2 > 9&.9 
 
 SAYINGS, PROVERBS, 
 
 AND 
 
 HUMOUR OF ULSTER. 
 
 BY 
 
 PROFESSOR BYERS, M.A., M.D. 
 
 Entered at Stationers' Hall. 
 
 .-Belfast s 
 
 Printed by Wm. Strain & Sons, Gt. Victoria Street. 
 
 1904. 
 
SAYINGS, PROVERBS, 
 
 AND 
 
 HUMOUR OF ULSTER. 
 
 BY 
 
 O HfJ 
 
 PROFESSOR . BYERS, M.A., M.D. 
 
 A 
 
 Entered at Stationers' Hall. 
 
 JSelfast : 
 
 Printed by Wm. Strain & Sons, Gt. Victoria Street. 
 
 1904. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster ... 3 
 
 Ulsterisms ... 59 
 
Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour 
 of Ulster.* 
 
 It has been truly said that nothing is so descriptive and characteristic 
 of a distinct race as their sayings, proverbs, and humour ; for a study 
 of these features enables us to form some opinion of the history and 
 character of the people, to understand their habits and peculiarities, 
 to investigate their methods of speech, and, in some measure, to explain 
 why it is they have exerted such an influence on the world’s history. 
 
 For three hundred years there has existed in Ulster (and mainly 
 in the north-eastern part of that province) a race of people who, by 
 their power of work, level-headedness, and thorough self-reliance, 
 have made Belfast the great centre of Irish industries, have contributed 
 to all parts of the British Empire men distinguished in commerce, 
 science, literature, statesmanship, and the arts of war ; and, as pointed 
 out by President Roosevelt in his great work, “ The Winning of the 
 West,” have done so much in colonizing what was formerly called 
 the western states of America — those lying beyond the Alleghanies. 
 Speaking of these settlers from the North of Ireland, President Roose- 
 velt says: 
 
 “They did not begin to come to America in any numbers till after the 
 opening of the eighteenth century ; but by 1730 they were fairly swarm- 
 ing across the ocean, for the most part in two streams — the larger going 
 to the port of Philadelphia; the smaller to the port of Charleston. 
 Pushing through the long settled lowlands of the sea-coast, they at 
 once made their abode at the foot of the mountains, and became the 
 outposts of civilization. From Pennsylvania, whither the great 
 majority had come, they drifted south along the foothills and down the 
 long valleys till they met their brethren from Charleston, who had 
 
 * Lecture delivered in part to the members of the Belfast Natural History and Philosophica 
 Society, December ist, 1903. 
 
4 Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 pushed up into the Carolina back country. In this land of hills, 
 covered by unbroken forest, they took root and flourished, stretching 
 in a broad belt from, north to south, a shield of sinewy men, thrust in 
 between the people of the seaboard and the red warriors of the wil- 
 derness. All through this region they were alike ; they had as little 
 kinship with the Cavalier as with the Quaker. The west was won by 
 those who have been rightly called the Roundheads of the South, the 
 same men who, before any others, declared for American independence. 
 That these Irish Presbyterians were a bold and hardy race is proved 
 by their at once pushing past the settled regions and plunging into 
 the wilderness as the leaders of the white advance. They were the 
 first and last set of immigrants to do 1 this ; all others have merely 
 followed in the wake of their predecessors. But, indeed, they were 
 fitted to be Americans from the very start : they were kinsfolk of the 
 Covenanters ; they deemed it a religious duty to interpret their own 
 Bible; and held for a Divine right the election of their own clergy. 
 For generations their whole ecclesiastic and scholastic systems had 
 been fundamentally democratic. In the hard life of the frontier they 
 lost much of their religion, and they had but scant opportunity to give 
 their children the schooling in which they believed ; but what few 
 meeting-houses and schools were on the borders were theirs.” 
 
 The northern Irish are a mixed people, and the Ulsterman, from 
 his heredity, is a product by himself. Through his veins there courses 
 a stream of Scotch, English, French Huguenot, and Irish blood, and 
 so, in the same individual you may sometimes find the pluck and grit 
 of the Englishman, the tenacity and forethought of the Scot, the 
 industry of the Huguenot, with the keen sympathy, pugnacity, and 
 ready wit of the native Irishman. 
 
 The predominant element in this racial amalgam is Scottish ; and 
 as those who> came originally from that country were from both the 
 Lowlands and Highlands, they contributed both Saxon and Celtic 
 elements ; but the Ulster race is now, and has been for a lengthened 
 period, as distinct from, the Scotch as the American race is from 
 the English. As the late Lord Dufferin — one of the greatest Ulster- 
 men of the nineteenth century, who was in part a Scotchman (his 
 ancestors, the Hamiltons and Blackwood's, came from that country) — 
 once wittily remarked in a St. Andrew’s Day speech in India, when 
 he was Governor-General, “ Ulstermen were Scotchmen improved 
 by three hundred years’ residence in Ireland.” The Ulsterman is 
 a true Irishman, proud of his birthplace and of his race. 
 
Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 5 
 
 The characteristics of a race so constituted find expression in the 
 quaint sayings, proverbs, and humour of the people of the northern 
 province of Ireland, which are inspired more by a shrewd observation 
 of men and nature than by mere book learning. They are met with 
 in their most pronounced form among those living in the country 
 districts, as distinguished from the towns ; and the clergy and the 
 members of the medical profession who are brought into intimate 
 relationship with the people, hear them most frequently. It is in 
 the plain, homely, everyday talk of the people that you meet these 
 sayings, and as shown by Mr. James N. Richardson, of Bessbrook, 
 if you know your “ Ulster,” and can handle it properly, you have 
 a language in which you may freely converse in any country in the 
 world, except the northern Irish province, without being “ understanded 
 of the people.” The use of these quaint sayings is as characteristic 
 of the Ulsterman as his accent, or as his curt, abrupt, and matter-of- 
 fact delivery of his words ; and we must never forget, as pointed out 
 by a great writer, that “ a countryman is as warm in fustian as a 
 king in velvet ; and a truth is as comfortable in homely words as in 
 fine speech.” Many of those recorded in this communication I have 
 picked up when professionally engaged in different parts of Ulster. 
 The majority are essentially Ulster in their origin or in their adoption ; 
 others have been probably introduced at various times, and may still 
 be met with in other parts of the United Kingdom. The explanation 
 of some of the sayings is at times difficult, and often gives rise to 
 plenty of discussion. Here are three expressions used in Ulster, the 
 origin of which the average reader would have difficulty in finding : 
 “ The rale McKay,” “ A Morgan Rattler,” and “ Tibb’s Eve/ 
 
 The expression, “ The rale McKay,” originated in the Highlands, 
 in the country north of Sutherland, where the real home of the great 
 clan McKay is found. There “ The real McKay ” is one who is able 
 to claim that both his parents and grandparents (on both sides) were 
 McKays, and so his clan connection is beyond doubt or dispute. 
 The MacKay clan was so famous for its integrity, uprightness, and 
 honesty that its name passed into a proverb in the rest of Scotland, 
 and so to all Scotchmen, “ The real MacKay,” applied to any person 
 or thing, means that it is genuine and honest, without any shoddy. A 
 blend of Scotch whiskey is advertised as “ The real MacKay,” and in 
 shops in Glasgow you will see articles labelled “ The real MacKay.” 
 
 In various parts of Ulster the term, “ The real MacKay ” is used 
 in this sense as indicating that the person or thing so designated is of 
 
6 Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 the very best quality, but in North Antrim the term undoubtedly took 
 its origin in another way. Seven brothers of the MacKay (MacCay) 
 clan came from Ayrshire, and settled at Mosside and Ballintoy, and 
 in the graveyard of the celebrated Franciscan Friary of Bun-na- 
 Margie, near Ballycastle, in North Antrim, so intimately associated 
 with the family of MacDonnell, Earls of Antrim, which, in his 
 most interesting account of this ecclesiastical antiquity, Mr. Francis 
 Joseph Bigger thinks was probably founded in the fourteenth century, 
 there is a stone with heraldic bearings. The arms of the MacKay 
 clan are boldly cut on the west side of this gravestone, while on the 
 east side is the inscription : “ Here Lyeth ye Body of Daniel McKay, 
 who Died April ye 2nd, 1732, Aged 30 Years.” One of the sons 
 or grandsons of the seven brothers entered the service of a Spanish 
 king and became a distinguished General, and, owing to the services 
 he rendered, he was rewarded by getting the title “ Real,” which is 
 the Spanish corruption of “ Regalis,” and indicates a high position 
 in the Casa Real, or royal household. This distinguished General 
 came back with this title, which the country folk pronounced “ Rale,” 
 and he and his descendants were distinguished from the other McKays 
 in this particular way. It is simply a title of honour pronounced in 
 a peculiar fashion, and with a meaning attached to it different from its 
 original signification. A doctor and a clergyman in North Antrim 
 are descendants of one of the seven original MacKays, and a medical 
 student of Queen’s College, Belfast, who> graduated M.B. in 1901 is, 
 I am informed, a great-great-great-grandson of one of the seven. The 
 descendants of the General who obtained the Spanish title, are gener- 
 ally supposed to be extinct. 
 
 Let me give another expressive phrase from South Down. Many 
 years ago if anyone in that part of Ulster owned a fast horse, it was 
 styled a “ Morgan Rattler.” The same term was applied, in coursing, 
 to a hare which the greyhounds failed to< catch, such as the type 
 described in that striking book published recently, “ The Confessions 
 of a Poacher,” or to a quick runner among schoolboys. I chanced to 
 lend some time ago to a County Down gentleman “ The Life of 
 General Chesney,” one of the most distinguished men that the 
 “ Kingdom of Mourne ” has produced, and, in returning it, he told me 
 he had made a great find which explained the term “ Morgan Rattler,” 
 for the biography showed that the “ Morgan Rattler ” was a famous 
 armed smuggling lugger which frequented the Mourne shores, and in 
 General Chesney’s life (p. 34), an account is given of an encounter 
 
Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. ^ 
 
 between the daring crew of this celebrated boat and the Revenue men, 
 of whom, General Chesnev’s father was captain, or coast officer. This 
 ship was so quick and hard to catch that anything with similar qual- 
 ities was designated a “ Morgan Rattler,” or was said to be as fleet 
 as the “ Morgan Rattler.” 
 
 “ Tibb’s Eve.” — This is an Ulster way of designating a day which 
 will never come. Like the millenium or the “ Greek Kalends ” it 
 indicates an indefinite or unfixed period of time, and so is really 
 an evasion. One often hears in Ulster the expression : “ He’ll pay 
 ye on Tibb’s Eve,” or, “ Ye’ll get it again Tibb's Eve,” which means, 
 you will be paid, or will get something on a day which will never 
 come; and you also find it in the phrase: “Tibb’s Eve is the day 
 neither afore (before) Christmas nor after.” But what is Tibb? and 
 how did the saying come to be so common in Ulster ? Some author- 
 ities say it is a corruption of Saint Ubes, which again is a corruption 
 of Setuval. Now, as there is no such saint in the calendar, the 
 eve falls practically on “ the Greek Kalends.” Other authorities think 
 Tibb, Tibbia, etc., are corruptions of the name Isabel ; but as there 
 is no such saint immortalized, the responsibility of one promising to 
 do anything on “ Tibb’s Eve ” is obvious. A third explanation is that 
 St. Tibb’s evening; is the evening of the last day, or Day of Judgment, 
 and so one understands the meaning of being paid on “ Tibb’s Eve.” 
 All these explanations are unsatisfactory. The term, which is a very 
 old one, was probably imported into Ulster, but when, and by whom, 
 there is no accurate information. 
 
 When an Ulsterman, on buying an article, pays at once, he is 
 said to “ pay on the nail.” This curious phrase, which is the anti- 
 thesis of “ tick ” (abbrev. of ticket), was thought by some to owe its 
 origin to the fact that money was paid on a, counter studded with 
 nails ; but two other explanations have been put forward : 
 
 ist. — In a Parliamentary Deed of King Robert the Bruce, it is 
 stipulated by indenture, dated July 15th, 1326 (“ Scots Acts,” I. 476), 
 that a tenth penny was covenanted for, payable to the King. On his 
 part, he agreed not to exact certain horses and carriages unless he was 
 passing through the realm, after the custom of his predecessor, Alex- 
 ander III., “ for which horses and carriages full payment should be 
 made super unguem, that is, “ down on the nail,” or into the hand, 
 u solvere super unguem .” 
 
 2 n d- — O’Keefe, in his “ Recollections,” Vol I., speaking of the 
 period 177 3 _ 5 > writes: “During the Limerick Assizes I saw a stuffed 
 
8 Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 glove, about four feet long, hanging out from the top of the exchange, 
 nearly across the main street; this was the accustomed token that for 
 a week or fortnight, whilst the courts were sitting, no debtor could be 
 arrested. . . . An ample piazzo under the exchange was a 
 
 thoroughfare, in the centre stood a pillar four feet high, upon it 
 a circular plate of copper about three feet in diameter, this was 
 called the nail, and on it was paid the earnest for any commercial 
 bargain made, which was the origin of the saying, ‘ paid down on the 
 nail.' ” The “ nail ” existed at Bristol, Liverpool, and other, places 
 in England. It is probable it was through the first or Scotch origin 
 that the term “ on the nail ” came to be used in Ulster. In Fletcher’s 
 “ Spanish Curate ” we find it : 
 
 “ What legacy would you bequeathe me now, 
 
 And fay it on the nail to fly my fury ?” 
 
 and in the following very witty poem by a distinguished townsman of 
 Belfast, the late Dr. J. S. Drennan : 
 
 AGAINST LEGACIES TO DOCTORS. 
 
 “ No, no, ma’am, this legacy plan would soon fail, 
 
 Whatever goodwill it attests ; 
 
 Let the curer of bodies be paid on the naif 
 To the saver of souls leave bequests. 
 
 “ Your doctor endow, whilst he keeps you alive, 
 
 With guineas in proof of his merit, 
 
 But take my advice, if you wish to survive, 
 
 And nought let him hope to inherit. 
 
 “ Medicines sometimes are pois’nous, post-obit fees 
 Might make Aesculapius death’s proctor; 
 
 And bad enough surely to die of disease, 
 
 ’Twere the devil to die of the doctor.” 
 
 Dr. J. Swanwick Drennan was son of the celebrated Dr. William 
 Drennan, who was bom and died in Belfast, and who w'rote many pieces. 
 In one of them, “ Erin,” is the famous phrase, “ The Emerald Isle.” 
 After the death of Dr. J. Swanwick Drennan, his children published, 
 in loving remembrance, a volume of his charming “ Poems and Son- 
 nets.” It is from a copy of this book, given me by his nephew, the 
 Right Hon. Thomas Andrews, D.L., that I quote several pieces in 
 this paper. Dr. J. S. Drennan was a man of the highest literary 
 
9 
 
 Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 culture, and a great favourite with those who were privileged to enjoy 
 his friendship. Of a retiring nature, his rather sad and even melan- 
 choly appearance was a curious environment for a man possessed of 
 the keenest sense of humour. 
 
 In Ulster certain words are often employed peculiarly ; for 
 example, the word “ disorder ” is used for a disease or illness, gen- 
 erally of an infectious nature, and the same term is applied to an out- 
 break among animals (pigs, etc.). In recent years one has heard in 
 Ulster the influenza described as a most “ sevendible (severe or seven 
 double) disorder.” Shakespeare, in King John, employs it rather as 
 indicating a sort of temporary mental aberration : 
 
 “ I will not keep this form upon my head, 
 
 When there is such disorder in my wit.” 
 
 It is also employed as a weaker term than disease, to imply functional 
 disturbance without structural changes, as is well seen in the following 
 lines by Dr. J. S. Drennan : 
 
 MEDICAL RECIPE. 
 
 “By a patient too fair sat a doctor too' young, 
 
 With eyes more intent on her lips than her tongue ; 
 
 He tested her heart, as its pulse’s recorder, 
 
 But, alas ! in his own was the latent disorder ; 
 
 And soon from the region in which it was bred, 
 
 This sad “ tremor cordis ” so muddled his head, 
 
 That instead of some physic to mend her condition, 
 
 He urged as a recipe, take your physician.” 
 
 When an Ulsterman is suffering from a malady which is attended 
 with paroxysms of pain, he says the pain comes in “ stoons,” or he may- 
 say he has a “ stooning ” in the part affected, as his side, head, etc. 
 This word is apparently a contraction of stound, a very old English 
 noun, meaning a severe blow or stroke, and is connected with stound, 
 an old past participle of stun, itself a variant of stunned. The word is 
 akin to the Sanskrit stan = sound, thunder. Spenser, in the “ Faery 
 Queen,” uses both, the noun : 
 
 “ Like to a mazed steare 
 
 That yet of mortal stroke, the stound doth beare ” ; 
 and the verb : 
 
 “ So was he stound with stroke of her huge taile.” 
 
io Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 The word is also allied to astound. It is interesting therefore 
 to know that when a County Down, County Derry, or County Tyrone 
 man says he has “stoons” of pain, instead of being accused', as is some- 
 times the case, of using a vulgar word, he is employing one of the 
 oldest and most expressive terms in our language. 
 
 Those who have suffered from a disease like influenza know the 
 extraordinary condition of weakness, depression, and general absence 
 of very high self- appreciation which often follows that complaint. 
 In such circumstances the American says “ he feels vary mean/’ the 
 Englishman puts it, “ You could hang me over a clothes’ line ” ; how 
 much more expressive was the saying of the Ulsterwoman who, de- 
 scribing the condition of her child in such circumstances, said to the 
 physician at an hospital where she went for advice, “ I could lap 
 (an old word, from which the more modern wrap, a doublet of lap, 
 is derived) her roun’ my wee finger.” 
 
 Lap in this sense means to “twist round, ” but it is also used with 
 the idea of “ to cover something underneath,” or to “ muffle,” as in the 
 following exquisite lyric of William Allingham: 
 
 HALF WAKING. 
 
 “ I thought it was the little bed 
 I slept in long ago ; 
 
 A straight, white curtain at the head, 
 
 And two smooth knobs below. 
 
 “ I thought I saw the nursery fire, 
 
 And in a chair well known 
 My mother sat, and did not tire 
 With reading all alone. 
 
 “If I should make the slightest sound 
 To show that I’m awake, 
 
 She’d rise, and lap the blankets round, 
 
 My pillow softly shake ; 
 
 “ Kiss me, and turn my face to see 
 The shadows on the wall, 
 
 And then sing Rousseau’s dream to me, 
 
 Till fast asleep I fall. 
 
 “ But this is not my little bed ; 
 
 That time is far away ; 
 
 ’Mong strangers cold I live instead, 
 
 From dreary day to day.” 
 
Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. n 
 
 When hay is cut, aimfuls are often rolled' up in such a way as 
 to form conical heaps, which “ turn ” the rain. Each of these is 
 called in Ulster a “ lap-cole.” Lap here conveys the idea of folding 
 one part over another, while “ cole ” is derived from the Icelandic 
 kollr=a top, a head, a heap. The English dialectical variant of it 
 is “coil,” as in “Child’s Ballads”: 
 
 “ O bonny, bonny, sang the bird, 
 
 Sat in the coil o’ hay.” 
 
