Page:English as we speak it in Ireland - Joyce.djvu/292

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jarvey who got sixpence for a long drive, said in a rage:—'I'm in luck to-day; but if I am, 'tis blazing bad luck.' 'Bill ran into the house, and if he did, the other man seized him round the waist and threw him on his back.'

If that. This is old English, but has quite disappeared from the standard language of the present day, though still not unfrequently heard in Ireland:—'If that you go I'll go with you.'
'If from Sally that I get free,
My dear I love you most tenderlie.'
(Irish Folk Song—'Handsome Sally.')
'And if that you wish to go further
Sure God He made Peter His own,
The keys of His treasures He gave him,
To govern the old Church of Rome.'
(Old Irish Folk Song.)
Inagh´ or in-yah´ [both strongly accented on second syll.]; a satirical expression of dissent or disbelief, like the English forsooth, but much stronger. A fellow boasting says:—'I could run ten miles in an hour': and another replies, 'You could inah': meaning 'Of course I don't believe a word of it.' A man coming back from the other world says to a woman:—'I seen your [dead] husband there too, ma'am;' to which she replies:—'My husband inah.' (Gerald Griffin: 'Collegians.') Irish an eadh, same sound and meaning.
Inch; a long strip of level grassy land along a river. Very general. Irish inis [innish], of the same family as Lat. insula: but inis is older than insula which is a diminutive and consequently a derived form. 'James, go out and drive the cows down to the inch.'
Insense´; to make a person understand;—'I can't