| ULYSSES |
| |
| by James Joyce |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| -- I -- |
| |
| Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of |
| lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed. A yellow dressinggown, |
| ungirdled, was sustained gently behind him on the mild morning air. He |
| held the bowl aloft and intoned: |
| |
| --_Introibo ad altare Dei_. |
| |
| Halted, he peered down the dark winding stairs and called out coarsely: |
| |
| --Come up, Kinch! Come up, you fearful jesuit! |
| |
| Solemnly he came forward and mounted the round gunrest. He faced about |
| and blessed gravely thrice the tower, the surrounding land and the |
| awaking mountains. Then, catching sight of Stephen Dedalus, he bent |
| towards him and made rapid crosses in the air, gurgling in his throat |
| and shaking his head. Stephen Dedalus, displeased and sleepy, leaned |
| his arms on the top of the staircase and looked coldly at the shaking |
| gurgling face that blessed him, equine in its length, and at the light |
| untonsured hair, grained and hued like pale oak. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan peeped an instant under the mirror and then covered the |
| bowl smartly. |
| |
| --Back to barracks! he said sternly. |
| |
| He added in a preacher's tone: |
| |
| --For this, O dearly beloved, is the genuine Christine: body and soul |
| and blood and ouns. Slow music, please. Shut your eyes, gents. One |
| moment. A little trouble about those white corpuscles. Silence, all. |
| |
| He peered sideways up and gave a long slow whistle of call, then paused |
| awhile in rapt attention, his even white teeth glistening here and there |
| with gold points. Chrysostomos. Two strong shrill whistles answered |
| through the calm. |
| |
| --Thanks, old chap, he cried briskly. That will do nicely. Switch off |
| the current, will you? |
| |
| He skipped off the gunrest and looked gravely at his watcher, gathering |
| about his legs the loose folds of his gown. The plump shadowed face and |
| sullen oval jowl recalled a prelate, patron of arts in the middle ages. |
| A pleasant smile broke quietly over his lips. |
| |
| --The mockery of it! he said gaily. Your absurd name, an ancient Greek! |
| |
| He pointed his finger in friendly jest and went over to the parapet, |
| laughing to himself. Stephen Dedalus stepped up, followed him wearily |
| halfway and sat down on the edge of the gunrest, watching him still as |
| he propped his mirror on the parapet, dipped the brush in the bowl and |
| lathered cheeks and neck. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan's gay voice went on. |
| |
| --My name is absurd too: Malachi Mulligan, two dactyls. But it has a |
| Hellenic ring, hasn't it? Tripping and sunny like the buck himself. |
| We must go to Athens. Will you come if I can get the aunt to fork out |
| twenty quid? |
| |
| He laid the brush aside and, laughing with delight, cried: |
| |
| --Will he come? The jejune jesuit! |
| |
| Ceasing, he began to shave with care. |
| |
| --Tell me, Mulligan, Stephen said quietly. |
| |
| --Yes, my love? |
| |
| --How long is Haines going to stay in this tower? |
| |
| Buck Mulligan showed a shaven cheek over his right shoulder. |
| |
| --God, isn't he dreadful? he said frankly. A ponderous Saxon. He thinks |
| you're not a gentleman. God, these bloody English! Bursting with money |
| and indigestion. Because he comes from Oxford. You know, Dedalus, you |
| have the real Oxford manner. He can't make you out. O, my name for you |
| is the best: Kinch, the knife-blade. |
| |
| He shaved warily over his chin. |
| |
| --He was raving all night about a black panther, Stephen said. Where is |
| his guncase? |
| |
| --A woful lunatic! Mulligan said. Were you in a funk? |
| |
| --I was, Stephen said with energy and growing fear. Out here in the dark |
| with a man I don't know raving and moaning to himself about shooting a |
| black panther. You saved men from drowning. I'm not a hero, however. If |
| he stays on here I am off. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan frowned at the lather on his razorblade. He hopped down |
| from his perch and began to search his trouser pockets hastily. |
| |
| --Scutter! he cried thickly. |
| |
| He came over to the gunrest and, thrusting a hand into Stephen's upper |
| pocket, said: |
| |
| --Lend us a loan of your noserag to wipe my razor. |
| |
| Stephen suffered him to pull out and hold up on show by its corner a |
| dirty crumpled handkerchief. Buck Mulligan wiped the razorblade neatly. |
| Then, gazing over the handkerchief, he said: |
| |
| --The bard's noserag! A new art colour for our Irish poets: snotgreen. |
| You can almost taste it, can't you? |
| |
| He mounted to the parapet again and gazed out over Dublin bay, his fair |
| oakpale hair stirring slightly. |
| |
| --God! he said quietly. Isn't the sea what Algy calls it: a grey |
| sweet mother? The snotgreen sea. The scrotumtightening sea. _Epi oinopa |
| ponton_. Ah, Dedalus, the Greeks! I must teach you. You must read them |
| in the original. _Thalatta! Thalatta_! She is our great sweet mother. |
| Come and look. |
| |
| Stephen stood up and went over to the parapet. Leaning on it he looked |
| down on the water and on the mailboat clearing the harbourmouth of |
| Kingstown. |
| |
| --Our mighty mother! Buck Mulligan said. |
| |
| He turned abruptly his grey searching eyes from the sea to Stephen's |
| face. |
| |
| --The aunt thinks you killed your mother, he said. That's why she won't |
| let me have anything to do with you. |
| |
| --Someone killed her, Stephen said gloomily. |
| |
| --You could have knelt down, damn it, Kinch, when your dying mother |
| asked you, Buck Mulligan said. I'm hyperborean as much as you. But to |
| think of your mother begging you with her last breath to kneel down and |
| pray for her. And you refused. There is something sinister in you... |
| |
| He broke off and lathered again lightly his farther cheek. A tolerant |
| smile curled his lips. |
| |
| --But a lovely mummer! he murmured to himself. Kinch, the loveliest |
| mummer of them all! |
| |
| He shaved evenly and with care, in silence, seriously. |
| |
| Stephen, an elbow rested on the jagged granite, leaned his palm against |
| his brow and gazed at the fraying edge of his shiny black coat-sleeve. |
| Pain, that was not yet the pain of love, fretted his heart. Silently, in |
| a dream she had come to him after her death, her wasted body within its |
| loose brown graveclothes giving off an odour of wax and rosewood, her |
| breath, that had bent upon him, mute, reproachful, a faint odour of |
| wetted ashes. Across the threadbare cuffedge he saw the sea hailed as a |
| great sweet mother by the wellfed voice beside him. The ring of bay |
| and skyline held a dull green mass of liquid. A bowl of white china had |
| stood beside her deathbed holding the green sluggish bile which she had |
| torn up from her rotting liver by fits of loud groaning vomiting. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan wiped again his razorblade. |
| |
| --Ah, poor dogsbody! he said in a kind voice. I must give you a shirt |
| and a few noserags. How are the secondhand breeks? |
| |
| --They fit well enough, Stephen answered. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan attacked the hollow beneath his underlip. |
| |
| --The mockery of it, he said contentedly. Secondleg they should be. God |
| knows what poxy bowsy left them off. I have a lovely pair with a hair |
| stripe, grey. You'll look spiffing in them. I'm not joking, Kinch. You |
| look damn well when you're dressed. |
| |
| --Thanks, Stephen said. I can't wear them if they are grey. |
| |
| --He can't wear them, Buck Mulligan told his face in the mirror. |
| Etiquette is etiquette. He kills his mother but he can't wear grey |
| trousers. |
| |
| He folded his razor neatly and with stroking palps of fingers felt the |
| smooth skin. |
| |
| Stephen turned his gaze from the sea and to the plump face with its |
| smokeblue mobile eyes. |
| |
| --That fellow I was with in the Ship last night, said Buck Mulligan, |
| says you have g.p.i. He's up in Dottyville with Connolly Norman. General |
| paralysis of the insane! |
| |
| He swept the mirror a half circle in the air to flash the tidings abroad |
| in sunlight now radiant on the sea. His curling shaven lips laughed and |
| the edges of his white glittering teeth. Laughter seized all his strong |
| wellknit trunk. |
| |
| --Look at yourself, he said, you dreadful bard! |
| |
| Stephen bent forward and peered at the mirror held out to him, cleft by |
| a crooked crack. Hair on end. As he and others see me. Who chose this |
| face for me? This dogsbody to rid of vermin. It asks me too. |
| |
| --I pinched it out of the skivvy's room, Buck Mulligan said. It does her |
| all right. The aunt always keeps plainlooking servants for Malachi. Lead |
| him not into temptation. And her name is Ursula. |
| |
| Laughing again, he brought the mirror away from Stephen's peering eyes. |
| |
| --The rage of Caliban at not seeing his face in a mirror, he said. If |
| Wilde were only alive to see you! |
| |
| Drawing back and pointing, Stephen said with bitterness: |
| |
| --It is a symbol of Irish art. The cracked looking-glass of a servant. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan suddenly linked his arm in Stephen's and walked with him |
| round the tower, his razor and mirror clacking in the pocket where he |
| had thrust them. |
| |
| --It's not fair to tease you like that, Kinch, is it? he said kindly. |
| God knows you have more spirit than any of them. |
| |
| Parried again. He fears the lancet of my art as I fear that of his. The |
| cold steelpen. |
| |
| --Cracked lookingglass of a servant! Tell that to the oxy chap |
| downstairs and touch him for a guinea. He's stinking with money and |
| thinks you're not a gentleman. His old fellow made his tin by selling |
| jalap to Zulus or some bloody swindle or other. God, Kinch, if you and I |
| could only work together we might do something for the island. Hellenise |
| it. |
| |
| Cranly's arm. His arm. |
| |
| --And to think of your having to beg from these swine. I'm the only one |
| that knows what you are. Why don't you trust me more? What have you |
| up your nose against me? Is it Haines? If he makes any noise here I'll |
| bring down Seymour and we'll give him a ragging worse than they gave |
| Clive Kempthorpe. |
| |
| Young shouts of moneyed voices in Clive Kempthorpe's rooms. Palefaces: |
| they hold their ribs with laughter, one clasping another. O, I shall |
| expire! Break the news to her gently, Aubrey! I shall die! With slit |
| ribbons of his shirt whipping the air he hops and hobbles round the |
| table, with trousers down at heels, chased by Ades of Magdalen with the |
| tailor's shears. A scared calf's face gilded with marmalade. I don't |
| want to be debagged! Don't you play the giddy ox with me! |
| |
| Shouts from the open window startling evening in the quadrangle. A deaf |
| gardener, aproned, masked with Matthew Arnold's face, pushes his mower |
| on the sombre lawn watching narrowly the dancing motes of grasshalms. |
| |
| To ourselves... new paganism... omphalos. |
| |
| --Let him stay, Stephen said. There's nothing wrong with him except at |
| night. |
| |
| --Then what is it? Buck Mulligan asked impatiently. Cough it up. I'm |
| quite frank with you. What have you against me now? |
| |
| They halted, looking towards the blunt cape of Bray Head that lay on the |
| water like the snout of a sleeping whale. Stephen freed his arm quietly. |
| |
| --Do you wish me to tell you? he asked. |
| |
| --Yes, what is it? Buck Mulligan answered. I don't remember anything. |
| |
| He looked in Stephen's face as he spoke. A light wind passed his brow, |
| fanning softly his fair uncombed hair and stirring silver points of |
| anxiety in his eyes. |
| |
| Stephen, depressed by his own voice, said: |
| |
| --Do you remember the first day I went to your house after my mother's |
| death? |
| |
| Buck Mulligan frowned quickly and said: |
| |
| --What? Where? I can't remember anything. I remember only ideas and |
| sensations. Why? What happened in the name of God? |
| |
| --You were making tea, Stephen said, and went across the landing to |
| get more hot water. Your mother and some visitor came out of the |
| drawingroom. She asked you who was in your room. |
| |
| --Yes? Buck Mulligan said. What did I say? I forget. |
| |
| --You said, Stephen answered, _O, it's only Dedalus whose mother is |
| beastly dead._ |
| |
| A flush which made him seem younger and more engaging rose to Buck |
| Mulligan's cheek. |
| |
| --Did I say that? he asked. Well? What harm is that? |
| |
| He shook his constraint from him nervously. |
| |
| --And what is death, he asked, your mother's or yours or my own? You |
| saw only your mother die. I see them pop off every day in the Mater and |
| Richmond and cut up into tripes in the dissectingroom. It's a beastly |
| thing and nothing else. It simply doesn't matter. You wouldn't kneel |
| down to pray for your mother on her deathbed when she asked you. Why? |
| Because you have the cursed jesuit strain in you, only it's injected the |
| wrong way. To me it's all a mockery and beastly. Her cerebral lobes |
| are not functioning. She calls the doctor sir Peter Teazle and picks |
| buttercups off the quilt. Humour her till it's over. You crossed her |
| last wish in death and yet you sulk with me because I don't whinge like |
| some hired mute from Lalouette's. Absurd! I suppose I did say it. I |
| didn't mean to offend the memory of your mother. |
| |
| He had spoken himself into boldness. Stephen, shielding the gaping |
| wounds which the words had left in his heart, said very coldly: |
| |
| --I am not thinking of the offence to my mother. |
| |
| --Of what then? Buck Mulligan asked. |
| |
| --Of the offence to me, Stephen answered. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan swung round on his heel. |
| |
| --O, an impossible person! he exclaimed. |
| |
| He walked off quickly round the parapet. Stephen stood at his post, |
| gazing over the calm sea towards the headland. Sea and headland now grew |
| dim. Pulses were beating in his eyes, veiling their sight, and he felt |
| the fever of his cheeks. |
| |
| A voice within the tower called loudly: |
| |
| --Are you up there, Mulligan? |
| |
| --I'm coming, Buck Mulligan answered. |
| |
| He turned towards Stephen and said: |
| |
| --Look at the sea. What does it care about offences? Chuck Loyola, |
| Kinch, and come on down. The Sassenach wants his morning rashers. |
| |
| His head halted again for a moment at the top of the staircase, level |
| with the roof: |
| |
| --Don't mope over it all day, he said. I'm inconsequent. Give up the |
| moody brooding. |
| |
| His head vanished but the drone of his descending voice boomed out of |
| the stairhead: |
| |
| _And no more turn aside and brood |
| Upon love's bitter mystery |
| For Fergus rules the brazen cars._ |
| |
| |
| Woodshadows floated silently by through the morning peace from the |
| stairhead seaward where he gazed. Inshore and farther out the mirror of |
| water whitened, spurned by lightshod hurrying feet. White breast of |
| the dim sea. The twining stresses, two by two. A hand plucking the |
| harpstrings, merging their twining chords. Wavewhite wedded words |
| shimmering on the dim tide. |
| |
| A cloud began to cover the sun slowly, wholly, shadowing the bay in |
| deeper green. It lay beneath him, a bowl of bitter waters. Fergus' song: |
| I sang it alone in the house, holding down the long dark chords. Her |
| door was open: she wanted to hear my music. Silent with awe and pity |
| I went to her bedside. She was crying in her wretched bed. For those |
| words, Stephen: love's bitter mystery. |
| |
| Where now? |
| |
| Her secrets: old featherfans, tasselled dancecards, powdered with musk, |
| a gaud of amber beads in her locked drawer. A birdcage hung in the sunny |
| window of her house when she was a girl. She heard old Royce sing in the |
| pantomime of Turko the Terrible and laughed with others when he sang: |
| |
| _I am the boy |
| That can enjoy |
| Invisibility._ |
| |
| |
| Phantasmal mirth, folded away: muskperfumed. |
| |
| _And no more turn aside and brood._ |
| |
| |
| Folded away in the memory of nature with her toys. Memories beset his |
| brooding brain. Her glass of water from the kitchen tap when she had |
| approached the sacrament. A cored apple, filled with brown sugar, |
| roasting for her at the hob on a dark autumn evening. Her shapely |
| fingernails reddened by the blood of squashed lice from the children's |
| shirts. |
| |
| In a dream, silently, she had come to him, her wasted body within its |
| loose graveclothes giving off an odour of wax and rosewood, her breath, |
| bent over him with mute secret words, a faint odour of wetted ashes. |
| |
| Her glazing eyes, staring out of death, to shake and bend my soul. On me |
| alone. The ghostcandle to light her agony. Ghostly light on the tortured |
| face. Her hoarse loud breath rattling in horror, while all prayed on |
| their knees. Her eyes on me to strike me down. _Liliata rutilantium te |
