ago, and it has been properly dwelt upon by Miss Hayden and Professor Hartog in their recently written joint paper mentioned in the Preface. Most of these idiomatic phrases are simply translations from Irish; and when the translations are literal, Englishmen often find it hard or impossible to understand them. For a phrase may be correct in Irish, but incorrect, or even unintelligible, in English when translated word for word. Gerald Griffin has preserved more of these idioms (in 'The Collegians,' 'The Coiner,' 'Tales of a Jury-room,' &c.) than any other writer; and very near him come Charles Kickham (in 'Knocknagow'), Crofton Croker (in 'Fairy Legends') and Edward Walsh. These four writers almost exhaust the dialect of the South of Ireland.
On the other hand Carleton gives us the Northern dialect very fully, especially that of Tyrone and eastern Ulster; but he has very little idiom, the peculiarities he has preserved being chiefly in vocabulary and pronunciation.
Mr. Seumas MacManus has in his books faithfully pictured the dialect of Donegal (of which he is a native) and of all north-west Ulster.
In the importation of Irish idiom into English, Irish writers of the present day are also making their influence felt, for I often come across a startling Irish expression (in English words of course) in some English magazine article, obviously written by one of my fellow-countrymen. Here I ought to remark that they do this with discretion and common sense, for they always make sure that the Irish idiom they use is such as that any Englishman can understand it.
