Patriotic, and therefore seeing no reason not to applaud an Anglo-Irish Lord if he was good enough to behave respectfully towards a representative of his country, as in this case. Nothing ironic about it. Whatever the disagreements about the link with England and so forth, noone in Ireland in those days would have thought for a moment that they weren't all Irish.

Colm O Lochlann's version has "Snuff that up your nostrils", which is what you'd do with snuff. That makes it two bits of wordplay in the line, if you are thinking "Stuff that up your arsehole" - but I'd never noticed that before.

As for the tune, he prints the tune which is the one I've heard most often, and would use myself; and in the notes he says it was sung both to The game played in Erin-go-bragh, and to Villikens and his Dinah. (Which is pretty well the same as Sweet Betsy.)

But does anyone know the truth about that five thousand to one bet?