One night a poet was grossly insulted: 'On the morrow he rose and he was not thankful.' (From the very old Irish tale called 'The Second Battle of Moytura': Rev. Celt.)
Another old Irish writer, telling us that a certain company of soldiers is well out of view, expresses it in this way:--_Ní fhuil in cuire gan chleith_, literally, 'the company is not without concealment.'
How closely these and other old models are imitated in our English will be seen from the following examples from every part of Ireland:--
'I can tell you Paddy Walsh is no chicken now,' meaning he is very old. The same would be said of an old maid:--'She's no chicken,' meaning that she is old for a girl.
'How are your potato gardens going on this year?' 'Why then they're not too good'; i.e. only middling or bad.
A usual remark among us conveying mild approval { 18} is 'that's not bad.' A Dublin boy asked me one day:--'Maybe you wouldn't have e'er a penny that you'd give me, sir?' i.e., 'Have you a penny to give me?' 'You wouldn't like to have a cup of tea, would you?' An invitation, but not a cordial one. This is a case of '_will you_ was never a good fellow' (for which see Vocabulary).
'No joke' is often used in the sense of 'very serious.' 'It was no joke to be caught in our boat in such a storm as that.' 'The loss of £10 is no joke for that poor widow.'
'As for Sandy he worked like a downright demolisher-- Bare as he is, yet _his lick is no polisher_.'
(THOMAS MOORE in the early part of his career.)
You remark that a certain person has some fault, he is miserly, or extravagant, or dishonest, &c.: and a bystander replies, 'Yes indeed, and 'tisn't to-day or yesterday it happened him'--meaning that it is a fault of long standing.
A tyrannical or unpopular person goes away or dies:--'There's many a dry eye after him.' (Kildare.)
'Did Tom do your work as satisfactorily as Davy?' 'Oh, it isn't alike': to imply that Tom did the work very much better than Davy.
'Here is the newspaper; and 'tisn't much you'll find in it.'
'Is Mr. O'Mahony good to his people?' 'Oh, indeed he is no great things': or another way of saying it:--'He's no great shakes.' 'How do you like your new horse?' 'Oh then he's no great shakes'--or 'he's { 19} not much to boast of.' Lever has this in a song:--'You think the Blakes are no great shakes.' But I think it is also used in England.