| confessorum turma circumdet: iubilantium te virginum chorus excipiat._ |
| |
| Ghoul! Chewer of corpses! |
| |
| No, mother! Let me be and let me live. |
| |
| --Kinch ahoy! |
| |
| Buck Mulligan's voice sang from within the tower. It came nearer up the |
| staircase, calling again. Stephen, still trembling at his soul's cry, |
| heard warm running sunlight and in the air behind him friendly words. |
| |
| --Dedalus, come down, like a good mosey. Breakfast is ready. Haines is |
| apologising for waking us last night. It's all right. |
| |
| --I'm coming, Stephen said, turning. |
| |
| --Do, for Jesus' sake, Buck Mulligan said. For my sake and for all our |
| sakes. |
| |
| His head disappeared and reappeared. |
| |
| --I told him your symbol of Irish art. He says it's very clever. Touch |
| him for a quid, will you? A guinea, I mean. |
| |
| --I get paid this morning, Stephen said. |
| |
| --The school kip? Buck Mulligan said. How much? Four quid? Lend us one. |
| |
| --If you want it, Stephen said. |
| |
| --Four shining sovereigns, Buck Mulligan cried with delight. We'll |
| have a glorious drunk to astonish the druidy druids. Four omnipotent |
| sovereigns. |
| |
| He flung up his hands and tramped down the stone stairs, singing out of |
| tune with a Cockney accent: |
| |
| _O, won't we have a merry time, |
| Drinking whisky, beer and wine! |
| On coronation, |
| Coronation day! |
| O, won't we have a merry time |
| On coronation day!_ |
| |
| |
| Warm sunshine merrying over the sea. The nickel shavingbowl shone, |
| forgotten, on the parapet. Why should I bring it down? Or leave it there |
| all day, forgotten friendship? |
| |
| He went over to it, held it in his hands awhile, feeling its coolness, |
| smelling the clammy slaver of the lather in which the brush was stuck. |
| So I carried the boat of incense then at Clongowes. I am another now and |
| yet the same. A servant too. A server of a servant. |
| |
| In the gloomy domed livingroom of the tower Buck Mulligan's gowned form |
| moved briskly to and fro about the hearth, hiding and revealing its |
| yellow glow. Two shafts of soft daylight fell across the flagged floor |
| from the high barbacans: and at the meeting of their rays a cloud of |
| coalsmoke and fumes of fried grease floated, turning. |
| |
| --We'll be choked, Buck Mulligan said. Haines, open that door, will you? |
| |
| Stephen laid the shavingbowl on the locker. A tall figure rose from the |
| hammock where it had been sitting, went to the doorway and pulled open |
| the inner doors. |
| |
| --Have you the key? a voice asked. |
| |
| --Dedalus has it, Buck Mulligan said. Janey Mack, I'm choked! |
| |
| He howled, without looking up from the fire: |
| |
| --Kinch! |
| |
| --It's in the lock, Stephen said, coming forward. |
| |
| The key scraped round harshly twice and, when the heavy door had been |
| set ajar, welcome light and bright air entered. Haines stood at the |
| doorway, looking out. Stephen haled his upended valise to the table and |
| sat down to wait. Buck Mulligan tossed the fry on to the dish beside |
| him. Then he carried the dish and a large teapot over to the table, set |
| them down heavily and sighed with relief. |
| |
| --I'm melting, he said, as the candle remarked when... But, hush! Not a |
| word more on that subject! Kinch, wake up! Bread, butter, honey. Haines, |
| come in. The grub is ready. Bless us, O Lord, and these thy gifts. |
| Where's the sugar? O, jay, there's no milk. |
| |
| Stephen fetched the loaf and the pot of honey and the buttercooler from |
| the locker. Buck Mulligan sat down in a sudden pet. |
| |
| --What sort of a kip is this? he said. I told her to come after eight. |
| |
| --We can drink it black, Stephen said thirstily. There's a lemon in the |
| locker. |
| |
| --O, damn you and your Paris fads! Buck Mulligan said. I want Sandycove |
| milk. |
| |
| Haines came in from the doorway and said quietly: |
| |
| --That woman is coming up with the milk. |
| |
| --The blessings of God on you! Buck Mulligan cried, jumping up from his |
| chair. Sit down. Pour out the tea there. The sugar is in the bag. Here, |
| I can't go fumbling at the damned eggs. |
| |
| He hacked through the fry on the dish and slapped it out on three |
| plates, saying: |
| |
| --_In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti._ |
| |
| Haines sat down to pour out the tea. |
| |
| --I'm giving you two lumps each, he said. But, I say, Mulligan, you do |
| make strong tea, don't you? |
| |
| Buck Mulligan, hewing thick slices from the loaf, said in an old woman's |
| wheedling voice: |
| |
| --When I makes tea I makes tea, as old mother Grogan said. And when I |
| makes water I makes water. |
| |
| --By Jove, it is tea, Haines said. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan went on hewing and wheedling: |
| |
| --_So I do, Mrs Cahill,_ says she. _Begob, ma'am,_ says Mrs Cahill, _God |
| send you don't make them in the one pot._ |
| |
| He lunged towards his messmates in turn a thick slice of bread, impaled |
| on his knife. |
| |
| --That's folk, he said very earnestly, for your book, Haines. Five |
| lines of text and ten pages of notes about the folk and the fishgods of |
| Dundrum. Printed by the weird sisters in the year of the big wind. |
| |
| He turned to Stephen and asked in a fine puzzled voice, lifting his |
| brows: |
| |
| --Can you recall, brother, is mother Grogan's tea and water pot spoken |
| of in the Mabinogion or is it in the Upanishads? |
| |
| --I doubt it, said Stephen gravely. |
| |
| --Do you now? Buck Mulligan said in the same tone. Your reasons, pray? |
| |
| --I fancy, Stephen said as he ate, it did not exist in or out of the |
| Mabinogion. Mother Grogan was, one imagines, a kinswoman of Mary Ann. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan's face smiled with delight. |
| |
| --Charming! he said in a finical sweet voice, showing his white teeth |
| and blinking his eyes pleasantly. Do you think she was? Quite charming! |
| |
| Then, suddenly overclouding all his features, he growled in a hoarsened |
| rasping voice as he hewed again vigorously at the loaf: |
| |
| _--For old Mary Ann |
| She doesn't care a damn. |
| But, hising up her petticoats..._ |
| |
| |
| He crammed his mouth with fry and munched and droned. |
| |
| The doorway was darkened by an entering form. |
| |
| --The milk, sir! |
| |
| --Come in, ma'am, Mulligan said. Kinch, get the jug. |
| |
| An old woman came forward and stood by Stephen's elbow. |
| |
| --That's a lovely morning, sir, she said. Glory be to God. |
| |
| --To whom? Mulligan said, glancing at her. Ah, to be sure! |
| |
| Stephen reached back and took the milkjug from the locker. |
| |
| --The islanders, Mulligan said to Haines casually, speak frequently of |
| the collector of prepuces. |
| |
| --How much, sir? asked the old woman. |
| |
| --A quart, Stephen said. |
| |
| He watched her pour into the measure and thence into the jug rich white |
| milk, not hers. Old shrunken paps. She poured again a measureful and |
| a tilly. Old and secret she had entered from a morning world, maybe |
| a messenger. She praised the goodness of the milk, pouring it out. |
| Crouching by a patient cow at daybreak in the lush field, a witch on her |
| toadstool, her wrinkled fingers quick at the squirting dugs. They lowed |
| about her whom they knew, dewsilky cattle. Silk of the kine and poor old |
| woman, names given her in old times. A wandering crone, lowly form of |
| an immortal serving her conqueror and her gay betrayer, their common |
| cuckquean, a messenger from the secret morning. To serve or to upbraid, |
| whether he could not tell: but scorned to beg her favour. |
| |
| --It is indeed, ma'am, Buck Mulligan said, pouring milk into their cups. |
| |
| --Taste it, sir, she said. |
| |
| He drank at her bidding. |
| |
| --If we could live on good food like that, he said to her somewhat |
| loudly, we wouldn't have the country full of rotten teeth and rotten |
| guts. Living in a bogswamp, eating cheap food and the streets paved with |
| dust, horsedung and consumptives' spits. |
| |
| --Are you a medical student, sir? the old woman asked. |
| |
| --I am, ma'am, Buck Mulligan answered. |
| |
| --Look at that now, she said. |
| |
| Stephen listened in scornful silence. She bows her old head to a voice |
| that speaks to her loudly, her bonesetter, her medicineman: me she |
| slights. To the voice that will shrive and oil for the grave all there |
| is of her but her woman's unclean loins, of man's flesh made not in |
| God's likeness, the serpent's prey. And to the loud voice that now bids |
| her be silent with wondering unsteady eyes. |
| |
| --Do you understand what he says? Stephen asked her. |
| |
| --Is it French you are talking, sir? the old woman said to Haines. |
| |
| Haines spoke to her again a longer speech, confidently. |
| |
| --Irish, Buck Mulligan said. Is there Gaelic on you? |
| |
| --I thought it was Irish, she said, by the sound of it. Are you from the |
| west, sir? |
| |
| --I am an Englishman, Haines answered. |
| |
| --He's English, Buck Mulligan said, and he thinks we ought to speak |
| Irish in Ireland. |
| |
| --Sure we ought to, the old woman said, and I'm ashamed I don't speak |
| the language myself. I'm told it's a grand language by them that knows. |
| |
| --Grand is no name for it, said Buck Mulligan. Wonderful entirely. Fill |
| us out some more tea, Kinch. Would you like a cup, ma'am? |
| |
| --No, thank you, sir, the old woman said, slipping the ring of the |
| milkcan on her forearm and about to go. |
| |
| Haines said to her: |
| |
| --Have you your bill? We had better pay her, Mulligan, hadn't we? |
| |
| Stephen filled again the three cups. |
| |
| --Bill, sir? she said, halting. Well, it's seven mornings a pint at |
| twopence is seven twos is a shilling and twopence over and these three |
| mornings a quart at fourpence is three quarts is a shilling. That's a |
| shilling and one and two is two and two, sir. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan sighed and, having filled his mouth with a crust thickly |
| buttered on both sides, stretched forth his legs and began to search his |
| trouser pockets. |
| |
| --Pay up and look pleasant, Haines said to him, smiling. |
| |
| Stephen filled a third cup, a spoonful of tea colouring faintly the |
| thick rich milk. Buck Mulligan brought up a florin, twisted it round in |
| his fingers and cried: |
| |
| --A miracle! |
| |
| He passed it along the table towards the old woman, saying: |
| |
| --Ask nothing more of me, sweet. All I can give you I give. |
| |
| Stephen laid the coin in her uneager hand. |
| |
| --We'll owe twopence, he said. |
| |
| --Time enough, sir, she said, taking the coin. Time enough. Good |
| morning, sir. |
| |
| She curtseyed and went out, followed by Buck Mulligan's tender chant: |
| |
| _--Heart of my heart, were it more, |
| More would be laid at your feet._ |
| |
| |
| He turned to Stephen and said: |
| |
| --Seriously, Dedalus. I'm stony. Hurry out to your school kip and bring |
| us back some money. Today the bards must drink and junket. Ireland |
| expects that every man this day will do his duty. |
| |
| --That reminds me, Haines said, rising, that I have to visit your |
| national library today. |
| |
| --Our swim first, Buck Mulligan said. |
| |
| He turned to Stephen and asked blandly: |
| |
| --Is this the day for your monthly wash, Kinch? |
| |
| Then he said to Haines: |
| |
| --The unclean bard makes a point of washing once a month. |
| |
| --All Ireland is washed by the gulfstream, Stephen said as he let honey |
| trickle over a slice of the loaf. |
| |
| Haines from the corner where he was knotting easily a scarf about the |
| loose collar of his tennis shirt spoke: |
| |
| --I intend to make a collection of your sayings if you will let me. |
| |
| Speaking to me. They wash and tub and scrub. Agenbite of inwit. |
| Conscience. Yet here's a spot. |
| |
| --That one about the cracked lookingglass of a servant being the symbol |
| of Irish art is deuced good. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan kicked Stephen's foot under the table and said with warmth |
| of tone: |
| |
| --Wait till you hear him on Hamlet, Haines. |
| |
| --Well, I mean it, Haines said, still speaking to Stephen. I was just |
| thinking of it when that poor old creature came in. |
| |
| --Would I make any money by it? Stephen asked. |
| |
| Haines laughed and, as he took his soft grey hat from the holdfast of |
| the hammock, said: |
| |
| --I don't know, I'm sure. |
| |
| He strolled out to the doorway. Buck Mulligan bent across to Stephen and |
| said with coarse vigour: |
| |
| --You put your hoof in it now. What did you say that for? |
| |
| --Well? Stephen said. The problem is to get money. From whom? From the |
| milkwoman or from him. It's a toss up, I think. |
| |
| --I blow him out about you, Buck Mulligan said, and then you come along |
| with your lousy leer and your gloomy jesuit jibes. |
| |
| --I see little hope, Stephen said, from her or from him. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan sighed tragically and laid his hand on Stephen's arm. |
| |
| --From me, Kinch, he said. |
| |
| In a suddenly changed tone he added: |
| |
| --To tell you the God's truth I think you're right. Damn all else they |
| are good for. Why don't you play them as I do? To hell with them all. |
| Let us get out of the kip. |
| |
| He stood up, gravely ungirdled and disrobed himself of his gown, saying |
| resignedly: |
| |
| --Mulligan is stripped of his garments. |
| |
| He emptied his pockets on to the table. |
| |
| --There's your snotrag, he said. |
| |
| And putting on his stiff collar and rebellious tie he spoke to them, |
| chiding them, and to his dangling watchchain. His hands plunged and |
| rummaged in his trunk while he called for a clean handkerchief. God, |
| we'll simply have to dress the character. I want puce gloves and |
| green boots. Contradiction. Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I |
| contradict myself. Mercurial Malachi. A limp black missile flew out of |
| his talking hands. |
| |
| --And there's your Latin quarter hat, he said. |
| |
| Stephen picked it up and put it on. Haines called to them from the |
| doorway: |
| |
| --Are you coming, you fellows? |
| |
| --I'm ready, Buck Mulligan answered, going towards the door. Come out, |
| Kinch. You have eaten all we left, I suppose. Resigned he passed out |
| with grave words and gait, saying, wellnigh with sorrow: |
| |
| --And going forth he met Butterly. |
| |
| Stephen, taking his ashplant from its leaningplace, followed them out |
| and, as they went down the ladder, pulled to the slow iron door and |
| locked it. He put the huge key in his inner pocket. |
| |
| At the foot of the ladder Buck Mulligan asked: |
| |
| --Did you bring the key? |
| |
| --I have it, Stephen said, preceding them. |
| |
| He walked on. Behind him he heard Buck Mulligan club with his heavy |
| bathtowel the leader shoots of ferns or grasses. |
| |
| --Down, sir! How dare you, sir! |
| |
| Haines asked: |
| |
| --Do you pay rent for this tower? |
| |
| --Twelve quid, Buck Mulligan said. |
| |
| --To the secretary of state for war, Stephen added over his shoulder. |
| |
| They halted while Haines surveyed the tower and said at last: |
| |
| --Rather bleak in wintertime, I should say. Martello you call it? |
| |
| --Billy Pitt had them built, Buck Mulligan said, when the French were on |
| the sea. But ours is the _omphalos_. |
| |
| --What is your idea of Hamlet? Haines asked Stephen. |
| |
| --No, no, Buck Mulligan shouted in pain. I'm not equal to Thomas Aquinas |
| and the fiftyfive reasons he has made out to prop it up. Wait till I |
| have a few pints in me first. |
| |
| He turned to Stephen, saying, as he pulled down neatly the peaks of his |
| primrose waistcoat: |
| |
| --You couldn't manage it under three pints, Kinch, could you? |
| |
| --It has waited so long, Stephen said listlessly, it can wait longer. |
| |
| --You pique my curiosity, Haines said amiably. Is it some paradox? |
| |
| --Pooh! Buck Mulligan said. We have grown out of Wilde and paradoxes. |
| It's quite simple. He proves by algebra that Hamlet's grandson is |
| Shakespeare's grandfather and that he himself is the ghost of his own |
| father. |
| |
| --What? Haines said, beginning to point at Stephen. He himself? |
| |
| Buck Mulligan slung his towel stolewise round his neck and, bending in |
| loose laughter, said to Stephen's ear: |
| |
| --O, shade of Kinch the elder! Japhet in search of a father! |
| |
| --We're always tired in the morning, Stephen said to Haines. And it is |
| rather long to tell. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan, walking forward again, raised his hands. |
| |
| --The sacred pint alone can unbind the tongue of Dedalus, he said. |
| |
| --I mean to say, Haines explained to Stephen as they followed, this |
| tower and these cliffs here remind me somehow of Elsinore. _That beetles |
| o'er his base into the sea,_ isn't it? |
| |
| Buck Mulligan turned suddenly for an instant towards Stephen but did |
| not speak. In the bright silent instant Stephen saw his own image in |
| cheap dusty mourning between their gay attires. |
| |
