English As We Speak It in Ireland. P. W. Joyce

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      The word itself is used in a curious way in Ireland, which has been something of a puzzle to outsiders. As so used it has no gender, number, or case; it is not in fact a pronoun at all, but a substitute for the word even. This has arisen from the fact that in the common colloquial Irish language the usual word to express both even and itself, is féin; and in translating a sentence containing this word féin, the people rather avoided even, a word not very familiar to them in this sense, and substituted the better known itself, in cases where even would be the correct word, and itself would be incorrect. Thus da mbeith an meud sin féin agum is correctly rendered 'if I had even that much': but the people don't like even, and don't well understand it (as applied here), so they make it 'If I had that much itself.' This explains all such Anglo-Irish sayings as 'if I got it itself it would be of no use to me,' i.e. 'even if I got it': 'If she were there itself I wouldn't know her'; 'She wouldn't go to bed till you'd come home, and if she did itself she couldn't sleep.' (Knocknagow.) A woman is finding some fault with the arrangements for a race, and Lowry Looby (Collegians) puts in 'so itself what hurt' i.e. 'even so what harm.' (Russell and myself.)

      The English when is expressed by the Irish an uair, which is literally 'the hour' or 'the time.' This is often transplanted into English; as when a person says 'the time you arrived I was away in town.'

      When you give anything to a poor person the recipient commonly utters the wish 'God increase you!' (meaning your substance): which is an exact translation of the equally common Irish wish Go meádaighe Dia dhuit. Sometimes the prayer is 'God increase your store,' which expresses exactly what is meant in the Irish wish.

      The very common aspiration 'God help us' [you, me, them, &c.] is a translation of the equally common Go bh-fóireadh Dia orruinn [ort, &c.].

      In the north-west instead of 'your father,' 'your sister,' &c., they often say 'the father of you,' 'the sister of you,' &c.; and correspondingly as to things:—'I took the hand of her' (i.e. her hand) (Seumas Mac Manus).

      All through Ireland you will hear show used instead of give or hand (verb), in such phrases as 'Show me that knife,' i.e. hand it to me. 'Show me the cream, please,' says an Irish gentleman at a London restaurant; and he could not see why his English friends were laughing.

      'He passed me in the street by the way he didn't know me'; 'he refused to give a contribution by the way he was so poor.' In both, by the way means 'pretending.'

      'My own own people' means my immediate relations. This is a translation of mo mhuinterse féin. In Irish the repetition of the emphatic pronominal particles is very common, and is imported into English; represented here by 'own own.'

      A prayer or a wish in Irish often begins with the particle go, meaning 'that' (as a conjunction): Go raibh maith agut, 'that it may be well with you,' i.e. 'May it be well with you.' In imitation or translation of this the corresponding expression in English is often opened by this word that: 'that you may soon get well,' i.e., 'may you soon get well.' Instead of 'may I be there to see' (John Gilpin) our people would say 'that I may be there to see.' A person utters some evil wish such as 'may bad luck attend you,' and is answered 'that the prayer may happen the preacher.' A usual ending of a story told orally, when the hero and heroine have been comfortably disposed of is 'And if they don't live happy that we may.'

      When a person sees anything unusual or unexpected, he says to his companion, 'Oh do you mind that!'

      'You want me to give you £10 for that cow: well, I'm not so soft all out.' 'He's not so bad as that all out.'

      A common expression is 'I was talking to him to-day, and I drew down about the money,' i.e. I brought on or introduced the subject. This is a translation of the Irish form do tharraing me anuas 'I drew down.'

      Quite a common form of expression is 'I had like to be killed,' i.e., I was near being killed: I had a narrow escape of being killed: I escaped being killed by the black of my nail.

      Where the English say it rains, we say 'it is raining': which is merely a translation of the Irish way of saying it:—ta se ag fearthainn.

      The usual Gaelic equivalent of 'he gave a roar' is do léig sé géim as (met everywhere in Irish texts), 'he let a roar out of him'; which is an expression you will often hear among people who have not well mastered English—who in fact often speak the Irish language with English words.

      'I put it before me to do it,' meaning I was resolved to do it, is the literal translation of chuireas rómhaim é to dheunamh. Both Irish and Anglo-Irish are very common in the respective languages.

      When a narrator has come to the end of some minor episode in his narrative, he often resumes with the opening 'That was well and good': which is merely a translation of the Gaelic bhí sin go maith.

      Lowry Looby having related how the mother and daughter raised a terrible pillilu, i.e., 'roaring and bawling,' says after a short pause 'that was well and good,' and proceeds with his story. (Gerald Griffin: 'Collegians.')

      A common Irish expression interjected into a narrative or discourse, as a sort of stepping stone between what is ended and what is coming is Ní'l tracht air, 'there is no talking about it,' corresponding to the English 'in short,' or 'to make a long story short.' These Irish expressions are imported into our English, in which popular phrases like the following are very often heard:—'I went to the fair, and there's no use in talking, I found the prices real bad.'

      'Wisha my bones are exhausted, and there's no use in talking,

      My heart is scalded, a wirrasthru.'

      (Old Song.)

      'Where is my use in staying here, so there's no use in talking, go I will.' ('Knocknagow.') Often the expression takes this form:—'Ah 'tis a folly to talk, he'll never get that money.'

      Sometimes the original Irish is in question form. Cid tracht ('what talking?' i.e. 'what need of talking?') which is Englished as follows:—'Ah what's the use of talking, your father will never consent.' These expressions are used in conversational Irish-English, not for the purpose of continuing a narrative as in the original Irish, but—as appears from the above examples—merely to add emphasis to an assertion.

      'It's a fine day that.' This expression, which is common enough among us, is merely a translation from the common Irish phrase is breagh an lá é sin, where the demonstrative sin (that) comes last in the proper Irish construction: but when imitated in English it looks queer to an English listener or reader.

      'There is no doubt that is a splendid animal.' This expression is a direct translation from the Irish Ní'l contabhairt ann, and is equivalent to the English 'doubtless.' It occurs often in the Scottish dialect also:—'Ye need na doubt I held my whisht' (Burns).

      You are about to drink from a cup. 'How much shall I put into this cup for you?' 'Oh you may give me the full of it.' This is Irish-English: in England they would say—'Give it to me full.' Our expression is a translation from the Irish language. For example, speaking of a drinking-horn, an old writer says, a lán do'n lionn, literally, 'the full of it of ale.' In Silva Gadelica we find lán a ghlaice deise do losaibh, which an Irishman translating literally would render 'the full of his right hand of herbs,' while an Englishman would express the same idea in this way—'his right hand full of herbs.'

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