you where treasure is hid, or give you a purse in which you will always find money. But if you once take your eyes off him, he is gone in an instant; and he is very ingenious in devising tricks to induce you to look round. It is very hard to catch a leprachaun, and still harder to hold him. I never heard of any man who succeeded in getting treasure from him, except one, a lucky young fellow named MacCarthy, who, according to the peasantry, built the castle of Carrigadrohid near Macroom in Cork with the money. Every Irishman understands well the terms cruiskeen and mountain dew, some indeed a little too well; but for the benefit of the rest of the world, I think it better to state that a cruískeen is a small jar, and that mountain dew is pottheen or illicit whiskey.

Let out; a spree, an entertainment. (General.) 'Mrs. Williams gave a great let out.'

Libber; this has much the same meaning as flipper, which see: an untidy person careless about his dress and appearance—an easy-going ould sthreel of a man. I have heard an old fellow say, regarding those that went before him—father, grandfather, &c.—that they were 'ould aancient libbers,' which is the Irish peasant's way of expressing Gray's 'rude forefathers of the hamlet.'

Lief; willing: 'I had as lief be working as not.' 'I had liefer': I had rather. (General.) This is an old English word, now fallen out of use in England, but common here.

Lifter; a beast that is so weak from starvation (chiefly in March when grass is withered up) that it can hardly stand and has to be lifted home from the hill-pasture to the stable. (Kinahan: Connemara.)

Light; a little touched in the head, a little crazed:—'Begor sir if you say I know nothing about sticks your head must be getting light in earnest.' (Robert Dwyer Joyce.)

Likely; well-looking: 'a likely girl'; 'a clane likely boy.'

Likes; 'the likes of you': persons or a person like you or in your condition. Very common in Ireland. 'I'll not have any dealings with the likes of him.' Colonel Lake, Inspector General of Constabulary in last century, one afternoon met one of his recruits on the North Circular Road, Dublin, showing signs of liquor, and stopped him. 'Well, my good fellow, what is your name please?' The recruit replied:—'Who are you, and what right have you to ask my name?' 'I am Colonel Lake, your inspector general.' The recruit eyed him closely:—'Oh begor your honour, if that's the case it's not right for the likes of me to be talking to the likes of you': on which he turned round and took leg bail on the spot like a deer, leaving the inspector general standing on the pathway. The Colonel often afterwards told that story with great relish.

Linnaun-shee or more correct Lannaun-shee; a familiar spirit or fairy that attaches itself to a mortal and follows him. From Irish leannán, a lover, and sídh [shee], a fairy: lannaun-shee, 'fairy-lover.'

Linnie; a long shed—a sort of barn—attached to a a farm house for holding farm-yard goods and articles of various kinds—carts, spades, turnips, corn, &c. (Munster.) Irish lann-iotha, lit. 'corn-house.'

Lint; in Ulster, a name for flax.

Linthern or lenthern; a small drain or sewer covered with flags for the passage of water, often under a road from side to side. (Munster.) Irish lintreán, linntreach [lintran, lintragh].

Liscauns; gleanings of corn from the field after reaping: 'There's Mary gathering liscauns.' (South.) Irish.

Loanen; a lane, a bohereen. (Ulster.)

Lob; a quantity, especially of money or of any valuable commodity:—''Tis reported that Jack got a great lob of money with his wife.' A person is trying to make himself out very useful or of much consequence, and another says satirically—generally in play:—'Oh what a lob you are!'

Lock; a quantity or batch of anything—generally small:—a lock of straw; a lock of sheep. (General.)

Logey; heavy or fat as applied to a person. (Moran: Carlow.) Also the fireplace in a flax-kiln.

Lone; unmarried:—'A lone man'; 'a lone woman.'

Long family; a common expression for a large family.

Lood, loodh, lude; ashamed: 'he was lude of himself when he was found out.' (South.)

Loody; a loose heavy frieze coat. (Munster.)

Loof; the open hand, the palm of the hand. (Ulster.) Irish lámh [lauv], the hand.

Loo-oge or lu-oge; the eel-fry a couple of inches long that come up the southern Blackwater periodically in myriads, and are caught and sold as food. (Waterford: Healy.) Irish luadhóg, same sound and meaning.

Loose leg; when a person is free from any engagement or impediment that bound him down—'he has a loose leg'—free to act as he likes. 'I have retired from the service with a pension, so that now I have a loose leg.' The same is often said of a prisoner discharged from jail.

Lord; applied as a nickname to a hunchback. The hunchback Danny Mann in 'The Collegians' is often called 'Danny the lord.'

Losset; a kneading tray for making cakes.

Lossagh; a sudden blaze from a turf fire. Irish las [loss], a blaze, with the usual termination ach.

Lossoge; a handful or little bundle of sticks for firing. (Mayo.) Irish las [loss], fire, a blaze, with the diminutive termination.

Low-backed car; a sort of car common in the southern half of Ireland down to the middle of the last century, used to bring the country people and their farm produce to markets. Resting on the shafts was a long flat platform placed lengthwise and sloping slightly downwards towards the back, on which were passengers and goods. Called trottle-car in Derry.

Loy; a spade. Used in the middle of Ireland all across from shore to shore. Irish láighe, same sound and meaning.

Luck-penny; a coin given by the seller to the buyer after a bargain has been concluded: given to make sure that the buyer will have luck with the animal or article he buys.

Ludeen or loodeen [d sounded like th in then]; the little finger. Irish lúidín, same sound and meaning. From lu, little, with the diminutive termination.

Lu-oge: see Loo-oge.

Luscan; a spot on the hillside from which the furze and heath have been burned off. (Wicklow and round about.) From Irish losc to burn: luscan, 'burned little spot.'

Lusmore; fairy-thimble, fairy-finger, foxglove, Digitalis purpurea; an herb of mighty power in fairy lore. Irish lus, herb; mór, great; 'mighty herb.'

Lybe; a lazy fellow. (MacCall: Wex.) See Libber.

Lyre; the full of the two hands used together: a beggar usually got a lyre of potatoes. (Munster: same as gopen in Ulster.) Irish ladhar, same sound and meaning.

MacManus, Seumas, 5, &c.

Mad; angry. There are certain Irish words, such as buileamhail, which might denote either mad or very angry: hence in English you very often hear:—'Oh the master is very mad with you,' i.e. angry. 'Excessively angry' is often expressed this way in dialect language:—'The master is blazing mad about that accident to the mare.' But even this expression is classical Irish; for we read in the Irish Bible that Moses went away from Pharaoh, air lasadh le feírg, 'blazing with anger.' 'Like mad' is often used to denote very quickly or energetically: Crofton Croker speaks of people who were 'dancing like mad.' This expression is constantly heard in Munster.

Maddha-brishtha; an improvised tongs, such as would be used with a fire in the fields, made from a strong twig bent sharp. (Derry.) Irish maide [maddha], a stick; briste, broken:—'broken stick.'

Maddhiaghs or muddiaghs; same as last, meaning simply 'sticks': the two ends giving the idea of plurality. (Armagh.)

Maddhoge or middhoge; a dagger. (North and South.) Irish meadóg or miodóg.

Made; fortunate:—'I'm a made man' (or 'a med man'), meaning 'my fortune is made.' (Crofton Croker—but used very generally.)

Mag; a swoon:—'Light of grace,' she exclaimed, dropping in a mag on the floor. (Edward Walsh: used all over Munster.)

Maisled; speckled; a lazy young fellow's shins get maisled from sitting before the fire. (Knowles: Ulster.)

Make; used in the South in the following way:—'This will make a fine day': 'That cloth will make a fine coat': 'If that fellow was shaved he'd make a handsome young man' (Irish folk-song): 'That Joe of yours is a clever fellow: no doubt he'll make a splendid doctor.' The noun makings is applied similarly:—'That young fellow is the makings of a great scholar.'

Man above. In Irish God is often designated an Fear suas or an t-É suas ('the Man above,' 'the Person above'): thus in Hardiman's 'Irish Minstrelsy' (I. 228):—Comarc an t-É tá shuas ort: 'the protection of the Person who is above be on thee': an Fear suas occurs in the Ossianic Poems. Hence they use this term all through the South:—'As cunning as he is he can't hide his knavery from the Man above.'

Man in the gap, 182.

Mankeeper; used North and South as the English name of the little lizard called in Irish 'Art-loochra,' which see.

Mannam; my soul: Irish m'anam, same sound and meaning:—'Mannam on ye,' used as an affectionate exclamation to a child. (Scott: Derry.)

Many; 'too many' is often used in the following way, when two persons were in rivalry of any kind, whether of wit, of learning, or of strength:—'James was too many for Dick,' meaning he was an overmatch for him.

Maol, Mail, Maileen, Moileen, Moilie (these two last forms common in Ulster; the others elsewhere); a hornless cow. Irish Maol [mwail], same meaning. Quite a familiar word all through Ireland.

One night Jacky was sent out, much against his will, for an armful of turf, as the fire was getting low; and in a moment afterwards, the startled family heard frantic yells. Just as they jumped up Jacky rushed in still yelling with his whole throat.

'What's the matter—what's wrong!'

'Oh I saw the divel!'

'No you didn't, you fool, 'twas something else you saw.'

'No it wasn't, 'twas the divel I saw—didn't I know him well!'

'How did you know him—did you see his horns?'

'I didn't: he had no horns—he was a mwail divel—sure that's how I knew him!'

They ran out of course; but the mwail divel was gone, leaving behind him, standing up against the turf-rick, the black little Maol Kerry cow.

