“There is a feeling among the people who speak Irish that the language is something priceless, like a precious stone kept in the pocket. You don’t speak Irish; you have your Irish. It’s wonderfully exact. There is a word for the roof of a dog’s mouth (carball) and the steam rising from a fermented haystack (bladhmann). Muirleadh is the act of chewing up small crabs and spitting them into the sea for bait. Gabhpán is a double handful, and súitú the clacking of pebbles moved by lapping seawater.”