 In walking or running matches, a single round of the course is 
 a “lap.” In America what is called in our country a travelling rug is 
 designated a “lap-robe.” Wrap, hap, and lap are closely associated, 
 and one of the ways they are employed conveys the idea of protecting 
 from cold. In Ulster, as well as in Scotland and the North of Eng- 
 land, a “ hap ” is a cloak, plaid, or covering. 
 
 A lady suffering from a sudden brain attack said to me most 
 expressively : “ I’m moithered,” meaning her head was confused. This 
 word is allied to muddle. In “ Corymeela,” by Moira O’Neill, the 
 native of the glen, in speaking of the place he is living in in England, 
 says. : 
 
 “ This livin’ air is moithered wi’ the bummin’ o’ the bees ” 
 (bummin’ : an imitative word, the earlier representation of the modern 
 booming. A man who boasts is said in Ulster to be “ bummin’ ” 
 “ blowing,” “ bragging,” or “ breezing.” The American words are 
 “ booming ” : “ Business is booming ” ; “ boomer ” — one who assists in 
 a boom ; and in “ Silas Marner,” George Eliot uses the word as in- 
 dicating distracted : “ You’ll happen to be a bit moithered with it (a 
 child) while it’s so little.” 
 
 A person v.ho cannot endure pain well is said in Ulster to be a 
 bad “ tholer.” The word thole (early English, tholen ; Anglo-Saxon, 
 tholian ; old Saxon, tholean; Icelandic, thola; Greek, tolman = suffer : 
 Latin, tolerare=tollere — hence tolerate) in this sense of bearing injuries 
 silently, or enduring torture (mental or physical) without word or com- 
 plaint, is an extremely old one. In “ Piers Plowman” we have it used : 
 
 “ And what myschief and malese Cryst for man tholed.” 
 
 The following Ulster proverb, “ Thole weel’s a fine cowlt ” (colt), 
 means that patience and endurance go far. It is also employed in 
 another sense, meaning to wait, as the following story will illustrate. 
 Many years ago there lived in the district of Rathfriland, County 
 Down (a locality which has given birth to so many able women and men), 
 
12 Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 a clergyman who was clever, popular, and humorous. On one occas- 
 ion, while engaged in baptizing a child, he enquired from the father 
 the name of the infant. The parent for a moment forgot what the 
 child was to be named, and in his confusion, while scratching his 
 head, said : “ Thole a wee, sir” (meaning, wait a little), whereupon 
 the minister continued, “ Thole a wee, I baptize thee,” but was 
 suddenly interrupted by the father, who had now recollected the name, 
 exclaiming : “ Oh, stop, sir, the child’s name’s Hugh ¥’ 
 
 Strangers coming to reside in Ulster are at first puzzled at the 
 way “ better ” is used in regard to a person who is ailing. If you 
 ask an Ulsterman how a relative is who you have heard is very ill, and, 
 in reply, he says, “ he is better,” it does not mean simply that the 
 person has got the “ turn ” of the disease (as it is termed), but that 
 he is quite recovered. 
 
 A mother when harassed with a child who is constantly crying 
 says she is “ heart -scalded,” and so a member of a family or con- 
 nection who is a constant source of trouble is termed a “ heart’s scald.” 
 Some think this expressive word is “ heart’s scold,” “ scald ” being 
 Scotch for “ scold,” as in the “ Taming of the Shrew,” Petruchio says : 
 “ I know she is an irksome brawling scold, ” but I believe the word 
 is “ heart scald,” that is, someone who, by their actions, affects pain- 
 fully, or scalds, the heart=a “heart break.” 
 
 A place where rowdy characters collect is termed a “ randy- 
 boose.” A friend walking through Holywood heard someone in the 
 street say of a place where there was a collection of corner-boys: 
 “ That’s a regular randy-boose for all the roughs.” It is often ap- 
 plied to a race-course. One explanation of this phrase is that it is 
 a corruption of “ rendez-vous,” the word coming from the French 
 through Scotland. I believe, however, it is a compound of two words, 
 “randy,” a Scotch word= disorderly or boisterous (in the “Jolly 
 Beggars” Burns writes: 
 
 “ A merry core 
 O’ randie gangrel bodies ”), 
 
 and “ boose,” a very old word (Anglo-Saxon, bos ; Icelandic, bass ; 
 Danish, bass), meaning a stall or enclosure for cattle (cows or horses). 
 The word “ boose ” dates back to the fifteenth century when it was 
 first used. In various parts of County Down the word “ boose ” simply 
 means a situation, or post, or office, as the following story will illus- 
 trate : In a well-known town in South Down there lived many years 
 
Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 13 
 
 ago a lad of great natural ability, who, by the help of a very kindly 
 clergyman, became a member of a learned profession. Unfortunately 
 he at times was unsteady, and in corresponding with him, his friend 
 and patron, the clergyman, thought it advisable to remind him of his 
 failing. It so happened that at this particular time Sir Thomas Lar- 
 00m was Registrar- General of Ireland, and the clergyman was the 
 local Registrar of Marriages in his own district. One day he had 
 occasion to send a return to‘ that official, while at the same time he 
 wrote a letter to his protege, beginning it, “ Dear Tommy ” (the same 
 Christian name as that of the Registrar-General), reminding him to 
 keep clear of the drink as he had a “ snug boose , good pay, and 
 not much to do.” Unfortunately, the letters were put into the wrong 
 envelopes, and a most amusing situation arose, when a sharp reprimand 
 came down from Charlemont House, Dublin (the official residence of 
 t the Registrar-General), asking for an immediate explanation, and 
 shortly afterwards a note from the young friend to the clergyman 
 enquiring what in all the world he had to do with the registration of 
 marriages. Speaking of “ boose ” reminds me that in Comber there 
 is an old street (the present High Street) called the Cow “ Vennel,” 
 a word which is simply the French “venelle”=a small street. 
 
 Here are three words applied in Ulster to animals which the 
 semi-educated might in error consider to be vulgar. When a goat is 
 attached to one end of a rope or chain, the other extremity of which 
 is fastened in the ground by means of an iron pin (“ stab ”), it is said 
 to be “ tethered.” This is a very old word (formerly “ tedder ” as 
 used by Bacon : “ We live joyfully, going abroad within our tedder”), 
 occurring in old Friesic (tieder), Icelandic (tjodhr), and Danish (toir), 
 and Gaelic (teadhir=a tether). A horse, two of whose legs are 
 bound together, generally on the same side, is said to be “langeled.” 
 This is an old English word, meaning to bind together or “ hobble ” 
 a horse. “ Lanyel ” is a variant. If a valuable hen, or especially 
 one with a brood of young birds, breaks one of her legs, a splinter 
 of wood is carefully bound to one Ude of the leg, as a surgeon uses 
 a splint in setting a broken bone, and the hen, who manages to walk 
 about in this condition, is said to be “spelcheled.” The word “ spelch,” 
 which is the same as “ spelk,” is a very old one (middle English, 
 spelke ; Anglo-Saxon, spelc; Danish, spalk ; Icelandic, spelkur), mean- 
 ing, to set, as a broken bone, with a splint or spelk (a splinter of 
 wood). I have often heard people in the country speak of a splint 
 used by surgeons as a “ splinter.” 
 
14 
 
 Sayings , Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 In County Armagh, food that is insipid is teimed “ wersh,” a word 
 which is probably of Scotch origin. It is also applied to a person of 
 pale or sickly appearance. We find in “Old Mortality,” “ Wersh 
 parritch, neither good to fry, boil, nor sup cauld.” In the “ History 
 First Forty Years,” Vol. I., p. 242, Carlyle writes: “Irving and she 
 are sometimes ridiculous enough at present in the matter of their son, 
 a quiet wersh gorb of a thing, as all children of six weeks are.” And 
 in “ Life in London,” Vol. I., p. 244, he says: “ I went to the factor 
 as I proposed on F riday — a harmless, intelligent enough, rather wersh 
 looking man.” It may be a reduced form of “ wearish,” a word of 
 uncertain etymology, but having perhaps relationships with “ weary ” 
 and “ waterish.” If the word comes from Scotland its use in Armagh 
 (in which it is common), where there was an early English settlement, 
 is peculiar. 
 
 In walking through a bog or “ moss ” one sometimes, as in shoot- 
 ing snipe, suddenly comes upon a place, where, owing to the marshy, 
 shaking nature of the soil, there is risk of sinking deeply. Such a 
 situation is known in Ulster as a “ Qua” a word abbreviated from 
 “ quag,” to which in “ Pilgrim’s Progress ” Bunvan thus refers : 
 “ On the left hand there was a very dangerous quag , into which, if 
 even a good man falls, he can find no bottom for even his foot to 
 stand on ; into that quag King David once did fall.” Now this word 
 “quag” is a shortened form of “quagmire,” which is a variant of 
 the earlier “ quakemire ” (old English, quake=shake, and mire=damp, 
 yielding soil). So we have quakemire, quagmire, quag, qua. 
 
 The Ulsterman, with all his level-headedness, has a good deal of 
 superstition in his nature, and this becomes specially evident in times 
 of sickness ; and so the baying of a dog, the breaking of a looking- 
 glass, or the sudden creaking of a table or chair in a house where 
 anyone is seriously ill, is often regarded as a probable forerunner of 
 death; but if anyone sees, or, rather, imagines he sees, an apparition, 
 then the superstitious are almost certain that death is at hand. I 
 recollect well some years ago driving late at night from Ballycastle 
 to Ballymoney. The jarvey was doing his utmost by constant talking 
 to while away the tedium, of this rather tiresome journey, when quite 
 suddenly, as we were passing a place called the “ dry arch ” (where 
 one country road crosses another by a bridge), he said in a most 
 alarmed manner: “ Sir, there’s my brother’s wraith,” pointing with his 
 whip to the side of the road (he had previously mentioned he was 
 ill), and not another word could he be induced to utter until we arrived 
 
Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster . 15 
 
 at Ballymoney. The moon had previously arisen, and probably the 
 silhouette or outline formed by its sudden shining through the trees 
 at the side of the road had convinced him that, as in Tennyson’s 
 “ Maud ” : 
 
 “ Then glided out of the joyous wood 
 The ghastly wraith of one I knew.” 
 
 Another sign of the Ulsterman’s superstition is the existence 
 throughout the northern province of fairy lore, more marked in some 
 districts than in others, but gradually becoming less prevalent. Among 
 the peasants — especially those of a superstitious turn of mind — there is 
 a strong belief that fairies are real and are not to be trifled with. 
 These little creatures are supposed to be a sort of intermediate beings 
 between men and angels. The tradition is that the fairies were at 
 one time angels in heaven, but were punished for their pride by being 
 cast out. Some, it is said, fell on the earth, others into the sea, but 
 a third group were carried by demons to the nether regions. These 
 latter are demoniacal, and are used by the evil one to do wicked deeds. 
 These malicious fairies, it is said, live under the earth, and impart 
 knowledge of wicked spells, of magic, and of potions to certain evil 
 persons chosen by the devil, such as the witch-women. The fairies 
 who fell into the sea have palaces under the ocean and ride on white 
 horses, and often hold revels and have dances with their companions 
 on the land, who live in the clefts of the hills, and frequent forths or 
 raths, and are specially fond of the hawthorn. The fairies are small 
 in stature, and can render their bodies invisible and pass them through 
 all sorts of enclosures. F air in complexion, they are generally clothed 
 in green ; as a rule they are kindly and frolicsome, and very fond of 
 music and dancing, but they may be mischievous or spiteful to human 
 beings, because, while the human race is immortal, the fairies, tradition 
 says, will be annihilated on the last day. They are very particular in 
 their habits, and dislike anyone that is of a mean or niggardly nature, 
 so it is common in some places to leave water for them to wash in, 
 to put some food on the “dresser” (dresser is from the old French 
 dresseur, dreceur, dreyor; modern French, dressoir=a sideboard, gnd 
 comes from dresser = to dress. In the “ Taming of the Shrew,” Pet- 
 ruchio says, in reference to the burnt mutton: “How durst you, vil- 
 lains, bring it from the dresser ”) for them to eat ; and, curiously, the 
 common custom of placing coom or peat (turf) dust (coom, koom, comb, 
 is a dialect variant of culm, which is derived from the old English 
 
1 6 Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 
 
 culme, colm = soot, smoke, from which came the words, culmy, colmy = 
 black or smutted. Culm became coom as coulter became cooter. The 
 word “coom” apparently comes from Scotland, where its original meaning 
 was soot forming about a fireplace. The “smithy coom” was the 
 hard granular grit which forms over a blacksmith’s fire. Then it 
 came to be used for coal dust or slack. In the North of Ireland it is 
 invariably applied to the dust or fine particles of turf) at the back of 
 the kitchen fire, which, while it serves to prevent it going out, is also used 
 among the superstitious with the idea of providing a fire for the fairies, 
 who often hold council, it is said, around it at night. The fox-glove 
 is known as “ fairy fingers,” and I remember as a boy being shown in 
 the country rings in the fields caused, it was believed, by the fairies 
 dancing in circles. Alas ! modem science shows, that this phenomenon 
 is due to the growth of certain fungi, which appear in a single night, 
 forming a circle in the grass as if sprinkled with ashes. There is a 
 dread among the country people lest the fairies may carry off their 
 children, and in certain places it is believed they can do so onlv before 
 the children are baptized, and so the parents watch the cradles most 
 anxiously till they are christened. If the fairies bewitch the children 
 before they are baptized, tradition says, such infants grow up bad and 
 have the “ evil eye,” and so by their look bring ill-luck. In certain 
 parts of Tyrone, if an infant is taken out “ after dark ” a little salt 
 is placed in some of its garments (dress or petticoat), probably as a 
 charm against the fairies. The serious part of this is that if the fairies 
 take an infant away “ the changeling ” they leave, being their own 
 offspring or elve, is believed to be less robust (Tennyson in “ The Com- 
 ing of Arthur” has clearly this idea when he writes : “Shrunk like a 
 fairy changeling lay the mage ”) and of defective intellect, so that in 
 some places the term “ changeling ” simply means an idiot. The 
 fairies are believed to inhabit forts or raths. as well as underground 
 dwellings, and to have a special predilection for thorns, and 1 a stranger 
 noticing a thombush growing in the centre of a field 1 or the portion 
 of a rath, and asking why it is not removed, will be told it would annoy 
 the fairies to do so. 
 
 Another and more realistic view of the fairies has been put forward 
 by Mr. D. MacRitchie in his book, “ The Testimony of Tradition.” 
 According to this authority, the fairies, with whom we have been 
 traditionally acquainted, are the mound-dwellers, whose remains have 
 been found in the form of green hillocks, which have, as in one of the 
 most noted, the “ Ma’es-How,” of Orkney, been artifically erected over 
 
Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 17 
 
 a long, low passage, leading to a central chamber, which has no roof, 
 but is open to heaven. Mr. MacRitchie explains, as is well known, 
 that many traditions in fairy folk-lore connect the “ good people ” 
 with mounds, which subsequent investigation has shown to be the resi- 
 dence of men of a pigmy race. He identifies these with the Piets 
 (fairies are termed in Scotland “ Pechs ”). There can be no doubt, 
 apart from this theory of MacRitchie’s, that in Ulster, as in other 
 places, the stories in reference to fairies are often associated with 
 hills, forts, and subterranean residences (generally of a palatial 
 nature) into which the “ wee folk ” often suddenly disappear. There is 
 a very interesting discussion of this question in “English Fairy Tales,” 
 written by the Editor of “ Folk-Lore,” Mr. Joseph Jacobs, and illus- 
 trated by Mr. John D. Batten. Mr. Jacobs says: “If, as archaeolo- 
 gists tell us, there was once a race of men in Northern Europe, very 
 short and hairy, that dwelt in underground chambers, artificially 
 concealed by green hillocks, it does not seem: unlikely that odd sur- 
 vivors of the race should have lived on after they had been conquered 
 and nearly exterminated by Aryan invaders, and should occasionally 
 have performed something like the pranks told of Fairies and Trolls.” 
 Mr. MacRitchie’s work is a most interesting one, but all the traditions 
 about the fairies existing in our folk-lore cannot be explained in his 
 “ realistic ” way. 
 
 A popular superstition prevails in the Ards district of County 
 Down that John MacAnanty, the Northern Fairy King, lived on 
 Scrabo Hill, and held his court in the interior of the cairn on its 
 summit. The banshee, or woman fairy — the spirit of death — is the 
 most terrible of all the fairy race. The cry of this awful apparition 
 is the most weird and mournful of all earthly sounds, and, heard in 
 the silence of the night, betokens death to some member of a historic 
 family, to whom this spirit is attached. The fairies, being small of 
 stature, are designated as “ wee folk, ” and to propitiate them are called 
 “ good folk.” Moira O’Neill, whose poetry is so much associated with 
 the Glens of Antrim, in her “ Baby Song,” writes : 
 
 A BABY SONG. 
 
 ‘ When mv little son is born on a sunny summer morn, 
 
 I’ll take him sleepin’ in my arms to walk beside the sea, 
 
 For the windy wathers blue would be dancin’ if they knew, 
 
 And the weeny waves that wet the sand come creepin’ up to me. 
 
1 8 Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 “ When my pretty son’s awake, och ! the care o’ him I’ll take, 
 
 An’ we’ll never pass a gentle place between the dark an’ day ; 
 
 If he’s lovely in his sleep on his face a veil I’ll keep, 
 
 Or the wee folk an’ the good folk might be wantin’ him away. 
 
 “ When my darlin’ comes to me he ill lie upon my knee — 
 
 Though the world should be my pillow he must know no harder 
 place — 
 
 Sure a queen’s son may be cold in a cradle all o’ gold, 
 
 But my arm shall be about him, an’ my kiss upon his face.” 
 