Margamore; the 'Great Market' held in Derry immediately before Christmas or Easter. (Derry.) Irish margadh [marga], a market, mór [more], great.

Martheen; a stocking with the foot cut off. (Derry.) Irish mairtín, same sound and meaning. Martheens are what they call in Munster triheens, which see.

Mass, celebration of, 144.

Mau-galore; nearly drunk: Irish maith [mau], good: go leór, plenty: 'purty well I thank you,' as the people often say: meaning almost the same as Burns's 'I was na fou but just had plenty.' (Common in Munster.)

Mauleen; a little bag: usually applied in the South to the little sack slung over the shoulder of a potato-planter, filled with the potato-sets (or skillauns), from which the setter takes them one by one to plant them. In Ulster and Scotland, the word is mailin, which is sometimes applied to a purse:—'A mailin plenished (filled) fairly.' (Burns.)

Maum; the full of the two hands used together (Kerry); the same as Lyre and Gopan, which see. Irish Mám, same sound and meaning.

Mavourneen; my love. (Used all through Ireland.) Irish Mo-mhúirnín, same sound and meaning. See Avourneen.

May-day customs, 170.

Méaracaun [mairacaun]; a thimble. Merely the Irish méaracán, same sound and meaning: from méar, a finger, with the diminutive termination cán. Applied in the South to the fairy-thimble or foxglove, with usually a qualifying word:—Mearacaun-shee (shee, a fairy—fairy thimble) or Mearacaun-na-man-shee (where na-man-shee is the Irish na-mban-sidhe, of the banshees or fairy-women). 'Lusmore,' another name, which see.

Mearing; a well-marked boundary—but not necessarily a raised ditch—a fence between two farms, or two fields, or two bogs. Old English.

Mease: a measure for small fish, especially herrings:—'The fisherman brought in ten mease of herrings.' Used all round the Irish coast. It is the Irish word mías [meece], a dish.

Mee-aw; a general name for the potato blight. Irish mí-adh [mee-aw], ill luck: from Irish mí, bad, and ádh, luck. But mee-aw is also used to designate 'misfortune' in general.

Meela-murder; 'a thousand murders': a general exclamation of surprise, alarm, or regret. The first part is Irish—míle [meela], a thousand; the second is of course English.

Meelcar´ [car long like the English word car]; also called meelcartan; a red itchy sore on the sole of the foot just at the edge. It is believed by the people to be caused by a red little flesh-worm, and hence the name míol [meel], a worm, and cearr [car], an old Irish word for red:—Meel-car, 'red-worm.' (North and South.)

Meeraw; ill luck. (Munster.) From Irish mí, ill, and ráth [raw], luck:—'There was some meeraw on the family.

Melder of corn; the quantity sent to the mill and ground at one time. (Ulster.)

Memory of History and of Old Customs, 143.

Merrow; a mermaid. Irish murrughagh [murrooa], from muir, the sea. She dives and travels under sea by means of a hood and cape called cohuleen-dru: cochall, a hood and cape (with diminutive termination); druádh, druidical: 'magical cape.'

Midjilinn or middhilin; the thong of a flail. (Morris: South Monaghan.)

Mihul or mehul [i and e short]; a number of men engaged in any farm-work, especially corn-reaping, still used in the South and West. It is the very old Irish word meithel, same sound and meaning.

Mills. The old English game of 'nine men's morris' or 'nine men's merrils' or mills was practised in my native place when I was a boy. We played it on a diagram of three squares one within another, connected by certain straight lines, each player having nine counters. It is mentioned by Shakespeare ('Midsummer-Night's Dream'). I learned to be a good player, and could play it still if I could meet an antagonist. How it reached Limerick I do not know. A few years ago I saw two persons playing mills in a hotel in Llandudno; and my heart went out to them.

Mind; often used in this way:—'Will you write that letter to-day?' 'No: I won't mind it to-day: I'll write it to-morrow.'

Minnikin; a very small pin.

Minister; always applied in Ireland to a Protestant clergyman.

Miscaun, mescaun, mescan, miscan; a roll or lump of butter. Irish mioscán [miscaun]. Used all over Ireland.

Mitch; to play truant from school.

Mitchelstown, Co. Cork, 155.

Moanthaun; boggy land. Moantheen; a little bog. (Munster.) Both dims. of Irish móin, a bog.

Molly; a man who busies himself about women's affairs or does work that properly belongs to women. (Leinster.) Same as sheela in the South.

Moneen; a little moan or bog; a green spot in a bog where games are played. Also a sort of jig dance-tune: so called because often danced on a green moneen. (Munster.)

Month's Mind; Mass and a general memorial service for the repose of the soul of a person, celebrated a month after death. The term was in common use in England until the change of religion at the Reformation; and now it is not known even to English Roman Catholics. (Woollett.) It is in constant use in Ireland, and I think among Irish Catholics everywhere. But the practice is kept up by Catholics all over the world. Mind, 'Memory.'

Mootch: to move about slowly and meaninglessly: without intelligence. A mootch is a slow stupid person. (South.)

Moretimes; often used as corresponding to sometimes: 'Sometimes she employs herself at sewing, and moretimes at knitting.'

Mor-yah; a derisive expression of dissent to drive home the untruthfulness of some assertion or supposition or pretence, something like the English 'forsooth,' but infinitely stronger:—A notorious schemer and cheat puts on airs of piety in the chapel and thumps his breast in great style; and a spectator says:—Oh how pious and holy Joe is growing—mar-yah! 'Mick is a great patriot, mor-yah!—he'd sell his country for half a crown.' Irish mar-sheadh [same sound], 'as it were.'

Mossa; a sort of assertive particle used at the opening of a sentence, like the English well, indeed: carrying little or no meaning. 'Do you like your new house?'—'Mossa I don't like it much.' Another form of wisha, and both anglicised from the Irish má'seadh, used in Irish in much the same sense.

Mountain dew; a fanciful and sort of pet name for pottheen whiskey: usually made in the mountains.

Mounthagh, mounthaun; a toothless person. (Munster.) From the Irish mant [mounth], the gum, with the terminations. Both words are equivalent to gummy, a person whose mouth is all gums.

Moutre. In very old times a mill-owner commonly received as payment for grinding corn one-tenth of the corn ground—in accordance with the Brehon Law. This custom continued to recent times—and probably continues still—in Ulster, where the quantity given to the miller is called moutre, or muter, or mooter.

Mulharten; a flesh-worm: a form of meelcartan. See Meelcar.

Mullaberta; arbitration. (Munster.) Merely the Irish moladh-beirte, same sound and meaning: in which moladh [mulla] is 'appraisement'; and beirtĕ, gen. of beart, 'two persons':—lit. 'appraisement of two.' The word mullaberta has however in recent times drifted to mean a loose unbusinesslike settlement. (Healy.)

Mummers, 171.

Murray, Mr. Patrick, schoolmaster of Kilfinane, 153, 154, and under 'Roasters,' below.

Murrogh O'Brien, Earl of Inchiquin, 165.

Musicianer for musician is much in use all over Ireland. Of English origin, and used by several old English writers, among others by Collier.

Nab; a knowing old-fashioned little fellow. (Derry.)

Naboc´lesh; never mind. (North and South.) Irish ná-bac-leis (same sound), 'do not stop to mind it,' or 'pass it over.'

Nail, paying on the nail, 183.

Naygur; a form of niggard: a wretched miser:—

Nicely: often used in Ireland as shown here:— 'Well, how is your [sick] mother to-day?' 'Oh she's nicely,' or 'doing nicely, thank you'; i.e. getting on very well—satisfactorily. A still stronger word is bravely. 'She's doing bravely this morning'; i.e. extremely well—better than was expected.

Nim or nym; a small bit of anything. (Ulster.)

Noggin; a small vessel, now understood to hold two glasses; also called naggin. Irish noigín.

Nose; to pay through the nose; to pay and be made to pay, against your grain, the full sum without delay or mitigation.

Oanshagh; a female fool, corresponding with omadaun, a male fool. Irish óinseach, same sound and meaning: from ón, a fool, and seach, the feminine termination.

Offer; an attempt:—'I made an offer to leap the fence but failed.'

Old English, influence of, on our dialect, 6.

Oliver's summons, 184.

On or upon; in addition to its functions as explained at pp. 27, 28, it is used to express obligation:— 'Now I put it upon you to give Bill that message for me': one person meeting another on Christmas Day says:—'My Christmas box on you,' i.e. 'I put it as an obligation on you to give me a Christmas box.'

Once; often used in this manner:—'Once he promises he'll do it' (Hayden and Hartog): 'Once you pay the money you are free,' i.e. if or when you pay.

O'Neills and their war-cry, 179.

Oshin [sounded nearly the same as the English word ocean]; a weakly creature who cannot do his fair share of work. (Innishowen, Donegal.)

Out; used, in speaking of time, in the sense of down or subsequently:—'His wife led him a mighty uneasy life from the day they married out.' (Gerald Griffin: Munster.) 'You'll pay rent for your house for the first seven years, and you will have it free from that out.'

Out; to call a person out of his name is to call him by a wrong name.

Out; 'be off out of that' means simply go away.

Out; 'I am out with him' means I am not on terms with him—I have fallen out with him.

Overright; opposite, in front of: the same meaning as forenenst; but forenenst is English, while overright is a wrong translation from an Irish word—ós-cómhair. Os means over, and comhair opposite: but this last word was taken by speakers to be cóir (for both are sounded alike), and as cóir means right or just, so they translated os-comhair as if it were ós-cóir, 'over-right.' (Russell: Munster.)

