190 STRAY-AWAYS 



hearing a beggar woman, addressing a young soldier, 

 has improvised this one : " My welcome home to ye in 

 grandeur and in splendour ! Here's my dirty hand 

 to ye, my lovely Captain ! That no angry ball may 

 ever catch ye I " In the same category of benedic- 

 tion may be recorded a Meath blessing that has escaped 

 Dr. Joyce's net : " May you live so long that a spider 

 would draw you to the grave." And again, as a 

 coffin was entering a churchyard, a kneeling woman, 

 shrouded in the long, dark cloak of Southern Munster, 

 cried : " That your journey may thrive with ye ! " 



Which brings us to a point noticeable in a collection 

 so comprehensive and so sympathetic as Dr. Joyce's. 

 The poetic phrase, that in Ireland " blooms and withers 

 on the hill like any hill flower," and in a like profusion, 

 is but sparsely represented in his book. A few, 

 indeed, there are, and their quality is of the best : 

 " You'd lead him there with a halter of snow " — ^this 

 of a person secretly very willing to go to a place, as a 

 lover to the house of the girl's parents ; " The breath 

 is only just in and out of him, and the grass doesn't 

 know of him walking over it." Of an unlucky man 

 it is said : " He is always in the field when luck is on 

 the road " — sl picture drawn from the life of a people 

 whose days are spent under the sky in the open 

 country. " The road flew under him," is yet another, 

 and, save these, we have discovered none that appeal 

 to the sense of beauty. 



One other trifling charge must be made. Into this 

 collection there have crept many expressions neither 

 native to Ireland nor specially interesting. It will 

 certainly be news to most people that " Out of sight, 

 out of mind," " Adam's ale," " Down in the mouth," 

 "The other day," "A chip of the old block," "As 

 many lives as a cat," and others of similar familiarity, 

 are phrases that " belong to Ireland, though possibly 