| --It's a wonderful tale, Haines said, bringing them to halt again. |
| |
| Eyes, pale as the sea the wind had freshened, paler, firm and prudent. |
| The seas' ruler, he gazed southward over the bay, empty save for the |
| smokeplume of the mailboat vague on the bright skyline and a sail |
| tacking by the Muglins. |
| |
| --I read a theological interpretation of it somewhere, he said bemused. |
| The Father and the Son idea. The Son striving to be atoned with the |
| Father. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan at once put on a blithe broadly smiling face. He looked |
| at them, his wellshaped mouth open happily, his eyes, from which he had |
| suddenly withdrawn all shrewd sense, blinking with mad gaiety. He moved |
| a doll's head to and fro, the brims of his Panama hat quivering, and |
| began to chant in a quiet happy foolish voice: |
| |
| _--I'm the queerest young fellow that ever you heard. |
| My mother's a jew, my father's a bird. |
| With Joseph the joiner I cannot agree. |
| So here's to disciples and Calvary._ |
| |
| |
| He held up a forefinger of warning. |
| |
| _--If anyone thinks that I amn't divine |
| He'll get no free drinks when I'm making the wine |
| But have to drink water and wish it were plain |
| That i make when the wine becomes water again._ |
| |
| |
| He tugged swiftly at Stephen's ashplant in farewell and, running forward |
| to a brow of the cliff, fluttered his hands at his sides like fins or |
| wings of one about to rise in the air, and chanted: |
| |
| _--Goodbye, now, goodbye! Write down all I said |
| And tell Tom, Dick and Harry I rose from the dead. |
| What's bred in the bone cannot fail me to fly |
| And Olivet's breezy... Goodbye, now, goodbye!_ |
| |
| |
| He capered before them down towards the fortyfoot hole, fluttering his |
| winglike hands, leaping nimbly, Mercury's hat quivering in the fresh |
| wind that bore back to them his brief birdsweet cries. |
| |
| Haines, who had been laughing guardedly, walked on beside Stephen and |
| said: |
| |
| --We oughtn't to laugh, I suppose. He's rather blasphemous. I'm not a |
| believer myself, that is to say. Still his gaiety takes the harm out of |
| it somehow, doesn't it? What did he call it? Joseph the Joiner? |
| |
| --The ballad of joking Jesus, Stephen answered. |
| |
| --O, Haines said, you have heard it before? |
| |
| --Three times a day, after meals, Stephen said drily. |
| |
| --You're not a believer, are you? Haines asked. I mean, a believer in |
| the narrow sense of the word. Creation from nothing and miracles and a |
| personal God. |
| |
| --There's only one sense of the word, it seems to me, Stephen said. |
| |
| Haines stopped to take out a smooth silver case in which twinkled a |
| green stone. He sprang it open with his thumb and offered it. |
| |
| --Thank you, Stephen said, taking a cigarette. |
| |
| Haines helped himself and snapped the case to. He put it back in his |
| sidepocket and took from his waistcoatpocket a nickel tinderbox, sprang |
| it open too, and, having lit his cigarette, held the flaming spunk |
| towards Stephen in the shell of his hands. |
| |
| --Yes, of course, he said, as they went on again. Either you believe |
| or you don't, isn't it? Personally I couldn't stomach that idea of a |
| personal God. You don't stand for that, I suppose? |
| |
| --You behold in me, Stephen said with grim displeasure, a horrible |
| example of free thought. |
| |
| He walked on, waiting to be spoken to, trailing his ashplant by his |
| side. Its ferrule followed lightly on the path, squealing at his heels. |
| My familiar, after me, calling, Steeeeeeeeeeeephen! A wavering line |
| along the path. They will walk on it tonight, coming here in the dark. |
| He wants that key. It is mine. I paid the rent. Now I eat his salt |
| bread. Give him the key too. All. He will ask for it. That was in his |
| eyes. |
| |
| --After all, Haines began... |
| |
| Stephen turned and saw that the cold gaze which had measured him was not |
| all unkind. |
| |
| --After all, I should think you are able to free yourself. You are your |
| own master, it seems to me. |
| |
| --I am a servant of two masters, Stephen said, an English and an |
| Italian. |
| |
| --Italian? Haines said. |
| |
| A crazy queen, old and jealous. Kneel down before me. |
| |
| --And a third, Stephen said, there is who wants me for odd jobs. |
| |
| --Italian? Haines said again. What do you mean? |
| |
| --The imperial British state, Stephen answered, his colour rising, and |
| the holy Roman catholic and apostolic church. |
| |
| Haines detached from his underlip some fibres of tobacco before he |
| spoke. |
| |
| --I can quite understand that, he said calmly. An Irishman must think |
| like that, I daresay. We feel in England that we have treated you rather |
| unfairly. It seems history is to blame. |
| |
| The proud potent titles clanged over Stephen's memory the triumph |
| of their brazen bells: _et unam sanctam catholicam et apostolicam |
| ecclesiam:_ the slow growth and change of rite and dogma like his own |
| rare thoughts, a chemistry of stars. Symbol of the apostles in the |
| mass for pope Marcellus, the voices blended, singing alone loud in |
| affirmation: and behind their chant the vigilant angel of the church |
| militant disarmed and menaced her heresiarchs. A horde of heresies |
| fleeing with mitres awry: Photius and the brood of mockers of |
| whom Mulligan was one, and Arius, warring his life long upon the |
| consubstantiality of the Son with the Father, and Valentine, spurning |
| Christ's terrene body, and the subtle African heresiarch Sabellius who |
| held that the Father was Himself His own Son. Words Mulligan had spoken |
| a moment since in mockery to the stranger. Idle mockery. The void |
| awaits surely all them that weave the wind: a menace, a disarming and a |
| worsting from those embattled angels of the church, Michael's host, |
| who defend her ever in the hour of conflict with their lances and their |
| shields. |
| |
| Hear, hear! Prolonged applause. _Zut! Nom de Dieu!_ |
| |
| --Of course I'm a Britisher, Haines's voice said, and I feel as one. I |
| don't want to see my country fall into the hands of German jews either. |
| That's our national problem, I'm afraid, just now. |
| |
| Two men stood at the verge of the cliff, watching: businessman, boatman. |
| |
| --She's making for Bullock harbour. |
| |
| The boatman nodded towards the north of the bay with some disdain. |
| |
| --There's five fathoms out there, he said. It'll be swept up that way |
| when the tide comes in about one. It's nine days today. |
| |
| The man that was drowned. A sail veering about the blank bay waiting |
| for a swollen bundle to bob up, roll over to the sun a puffy face, |
| saltwhite. Here I am. |
| |
| They followed the winding path down to the creek. Buck Mulligan stood on |
| a stone, in shirtsleeves, his unclipped tie rippling over his shoulder. |
| A young man clinging to a spur of rock near him, moved slowly frogwise |
| his green legs in the deep jelly of the water. |
| |
| --Is the brother with you, Malachi? |
| |
| --Down in Westmeath. With the Bannons. |
| |
| --Still there? I got a card from Bannon. Says he found a sweet young |
| thing down there. Photo girl he calls her. |
| |
| --Snapshot, eh? Brief exposure. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan sat down to unlace his boots. An elderly man shot up near |
| the spur of rock a blowing red face. He scrambled up by the stones, |
| water glistening on his pate and on its garland of grey hair, water |
| rilling over his chest and paunch and spilling jets out of his black |
| sagging loincloth. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan made way for him to scramble past and, glancing at Haines |
| and Stephen, crossed himself piously with his thumbnail at brow and lips |
| and breastbone. |
| |
| --Seymour's back in town, the young man said, grasping again his spur of |
| rock. Chucked medicine and going in for the army. |
| |
| --Ah, go to God! Buck Mulligan said. |
| |
| --Going over next week to stew. You know that red Carlisle girl, Lily? |
| |
| --Yes. |
| |
| --Spooning with him last night on the pier. The father is rotto with |
| money. |
| |
| --Is she up the pole? |
| |
| --Better ask Seymour that. |
| |
| --Seymour a bleeding officer! Buck Mulligan said. |
| |
| He nodded to himself as he drew off his trousers and stood up, saying |
| tritely: |
| |
| --Redheaded women buck like goats. |
| |
| He broke off in alarm, feeling his side under his flapping shirt. |
| |
| --My twelfth rib is gone, he cried. I'm the _Uebermensch._ Toothless |
| Kinch and I, the supermen. |
| |
| He struggled out of his shirt and flung it behind him to where his |
| clothes lay. |
| |
| --Are you going in here, Malachi? |
| |
| --Yes. Make room in the bed. |
| |
| The young man shoved himself backward through the water and reached |
| the middle of the creek in two long clean strokes. Haines sat down on a |
| stone, smoking. |
| |
| --Are you not coming in? Buck Mulligan asked. |
| |
| --Later on, Haines said. Not on my breakfast. |
| |
| Stephen turned away. |
| |
| --I'm going, Mulligan, he said. |
| |
| --Give us that key, Kinch, Buck Mulligan said, to keep my chemise flat. |
| |
| Stephen handed him the key. Buck Mulligan laid it across his heaped |
| clothes. |
| |
| --And twopence, he said, for a pint. Throw it there. |
| |
| Stephen threw two pennies on the soft heap. Dressing, undressing. Buck |
| Mulligan erect, with joined hands before him, said solemnly: |
| |
| --He who stealeth from the poor lendeth to the Lord. Thus spake |
| Zarathustra. |
| |
| His plump body plunged. |
| |
| --We'll see you again, Haines said, turning as Stephen walked up the |
| path and smiling at wild Irish. |
| |
| Horn of a bull, hoof of a horse, smile of a Saxon. |
| |
| --The Ship, Buck Mulligan cried. Half twelve. |
| |
| --Good, Stephen said. |
| |
| He walked along the upwardcurving path. |
| |
| _Liliata rutilantium. |
| Turma circumdet. |
| Iubilantium te virginum._ |
| |
| |
| The priest's grey nimbus in a niche where he dressed discreetly. I will |
| not sleep here tonight. Home also I cannot go. |
| |
| A voice, sweettoned and sustained, called to him from the sea. Turning |
| the curve he waved his hand. It called again. A sleek brown head, a |
| seal's, far out on the water, round. |
| |
| Usurper. |
| |
| |
| |
| --You, Cochrane, what city sent for him? |
| |
| --Tarentum, sir. |
| |
| --Very good. Well? |
| |
| --There was a battle, sir. |
| |
| --Very good. Where? |
| |
| The boy's blank face asked the blank window. |
| |
| Fabled by the daughters of memory. And yet it was in some way if not as |
| memory fabled it. A phrase, then, of impatience, thud of Blake's wings |
| of excess. I hear the ruin of all space, shattered glass and toppling |
| masonry, and time one livid final flame. What's left us then? |
| |
| --I forget the place, sir. 279 B. C. |
| |
| --Asculum, Stephen said, glancing at the name and date in the |
| gorescarred book. |
| |
| --Yes, sir. And he said: _Another victory like that and we are done |
| for._ |
| |
| That phrase the world had remembered. A dull ease of the mind. From |
| a hill above a corpsestrewn plain a general speaking to his officers, |
| leaned upon his spear. Any general to any officers. They lend ear. |
| |
| --You, Armstrong, Stephen said. What was the end of Pyrrhus? |
| |
| --End of Pyrrhus, sir? |
| |
| --I know, sir. Ask me, sir, Comyn said. |
| |
| --Wait. You, Armstrong. Do you know anything about Pyrrhus? |
| |
| A bag of figrolls lay snugly in Armstrong's satchel. He curled them |
| between his palms at whiles and swallowed them softly. Crumbs adhered to |
| the tissue of his lips. A sweetened boy's breath. Welloff people, proud |
| that their eldest son was in the navy. Vico road, Dalkey. |
| |
| --Pyrrhus, sir? Pyrrhus, a pier. |
| |
| All laughed. Mirthless high malicious laughter. Armstrong looked round |
| at his classmates, silly glee in profile. In a moment they will laugh |
| more loudly, aware of my lack of rule and of the fees their papas pay. |
| |
| --Tell me now, Stephen said, poking the boy's shoulder with the book, |
| what is a pier. |
| |
| --A pier, sir, Armstrong said. A thing out in the water. A kind of a |
| bridge. Kingstown pier, sir. |
| |
| Some laughed again: mirthless but with meaning. Two in the back bench |
| whispered. Yes. They knew: had never learned nor ever been innocent. |
| All. With envy he watched their faces: Edith, Ethel, Gerty, Lily. Their |
| likes: their breaths, too, sweetened with tea and jam, their bracelets |
| tittering in the struggle. |
| |
| --Kingstown pier, Stephen said. Yes, a disappointed bridge. |
| |
| The words troubled their gaze. |
| |
| --How, sir? Comyn asked. A bridge is across a river. |
| |
| For Haines's chapbook. No-one here to hear. Tonight deftly amid wild |
| drink and talk, to pierce the polished mail of his mind. What then? A |
| jester at the court of his master, indulged and disesteemed, winning a |
| clement master's praise. Why had they chosen all that part? Not wholly |
| for the smooth caress. For them too history was a tale like any other |
| too often heard, their land a pawnshop. |
| |
| Had Pyrrhus not fallen by a beldam's hand in Argos or Julius Caesar not |
| been knifed to death. They are not to be thought away. Time has |
| branded them and fettered they are lodged in the room of the infinite |
| possibilities they have ousted. But can those have been possible seeing |
| that they never were? Or was that only possible which came to pass? |
| Weave, weaver of the wind. |
| |
| --Tell us a story, sir. |
| |
| --O, do, sir. A ghoststory. |
| |
| --Where do you begin in this? Stephen asked, opening another book. |
| |
| -_-Weep no more,_ Comyn said. |
| |
| --Go on then, Talbot. |
| |
| --And the story, sir? |
| |
| --After, Stephen said. Go on, Talbot. |
| |
| A swarthy boy opened a book and propped it nimbly under the breastwork |
| of his satchel. He recited jerks of verse with odd glances at the text: |
| |
| _--Weep no more, woful shepherds, weep no more |
| For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead, |
| Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor..._ |
| |
| |
| It must be a movement then, an actuality of the possible as possible. |
| Aristotle's phrase formed itself within the gabbled verses and floated |
| out into the studious silence of the library of Saint Genevieve where he |
| had read, sheltered from the sin of Paris, night by night. By his elbow |
| a delicate Siamese conned a handbook of strategy. Fed and feeding brains |
| about me: under glowlamps, impaled, with faintly beating feelers: and |
| in my mind's darkness a sloth of the underworld, reluctant, shy of |
| brightness, shifting her dragon scaly folds. Thought is the thought of |
| thought. Tranquil brightness. The soul is in a manner all that is: the |
| soul is the form of forms. Tranquility sudden, vast, candescent: form of |
| forms. |
| |
| Talbot repeated: |
| |
| _--Through the dear might of Him that walked the waves, |
| Through the dear might..._ |
| |
| |
| --Turn over, Stephen said quietly. I don't see anything. |
| |
| --What, sir? Talbot asked simply, bending forward. |
| |
| His hand turned the page over. He leaned back and went on again, having |
| just remembered. Of him that walked the waves. Here also over these |
| craven hearts his shadow lies and on the scoffer's heart and lips and |
| on mine. It lies upon their eager faces who offered him a coin of the |
| tribute. To Caesar what is Caesar's, to God what is God's. A long |
| look from dark eyes, a riddling sentence to be woven and woven on the |
| church's looms. Ay. |
| |
| _Riddle me, riddle me, randy ro. |
| My father gave me seeds to sow._ |
| |
| |
| Talbot slid his closed book into his satchel. |
| |
| --Have I heard all? Stephen asked. |
| |
| --Yes, sir. Hockey at ten, sir. |
| |
| --Half day, sir. Thursday. |
| |
| --Who can answer a riddle? Stephen asked. |
| |
| They bundled their books away, pencils clacking, pages rustling. |
| Crowding together they strapped and buckled their satchels, all gabbling |
| gaily: |
| |
| --A riddle, sir? Ask me, sir. |
| |
| --O, ask me, sir. |
| |
| --A hard one, sir. |
| |
| --This is the riddle, Stephen said: |
| |
| _The cock crew, |
| The sky was blue: |
| The bells in heaven |
| Were striking eleven. |
| 'Tis time for this poor soul |
| To go to heaven._ |
| |
| |
| What is that? |
| |
| --What, sir? |
| |
| --Again, sir. We didn't hear. |
| |
| Their eyes grew bigger as the lines were repeated. After a silence |
| Cochrane said: |
| |
| --What is it, sir? We give it up. |
| |
| Stephen, his throat itching, answered: |
| |
| --The fox burying his grandmother under a hollybush. |
| |
| He stood up and gave a shout of nervous laughter to which their cries |
| echoed dismay. |
| |
| A stick struck the door and a voice in the corridor called: |
| |
| --Hockey! |
| |
| They broke asunder, sidling out of their benches, leaping them. Quickly |
| they were gone and from the lumberroom came the rattle of sticks and |
| clamour of their boots and tongues. |
| |
| Sargent who alone had lingered came forward slowly, showing an open |