Paddhereen; a prayer: dim. of Latin Pater (Pater Noster). Paddereen Paurtagh, the Rosary: from Irish páirteach, sharing or partaking: because usually several join in it.

Páideóge [paudh-yoge]; a torch made of a wick dipped in melted rosin (Munster): what they call a slut in Ulster.

Paghil or pahil; a lump or bundle, 108. (Ulster.)

Palatines, 65.

Palleen; a rag: a torn coat is 'all in paleens.' (Derry.)

Palm; the yew-tree, 184.

Pampooty; a shoe made of untanned hide. (West.)

Pandy; potatoes mashed up with milk and butter. (Munster.)

Pannikin; now applied to a small tin drinking-vessel: an old English word that has fallen out of use in England, but is still current in Ireland: applied down to last century to a small earthenware pot used for boiling food. These little vessels were made at Youghal and Ardmore (Co. Waterford). The earthenware pannikins have disappeared, their place being supplied by tinware. (Kinahan.)

Parisheen; a foundling; one brought up in childhood by the parish. (Kildare.)

Parson; was formerly applied to a Catholic parish priest: but in Ireland it now always means a Protestant minister.

Parthan; a crab-fish. (Donegal.) Merely the Irish partan, same sound and meaning.

Parts; districts, territories:—'Prince and plinnypinnytinshary of these parts' (King O'Toole and St. Kevin): 'Welcome to these parts.' (Crofton Croker.)

Past; 'I wouldn't put it past him,' i.e. I think him bad or foolish enough (to do it).

Past; more than: 'Our landlord's face we rarely see past once in seven years'—Irish Folk Song.

Pattern (i.e. patron); a gathering at a holy well or other relic of a saint on his or her festival day, to pray and perform rounds and other devotional acts in honour of the patron saint. (General.)

Pattha; a pet, applied to a young person who is brought up over tenderly and indulged too much:—'What a pattha you are!' This is an extension of meaning; for the Irish peata [pattha] means merely a pet, nothing more.

Pelt; the skin:—'He is in his pelt,' i.e. naked.

Penal Laws, 144, and elsewhere through the book.

Personable; comely, well-looking, handsome:—'Diarmid Bawn the piper, as personable a looking man as any in the five parishes.' (Crofton Croker: Munster.)

Pickey; a round flat little stone used by children in playing transe or Scotch-hop. (Limerick.)

Piggin; a wooden drinking-vessel. It is now called pigín in Irish; but it is of English origin.

Pike; a pitchfork; commonly applied to one with two prongs. (Munster.)

Pike or croppy-pike; the favourite weapon of the rebels of 1798: it was fixed on a very long handle, and had combined in one head a long sharp spear, a small axe, and a hook for catching the enemy's horse-reins.

Pillibeen or pillibeen-meeg; a plover. (Munster.) 'I'm king of Munster when I'm in the bog, and the pillibeens whistling about me.' ('Knocknagow.') Irish pilibín-míog, same sound and meaning.

Pindy flour; flour that has begun to ferment slightly on account of being kept in a warm moist place. Cakes made from it were uneatable as they were soft and clammy and slightly sour. (Limerick.)

Pinkeen; a little fish, a stickleback: plentiful in small streams. Irish pincín, same sound and meaning. See Scaghler.

Piper's invitation; 'He came on the piper's invitation,' i.e. uninvited. (Cork.) A translation of Irish cuireadh-píobaire [curra-peebara]. Pipers sometimes visited the houses of well-to-do people and played—to the great delight of the boys and girls—and they were sure to be well treated. But that custom is long since dead and gone.

Pishminnaan´ [the aa long as a in car]; common wild peas. (Munster.) They are much smaller—both plant and peas—than the cultivated pea, whence the above anglicised name, which has the same sound as the Irish pise-mionnáin, 'kid's peas.'

Pishmool; a pismire, an ant. (Ulster.)

Pishoge, pisheroge, pishthroge; a charm, a spell, witchcraft:—'It is reported that someone took Mrs. O'Brien's butter from her by pishoges.'

Place; very generally used for house, home, homestead:—'If ever you come to Tipperary I shall be very glad to see you at my place.' This is a usage of the Irish language; for the word baile [bally], which is now used for home, means also, and in an old sense, a place, a spot, without any reference to home.

Plaikeen; an old shawl, an old cloak, any old covering or wrap worn round the shoulders. (South.)

Plantation; a colony from England or Scotland settled down or planted in former times in a district in Ireland from which the rightful old Irish owners were expelled, 7, 169, 170.

Plaumause [to rhyme with sauce]; soft talk, plausible speech, flattery—conveying the idea of insincerity. (South.) Irish plámás, same sound and meaning.

Plauzy; full of soft, flattering, plausible talk. Hence the noun pláusoge [plauss-oge], a person who is plauzy. (South.)

Plerauca; great fun and noisy revelry. Irish pléaráca, same sound and meaning.

Pluddogh; dirty water. (MacCall: Wexford.) From Irish plod [pludh], a pool of dirty water, with the termination ach.

Pluvaun; a kind of soft weed that grows excessively on tilled moory lands and chokes the crop. (Moran: Carlow.)

Poll-talk; backbiting: from the poll of the head: the idea being the same as in backbiting.

Polthogue; a blow; a blow with the fist. Irish palltóg, same sound and meaning.

Pooka; a sort of fairy: a mischievous and often malignant goblin that generally appears in the form of a horse, but sometimes as a bull, a buck-goat, &c. The great ambition of the pooka horse is to get some unfortunate wight on his back; and then he gallops furiously through bogs, marshes, and woods, over rocks, glens, and precipices; till at last when the poor wretch on his back is nearly dead with terror and fatigue, the pooka pitches him into some quagmire or pool or briar-brake, leaving him to extricate himself as best he can. But the goblin does not do worse: he does not kill people. Irish púca. Shakespeare has immortalised him as Puck, the goblin of 'A Midsummer-Night's Dream.'

Pookapyle, also called Pookaun; a sort of large fungus, the toadstool. Called also causha pooka. All these names imply that the Pooka has something to do with this poisonous fungus. See Causha-pooka (pooka's cheese).

Pookeen; a play—blindman's buff: from Irish púic, a veil or covering, from the covering put over the eyes. Pookeen is also applied in Cork to a cloth muzzle tied on calves or lambs to prevent sucking the mother. The face-covering for blindman's buff is called pookoge, in which the dim. óg is used instead of ín or een. The old-fashioned coal-scuttle bonnets of long ago that nearly covered the face were often called pookeen bonnets. It was of a bonnet of this kind that the young man in Lover's song of 'Molly Carew' speaks:—

because it hid Molly's face from him.

Poor mouth; making the poor mouth is trying to persuade people you are very poor—making out or pretending that you are poor.

Poor scholars, 151, 157.

Poreens; very small potatoes—mere crachauns (which see)—any small things, such as marbles, &c. (South: porrans in Ulster.)

Porter-meal: oatmeal mixed with porter. Seventy or eighty years ago, the carters who carried bags of oatmeal from Limerick to Cork (a two-day journey) usually rested for the night at Mick Lynch's public-house in Glenosheen. They often took lunch or dinner of porter-meal in this way:—Opening the end of one of the bags, the man made a hollow in the oatmeal into which he poured a quart of porter, stirring it up with a spoon: then he ate an immense bellyful of the mixture. But those fellows could digest like an ostrich.

In Ulster, oatmeal mixed in this manner with buttermilk, hot broth, &c., and eaten with a spoon, is called croudy.

Potthalowng; an awkward unfortunate mishap, not very serious, but coming just at the wrong time. When I was a boy 'Jack Mullowney's potthalowng' had passed into a proverb. Jack one time went courting, that is, to spend a pleasant evening with the young lady at the house of his prospective father-in-law, and to make up the match with the old couple. He wore his best of course, body-coat, white waistcoat, caroline hat (tall silk), and ducks (ducks, snow-white canvas trousers.) All sat down to a grand dinner given in his honour, the young couple side by side. Jack's plate was heaped up with beautiful bacon and turkey, and white cabbage swimming in fat, that would make you lick your lips to look at it. Poor Jack was a bit sheepish; for there was a good deal of banter, as there always is on such occasions. He drew over his plate to the very edge of the table; and in trying to manage a turkey bone with knife and fork, he turned the plate right over into his lap, down on the ducks.

The marriage came off all the same; but the story went round the country like wildfire; and for many a long day Jack had to stand the jokes of his friends on the potthalowng. Used in Munster. The Irish is patalong, same sound and meaning; but I do not find it in the dictionaries.

Pottheen; illicit whiskey: always distilled in some remote lonely place, as far away as possible from the nose of a gauger. It is the Irish word poitín [pottheen], little pot. We have partly the same term still; for everyone knows the celebrity of pot-still whiskey: but this is Parliament whiskey, not pottheen, see p. 174.

Power; a large quantity, a great deal: Jack Hickey has a power of money: there was a power of cattle in the fair yesterday: there's a power of ivy on that old castle. Miss Grey, a small huckster who kept a little vegetable shop, was one day showing off her rings and bracelets to our servant. 'Oh Miss Grey,' says the girl, 'haven't you a terrible lot of them.' 'Well Ellen, you see I want them all, for I go into a power of society.' This is an old English usage as is shown by this extract from Spenser's 'View':—'Hee also [Robert Bruce] sent over his said brother Edward, with a power of Scottes and Red-Shankes into Ireland.' There is a corresponding Irish expression (neart airgid, a power of money), but I think this is translated from English rather than the reverse. The same idiom exists in Latin with the word vis (power): but examples will not be quoted, as they would take up a power of space.

