When a mistake or any circumstance that entails loss or trouble is irreparable—'there's no help for spilt milk.'
Seventy or eighty years ago the accomplishments of an Irishman should be:
To smoke his dudheen,
To drink his cruiskeen,
To flourish his alpeen,
To wallop a spalpeen.
(MacCall: Wexford.)
It is reported about that Tom Fox stole Dick Finn's sheep: but he didn't. Driven to desperation by the false report, Tom now really steals one, and says:—'As I have the name of it, I may as well have the gain of it.'
A person is told of some extraordinary occurrence and exclaims—'Well such a thing as that was never before heard of since Adam was a boy.' This last expression is very general.
The Chairman of the Banbridge Board of Guardians