English As We Speak It in Ireland Part 51

Snaggle-tooth; a person with some teeth gone so as to leave gaps.

Snap-apple; a play with apples on Hallow-eve, where big apples are placed in difficult positions and are to be caught by the teeth of the persons playing. Hence Hallow-Eve is often called 'Snap-apple night.'

Snauvaun; to move about slowly and lazily. From Irish _snamh_ [snauv], to swim, with the diminutive:--Moving slowly like a person swimming.

Sned; to clip off, to cut away, like the leaves and roots of a turnip.

Sned also means the handle of a scythe.

Snig; to cut or clip with a knife:--'The shoots of that apple-tree are growing out too long: I must snig off the tops of them.'

Snish; neatness in clothes. (Morris: Carlow.)

Sn.o.boge; a rosin torch. (Moran: Carlow.) Same as _s.l.u.t_ and _paudheoge_.

Snoke; to scent or snuff about like a dog. (Derry.)

So. This has some special dialectical senses among us. It is used for _if_:--'I will pay you well _so_ you do the work to my liking.' This is old English:--'I am content _so_ thou wilt have it so.' {330} ('Rom.

and Jul.') It is used as a sort of emphatic expletive carrying accent or emphasis:--'Will you keep that farm?' 'I will _so_,' i.e. 'I will for certain.' 'Take care and don't break them' (the dishes): 'I won't _so_.' ('Collegians.') It is used in the sense of 'in that case':--'I am not going to town to-day'; 'Oh well I will not go, _so_'--i.e. 'as you are not going.'

Sock; the tubular or half-tubular part of a spade or shovel that holds the handle. Irish _soc_.

Soft day; a wet day. (A usual salute.)

Soil; fresh-cut gra.s.s for cattle.

Sold; betrayed, outwitted:--'If that doesn't frighten him off you're sold' (caught in the trap, betrayed, ruined. Edw. Walsh in Ir. Pen.

Journal).

Something like; excellent:--'That's something like a horse,' i.e. a fine horse and no mistake.

Sonaghan; a kind of trout that appears in certain lakes in November, coming from the rivers. (Prof. J. Cooke, M.A., of Dublin: for Ulster):--Irish _samhain_ [sowan], November: _samhnachan_ with the diminutive _an_ or _chan_, 'November-fellow.'

Sonoohar; a good wife, a good partner in marriage; a good marriage: generally used in the form of a wish:--'Thankee sir and sonoohar to you.' Irish _sonuachar_, same sound and meaning.

Sonsy; fortunate, prosperous. Also well-looking and healthy:--'A fine _sonsy_ girl.' Irish _sonas_, luck; _sonasach_, _sonasaigh_, same sound and meaning.

Soogan, sugan, sugaun; a straw or hay rope twisted by the hand.

Soss; a short trifling fall with no harm beyond a smart shock. (Moran: Carlow.) {331}

Sough; a whistling or sighing noise like that of the wind through trees. 'Keep a calm sough' means keep quiet, keep silence. (Ulster.)

Soulth; 'a formless luminous apparition.' (W. B. Yeats.) Irish _samhailt_ [soulth], a ghost, an apparition; _lit._ a 'likeness,' from _samhai_ [sowel], like.

Sources of Anglo-Irish Dialect, 1.

Sowans, sowens; a sort of flummery or gruel usually made and eaten on Hallow Eve. Very general in Ulster and Scotland; merely the Irish word _samhain_, the first of November; for Hallow Eve is really a November feast, as being the eve of the first of that month. In old times in Ireland, the evening went with the coming night.

Spalpeen. Spalpeens were labouring men--reapers, mowers, potato-diggers, &c.--who travelled about in the autumn seeking employment from the farmers, each with his spade, or his scythe, or his reaping-hook. They congregated in the towns on market and fair days, where the farmers of the surrounding districts came to hire them. Each farmer brought home his own men, fed them on good potatoes and milk, and sent them to sleep in the barn on dry straw--a bed--as one of them said to me--'a bed fit for a lord, let alone a spalpeen.' The word _spalpeen_ is now used in the sense of a low rascal. Irish _spailpin_, same sound and meaning. (See my 'Old Irish Folk Music and Songs,' p.

216; and for the Ulster term see Rabble above.)

Spaug; a big clumsy foot:--'You put your ugly spaug down on my handkerchief.' Irish _spag_, same sound and sense. {332}

Speel; to climb. (Patterson: Ulster.)

Spink; a sharp rock, a precipice. (Tyrone.) _Splink_ in Donegal. Irish _spinnc_ and _splinnc_, same sounds and meaning.

Spit; the soil dug up and turned over, forming a long trench as deep as the spade will go. 'He dug down three spits before he came to the gravel.'

Spoileen; a coa.r.s.e kind of soap made out of sc.r.a.ps of inferior grease and meat: often sold cheap at fairs and markets. (Derry and Tyrone.) Irish _spoilin_, a small bit of meat.

Spoocher; a sort of large wooden shovel chiefly used for lifting small fish out of a boat. (Ulster.)

Spreece; red-hot embers, chiefly ashes. (South.) Irish _spris_, same sound and meaning. Same as _greesagh_.

Sprissaun; an insignificant contemptible little chap. Irish _spriosan_ [same sound], the original meaning of which is a twig or spray from a bush. (South.)

'To the devil I pitch ye ye set of sprissauns.'

(Old Folk Song, for which see my 'Ancient Irish Music,' p. 85.)

Sp.r.o.ng: a four-p.r.o.nged manure fork. (MacCall: South-east counties.)

Spruggil, spruggilla; the craw of a fowl. (Morris: South Monaghan.) Irish _sprogal_ [spruggal], with that meaning and several others.

Sprunge [sprunj], any animal miserable and small for its age. (Ulster.)

Spuds; potatoes.

s.p.u.n.k; tinder, now usually made by steeping {333} brown paper in a solution of nitre; lately gone out of use from the prevalence of matches. Often applied in Ulster and Scotland to a spark of fire: 'See is there a s.p.u.n.k of fire in the hearth.' s.p.u.n.k also denotes spirit, courage, and dash. 'Hasn't d.i.c.k great s.p.u.n.k to face that big fellow, twice his size?'

'I'm sure if you had not been drunk With whiskey, rum, or brandy--O, You would not have the gallant s.p.u.n.k To be half so bold or manly--O.'

(Old Irish Folk Song.)

Irish _sponnc_.

Spy farleys; to pry into secrets: to visit a house, in order to spy about what's going on. (Ulster.)

Spy-Wednesday; the Wednesday before Easter. According to the religious legend it got the name because on the Wednesday before the Crucifixion Judas was spying about how best he could deliver up our Lord.

(General.)

Squireen; an Irish gentleman in a small way who apes the manners, the authoritative tone, and the aristocratic bearing of the large landed proprietors. Sometimes you can hardly distinguish a squireen from a _half-sir_ or from a _shoneen_. Sometimes the squireen was the son of the old squire: a worthless young fellow, who loafed about doing nothing, instead of earning an honest livelihood: but he was too grand for that. The word is a diminutive of _squire_, applied here in contempt, like many other diminutives. The cla.s.s of squireen is nearly extinct: 'Joy be with them.'

Stackan; the stump of a tree remaining after the {334} tree itself has been cut or blown down. (Simmons: Armagh.) Irish _staic_, a stake, with the diminutive.

Stad; the same as _sthallk_, which see.