Powter [t sounded like th in pith]; to root the ground like a pig; to root up potatoes from the ground with the hands. (Derry.)

Prashagh, more commonly called prashagh-wee; wild cabbage with yellow blossoms, the rape plant. Irish praiseach-bhuidhe [prashagh-wee], yellow cabbage. Praiseach is borrowed from Latin brassica.

Prashameen; a little group all clustered together:—'The children sat in a prashameen on the floor.' I have heard this word a hundred times in Limerick among English speakers: its Irish form should be praisimín, but I do not find it in the dictionaries.

Prashkeen; an apron. Common all over Ireland. Irish praiscín, same sound and meaning.

Prawkeen; raw oatmeal and milk (MacCall: South Leinster.) See Porter-meal.

Prepositions, incorrect use of, 26, 32, 44.

Presently; at present, now:—'I'm living in the country presently.' A Shakespearian survival:—Prospero:—'Go bring the rabble.' Ariel:—'Presently?' [i.e. shall I do so now?] Prospero:—'Ay, with a wink.' Extinct in England, but preserved and quite common in Ireland.

Priested; ordained: 'He was priested last year.'

Priest's share; the soul. A mother will say to a refractory child:—'I'll knock the priest's share out of you.' (Moran: Carlow.)

Professions hereditary, 172.

Pronunciation, 2, 91 to 104.

Protestant herring: Originally applied to a bad or a stale herring: but in my boyhood days it was applied, in our neighbourhood, to almost anything of an inferior quality:—'Oh that butter is a Protestant herring.' Here is how it originated:—Mary Hewer of our village had been for time out of mind the only huckster who sold salt herrings, sending to Cork for a barrel from time to time, and making good profit. At last Poll Alltimes sent for a barrel and set up an opposition shop, taking away a large part of Mary's custom. Mary was a Catholic and Poll a Protestant: and then our herrings became sharply distinguished as Catholic herrings and Protestant herrings: each party eating herrings of their own creed. But after some time a horrible story began to go round—whispered at first under people's breath—that Poll found the head of a black with long hair packed among the herrings half way down in her barrel. Whether the people believed it or not, the bare idea was enough; and Protestant herrings suddenly lost character, so that poor Poll's sale fell off at once, while Mary soon regained all her old customers. She well deserved it, if anyone ever deserved a reward for a master-stroke of genius. But I think this is all 'forgotten lore' in the neighbourhood now.

Proverbs, 105.

Puck; to play the puck with anything: a softened equivalent of playing the devil. Puck here means the Pooka, which see.

Puck; a blow:—'He gave him a puck of a stick on the head.' More commonly applied to a punch or blow of the horns of a cow or goat. 'The cow gave him a puck (or pucked him) with her horns and knocked him down.' The blow given by a hurler to the ball with his caman or hurley is always called a puck. Irish poc, same sound and meaning.

Puckaun; a he-goat. (South.) Irish poc, a he-goat, with the diminutive.

Puke; a poor puny unhealthy-looking person.

Pulling a cord (or the cord); said of a young man and a young woman who are courting:—'Miss Anne and himself that's pulling the cord.' ('Knocknagow.')

Pulloge; a quantity of hidden apples: usually hidden by a boy who steals them. (Limerick.) Diminutive of the Irish poll, a hole.

Pusheen; the universal word for a kitten in Munster: a diminutive of the English word puss; exactly equivalent to pussy.

Puss [u sounded as in full]; the mouth and lips, always used in dialect in an offensive or contemptuous sense:—'What an ugly puss that fellow has.' 'He had a puss on him,' i.e. he looked sour or displeased—with lips contracted. I heard one boy say to another:—'I'll give you a skelp (blow) on the puss.' (General.) Irish pus, the mouth, same sound.

Pusthaghaun; a puffed up conceited fellow. The corresponding word applied to a girl is pusthoge (MacCall: Wexford): the diminutive termination aun or chaun being masculine and óg feminine. Both are from pus the mouth, on account of the consequential way a conceited person squares up the lips.

Quaw or quagh; a quag or quagmire:—'I was unwilling to attempt the quagh.' (Maxwell: 'Wild Sports': Mayo, but used all over Ireland.) Irish caedh [quay], for which and for the names derived from it, see 'Irish Names of Places': II. 396.

Quality; gentlemen and gentlewomen as distinguished from the common people. Out of use in England, but general in Ireland:—'Make room for the quality.'

Queer, generally pronounced quare; used as an intensive in Ulster:—This day is quare and hot (very hot); he is quare and sick (very sick): like fine and fat elsewhere (see p. 89).

Quin or quing; the swing-tree, a piece of wood used to keep the chains apart in ploughing to prevent them rubbing the horses. (Cork and Kerry.) Irish cuing [quing], a yoke.

Quit: in Ulster 'quit that' means cease from that:—'quit your crying.' In Queen's County they say rise out of that.

Rabble; used in Ulster to denote a fair where workmen congregate on the hiring day to be hired by the surrounding farmers. See Spalpeen.

Rack. In Munster an ordinary comb is called a rack: the word comb being always applied and confined to a small close fine-toothed one.

Rackrent; an excessive rent of a farm, so high as to allow to the occupier a bare and poor subsistence. Not used outside Ireland except so far as it has been recently brought into prominence by the Irish land question.

Rag on every bush; a young man who is caught by and courts many girls but never proposes.

Raghery; a kind of small-sized horse; a name given to it from its original home, the island of Rathlin or Raghery off Antrim.

Rake; to cover up with ashes the live coals of a turf fire, which will keep them alive till morning:—'Don't forget to rake the fire.'

Randy; a scold. (Kinahan: general.)

Rap; a bad halfpenny: a bad coin:—'He hasn't a rap in his pocket.'

Raumaush or raumaish; romance or fiction, but now commonly applied to foolish senseless brainless talk. Irish rámás or rámáis, which is merely adapted from the word romance.

Raven's bit; a beast that is going to die. (Kinahan.)

Rawney; a delicate person looking in poor health; a poor sickly-looking animal. (Connaught.) Irish ránaidhe, same sound and meaning.

Reansha; brown bread: sometimes corrupted to range-bread. (MacCall: Wexford.)

Red or redd; clear, clear out, clear away:—Redd the road, the same as the Irish Fág-a-ballagh, 'clear the way.' If a girl's hair is in bad tangles, she uses a redding-comb first to open it, and then a finer comb.

Redden; to light: 'Take the bellows and redden the fire.' An Irishman hardly ever lights his pipe: he reddens it.

Redundancy, 52, 130.

Ree; as applied to a horse means restive, wild, almost unmanageable.

Reek; a rick:—A reek of turf: so the Kerry mountains, 'MacGillicuddy's Reeks.'

Reel-foot; a club-foot, a deformed foot. (Ulster.) 'Reel-footed and hunch-backed forbye, sir.' (Old Ulster song.)

Reenaw´lee; a slow-going fellow who dawdles and delays and hesitates about things. (Munster.) Irish ríanálaidhe, same sound and meaning: from rían, a way, track, or road: ríanalaidhe , a person who wanders listlessly along the way.

Reign. This word is often used in Munster, Leinster, and Connaught, in the sense of to occupy, to be master of: 'Who is in the Knockea farm?' 'Mr. Keating reigns there now.' 'Who is your landlord?' 'The old master is dead and his son Mr. William reigns over us now.' 'Long may your honour [the master] reign over us.' (Crofton Croker.) In answer to an examination question, a young fellow from Cork once answered me, 'Shakespeare reigned in the sixteenth century.' This usage is borrowed from Irish, in which the verb riaghail [ree-al] means both to rule (as a master), and to reign (as a king), and as in many other similar cases the two meanings were confounded in English. (Kinahan and myself.)

Relics of old decency. When a man goes down in the world he often preserves some memorials of his former rank—a ring, silver buckles in his shoes, &c.—'the relics of old decency.'

Revelagh; a long lazy gadding fellow. (Morris: Monaghan.)

Rib; a single hair from the head. A poet, praising a young lady, says that 'every golden rib of her hair is worth five guineas.' Irish ruibe [ribbe], same meaning.

Rickle; a little heap of turf peats standing on ends against each other. (Derry.) Irish ricil, same sound and meaning.

Riddles, 185.

Ride and tie. Two persons set out on a journey having one horse. One rides on while the other sets out on foot after him. The first man, at the end of a mile or two, ties up the horse at the roadside and proceeds on foot. When the second comes to the horse he mounts and rides till he is one or two miles ahead of his comrade and then ties. And so to the end of the journey. A common practice in old times for courier purposes; but not in use now, I think.

Rife, a scythe-sharpener, a narrow piece of board punctured all over and covered with grease on which fine sand is sprinkled. Used before the present emery sharpener was known. (Moran: Carlow.) Irish ríabh [reev], a long narrow stripe.

Right or wrong: often heard for earnestly: 'he pressed me right or wrong to go home with him.'

Ringle-eyed; when the iris is light-coloured, and the circle bounding it is very marked, the person is ringle-eyed. (Derry.)

Rings; often used as follows:—'Did I sleep at all?' 'Oh indeed you did—you slept rings round you.'

Rip; a coarse ill-conditioned woman with a bad tongue. (General.)

Roach lime; lime just taken from the kiln, burnt, before being slaked and while still in the form of stones. This is old English from French roche, a rock, a stone.