| copybook. His thick hair and scraggy neck gave witness of unreadiness |
| and through his misty glasses weak eyes looked up pleading. On his |
| cheek, dull and bloodless, a soft stain of ink lay, dateshaped, recent |
| and damp as a snail's bed. |
| |
| He held out his copybook. The word _Sums_ was written on the headline. |
| Beneath were sloping figures and at the foot a crooked signature with |
| blind loops and a blot. Cyril Sargent: his name and seal. |
| |
| --Mr Deasy told me to write them out all again, he said, and show them |
| to you, sir. |
| |
| Stephen touched the edges of the book. Futility. |
| |
| --Do you understand how to do them now? he asked. |
| |
| --Numbers eleven to fifteen, Sargent answered. Mr Deasy said I was to |
| copy them off the board, sir. |
| |
| --Can you do them yourself? Stephen asked. |
| |
| --No, sir. |
| |
| Ugly and futile: lean neck and thick hair and a stain of ink, a snail's |
| bed. Yet someone had loved him, borne him in her arms and in her heart. |
| But for her the race of the world would have trampled him underfoot, |
| a squashed boneless snail. She had loved his weak watery blood drained |
| from her own. Was that then real? The only true thing in life? His |
| mother's prostrate body the fiery Columbanus in holy zeal bestrode. |
| She was no more: the trembling skeleton of a twig burnt in the fire, |
| an odour of rosewood and wetted ashes. She had saved him from being |
| trampled underfoot and had gone, scarcely having been. A poor soul |
| gone to heaven: and on a heath beneath winking stars a fox, red reek |
| of rapine in his fur, with merciless bright eyes scraped in the earth, |
| listened, scraped up the earth, listened, scraped and scraped. |
| |
| Sitting at his side Stephen solved out the problem. He proves by algebra |
| that Shakespeare's ghost is Hamlet's grandfather. Sargent peered askance |
| through his slanted glasses. Hockeysticks rattled in the lumberroom: the |
| hollow knock of a ball and calls from the field. |
| |
| Across the page the symbols moved in grave morrice, in the mummery of |
| their letters, wearing quaint caps of squares and cubes. Give hands, |
| traverse, bow to partner: so: imps of fancy of the Moors. Gone too from |
| the world, Averroes and Moses Maimonides, dark men in mien and movement, |
| flashing in their mocking mirrors the obscure soul of the world, a |
| darkness shining in brightness which brightness could not comprehend. |
| |
| --Do you understand now? Can you work the second for yourself? |
| |
| --Yes, sir. |
| |
| In long shaky strokes Sargent copied the data. Waiting always for a word |
| of help his hand moved faithfully the unsteady symbols, a faint hue of |
| shame flickering behind his dull skin. _Amor matris:_ subjective and |
| objective genitive. With her weak blood and wheysour milk she had fed |
| him and hid from sight of others his swaddling bands. |
| |
| Like him was I, these sloping shoulders, this gracelessness. My |
| childhood bends beside me. Too far for me to lay a hand there once or |
| lightly. Mine is far and his secret as our eyes. Secrets, silent, stony |
| sit in the dark palaces of both our hearts: secrets weary of their |
| tyranny: tyrants, willing to be dethroned. |
| |
| The sum was done. |
| |
| --It is very simple, Stephen said as he stood up. |
| |
| --Yes, sir. Thanks, Sargent answered. |
| |
| He dried the page with a sheet of thin blottingpaper and carried his |
| copybook back to his bench. |
| |
| --You had better get your stick and go out to the others, Stephen said |
| as he followed towards the door the boy's graceless form. |
| |
| --Yes, sir. |
| |
| In the corridor his name was heard, called from the playfield. |
| |
| --Sargent! |
| |
| --Run on, Stephen said. Mr Deasy is calling you. |
| |
| He stood in the porch and watched the laggard hurry towards the scrappy |
| field where sharp voices were in strife. They were sorted in teams and |
| Mr Deasy came away stepping over wisps of grass with gaitered feet. When |
| he had reached the schoolhouse voices again contending called to him. He |
| turned his angry white moustache. |
| |
| --What is it now? he cried continually without listening. |
| |
| --Cochrane and Halliday are on the same side, sir, Stephen said. |
| |
| --Will you wait in my study for a moment, Mr Deasy said, till I restore |
| order here. |
| |
| And as he stepped fussily back across the field his old man's voice |
| cried sternly: |
| |
| --What is the matter? What is it now? |
| |
| Their sharp voices cried about him on all sides: their many forms closed |
| round him, the garish sunshine bleaching the honey of his illdyed head. |
| |
| Stale smoky air hung in the study with the smell of drab abraded leather |
| of its chairs. As on the first day he bargained with me here. As it was |
| in the beginning, is now. On the sideboard the tray of Stuart coins, |
| base treasure of a bog: and ever shall be. And snug in their spooncase |
| of purple plush, faded, the twelve apostles having preached to all the |
| gentiles: world without end. |
| |
| A hasty step over the stone porch and in the corridor. Blowing out his |
| rare moustache Mr Deasy halted at the table. |
| |
| --First, our little financial settlement, he said. |
| |
| He brought out of his coat a pocketbook bound by a leather thong. It |
| slapped open and he took from it two notes, one of joined halves, and |
| laid them carefully on the table. |
| |
| --Two, he said, strapping and stowing his pocketbook away. |
| |
| And now his strongroom for the gold. Stephen's embarrassed hand moved |
| over the shells heaped in the cold stone mortar: whelks and money |
| cowries and leopard shells: and this, whorled as an emir's turban, and |
| this, the scallop of saint James. An old pilgrim's hoard, dead treasure, |
| hollow shells. |
| |
| A sovereign fell, bright and new, on the soft pile of the tablecloth. |
| |
| --Three, Mr Deasy said, turning his little savingsbox about in his hand. |
| These are handy things to have. See. This is for sovereigns. This is for |
| shillings. Sixpences, halfcrowns. And here crowns. See. |
| |
| He shot from it two crowns and two shillings. |
| |
| --Three twelve, he said. I think you'll find that's right. |
| |
| --Thank you, sir, Stephen said, gathering the money together with shy |
| haste and putting it all in a pocket of his trousers. |
| |
| --No thanks at all, Mr Deasy said. You have earned it. |
| |
| Stephen's hand, free again, went back to the hollow shells. Symbols too |
| of beauty and of power. A lump in my pocket: symbols soiled by greed and |
| misery. |
| |
| --Don't carry it like that, Mr Deasy said. You'll pull it out somewhere |
| and lose it. You just buy one of these machines. You'll find them very |
| handy. |
| |
| Answer something. |
| |
| --Mine would be often empty, Stephen said. |
| |
| The same room and hour, the same wisdom: and I the same. Three times |
| now. Three nooses round me here. Well? I can break them in this instant |
| if I will. |
| |
| --Because you don't save, Mr Deasy said, pointing his finger. You don't |
| know yet what money is. Money is power. When you have lived as long as I |
| have. I know, I know. If youth but knew. But what does Shakespeare say? |
| _Put but money in thy purse._ |
| |
| --Iago, Stephen murmured. |
| |
| He lifted his gaze from the idle shells to the old man's stare. |
| |
| --He knew what money was, Mr Deasy said. He made money. A poet, yes, but |
| an Englishman too. Do you know what is the pride of the English? Do you |
| know what is the proudest word you will ever hear from an Englishman's |
| mouth? |
| |
| The seas' ruler. His seacold eyes looked on the empty bay: it seems |
| history is to blame: on me and on my words, unhating. |
| |
| --That on his empire, Stephen said, the sun never sets. |
| |
| --Ba! Mr Deasy cried. That's not English. A French Celt said that. He |
| tapped his savingsbox against his thumbnail. |
| |
| --I will tell you, he said solemnly, what is his proudest boast. _I paid |
| my way._ |
| |
| Good man, good man. |
| |
| _--I paid my way. I never borrowed a shilling in my life._ Can you feel |
| that? _I owe nothing._ Can you? |
| |
| Mulligan, nine pounds, three pairs of socks, one pair brogues, ties. |
| Curran, ten guineas. McCann, one guinea. Fred Ryan, two shillings. |
| Temple, two lunches. Russell, one guinea, Cousins, ten shillings, Bob |
| Reynolds, half a guinea, Koehler, three guineas, Mrs MacKernan, five |
| weeks' board. The lump I have is useless. |
| |
| --For the moment, no, Stephen answered. |
| |
| Mr Deasy laughed with rich delight, putting back his savingsbox. |
| |
| --I knew you couldn't, he said joyously. But one day you must feel it. |
| We are a generous people but we must also be just. |
| |
| --I fear those big words, Stephen said, which make us so unhappy. |
| |
| Mr Deasy stared sternly for some moments over the mantelpiece at the |
| shapely bulk of a man in tartan filibegs: Albert Edward, prince of |
| Wales. |
| |
| --You think me an old fogey and an old tory, his thoughtful voice said. |
| I saw three generations since O'Connell's time. I remember the famine in |
| '46. Do you know that the orange lodges agitated for repeal of the |
| union twenty years before O'Connell did or before the prelates of your |
| communion denounced him as a demagogue? You fenians forget some things. |
| |
| Glorious, pious and immortal memory. The lodge of Diamond in Armagh the |
| splendid behung with corpses of papishes. Hoarse, masked and armed, the |
| planters' covenant. The black north and true blue bible. Croppies lie |
| down. |
| |
| Stephen sketched a brief gesture. |
| |
| --I have rebel blood in me too, Mr Deasy said. On the spindle side. But |
| I am descended from sir John Blackwood who voted for the union. We are |
| all Irish, all kings' sons. |
| |
| --Alas, Stephen said. |
| |
| --_Per vias rectas_, Mr Deasy said firmly, was his motto. He voted for |
| it and put on his topboots to ride to Dublin from the Ards of Down to do |
| so. |
| |
| _Lal the ral the ra |
| The rocky road to Dublin._ |
| |
| |
| A gruff squire on horseback with shiny topboots. Soft day, sir John! |
| Soft day, your honour!... Day!... Day!... Two topboots jog dangling |
| on to Dublin. Lal the ral the ra. Lal the ral the raddy. |
| |
| --That reminds me, Mr Deasy said. You can do me a favour, Mr Dedalus, |
| with some of your literary friends. I have a letter here for the press. |
| Sit down a moment. I have just to copy the end. |
| |
| He went to the desk near the window, pulled in his chair twice and read |
| off some words from the sheet on the drum of his typewriter. |
| |
| --Sit down. Excuse me, he said over his shoulder, _the dictates of |
| common sense._ Just a moment. |
| |
| He peered from under his shaggy brows at the manuscript by his elbow |
| and, muttering, began to prod the stiff buttons of the keyboard slowly, |
| sometimes blowing as he screwed up the drum to erase an error. |
| |
| Stephen seated himself noiselessly before the princely presence. Framed |
| around the walls images of vanished horses stood in homage, their meek |
| heads poised in air: lord Hastings' Repulse, the duke of Westminster's |
| Shotover, the duke of Beaufort's Ceylon, _prix de Paris_, 1866. Elfin |
| riders sat them, watchful of a sign. He saw their speeds, backing king's |
| colours, and shouted with the shouts of vanished crowds. |
| |
| --Full stop, Mr Deasy bade his keys. But prompt ventilation of this |
| allimportant question... |
| |
| Where Cranly led me to get rich quick, hunting his winners among the |
| mudsplashed brakes, amid the bawls of bookies on their pitches and reek |
| of the canteen, over the motley slush. Fair Rebel! Fair Rebel! Even |
| money the favourite: ten to one the field. Dicers and thimbleriggers |
| we hurried by after the hoofs, the vying caps and jackets and past |
| the meatfaced woman, a butcher's dame, nuzzling thirstily her clove of |
| orange. |
| |
| Shouts rang shrill from the boys' playfield and a whirring whistle. |
| |
| Again: a goal. I am among them, among their battling bodies in a medley, |
| the joust of life. You mean that knockkneed mother's darling who seems |
| to be slightly crawsick? Jousts. Time shocked rebounds, shock by shock. |
| Jousts, slush and uproar of battles, the frozen deathspew of the slain, |
| a shout of spearspikes baited with men's bloodied guts. |
| |
| --Now then, Mr Deasy said, rising. |
| |
| He came to the table, pinning together his sheets. Stephen stood up. |
| |
| --I have put the matter into a nutshell, Mr Deasy said. It's about |
| the foot and mouth disease. Just look through it. There can be no two |
| opinions on the matter. |
| |
| May I trespass on your valuable space. That doctrine of _laissez faire_ |
| which so often in our history. Our cattle trade. The way of all our old |
| industries. Liverpool ring which jockeyed the Galway harbour scheme. |
| European conflagration. Grain supplies through the narrow waters of |
| the channel. The pluterperfect imperturbability of the department of |
| agriculture. Pardoned a classical allusion. Cassandra. By a woman who |
| was no better than she should be. To come to the point at issue. |
| |
| --I don't mince words, do I? Mr Deasy asked as Stephen read on. |
| |
| Foot and mouth disease. Known as Koch's preparation. Serum and virus. |
| Percentage of salted horses. Rinderpest. Emperor's horses at Murzsteg, |
| lower Austria. Veterinary surgeons. Mr Henry Blackwood Price. Courteous |
| offer a fair trial. Dictates of common sense. Allimportant question. In |
| every sense of the word take the bull by the horns. Thanking you for the |
| hospitality of your columns. |
| |
| --I want that to be printed and read, Mr Deasy said. You will see at the |
| next outbreak they will put an embargo on Irish cattle. And it can |
| be cured. It is cured. My cousin, Blackwood Price, writes to me it is |
| regularly treated and cured in Austria by cattledoctors there. They |
| offer to come over here. I am trying to work up influence with |
| the department. Now I'm going to try publicity. I am surrounded by |
| difficulties, by... intrigues by... backstairs influence by... |
| |
| He raised his forefinger and beat the air oldly before his voice spoke. |
| |
| --Mark my words, Mr Dedalus, he said. England is in the hands of the |
| jews. In all the highest places: her finance, her press. And they are |
| the signs of a nation's decay. Wherever they gather they eat up the |
| nation's vital strength. I have seen it coming these years. As sure |
| as we are standing here the jew merchants are already at their work of |
| destruction. Old England is dying. |
| |
| He stepped swiftly off, his eyes coming to blue life as they passed a |
| broad sunbeam. He faced about and back again. |
| |
| --Dying, he said again, if not dead by now. |
| |
| _The harlot's cry from street to street |
| Shall weave old England's windingsheet._ |
| |
| |
| His eyes open wide in vision stared sternly across the sunbeam in which |
| he halted. |
| |
| --A merchant, Stephen said, is one who buys cheap and sells dear, jew or |
| gentile, is he not? |
| |
| --They sinned against the light, Mr Deasy said gravely. And you can see |
| the darkness in their eyes. And that is why they are wanderers on the |
| earth to this day. |
| |
| On the steps of the Paris stock exchange the goldskinned men quoting |
| prices on their gemmed fingers. Gabble of geese. They swarmed loud, |
| uncouth about the temple, their heads thickplotting under maladroit silk |
| hats. Not theirs: these clothes, this speech, these gestures. Their full |
| slow eyes belied the words, the gestures eager and unoffending, but |
| knew the rancours massed about them and knew their zeal was vain. Vain |
| patience to heap and hoard. Time surely would scatter all. A hoard |
| heaped by the roadside: plundered and passing on. Their eyes knew their |
| years of wandering and, patient, knew the dishonours of their flesh. |
| |
| --Who has not? Stephen said. |
| |
| --What do you mean? Mr Deasy asked. |
| |
| He came forward a pace and stood by the table. His underjaw fell |
| sideways open uncertainly. Is this old wisdom? He waits to hear from me. |
| |
| --History, Stephen said, is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake. |
| |
| From the playfield the boys raised a shout. A whirring whistle: goal. |
| What if that nightmare gave you a back kick? |
| |
| --The ways of the Creator are not our ways, Mr Deasy said. All human |
| history moves towards one great goal, the manifestation of God. |
| |
| Stephen jerked his thumb towards the window, saying: |
| |
| --That is God. |
| |
| Hooray! Ay! Whrrwhee! |
| |
| --What? Mr Deasy asked. |
| |
| --A shout in the street, Stephen answered, shrugging his shoulders. |
| |
| Mr Deasy looked down and held for awhile the wings of his nose tweaked |
| between his fingers. Looking up again he set them free. |
| |
| --I am happier than you are, he said. We have committed many errors and |
| many sins. A woman brought sin into the world. For a woman who was no |
| better than she should be, Helen, the runaway wife of Menelaus, ten |
| years the Greeks made war on Troy. A faithless wife first brought the |
| strangers to our shore here, MacMurrough's wife and her leman, O'Rourke, |