 “ Moira O’Neill ” is the well-known nom-de-flume of a member 
 of an old and distinguished County Antrim family who, at Cushendun, 
 wrote her first songs and tales of “The Glen Folk” of North Antrim, 
 and who at present resides in Ireland. Many of her lyrics have 
 appeared in Blackwood's Magazine (old Mr. Blackwood was one of 
 her early literary patrons) and in the Spectator. She has a most in- 
 teresting personal history, in reference to which I say nothing out of 
 respect to her own wish to preserve her incognito. No one has done 
 more, as pointed out by Stephen Gwynn, than “ Moira O’Neill ” 
 to redeem English-speaking Ireland from the reproach of lacking a 
 literature, and no pGet has shown more of the “ Celtic note ” in her 
 songs ; and I may be allowed to define this “ Celtic note ” by quoting 
 the following from a very interesting paper by Quiller Couch : 
 
 “ Meanwhile let it be understood that in speaking of a 1 Celtic 
 note ’ I accuse no fellow-creature of being an Irishman, Scotsman, 
 Welshman, Manxman, Comishman, or Breton. The poet will as a 
 rule turn out to be one or other of these, or at least to have a trace- 
 able strain of Celtic blood in him. But to the note only is the term 
 applied. Now this note (as I shall hope in some future paper to 
 show) may be recognized by many tokens ; but the first and chiefest is 
 its insistence upon man’s brotherhood with bird and beast, star and 
 flower, everything in short which we loosely call * nature,’ his brother- 
 hood even with spirits and angels, as one of an infinite number of 
 microcosms reflecting a common image of God. And poetry which 
 holds by this creed will hardly be subservient to societies and govern- 
 ments and legalized doctrines and conventions ; it will hold to them by 
 a long and loose chain if at all. It flies high enough, at any rate, 
 to take a bird’s-eye view of all manner of things which in the temple, 
 the palace, or the market-place have come to be taken as axiomatic. 
 It eyes them with an extraordinary ‘ dissoluteness,’ if you will give 
 
Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 19 
 
 that word its literal meaning. It sees that some accepted virtues 
 carry no reflection of heaven ; it sees that heaven, on the other hand — 
 so infinite is its care — may shake with anger from bound to bound 
 at the sight of a caged bird. It sees that the souls of living things 
 even of the least conspicuous, reach up by chains and are anchored in 
 heaven, while “ great” events sh’de by on the surface of this skimming 
 planet with empires and their ordinances.” 
 
 This subject, fairy lore, is a most attractive one to all interested 
 in literature, and, as pointed out by G. A. Greene, “ together with its 
 kindred science of mythology and folk-lore, it provides us with the 
 nearest glimpses now obtainable of the primitive imagination of man, 
 upon which almost all imaginative literature, even the greatest, is 
 primarily founded.” No writer had a greater sympathy with, and 
 appreciation of, the fairy world of fancy and myth than the Ulster 
 poet Allingham, as is well seen in his charming poems, “ The F airy 
 King,” The Lepracaun ” (Leprahaun) or F airy Shoemaker (a great 
 favourite in Co. Donegal), and in the well-known child's song : 
 
 THE FAIRIES. 
 
 “ Up the airy mountain, 
 
 Down the rushy glen, 
 
 We daren’t go a-hunting 
 F or fear of little men : 
 
 Wee folk, good folk, 
 
 Trooping all together, 
 
 Green jacket, red cap, 
 
 And white owl’s feather ! 
 
 “ Down along the rocky shore 
 Some make their home : 
 
 They live on crispy pancakes 
 Of yellow-tide foam ; 
 
 Some in the reeds 
 
 Of the black mountain lake, 
 
 With frogs for their watch-dogs, 
 
 All night awake. 
 
 “ High on the hill -top 
 The old king sits : 
 
 He is now so old and grey, 
 
 He’s nigh lost his wits; 
 
20 
 
 Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 With a bridge of white mist 
 Columbkill he crosses, 
 
 On his stately journeys, 
 
 From Slieveleague to Rosses; 
 
 Or going up with music, 
 
 On cold, starry nights, 
 
 To sup with the Queen 
 
 Of the gay Northern Lights. 
 
 “ They stole little Bridget 
 For seven years long; 
 
 When she came down again 
 Her friends were all gone ; 
 
 They took her lightly back, 
 
 Between the night and morrow, 
 They thought that she was fast asleep, 
 But she was dead with sorrow. 
 They have kept her ever since, 
 
 Deep within the lake, 
 
 On a bed of flag leaves, 
 
 Watching till she wake. 
 
 “ By the craggy hill-side, 
 
 Through the mosses bare, 
 
 They have planted thorn-trees 
 For pleasure here and there: 
 
 Is any man so daring 
 As dig them up in spite, 
 
 He shall find their sharpest thorns 
 In his bed at night. 
 
 “Up the airy mountain, 
 
 Down the rushy glen, 
 
 We daren’t go a-hunting 
 F or fear of little men : 
 
 Wee folk, good folk, 
 
 Trooping all together, 
 
 Green jacket, red cap, 
 
 And white owl’s feather !” 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster . 21 
 
 In the lines : 
 
 “ Down along the rocky shore 
 Some make their home ” 
 
 there is a reference to the fairy bridges — “ a series of natural arches 
 carved or shapen out of the cliffs in times long past by the rollers 
 of the Atlantic,” in the neighbourhood of Ballyshannon, while the 
 Slieveleague headland is the only land lying between the fairy bridges 
 and America. In “ Happy England ” there is a beautiful drawing, 
 No. 79, by Mrs. Allingham (widow of the poet) of the fairy bridges 
 with a distant view of Slieveleague. Mrs. Allingham, who is a 
 member of the Royal Society of Painters in Water Colours, is the 
 well-known water-colourist. She has, during a quarter of a century, 
 produced nearly a thousand drawings, and, looked at from, the point 
 of view of her figures and her cottage subjects, she is of the same 
 artistic school as Frederick Walker and Birket Foster. 
 
 The “ Lepiacaun ” (Leprahaun), according to Dr. Hyde, is from 
 the Irish “ Leith Bhrogan,” and so means the “ Artisan of the Brogue” ; 
 according to other authorities (Joyce, etc.), the true etymology is 
 luchor pan=“ little man.” He is an industrious, canty, little sprite, 
 who acts as shoemaker, cobbler, and tailor for the fairy gentry ; and 
 the country folk, especially in Donegal, will tell you that they some- 
 times see or hear these little creatures at their work under the hedge 
 or in a dry ditch stitching and singing. The Lepracauns are elfs 
 altogether peculiar to Ireland, and rhey have the secret of hidden 
 gold. The peasants represent them as in appearance like tiny old 
 men, who wear little cocked hats on the side of their heads, and have 
 leather aprons hanging before them. If they take a fancy to a per- 
 son they may, it is said, of their own free will guide him, to a spot 
 in the forth or rath where the gold is buried, and the country folk 
 believe the fairy shoemaker may be forced to> give you of his store 
 of gold if you can only manage to keep your eye on him, but at the 
 last moment, when you think you have caught him, he often manages 
 to escape. In his poem,, “ The Lepracaun,” Allingham represents a 
 Donegal countryman pursuing this little sprite, and at last finding him 
 but the Lepracaun was too clever, and got off. Here is the last verse: 
 
 “ I caught him at work one day myself, 
 
 In the castle- ditch, where fox- glove grows, 
 
 A wrinkled, wizened, and bearded elf, 
 
 Spectacles stuck on his pointed nose, 
 
22 Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 Leather apron, shoe in his lap — 
 
 “ Rip-rap, tip-tap, 
 
 Tack-tack too ! 
 
 (A grasshopper on my cap ! 
 
 Away the moth flew !) 
 
 Buskins for a fairy prince, 
 
 Brogues for his son — 
 
 Pay me well, pay me well 
 When the job is done !” 
 
 ‘‘ The rogue was mine beyond a doubt, 
 
 I stared at him!, he stared at me : 
 
 ‘ Servant, sir !’ ‘ Humph !’ says he, 
 
 And pulled a snuff-box out. 
 
 He took a long pinch, looked better pleased, 
 
 The queer little Lepracaun 
 
 Offer’d the box with a whimsical grace — 
 
 Pouf ! he flung the dust in my face, 
 
 And, while I sneezed, 
 
 Was gone.” 
 
 William Allingham, the celebrated Ulster poet, was born in 
 Ballyshannon, Co. Donegal, in 1824, and those who have visited that de- 
 lightful place will recollect the lines on the tablet on the Bridge, which 
 were left by the poet as an inscription to be placed on a stone which 
 he wished his widow to put up to his memory near the River Erne 
 he loved so well : 
 
 “ Here once he roved, a happy boy, 
 
 Along the winding banks of Erne ; 
 
 And now, please God, with finer joy, 
 
 A fairer world his eyes discern.” 
 
 He was chiefly educated at what was, in his day, an exceptionally 
 good classical school in his native town, and which was conducted by 
 Mr. Robert Wray, M.A. (T.C.D.) At this school, just as happened 
 at the same period in various parts of the North of Ireland, many 
 pupils obtained an education which fitted them, for the prominent 
 positions which they afterwards filled with distinction and credit to 
 themselves and to the nation. Allingham was for a short period a 
 clerk in the Provincial Bank in Ballyshannon, of which his father 
 
Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 23 
 
 was first manager, and at the present time the poet’s brother occupies 
 the same position. Not finding the routine of banking altogether 
 congenial, he obtained another appointment in Her Majesty’s (Vic- 
 toria) Customs, and in this department he was for a time in Belfast, 
 and also in Coleraine, but the greater part of his career in the Customs 
 was spent in his native town, Bally shannon, where he was controller. 
 His official duties were light, and afforded him ample leisure to follow 
 his literary pursuits. He was very much given to long walks and 
 rides through the country, and was on the closest terms of friendship 
 with the people, and he was a particular friend of children. It was 
 during these rambles he picked up old ballads which he heard the 
 Irish girls singing at their cottage doors, which he often altered, cloth- 
 ing them in a more perfect literary form. In the introduction to a 
 most interesting book, “ Letters of Dante Gabriel Rosetti to William 
 Allingham,” the editor, Dr. Birbeck Hill, says : “ He could not 
 get them (the ballads) sung till he got the Dublin ‘ Catnatch ’ of that 
 day to print them on long slips of blue paper, like old songs, and if 
 about the sea, with the old rough woodcut of a ship on the top. He 
 either gave them away or they were sold in the neighbourhood. Then 
 in his evening walks, he had at last, the pleasure of hearing some of 
 his own ballads sung at the cottage doors by the crooning lasses, who 
 were quite unaware that it was the author who was passing by.” In 
 the “ fifties ” of the last century, he left his native district for Lon- 
 don, and the rest of his life was spent in England. Retiring from 
 the Government service in 1870, he became sub-editor of Frazer 7 s 
 Magazine, and four years later he succeeded Froude in the Editorial 
 chair. He died in 1889. As evidence of the amount of his writings, 
 an edition of his works published after his death comprises six vol- 
 umes. His name and memory are ever green amongst the cottages 
 of Donegal. 
 
 Another form of superstition still extant in some places in Ulster 
 is the use of certain cures and charms for disease. In many country 
 districts, if a person has erysipelas, it is customary to procure some- 
 one who has obtained a reputation for charming this disease away. 
 It is astonishing how many people, otherwise intelligent, believe in 
 the charming of erysipelas. In some places in Ulster, the moment a 
 medical attendant pronounces a disease to be erysipelas, the friends 
 advise that the charmer (often some one in the district) be brought. 
 It is probable that the reason why this complaint is so often treated 
 by charming is owing to the very old belief that erysipelas originates 
 
24 Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 from fairy malice. I recollect, when a boy, seeing children with 
 whooping cough passed by their parents three times under and over 
 a donkey’s body. Another cure for the same chronic complaint was 
 to give to those affected two articles of food (i.e., bread and milk, 
 or bread and cheese), procured from two first cousins who were mar- 
 ried. I remember well, when staying many years ago with relatives — 
 first cousins who were married — seeing the country people in the 
 neighbourhood come to the house and ask for two different kinds of 
 food for their children, ill of this troublesome complaint. These 
 charms for whooping cough are at present used in many parts of 
 Ulster, and I may mention two other charms or cures still practised 
 in our Irish northern province. If a child is afflicted with mumps, 
 a donkey’s bridle or winkers is put on his head, with the bit in his 
 mouth. The child is then blindfolded with a handkerchief and led 
 to a stream or well, of which he is made to drink three times in the 
 name of the Trinity, the charmer at the same time repeating his 
 incantation. He is then led back again, the bridle or winkers and 
 handkerchief over his eyes are removed, and he is pronounced cured. 
 For a severe headache, generally of a nervous type, the charmer per- 
 forms what is called, “ measuring the head,” that is, he takes a variety 
 of measurements vertically and longitudinally of the skull-cap, and 
 then with his hands he compresses the head, saying at the same time it 
 is “ too open,” and muttering certain prayers and charms. This 
 process is repeated on several occasions, until at last the charmer pro- 
 nounces the head “ completely closed,” on which the headache is 
 said to disappear, and, fortunately for the sufferer, never to return 
 again. 
 
 Again, one of my earliest recollections was, when staying at a 
 house in County Down, hearing one of the principal servants 
 request the owner of the house to order away from the premises an 
 old beggar-woman who the country-folk said was possessed of the 
 “ evil eye,” and had' 1 the power of bewitching the cows so that they 
 would give no milk. In some parts of Ulster the superstition in 
 reference to the “evil eye,” which is of great antiquity in Ireland, 
 still exists. It means that certain persons (men, and especially old 
 women) — it is said those chiefly with dark, lowering eyebrows — are 
 possessed of a certain gift from their birth, so that their glance or 
 frown has a malignant influence when directed against either human 
 beings or animals. Anything which is young, beautiful, or perfect 
 of its kind, and which in consequence is admired, is liable to the ill 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster . 25 
 
 luck which follows a glance of the “ evil eye,” and so, in some places, 
 to avoid being thought to possess this influence, when looking at an 
 infant or a young animal (as a foal), it is necessary at once to say, 
 “ God bless it.” A person coming under the influence of the “ evil 
 eye ” is declared to> be “ overlooked ” by it (in the famous “ casket ” 
 scene in “ The Merchant of Venice,” Portia says to Bassanio : 
 
 “ Beshrew ( ? make evil or curse) your eyes 
 They have overlooked me, and divided me : 
 
 One half of me is yours, the other half yours — 
 
 Mine own, I would say ; but if mine, then yours, 
 
 And so all yours ”), 
 
 and in the case of an animal I have heard it said : “ So and so,” 
 whom the country people thought had the “ evil eye,” “ on a certain 
 occasion ‘blinkt ’ it,” and as a result it did no good. The word “ blink,” 
 or “ elf-shot,” as used in this sense in Ulster, means that by the in- 
 fluence of the “ evil eye ” the animal was injured. It is curious that 
 in some parts of England “ blink ” means to turn beer or milk slightly 
 sour, and the origin of the word has been sought in the glance of 
 an “ evil eye,” the blinking of milk (souring or injuring it) being for- 
 merly ascribed to' witchcraft. It is also said in some English counties 
 at times of lightning storms, that the thunder “ blinks ” the milk. 
 I knew a gentleman in County Antrim, who was very fond of horses, 
 and he was suspected of having the “ evil eye ” influence, so that if 
 he offered anyone a price for a horse, the belief of the country people 
 was that it was better, as they put it, “to part with the animal to him, for 
 if they didn’t, the horse would go wrong in some way,” in other 
 words, they imagined this gentleman could, as they said, “ blink ” the 
 horse, if he did not buy him. 
 
 In certain places a little thatch was taken off the roof of a house 
 and burned under the nose of a horse that had been “ blinkt,” as this 
 was supposed to be a way of charming the ill -effects that followed a 
 “ blink.” “ Thatch ” is the old English thak ; Dutch, dak ; Swedish, 
 tak. In “ Henry V.” Shakespeare writes : 
 
 “ O, for honour of our land, 
 
 Let us not hang like roping icicles 
 
 Upon our houses thcttch , whilst a more frosty people 
 
 Sweat drops of gallant youth in our rich fields.” 
 
 There is occasionally in a district of the country a person who 
 is supposed to have this “ evil eye ” influence, and the country folk 
 
26 Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 dislike meeting him if they are, say in the morning, going a journey. 
 I have heard of cases where farmers going to the fairs with animals 
 to sell would actually turn back if they met a man or woman with 
 the “ evil eye.” Since I began to> write this paper, one evening while 
 hurrying to catch a train at a station in South Down, the driver of 
 the car suddenly pointed out to me a little old woman in the road 
 who, he said, was believed by the country people to> have the “ evil 
 eye.” 
 
 A medical friend told me that he knew a case in the neighbour- 
 hood of Ballymena, where a man suspected of the “ evil eye ” entered 
 a farm house where they were churning in the kitchen. Those who 
 saw him at once came to the conclusion that as the result of his 
 presence there would be no butter, but as he gave a helping hand at 
 the chum their fears were dispelled, because it is an omen that fore- 
 bodes evil to pass a churn and not give a helping hand. The man, 
 by giving the chum: a “brash” ( i.e ., a short turn of work or effort, 
 probably of Scotch origin, but may be connected with the middle 
 low -German “ brasch ” ; or may be onomatopoeic, with associations 
 with crash, dash, rash, splash) either did away with the influence of 
 his own “ evil eye ” or the country people were wrong in thinking he 
 had the “ evil eye.” In certain very superstitious districts if a young 
 child takes ill, I have been told that someone is suspected, either out 
 of malice or even ill-will, of having forgotten, when they saw the 
 child, to say, “ God bless it,” or “ God love it for a crater ” (creature). 
 Without being the least superstitious have we not all at times felt the 
 unpleasant effect produced in a room where someone who has a bad 
 expression in their eyes, or who looks in a furtive way, or, as it is 
 said, “ not straight at you,” enters ? Such people when they give 
 evidence in a Court of Law carry little weight with the jury ; but at other 
 times they have an extraordinary influence, and so, what we call a 
 magnetic or mesmeric effect or a bewitching influence, the uneducated 
 or superstitious — if the influence is bad — say it is the “ evil eye.” 
 
 One often hears it said in country districts in Ulster that a per- 
 son who can perform clever tricks by sleight of hand has the “ black 
 art.” Originally the idea conveyed by this was that the remarkable 
 feats of magic were done by means preternatural, derived from the 
 prince of evil ; or “ black ” may refer primarily to the dark and secret 
 nature of the magician’s art, but it is more probable that “ black art” 
 is a translation of the middle Latin (“ Bog-Latin,” as it is called) 
 nigromantia, an apparent corruption, due to confusion with the Latin 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 27 
 
 niger (black) of necromantia, a mediaeval Latin word derived from the 
 Greek nekromanteia (nekros^a. dead body, and manteia =divination, 
 and so the modem necromancy) which meant originally divination, 
 by calling up and conversing with the spirits of the dead. No doubt 
 the common notion that the devil is black helped in confusing nig- 
 romantia for nepromantia. We find references to the “ Black art ” 
 in Marlow’s “ F aust,” in Addison’s “ Spectator,” and in the famous 
 second scene of the first act of “The Rivals,” where on Lydia Languish 
 declining to> promise to* take a husband of her friend’s choosing, Sir 
 Anthony Absolute says to Mrs. Malaprop — “ It is not to be wondered 
 at ma’ami ; all this is the natural consequence of teaching girls to read. 
 Had I a thousand daughters, by heaven ! I’d as soon have them taught 
 the black art as their alphabet !” So we see again the Ulsterman has 
 good literary authority for his reference to the “ black art.” 
 