Roasters; potatoes kept crisping on the coals to be brought up to table hot at the end of the dinner—usually the largest ones picked out. But the word roaster was used only among the lower class of people: the higher classes considered it vulgar. Here is how Mr. Patrick Murray (see p. 154) describes them about 1840 in a parody on Moore's 'One bumper at parting' (a lumper, in Mr. Murray's version, means a big potato):—

In the higher class of houses they were peeled and brought up at the end nice and brown in a dish. About eighty years ago a well-known military gentleman of Baltinglass in the County Wicklow—whose daughter told me the story—had on one occasion a large party of friends to dinner. On the very day of the dinner the waiter took ill, and the stable boy—a big coarse fellow—had to be called in, after elaborate instructions. All went well till near the end of the dinner, when the fellow thought things were going on rather slowly. Opening the diningroom door he thrust in his head and called out in the hearing of all:—'Masther, are ye ready for the roasthers?' A short time ago I was looking at the house and diningroom where that occurred.

Rocket; a little girl's frock. (Very common in Limerick.) It is of course an old application of the English-French rochet.

Rodden; a bohereen or narrow road. (Ulster.) It is the Irish róidín, little road.

Roman; used by the people in many parts of Ireland for Roman Catholic. I have already quoted what the Catholic girl said to her Protestant lover:—'Unless that you turn a Roman you ne'er shall get me for your bride.' Sixty or seventy years ago controversial discussions—between a Catholic on the one hand and a Protestant on the other—were very common. I witnessed many when I was a boy—to my great delight. Garrett Barry, a Roman Catholic, locally noted as a controversialist, was arguing with Mick Cantlon, surrounded by a group of delighted listeners. At last Garrett, as a final clincher, took up the Bible, opened it at a certain place, and handed it to his opponent, with:—'Read that heading out for us now if you please.' Mick took it up and read 'St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans.' 'Very well,' says Garrett: 'now can you show me in any part of that Bible, 'St. Paul's Epistle to the Protestants'? This of course was a down blow; and Garrett was greeted with a great hurrah by the Catholic part of his audience. This story is in 'Knocknagow,' but the thing occurred in my neighbourhood, and I heard about it long before 'Knocknagow' was written.

Rookaun; great noisy merriment. Also a drinking-bout. (Limerick.)

Room. In a peasant's house the room is a special apartment distinct from the kitchen or living-room, which is not a 'room' in this sense at all. I slept in the kitchen and John slept in the 'room.' (Healy and myself: Munster.)

Round coal; coal in lumps as distinguished from slack or coal broken up small and fine.

Ruction, ructions; fighting, squabbling, a fight, a row. It is a memory of the Insurrection of 1798, which was commonly called the 'Ruction.'

Rue-rub; when a person incautiously scratches an itchy spot so as to break the skin: that is rue-rub. (Derry.) From rue, regret or sorrow.

Rury; a rough hastily-made cake or bannock. (Morris: Monaghan.)

Rut; the smallest bonnive in a litter. (Kildare and Carlow.)

Saluting, salutations, 14.

Sapples; soap suds: sapple, to wash in suds. (Derry.)

Saulavotcheer; a person having lark-heels. (Limerick.) The first syll. is Irish; sál [saul], heel.

Sauvaun; a rest, a light doze or nap. (Munster.) Irish sámhán, same sound and meaning, from sámh [sauv], pleasant and tranquil.

Scagh; a whitethorn bush. (General.) Irish sceach, same sound and meaning.

Scaghler: a little fish—the pinkeen or thornback: Irish sceach [scagh], a thorn or thornbush, and the English termination ler.

Scald: to be scalded is to be annoyed, mortified, sorely troubled, vexed. (Very general.) Translated from one or the other of two Irish words, loisc [lusk], to burn; and scall, to scald. Finn Bane says:—'Guary being angry with me he scorched me (romloisc), burned me, scalded me, with abuse.' ('Colloquy.') 'I earned that money hard and 'tis a great heart-scald (scollach-croidhe) to me to lose it.' There is an Irish air called 'The Scalded poor man.' ('Old Irish Music and Songs.')

Scalder, an unfledged bird (South): scaldie and scaulthoge in the North. From the Irish scal (bald), from which comes the Irish scalachán, an unfledged bird.

Scallan; a wooden shed to shelter the priest during Mass, 143, 145.

Scalp, scolp, scalpeen; a rude cabin, usually roofed with scalps or grassy sods (whence the name). In the famine times—1847 and after—a scalp was often erected for any poor wanderer who got stricken down with typhus fever: and in that the people tended him cautiously till he recovered or died. (Munster.) Irish scaílp [scolp].

Scalteen: see Scolsheen.

Scollagh-cree; ill-treatment of any kind. (Moran: Carlow.) Irish scallach-croidhe, same sound and meaning: a 'heart scald'; from scalladh, scalding, and croidhe, heart.

Scollop; the bended rod pointed at both ends that a thatcher uses to fasten down the several straw-wisps. (General.) Irish scolb [scollub].

Scolsheen or scalteen; made by boiling a mixture of whiskey, water, sugar, butter and pepper (or caraway seeds) in a pot: a sovereign cure for a cold. In the old mail-car days there was an inn on the road from Killarney to Mallow, famous for scolsheen, where a big pot of it was always kept ready for travellers. (Kinahan and Kane.) Sometimes the word scalteen was applied to unmixed whiskey burned, and used for the same purpose. From the Irish scall, burn, singe, scald.

Sconce; to chaff, banter, make game of:—'None of your sconcing.' (Ulster.)

Sconce; to shirk work or duty. (Moran: Carlow.)

Scotch Dialect: influence of, on our Dialect, 6, 7.

Scotch lick; when a person goes to clean up anything—a saucepan, a floor, his face, a pair of shoes, &c.—and only half does it, he (or she) has given it a Scotch lick. General in South. In Dublin it would be called a 'cat's lick': for a cat has only a small tongue and doesn't do much in the way of licking.

Scout; a reproachful name for a bold forward girl.

Scouther; to burn a cake on the outside before it is fully cooked, by over haste in baking:—burned outside, half raw inside. Hence 'to scouther' means to do anything hastily and incompletely. (Ulster.)

Scrab; to scratch:—'The cat near scrabbed his eyes out.' (Patterson: Ulster.) In the South it is scraub:—'He scraubed my face.'

Scrab; to gather the stray potatoes left after the regular crop, when they are afterwards turned out by plough or spade.

Scraddhin; a scrap; anything small—smaller than usual, as a small potato: applied contemptuously to a very small man, exactly the same as the Southern sprissaun. Irish scraidín, same sound and meaning. (East Ulster.)

Scran; 'bad scran to you,' an evil wish like 'bad luck to you,' but much milder: English, in which scran means broken victuals, food-refuse, fare—very common. (North and South.)

Scraw; a grassy sod cut from a grassy or boggy surface and often dried for firing; also called scrahoge (with diminutive óg). Irish scrath, scrathóg, same sounds and meaning.

Screenge; to search for. (Donegal and Derry.)

Scunder or Scunner; a dislike; to take a dislike or disgust against anything. (Armagh.)

Scut; the tail of a hare or rabbit: often applied in scorn to a contemptible fellow:—'He's just a scut and nothing better.' The word is Irish, as is shown by the following quotation:—'The billows [were] conversing with the scuds (sterns) and the beautiful prows [of the ships].' (Battle of Moylena: and note by Kuno Meyer in 'Rev. Celt.') (General.)

Seeshtheen; a low round seat made of twisted straw. (Munster.) Irish suidhistín, same sound and meaning: from suidhe [see], to sit, with diminutive.

Set: all over Ireland they use set instead of let [a house or lodging]. A struggling housekeeper failed to let her lodging, which a neighbour explained by:—'Ah she's no good at setting.'

Set; used in a bad sense, like gang and crew:—'They're a dirty set.'

Settle bed; a folding-up bed kept in the kitchen: when folded up it is like a sofa and used as a seat. (All over Ireland.)

Seven´dable [accent on ven], very great, mighty great as they would say:—'Jack gave him a sevendable thrashing.' (North.)

Shaap [the aa long as in car]; a husk of corn, a pod. (Derry.)

Shamrock or Shamroge; the white trefoil (Trifolium repens). The Irish name is seamar [shammer], which with the diminutive makes seamar-óg [shammer-oge], shortened to shamrock.

Shanachus, shortened to shanagh in Ulster, a friendly conversation. 'Grandfather would like to have a shanahus with you.' ('Knocknagow.') Irish seanchus, antiquity, history, an old story.

Shandradan´ [accented strongly on -dan]; an old rickety rattle-trap of a car. The first syllable is Irish sean [shan], old.

Shanty: a mean hastily put up little house. (General.) Probably from Irish sean, old, and tigh [tee], a house.

Shaugh; a turn or smoke of a pipe. (General.) Irish seach, same sound and meaning.

Shaughraun; wandering about: to be on the shaughraun is to be out of employment and wandering idly about looking for work. Irish seachrán, same sound and meaning.

Shebeen or sheebeen; an unlicensed public-house or alehouse where spirits are sold on the sly. (Used all over Ireland.) Irish síbín, same sound and meaning.

Shee; a fairy, fairies; also meaning the place where fairies live, usually a round green little hill or elf-mound having a glorious palace underneath: Irish sidhe, same sound and meanings. Shee often takes the diminutive form—sheeoge.