| prince of Breffni. A woman too brought Parnell low. Many errors, many |
| failures but not the one sin. I am a struggler now at the end of my |
| days. But I will fight for the right till the end. |
| |
| _For Ulster will fight |
| And Ulster will be right._ |
| |
| |
| Stephen raised the sheets in his hand. |
| |
| --Well, sir, he began... |
| |
| --I foresee, Mr Deasy said, that you will not remain here very long |
| at this work. You were not born to be a teacher, I think. Perhaps I am |
| wrong. |
| |
| --A learner rather, Stephen said. |
| |
| And here what will you learn more? |
| |
| Mr Deasy shook his head. |
| |
| --Who knows? he said. To learn one must be humble. But life is the great |
| teacher. |
| |
| Stephen rustled the sheets again. |
| |
| --As regards these, he began. |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Deasy said. You have two copies there. If you can have them |
| published at once. |
| |
| _ Telegraph. Irish Homestead._ |
| |
| --I will try, Stephen said, and let you know tomorrow. I know two |
| editors slightly. |
| |
| --That will do, Mr Deasy said briskly. I wrote last night to Mr Field, |
| M.P. There is a meeting of the cattletraders' association today at the |
| City Arms hotel. I asked him to lay my letter before the meeting. You |
| see if you can get it into your two papers. What are they? |
| |
| _--The Evening Telegraph..._ |
| |
| --That will do, Mr Deasy said. There is no time to lose. Now I have to |
| answer that letter from my cousin. |
| |
| --Good morning, sir, Stephen said, putting the sheets in his pocket. |
| Thank you. |
| |
| --Not at all, Mr Deasy said as he searched the papers on his desk. I |
| like to break a lance with you, old as I am. |
| |
| --Good morning, sir, Stephen said again, bowing to his bent back. |
| |
| He went out by the open porch and down the gravel path under the trees, |
| hearing the cries of voices and crack of sticks from the playfield. |
| The lions couchant on the pillars as he passed out through the gate: |
| toothless terrors. Still I will help him in his fight. Mulligan will dub |
| me a new name: the bullockbefriending bard. |
| |
| --Mr Dedalus! |
| |
| Running after me. No more letters, I hope. |
| |
| --Just one moment. |
| |
| --Yes, sir, Stephen said, turning back at the gate. |
| |
| Mr Deasy halted, breathing hard and swallowing his breath. |
| |
| --I just wanted to say, he said. Ireland, they say, has the honour of |
| being the only country which never persecuted the jews. Do you know |
| that? No. And do you know why? |
| |
| He frowned sternly on the bright air. |
| |
| --Why, sir? Stephen asked, beginning to smile. |
| |
| --Because she never let them in, Mr Deasy said solemnly. |
| |
| A coughball of laughter leaped from his throat dragging after it a |
| rattling chain of phlegm. He turned back quickly, coughing, laughing, |
| his lifted arms waving to the air. |
| |
| --She never let them in, he cried again through his laughter as he |
| stamped on gaitered feet over the gravel of the path. That's why. |
| |
| On his wise shoulders through the checkerwork of leaves the sun flung |
| spangles, dancing coins. |
| |
| |
| Ineluctable modality of the visible: at least that if no more, thought |
| through my eyes. Signatures of all things I am here to read, seaspawn |
| and seawrack, the nearing tide, that rusty boot. Snotgreen, bluesilver, |
| rust: coloured signs. Limits of the diaphane. But he adds: in bodies. |
| Then he was aware of them bodies before of them coloured. How? By |
| knocking his sconce against them, sure. Go easy. Bald he was and a |
| millionaire, _maestro di color che sanno_. Limit of the diaphane in. Why |
| in? Diaphane, adiaphane. If you can put your five fingers through it it |
| is a gate, if not a door. Shut your eyes and see. |
| |
| |
| Stephen closed his eyes to hear his boots crush crackling wrack and |
| shells. You are walking through it howsomever. I am, a stride at a time. |
| A very short space of time through very short times of space. Five, six: |
| the _nacheinander_. Exactly: and that is the ineluctable modality of the |
| audible. Open your eyes. No. Jesus! If I fell over a cliff that beetles |
| o'er his base, fell through the _nebeneinander_ ineluctably! I am |
| getting on nicely in the dark. My ash sword hangs at my side. Tap with |
| it: they do. My two feet in his boots are at the ends of his legs, |
| _nebeneinander_. Sounds solid: made by the mallet of _Los Demiurgos_. |
| Am I walking into eternity along Sandymount strand? Crush, crack, crick, |
| crick. Wild sea money. Dominie Deasy kens them a'. Won't you come to |
| Sandymount, Madeline the mare? |
| |
| |
| Rhythm begins, you see. I hear. Acatalectic tetrameter of iambs |
| marching. No, agallop: _deline the mare_. |
| |
| Open your eyes now. I will. One moment. Has all vanished since? If I |
| open and am for ever in the black adiaphane. _Basta_! I will see if I |
| can see. |
| |
| See now. There all the time without you: and ever shall be, world |
| without end. |
| |
| They came down the steps from Leahy's terrace prudently, _Frauenzimmer_: |
| and down the shelving shore flabbily, their splayed feet sinking in |
| the silted sand. Like me, like Algy, coming down to our mighty mother. |
| Number one swung lourdily her midwife's bag, the other's gamp poked in |
| the beach. From the liberties, out for the day. Mrs Florence MacCabe, |
| relict of the late Patk MacCabe, deeply lamented, of Bride Street. One |
| of her sisterhood lugged me squealing into life. Creation from nothing. |
| What has she in the bag? A misbirth with a trailing navelcord, hushed |
| in ruddy wool. The cords of all link back, strandentwining cable of |
| all flesh. That is why mystic monks. Will you be as gods? Gaze in your |
| omphalos. Hello! Kinch here. Put me on to Edenville. Aleph, alpha: |
| nought, nought, one. |
| |
| Spouse and helpmate of Adam Kadmon: Heva, naked Eve. She had no navel. |
| Gaze. Belly without blemish, bulging big, a buckler of taut vellum, |
| no, whiteheaped corn, orient and immortal, standing from everlasting to |
| everlasting. Womb of sin. |
| |
| Wombed in sin darkness I was too, made not begotten. By them, the man |
| with my voice and my eyes and a ghostwoman with ashes on her breath. |
| They clasped and sundered, did the coupler's will. From before the ages |
| He willed me and now may not will me away or ever. A _lex eterna_ stays |
| about Him. Is that then the divine substance wherein Father and Son are |
| consubstantial? Where is poor dear Arius to try conclusions? Warring |
| his life long upon the contransmagnificandjewbangtantiality. Illstarred |
| heresiarch' In a Greek watercloset he breathed his last: euthanasia. |
| With beaded mitre and with crozier, stalled upon his throne, widower of |
| a widowed see, with upstiffed omophorion, with clotted hinderparts. |
| |
| Airs romped round him, nipping and eager airs. They are coming, waves. |
| The whitemaned seahorses, champing, brightwindbridled, the steeds of |
| Mananaan. |
| |
| I mustn't forget his letter for the press. And after? The Ship, half |
| twelve. By the way go easy with that money like a good young imbecile. |
| |
| Yes, I must. |
| |
| His pace slackened. Here. Am I going to aunt Sara's or not? My |
| consubstantial father's voice. Did you see anything of your artist |
| brother Stephen lately? No? Sure he's not down in Strasburg terrace with |
| his aunt Sally? Couldn't he fly a bit higher than that, eh? And and and |
| and tell us, Stephen, how is uncle Si? O, weeping God, the things I |
| married into! De boys up in de hayloft. The drunken little costdrawer |
| and his brother, the cornet player. Highly respectable gondoliers! And |
| skeweyed Walter sirring his father, no less! Sir. Yes, sir. No, sir. |
| Jesus wept: and no wonder, by Christ! |
| |
| I pull the wheezy bell of their shuttered cottage: and wait. They take |
| me for a dun, peer out from a coign of vantage. |
| |
| --It's Stephen, sir. |
| |
| --Let him in. Let Stephen in. |
| |
| A bolt drawn back and Walter welcomes me. |
| |
| --We thought you were someone else. |
| |
| In his broad bed nuncle Richie, pillowed and blanketed, extends over the |
| hillock of his knees a sturdy forearm. Cleanchested. He has washed the |
| upper moiety. |
| |
| --Morrow, nephew. |
| |
| He lays aside the lapboard whereon he drafts his bills of costs for |
| the eyes of master Goff and master Shapland Tandy, filing consents and |
| common searches and a writ of _Duces Tecum_. A bogoak frame over his |
| bald head: Wilde's _Requiescat_. The drone of his misleading whistle |
| brings Walter back. |
| |
| --Yes, sir? |
| |
| --Malt for Richie and Stephen, tell mother. Where is she? |
| |
| --Bathing Crissie, sir. |
| |
| Papa's little bedpal. Lump of love. |
| |
| --No, uncle Richie... |
| |
| --Call me Richie. Damn your lithia water. It lowers. Whusky! |
| |
| --Uncle Richie, really... |
| |
| --Sit down or by the law Harry I'll knock you down. |
| |
| Walter squints vainly for a chair. |
| |
| --He has nothing to sit down on, sir. |
| |
| --He has nowhere to put it, you mug. Bring in our chippendale chair. |
| Would you like a bite of something? None of your damned lawdeedaw airs |
| here. The rich of a rasher fried with a herring? Sure? So much the |
| better. We have nothing in the house but backache pills. |
| |
| _All'erta_! |
| |
| He drones bars of Ferrando's _aria di sortita_. The grandest number, |
| Stephen, in the whole opera. Listen. |
| |
| His tuneful whistle sounds again, finely shaded, with rushes of the air, |
| his fists bigdrumming on his padded knees. |
| |
| This wind is sweeter. |
| |
| Houses of decay, mine, his and all. You told the Clongowes gentry you |
| had an uncle a judge and an uncle a general in the army. Come out of |
| them, Stephen. Beauty is not there. Nor in the stagnant bay of Marsh's |
| library where you read the fading prophecies of Joachim Abbas. For whom? |
| The hundredheaded rabble of the cathedral close. A hater of his kind |
| ran from them to the wood of madness, his mane foaming in the moon, |
| his eyeballs stars. Houyhnhnm, horsenostrilled. The oval equine |
| faces, Temple, Buck Mulligan, Foxy Campbell, Lanternjaws. Abbas |
| father,--furious dean, what offence laid fire to their brains? Paff! |
| _Descende, calve, ut ne amplius decalveris_. A garland of grey hair |
| on his comminated head see him me clambering down to the footpace |
| (_descende_!), clutching a monstrance, basiliskeyed. Get down, baldpoll! |
| A choir gives back menace and echo, assisting about the altar's horns, |
| the snorted Latin of jackpriests moving burly in their albs, tonsured |
| and oiled and gelded, fat with the fat of kidneys of wheat. |
| |
| And at the same instant perhaps a priest round the corner is elevating |
| it. Dringdring! And two streets off another locking it into a pyx. |
| Dringadring! And in a ladychapel another taking housel all to his own |
| cheek. Dringdring! Down, up, forward, back. Dan Occam thought of that, |
| invincible doctor. A misty English morning the imp hypostasis tickled |
| his brain. Bringing his host down and kneeling he heard twine with his |
| second bell the first bell in the transept (he is lifting his) and, |
| rising, heard (now I am lifting) their two bells (he is kneeling) twang |
| in diphthong. |
| |
| Cousin Stephen, you will never be a saint. Isle of saints. You were |
| awfully holy, weren't you? You prayed to the Blessed Virgin that you |
| might not have a red nose. You prayed to the devil in Serpentine avenue |
| that the fubsy widow in front might lift her clothes still more from the |
| wet street. _O si, certo_! Sell your soul for that, do, dyed rags pinned |
| round a squaw. More tell me, more still!! On the top of the Howth tram |
| alone crying to the rain: Naked women! _naked women_! What about that, |
| eh? |
| |
| What about what? What else were they invented for? |
| |
| Reading two pages apiece of seven books every night, eh? I was young. |
| You bowed to yourself in the mirror, stepping forward to applause |
| earnestly, striking face. Hurray for the Goddamned idiot! Hray! No-one |
| saw: tell no-one. Books you were going to write with letters for titles. |
| Have you read his F? O yes, but I prefer Q. Yes, but W is wonderful. O |
| yes, W. Remember your epiphanies written on green oval leaves, deeply |
| deep, copies to be sent if you died to all the great libraries of the |
| world, including Alexandria? Someone was to read them there after a few |
| thousand years, a mahamanvantara. Pico della Mirandola like. Ay, very |
| like a whale. When one reads these strange pages of one long gone one |
| feels that one is at one with one who once... |
| |
| The grainy sand had gone from under his feet. His boots trod again |
| a damp crackling mast, razorshells, squeaking pebbles, that on the |
| unnumbered pebbles beats, wood sieved by the shipworm, lost Armada. |
| Unwholesome sandflats waited to suck his treading soles, breathing |
| upward sewage breath, a pocket of seaweed smouldered in seafire under a |
| midden of man's ashes. He coasted them, walking warily. A porterbottle |
| stood up, stogged to its waist, in the cakey sand dough. A sentinel: |
| isle of dreadful thirst. Broken hoops on the shore; at the land a maze |
| of dark cunning nets; farther away chalkscrawled backdoors and on the |
| higher beach a dryingline with two crucified shirts. Ringsend: wigwams |
| of brown steersmen and master mariners. Human shells. |
| |
| He halted. I have passed the way to aunt Sara's. Am I not going there? |
| Seems not. No-one about. He turned northeast and crossed the firmer sand |
| towards the Pigeonhouse. |
| |
| _--Qui vous a mis dans cette fichue position?_ |
| |
| _--c'est le pigeon, Joseph._ |
| |
| Patrice, home on furlough, lapped warm milk with me in the bar MacMahon. |
| Son of the wild goose, Kevin Egan of Paris. My father's a bird, he |
| lapped the sweet _lait chaud_ with pink young tongue, plump bunny's |
| face. Lap, _lapin._ He hopes to win in the _gros lots_. About the nature |
| of women he read in Michelet. But he must send me _La Vie de Jesus_ by |
| M. Leo Taxil. Lent it to his friend. |
| |
| _--C'est tordant, vous savez. Moi, je suis socialiste. Je ne crois pas |
| en l'existence de Dieu. Faut pas le dire a mon p-re._ |
| |
| _--Il croit?_ |
| |
| _--Mon pere, oui._ |
| |
| _Schluss_. He laps. |
| |
| My Latin quarter hat. God, we simply must dress the character. I want |
| puce gloves. You were a student, weren't you? Of what in the other |
| devil's name? Paysayenn. P. C. N., you know: _physiques, chimiques et |
| naturelles_. Aha. Eating your groatsworth of _mou en civet_, fleshpots |
| of Egypt, elbowed by belching cabmen. Just say in the most natural |
| tone: when I was in Paris; _boul' Mich'_, I used to. Yes, used to |
| carry punched tickets to prove an alibi if they arrested you for murder |
| somewhere. Justice. On the night of the seventeenth of February 1904 the |
| prisoner was seen by two witnesses. Other fellow did it: other me. |
| Hat, tie, overcoat, nose. _Lui, c'est moi_. You seem to have enjoyed |
| yourself. |
| |
| Proudly walking. Whom were you trying to walk like? Forget: a |
| dispossessed. With mother's money order, eight shillings, the banging |
| door of the post office slammed in your face by the usher. Hunger |
| toothache. _Encore deux minutes_. Look clock. Must get. _Ferme_. Hired |
| dog! Shoot him to bloody bits with a bang shotgun, bits man spattered |
| walls all brass buttons. Bits all khrrrrklak in place clack back. Not |
| hurt? O, that's all right. Shake hands. See what I meant, see? O, that's |
| all right. Shake a shake. O, that's all only all right. |
| |
| You were going to do wonders, what? Missionary to Europe after fiery |
| Columbanus. Fiacre and Scotus on their creepystools in heaven spilt from |
| their pintpots, loudlatinlaughing: _Euge! Euge_! Pretending to speak |
| broken English as you dragged your valise, porter threepence, across |
| the slimy pier at Newhaven. _Comment?_ Rich booty you brought back; _Le |
| Tutu_, five tattered numbers of _Pantalon Blanc et Culotte Rouge_; a |
| blue French telegram, curiosity to show: |
| |
| --Mother dying come home father. |
| |
| The aunt thinks you killed your mother. That's why she won't. |
| |
| _Then here's a health to Mulligan's aunt |
| And I'll tell you the reason why. |
| She always kept things decent in |
| The Hannigan famileye._ |
| |
| |
| His feet marched in sudden proud rhythm over the sand furrows, along by |
| the boulders of the south wall. He stared at them proudly, piled stone |
| mammoth skulls. Gold light on sea, on sand, on boulders. The sun is |
| there, the slender trees, the lemon houses. |
| |
| Paris rawly waking, crude sunlight on her lemon streets. Moist pith of |
| farls of bread, the froggreen wormwood, her matin incense, court |
| the air. Belluomo rises from the bed of his wife's lover's wife, the |
| kerchiefed housewife is astir, a saucer of acetic acid in her hand. In |
| Rodot's Yvonne and Madeleine newmake their tumbled beauties, shattering |
| with gold teeth _chaussons_ of pastry, their mouths yellowed with the |
| _pus_ of _flan breton_. Faces of Paris men go by, their wellpleased |