 The belief in omens is still very prevalent, and the people or 
 things seen the first thing in the morning are considered to bring luck 
 or the reverse. To meet a donkey and cart on the road early in the 
 morning is a good omen, and if a black-avised (dark-complexioned) 
 person calls the first thing on New Year’s morning at any house 
 he brings luck for the rest of that year to the house he visits. If a 
 man, on entering a field, sees a hare cross his path it is very unlucky, 
 and the sight of a weazel, or whitrit as it is called in Ulster, on the 
 road under similar circumstances is not good. To find a four-leaved 
 shamrock is lucky, or the shoe of a horse or donkey, which we SO' often 
 see put over doors (the reference being to the manger where Christ 
 lay). It is considered very unlucky to kill a robin redbreast, the 
 reason for not injuring this little bird being that — according to a very 
 prevalent tradition amongst the people — it plucked out of our Saviour’s 
 brow one of the sharpest thorns that pierced Him on the Cross, and in 
 doing this its little breast was reddened with His blood. No one 
 cares to kill a cricket, and I have often heard people say their noise 
 at night in a house is sonsy or heartsome. 
 
 The reason why hares are considered unlucky is the curious 
 belief that witches take their form to enter a field to do harm to the 
 cattle. 
 
 It is a very common superstition that, if in going a journey you 
 meet the magpie it is an ill omen, while any number, except one, 
 brings luck, and hence the rhyme I remember since boyhood : 
 
 “ One for sorrow, 
 
 Two for mirth, 
 
28 
 
 Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 
 
 Three for a wedding, 
 
 Four for a birth, 
 
 Five for silver, 
 
 Six for gold, 
 
 Seven for a secret that never may be told.” 
 
 Some people don’t like to begin work on a Friday, and the idea 
 so prevalent that no> one should remove to another house, or leave a 
 situation on a Saturday, finds expression in the well-known Ulster 
 saying : 
 
 “ A Saturday’s flit is a short sit.” 
 
 In my boyhood it was common in County Armagh to hear the 
 Christmas Rhymers near the close of the year. They came about in 
 a sort of fancy dress, and after reciting or singing some verses out- 
 side, one, generally the smallest, was admitted, and holding his hat in 
 one hand, and a brush or besom in the other, he said : 
 
 “ Next come I, wee divil doit, 
 
 Money I want, money I crave, 
 
 If ye don’t give me money 
 
 I’ll sweep ye all to yer grave.” 
 
 My friend and colleague at the Royal Victoria Hospital, Mr. J. A. 
 Craig, F.R.C.S. (Eng.), has given me the following lines, which were 
 formerly recited by the Christmas Rhymers in the Ballymoney district : 
 
 Omnes : 
 
 Room, room, brave gallant boys — 
 
 Give us room to rhyme ; 
 
 We have come to show our activity 
 At this Christmas time. 
 
 Active youth and active age, 
 
 The like was never acted on a stage; 
 
 And if you don’t believe what I say, 
 
 Enter in, St. George, and clear the way. 
 
 St. George : 
 
 Here comes I, St. George, from England have I sprung — 
 One ot those noble deeds of valour to begin. 
 
 Seven long years in a close cave have I been kept, 
 
 And out of that into a prison leapt, 
 
Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 29 
 
 And out of that into a block of stone, 
 
 Where I made many a sad and grievous moan. 
 
 Many a giant did I subdue, 
 
 I ran the fiery dragon through and through — 
 
 I fought them all courageously, 
 
 And still will always fight for liberty. 
 
 Here I draw my bloody weapon : 
 
 Show me the man that dare me stand, 
 
 I’ll cut him down with my courageous hand. 
 
 A youth with blackened face here steps forward , George says to 
 
 him : 
 
 “ Who are you but a poor silly lad ?” 
 
 The nigger replies'. 
 
 “ I am a Turkey champion, from, Turkeyland I came, 
 
 To fight you, great George by name; 
 
 I’ll cut you and slash you, and send you to Turkey 
 To make mince pies baked in an oven, 
 
 And after I’ve done I’ll fight e’er a champion in Christendom.” 
 
 Here George sticks him with his sword. Having done this he 
 shouts : 
 
 “A doctor, a doctor! Ten pounds for a doctor! 
 
 Is there never a doctor to be found who can 
 Cure this man of his deep and mortal wound?” 
 
 A doctor comes forward. He says : 
 
 “ Here comes I, old Doctor Brown, 
 
 The best old doctor in the town : 
 
 I am a doctor pure and good, 
 
 And with my sword I’ll staunch his blood. 
 
 If you’ve a mind his life to save 
 Full fifty guineas I must have.” 
 
 George tests him. He says : 
 
 “ What can you cure, Doctor ?” 
 
3 ° 
 
 Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 The Doctor'. 
 
 “ I can cure the plague within, the plague without, 
 
 The palsy or the gout. 
 
 Moreover than that,” sez he 
 “ If you bring me an old woman of threescore and ten, 
 
 And the knuckle-bone of her toe be broken, 
 
 I can fix it again. 
 
 And if you don’t believe what I say, 
 
 Enter St. Patrick and clear the way.” 
 
 St. Patrick : 
 
 “ Here comes I, St. Patrick, in shining armour bright, 
 
 A famous champion and a worthy knight. 
 
 What was St. George ?” sez he, “ but St. Patrick’s boy, 
 
 Who fed his horse with oats and hay, 
 
 And afterwards he ran away.” 
 
 This annoys St. George. They altercate'. 
 
 G. — I say, by St. George, you lie, sir, 
 
 P. — Pull out your sw^ord and try, sir. 
 
 G. — Pull out your purse and pay, sir. 
 
 P. — I’ll run my sword through your body, 
 
 And make you run away, sir. 
 
 In the middle of the squabble in comes Oliver Cromwell. 
 Oliver (loq.) : 
 
 “Here comes I, Oliver Cromwell, as you may suppose, 
 
 I’ve conquered many nations with my long copper nose ; 
 I’ve made my foes to tremble and my enemies for to quake, 
 And I’ve beat my opposers till I’ve made their hearts to ache 
 And if you don’t believe what I say, 
 
 Enter Beelzebub and clear the way.” 
 
 Beelzebub : 
 
 “ Here comes I, Beelzebub, 
 
 And over my shoulder I carry my club, 
 
 And in my hand a dripping pan — 
 
 I think myself a jolly old man ; 
 
 And if you don’t believe what I say, 
 
 Enter Divil Doubt and clear the way.” 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 31 
 
 Divil Doubt : 
 
 “ Here comes I, wee Divil Doubt, 
 
 If you don’t give me money I’ll sweep you all out — 
 Money I want, and money I crave, 
 
 If you don’t give me money I’ll sweep you all to your grave.” 
 
 Omnes : 
 
 “ Ladies and Gentlemen, — Since our sport is ended, 
 
 Our box must now be recommended ; 
 
 Our box would speak if it had a tongue — 
 
 Nine or ten shillings would do it no wrong. 
 
 All silver, no brass ; bad ha’pence won’t pass.” 
 
 Exeunt Omnes. 
 
 I am afraid this custom is now largely a thing of the past. 
 
 I wonder are the Ulster children of the present age as well ac- 
 quainted as their parents were with Johnny Nod, who came towards 
 bedtime, not from “ the land of Nod 1 , on the east of Eden,” but right 
 down the chimley (dialect form, of chimney) ; are they told not to go 
 out at “ dayligone ” (daylight going or gone=twilight) or duskiss 
 (dusk) lest that awful person, “ Raw Head and Bloody Bones ” might 
 catch them,? Were they, during the late African war, frightened by 
 the bogey, Paul Kruger, as their ancestors were in the early part of the 
 last century by Bonaparte? Such was the dread inspired by that 
 great warrior, that it permeated even the literature of the nursery, and 
 children, as they heard a rhyme like this, delivered with adequate 
 facial expression, were soon brought to reason : 
 
 “ Baby, baby, naughty baby, 
 
 Stop your crying, child, I say, 
 
 Stop, or, I tell ye, Bonyparte ’ill pass this way, 
 
 And he’ll bate you, bate you, bate you, 
 
 And he’ll bate you into pap ; 
 
 Gobble you, gobble you, 
 
 Snap, snap, snap !” 
 
 The word “ gobble, ” used in this old nursery rhyme, is a fre- 
 quentative of “ gob,” an abbreviation of the older “ gobbet ” : a small 
 piece or fragment, which is derived from the old French “gobbet” 
 (“ goubet,” “ gobet ”)=a morsel of food, which is in turn a diminutive 
 of the old F rench “ gob ”=a gulp, and is ultimately 
 
32 Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 
 
 of Celtic origin, “ Gob ” is used in two senses, first 
 as meaning the mouth (we have also the dialect “ gab ” 
 derived from the Gaelic “ gob ”=the beak or bill of a bird, the mouth, 
 this is the Irish “ gob/ 7 “gab,” “ cab ” =the beak, snout, mouth, and 
 with these may be compared the Welsh “ gwp ” =the head and neck of 
 a bird. Hence, instead of saying, “ hold your tongue,” or “ shut your 
 mouth,” the phrase in Ulster often is “ shut up your gub ” (another 
 variant of “ gob ”). It is said by some that “ gab ” (derived from the 
 old English “ gabben ”) =to talk idly, is connected with the Celtic 
 u gob ” (a good talker has the “ gift of the gab ”) and “ give me none 
 of yer (your) gab ” (variants, “ back-chat,” “ lip,” “ jaw ”), heard some- 
 times in County Down and County Antrim, means, “ give me no im- 
 pudence,” Probably “gabble” and “jabber” are connected with 
 u gab.” “ Gab ” is also used in the North of England and in Scotland 
 as meaning the mouth, and hence the old proverb : “Ye take mair (more) 
 in your gab than your cheeks can had” (hold), which has been modern- 
 ised by our Transatlantic cousins into* the well-known saying: “You 
 have bitten off more tobacco than you can well chew.” “ Gob ” has 
 also a second meaning, which is a “ mouthful.” In Swift’s “ Lady’s 
 Journal ” we find “ gobble ” used as follows : 
 
 “ The time too' precious now to waste, 
 
 And supper gobbled up in haste, 
 
 Again afresh to cards they run.” 
 
 The Ulsterman has a great affection and tender feeling for the 
 dead 1 , and in no way is this seen more than in his care of a grave. 
 When the coffin is lowered to> its last resting-place in the ground, and 
 the grave is filled up with earth, soft mossy layers of sod or turf are 
 placed on the top. These are called “ scras ” or “ scraws,” from the 
 Irish and Gaelic word “ scrath ” =a turf ; and although in “ Drapier’s 
 Letters ” Swift may write : 
 
 “ Neither should that odious custom be allowed of cutting scraws 
 (as they call them), which is flaying off the green surface of the ground, 
 to cover their cabins or make up their ditches ” ; yet I am confident a 
 true Ulsterman will always reverence the word “ scraw ” from its as- 
 sociation with the burial of his relatives or friends of the past. 
 
 A person who is buried is said to be “covered with the daisy sod ” 
 or the “ daisy quilt,” and so in “ Denny’s Daughter,” Moira O’Neill 
 writes : 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 33 
 
 “ She, the girl my own hands covered wi’ the narrow daisy quilt , 
 For the love of her, 
 
 The love of her, 
 
 That would not be my wife : 
 
 Ay’, the loss of her 
 The loss of her, 
 
 Has left me lone for life.” 
 
 The same idea is conveyed in the common saying : “ He’s on 
 the broad of his back, with his toes towards the daisies.” 
 
 The Ulsterman’s method of salutation when he meets an acquaint- 
 ance on the road varies. He may say, “ Good morrow, ” or “ Morrow 
 to you,” or “ Where are ye for ?” or “ The top o’ the momin’,” as in 
 the following lines from one of Moira O’Neill’s “ Songs of the Glens 
 of Antrim ” : 
 
 “ I met an’ ould caillach I knowed right well on the brow o’ Carnashee ; 
 1 The top o' the momin? !’ I says to her, ‘ God save ye !’ she says 
 to me ” ; 
 
 or if he is very friendly, “ Good morrow an’ good luck,” and the reply 
 often is “ Morrow to yourself.” “ Morrow ” is apparently a corrup- 
 tion of “morning” — In Richard III., Shakespeare writes: 
 
 “ Many good morrows to my noble lord ” — 
 
 or he may say to a person he meets : “ How are you ?” or “ How do 
 you think you are ?” and the reply may be short and laconic : “ The 
 very best,” or “ Rightly ” ; or he may salute in this way : “ Is that 
 yourself?” to> which his friend may say: “It’s all that’s for me.” 
 There is no more common salutation in Ulster than “Is that you?” 
 Suppose an examiner either of the Irish Intermediate Board or of 
 Trinity College, or of the Royal University asked a candidate to 
 analyse this very common Ulster method of greeting, “Is that you ?” 
 the candidate, if he is of a metaphysical turn of mind, might say : 
 “ Subjectively , it could only mean the person addressed, that is, myself ; 
 while objectively , and especially if the question was put suddenly on 
 a dark night, or through a telephone, the querist might be in doubt 
 whether he was the person addressed or somebody else. The reply to 
 the question would clear up the difficulty. 
 
 Again the salutation may be : “ You are wearing well,” or “ You 
 are doing well on ic,” especially if the person addressed has recovered 
 from a severe illness ; or “ How’re ye doin’ ?” When an old person is 
 
34 Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 asked how he is, he may reply : “ I’m just putting in my wee bit time.” 
 Another odd method of salutation is : “ It’s new -ones to. meet you,” or 
 “ It’s a sight for sore eyes to see you,” the meaning conveyed being 
 that the person addressed has. been slow in calling. “You’re not a 
 day older since I seen ye last ” is a complimentary salutation, as well 
 as “ Take care of yourself, for good people are getting scarce.” When 
 one Ulsterman, meeting another, says : “ That’s a fine growin’ day,” 
 he may not speak accurately, but how better can he convey his mean- 
 ing ? and, if there is rain, he may add : “ It’s a fine day for young 
 ducks.” 
 
 A person who has lost flesh rapidly may, on being asked how he 
 is, reply, “ Badly ; don’t you see I’m all away to scrapin’s (scrapings)” ; 
 or it may be said of him : “ He’s lavin’ his clothes,” or “ He’s hadden 
 (holden) the-gether (together) by the help of the clathes ” (clothes). 
 On enquiring once from a countryman how an old clergyman in his 
 neighbourhood 1 was, he replied most graphically, “ The Dane’s getting 
 short in his steps.” This is part of the proverb : “ He’s getting long 
 in the teeth and short in the steps,” so characteristic of old age. 
 
 The terms used in the northern province to describe the qualities 
 and appearance of men and women are most expressive, and many 
 of them have almost become proverbs. A “ fine bouncin’ ” or “ strap- 
 ping girl ” is to be admired, as well as a “ brave (very) smart one ” ; 
 but the daughter of a respected mother is a “ chip off a good block,” and 
 so more commendable. If she possesses monetary charms she is 
 styled a “ great catch,” but in this case she must be all the more care- 
 ful lest someone “ should marry her money and only ask herself 
 to the wedding,” and if she makes a mistake in her marriage she 
 will “tie a knot with her tongue which her teeth won’t loose.” A 
 dirty woman is styled a “ dart ” (this- is clearly taken from the Scotch 
 “ clarty,” meaning dirty). The word “beclart”=to soil or dirty, dates 
 back to the thirteenth century. In Burns’ poem : “ On being appointed 
 to the Extise ” we find it as follows : 
 
 “ Searching auld wives’ barrels, 
 
 Och, hon ! the day ! 
 
 That clarty barm should stain my laurels ” ; 
 and if untidy, she may be said to have her hair like a “ peas’ wisp” 
 (wisp : a bundle or bunch, is found in Henry VI., where Shakespeare 
 writes : 
 
 “ A wisp of straw were worth a thousand crowns 
 To make this shameless callet know herself ”). 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 35 
 
 Anyone who has seen growing peas will recognise the apt com- 
 parison of a wisp of them to untidy hair in a woman. If she is 
 well dressed she is “ cruel gran’ ” (very grand) ; but her beauty may 
 be so apparent that fine garments do not matter, as “ a bonny 
 face becomes the dish-clout.” Nature may have lavished on her such 
 gifts of manner that she “ could charm the birds off the bush,” but 
 she must not “ set her cap ” at anyone, and if she carries her head too 
 loftily, she may be styled “ a high-flyer.” 
 
 There is a shrewd warning conveyed to mothers in the sayings : 
 “ Active mothers make leaden-heeled, daughters,” and “ A soople 
 (supple) mother mak’s a sweer (a very old word=lazy) wean and a 
 dawdlin’ woman.” It is too often the case that handsome children 
 when they grow up lose their early beauty ; how much better this is 
 expressed in Ulster by the phrase : “ Bonnie weans make omary (ord- 
 inary) folk.” A man who has not an assured means of livelihood 
 is said to be “cooling and supping” ; but if he has made his pile, and has 
 retired, he is “ living private ” ; if he has been long in a locality, as 
 well & his fathers before him, he is styled an “ ould residenter ” ; if 
 he is an oddity he is styled “ an ould ‘ curosity 5 ” (curiosity) ; if he is 
 smart “ he has his wits about him.” A man who unfairly reveals 
 a secret on another is said to “ discover” on him; a similar individual 
 among boys at school is a, “ clash-bag ” ; if averse to change he is “ an 
 old fogey ” (this odd word may be associated with the Swedish 
 “ fodge ” =one in charge of a garrison, or it may be mediaeval Latin : 
 vocatus for advocatus = patron or protector. Thackeray, in his amus- 
 ing “ Book of Snobs ” has made the word classical when he writes : 
 
 “ Old Livermore, old Soy, old Chutney, the East Indian director ; old 
 Cutler, the surgeon, etc., that society of old fogies in fine, who give 
 each other dinners round and round, and dine for the mere purpose of 
 guttling — these again are dinner-giving snobs ”). 
 
 When you speak to an Ulsterman who is somewhat deaf, or, 
 as he puts it, “ a little hard-a-hearing,” he may remark, holding his 
 hand behind one of his ears like a trumpet, “ I didn’t catch what you 
 said.” The use of the word “ catch,” meaning to hear, or by an effort 
 to seize by the senses (ear, eye) or intellect, is very common in the 
 northern province. In ‘ L The Vicar of Wakefield ” Goldsmith uses 
 it : “ Listening to catch the glorious sounds.” It has also been used 
 in this sense by Jowett in his “ Plato,” by Whewell, and by Hazlitt. 
 
 If he is puzzling himself to recall something, he tells you he is 
 “ cudgelling his brains” to recollect it. Although prepared at times, 
 
36 Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 
 
 in true Hibernian, fashion, to hit with his cudgel or stick any head 
 that may appear, he uses this expression in reference to' himself in 
 a purely figurative sense ; and he is prepared, if necessary, in defence 
 of a friend, to “take up the cudgels,” that is, to engage in a vigorous 
 contest on behalf of one who, he thinks, has been wronged. Accord- 
 ing to some authorities, “cudgel” is derived from the old English 
 kuggel, which is again of Celtic origin ; the Welsh is coggl=a club ; 
 the Gallic is cuaille ; the Irish is cuaill. Others say it is the early 
 English cycgel — kucgel, the old Teutonic kuggelo — the original “ y ” 
 having become “ u ”, as in blush, clutch, and it is said not to be known 
 in cognate languages. Cudgel is a fine old word, and in employing 
 it in the saying “ cudgelling his brains,” the Ulsterman has the best of 
 literary authority. In the famous churchyard scene in “ Hamlet,” 
 when one of the clowns asks : “ Who builds stronger than a mason, 
 a shipwright, or a carpenter ?” the other replies : “ Cudgel thy brains 
 no more about it, for your dull ass will not mend his pace with 
 beating, and when you are asked this question next, say a grave- 
 maker, the houses that he makes last till doomsday.” The phrase has 
 also been used 1 by De Quincey and by Thackeray in “ Pendennis.” 
 The saying to “ take up the cudgels ” dates back to the middle of the 
 seventeenth century. 
 