Shee-geeha; the little whirl of dust you often see moving along the road on a calm dusty day: this is a band of fairies travelling from one lis or elf-mound to another, and you had better turn aside and avoid it. Irish sidhe-gaoithe, same sound and meaning, where gaoithe is wind: 'wind-fairies': called 'fairy-blast' in Kildare.

Sheehy, Rev. Father, of Kilfinane, 147.

Sheela; a female Christian name (as in 'Sheela Ni Gyra'). Used in the South as a reproachful name for a boy or a man inclined to do work or interest himself in affairs properly belonging to women. See 'Molly.'

Sheep's eyes: when a young man looks fondly and coaxingly on his sweetheart he is 'throwing sheep's eyes' at her.

Sherral; an offensive term for a mean unprincipled fellow. (Moran: South Mon.)

Sheugh or Shough; a deep cutting, elsewhere called a ditch, often filled with water. (Seumas MacManus: N.W. Ulster.)

Shillelah; a handstick of oak, an oaken cudgel for fighting. (Common all over Ireland.) From a district in Wicklow called Shillelah, formerly noted for its oak woods, in which grand shillelahs were plentiful.

Shingerleens [shing-erleens]; small bits of finery; ornamental tags and ends—of ribbons, bow-knots, tassels, &c.—hanging on dress, curtains, furniture, &c. (Munster.)

Shire; to pour or drain off water or any liquid, quietly and without disturbing the solid parts remaining behind, such as draining off the whey-like liquid from buttermilk.

Shlamaan´ [aa like a in car]; a handful of straw, leeks, &c. (Morris: South Monaghan.)

Shoggle; to shake or jolt. (Derry.)

Shoneen; a gentleman in a small way: a would-be gentleman who puts on superior airs. Always used contemptuously.

Shook; in a bad way, done up, undone:—'I'm shook by the loss of that money': 'he was shook for a pair of shoes.'

Shooler; a wanderer, a stroller, a vagrant, a tramp, a rover: often means a mendicant. (Middle and South of Ireland.) From the Irish siubhal [shool], to walk, with the English termination er: lit. 'walker.'

Shoonaun; a deep circular basket, made of twisted rushes or straw, and lined with calico; it had a cover and was used for holding linen, clothes, &c. (Limerick and Cork.) From Irish sibhinn [shiven], a rush, a bulrush: of which the diminutive siubhnán [shoonaun] is our word: signifying 'made of rushes.' Many a shoonaun I saw in my day; and I remember meeting a man who was a shoonaun maker by trade.

Short castle or short castles; a game played by two persons on a square usually drawn on a slate with the two diagonals: each player having three counters. See Mills.

Shore; the brittle woody part separated in bits and dust from the fibre of flax by scutching or cloving. Called shores in Monaghan.

Shraff, shraft; Shrovetide: on and about Shrove Tuesday:—'I bought that cow last shraff.'

Shraums, singular shraum; the matter that collects about the eyes of people who have tender eyes: matter running from sore eyes. (Moran: Carlow.) Irish sream [sraum]. Same meaning.

Shrule; to rinse an article of clothing by pulling it backwards and forwards in a stream. (Moran: Carlow.) Irish srúil, a stream.

Shrough; a rough wet place; an incorrect anglicised form of Irish srath, a wet place, a marsh.

Shuggy-shoo; the play of see-saw. (Ulster.)

Shurauns; any plants with large leaves, such as hemlock, wild parsnip, &c. (Kinahan: Wicklow.)

Sighth (for sight); a great number, a large quantity. (General.) 'Oh Mrs. Morony haven't you a sighth of turkeys': 'Tom Cassidy has a sighth of money.' This is old English. Thus in a Quaker's diary of 1752:—'There was a great sight of people passed through the streets of Limerick.' This expression is I think still heard in England, and is very much in use in America. Very general in Ireland.

Sign; a very small quantity—a trace. Used all over Ireland in this way:—'My gardens are every sign as good as yours': 'he had no sign of drink on him': 'there's no sign of sugar in my tea' (Hayden and Hartog): 'look out to see if Bill is coming': 'no—there's no sign of him.' This is a translation from the Irish rian, for which see next entry.

Sign's on, sign is on, sign's on it; used to express the result or effect or proof of any proceeding:—'Tom Kelly never sends his children to school, and sign's on (or sign's on it) they are growing up like savages': 'Dick understands the management of fruit trees well, and sign's on, he is making lots of money by them.' This is a translation from Irish, in which rian means track, trace, sign: and 'sign's on it' is ta a rian air ('its sign is on it').

Silenced; a priest is silenced when he is suspended from his priestly functions by his ecclesiastical superiors: 'unfrocked.'

Singlings; the weak pottheen whiskey that comes off at the first distillation: agreeable to drink but terribly sickening. Also called 'First shot.'

Sippy; a ball of rolled sugans (i.e. hay or straw ropes), used instead of a real ball in hurling or football. (Limerick.) Irish suipigh, same sound and meaning. A diminutive of sop, a wisp.

Skeeagh [2-syll.]; a shallow osier basket, usually for potatoes. (South.)

Skeedeen; a trifle, anything small of its kind; a small potato. (Derry and Donegal.) Irish scídín, same sound and meaning.

Skellig, Skellig List—On the Great Skellig rock in the Atlantic, off the coast of Kerry, are the ruins of a monastery, to which people at one time went on pilgrimage—and a difficult pilgrimage it was. The tradition is still kept up in some places, though in an odd form; in connection with the custom that marriages are not solemnised in Lent, i.e. after Shrove Tuesday. It is well within my memory that—in the south of Ireland—young persons who should have been married before Ash-Wednesday, but were not, were supposed to set out on pilgrimage to Skellig on Shrove Tuesday night: but it was all a make-believe. Yet I remember witnessing occasionally some play in mock imitation of the pilgrimage. It was usual for a local bard to compose what was called a 'Skellig List'—a jocose rhyming catalogue of the unmarried men and women of the neighbourhood who went on the sorrowful journey—which was circulated on Shrove Tuesday and for some time after. Some of these were witty and amusing: but occasionally they were scurrilous and offensive doggerel. They were generally too long for singing; but I remember one—a good one too—which—when I was very young—I heard sung to a spirited air. It is represented here by a single verse, the only one I remember. (See also 'Chalk Sunday,' p. 234, above.)

Here is a verse from another:—

Skelly; to aim askew and miss the mark; to squint. (Patterson: all over Ulster.)

Skelp; a blow, to give a blow or blows; a piece cut off:—'Tom gave Pat a skelp': 'I cut off a skelp of the board with a hatchet.' To run fast:—'There's Joe skelping off to school.'

Skib; a flat basket:—'We found the people collected round a skibb of potatoes.' ('Wild Sports of the West.')

Skidder, skiddher; broken thick milk, stale and sour. (Munster.)

Skillaun. The piece cut out of a potato to be used as seed, containing one germinating eye, from which the young stalk grows. Several skillauns will be cut from one potato; and the irregular part left is a skilloge (Cork and Kerry), or a creelacaun (Limerick). Irish sciollán, same sound and meaning.

Skit; to laugh and giggle in a silly way:—'I'll be bail they didn't skit and laugh.' (Crofton Croker.) 'Skit and laugh,' very common in South.

Skite; a silly frivolous light-headed person. Hence Blatherumskite (South), or (in Ulster), bletherumskite.

Skree; a large number of small things, as a skree of potatoes, a skree of chickens, &c. (Morris: South Monaghan.)

Skull-cure for a bad toothache. Go to the nearest churchyard alone by night, to the corner where human bones are usually heaped up, from which take and bring away a skull. Fill the skull with water, and take a drink from it: that will cure your toothache.

Sky farmer; a term much used in the South with several shades of meaning: but the idea underlying all is a farmer without land, or with only very little—having broken down since the time when he had a big farm—who often keeps a cow or two grazing along the roadsides. Many of these struggling men acted as intermediaries between the big corn merchants and the large farmers in the sale of corn, and got thereby a percentage from the buyers. A 'sky farmer' has his farm in the sky.

Slaan [aa long as the a in car]; a sort of very sharp spade, used in cutting turf or peat. Universal in the South.

Slack-jaw; impudent talk, continuous impertinences:—'I'll have none of your slack-jaw.'

Slang; a narrow strip of land along a stream, not suited to cultivation, but grazed. (Moran: Carlow.)

Sleeveen; a smooth-tongued, sweet-mannered, sly, guileful fellow. Universal all over the South and Middle. Irish slíghbhín, same sound and meaning; from slígh, a way: binn, sweet, melodious: 'a sweet-mannered fellow.'

Slewder, sluder [d sounded like th in smooth]; a wheedling coaxing fellow: as a verb, to wheedle. Irish sligheadóir [sleedore], same meaning.

Sliggin; a thin flat little stone. (Limerick.) Irish. Primary meaning a shell.

Sling-trot; when a person or an animal is going along [not walking but] trotting or running along at a leisurely pace. (South.)

Slinge [slinj]; to walk along slowly and lazily. In some places, playing truant from school. (South.)

Slip; a young girl. A young pig, older than a bonnive, running about almost independent of its mother. (General.)

Slipe; a rude sort of cart or sledge without wheels used for dragging stones from a field. (Ulster.)

Slitther; a kind of thick soft leather: also a ball covered with that leather, for hurling. (Limerick.)

Sliver; a piece of anything broken or cut off, especially cut off longitudinally. An old English word, obsolete in England, but still quite common in Munster.

Slob; a soft fat quiet simple-minded girl or boy:—'Your little Nellie is a quiet poor slob': used as a term of endearment.