| pleasers, curled conquistadores. |
| |
| Noon slumbers. Kevin Egan rolls gunpowder cigarettes through fingers |
| smeared with printer's ink, sipping his green fairy as Patrice his |
| white. About us gobblers fork spiced beans down their gullets. _Un demi |
| setier!_ A jet of coffee steam from the burnished caldron. She serves me |
| at his beck. _Il est irlandais. Hollandais? Non fromage. Deux irlandais, |
| nous, Irlande, vous savez ah, oui!_ She thought you wanted a cheese |
| _hollandais_. Your postprandial, do you know that word? Postprandial. |
| There was a fellow I knew once in Barcelona, queer fellow, used to call |
| it his postprandial. Well: _slainte_! Around the slabbed tables the |
| tangle of wined breaths and grumbling gorges. His breath hangs over our |
| saucestained plates, the green fairy's fang thrusting between his lips. |
| Of Ireland, the Dalcassians, of hopes, conspiracies, of Arthur Griffith |
| now, A E, pimander, good shepherd of men. To yoke me as his yokefellow, |
| our crimes our common cause. You're your father's son. I know the voice. |
| His fustian shirt, sanguineflowered, trembles its Spanish tassels at |
| his secrets. M. Drumont, famous journalist, Drumont, know what he called |
| queen Victoria? Old hag with the yellow teeth. _Vieille ogresse_ |
| with the _dents jaunes_. Maud Gonne, beautiful woman, _La Patrie_, M. |
| Millevoye, Felix Faure, know how he died? Licentious men. The froeken, |
| _bonne a tout faire_, who rubs male nakedness in the bath at Upsala. |
| _Moi faire_, she said, _Tous les messieurs_. Not this _Monsieur_, I |
| said. Most licentious custom. Bath a most private thing. I wouldn't let |
| my brother, not even my own brother, most lascivious thing. Green eyes, |
| I see you. Fang, I feel. Lascivious people. |
| |
| The blue fuse burns deadly between hands and burns clear. Loose |
| tobaccoshreds catch fire: a flame and acrid smoke light our corner. Raw |
| facebones under his peep of day boy's hat. How the head centre got away, |
| authentic version. Got up as a young bride, man, veil, orangeblossoms, |
| drove out the road to Malahide. Did, faith. Of lost leaders, the |
| betrayed, wild escapes. Disguises, clutched at, gone, not here. |
| |
| Spurned lover. I was a strapping young gossoon at that time, I tell you. |
| I'll show you my likeness one day. I was, faith. Lover, for her love he |
| prowled with colonel Richard Burke, tanist of his sept, under the walls |
| of Clerkenwell and, crouching, saw a flame of vengeance hurl them upward |
| in the fog. Shattered glass and toppling masonry. In gay Paree he hides, |
| Egan of Paris, unsought by any save by me. Making his day's stations, |
| the dingy printingcase, his three taverns, the Montmartre lair he sleeps |
| short night in, rue de la Goutte-d'Or, damascened with flyblown faces of |
| the gone. Loveless, landless, wifeless. She is quite nicey comfy |
| without her outcast man, madame in rue Git-le-Coeur, canary and two |
| buck lodgers. Peachy cheeks, a zebra skirt, frisky as a young thing's. |
| Spurned and undespairing. Tell Pat you saw me, won't you? I wanted to |
| get poor Pat a job one time. _Mon fils_, soldier of France. I taught him |
| to sing _The boys of Kilkenny are stout roaring blades_. Know that old |
| lay? I taught Patrice that. Old Kilkenny: saint Canice, Strongbow's |
| castle on the Nore. Goes like this. O, O. He takes me, Napper Tandy, by |
| the hand. |
| |
| _O, O THE BOYS OF |
| KILKENNY..._ |
| |
| |
| Weak wasting hand on mine. They have forgotten Kevin Egan, not he them. |
| Remembering thee, O Sion. |
| |
| He had come nearer the edge of the sea and wet sand slapped his boots. |
| The new air greeted him, harping in wild nerves, wind of wild air of |
| seeds of brightness. Here, I am not walking out to the Kish lightship, |
| am I? He stood suddenly, his feet beginning to sink slowly in the |
| quaking soil. Turn back. |
| |
| Turning, he scanned the shore south, his feet sinking again slowly |
| in new sockets. The cold domed room of the tower waits. Through the |
| barbacans the shafts of light are moving ever, slowly ever as my |
| feet are sinking, creeping duskward over the dial floor. Blue dusk, |
| nightfall, deep blue night. In the darkness of the dome they wait, |
| their pushedback chairs, my obelisk valise, around a board of abandoned |
| platters. Who to clear it? He has the key. I will not sleep there when |
| this night comes. A shut door of a silent tower, entombing their--blind |
| bodies, the panthersahib and his pointer. Call: no answer. He lifted his |
| feet up from the suck and turned back by the mole of boulders. Take |
| all, keep all. My soul walks with me, form of forms. So in the moon's |
| midwatches I pace the path above the rocks, in sable silvered, hearing |
| Elsinore's tempting flood. |
| |
| The flood is following me. I can watch it flow past from here. Get back |
| then by the Poolbeg road to the strand there. He climbed over the sedge |
| and eely oarweeds and sat on a stool of rock, resting his ashplant in a |
| grike. |
| |
| A bloated carcass of a dog lay lolled on bladderwrack. Before him the |
| gunwale of a boat, sunk in sand. _Un coche ensablé_ Louis Veuillot |
| called Gautier's prose. These heavy sands are language tide and wind |
| have silted here. And these, the stoneheaps of dead builders, a warren |
| of weasel rats. Hide gold there. Try it. You have some. Sands and |
| stones. Heavy of the past. Sir Lout's toys. Mind you don't get one |
| bang on the ear. I'm the bloody well gigant rolls all them bloody well |
| boulders, bones for my steppingstones. Feefawfum. I zmellz de bloodz odz |
| an Iridzman. |
| |
| A point, live dog, grew into sight running across the sweep of sand. |
| Lord, is he going to attack me? Respect his liberty. You will not |
| be master of others or their slave. I have my stick. Sit tight. From |
| farther away, walking shoreward across from the crested tide, figures, |
| two. The two maries. They have tucked it safe mong the bulrushes. |
| Peekaboo. I see you. No, the dog. He is running back to them. Who? |
| |
| Galleys of the Lochlanns ran here to beach, in quest of prey, their |
| bloodbeaked prows riding low on a molten pewter surf. Dane vikings, |
| torcs of tomahawks aglitter on their breasts when Malachi wore the |
| collar of gold. A school of turlehide whales stranded in hot noon, |
| spouting, hobbling in the shallows. Then from the starving cagework city |
| a horde of jerkined dwarfs, my people, with flayers' knives, running, |
| scaling, hacking in green blubbery whalemeat. Famine, plague and |
| slaughters. Their blood is in me, their lusts my waves. I moved among |
| them on the frozen Liffey, that I, a changeling, among the spluttering |
| resin fires. I spoke to no-one: none to me. |
| |
| The dog's bark ran towards him, stopped, ran back. Dog of my enemy. I |
| just simply stood pale, silent, bayed about. _Terribilia meditans_. A |
| primrose doublet, fortune's knave, smiled on my fear. For that are you |
| pining, the bark of their applause? Pretenders: live their lives. The |
| Bruce's brother, Thomas Fitzgerald, silken knight, Perkin Warbeck, |
| York's false scion, in breeches of silk of whiterose ivory, wonder of |
| a day, and Lambert Simnel, with a tail of nans and sutlers, a scullion |
| crowned. All kings' sons. Paradise of pretenders then and now. He saved |
| men from drowning and you shake at a cur's yelping. But the courtiers |
| who mocked Guido in Or san Michele were in their own house. House of... |
| We don't want any of your medieval abstrusiosities. Would you do what he |
| did? A boat would be near, a lifebuoy. _Natürlich_, put there for you. |
| Would you or would you not? The man that was drowned nine days ago off |
| Maiden's rock. They are waiting for him now. The truth, spit it out. I |
| would want to. I would try. I am not a strong swimmer. Water cold soft. |
| When I put my face into it in the basin at Clongowes. Can't see! Who's |
| behind me? Out quickly, quickly! Do you see the tide flowing quickly in |
| on all sides, sheeting the lows of sand quickly, shellcocoacoloured? If |
| I had land under my feet. I want his life still to be his, mine to be |
| mine. A drowning man. His human eyes scream to me out of horror of his |
| death. I... With him together down... I could not save her. Waters: |
| bitter death: lost. |
| |
| A woman and a man. I see her skirties. Pinned up, I bet. |
| |
| Their dog ambled about a bank of dwindling sand, trotting, sniffing on |
| all sides. Looking for something lost in a past life. Suddenly he made |
| off like a bounding hare, ears flung back, chasing the shadow of a |
| lowskimming gull. The man's shrieked whistle struck his limp ears. He |
| turned, bounded back, came nearer, trotted on twinkling shanks. On a |
| field tenney a buck, trippant, proper, unattired. At the lacefringe of |
| the tide he halted with stiff forehoofs, seawardpointed ears. His |
| snout lifted barked at the wavenoise, herds of seamorse. They serpented |
| towards his feet, curling, unfurling many crests, every ninth, breaking, |
| plashing, from far, from farther out, waves and waves. |
| |
| Cocklepickers. They waded a little way in the water and, stooping, |
| soused their bags and, lifting them again, waded out. The dog yelped |
| running to them, reared up and pawed them, dropping on all fours, again |
| reared up at them with mute bearish fawning. Unheeded he kept by them as |
| they came towards the drier sand, a rag of wolf's tongue redpanting from |
| his jaws. His speckled body ambled ahead of them and then loped off at a |
| calf's gallop. The carcass lay on his path. He stopped, sniffed, stalked |
| round it, brother, nosing closer, went round it, sniffling rapidly like |
| a dog all over the dead dog's bedraggled fell. Dogskull, dogsniff, eyes |
| on the ground, moves to one great goal. Ah, poor dogsbody! Here lies |
| poor dogsbody's body. |
| |
| --Tatters! Out of that, you mongrel! |
| |
| The cry brought him skulking back to his master and a blunt bootless |
| kick sent him unscathed across a spit of sand, crouched in flight. He |
| slunk back in a curve. Doesn't see me. Along by the edge of the mole he |
| lolloped, dawdled, smelt a rock and from under a cocked hindleg pissed |
| against it. He trotted forward and, lifting again his hindleg, pissed |
| quick short at an unsmelt rock. The simple pleasures of the poor. His |
| hindpaws then scattered the sand: then his forepaws dabbled and delved. |
| Something he buried there, his grandmother. He rooted in the sand, |
| dabbling, delving and stopped to listen to the air, scraped up the sand |
| again with a fury of his claws, soon ceasing, a pard, a panther, got in |
| spousebreach, vulturing the dead. |
| |
| After he woke me last night same dream or was it? Wait. Open hallway. |
| Street of harlots. Remember. Haroun al Raschid. I am almosting it. That |
| man led me, spoke. I was not afraid. The melon he had he held against my |
| face. Smiled: creamfruit smell. That was the rule, said. In. Come. Red |
| carpet spread. You will see who. |
| |
| Shouldering their bags they trudged, the red Egyptians. His blued feet |
| out of turnedup trousers slapped the clammy sand, a dull brick muffler |
| strangling his unshaven neck. With woman steps she followed: the |
| ruffian and his strolling mort. Spoils slung at her back. Loose sand and |
| shellgrit crusted her bare feet. About her windraw face hair trailed. |
| Behind her lord, his helpmate, bing awast to Romeville. When night hides |
| her body's flaws calling under her brown shawl from an archway |
| where dogs have mired. Her fancyman is treating two Royal Dublins in |
| O'Loughlin's of Blackpitts. Buss her, wap in rogues' rum lingo, for, O, |
| my dimber wapping dell! A shefiend's whiteness under her rancid rags. |
| Fumbally's lane that night: the tanyard smells. |
| |
| _White thy fambles, red thy gan |
| And thy quarrons dainty is. |
| Couch a hogshead with me then. |
| In the darkmans clip and kiss._ |
| |
| |
| Morose delectation Aquinas tunbelly calls this, _frate porcospino_. |
| Unfallen Adam rode and not rutted. Call away let him: _thy quarrons |
| dainty is_. Language no whit worse than his. Monkwords, marybeads jabber |
| on their girdles: roguewords, tough nuggets patter in their pockets. |
| |
| Passing now. |
| |
| A side eye at my Hamlet hat. If I were suddenly naked here as I sit? I |
| am not. Across the sands of all the world, followed by the sun's flaming |
| sword, to the west, trekking to evening lands. She trudges, schlepps, |
| trains, drags, trascines her load. A tide westering, moondrawn, in |
| her wake. Tides, myriadislanded, within her, blood not mine, _oinopa |
| ponton_, a winedark sea. Behold the handmaid of the moon. In sleep |
| the wet sign calls her hour, bids her rise. Bridebed, childbed, bed of |
| death, ghostcandled. _Omnis caro ad te veniet_. He comes, pale vampire, |
| through storm his eyes, his bat sails bloodying the sea, mouth to her |
| mouth's kiss. |
| |
| Here. Put a pin in that chap, will you? My tablets. Mouth to her kiss. |
| |
| No. Must be two of em. Glue em well. Mouth to her mouth's kiss. |
| |
| His lips lipped and mouthed fleshless lips of air: mouth to her moomb. |
| Oomb, allwombing tomb. His mouth moulded issuing breath, unspeeched: |
| ooeeehah: roar of cataractic planets, globed, blazing, roaring |
| wayawayawayawayaway. Paper. The banknotes, blast them. Old Deasy's |
| letter. Here. Thanking you for the hospitality tear the blank end off. |
| Turning his back to the sun he bent over far to a table of rock and |
| scribbled words. That's twice I forgot to take slips from the library |
| counter. |
| |
| His shadow lay over the rocks as he bent, ending. Why not endless till |
| the farthest star? Darkly they are there behind this light, darkness |
| shining in the brightness, delta of Cassiopeia, worlds. Me sits there |
| with his augur's rod of ash, in borrowed sandals, by day beside a livid |
| sea, unbeheld, in violet night walking beneath a reign of uncouth stars. |
| I throw this ended shadow from me, manshape ineluctable, call it back. |
| Endless, would it be mine, form of my form? Who watches me here? Who |
| ever anywhere will read these written words? Signs on a white field. |
| Somewhere to someone in your flutiest voice. The good bishop of Cloyne |
| took the veil of the temple out of his shovel hat: veil of space with |
| coloured emblems hatched on its field. Hold hard. Coloured on a flat: |
| yes, that's right. Flat I see, then think distance, near, far, flat |
| I see, east, back. Ah, see now! Falls back suddenly, frozen in |
| stereoscope. Click does the trick. You find my words dark. Darkness is |
| in our souls do you not think? Flutier. Our souls, shamewounded by our |
| sins, cling to us yet more, a woman to her lover clinging, the more the |
| more. |
| |
| She trusts me, her hand gentle, the longlashed eyes. Now where the blue |
| hell am I bringing her beyond the veil? Into the ineluctable modality of |
| the ineluctable visuality. She, she, she. What she? The virgin at Hodges |
| Figgis' window on Monday looking in for one of the alphabet books you |
| were going to write. Keen glance you gave her. Wrist through the |
| braided jesse of her sunshade. She lives in Leeson park with a grief |
| and kickshaws, a lady of letters. Talk that to someone else, Stevie: a |
| pickmeup. Bet she wears those curse of God stays suspenders and |
| yellow stockings, darned with lumpy wool. Talk about apple dumplings, |
| _piuttosto_. Where are your wits? |
| |
| Touch me. Soft eyes. Soft soft soft hand. I am lonely here. O, touch me |
| soon, now. What is that word known to all men? I am quiet here alone. |
| Sad too. Touch, touch me. |
| |
| He lay back at full stretch over the sharp rocks, cramming the scribbled |
| note and pencil into a pock his hat. His hat down on his eyes. That is |
| Kevin Egan's movement I made, nodding for his nap, sabbath sleep. _Et |
| vidit Deus. Et erant valde bona_. Alo! _Bonjour_. Welcome as the flowers |
| in May. Under its leaf he watched through peacocktwittering lashes the |
| southing sun. I am caught in this burning scene. Pan's hour, the faunal |
| noon. Among gumheavy serpentplants, milkoozing fruits, where on the |
| tawny waters leaves lie wide. Pain is far. |
| |
| _And no more turn aside and brood._ |
| |
| His gaze brooded on his broadtoed boots, a buck's castoffs, |
| _nebeneinander_. He counted the creases of rucked leather wherein |
| another's foot had nested warm. The foot that beat the ground in |
| tripudium, foot I dislove. But you were delighted when Esther Osvalt's |
| shoe went on you: girl I knew in Paris. _Tiens, quel petit pied!_ |
| Staunch friend, a brother soul: Wilde's love that dare not speak its |
| name. His arm: Cranly's arm. He now will leave me. And the blame? As I |
| am. As I am. All or not at all. |
| |
| In long lassoes from the Cock lake the water flowed full, covering |
| greengoldenly lagoons of sand, rising, flowing. My ashplant will float |
| away. I shall wait. No, they will pass on, passing, chafing against the |
| low rocks, swirling, passing. Better get this job over quick. Listen: a |