 An “ ignorant ” fellow in Ulster is not one who is destitute of 
 knowledge, rather the idea conveyed is that he is presuming, inter- 
 fering, and one who does not know his proper position. The following 
 story will illustrate the true Ulster use of the word : 
 
 At a railway station in County Derry a man, slightly under the 
 influence of drink, who had seen better days, came up to speak to 
 a former acquaintance who was sitting in a first-class railway carriage. 
 As they were conversing, a boon companion walked up and presumed 
 to join in the conversation, when his friend on the platform said, ad- 
 dressing him with the greatest contempt : “ Sir, you are grossly ignor- 
 ant !” 
 
 When it is impossible to make a stupid person understand some- 
 thing he is asking about, the Ulsterman says : “ I can’t insense it into 
 him.” The word “ eternal ” is often employed as simply conveying 
 great emphasis. An “ eternally ” wet day is one that is more wet than 
 usual. At the Belfast Assizes, recently, in a case in which a woman 
 brought an action against a railway company for damage done through 
 their negligence, the leading K.C. for the defence, in cross-examining 
 the woman’s husband, asked : “ Her nerves are not so bad as they 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster . 37 
 
 were, are they ?” to which the man replied : “ Well, if my explanation 
 goes for anything I would say she is eternally destroyed” Great 
 laughter followed, and the K.C. remarked : “ Oh ! well, I wouldn’t 
 say that. I don’t think any railway company could do it. The 
 damages would be such that I don’t know where we would be if that 
 went on.” Now the Ulsterman did not mean to convey what, owing 
 to its being wrongly understood, occasioned such amusement in Court, 
 that his wife was destroyed both as regards the present and the future 
 world. All he desired to> imply — in as emphatic Ulster phraseology 
 as he could employ — was that his wife was very badly injured, and 
 that she would never be the same physically again. 
 
 Another word used in the same sense=“ extremely ” is “ mortal ” 
 or “ mortyal ” — i.e ., “It’s a mortyal pity of him” (said of a person 
 who has had a trial), or “ It’s a mortal wet day.” In “ Corrymeela,” 
 by Moira O’Neill, the Antrim man living in England, says : 
 
 “ D’ye mind me now, the song at night is mortial hard to raise, 
 
 The girls are heavy goin’ here, the boys are ill to plase ; 
 
 When one’st I’m out this workin’ hive, ’tis I’ll be back again, 
 
 Ay, Corrymeela, in the same soft rain.” 
 
 In “Oliver Twist” Dickens writes: “Forty-two mortal long 
 hard-working days.” “ Cruel,” is another of the same type of terms 
 used to convey emphasis : “ We had very few ‘crul’ (cruel) fine days this 
 summer.” In the epilogue to “ Two Noble Kinsmen,” by Fletcher 
 (and another), we find : “ I’m cruel fearful ” ; while in his Diary, under 
 the date July 31st, 1662, the immortal Pepys notes: “Met Captain 
 Brown of the Rosebush, at which he was cruel angry.” When Ulster 
 folk meet, they, like others, sometimes talk of their troubles. One who 
 has suffered greatly will say : “ Misfortunes never come single ” ; 
 another of a humorous turn will add : “ Misfortunes make strange 
 bedfellows ” ; while a third, of the Mark Tapley type, will take 
 pleasure in pointing out that there are sure to be more trials in store. 
 Irritated by such pessimism, another of the group — this time, an 
 optimist — will say : “ It’s a long lane that has no turn,” or 
 “ Don’t cross the bridge until you come to it,” or “ It’s time enough to 
 bid the old fellow good -morrow when you meet him.” As is well- 
 known, in Ireland at present a keen contest is raging between the 
 wretchedly underpaid and far-too-overworked dispensary doctors and 
 the boards of guardians. The question came before the Newry Board 
 recently, when the clerk said that the guardians had had no trouble 
 
38 Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 
 
 with the medical officers in the Newry Union. One of the guardians, 
 evidently of a poetical and militant type, replied : “ But we do not 
 know when we might have, and it is too late to> sharpen the sword 
 when the drum beats for battle,” and was immediately answered by 
 a wittier and more practical colleague : “ It’s time enough to bid the 
 old fellow good morrow when we meet: him.” 
 
 When an Ulsterman wishes to pay his wife a great compliment, he 
 says : “ She’s my best rib.” This saying has reference to a common 
 belief that since the days of Eve men have one rib less than women ; 
 and so if a man’s wife is in every respect suitable, he calls her his 
 “ best rib,” or “ She’s just my own hand’s morrow ” (that is, what the left 
 hand or left eye is to the right=its morrow or mate), while, in return, 
 how better can she show her respect for her husband than by styling 
 him “ Himself,” or “ Him,” and so, to emphasize a statement in total 
 disregard' of Lindley Murray, she avers : “ Himself says it, and so it 
 be to> be true.” In the “ Sea Wrack,” Moira O’Neill writes : 
 
 “ The wrack was dark an’ shiny where it floated in the sea. 
 
 There was no one in the brown boat but only him an’ me : 
 
 Him to cut the sea wrack, me to mind the boat, 
 
 An’ not a word between us the hours we were afloat. 
 
 The wet wrack, 
 
 The sea wrack, 
 
 The wrack was strong to cut.” 
 
 An old and much-valued servant on being told by her mistress 
 that a grandson had just arrived, asked : “ Is it like himself?” What 
 she meant to convey was really was the child like its father. When an 
 ill -matched pair are constantly quarrelling, the neighbours say : “They 
 are as contrary as the tongs tied thegether (together), and aye (always) 
 chappin’,” or “ They’re like sweeled (tied by a strap) goats, aye on 
 the opposite sides of the ditch.” The word “ sweeled ’ is also used 
 with the meaning, swathed or wrapped or rolled round, as an infant 
 is said to be “ sweeled ” with a roller, and the piece of leather rolled 
 round the top of a whip is said to be “ sweeled.” A bold jade is 
 styled a “regular heeler ” (a heeler being a game-cock that strikes 
 out with its spurs, or one who' catches up by the heels, that is, who 
 undermines or supplants.) Of an ignorant fellow it is remarked: 
 “ He doesn’t know B from a bull’s foot ” ; while of a talkative 
 fool people say : “ He’ll never drown ; he’s only a blether ” (bladder). 
 How expressive the phrases.: “Eaten bread is soon forgotten,” “He 
 was cut out for a gentleman, but the devil ran away with the patthurn” 
 
Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 39 
 
 (pattern), “ Listeners rarely hear well of themselves,” “ He’s no chicken 
 for all his cheepin’, ” “ It’s too late to close the stable door when the 
 steed’s gone,” “ A wink’s as good as a nod to a blind horse, ” “ Don’t 
 look a gift horse in the mouth.” 
 
 A sillv person is said to “ have a slate off,” or “ want’s a square 
 of being round,” or “ is not all there ” ; while of a constant talker 
 some one may allege “ He’d talk the horns off a moily cow,” or “ He’d 
 talk a dog blind.” Of a man who pretends to be younger than he 
 really is, someone may say : “ He’s many a nick on his horn.” When 
 a family of low origin take on airs, the Ulsterman, to indicate that 
 they are merely upstarts, will say : “ No banshee ’ll skirl when they’re 
 stark,” a curious example of the use of old English, Scotch, and Irish 
 words, and throwing an interesting and suggestive light on the origin 
 of the Ulster race. Banshee is purely native Irish, being a phonetic 
 spelling of Bean-sidhe=woman of the fairies= old Irish, ben-side. 
 Skirl is the unassibilated form of the Scotch shirl, which is a trans- 
 position of shrill; while stark is derived from the old English stark, 
 the Anglo-Saxon stearc, the Danish sterk, the low German sterk, and 
 the Icelandic sterkr. No saying could so well convey the meaning ; 
 the banshee being the apparition or guardian who, by its appearance 
 and wail, foretells the death of the chief of an old Irish noble family. 
 In Allingham’s “ The Banshee ” we read : 
 
 “ Heard’st thou over the fortress wild geese flying and crying ? 
 
 Was it a grey wolf’s howl? wind in the forest sighing? 
 
 Wail from the sea, as of wreck? Hast heard it, comrade? Not so ! 
 Here all’s still as the grave, above, around, and below. 
 
 “ The cry, the dreadful cry ! I know it — louder and nearer, 
 Circling our Dun — the banshee , my heart is frozen to hear her ! 
 Saw you not in the darkness a spectral glimmer of white 
 Flitting away? I saw it! — evil her message to-night! 
 
 “ Constant, but never welcome, she to the line of our chief, 
 
 Bodeful, baleful, fateful, voice of terror and grief. 
 
 Dimly burneth the lamp — hush ! Again that horrible cry ! 
 
 If a thousand lives could save thee, Tierna, thou shouldest not die ! 
 
 “ Now ! what whisper ye, clansmen ? I wake. Be your words of me ? 
 Wherefore gaze on each other ? I, too, have heard the banshee : 
 Death is her message ; but ye, be silent. Death comes to no man 
 Sweet as to him who in fighting crushes his country’s foeman.” 
 
4© Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 It is well if anyone has sustained an injustice to blame the real 
 culprit, that is, “ to put the saddle on the right horse ” ; and when 
 several people are equally blameworthy they must all take their chance 
 of being punished, in other words : “ Every herring must hang by its 
 own head,” an allusion to> the iron rod one often sees outside little 
 shops, which carries a number of herrings, through the heads of which 
 it is pierced. 
 
 If a man has lost his wife he is a “ wida-man ” ; a great talker is 
 “ a fine level -cracking fellow ” (the word “crack ” with the meaning 
 to talk freely is used all over Ulster. It is a very old word, and we 
 have it in Pilgrim’s “ Sea-Voyage ” : 
 
 “ 1 What, howe, mate ! thou stondyst to ny, 
 
 Thy felow may not hale the by ; 
 
 Thus they begyn to crakef 
 
 It has an entirely different meaning in other parts of the United 
 Kingdom, that is, to boast or brag, and Burton, in his “ Anatomy of 
 Melancholy,” uses it in this sense : “ Galen cracks how many several 
 cures he hath performed in this kind by use of baths alone.” 
 
 The word “crack” is also used in Ulster as indicating a very 
 short space of time — i.e., “ It won’t be a crack till I’m there.” “ In 
 a jiffy ” means the same, and is often heard in Antrim and Down. 
 Curiously, it is found in “ Ingoldsby Legends,” as follows : 
 
 “ ‘ And oh !’ he exclaimed, ‘ let them go catch my skiff : 
 
 I’ll be home in a twinkling and back in a jiffy.’ ” 
 
 A vulgar person is said to be “ as coarse as bane (bean) straw ” ; 
 while if he exhibits signs of peevishness, the people declare he 
 is “as lumpy as pritty -oaten” (i.e., bread made of oatmeal and potatoes). 
 
 If a man is not specially courageous he is “ afeard of his own 
 shada ” (shadow) ; if he is selfish, he “ wouldn’t put his heel where his 
 toe is to> oblige his neighbour ” ; if his attendance at church is not 
 regular the people say : “ He’s not like his forebears — he’s no gospel 
 greedy ” ; if in appearance he is short and stout, he is styled : “ A 
 wee butt of a man,” or “ He’s just as broad as he’s long ” ; if he 
 walks as if lame, he is “ hirplin ” (this is of Scotch origin). Burns, 
 in the “ Holy F air,” says : “ The hares were hirplin down the furs ” ; 
 and in Dr. John Brown’s “ Spare Hours ” we have the word as follows : 
 “ His aged grandmother was wont to hirple out to the Lindsaylands 
 Road to meet him on his way home.” If he does things the wrong 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster . 4 1 
 
 way “ He always puts the cart before the horse ” ; if a man is thrifty, 
 people say of him : “ He ploughs both the head and the foot rig ” ; 
 if he looks after his own interests, “ He knows on what side his 
 bread is buttered ” ; if he always takes good care of himself, “ He 
 swims near the broo ” (bank) — broo is a dialectal variant of brow. 
 A man who stops at nothing would “ Steal the cross off a donkey ” ; if 
 a man usually easy to work with shows signs of irritability in the 
 morning, it is said, “ He has got out at the wrong side of the bed 
 the day,” or a friend may say of him in such circumstances, “ I doubt 
 the wind’s in the aist ” (east ) ; or a man may be “ as crookid as the hind 
 leg of a dog,^’ or “ as cross as a bag of weasels,” or “ as hungry as a 
 grew ” (greyhound), “ as full as a fiddler,” “ as sober as a judge,” “ as 
 yellow as a duck’s fut ” (foot), “ as busy as a nailer,” “ as blunt as a 
 beetle,” or “ like a hen on a hot griddle ” (fussy and fidgetty), or as 
 “ thrawn as a corkscrew,” or “ as thrawn as a hay rope,” or “ he’s as 
 deep as a draw well,” or “ slippery as^ an eel,” or he may “ tell 
 lies faster than a dog can trot,” or “ he may not be so saft (soft) as he 
 lets on ” (pretends). Of a man slow in paying for anything he has 
 purchased, it is said : “ He keeps time between him. and the day ” ; 
 he does not follow the advice contained in the proverb : “ Short reckon- 
 ings make long friends.” A “ Luck penny ” is the small sum of 
 money given back for luck by the seller to the payer , its amount 
 depending on the size of the transaction and the “ cleverness ” (gen- 
 erosity) of the seller. 
 
 Of a woman it may be said, if she is constantly complaining, and 
 who thinks herself worse than she really is : “ Och ! she’s like a lay in’ 
 hen, more onaisy than sick ” ; while, if she boasts of her work, people 
 say : “ Her eggs are not worth all her cackling,” or “ It’s not the 
 hen cackles the most lays the biggest eggs.” A woman no one can 
 trust, and who is always, at some mischief, is compared to a trouble- 
 some cow : “ If she doesn’t kick she will chaw claes ” (clothes). A car- 
 driver at Rostrevor said recently, when pointing out a very rich lady 
 to the person he was driving : “ She’s a millionaire, or what is the 
 female for that.” 
 
 When a man makes great boasting of what he is going to do, but 
 in the end accomplishes little, the Ulsterman says : “ Great cry and 
 little wool, as the de’il said when he pluckt the pig.” Of a person 
 currying favour in expectation of a benefit, a neighbour will remark : 
 “ There’s a great bigness between the cow and the haystack.” “ Big- 
 ness ” in this sense means friendship or intimacy. The word “great ” 
 
42 Sayings, Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 
 
 is used in the same way, hence it is said of two people : “ They’re 
 very great ” (intimate), as well as the word “ thick,” and hence the well- 
 known saying : “ They are as thick as thieves,” which rather conveys 
 the idea that the reason for their friendship is not a worthy one. 
 When a person has failed in something, a looker-on remarks : “ You 
 missed that, as you missed your mother’s blessing.” To indicate that 
 a man cannot have success in life without its accompanying trials, 
 it is said : “ A car does not go fast that is not jaupped” (dirtied). In 
 Ardglass and Kilkeel, where many of the poorer classes live by fishing, 
 they say of a lazy fellow who does not take advantage of his oppor- 
 tunity : “ The mouth of his net is behind the tail of the herrings ” 
 (the fish get through before he is ready). 
 
 When a man has not the stability ^o follow one course of action 
 in life, it is said of him : “ A rolling stone gathers no moss.” The 
 proverb must be a very old one, as in Wyatt’s “ How to use the 
 Court ” we find : 
 
 “ And on the stone that still doth turn about 
 There groweth no mosse.” 
 
 A friend of mine living in Western Canada told me he quoted 
 
 this saying — “ A rolling stone gathers no moss ” — to a stranger who, 
 
 in coming to that colony, said to him that he had been in every State 
 
 in North America, but had not “ struck oil ” yet ; when, in return, the 
 wanderer (who was originally a County Down man) replied : “ A 
 sitting hen never grows fat.” 
 
 Again, a man may be “ as narrow as the rim of a sixpence, ’ r 
 “ as hard as a whinstone,” or “ as “ awkward as a plough upstairs,” 
 or so innocent -looking that “ you would think butter wouldn’t melt 
 in his mouth,” or he may be “ too sweet to be wholesome,” or as 
 “ innocent looking as a pet fox ” ; or he may be one of those undesir- 
 able men who give you a “ back- spang,” that is, fair to y^our face 
 but treacherous behind your back (the word spang =a violent blow, a 
 variant of spank, is met with in provincial English and Scotch, but 
 in its Ulster use it conveys the idea of want of straightness or treach- 
 ery). Of a man who cannot be trusted, it is said : “ You couldn’t 
 trust him farther than you could see him,” or “ He’s a. bad plant,” or 
 “ He has a bad drop in him,” or “ He has a kick in his gallop ” ; 
 and if his progenitors have not borne a good reputation, it will be 
 said : “ What’s bred in the bone stays long in the flesh,” and some 
 one may prophecy' of him : “ That boy ’ll dance on nothing yet ” (be 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 43 
 
 hanged), or “ Hemp’s sown for him ” (in reference to the hangman’s 
 noose). 
 
 When a man is a hard worker people say you would “ need to 
 rise early to catch him ” ; and if he has a good appetite his friends 
 need not be uneasy, although he complains about the state of his health, 
 for “ An atin’ horse rarely founders,” and “ The hungry eye sees far.” 
 He may, however, through stress of circumstances, become “ As poor 
 as a church mouse,” and those who know him well may say : 
 “ He hasn’t what would jingle on a tombstone,” or “ He has neither 
 money, marvels (marbles), nor chalk to make a ring,” or “ He has four 
 outs and one in ” : 
 
 “ Out of money, out of clothes, 
 
 Out at the heels, and out at the toes, 
 
 But in debt.” 
 
 And, finally, he may be compelled “ To take the benefit of the Act ” 
 (Bankruptcy Court), or “ Make a moonlight flit.’ A man on the con- 
 trary who is thrifty, and has saved something, is said “ To have some- 
 thing by him for a rainy day.” If the country people believe a man 
 who' has “ failed ” possesses means, they say : “ He has closed with a 
 full hand,” that is, he could pay twenty shillings in the jQ. 
 
 Of a man who makes a great “ stir ” in a district, and by his 
 unusual success draws attention to himself, people say : “ Every dog 
 has his day,” and if, after having gone up as a rocket he comes down 
 like a stick, but not in the way the people prophesied, it will be re- 
 marked : “ There’s many a way of killing a dog besides choking him 
 with butter.” 
 