Sloke, sloak, sluke, sloukaun; a sea plant of the family of laver found growing on rocks round the coast, which is esteemed a table delicacy—dark-coloured, almost black; often pickled and eaten with pepper, vinegar, &c. Seen in all the Dublin fish shops. The name, which is now known all over the Three Kingdoms, is anglicised from Irish sleabhac, sleabhacán [slouk, sloukaun].

Slug; a drink: as a verb, to drink:—'Here take a little slug from this and 'twill do you good.' Irish slog to swallow by drinking. (General.) Whence slugga and sluggera, a cavity in a river-bed into which the water is slugged or swallowed.

Slugabed; a sluggard. (General in Limerick.) Old English, obsolete in England:—'Fie, you slug-a-bed.' ('Romeo and Juliet.')

Slush; to work and toil like a slave: a woman who toils hard. (General.)

Slut; a torch made by dipping a long wick in resin. (Armagh.) Called a paudheoge in Munster.

Smaadher [aa like a in car]; to break in pieces. Jim Foley was on a pooka's back on the top of an old castle, and he was afraid he'd 'tumble down and be smathered to a thousand pieces.' (Ir. Mag.)

Smalkera; a rude home-made wooden spoon.

Small-clothes; kneebreeches. (Limerick.) So called to avoid the plain term breeches, as we now often say inexpressibles.

Small farmer; has a small farm with small stock of cattle: a struggling man as distinguished from a 'strong' farmer.

Smeg, smeggeen, smiggin; a tuft of hair on the chin. (General.) Merely the Irish smeig, smeigín; same sounds and meaning.

Smithereens; broken fragments after a smash, 4.

Smullock [to rhyme with bullock]; a fillip of the finger. (Limerick.) Irish smallóg, same meaning.

Smur, smoor, fine thick mist. (North.) Irish smúr, mist.

Smush [to rhyme with bush]: anything reduced to fine small fragments, like straw or hay, dry peat-mould in dust, &c.

Smush, used contemptuously for the mouth, a hairy mouth:—'I don't like your ugly smush.'

Snachta-shaidhaun: dry powdery snow blown about by the wind. Irish sneachta, snow, and séideán, a breeze. (South.)

Snaggle-tooth; a person with some teeth gone so as to leave gaps.

Snap-apple; a play with apples on Hallow-eve, where big apples are placed in difficult positions and are to be caught by the teeth of the persons playing. Hence Hallow-Eve is often called 'Snap-apple night.'

Snauvaun; to move about slowly and lazily. From Irish snámh [snauv], to swim, with the diminutive:—Moving slowly like a person swimming.

Sned; to clip off, to cut away, like the leaves and roots of a turnip. Sned also means the handle of a scythe.

Snig; to cut or clip with a knife:—'The shoots of that apple-tree are growing out too long: I must snig off the tops of them.'

Snish; neatness in clothes. (Morris: Carlow.)

Snoboge; a rosin torch. (Moran: Carlow.) Same as slut and paudheoge.

Snoke; to scent or snuff about like a dog. (Derry.)

So. This has some special dialectical senses among us. It is used for if:—'I will pay you well so you do the work to my liking.' This is old English:—'I am content so thou wilt have it so.' ('Rom. and Jul.') It is used as a sort of emphatic expletive carrying accent or emphasis:—'Will you keep that farm?' 'I will so,' i.e. 'I will for certain.' 'Take care and don't break them' (the dishes): 'I won't so.' ('Collegians.') It is used in the sense of 'in that case':—'I am not going to town to-day'; 'Oh well I will not go, so'—i.e. 'as you are not going.'

Sock; the tubular or half-tubular part of a spade or shovel that holds the handle. Irish soc.

Soft day; a wet day. (A usual salute.)

Soil; fresh-cut grass for cattle.

Sold; betrayed, outwitted:—'If that doesn't frighten him off you're sold' (caught in the trap, betrayed, ruined. Edw. Walsh in Ir. Pen. Journal).

Something like; excellent:—'That's something like a horse,' i.e. a fine horse and no mistake.

Sonaghan; a kind of trout that appears in certain lakes in November, coming from the rivers. (Prof. J. Cooke, M.A., of Dublin: for Ulster):—Irish samhain [sowan], November: samhnachán with the diminutive án or chán, 'November-fellow.'

Sonoohar; a good wife, a good partner in marriage; a good marriage: generally used in the form of a wish:—'Thankee sir and sonoohar to you.' Irish sonuachar, same sound and meaning.

Sonsy; fortunate, prosperous. Also well-looking and healthy:—'A fine sonsy girl.' Irish sonas, luck; sonasach, sonasaigh, same sound and meaning.

Soogan, sugan, sugaun; a straw or hay rope twisted by the hand.

Soss; a short trifling fall with no harm beyond a smart shock. (Moran: Carlow.)

Sough; a whistling or sighing noise like that of the wind through trees. 'Keep a calm sough' means keep quiet, keep silence. (Ulster.)

Soulth; 'a formless luminous apparition.' (W. B. Yeats.) Irish samhailt [soulth], a ghost, an apparition; lit. a 'likeness,' from samhai [sowel], like.

Sources of Anglo-Irish Dialect, 1.

Sowans, sowens; a sort of flummery or gruel usually made and eaten on Hallow Eve. Very general in Ulster and Scotland; merely the Irish word samhain, the first of November; for Hallow Eve is really a November feast, as being the eve of the first of that month. In old times in Ireland, the evening went with the coming night.

Spalpeen. Spalpeens were labouring men—reapers, mowers, potato-diggers, &c.—who travelled about in the autumn seeking employment from the farmers, each with his spade, or his scythe, or his reaping-hook. They congregated in the towns on market and fair days, where the farmers of the surrounding districts came to hire them. Each farmer brought home his own men, fed them on good potatoes and milk, and sent them to sleep in the barn on dry straw—a bed—as one of them said to me—'a bed fit for a lord, let alone a spalpeen.' The word spalpeen is now used in the sense of a low rascal. Irish spailpín, same sound and meaning. (See my 'Old Irish Folk Music and Songs,' p. 216; and for the Ulster term see Rabble above.)

Spaug; a big clumsy foot:—'You put your ugly spaug down on my handkerchief.' Irish spág, same sound and sense.

Speel; to climb. (Patterson: Ulster.)

Spink; a sharp rock, a precipice. (Tyrone.) Splink in Donegal. Irish spinnc and splinnc, same sounds and meaning.

Spit; the soil dug up and turned over, forming a long trench as deep as the spade will go. 'He dug down three spits before he came to the gravel.'

Spoileen; a coarse kind of soap made out of scraps of inferior grease and meat: often sold cheap at fairs and markets. (Derry and Tyrone.) Irish spóilín, a small bit of meat.

Spoocher; a sort of large wooden shovel chiefly used for lifting small fish out of a boat. (Ulster.)

Spreece; red-hot embers, chiefly ashes. (South.) Irish sprís, same sound and meaning. Same as greesagh.

Sprissaun; an insignificant contemptible little chap. Irish spriosán [same sound], the original meaning of which is a twig or spray from a bush. (South.)

Sprong: a four-pronged manure fork. (MacCall: South-east counties.)

Spruggil, spruggilla; the craw of a fowl. (Morris: South Monaghan.) Irish sprogal [spruggal], with that meaning and several others.

Sprunge [sprunj], any animal miserable and small for its age. (Ulster.)

Spuds; potatoes.

Spunk; tinder, now usually made by steeping brown paper in a solution of nitre; lately gone out of use from the prevalence of matches. Often applied in Ulster and Scotland to a spark of fire: 'See is there a spunk of fire in the hearth.' Spunk also denotes spirit, courage, and dash. 'Hasn't Dick great spunk to face that big fellow, twice his size?'

Irish sponnc.

Spy farleys; to pry into secrets: to visit a house, in order to spy about what's going on. (Ulster.)

Spy-Wednesday; the Wednesday before Easter. According to the religious legend it got the name because on the Wednesday before the Crucifixion Judas was spying about how best he could deliver up our Lord. (General.)

Squireen; an Irish gentleman in a small way who apes the manners, the authoritative tone, and the aristocratic bearing of the large landed proprietors. Sometimes you can hardly distinguish a squireen from a half-sir or from a shoneen. Sometimes the squireen was the son of the old squire: a worthless young fellow, who loafed about doing nothing, instead of earning an honest livelihood: but he was too grand for that. The word is a diminutive of squire, applied here in contempt, like many other diminutives. The class of squireen is nearly extinct: 'Joy be with them.'

Stackan; the stump of a tree remaining after the tree itself has been cut or blown down. (Simmons: Armagh.) Irish staic, a stake, with the diminutive.

Stad; the same as sthallk, which see.

Stag; a potato rendered worthless or bad by frost or decay.

Stag; a cold-hearted unfeeling selfish woman.

Stag; an informer, who turns round and betrays his comrades:—'The two worst informers against a private [pottheen] distiller, barring a stag, are a smoke by day and a fire by night.' (Carleton in 'Ir. Pen. Journ.') 'Do you think me a stag, that I'd inform on you.' (Ibid.)

Staggeen [the t sounded like th in thank], a worn-out worthless old horse.

Stand to or by a person, to act as his friend; to stand for an infant, to be his sponsor in baptism. The people hardly ever say, 'I'm his godfather,' but 'I stood for him.'

Stare; the usual name for a starling (bird) in Ireland.

Station. The celebration of Mass with confessions and Holy Communion in a private house by the parish priest or one of his curates, for the convenience of the family and their neighbours, to enable them the more easily to receive the sacraments. Latterly the custom has been falling into disuse.

