What may be called the Narrative Infinitive is a very usual construction in Irish. An Irish writer, relating a past event (and using the Irish language) instead of beginning his narrative in this way, 'Donall O'Brien went on an expedition against the English of Athlone,' will begin 'Donall O'Brien to go on an expedition,' &c. No Irish examples of this need be given here, as they will be found in every page of the Irish Annals, as well as in other Irish writings. Nothing like this exists in English, but the people constantly imitate it in the Anglo-Irish speech. 'How did you come by all that money?' Reply:—'To get into the heart of the fair' (meaning 'I got into the heart of the fair'), and to cry old china, &c. (Gerald Griffin.) 'How was that, Lowry?' asks Mr. Daly: and Lowry answers:—'Some of them Garryowen boys sir to get about Danny Mann.' (Gerald Griffin: 'Collegians.') 'How did the mare get that hurt?' 'Oh Tom Cody to leap her over the garden wall yesterday, and she to fall on her knees on the stones.'
The Irish language has the word annso for here, but it has no corresponding word derived from annso, to signify hither, though there are words for this too, but not from annso. A similar observation applies to the Irish for the words there and thither, and for where and whither. As a consequence of this our people do not use hither, thither, and whither at all. They make here, there, and where do duty for them. Indeed much the same usage exists in the Irish language too: Is ann tigdaois eunlaith (Keating): 'It is here the birds used to come,' instead of hither. In consequence of all this you will hear everywhere in Anglo-Irish speech:—'John came here yesterday': 'come here Patsy': 'your brother is in Cork and you ought to go there to see him': 'where did you go yesterday after you parted from me?'
'Well Jack how are you these times?' 'Oh, indeed Tom I'm purty well thank you—all that's left of me': a mock way of speaking, as if the hard usage of the world had worn him to a thread. 'Is Frank Magaveen there?' asks the blind fiddler. 'All that's left of me is here,' answers Frank. (Carleton.) These expressions, which are very usual, and many others of the kind, are borrowed from the Irish. In the Irish tale, 'The Battle of Gavra,' poor old Osheen, the sole survivor of the Fena, says:—'I know not where to follow them [his lost friends]; and this makes the little remnant that is left of me wretched. (D'fúig sin m'iarsma).
Ned Brophy, introducing his wife to Mr. Lloyd, says, 'this is herself sir.' This is an extremely common form of phrase. 'Is herself [i.e. the mistress] at home Jenny?' 'I'm afraid himself [the master of the house] will be very angry when he hears about the accident to the mare.' This is an Irish idiom. The Irish chiefs, when signing their names to any document, always wrote the name in this form, Misi O'Neill, i.e. 'Myself O'Neill.'
A usual expression is 'I have no Irish,' i.e. I do not know or speak Irish. This is exactly the way of saying it in Irish, of which the above is a translation:—Ní'l Gaodhlainn agum.
To let on is to pretend, and in this sense is used everywhere in Ireland. 'Oh your father is very angry': 'Not at all, he's only letting on.' 'If you meet James don't let on you saw me,' is really a positive, not a negative request: equivalent to—'If you meet James, let on (pretend) that you didn't see me.' A Dublin working-man recently writing in a newspaper says, 'they passed me on the bridge (Cork), and never let on to see me' (i.e. 'they let on not to see me').
'He is all as one as recovered now'; he is nearly the same as recovered.
At the proper season you will often see auctioneers' posters:—'To be sold by auction 20 acres of splendid meadow on foot,' &c. This term on foot, which is applied in Ireland to growing crops of all kinds—corn, flax, meadow, &c.—is derived from the Irish language, in which it is used in the oldest documents as well as in the everyday spoken modern Irish; the usual word cos for 'foot' being used. Thus in the Brehon Laws we are told that a wife's share of the flax is one-ninth if it be on foot (for a cois, 'on its foot,' modern form air a chois) one-sixth after being dried, &c. In one place a fine is mentioned for appropriating or cutting furze if it be 'on foot.' (Br. Laws.)
This mode of speaking is applied in old documents to animals also. Thus in one of the old Tales is mentioned a present of a swine and an ox on foot (for a coiss, 'on their foot') to be given to Mac Con and his people, i.e. to be sent to them alive—not slaughtered. (Silva Gadelica.) But I have not come across this application in our modern Irish-English.
To give a thing 'for God's sake,' i.e. to give it in charity or for mere kindness, is an expression very common at the present day all over Ireland. 'Did you sell your turf-rick to Bill Fennessy?' Oh no, I gave it to him for God's sake: he's very badly off now poor fellow, and I'll never miss it.' Our office attendant Charlie went to the clerk, who was chary of the pens, and got a supply with some difficulty. He came back grumbling:—'A person would think I was asking them for God's sake' (a thoroughly Hibernian sentence). This expression is common also in Irish, both ancient and modern, from which the English is merely a translation. Thus in the Brehon Laws we find mention of certain young persons being taught a trade 'for God's sake' (ar Dia), i.e. without fee: and in another place a man is spoken of as giving a poor person something 'for God's sake.'
The word 'nough, shortened from enough, is always used in English with the possessive pronouns, in accordance with the Gaelic construction in such phrases as gur itheadar a n-doithin díobh, 'So that they ate their enough of them' ('Diarmaid and Grainne'): d'ith mo shaith 'I ate my enough.' Accordingly uneducated people use the word 'nough in this manner, exactly as fill is correctly used in 'he ate his fill.' Lowry Looby wouldn't like to be 'a born gentleman' for many reasons—among others that you're expected 'not to ate half your 'nough at dinner.' (Gerald Griffin: 'Collegians.')
The words world and earth often come into our Anglo-Irish speech in a way that will be understood and recognised from the following examples:—'Where in the world are you going so early?' 'What in the world kept you out so long?' 'What on earth is wrong with you?' 'That cloud looks for all the world like a man.' 'Oh you young thief of the world, why did you do that?' (to a child). These expressions are all thrown in for emphasis, and they are mainly or altogether imported from the Irish. They are besides of long standing. In the 'Colloquy'—a very old Irish piece—the king of Leinster says to St. Patrick:—'I do not know in the world how it fares [with my son].' So also in a still older story, 'The Voyage of Maildune':—'And they [Maildune and his people] knew not whither in the world (isan bith) they were going. In modern Irish, Ní chuirionn sé tábhacht a n-éinidh san domhuin: 'he minds nothing in the world.' (Mac Curtin.)
But I think some of the above expressions are found in good English too, both old and new. For example in a letter to Queen Elizabeth the Earl of Ormond (an Irishman—one of the Butlers) designates a certain Irish chief 'that most arrogant, vile, traitor of the world Owney M‘Rorye' [O'Moore]. But perhaps he wrote this with an Irish pen.
A person does something to displease me—insults me, breaks down my hedge—and I say 'I will not let that go with him': meaning I will bring him to account for it, I will take satisfaction, I will punish him. This, which is very usual, is an Irish idiom. In the story of The Little Brawl of Allen, Goll boasts of having slain Finn's father; and Finn answers bud maith m'acfainnse ar gan sin do léicen let, 'I am quite powerful enough not to let that go with you.' ('Silva Gadelica.') Sometimes this Anglo-Irish phrase means to vie with, to rival. 'There's no doubt that old Tom Long is very rich': 'Yes indeed, but I think Jack Finnerty wouldn't let it go with him.' Lory Hanly at the dance, seeing his three companions sighing and obviously in love with three of the ladies, feels himself just as bad for a fourth, and sighing, says to himself that he 'wouldn't let it go with any of them.' ('Knocknagow.')
'I give in to you' means 'I yield to you,' 'I assent to