 A person who engages in a bad speculation “ has got a footless 
 stocking without a leg.” His relatives may give him financial assist- 
 ance, whereupon the neighbours will say : “ They’re only making a 
 coffin for a dead horse ” (that is, “ Throwing good money after bad ”). 
 In speaking once to an Ulsterman in reference to a friend recently 
 deceased, who left a large family, I ventured to remark that I was 
 glad to hear he was insured. He replied, very drily : “ Ay, but 
 that’s a dead horse ” (he meant to convey he was in debt). A man 
 may notice a neighbour so slightly that he says of him : “ He hasn’t 
 a word to throw to a dog.” If he is not hospitable to a caller, the 
 caller will say : “ He never asked me had I a mouth on me.” When 
 he speaks his remarks may be pointless or even vulgar, and so someone 
 says : “ What would you expect from a pig but a grunt ?” or “ Give 
 
44 Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster . 
 
 him a fool’s pardon/’ or “ Do you think I would even my wit to him?” 
 A man well dressed has his “ Sunday Shute ” on, and so Drennan 
 writes : 
 
 “ Were I linkin’ in heaven. 
 
 With yon Pleiades seven, 
 
 All shaven and shriven, 
 
 In my Sunday shute clane 
 I would give them the slip, 
 
 And to Newcastle dip, 
 
 To walk with bare feet, 
 
 Tollybranaghan Lane.” 
 
 “ He could not hit a flying turf -stack,” is said of a person who 
 is a bad shot. When an Ulsterman sees something painful or un- 
 pleasant to him, he says to his neighbour : “ I hope I’ll never see the 
 likes of it again,” and the friend addressed will reply : “ Ay, and 
 keep your eyesight.” If one has no respect for the feelings of another 
 he “ rides roughshod over him,” and the person aggrieved may say 
 of him : “ He’ll never sole-leather me again.” A person in talking 
 to one he meets may, by some remark, “ affront ” him (Milton in 
 “ Paradise Lost ” uses it in this sense of offend : 
 
 “ Only our foe, 
 
 Tempting, affronts us with his foul esteem. 
 
 Of our integrity ”) ; 
 
 and as an indication, he will remark as a result : “ I seen a cloud 
 pass over his countenance.” A coachman of a lady who was accus- 
 tomed to drive fast horses, by a mistake on one occasion put a slow 
 animal in a machine for his mistress. On emerging from her house 
 she suddenly observed the horse, and her general disgust with the 
 situation was afterwards graphically described by the coachman, an 
 Ulsterman : “ She wouldn’t have been worse affronted if you had 
 handed her a pross ” (process= summons). 
 
 A baby is “ cut for the pox,” and when it is able to walk alone 
 it is “ fit to travel ” ; if it has no shoes it is “barefut.” The Glens- 
 man in Moira O’Neill’s “ Corrymeela” wiites : 
 
 “ The people that’s in England is richer nor the Jews 
 There’s not the smallest gossoon but thravels in his shoes ! 
 
 I’d give the pipe between me teeth to see a barefut child, 
 
 Och ! Corrymeela an’ the low south wind” ; 
 
Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 45 
 
 it may “ fluster ” (flooster) about its mother (flooster=to flatter or 
 wheedle, is, I think, purely Ulster) ; if a child is spoiled it is “ petted 
 on” (from the Irish peat=a pet) its mother; and if precocious, it is 
 “ ould-fashioned.” At school, a boy playing at marbles likes a good 
 “ taw ” (the origin of this word is unknown, but Cowper, in “ Tiroc- 
 inium, ” speaks of 
 
 “ The little ones .... 
 
 As happy as we once, to kneel and draw 
 The chalky ring, and knuckle down at taw ”) 
 
 to shoot from “trig.” Most Ulster children know what “ bitin’ billy ” 
 and “ yellow-man ” taste like. A boy with his “ galluses ” (suspend- 
 ers) broken, and no “ whang ” in his boot (a variant of thwang, now 
 thong) is very untidy. 
 
 An Ulster, girl at school writes home she is “ thinking long,” mean- 
 ing that she is longing for her home and relatives. It is a most 
 expressive saying, and is beautifully conveyed in Moira O’Neill’s 
 
 A SONG OF GLENANN. 
 
 “ Och ! when we lived in ould Glenann 
 Meself could lift a song ! 
 
 An’ ne’er an hour by day or dark 
 Would I be thinkirt long. 
 
 “ The weary wind might take the roof, 
 
 The rain might lay the corn ; 
 
 We’d up an’ look for betther luck 
 About the morrow’s mom. 
 
 “ But since we come away from there 
 An’ far across the say, 
 
 I still have wrought, an’ still have thought 
 The way I’m doin’ the day. 
 
 “ An’ now we’re quarely betther fixed, 
 
 In troth ! there’s nothing wrong : 
 
 But me and mine, by rain an’ shine 
 We do be thinkin’ long. 
 
 This phrase by some has been regarded as an Ulster vulgarism 
 to be corrected, but those conversant with “ Romeo and Juliet ” will 
 
46 Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulste r . 
 
 recollect how, in the tragic scene where Juliet is found dead, Paris 
 exclaims : 
 
 “ Have I thought long to see this morning’s face, 
 
 And doth it give me such a sight as this?” 
 
 As illustrating some points in the folk-lore of Ulster, I have 
 quoted freely from the writings of Moira O’Neill and William All- 
 ingham. Their songs and lyrics are creative, full of imagination and 
 humour, and of sympathy with the Ulster character and tempera- 
 ment. Moira O’Neill has more of what I have spoken of as the 
 Celtic note, and in her songs we find the very expressions and peculiar 
 sayings used everyday by the people. Allingham has a great love for 
 nature and for children, and perhaps shows more liking for fairy 
 lore, but he clothes his lyrics in ordinary phraseology ; in this respect 
 having probably been influenced by his friendship with Tenny- 
 son and Carlyle, Rosetti, Ruskin, and Millais. Up to the present, 
 Moira O’Neill is best known in literature by her songs ; Allingham 
 has written many other articles in addition to his charming lyrics. 
 Moira O’Neill may be regarded as the Bums, Allingham as the Cole- 
 ridge or Scott of Ulster. 
 
 If a person is not easily affected by criticism, people say : “ It 
 just went off him like water off a duck’s back ” ; and if a man leaves 
 a number of people who are discussing some subject in which he has 
 exhibited little interest, some one may say : “ Oh, he has other fish 
 to fry.” The most important person in a large connection of people 
 is “ the top of kin.” “Far-out friends” are usually recognized if 
 successful in life, otherwise they are to be considered as “ poor re- 
 lations.” 
 
 The phrases and expressions one constantly hears in Ulster 
 indicate how observant the people are who employ them. They have 
 endless forms of sayings to describe the varied appearance of the 
 face. A person whose face is covered wfith pock-marks is said to be 
 “pock-arr’d” (arr is an old word found in Danish ar, Swedish arr, and 
 Icelandic orr, meaning a scar). A person with a hare-lip, is “ hare- 
 scart” (hare scarred). One who talks through a cleft palate is said to 
 “ sneevle ” (an obsolete form of snivel). One (generally applied to 
 a woman) whose upper lip is expressionless from the absence of the 
 usual depression in the centre below the level of the nose is said 
 to have no “ trinket to her lip.” (“ Trinket ” is an essentially Ulster 
 -word applied to the water-course by the roadside. It apparently is 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 47 
 
 for trinklet, and is derived from trinkle and -et, a variant of tricklet, 
 =a small trickling stream.) 
 
 And the hands and feet readily lend themselves to comment. A 
 man with no responsibilities is said “ to have a free foot and a fel- 
 lah (fellow) for it.” “Something done among hands,” means some- 
 thing outside the ordinary work. A place may be “ near hand a mile” 
 from a town. Twenty “hands ” may be working in a field, and some 
 may be so awkward that they have “ no hands at all ” ; and a smart 
 man at work may, if his fellow-workers are not “ coming much speed” 
 be asked 1 to “ put his hand till ” and hurry on the job. A very busy 
 person is said to “ have his hands full.” A person who blunders “puts 
 his foot into it,” and when he has made an utter mess of things it may 
 be said : “ He has put his foot into it up to the elbow.” On the 
 other hand a man may show good sense by “ putting his right foot 
 foremost,” and some people are so lucky that they always “ fall on 
 their feet ” ; and a “ footy ” man is very contemptible, and if obstin- 
 ate he won’t “ budge a foot.” The word “ hannel ” (handle) means 
 to hurry, and the following story will indicate the way it is used. As 
 I was once driving from the station of a country town in Ulster on 
 a car we met another vehicle approaching the railway station, on 
 which there was an old lady as the only passenger. As we passed, 
 the driver said to my Jehu: “Will I hit her?” to which he replied: 
 “ Ay, if you hannel .” When the first driver said, waving his whip, 
 “ Will I hit her ?” he had no idea of striking his old lady passenger 
 with his whip ; he meant could he “ hit ” (catch) the train ; and when 
 my carman said : “ Ay, if ye hannel,” he meant, yes, if he hurried on. 
 Speaking of the train, instead of saying: “Is this the place where 
 they collect the tickets ?” the Ulsterman puts it : “ Is it here they lift 
 the tickets ?” To take a “ wee dander ” (daunder, dauner) means to 
 go an aimless walk, hence one person says to another : “ Will you 
 come for a dander?” It is connected with the Scotch “ dandill ”=to 
 go about idly and “dandle.” I have come across the word in Mrs. 
 Carlyle’s “ Letters,” and in Barrie’s “ Window in Thrums.” It has 
 nothing to do with the saying : “ To get one’s dander up ” (this word 
 is said to be a corruption of dandruff, and conveys the idea of rub- 
 bing one’s hair the wrong way, and so getting one into a passion). 
 It is used by Thackeray in “ Pendennis,” and by Lowell in “ The Big- 
 low Papers.” Dander is closely related to “saunter” (old French, 
 s’aventurer), to walk in a listless, leisurely way. A literary friend 
 of mine was once staying at Hughenden, when another guest asked 
 
48 
 
 Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 the host if he walked much, to which Dizzy replied : “ I never walk, 
 I only saunter.” A common saying, indicating a large number or a 
 great quantity, is a “ power” — i.e., a countryman will say of a meeting, 
 that there was “ a power. ” at it, or of a farmer that he has “ a power” 
 of sheep. It is simply power or force as estimated by numbers, and 
 so is analogous with the word “ strength,” as the strength of a regi- 
 ment (in “ All’s Well that Ends Well,” Shakespeare writes : “ Demand 
 of him of what strength they are a-foot ”), and has nothing to do with 
 another similarly pronounced well-known Ulster phrase : “ A pour, of 
 rain,” which is simply a downpour. Some people on hearing an 
 Ulsterman say of a friend that he had “ a power ” of money, might 
 think the phrase vulgar, but it has been rendered classical by Richard- 
 son in “ Pamela ” as follows : “ I am providing a power of pretty 
 things for her against I see her next.” 
 
 The word “ heap ” is used in the same way, we find it in Moira 
 O’Neill’s “ Forgettin’ ” : 
 
 “ Och, never fear, my jewel ! 
 
 I’d forget ye now this minute, 
 
 If I only had a notion 
 
 O’ the way I should begin it ; 
 
 But first an’ last it isn’t known, 
 
 The heap o’ throuble’s in it. 
 
 “ Meself began the night ye went, 
 
 An’ haven’t done it yet ; 
 
 I’m nearly fit to give it up, 
 
 For where’s the use to fret? 
 
 An’ the memory’s fairly spoilt on me 
 Wid’ mindin’ to forget.” 
 
 Certain names, sayings, and proverbs have come to be associated 
 with particular places in Ulster. 
 
 Everyone knows “ Kitty of Coleraine,” immortalised in the fam- 
 ous Irish song : 
 
 “ As beautiful Kitty one morning was tripping 
 
 With a pitcher of milk for the fair of Coleraine, 
 
 When she saw me she stumbled, the pitcher down tumbled, 
 
 And all the sweet buttermilk watered the plain. 
 
49 
 
 Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 * Oh, what shall I do now ? ’Twas looking at you now ! 
 
 Fm sure such a pitcher I’ll ne’er, see again. 
 
 ’Twas the pride of my dairy. Oh, Barney McCleary, 
 
 Your sent as a. plague to the girls of Coleraine.’ 
 
 “ I sat down beside her, and gently did chide her, 
 
 That such a misfortune should give her such pain ; 
 
 A kiss then I gave her, and before I did leave her, 
 
 She vowed for such pleasure she’d break it again. 
 
 ’Twas the haymaking season — I can’t tell the reason — 
 Misfortunes will never come single, ’tis plain ! 
 
 For very soon after poor Kitty’s disaster, 
 
 The devil a pitcher was whole in Coleraine ” 
 
 (It is an interesting fact that the authorship of these verses, so well 
 known all over Ireland is, like that of “ The Cruiskeen Lawn,” “ The 
 Night before Larry was stretched,” “ Johnny, I hardly knew ye,” “Brian 
 O’Linn,” and “Nell Flaherty’s Drake,” unknown); and “Peg of 
 Limavady,” celebrated by Thackeray in his “ Irish Sketches”: 
 
 “ Beauty is not rare 
 
 In the Land of Paddy 
 Fair beyond compare 
 Is Peg of Limavady. 
 
 “ Citizen or squire, 
 
 Tory, Whig, or Radi- 
 cal would all desire 
 Peg of Limavady. 
 
 “ And till I expire, 
 
 Or till I grow mad, I 
 Will sing unto my lyre 
 Peg of Limavady !” 
 
 And some may have heard of that lady called 
 “ Isabella,” 
 
 who had 
 
 “ A gingham umbrella,” 
 
 and was married to 
 
 “ A sandy-whiskered fella,” 
 
 who lived 
 
 “ Down below Portadown.” 
 
50 Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster . 
 
 “ Tandferagee no pinch,” a well-known term when used of any- 
 thing, means that there is no stint. It had its origin, it is said, at the 
 time that town in County Armagh was at the zenith of its prosperity 
 as a great flax market, and when there was “ no pinch ” or stint in 
 the way whiskey was offered; on the other hand, “ A Tanderagee way 
 of talking,” means, I am told, to be always on the grumble. Of a 
 woman who is “knowing ” — what our American friends term “ cute ” — 
 it is said : “ She could keep Omagh,” an allusion to the gaol there. 
 A town that is not increasing in size is said to be a “ finished town.” 
 We have all heard of “ Good old County Down,” and “ One shot 
 more for the honour of Down,” were the last words of a distinguished 
 Comber man, Major-General Sir Robert Rollo Gillespie, K.C.B., as 
 he fell shot through the heart before the fort of Kalunga, in the Hima- 
 layas, while commanding the Meerut division of the Bengal troops. 
 
 To “ make a Bally shannon of it,” is a curious term, the meaning 
 of which the following: incident will explain : A keen “ hard-fisted ” 
 Northerner was buying some articles in a shop in Belfast. The 
 owner quoted them at one shilling each, the buyer offered sixpence 
 each, and as neither seemed inclined to yield, a bystander said : “ Make 
 a Ballyshannon of it,” that is, to use another Ulster expression, he 
 advised “ to split the differ,” making the price ninepence, which was 
 agreed upon. Those who have read Allingham’s “Emigrant’s Fare- 
 well ” will remember 
 
 “ Adieu to Belashanny ! where I was bred and bom ; 
 
 Go where I may, I’ll think of you, as sure as night and morn — 
 The kindly spot, the friendly town, where every one is known, 
 And not a face in all the place but partly seems my own ; 
 
 There’s not a house or window, there’s not a field or hill, 
 
 But, East or West, in foreign lands I’ll recollect them still 
 I leave my warm heart with you, tho’ my back I’m forced to turn, 
 So adieu to Belashanny, and the winding banks of Erne !” 
 
 Ballyshannon is situated on each side of the Erne, so “to make a 
 Ballyshannon ” of anything, means to halve or divide it. 
 
 Lisburn is often spoken of as old Lisnagarvey, its original name. 
 It was of Newry that Swift wrote his famous lines : 
 
 “ High church, 
 
 Low steeple, 
 
 Dirty streets. 
 
 Proud people.” 
 
Sayings , Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 5 1 
 
 Everyone has heard of the famous “ Book of Armagh,” and tra- 
 dition tells us that the bones of the Patron Saint of Ireland lie at 
 Downpatrick, either within the Cathedral, or in the adjoining grave- 
 yard outside ; but few, I believe, are aware that in former ages leper 
 hospitals existed in both these old cities. Several years ago when 
 investigating for my old and revered teacher, the great all-round 
 specialist, Mr. Jonathan Hutchinson, the question of the existence in 
 early times of leper institutions in Ireland, a piece of work that was 
 so well done for Scotland by the late Sir J. Simpson, I came across this 
 interesting fact. Part of the results of this research — 
 in which I received the greatest assistance from the late Bishop 
 Reeves — has been published in The Polyclinic. 
 
 Dr. Reeves enjoyed the reputation of being the most accurate 
 Irish antiquarian of his time, and on one occasion, in discussing with 
 him the much debated question of the relative antiquity of Armagh 
 and Downpatrick, the erudite Bishop said he believed Armagh was 
 the older of the two. 
 
 A man may be “ as long as Cookstown ” (that is, a very tall man 
 — Cookstown being largely one long street), “ as hard as Derry’s walls,” 
 or “as slippy (slippery) as a Bann eel” (at Toomebridge), or he may 
 be “ deeper and dirtier than the Glenwherry bogs,” or so deformed that 
 people may say of him : “He’s aye to one side like Clogher” (with its 
 shops, etc., on one side of the street). Banagher has been immortalized 
 in the saying : “ That beats Banagher, and Banagher bangs the de’il.” 
 In County Derry, near Dungiven, there is the old church of Banagher, 
 and adjacent to it a building called the Abbey or Monastery. It 
 is said that O’Heney, a saint, was the founder of both, and his effigy 
 exists on the western side of the Abbey. In the churchyard 
 is situated the tomb of the saint, and the sand adjacent to it (as in the 
 case of St. Patrick’s grave in Downpatrick) is regarded as sacred. In 
 a horse-race whoever can throw some of this Banagher sand on the 
 rider as he passes, ensures success to his horse ; hence at horse-races 
 Banagher men were thought to be certain to win, as they possessed the 
 lucky sand ; if thrown over a house it protects the house from burn- 
 ing. This sand carries virtue with it wherever it goes, but it should, 
 to prove efficacious, be lifted and given to anyone asking for it by a 
 real descendant of the saint, and I am told there is only one person 
 in the district (he lives at Dungiven) who can dO‘ so at present. The 
 sand is often carried away by emigrants to ensure their success, especi- 
 ally in America, so Banagher brings luck and keeps off or. “ bangs the 
 
52 Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 
 
 de’il,” and anything that beats Banagher must be very remarkable in 
 many ways. 
 