Staukan-vorraga [t sounded like th in thorn], a small high rick of turf in a market from which portions were continually sold away and as continually replaced: so that the sthauca stood always in the people's way. Applied also to a big awkward fellow always visiting when he's not wanted, and always in the way. (John Davis White, of Clonmel.) Irish stáca 'n mharga [sthaucan-vorraga], the 'market stake or stack.'

Stelk or stallk; mashed potatoes mixed with beans or chopped vegetables. (North.)

Sthallk; a fit of sulk in a horse—or in a child. (Munster.) Irish stailc, same sound and meaning.

Sthoakagh; a big idle wandering vagabond fellow. (South.) Irish stócach, same sound and meaning.

Sthowl; a jet or splash of water or of any liquid. (South.) Irish steall, same sound and meaning.

Stim or stime; a very small quantity, an iota, an atom, a particle:—'You'll never have a stim of sense' ('Knocknagow'): 'I couldn't see a stim in the darkness.'

Stook; a shock of corn, generally containing twelve sheaves. (General.) Irish stuaic, same sound and meaning, with several other meanings.

Stoon; a fit, the worst of a fit: same as English stound: a sting of pain:—'Well Bridget how is the toothache?' 'Ah well sir the stoon is off.' (De Vismes Kane: Ulster.)

Store pig; a pig nearly full grown, almost ready to be fattened. (Munster.)

Str. Most of the following words beginning with str are derived from Irish words beginning with sr. For as this combination sr does not exist in English, when an Irish word with this beginning is borrowed into English, a t is always inserted between the s and r to bring it into conformity with English usage and to render it more easily pronounced by English-speaking tongues. See this subject discussed in 'Irish Names of Places,' vol. I., p. 60. Moreover the t in str is almost always sounded the same as th in think, thank.

Straar or sthraar [to rhyme with star]; the rough straddle which supports the back band of a horse's harness—coming between the horse's back and the band. (Derry.) The old Irish word srathar [same sound], a straddle, a pack-saddle.

Straddy; a street-walker, an idle person always sauntering along the streets. There is a fine Irish air named 'The Straddy' in my 'Old Irish Music and Songs,' p. 310. From Irish sráid, a street.

Strahane, strahaun, struhane; a very small stream like a mill stream or an artificial stream to a pottheen still. Irish sruth [sruh] stream, with dim.

Strammel; a big tall bony fellow. (Limerick.)

Strap; a bold forward girl or woman; the word often conveys a sense slightly leaning towards lightness of character.

Strath; a term used in many parts of Ireland to denote the level watery meadow-land along a river. Irish srath.

Stravage [to rhyme with plague]; to roam about idly:—'He is always stravaging the streets.' In Ulster it is made stavage.

Streel; a very common word all through Ireland to denote a lazy untidy woman—a slattern: often made streeloge in Connaught, the same word with the diminutive. As a verb, streel is used in the sense of to drag along in an untidy way:—'Her dress was streeling in the mud.' Irish sríl [sreel], same meanings.

Streel is sometimes applied to an untidy slovenly-looking man too, as I once heard it applied under odd circumstances when I was very young. Bartholomew Power was long and lanky, with his clothes hanging loose on him. On the morning when he and his newly-married wife—whom I knew well, and who was then no chicken—were setting out for his home, I walked a bit of the way with the happy bride to take leave of her. Just when we were about to part, she turned and said to me—these were her very words—'Well Mr. Joyce, you know the number of nice young men I came across in my day (naming half a dozen of them), and,' said she—nodding towards the bride-groom, who was walking by the car a few perches in front—'isn't it a heart-scald that at the end of all I have now to walk off with that streel of a devil.'

Strickle; a scythe-sharpener covered with emery, (Simmons: Armagh.)

Strig; the strippings or milk that comes last from a cow. (Morris: South Monaghan.)

Striffin; the thin pellicle or skin on the inside of an egg-shell. (Ulster.)

Strippings; the same as strig, the last of the milk that comes from the cow at milking—always the richest. Often called in Munster sniug.

Stroansha; a big idle lazy lump of a girl, always gadding about. Irish stróinse, same sound and meaning.

Strock´ara [accent on strock-]; a very hard-working man. (Munster.) Irish stracaire, same sound and meaning, with several other meanings.

Strong; well in health, without any reference to muscular strength. 'How is your mother these times?' 'She's very strong now thank God.'

Strong farmer; a very well-to-do prosperous farmer, with a large farm and much cattle. In contradistinction to a 'small farmer.'

Stroup or stroop; the spout of a kettle or teapot or the lip of a jug. (Ulster.)

Strunt; to sulk. (Simmons: Armagh.) Same as sthallk for the South.

Stum; a sulky silent person. (Antrim and Down.)

Stumpy; a kind of coarse heavy cake made from grated potatoes from which the starch has been squeezed out: also called muddly. (Munster.)

Sturk, stirk, sterk; a heifer or bullock about two years old: a pig three or four months old. Often applied to a stout low-sized boy or girl. Irish storc.

Sugan; a straw or hay rope: same as soogan.

Sugeen; water in which oatmeal has been steeped: often drunk by workmen on a hot day in place of plain water. (Roscommon.) From Ir. sugh, juice.

Sulter; great heat [of a day]: a word formed from sultry:—'There's great sulther to-day.'

Summachaun; a soft innocent child. (Munster.) Irish somachán, same sound and meaning. In Connaught it means a big ignorant puffed up booby of a fellow.

Sup; one mouthful of liquid: a small quantity drunk at one time. This is English:—'I took a small sup of rum.' ('Robinson Crusoe.') 'We all take a sup in our turn.' (Irish Folk Song.)

Sure; one of our commonest opening words for a sentence: you will hear it perpetually among gentle and simple: 'Don't forget to lock up the fowls.' 'Sure I did that an hour ago.' 'Sure you won't forget to call here on your way back?' 'James, sure I sold my cows.'

Swan-skin; the thin finely-woven flannel bought in shops; so called to distinguish it from the coarse heavy home-made flannel. (Limerick.)

Swearing, 66.

Tally-iron or tallin-iron; the iron for crimping or curling up the borders of women's caps. A corruption of Italian-iron.

Targe; a scolding woman, a barge. (Ulster.)

Tartles: ragged clothes; torn pieces of dress. (Ulster.)

Taste; a small bit or amount of anything:—'He has no taste of pride': 'Aren't you ashamed of yourself?' 'Not a taste': 'Could you give me the least taste in life of a bit of soap?'

Tat, tait; a tangled or matted wad or mass of hair on a girl or on an animal. 'Come here till I comb the tats out of your hair. (Ulster.) Irish tath [tah]. In the anglicised word the aspirated t (th), which sounds like h in Irish, is restored to its full sound in the process of anglicisation in accordance with a law which will be found explained in 'Irish Names of Places,' vol. i., pp. 42-48.

Teem; to strain off or pour off water or any liquid. To teem potatoes is to pour the water off them when they are boiled. In a like sense we say it is teeming rain. Irish taom, same sound and sense.

Ten commandments. 'She put her ten commandments on his face,' i.e. she scratched his face with her ten finger-nails. (MacCall: Wexford.)

Tent; the quantity of ink taken up at one time by a pen.

Terr; a provoking ignorant presumptuous fellow. (Moran: Carlow.)

Thacka, thuck-ya, thackeen, thuckeen; a little girl. (South.) Irish toice, toicín [thucka, thuckeen].

Thaheen; a handful of flax or hay. Irish tath, taithín [thah, thaheen], same meaning. (Same Irish word as Tat above: but in thaheen the final t is aspirated to h, following the Irish word.)

Thauloge: a boarded-off square enclosure at one side of the kitchen fire-place of a farmhouse, where candlesticks, brushes, wet boots, &c., are put. (Moran: Carlow.)

Thayvaun or theevaun; the short beam of the roof crossing from one rafter to the opposite one. (South.) Irish taobh [thaiv], a 'side,' with the diminutive.

Theeveen; a patch on the side of a shoe. (General.) Irish taobh [thaiv], a side with the dim. een; taoibhín [theeveen], 'little side.'

Thick; closely acquainted: same meaning as 'Great,' which see. 'Dick is very thick with Joe now.'

Thiescaun thyscaun, [thice-caun], or thayscaun: a quantity of anything, as a small load of hay drawn by a horse: 'When you're coming home with the cart from the bog, you may as well bring a little thyscaun of turf. (South.) Irish taoscán [thayscaun], same meaning.

Think long: to be longing for anything—home, friends, an event, &c. (North.) 'I am thinking long till I see my mother.'

Thirteen. When the English and Irish currencies were different, the English shilling was worth thirteen pence in Ireland: hence a shilling was called a thirteen in Ireland:—'I gave the captain six thirteens to ferry me over to Park-gate.' (Irish Folk Song.)

Thivish; a spectre, a ghost. (General.) Irish taidhbhse [thivshe], same meaning.

Thole; to endure, to bear:—'I had to thole hardship and want while you were away.' (All over Ulster.)

Thon, thonder; yon, yonder:—'Not a tree or a thing only thon wee couple of poor whins that's blowing up thonder on the rise.' (Seumas MacManus, for North-West Ulster.)

Thoun´thabock: a good beating. Literally 'strong tobacco: Ir. teann-tabac [same sound]. 'If you don't mind your business, I'll give you thounthabock.'

Thrape or threep; to assert vehemently, boldly, and in a manner not to brook contradiction. Common in Meath and from that northward.