I explained.
He smiled and said:
"Jazus, bhoy, that reminds me ov Anna, she cud say more funny things than aany wan I iver know'd."
"And that reminds me," I said, "that the word you have just misused she always pronounced with a caress!"
"Aye, I know rightly, but ye know I mane no harm, don't ye?"
"I know, but you remember when she used that word every letter in it was dressed in its best Sunday clothes, wasn't it?"
"Och, aye, an' I'd thravel twinty miles jist t' hear aany wan say it like Anna!"
"Well, I have traveled tens of thousands of miles and I have heard the greatest preachers of the age, but I never heard any one pronounce it so beautifully!"
"But as I was a-sayin' bhoy, I haaven't had a rale good laugh since she died; haave I, Mary?"
"I haaven't naither," Mary said.