 When a place (I won’t name the Ulster town to which I first 
 heard it applied) is out of the way and hard to reach, and altogether 
 uninteresting, it is said to> be “ at the back of beyant ” (beyond), that 
 is, it is even more distant than “ beyant (beyond) the beyants,” a 
 phrase more expressive than “ a God- forsaken spot,” or the “ back 
 of God-speed.” An old lady, many years deceased, who- lived all her 
 life in the neighbourhood of Belfast, used to remark : “ It’s out of 
 the world and into Holywood.” 
 
 A word or two in conclusion about the humour of Ulster. One 
 sometimes hears visitors to Ireland say there is little wit or humour 
 in the northern province, but this is due to 1 a very superficial know- 
 ledge on their part of the people “ North of the Boyne,” where these 
 peculiar features form a marked characteristic of the inhabitants. The 
 humour of the North of Ireland differs from that of the South in 
 not being so apparent and spontaneous, and it is not so topsy-turvy ; 
 it is of a drier kind, but at the same time can be as sparkling as that 
 met with in any other part of the country. One feature about the 
 northern humour is that while it is not so much on the surface, and in 
 many cases not so evidently prepared beforehand as you find it in 
 the south, it is not so readily exhausted. In driving through Dublin, 
 the jarvey will at once, when you mount his vehicle, fire off some 
 humorous saying; in the North of Ireland the carman, on the con- 
 trary, waits until you draw it out of him by some remark, but, while 
 the carman in the south shows by the twinkle in his eye that he is 
 amusing you, his northern confrere never exhibits by any emotional 
 evidence that he is poking fun at you. A few examples will illus- 
 trate the northern humour: 
 
 i . — A clergyman, who for many years preached in Ulster, was 
 celebrated for a very ornate and rhetorical style. On one occasion 
 being asked to lecture to a country audience in the centre of County 
 Antrim, he selected as his subject “ Savonarola.” After the lecture 
 (a very florid one), on going out of the church where 
 
 the address was delivered, he and his host (the 
 
 local clergyman) met a well-known member of the congregation who 
 had been present. “ What did you think of the lecture ?” said the 
 local cleric. The lay friend at first, as is so> often the habit in the 
 North, said nothing, but on the lecturer himself repeating the same 
 
Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 53 
 
 question, he replied : “ It was a gran’ discourse, but I am thinkin’, 
 sir, it needed a heap o’ spellin’ ” (spelling). 
 
 2. — One day, as I was driving in County Down from a station to 
 meet a medical friend, I remarked to> the driver of the hack car that 
 his horse was making a good deal of noise ; this he altogether ques- 
 tioned 1 at first, but as we reached the top of a steep hill the “roaring” 
 became so evident that I again drew his attention to it, when, without 
 a smile, he made the extraordinary reply : “ Oh, sir, it’s the rubber 
 tyres you heerd ” (heard) — the wheels of the car were rubber tyred. 
 I replied I had never heard them so loud before, when he rejoined : 
 “ I mane, sir, if there were no tyres on the wheels, you wouldn’t hear 
 the ould mare.” 
 
 3. — On another occasion I told the carman he had only fifteen 
 minutes to' accomplish the journey to a country station. He said it 
 was too little, and, on my urging in reply, that another carman at the 
 same station (a rival of his) had told me he could “ cover the distance” 
 in ten minutes, he drily remarked : “ Oh, he has a quare imagination, 
 and you know, sir, imagination is a great help to a doctor’s medicine.” 
 
 4. — It used to be common in farm houses to give favourite beg 
 gars (who generally carry about the news of the country) a bowl or 
 tin of broth in the kitchen, and the quality of the food was estimated 
 just in proportion to its thickness. One day a beggar called at the 
 house of a woman of a miserly (“ near. ”) reputation, who' handed him 
 a tin of very thin broth, and on her asking him: “ Was it to bis lik- 
 ing?” he said nothing. “ Is it thick enough?” she enquired. “Well, 
 mistress,” he replied, “ I got yen (one) grot (groat) and I see anither” 
 (another). 
 
 5 . — A clergyman in County Armagh once boasted he could 
 preach a sermon from any text of Scripture. One of his congregation 
 gave him the following : “ Am not I thine ass ?” The next Sunday 
 he gave out as his text these words, as supplied to him. He first 
 referred to the context, then dwelt on the meaning of the question, and, 
 finally, made this practical application : “ My hearers, some of you 
 pay me four shillings and fourpence per annum, or one penny for 
 every Sunday, and in return for this handsome remuneration, I preach 
 once every Sabbath, marry you, baptize your children, visit you in 
 sickness, and attend your funerals — am not I thine ass?” 
 
 6- — The same clergyman told! me that in Paris, on the occasion of 
 one of its great exhibitions, he lost his way one evening, and in his 
 dilemma, not being able to speak French, he mounted the steps of a 
 
54 Sayings, Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 statue, and began to recite “ Lochinvar.” A crowd rapidly collected, 
 and one of them, an Englishman, coming close to* him asked him what 
 in all the world did he want ? “ You, sir,” he replied, telling him as 
 
 he stepped down of his inability to find his residence. The English- 
 man was so amused that he entertained 1 him hospitably at a cafe, and 
 then saw him safe home to his hotel. 
 
 7. — Coming into hospital one day long ago> I overheard a patient 
 
 say to another : “Is your chicken soup thin ?” The reply came at 
 
 once : “ Ay, the bird only walked through them,” to' which the first 
 
 answered : “ Maybe it was on stilts.” 
 
 8. — On one occasion I remarked to a carman in a country town 
 
 who sometimes drove me, on his telling me the horse was a new one, 
 that it was like the one he had when I had last employed him. “ Oh, 
 sir,” he replied, sorrowfully, “ like’s a bad! mark among sheep !” and 
 when he had gone a short distance I soon discovered how inferior the 
 present was to the former animal. The subsequent history of this 
 unfortunate animal may be best related in the owner’s words, who, in 
 reply to my asking him how the horse was doing, said : “ Dear be 
 thankit, he’s dead. He tuk (took) an ating (eating) diabatis (dia- 
 betes) and near han’ (hand) broke me keeping him goin’ (going) wi’ 
 
 (with) hay and oats, and the more I giv him the poorer he got, till 
 
 near the end he was as thin as a harra ” (harrow). 
 
 Nowhere is the humour and wit of the northern province of Ire- 
 land encountered more markedly than at fairs. The natural desire 
 of the seller to point out and exaggerate the good features of his 
 animal, and on the other hand, the keenness with which the buyer 
 dwells upon the defects of the same animal, both afford ample facil- 
 ities for remarks — humorous, caustic, and mordant — all the more 
 pointed from the fact that there is often an attentive audience of 
 onlookers who thoroughly enjoy the scene. The best of good nature 
 prevails, and no matter how amusing or depreciatory the sayings be 
 that are bandied to and fro, it is rare for any quarrel to arise. Let 
 me give a very few examples : 
 
 A gentleman took a rather good hunter, who, however, had a 
 very bad colour (a light Canary yellow) to Ballyclare Fair, and on 
 being asked “ what he wanted for the horse ?” named what was thought 
 to be a rather high price — one hundred guineas. The countryman 
 looked again critically at the animal, and then said : “ I’ll give you 
 twenty pounds, but (after a pause) you must first paint him a dacent 
 colour.” 
 
Sayings , Proverbs , Humour of Ulster. 55 
 
 One day at Saintfield fair, a gentleman on the lookout for a 
 horse saw one he fancied, and 1 made enquiries about him from Ihe 
 owner, who was a native of County Down. “ There,” said he, hand- 
 ing him the halter, “ try the horse as much as you like, but you’ll buy 
 him as he stands, for I’ll give you no warranty, nor allow him to be 
 examined by a vit. ” (vet.). The gentleman got his coachman to try 
 the horse in the usual way, “ galloping him for his wind,” etc., and, 
 as nothing seemed amiss, he became more pleased with the animal. 
 “ Why won’t you let him be examined by a veterinary surgeon ?” said 
 the gentleman. “ Because,” said the owner, “ he has two faults, and 
 ye may just find them out yersel’ as I did.” Finally, after some 
 further trials, the horse was bought, and after the money was paid 
 the purchaser said : “ You can’t refuse now to tell me his faults ?” 
 “ He has two,” said the countryman ; “ first, if ye turned him out in 
 a field all about your place couldn’t (could not) catch him,” “ Oh, 
 that’s easy managed,” said his new owner, “ we’ll always keep a slip 
 (a sort of light winkers) on him. What’s his other fault?” “ The 
 second fault is this,” said his former owner, “when ye do get him, 
 ye’ll find he’s not worth the catching.” 
 
 On one occasion, after purchasing a horse, the man who owned 
 him said 1 to me : “ I forgot to tell ye, sir, he has wan (one) fault.” 
 “ What’s that ?” I enquired. “ He won’t live long enough,” he replied. 
 
 At the celebrated Moy fair, a countryman examining a horse 
 said, on running his hands over the horse’s knees : “ That boy has been 
 saying his prayers.” “ Oh, not at all,” said the owner, “ he’s not your 
 soort (sortr=particular religious sect), he always prays stannin ” (stand- 
 
 ing)- 
 
 A man who was taking a cow to a fair was accosted by a country- 
 man, who enquired how much he was asking for her. The owner 
 named a high price, whereupon the other replied : “ Get her shod.” 
 No statement — so laconic and so expressive in its meaning- -could 
 better convey the idea that unless he asked less he would have to go 
 to a good many markets with his beast. 
 
 It is said sometimes that in the North of Ireland we are a very 
 fighting, quarrelling race; but surely the following story shows row 
 little those who bring this charge understand us. Two men were 
 brought before a magistrate in a local court (“ bench day ”) in a county 
 town in Ulster, charged with fighting in the public street. As the 
 evidence against one of the prisoners was not conclusive, he was or- 
 dered to be released, and the magistrate was about to sentence his 
 
56 Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 co-prisoner to a fine, when the man who had been liberated addressed 
 him as follows : “ We were not fighting when the polis (police) tuck 
 us.” “ What were you doing then ?” said his worship. “ We were 
 just trying to separate one another,” said the man. 
 
 A well-known medical man in an Ulster town (with whom I have 
 been acquainted since my boyhood), one of the strongest personalities 
 in his district, who was as resourceful in fighting the complications of 
 disease as in dealing with the difficulties of every-day life, asked the 
 sub-inspector or officer of the Royal Irish Constabulary — a young 
 Englishman who had recently been appointed to the neighbourhood — 
 to dine with him one Christmas. On returning from his round of 
 visits on Christmas Eve his wife, greatly put out, told him, that a 
 well-known half -starved dog of a neighbour had entered the larder 
 and had escaped, taking with him almost the whole of one side of the 
 breast of a turkey, which was to> form one of the principal dishes of 
 their Christmas dinner. The doctor, as was his wont, made little of 
 the occurrence, but early next morning a well-known character in the 
 town (who it was alleged the police thought was not above poaching) 
 brought the doctor a hare, and a portion of its flesh was carefully ap- 
 plied to fill up the gap made in the turkey by the dog. At the din- 
 ner (and never was there a more entertaining host) by a judicious ap- 
 plication of white sauce, and by careful manipulating in carving by 
 the doctor, nothing was noticed amiss with the turkey. In helping 
 his guest, the doctor gave him a slice from each side of the turkey’s 
 breast, and the flavour was so unique that the young English officer — 
 no mean sportsman — who had hunted and tasted wild turkey in his 
 time, said he had never eaten such a beautifully-flavoured bird ; and, 
 naturally, being a comparative stranger in the district, asked what 
 was the breed of this particular turkey. The doctor replied it was 
 a peculiar species that he himself took great pride in, and that it was 
 the result not of natural, but of artificial selection. As long as the 
 officer was in that Ulster town, he would at times refer to the beautiful 
 turkey, which was the chief dish on a particular Christmas night 
 he had dined with the doctor. 
 
 On one occasion, after a consultation with an old 1 and valued 
 former pupil, he kindly asked me to have something to eat at his 
 house before driving to catch the train for home. We sat down to 
 an excellent repast — roast duck and cabbage — but, unfortunately, the 
 bird was not sufficiently cooked. On finding this my host complained 
 to his old housekeeper, who was attending us, and who is quite a 
 
Sayings, Proverbs, and Humour of Ulster. 57 
 
 character, and she at once replied : 11 I don’t think there are many 
 people could catch, kill, and roast a drake all within an hour ! ar d 
 as she was leaving the room where we sat, she said, with great sarcasm 
 to me : “ Purfessor (Professor), maybe they are smarter in your big 
 town” (Belfast). In justice to the old lady, it is only fair to say 
 that she did not, through a mistake, get sufficient time for her work, 
 and further, as the doctor told me, she had a great liking for this 
 particular bird, and resented having to kill it. Indeed, her feelings 
 probably would have best found expression in the famous Irish 1 allad : 
 
 “ His neck it was green, most rare to be seen, 
 
 He was fit for a queen of the highest degree : 
 
 His body was white, and would you delight, 
 
 He was plump, fat, and heavy, and brisk as a bee ; 
 
 The dear little fellow, his legs they were yellow, 
 
 He would fly like a swallow, and dive like a hake, 
 
 But some wicked savage, to grease his white cabbage, 
 Has murdered Nell Flaherty’s beautiful drake. 
 
 “ My treasure had dozens of nephews and cousins, 
 
 And one I must get or my heart it will break, 
 
 To keep my mind easy, or else I’ll go crazy — 
 
 This ends the whole song of my beautiful drake.” 
 
 In the neighbourhood of Strabane, two twin brothers resided who 
 were so similar in appearance that even their friends could not dis- 
 tinguish them. One of them' left the district, and at a subsequent 
 period news came that he was dead. A countryman, shortly after- 
 wards meeting the surviving brother in a fair asked him : “ Are you 
 yourself or the one that died?” The survivor replied it was his 
 brother who had died, whereupon the countryman said : “ I never 
 knew the differ ’tween ye afore ” (before). 
 
 On one occasion while being driven by a coachman of a well-known 
 County Down gentleman, who has two capital matching carriage 
 horses, I asked : “ Which horse is this ” (only one was in the machine) ? 
 to which the coachman dryly replied : “ Oh ! that’s t’other (the other) 
 one.” 
 
 A clergyman walking along a country road overtook a man who 
 was in vain trying to raise on to his back several sheaves of recently 
 cut grass, tied together by means of a rope. With the aid of the 
 clergyman, the countryman at length got his load on his back, and just 
 before walking off, he turned to the good Samaritan, who had come 
 
58 Sayings , Proverbs , and Humour of Ulster. 
 
 to his assistance, and said, by way of thanks : “ I’ll have to give ye 
 a day’s hearing forenenst (opposite) this.” 
 
 The Ulsterman, no matter what may be his religion or politics is 
 essentially democratic in his tendencies, and this is often shown in the 
 humGur met with in the northern province. The following incidents 
 will illustrate this : 
 
 1. — At a levee in Dublin Castle, a lady on attempting to enter by 
 what is called the “ private entree ” door, was stopped by the police- 
 man in charge, who happened to be from the North of Ireland. Much 
 disgusted at his action, she said: : “ I must get in, I am the wife of 
 a Cabinet minister.” He replied at once : “ I couldn’t let you in, 
 ma’am, even if you were the wife of a Presbyterian minister.” 
 
 2. — A man was once talking to an Ulsterman about his ancestors, 
 his grandfathers and great-grandfathers, and the wonderful deeds of 
 valour they had done by sea and land for the State, when, after a long 
 recital, the Ulsterman enquired : “ Are they all living now ?” to which 
 the other replied contemptuously : “ Oh, no !” whereupon the Ulster- 
 man said : “ Then you’re no better than a growing pratie (potato), the 
 best part of you is underground 1 .” 
 
 3. — There is an old ballad giving an account of a quarrel be- 
 tween an Ulsterman and a Spanish dignitary, whom he had offended. 
 The injured Spaniard, with an air of loftiness, informs his opponent 
 that : “ I am Don Guzman Pedrillo* de Sota Murillo, of fair Seville 
 town,” to which the Ulsterman, breathing the northern spirit, replies : 
 
 “ Ye may be Don Guzzler O’Swillo, or whatever ye willo, but I’m 
 Mattha Brown.” 
 
 I have endeavoured, in a very imperfect way, to point out some 
 of the peculiarities of the folk-lore of the people who live in the 
 northern province of Ireland, with which all my life and all my in- 
 terests are bound up. I have not, for obvious reasons, touched upon 
 such debatable subjects as the political and sectarian opinions of 
 the inhabitants of Ulster. We are all entitled to our individual views 
 on such topics,, and we each should be tolerant of the opinions of 
 others who may differ from us, but in the desire to help, in every way, 
 our beloved country, every true and patriotic Irishman can say : 
 
 “ We’re one at heart, if you be Ireland’s friend, 
 
 Though leagues asunder our opinions tend ; 
 
 There are but two great parties in the end.” 
 
Ulsterisms.* 
 
 I have been much interested in the series of articles and letters in 
 your paper on “ Ulsterisms,” and if you think the subject has not been 
 exhausted, I should like to supply you with some more of those curious 
 words and phrases, which seem to form a distinct feature of the 
 dialect peculiar to the Northern province. Many of these “Ulsterisms” 
 came, no doubt, from Scotland, but, as Lord Dufferin very wittily 
 remarked recently in reference to> another subject, while that country 
 may have supplied the sayings as the raw material, they have been 
 considerably altered and improved into the perfect article we now hear 
 in daily use. Other “ Ulsterisms ” have no connection with Scotland ; 
 but this is what one would expect, considering the different places 
 from which the inhabitants of Ulster have from time to' time come. 
 While you may encounter these “ Ulsterisms ” in Belfast, their birth- 
 place is undoubtedly in the country districts, and it is to be hoped 
 that the present regrettable trend of civilization from country to city 
 life will not lead to their decadence. It is a great misfortune that no 
 genius has arisen in Ulster, like Burns or Scott, to make its folk-lore 
 classical. 
 
 No one has a better opportunity of noting these “ Ulsterisms ” 
 than a doctor. It is a well-known saying for an Ulsterman to ask 
 his medical adviser to “ spend his opinion ” on some member of his 
 household who> happens to be ill. What he conveys by this phrase 
 is that the doctor shall make a careful examination of the patient, 
 and then give his opinion as to the nature, treatment, etc., of the case. 
 Shakespeare makes Othello' say : “I will but spend a word here in the 
 house, and go with you ” ; but the use of the word in a medical sense 
 is, I think, peculiar to Ulster. While proceeding to visit the patient 
 the doctor may be told by the Ulsterman that the member of his 
 family who is ill (it may be his wife) has a “ bad brash ” (attack), or 
 that she has a “ touch of the weed ” (also spelled “ weid”), that is, a 
 sudden febrile attack ; or that the sick person has an “income” (in Ulster 
 this is usually applied to a chronic swelling of the leg or arm, but it 
 has a much wider application apparently in Scotland, for in his de- 
 lightful book “ Rab and His Friends,” Dr. John Brown, brother 
 of the present distinguished Professor of Chemistry in Edinburgh 
 University, represents one of his characters as saying : “ Maister 
 John, this is the mistress ; she’s got a trouble in her breast — some kind 
 o’ an income we’re thinkin’.” No term could be more expressive than 
 “ income” — that is, something unusual which has “ come in ” to the 
 
 *Paper contributed to “ The Northern Whig,” Belfast, of May 8th, 1901. 
 
