We are inclined to magnify distant or only half known things: 'Cows far off have long horns.'
'He'll make Dungarvan shake': meaning he will do great things, cut a great figure. Now generally said in ridicule. (Munster.)
A man is told something extraordinary:—'That takes the coal off my pipe'; i.e. it surpasses all I have seen or heard.
A man fails to obtain something he was looking after—a house or a farm to rent—a cow to buy—a girl he wished to marry, &c.—and consoles himself by reflecting or saying:—'There's as good fish in the say as ever was caught.'
Well, you were at the dance yesterday—who were there? Oh 'all the world and Garrett Reilly' were there. (Wicklow and Waterford.)
When a fellow puts on empty airs of great consequence, you say to him, 'Why you're as grand as Mat Flanagan with the cat': always said contemptuously. Mat Flanagan went to London one time. After two years he came home on a visit; but he was
now transformed into such a mass of grandeur that he did not recognise any of the old surroundings. He didn't know what the old cat was. 'Hallo, mother,' said he with a lofty air and a killing Cockney accent, 'What's yon long-tailed fellow in yon cawner?'
A person reproaching another for something wrong says:—'The back of my hand to you,' as much as to say 'I refuse to shake hands with you.'
To a person hesitating to enter on a doubtful enterprise which looks fairly hopeful, another says:—Go on Jack, try your fortune: 'faint heart never won fair lady.'
A person who is about to make a third and determined attempt at anything exclaims (in assonantal rhyme):—