Note: This week’s proverb is testimony to the indisputable fact that the Irish are mad for tea. Citizens of the Irish Republic drink more tea than anyone else in the world. Every man, women, and child drinks about six cups of tea a day on average, consuming about 3.2 kilograms (7 pounds) per year. That is over 20% more tea consumed than the average British tea drinker. Moreover, Irish tea consumption is currently increasing while British tea consumption is declining. America, which revolted against England because of the British tax on tea, drinks eight times less per capita than the Irish.
Annual Per Capita Consumption of Tea In Kilograms
Country
1987-89
1988-90
1989-91
1990-92
1991-93
1993-95
average
Ireland
3.00
3.09
3.14
3.00
3.17
3.21
3.10
United Kingdom
2.81
2.74
2.65
2.56
2.62
2.53
2.65
Turkey
2.64
2.33
2.08
2.25
2.15
2.08
2.26
Kuwait
2.12
1.73
1.18
0.99
1.79
2.52
1.72
Iran
–
1.62
1.63
1.83
1.74
1.46
1.66
Iraq
2.54
2.23
1.24
0.53
–
–
1.64
New Zealand
1.59
1.58
1.54
1.51
1.38
1.23
1.47
Syria
1.15
1.36
1.36
1.36
1.66
1.55
1.41
Egypt
1.32
1.39
1.32
1.40
1.25
1.04
1.29
Saudi Arabia
1.17
1.14
1.16
1.24
1.00
0.82
1.09
Australia
1.12
1.07
1.01
0.96
0.96
0.96
1.01
Japan
0.97
0.97
0.99
1.02
1.04
1.03
1.00
Pakistan
0.93
0.95
0.99
0.97
0.99
0.95
0.96
Russia
0.97
1.10
1.15
0.90
0.73
0.63
0.91
Chile
0.86
0.85
0.87
0.88
0.89
0.97
0.89
Poland
0.87
0.78
0.64
0.58
0.69
0.87
0.74
Netherland
0.65
0.66
0.67
0.66
0.63
0.58
0.64
Canada
0.55
0.53
0.51
0.49
0.49
0.48
0.51
U.S.A.
0.34
0.34
0.33
0.33
0.34
0.35
0.34
Germany
0.24
0.23
0.24
0.20
0.22
0.21
0.22
France
0.18
0.19
0.19
0.20
0.21
0.22
0.20
Italy
0.06
0.07
0.08
0.08
0.09
0.09
0.08
International Tea Committee, Ltd., Annual Bulletin of Statistics; Tea Brokers’ Publications, London (1995)
The Irish lust for tea comes from the British. Originally, all tea came to Ireland from the East India Company, a British trading company established under Queen Elizabeth I in 1600. In 1835, Charles Bewley broke that monopoly when he landed a ship in Dublin with over 2000 chests of tea from Canton. While the monopoly was broken, the Irish continued to buy tea exclusively from British concerns until World War II. In response to the British rationing of tea, the Irish government formed a private company, Tea Importers (Éire) to satisfy their thirst. The Irish Tea Act of 1958 granted this firm a monopoly franchise, not unlike the East India Company. This franchise had to be abolished in 1973 so that Ireland could enter the European Economic Community.
Note: With apologies to our vegetarian friends, cows are among those few animals who provide us nourishment both when alive (milk) and when departed (a nice juicy steak). Some things in life are unfailingly good, no matter what the circumstances.
Note also: The pronunciation of the words “bó” and “beo” are different. The only phonetic difference between the two pronunciations is that “bó” is pronounced with a broad “b,” while “beo” is pronounced with a slender “b.” If you listen closely to the speaker, you should hear a short i-sound, like the “i” in the English word “hit,” after the “b” of “beo” that is not spoken after the “b” in “bó.” This short, slight, trailing i-sound is characteristic of slender consonants. Slender consonants are indicated when either the vowel “i” or “e” appears next to a consonant.
Fearthain don lao agus grian don tsearrach; uisce don gé agus déirc don bhacach
Rain to the calf and sun to the foal; water to the goose and alms to the beggar(man).