| fourworded wavespeech: seesoo, hrss, rsseeiss, ooos. Vehement breath of |
| waters amid seasnakes, rearing horses, rocks. In cups of rocks it slops: |
| flop, slop, slap: bounded in barrels. And, spent, its speech ceases. It |
| flows purling, widely flowing, floating foampool, flower unfurling. |
| |
| Under the upswelling tide he saw the writhing weeds lift languidly and |
| sway reluctant arms, hising up their petticoats, in whispering water |
| swaying and upturning coy silver fronds. Day by day: night by night: |
| lifted, flooded and let fall. Lord, they are weary; and, whispered to, |
| they sigh. Saint Ambrose heard it, sigh of leaves and waves, waiting, |
| awaiting the fullness of their times, _diebus ac noctibus iniurias |
| patiens ingemiscit_. To no end gathered; vainly then released, |
| forthflowing, wending back: loom of the moon. Weary too in sight of |
| lovers, lascivious men, a naked woman shining in her courts, she draws a |
| toil of waters. |
| |
| Five fathoms out there. Full fathom five thy father lies. At one, he |
| said. Found drowned. High water at Dublin bar. Driving before it a loose |
| drift of rubble, fanshoals of fishes, silly shells. A corpse rising |
| saltwhite from the undertow, bobbing a pace a pace a porpoise landward. |
| There he is. Hook it quick. Pull. Sunk though he be beneath the watery |
| floor. We have him. Easy now. |
| |
| Bag of corpsegas sopping in foul brine. A quiver of minnows, fat of a |
| spongy titbit, flash through the slits of his buttoned trouserfly. |
| God becomes man becomes fish becomes barnacle goose becomes featherbed |
| mountain. Dead breaths I living breathe, tread dead dust, devour a |
| urinous offal from all dead. Hauled stark over the gunwale he breathes |
| upward the stench of his green grave, his leprous nosehole snoring to |
| the sun. |
| |
| A seachange this, brown eyes saltblue. Seadeath, mildest of all deaths |
| known to man. Old Father Ocean. _Prix de paris_: beware of imitations. |
| Just you give it a fair trial. We enjoyed ourselves immensely. |
| |
| Come. I thirst. Clouding over. No black clouds anywhere, are there? |
| Thunderstorm. Allbright he falls, proud lightning of the intellect, |
| _Lucifer, dico, qui nescit occasum_. No. My cockle hat and staff and |
| hismy sandal shoon. Where? To evening lands. Evening will find itself. |
| |
| He took the hilt of his ashplant, lunging with it softly, dallying |
| still. Yes, evening will find itself in me, without me. All days make |
| their end. By the way next when is it Tuesday will be the longest |
| day. Of all the glad new year, mother, the rum tum tiddledy tum. Lawn |
| Tennyson, gentleman poet. _Già _. For the old hag with the yellow teeth. |
| And Monsieur Drumont, gentleman journalist. _Già _. My teeth are very |
| bad. Why, I wonder. Feel. That one is going too. Shells. Ought I go to a |
| dentist, I wonder, with that money? That one. This. Toothless Kinch, the |
| superman. Why is that, I wonder, or does it mean something perhaps? |
| |
| My handkerchief. He threw it. I remember. Did I not take it up? |
| |
| His hand groped vainly in his pockets. No, I didn't. Better buy one. |
| |
| He laid the dry snot picked from his nostril on a ledge of rock, |
| carefully. For the rest let look who will. |
| |
| Behind. Perhaps there is someone. |
| |
| He turned his face over a shoulder, rere regardant. Moving through the |
| air high spars of a threemaster, her sails brailed up on the crosstrees, |
| homing, upstream, silently moving, a silent ship. + |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| -- II -- |
| |
| Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. |
| He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart, |
| liverslices fried with crustcrumbs, fried hencods' roes. Most of all |
| he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of |
| faintly scented urine. |
| |
| Kidneys were in his mind as he moved about the kitchen softly, righting |
| her breakfast things on the humpy tray. Gelid light and air were in the |
| kitchen but out of doors gentle summer morning everywhere. Made him feel |
| a bit peckish. |
| |
| The coals were reddening. |
| |
| Another slice of bread and butter: three, four: right. She didn't like |
| her plate full. Right. He turned from the tray, lifted the kettle off |
| the hob and set it sideways on the fire. It sat there, dull and squat, |
| its spout stuck out. Cup of tea soon. Good. Mouth dry. The cat walked |
| stiffly round a leg of the table with tail on high. |
| |
| --Mkgnao! |
| |
| --O, there you are, Mr Bloom said, turning from the fire. |
| |
| The cat mewed in answer and stalked again stiffly round a leg of the |
| table, mewing. Just how she stalks over my writingtable. Prr. Scratch my |
| head. Prr. |
| |
| Mr Bloom watched curiously, kindly the lithe black form. Clean to see: |
| the gloss of her sleek hide, the white button under the butt of her |
| tail, the green flashing eyes. He bent down to her, his hands on his |
| knees. |
| |
| --Milk for the pussens, he said. |
| |
| --Mrkgnao! the cat cried. |
| |
| They call them stupid. They understand what we say better than we |
| understand them. She understands all she wants to. Vindictive too. |
| Cruel. Her nature. Curious mice never squeal. Seem to like it. Wonder |
| what I look like to her. Height of a tower? No, she can jump me. |
| |
| --Afraid of the chickens she is, he said mockingly. Afraid of the |
| chookchooks. I never saw such a stupid pussens as the pussens. |
| |
| Cruel. Her nature. Curious mice never squeal. Seem to like it. |
| |
| --Mrkrgnao! the cat said loudly. |
| |
| She blinked up out of her avid shameclosing eyes, mewing plaintively |
| and long, showing him her milkwhite teeth. He watched the dark eyeslits |
| narrowing with greed till her eyes were green stones. Then he went to |
| the dresser, took the jug Hanlon's milkman had just filled for him, |
| poured warmbubbled milk on a saucer and set it slowly on the floor. |
| |
| --Gurrhr! she cried, running to lap. |
| |
| He watched the bristles shining wirily in the weak light as she tipped |
| three times and licked lightly. Wonder is it true if you clip them they |
| can't mouse after. Why? They shine in the dark, perhaps, the tips. Or |
| kind of feelers in the dark, perhaps. |
| |
| He listened to her licking lap. Ham and eggs, no. No good eggs with this |
| drouth. Want pure fresh water. Thursday: not a good day either for a |
| mutton kidney at Buckley's. Fried with butter, a shake of pepper. Better |
| a pork kidney at Dlugacz's. While the kettle is boiling. She lapped |
| slower, then licking the saucer clean. Why are their tongues so rough? |
| To lap better, all porous holes. Nothing she can eat? He glanced round |
| him. No. |
| |
| On quietly creaky boots he went up the staircase to the hall, paused by |
| the bedroom door. She might like something tasty. Thin bread and butter |
| she likes in the morning. Still perhaps: once in a way. |
| |
| He said softly in the bare hall: |
| |
| --I'm going round the corner. Be back in a minute. |
| |
| And when he had heard his voice say it he added: |
| |
| --You don't want anything for breakfast? |
| |
| A sleepy soft grunt answered: |
| |
| --Mn. |
| |
| No. She didn't want anything. He heard then a warm heavy sigh, softer, |
| as she turned over and the loose brass quoits of the bedstead jingled. |
| Must get those settled really. Pity. All the way from Gibraltar. |
| Forgotten any little Spanish she knew. Wonder what her father gave for |
| it. Old style. Ah yes! of course. Bought it at the governor's auction. |
| Got a short knock. Hard as nails at a bargain, old Tweedy. Yes, sir. At |
| Plevna that was. I rose from the ranks, sir, and I'm proud of it. |
| Still he had brains enough to make that corner in stamps. Now that was |
| farseeing. |
| |
| His hand took his hat from the peg over his initialled heavy overcoat |
| and his lost property office secondhand waterproof. Stamps: stickyback |
| pictures. Daresay lots of officers are in the swim too. Course they do. |
| The sweated legend in the crown of his hat told him mutely: Plasto's |
| high grade ha. He peeped quickly inside the leather headband. White slip |
| of paper. Quite safe. |
| |
| On the doorstep he felt in his hip pocket for the latchkey. Not there. |
| In the trousers I left off. Must get it. Potato I have. Creaky wardrobe. |
| No use disturbing her. She turned over sleepily that time. He pulled |
| the halldoor to after him very quietly, more, till the footleaf dropped |
| gently over the threshold, a limp lid. Looked shut. All right till I |
| come back anyhow. |
| |
| He crossed to the bright side, avoiding the loose cellarflap of number |
| seventyfive. The sun was nearing the steeple of George's church. Be a |
| warm day I fancy. Specially in these black clothes feel it more. Black |
| conducts, reflects, (refracts is it?), the heat. But I couldn't go in |
| that light suit. Make a picnic of it. His eyelids sank quietly often as |
| he walked in happy warmth. Boland's breadvan delivering with trays our |
| daily but she prefers yesterday's loaves turnovers crisp crowns hot. |
| Makes you feel young. Somewhere in the east: early morning: set off at |
| dawn. Travel round in front of the sun, steal a day's march on him. Keep |
| it up for ever never grow a day older technically. Walk along a strand, |
| strange land, come to a city gate, sentry there, old ranker too, old |
| Tweedy's big moustaches, leaning on a long kind of a spear. Wander |
| through awned streets. Turbaned faces going by. Dark caves of carpet |
| shops, big man, Turko the terrible, seated crosslegged, smoking a coiled |
| pipe. Cries of sellers in the streets. Drink water scented with fennel, |
| sherbet. Dander along all day. Might meet a robber or two. Well, |
| meet him. Getting on to sundown. The shadows of the mosques among the |
| pillars: priest with a scroll rolled up. A shiver of the trees, signal, |
| the evening wind. I pass on. Fading gold sky. A mother watches me from |
| her doorway. She calls her children home in their dark language. High |
| wall: beyond strings twanged. Night sky, moon, violet, colour of Molly's |
| new garters. Strings. Listen. A girl playing one of those instruments |
| what do you call them: dulcimers. I pass. |
| |
| Probably not a bit like it really. Kind of stuff you read: in the track |
| of the sun. Sunburst on the titlepage. He smiled, pleasing himself. What |
| Arthur Griffith said about the headpiece over the _Freeman_ leader: a |
| homerule sun rising up in the northwest from the laneway behind the bank |
| of Ireland. He prolonged his pleased smile. Ikey touch that: homerule |
| sun rising up in the north-west. |
| |
| He approached Larry O'Rourke's. From the cellar grating floated up the |
| flabby gush of porter. Through the open doorway the bar squirted out |
| whiffs of ginger, teadust, biscuitmush. Good house, however: just the |
| end of the city traffic. For instance M'Auley's down there: n. g. as |
| position. Of course if they ran a tramline along the North Circular from |
| the cattlemarket to the quays value would go up like a shot. |
| |
| Baldhead over the blind. Cute old codger. No use canvassing him for an |
| ad. Still he knows his own business best. There he is, sure enough, my |
| bold Larry, leaning against the sugarbin in his shirtsleeves watching |
| the aproned curate swab up with mop and bucket. Simon Dedalus takes him |
| off to a tee with his eyes screwed up. Do you know what I'm going to |
| tell you? What's that, Mr O'Rourke? Do you know what? The Russians, |
| they'd only be an eight o'clock breakfast for the Japanese. |
| |
| Stop and say a word: about the funeral perhaps. Sad thing about poor |
| Dignam, Mr O'Rourke. |
| |
| Turning into Dorset street he said freshly in greeting through the |
| doorway: |
| |
| --Good day, Mr O'Rourke. |
| |
| --Good day to you. |
| |
| --Lovely weather, sir. |
| |
| --'Tis all that. |
| |
| Where do they get the money? Coming up redheaded curates from the county |
| Leitrim, rinsing empties and old man in the cellar. Then, lo and behold, |
| they blossom out as Adam Findlaters or Dan Tallons. Then thin of the |
| competition. General thirst. Good puzzle would be cross Dublin without |
| passing a pub. Save it they can't. Off the drunks perhaps. Put down |
| three and carry five. What is that, a bob here and there, dribs and |
| drabs. On the wholesale orders perhaps. Doing a double shuffle with the |
| town travellers. Square it you with the boss and we'll split the job, |
| see? |
| |
| How much would that tot to off the porter in the month? Say ten barrels |
| of stuff. Say he got ten per cent off. O more. Fifteen. He passed Saint |
| Joseph's National school. Brats' clamour. Windows open. Fresh air |
| helps memory. Or a lilt. Ahbeesee defeegee kelomen opeecue rustyouvee |
| doubleyou. Boys are they? Yes. Inishturk. Inishark. Inishboffin. At |
| their joggerfry. Mine. Slieve Bloom. |
| |
| He halted before Dlugacz's window, staring at the hanks of sausages, |
| polonies, black and white. Fifteen multiplied by. The figures whitened |
| in his mind, unsolved: displeased, he let them fade. The shiny links, |
| packed with forcemeat, fed his gaze and he breathed in tranquilly the |
| lukewarm breath of cooked spicy pigs' blood. |
| |
| A kidney oozed bloodgouts on the willowpatterned dish: the last. He |
| stood by the nextdoor girl at the counter. Would she buy it too, calling |
| the items from a slip in her hand? Chapped: washingsoda. And a pound and |
| a half of Denny's sausages. His eyes rested on her vigorous hips. |
| Woods his name is. Wonder what he does. Wife is oldish. New blood. |
| No followers allowed. Strong pair of arms. Whacking a carpet on the |
| clothesline. She does whack it, by George. The way her crooked skirt |
| swings at each whack. |
| |
| The ferreteyed porkbutcher folded the sausages he had snipped off with |
| blotchy fingers, sausagepink. Sound meat there: like a stallfed heifer. |
| |
| He took a page up from the pile of cut sheets: the model farm at |
| Kinnereth on the lakeshore of Tiberias. Can become ideal winter |
| sanatorium. Moses Montefiore. I thought he was. Farmhouse, wall round |
| it, blurred cattle cropping. He held the page from him: interesting: |
| read it nearer, the title, the blurred cropping cattle, the page |
| rustling. A young white heifer. Those mornings in the cattlemarket, the |
| beasts lowing in their pens, branded sheep, flop and fall of dung, the |
| breeders in hobnailed boots trudging through the litter, slapping a palm |
| on a ripemeated hindquarter, there's a prime one, unpeeled switches in |
| their hands. He held the page aslant patiently, bending his senses and |
| his will, his soft subject gaze at rest. The crooked skirt swinging, |
| whack by whack by whack. |
| |
| The porkbutcher snapped two sheets from the pile, wrapped up her prime |
| sausages and made a red grimace. |
| |
| --Now, my miss, he said. |
| |
| She tendered a coin, smiling boldly, holding her thick wrist out. |
| |
| --Thank you, my miss. And one shilling threepence change. For you, |
| please? |
| |
| Mr Bloom pointed quickly. To catch up and walk behind her if she went |
| slowly, behind her moving hams. Pleasant to see first thing in the |
| morning. Hurry up, damn it. Make hay while the sun shines. She stood |
| outside the shop in sunlight and sauntered lazily to the right. He |
| sighed down his nose: they never understand. Sodachapped hands. Crusted |
| toenails too. Brown scapulars in tatters, defending her both ways. |
| The sting of disregard glowed to weak pleasure within his breast. For |
| another: a constable off duty cuddling her in Eccles lane. They like |
| them sizeable. Prime sausage. O please, Mr Policeman, I'm lost in the |
| wood. |
| |
| --Threepence, please. |
| |
| His hand accepted the moist tender gland and slid it into a sidepocket. |
| Then it fetched up three coins from his trousers' pocket and laid them |
| on the rubber prickles. They lay, were read quickly and quickly slid, |
| disc by disc, into the till. |
| |
| --Thank you, sir. Another time. |
| |
| A speck of eager fire from foxeyes thanked him. He withdrew his gaze |
| after an instant. No: better not: another time. |
| |
| --Good morning, he said, moving away. |
| |
| --Good morning, sir. |
| |
| No sign. Gone. What matter? |
| |
| He walked back along Dorset street, reading gravely. Agendath Netaim: |
| planters' company. To purchase waste sandy tracts from Turkish |
| government and plant with eucalyptus trees. Excellent for shade, fuel |
| and construction. Orangegroves and immense melonfields north of Jaffa. |
| You pay eighty marks and they plant a dunam of land for you with olives, |
| oranges, almonds or citrons. Olives cheaper: oranges need artificial |
| irrigation. Every year you get a sending of the crop. Your name entered |
| for life as owner in the book of the union. Can pay ten down and the |
| balance in yearly instalments. Bleibtreustrasse 34, Berlin, W. 15. |
| |
| Nothing doing. Still an idea behind it. |
| |
| He looked at the cattle, blurred in silver heat. Silverpowdered |
| olivetrees. Quiet long days: pruning, ripening. Olives are packed in |