6o 
 
 Ulsterisms. 
 
 part affected). The doctor may, however, be informed that the person 
 he is going to> see had, as the result of a severe wetting, “got a founder.” 
 (The use of this old word, as applied to a horse, is well known, but 
 as used in the case of human beings it is common in Ulster.) The 
 doctor may learn that the patient has the “rose” (a very old term for 
 erysipelas, from its colour, resembling that flower). I have heard the 
 same disease styled “St. Anthony’s Fire” in the South of England, 
 apparently because it looks a fiery colour, or because tradition said that 
 persons suffering from erysipelas could be cured by a pilgrimage 
 to the shrine of St. Anthony. If the patient is a child he may be 
 “donsie” (Scotch for sick or ailing), or he may have an attack of 
 “ dwaums” (a sudden illness), or he may have the “gnarls” (chicken- 
 pox), the spots being like knots or gnarls of wood ; or the “chin- 
 cough” (whooping-cough). This was originally “ kink-cough,” from an 
 old word kink (Anglo-Saxon cincian, and Dutch kinken), which was 
 used with two meanings — (i) to laugh loudly (one often hears in 
 Ulster, “ he kinked with laughter”), and ( 2 ) to gasp for breath, as in 
 the spasms or kinks of whooping-cough. Fletcher says : 
 
 “ It shall ne’er be said in our country 
 Thou diedst o’ th’ chin-cough”; 
 
 while Smollett, in his translation of “ Gil Bias,” writes most graphic- 
 ally : “ She ran to the assistance of the good man, rubbed his forehead, 
 and clapped him on the back, as is practised with children when they 
 have the chin-cough.” It is a pity that the modern word “ whooping- 
 cough” has so much displaced the more ancient and classical term 
 “ chin-cough,” still largely used in Ulster. Again the doctor may 
 be told that the person he is called to see has received an injury in 
 the “lisk” (the groin or flank). This is an extremely old English 
 word, the same as the Danish “lyske.” It is found in “Morte Arthure” : 
 “The laste was a litylle mane, that laide was be-nethe, his leskes atte 
 lene and lathelicke to schewe” ; or that he has a “ gathering in his 
 oxter” (the armpit, a word brought from Scotland, but originally de- 
 rived from the Anglo-Saxon ohsta, the armpit). An infectious or 
 catching disease is called “smittle,” hence the Ulster proverb: “Mock- 
 ing’s catching, and gaunting’s (yawning) smittle.” The word gaunt 
 (dialectal variant, gant), which is common in Ulster, is of Scotch 
 origin, and there is a well-known saying in Scotland : 
 
 “ Gaunting bodes wanting one of three, 
 
 Meat, sleep, or good company.” 
 
 In a church in Co. Down, on one occasion, after 
 
 a very prolonged service, the minister gave out six 
 
Ulsterisms. 
 
 61 
 
 verses of a Psalm to be sung. At the conclusion 
 of the first verse the old precentor looked up at the clergyman and 
 said : “ I think, sir, that’s enough, I see them (the congregation) 
 gaunting.” 
 
 During an illness the person is often said to' be “under the 
 harrow” (that is, the illness is a severe one). His friends hope “he has 
 got the turn,” but if the illness prove fatal, they will put it most 
 expressively : “he’s gone” (the Scotch is “he’s awa’ ”). When a person 
 dies he is said to be “underboard” from the time of his decease 
 until his burial. In reference toi the funeral those who> wish to attend 
 are “warned” for a certain hour, say twelve o’clock, but generally 
 they “lift” (that is, the funeral starts) half an hour or an hour later. 
 
 Most expressive terms are employed descriptive of the people in 
 Ulster. A child is a “back-gone wean” when it has lost its flesh ; it is 
 “reel-footed” if there is a club-foot ; it is “skelly-eyed” if it has a 
 squint (in “Old Mortality” it is used : “ It is the very man,” said Both- 
 well, “skellies fearfully with one eye”) ; it is “bandy-legged” if the 
 legs are bent or bowed. This is a most interesting word in its origin. 
 It would seem that about the time of Queen Elizabeth a game, the 
 prototype of the modern tennis or hockey, came into vogue, and the 
 stick or racket used in striking the ball was styled the “bandy.” In 
 his “Vision of Sin,” Tennyson writes : 
 
 “ To fly sublime 
 
 Thro’ the courts, the camps, the schools, 
 
 Is to be the ball of Time, 
 
 Bandied by the hands of fools.” 
 
 The use of the word in the further sense of “give and take” is seen 
 in “Lear,” where Shakespeare uses it as follows : “Do you bandy looks 
 with me, you rascal?” In Faulkland, in Fifeshire, the late Marquis 
 of Bute spent thousands of pounds in restoring the old monastery, 
 and I saw there a few years ago one of the best examples of these old 
 tennis or bandy courts, which is said to be now as perfect as when 
 it was originally built. The “bandy” club had a peculiar bend or 
 crook at one end, and a person whose legs resembled this bandy club 
 was said to be “bandy-legged.” We find it in Swift : 
 
 “ Nor make a scruple to expose 
 Your bandy-leg or crooked nose.” 
 
 A “lamiter” is used for a lame person or a cripple. In “Jane Eyre” 
 Charlotte Bronte writes : “You have now no doubt friends who will 
 look after you, and not suffer you to devote yourself to a blind lamiter 
 like me.” A deaf person is said tt> be “hard-a-hearing.” When a 
 
62 
 
 Ulsterisms. 
 
 child is sent a message to a farmhouse, and the residents do not know 
 him, he is asked, laconically : “Who’s owe you ?” and, with the usual 
 Northern reserve, he wdl reply “My da” (father), and, on being pressed 
 as to who his father is, the child will often give the name and address 
 of his parent in full — i.e “John Thompson, of the Causey.” The 
 addition of the place of residence serves to distinguish his father 
 from all other men of the same name. (The word “Causey” — Cause- 
 way — is very common in Antrim and Down. It means a road raised 
 above the usual level of the ground by stones. In “Paradise Lost” 
 we have it employed by Milton : 
 
 “ The other way Satan went down, 
 
 The causey to hell-gate.”) 
 
 On the child explaining his parentage, the farmer or his good-wife 
 will often reply : “Well, you don’t favour your father’s side of the 
 house.” (This word “favour” — to resemble — was used by Addison 
 in the Spectator) 
 
 The personal appearance of individuals is indicated by the follow- 
 ing terms : — A dark-countenanced man is said to be “blackavised” (black 
 of his visage). In “Jane Eyre” Charlotte Bronte writes: “I would 
 advise her blackavised suitor tO' look out ; if another comes with a 
 longer or. clearer rentroll he’s dished.” 
 
 As is well-known, that most remarkable genius, Charlotte 
 Bronte was the daughter of a County Down man, who lived in the 
 neighbourhood of Rathfriland, and it is interesting to find her employ- 
 ing in “Jane Eyre” such words as “lamiter” and “blackavised,” which 
 one may hear now every day in the district where her father spent his 
 early life. On enquiring once from a countryman how his mother 
 was, he replied pathetically : “Oh, doctor dear ! She’s clean dark” 
 (blind). 
 
 A stranger going through a district is termed by the residents 
 a “foreigner” ; a stout man is “lusty” ; a buxom-looking woman is 
 “sonsy.” In Scott’s “Heart of Midlothian” we read : “ Is she a pretty 
 girl ?” said the Duke ; “her sister does not get beyond a good, comely, 
 sonsy lass.” A stupid person is a “kitterty” or a “galumpus” ; one who 
 is a silly talker, is a “haverel.” In “Hallowe’en” Burns uses it : 
 
 ‘ Poor hav’ra.1 Will fell aff the drift, 
 
 An’ wandered thro’ the bow-kail.” 
 
 A rascal is a “rapscallion” ; a miserly person is “wee,” “close-fisted,” 
 “near,” “near-be-gone” ; a tall, badly-made lad is a “grawl,” while a 
 small, dwarfed creature is a “crowl”(two schoolboys in the neighbour- 
 hood of Ballymena while at play one day quarrelled, when the bigger 
 
Ulsterisms. 
 
 63 
 
 of the two said to the other, who was a little fellow, with great 
 contempt : “Ye crowl ; the next generation of ye will be thrashing 
 banes (beans) under a creepie” — a low stool) ; a fine-looking, tall man is 
 “clever” ; a person whose temper is easily roused is said to be “short in 
 the grain,” or “grulchy” ; one who speaks with great caution is 
 “mealy-mouthed” ; and if one does not attempt to fight his own corner 
 he is said to have made “debate” for himself ; one who is forward 
 or interfering is contemptuously styled a “beddy” creature. A man of 
 good mental capacity, who uses his powers of observation, is said to 
 be “knowledgeable.” Such a person could not be deceived readily, 
 unless it was “unbeknownst” to' him. A preacher is said to be “fosey” 
 if he is pointless in his sermon ; he is “fusionless” if his discourse is 
 pithless, or if, as I heard a County Down man say of a clergyman, 
 “he preaches powerful wake” (weak). “Fusionless” is a variant cf 
 the Scotch “fissenless.” In “Old Mortality” Scott uses it : “I will not 
 wait upon the thowless, thriftless, fissenless ministry of that man.” 
 A preacher wlx> is “vox et praetera nihil? is said to “gulder.” I once 
 heard an Ulsterman say of a young clergyman, who had a loud, badly 
 managed voice : “ You could hear the gulders o’ him a wheen (a few) 
 of perches afore you came to the meeting-house green.” If an Ulster- 
 man be accosted by someone whose identity he has forgotten, he says, 
 apologetically : “You have the advantage of me.” 
 
 A most important event in the life of a young Ulsterman is naturally 
 his marriage. If he is shy, or does not know the relatives cf his 
 young lady, he may ask a friend to accompany him, and this person 
 is called a “blackfoot” (a sort of matchmaker, the male repiesertation 
 of the modern female “gooseberry.” The word nas been made clas- 
 sical by its use in Scott’s “The Fortunes of Nigel”). Sometimes, 
 after the young people are engaged, or “bespoke,” there may un- 
 fortunately be a fall-out : then there is said to be a “kick-up” between 
 them, and sometimes the quarrel cannot be “patched up,” because 
 one of the parties has taken a dislike to the other ; if this is the case, 
 it may be said : “ she took a lasting scunner against him,” or he was 
 “clean scunnered of her.” If, however, all goes well and a marriage 
 takes place, the girl is “married on” so and so ; and she is often de- 
 scribed as “Jane Brown, by her mother’s name, but she is married on 
 William M‘Cullough.” The first Sunday after marriage the young 
 people go to their own place of worship ; it is said they “made their 
 appearance,” and in former years they were accustomed to go “linked” 
 (arm in arm). On this most trying occasion the bride’s appearance is 
 very freely discussed. Some will report “she is quare and ould,” or, 
 
6 4 
 
 Ulsterisms. 
 
 in reference to her age “she would get no change out of a. forty-shilling 
 note,” or she is “weezened” (dried up appearance), or “cruel ornery- 
 looking” (very ordinary). (In Ulster this really means ugly.) I once 
 heard of a person who appeared under such circumstances, and who 
 had a long, badly -carried neck, who was described in this graphic 
 way : “ She had a neck on her as long as a goose’s thrapple” (wind- 
 pipe). If the bride turns out a success, the husband is congratulated 
 on having met with a good “fitter” ; if she is frugal, she is styled a 
 “gatherer” ; and if, as a result, an air of prosperity appears about 
 their home, the people say there is a great “roughness” (plenty) about 
 the house, or they have a “full place both in and out” (plenty inside, 
 and a farm well stocked), and if they become rich, the people say they 
 are “full o’ gold.” But, unfortunately, the wife may turn out to be 
 a bad manager and the husband a failure, the house then gets a 
 “through-other” appearance, and if, by and by, they are unable to 
 “make ends meet,” they become “stone-broke” (this is like the word 
 “bed-rock,” used by American Stockbrokers). In the end they may be 
 “canted” out of their home. (This word “cant” is most interesting; 
 it appears in old Spanish (encante), old French (encant), and Italian 
 (incanto). Some authorities say it is derived from Latin words “in 
 quantum” — to how much will you bid ? — while others believe it is from 
 incantare (from cantare), to “proclaim.” It is met as early as the end 
 of the twelfth century, and is used specially in Ireland. The Scotch 
 equivalent is “roup.” Swift is very fond of this fine, old word ; he 
 speaks of “two< monks,” in the time of William Rufus, “outvying each 
 other in canting the price of an abbey.” I have heard the word “cant” 
 (for auction) used all over Ulster, and a famous Auctioneer, Murphy 
 by name, who lived in Rathfriland many years ago, was called a 
 “cant-master.” Speaking of a “cant” reminds me of another expressive 
 Ulster word — “sweetner” — applied to a person — generally a friend or 
 neighbour of the man whose articles are being canted — who gives 
 an occasional bid to keep up the prices. Of course such a practice is 
 contrary to law, but it is often “winked at.” 
 
 An Ulsterman uses most appropriate words to describe the weather. 
 When it alters to bad weather he says it is “broke.” A still summer 
 day, without any wind, is termed “quate” (quiet) ; a dry, cold day, with 
 an east wind blowing, which tends to “skin” the face, is “hasky” 
 (variant of harsh) ; a day with a mizzling rain is “drauky.” It was 
 near Groomsport I first heard the word “gurly” applied by a Bangor 
 carman to a stormy day. It is an altered form of “growly.” It is an 
 old word, and is used in “The Daemon Lover” (Child’s Ballads), 
 as follows : 
 
Ulsterisms. 
 
 65 
 
 ‘ The clouds grew dark, and the wind grew loud, 
 
 And the levin fill’d her ee ; 
 
 And waesome wail’d the snaw-white sprites 
 Upon the gurlie sea.” 
 
 The word “gurly” is also frequently applied to a growling dog. 
 On one occasion, I remember, when passing a house, a cross dog 
 ran growling after me, whereupon a man, who was leaning over 
 the “half-door,” said, with the most perfect Ulster naivete: “Don’t 
 be unaisy, sir ; he’s a bit gurly, but he wouldn’t bite unless he deemed 
 (thought) you were mebbe (may be) a beggar.” The word finally came 
 to be used of people, as “Don’t look gurly ” (cross). 
 
 Everyone knows what a “saft day” is, but far more expressive 
 terms are in use to describe the degrees of severity in the amount of 
 rain falling. If it is very wet, and you ask an Ulster carman is it 
 still raining, he will likely reply : “It’s not waiting to rain ; it’s just 
 teeming,” or he may inform you that it is a most “lamentable teem.” 
 When there is a heavy fall of snow there is said to be a “white world.” 
 
 In some of the previous articles the writers referred to terms used 
 in Ulster descriptive of drunkenness. I once heard a person, who 
 was brought into the hospital in a hopeless state of inebriety, described 
 by a policeman as being “blind drunk and paralytic” ; and a Southern 
 judge told me he was greatly puzzled on his first circuit in the North 
 of Ireland by a witness saying, in reference to the plaintiff in a case, 
 that he had seen him “ oxter-cogged ” from Omagh market. What 
 was meant was that two friends supported (cogged) him, each with 
 an arm under his “oxter.” Had the judge been a student of Burns 
 he would have been able to understand the expressive Ulster phrase 
 “oxter-cogged,” for, in “Meg o’ the Mill,” 
 
 “ The priest, he was oxter’d ; the clerk, he was carried ; 
 
 And that’s how Meg o’ the Mill was married.” 
 
 The greatest difficulty is often met in Ulster Courts in getting 
 witnesses to admit that either they or others were drunk. An Ulster- 
 man on one occasion, after a great deal of cross-examination, could 
 never be forced to say anything about a friend’s condition beyond the 
 fact that he had never seen him “absolutely drunk,” whereupon vhe 
 witty Judge O’Brien, who presided, said : “ Did you ever see him 
 relatively sober?” 
 
 The greatest compliment you can pay an Ulsterman is to say he 
 is “downright dacent” (decent) ; and if he entertains his friends well, 
 they will report that he “ done the thing dacent.” I have heard 
 the word decent used in an odd sense at a funeral in the country. A 
 
66 
 
 Ulsterisms. 
 
 man said to the brother of the deceased : “If your brother could only 
 sit up in his coffin and see the dacent funeral he is having he would 
 be powerful pleased.” If an Ulsterman is not quite sure of a person 
 he puts it this way : “ I am jubous (dubious) of him” ; and ; .f he gives 
 him a “nip,” or “does” him in the sale of a horse, he says : “that boy’s 
 worth a- watching.” A neighbour may, however, retort : “You got 
 your desarvins (what you deserve) for being so saft” (simple). 
 
 Many words in Ulster, spelled alike, are used with totally dif- 
 ferent meanings. I have said a good-looking, tall man is styled 
 “clever,” but when the same term is applied to a clergyman it means 
 that he is a good preacher. The “heel” of the hand is that part cf 
 the palm which becomes more prominent when the fingers are extended 
 back towards the wrist ; the “heel” of a loaf is the lowest part of the 
 crust ; the “heel” of the evening is the after-part ; and to “heel” up a 
 cart means to tilt it on its end. (The word in this sense is an old 
 one, and was used originally of a ship, and so Cowper writes : 
 
 “ Eight hundred of the brave, 
 
 Whose courage well was tried, 
 
 Had made the vessel heel, 
 
 And laid her on her side.”) 
 
 An Ulster lad when at school gets his “tasks” (a more expressive 
 word than lessons). Formerly he was punished v ith the “tawse,” 
 or “ratan” (a form of cane from Malay ) ; and he disliked very much 
 when the master of the school called him up to his desk for a “pandy” 
 (this word is of singular origin. It would appear the hedge-school- 
 master was often fond of airing his Latin, so when he was about to 
 punish a lad he said ; “Pande palmam” — “hold out your hand” — and, 
 finally, the phrase was shortened to> pande-pandy). 
 
 A favourite source of amusement to an Ulster lad is a “cogglety- 
 curry,” or “ shuggy-shoo,” made by placing a plank across a barrel or 
 log of a tree. When nicely balanced with boys of equal weight at 
 each end it gives, by its up and down movements, a pleasurable 
 exercise. A third boy sometimes stands in the centre of the plank 
 and is called the “candlestick.” I have heard no derivation of these 
 words, except that they axe examples of onomatopoeia. I intended 
 to have added some Ulster proverbs, and to have said something to 
 illustrate the humour of the Northern Province, which, while it resem- 
 bles the Scotch in being dry and caustic, has also a Hibernian sparkle 
 all its own ; but I have already occupied too much of your, valuable 
 space. In conclusion, let me, in true Ulster fashion, wish “good 
 fordher” (forwarder) to all those who are engaged in the interesting 
 study of the language of our Northern Province. 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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