Note: Every one of God’s creatures has its needs. Although their requirements may differ, it is fitting that the needs of each be fulfilled. On another level, this seanfhocal is a reminder that no one is self-sufficient; and we all lack something to make us whole. It is up to the human community to satisfy the needs of its members.
Note: Spinoza was almost as eloquent as this week’s seanfhocal when he wrote,
Surely human affairs would be far happier if the power in men to be silent were the same as that to speak. But experience more than teaches that men govern nothing with more difficulty than their tongues.
Ethics, pt. III, proposition 2, note.
Silence may be golden, metaphorically, but this seanfhocal alludes to the more tangible rewards of being quiet.
Note also: This week’s seanfhocal strays a bit from the Caighdeán Oifigiúil (the official standard) Irish grammar. According to the official standard, the direct relative clause of the sentence would be “a itheann an mhin” (that [he] eats the meal). However, a special form is widely used in the present and future tenses which appends a broad ‘s’ to the verb. So in this case, the direct relative clause becomes “a itheas an mhin.” The penultimate letter, or the last vowel, ‘a’ in ‘itheas’ is simply an indicator vowel that tells the reader this is a broad ‘s.’ We strayed here because this special form is very often found in conversation, literature, prayers, and in seanfhocail.
Note: St. Bernard of Clairvaux coined an English proverb similar to this week’s seanfhocal, “Love me, love my dog.” (The Saint Bernard dog was named after another Saint Bernard.) This Irish proverb has the same roots as the story of Cú Chulainn.
Sédanda was the son of the God Lugh, nephew of Conor mac Nessa, King of Ulster. One day Conor rode by while the boy, Sédanda, was playing with a bat and a ball. He asked the King where he was going. The King told him he was going to a feast held by the chief smith, Cullan, and invited the boy to join him. Sédanda said he would follow him later after he finished playing ball.
Conor and the other guests were feasting by the fire when Cullan asked the King if there were any other guests coming. Forgetting about Sédanda, the King said no. To this Cullan explained that it was his custom to unleash his hound at night to protect his property from thieves and robbers. It was a brave hound and a fierce fighter. Cullan feared no man when the hound was out. The King gave him permission to release his hound.
Sédanda arrived before the feast to be confronted by the savage hound. The hound lunged at Sédanda but the boy drove the ball with his stick into the skull of the dog, instantly killing the creature.
Upon arriving at the sight of his dead hound, the smith wept in grief and fear. He argued to the King that the boy’s family must pay a blood fine for such an egregiously inhospitable act. Who would now protect him, his clan, and his property?
The boy agreed to find a pup of a breed superior to the one he had killed and raise it into an even more fearsome defender of the smith’s home. Until the pup was old enough to do this, however, Sédanda said that he himself would replace the hound. He would become the Hound of Cullan, or Cú Chulainn in Irish.
Note: It is no wonder that this proverb can be heard all across Ireland in one form or another. This variant is from Connacht. In Ulster, you might hear the more alliterative, “Bíonn adharca móra ar bha i bhad ó bhaile.” Whereas, in Munster, one is more likely to hear an older form, “”Bíonn adharca móra ar na buaibh tharr lear,” which retains a dative form not used commonly today. In that ancient agrarian society cows were a form of currency, a measure of one’s wealth. A poor tentant farmer with no cows would, therefore, find the lure of emmigration compelling.
However, this proverb uses the present habitual form of the verb to be, ‘bíonn,’ as an ironic warning that it may not be so. This syntax is used to convey the sense that something is usually the case. We took a little poetic liberty and inserted the word ‘always’ to emphasize this subtle meaning. It is the same meaning as the American proverb, “The grass is always greener in the other fellow’s yard.”
Note also: This seanfhocal is not necessarily a paean to Texas longhorns either. Both the Ulster and the Munster versions use the nominative plural form of the adjective ‘mór’ to describe the horns. It means big. Big horns mean big cows. ‘Long horns’ is just another metaphor for big cows. While the Irish did emmigrate to Texas, others emmigrated to Africa, especially South Africa, and still others to Australia. All these Irish emmigrants would have written home about long horned cattle.