| jars, eh? I have a few left from Andrews. Molly spitting them out. Knows |
| the taste of them now. Oranges in tissue paper packed in crates. Citrons |
| too. Wonder is poor Citron still in Saint Kevin's parade. And Mastiansky |
| with the old cither. Pleasant evenings we had then. Molly in Citron's |
| basketchair. Nice to hold, cool waxen fruit, hold in the hand, lift it |
| to the nostrils and smell the perfume. Like that, heavy, sweet, wild |
| perfume. Always the same, year after year. They fetched high prices too, |
| Moisel told me. Arbutus place: Pleasants street: pleasant old times. |
| Must be without a flaw, he said. Coming all that way: Spain, Gibraltar, |
| Mediterranean, the Levant. Crates lined up on the quayside at Jaffa, |
| chap ticking them off in a book, navvies handling them barefoot in |
| soiled dungarees. There's whatdoyoucallhim out of. How do you? Doesn't |
| see. Chap you know just to salute bit of a bore. His back is like that |
| Norwegian captain's. Wonder if I'll meet him today. Watering cart. To |
| provoke the rain. On earth as it is in heaven. |
| |
| A cloud began to cover the sun slowly, wholly. Grey. Far. |
| |
| No, not like that. A barren land, bare waste. Vulcanic lake, the dead |
| sea: no fish, weedless, sunk deep in the earth. No wind could lift those |
| waves, grey metal, poisonous foggy waters. Brimstone they called it |
| raining down: the cities of the plain: Sodom, Gomorrah, Edom. All dead |
| names. A dead sea in a dead land, grey and old. Old now. It bore the |
| oldest, the first race. A bent hag crossed from Cassidy's, clutching a |
| naggin bottle by the neck. The oldest people. Wandered far away over |
| all the earth, captivity to captivity, multiplying, dying, being born |
| everywhere. It lay there now. Now it could bear no more. Dead: an old |
| woman's: the grey sunken cunt of the world. |
| |
| Desolation. |
| |
| Grey horror seared his flesh. Folding the page into his pocket he turned |
| into Eccles street, hurrying homeward. Cold oils slid along his veins, |
| chilling his blood: age crusting him with a salt cloak. Well, I am here |
| now. Yes, I am here now. Morning mouth bad images. Got up wrong side of |
| the bed. Must begin again those Sandow's exercises. On the hands down. |
| Blotchy brown brick houses. Number eighty still unlet. Why is that? |
| Valuation is only twenty-eight. Towers, Battersby, North, MacArthur: |
| parlour windows plastered with bills. Plasters on a sore eye. To smell |
| the gentle smoke of tea, fume of the pan, sizzling butter. Be near her |
| ample bedwarmed flesh. Yes, yes. |
| |
| Quick warm sunlight came running from Berkeley road, swiftly, in slim |
| sandals, along the brightening footpath. Runs, she runs to meet me, a |
| girl with gold hair on the wind. |
| |
| Two letters and a card lay on the hallfloor. He stooped and gathered |
| them. Mrs Marion Bloom. His quickened heart slowed at once. Bold hand. |
| Mrs Marion. |
| |
| --Poldy! |
| |
| Entering the bedroom he halfclosed his eyes and walked through warm |
| yellow twilight towards her tousled head. |
| |
| --Who are the letters for? |
| |
| He looked at them. Mullingar. Milly. |
| |
| --A letter for me from Milly, he said carefully, and a card to you. And |
| a letter for you. |
| |
| He laid her card and letter on the twill bedspread near the curve of her |
| knees. |
| |
| --Do you want the blind up? |
| |
| Letting the blind up by gentle tugs halfway his backward eye saw her |
| glance at the letter and tuck it under her pillow. |
| |
| --That do? he asked, turning. |
| |
| She was reading the card, propped on her elbow. |
| |
| --She got the things, she said. |
| |
| He waited till she had laid the card aside and curled herself back |
| slowly with a snug sigh. |
| |
| --Hurry up with that tea, she said. I'm parched. |
| |
| --The kettle is boiling, he said. |
| |
| But he delayed to clear the chair: her striped petticoat, tossed soiled |
| linen: and lifted all in an armful on to the foot of the bed. |
| |
| As he went down the kitchen stairs she called: |
| |
| --Poldy! |
| |
| --What? |
| |
| --Scald the teapot. |
| |
| On the boil sure enough: a plume of steam from the spout. He scalded and |
| rinsed out the teapot and put in four full spoons of tea, tilting the |
| kettle then to let the water flow in. Having set it to draw he took off |
| the kettle, crushed the pan flat on the live coals and watched the lump |
| of butter slide and melt. While he unwrapped the kidney the cat mewed |
| hungrily against him. Give her too much meat she won't mouse. Say they |
| won't eat pork. Kosher. Here. He let the bloodsmeared paper fall to |
| her and dropped the kidney amid the sizzling butter sauce. Pepper. He |
| sprinkled it through his fingers ringwise from the chipped eggcup. |
| |
| Then he slit open his letter, glancing down the page and over. Thanks: |
| new tam: Mr Coghlan: lough Owel picnic: young student: Blazes Boylan's |
| seaside girls. |
| |
| The tea was drawn. He filled his own moustachecup, sham crown |
| |
| Derby, smiling. Silly Milly's birthday gift. Only five she was then. No, |
| wait: four. I gave her the amberoid necklace she broke. Putting pieces |
| of folded brown paper in the letterbox for her. He smiled, pouring. |
| |
| _O, Milly Bloom, you are my darling. |
| You are my lookingglass from night to morning. |
| I'd rather have you without a farthing |
| Than Katey Keogh with her ass and garden._ |
| |
| |
| Poor old professor Goodwin. Dreadful old case. Still he was a courteous |
| old chap. Oldfashioned way he used to bow Molly off the platform. And |
| the little mirror in his silk hat. The night Milly brought it into |
| the parlour. O, look what I found in professor Goodwin's hat! All we |
| laughed. Sex breaking out even then. Pert little piece she was. |
| |
| He prodded a fork into the kidney and slapped it over: then fitted the |
| teapot on the tray. Its hump bumped as he took it up. Everything on |
| it? Bread and butter, four, sugar, spoon, her cream. Yes. He carried it |
| upstairs, his thumb hooked in the teapot handle. |
| |
| Nudging the door open with his knee he carried the tray in and set it on |
| the chair by the bedhead. |
| |
| --What a time you were! she said. |
| |
| She set the brasses jingling as she raised herself briskly, an elbow on |
| the pillow. He looked calmly down on her bulk and between her large soft |
| bubs, sloping within her nightdress like a shegoat's udder. The warmth |
| of her couched body rose on the air, mingling with the fragrance of the |
| tea she poured. |
| |
| A strip of torn envelope peeped from under the dimpled pillow. In the |
| act of going he stayed to straighten the bedspread. |
| |
| --Who was the letter from? he asked. |
| |
| Bold hand. Marion. |
| |
| --O, Boylan, she said. He's bringing the programme. |
| |
| --What are you singing? |
| |
| --_La ci darem_ with J. C. Doyle, she said, and _Love's Old Sweet Song_. |
| |
| Her full lips, drinking, smiled. Rather stale smell that incense leaves |
| next day. Like foul flowerwater. |
| |
| --Would you like the window open a little? |
| |
| She doubled a slice of bread into her mouth, asking: |
| |
| --What time is the funeral? |
| |
| --Eleven, I think, he answered. I didn't see the paper. |
| |
| Following the pointing of her finger he took up a leg of her soiled |
| drawers from the bed. No? Then, a twisted grey garter looped round a |
| stocking: rumpled, shiny sole. |
| |
| --No: that book. |
| |
| Other stocking. Her petticoat. |
| |
| --It must have fell down, she said. |
| |
| He felt here and there. _Voglio e non vorrei_. Wonder if she pronounces |
| that right: _voglio_. Not in the bed. Must have slid down. He stooped |
| and lifted the valance. The book, fallen, sprawled against the bulge of |
| the orangekeyed chamberpot. |
| |
| --Show here, she said. I put a mark in it. There's a word I wanted to |
| ask you. |
| |
| She swallowed a draught of tea from her cup held by nothandle and, |
| having wiped her fingertips smartly on the blanket, began to search the |
| text with the hairpin till she reached the word. |
| |
| --Met him what? he asked. |
| |
| --Here, she said. What does that mean? |
| |
| He leaned downward and read near her polished thumbnail. |
| |
| --Metempsychosis? |
| |
| --Yes. Who's he when he's at home? |
| |
| --Metempsychosis, he said, frowning. It's Greek: from the Greek. That |
| means the transmigration of souls. |
| |
| --O, rocks! she said. Tell us in plain words. |
| |
| He smiled, glancing askance at her mocking eyes. The same young eyes. |
| The first night after the charades. Dolphin's Barn. He turned over |
| the smudged pages. _Ruby: the Pride of the Ring_. Hello. Illustration. |
| Fierce Italian with carriagewhip. Must be Ruby pride of the on the floor |
| naked. Sheet kindly lent. _The monster Maffei desisted and flung his |
| victim from him with an oath_. Cruelty behind it all. Doped animals. |
| Trapeze at Hengler's. Had to look the other way. Mob gaping. Break your |
| neck and we'll break our sides. Families of them. Bone them young so |
| they metamspychosis. That we live after death. Our souls. That a man's |
| soul after he dies. Dignam's soul... |
| |
| --Did you finish it? he asked. |
| |
| --Yes, she said. There's nothing smutty in it. Is she in love with the |
| first fellow all the time? |
| |
| --Never read it. Do you want another? |
| |
| --Yes. Get another of Paul de Kock's. Nice name he has. |
| |
| She poured more tea into her cup, watching it flow sideways. |
| |
| Must get that Capel street library book renewed or they'll write to |
| Kearney, my guarantor. Reincarnation: that's the word. |
| |
| --Some people believe, he said, that we go on living in another body |
| after death, that we lived before. They call it reincarnation. That |
| we all lived before on the earth thousands of years ago or some other |
| planet. They say we have forgotten it. Some say they remember their past |
| lives. |
| |
| The sluggish cream wound curdling spirals through her tea. Bette remind |
| her of the word: metempsychosis. An example would be better. An example? |
| |
| The _Bath of the Nymph_ over the bed. Given away with the Easter number |
| of _Photo Bits_: Splendid masterpiece in art colours. Tea before you |
| put milk in. Not unlike her with her hair down: slimmer. Three and six |
| I gave for the frame. She said it would look nice over the bed. Naked |
| nymphs: Greece: and for instance all the people that lived then. |
| |
| He turned the pages back. |
| |
| --Metempsychosis, he said, is what the ancient Greeks called it. They |
| used to believe you could be changed into an animal or a tree, for |
| instance. What they called nymphs, for example. |
| |
| Her spoon ceased to stir up the sugar. She gazed straight before her, |
| inhaling through her arched nostrils. |
| |
| --There's a smell of burn, she said. Did you leave anything on the fire? |
| |
| --The kidney! he cried suddenly. |
| |
| He fitted the book roughly into his inner pocket and, stubbing his toes |
| against the broken commode, hurried out towards the smell, stepping |
| hastily down the stairs with a flurried stork's legs. Pungent smoke shot |
| up in an angry jet from a side of the pan. By prodding a prong of the |
| fork under the kidney he detached it and turned it turtle on its back. |
| Only a little burnt. He tossed it off the pan on to a plate and let the |
| scanty brown gravy trickle over it. |
| |
| Cup of tea now. He sat down, cut and buttered a slice of the loaf. |
| He shore away the burnt flesh and flung it to the cat. Then he put a |
| forkful into his mouth, chewing with discernment the toothsome pliant |
| meat. Done to a turn. A mouthful of tea. Then he cut away dies of bread, |
| sopped one in the gravy and put it in his mouth. What was that about |
| some young student and a picnic? He creased out the letter at his side, |
| reading it slowly as he chewed, sopping another die of bread in the |
| gravy and raising it to his mouth. |
| |
| Dearest Papli |
| |
| Thanks ever so much for the lovely birthday present. It suits me |
| splendid. Everyone says I am quite the belle in my new tam. I got |
| mummy's Iovely box of creams and am writing. They are lovely. I am |
| getting on swimming in the photo business now. Mr Coghlan took one of me |
| and Mrs. Will send when developed. We did great biz yesterday. Fair day |
| and all the beef to the heels were in. We are going to lough Owel on |
| Monday with a few friends to make a scrap picnic. Give my love to |
| mummy and to yourself a big kiss and thanks. I hear them at the piano |
| downstairs. There is to be a concert in the Greville Arms on Saturday. |
| There is a young student comes here some evenings named Bannon his |
| cousins or something are big swells and he sings Boylan's (I was on the |
| pop of writing Blazes Boylan's) song about those seaside girls. Tell him |
| silly Milly sends my best respects. I must now close with fondest love |
| |
| Your fond daughter, MILLY. |
| |
| P. S. Excuse bad writing am in hurry. Byby. M. |
| |
| Fifteen yesterday. Curious, fifteenth of the month too. Her first |
| birthday away from home. Separation. Remember the summer morning she |
| was born, running to knock up Mrs Thornton in Denzille street. Jolly old |
| woman. Lot of babies she must have helped into the world. She knew from |
| the first poor little Rudy wouldn't live. Well, God is good, sir. She |
| knew at once. He would be eleven now if he had lived. |
| |
| His vacant face stared pityingly at the postscript. Excuse bad writing. |
| Hurry. Piano downstairs. Coming out of her shell. Row with her in the |
| XL Cafe about the bracelet. Wouldn't eat her cakes or speak or look. |
| Saucebox. He sopped other dies of bread in the gravy and ate piece after |
| piece of kidney. Twelve and six a week. Not much. Still, she might do |
| worse. Music hall stage. Young student. He drank a draught of cooler tea |
| to wash down his meal. Then he read the letter again: twice. |
| |
| O, well: she knows how to mind herself. But if not? No, nothing has |
| happened. Of course it might. Wait in any case till it does. A wild |
| piece of goods. Her slim legs running up the staircase. Destiny. |
| Ripening now. |
| |
| Vain: very. |
| |
| He smiled with troubled affection at the kitchen window. Day I caught |
| her in the street pinching her cheeks to make them red. Anemic a little. |
| Was given milk too long. On the ERIN'S KING that day round the Kish. |
| Damned old tub pitching about. Not a bit funky. Her pale blue scarf |
| loose in the wind with her hair. _All dimpled cheeks and curls, Your |
| head it simply swirls._ |
| |
| |
| Seaside girls. Torn envelope. Hands stuck in his trousers' pockets, |
| jarvey off for the day, singing. Friend of the family. Swurls, he says. |
| Pier with lamps, summer evening, band, |
| |
| _Those girls, those girls, |
| Those lovely seaside girls._ |
| |
| |
| Milly too. Young kisses: the first. Far away now past. Mrs Marion. |
| Reading, lying back now, counting the strands of her hair, smiling, |
| braiding. |
| |
| A soft qualm, regret, flowed down his backbone, increasing. Will happen, |
| yes. Prevent. Useless: can't move. Girl's sweet light lips. Will happen |
| too. He felt the flowing qualm spread over him. Useless to move now. |
| Lips kissed, kissing, kissed. Full gluey woman's lips. |
| |
| Better where she is down there: away. Occupy her. Wanted a dog to pass |
| the time. Might take a trip down there. August bank holiday, only two |
| and six return. Six weeks off, however. Might work a press pass. Or |
| through M'Coy. |
| |
| The cat, having cleaned all her fur, returned to the meatstained paper, |
| nosed at it and stalked to the door. She looked back at him, mewing. |
| Wants to go out. Wait before a door sometime it will open. Let her wait. |
| Has the fidgets. Electric. Thunder in the air. Was washing at her ear |
| with her back to the fire too. |
| |
| He felt heavy, full: then a gentle loosening of his bowels. He stood up, |
| undoing the waistband of his trousers. The cat mewed to him. |
| |
| --Miaow! he said in answer. Wait till I'm ready. |
| |
| Heaviness: hot day coming. Too much trouble to fag up the stairs to the |
| landing. |
| |
| A paper. He liked to read at stool. Hope no ape comes knocking just as |
| I'm. |
| |
| In the tabledrawer he found an old number of _Titbits_. He folded it |
| under his armpit, went to the door and opened it. The cat went up in |
| soft bounds. Ah, wanted to go upstairs, curl up in a ball on the bed. |
| |
| Listening, he heard her voice: |
| |
| --Come, come, pussy. Come. |
| |
| He went out through the backdoor into the garden: stood to listen |
| towards the next garden. No sound. Perhaps hanging clothes out to dry. |
| The maid was in the garden. Fine morning. |
| |
| He bent down to regard a lean file of spearmint growing by the wall. |
| Make a summerhouse here. Scarlet runners. Virginia creepers. Want to |
| manure the whole place over, scabby soil. A coat of liver of sulphur. |
| All soil like that without dung. Household slops. Loam, what is this |
| that is? The hens in the next garden: their droppings are very good top |
| dressing. Best of all though are the cattle, especially when they are |
| fed on those oilcakes. Mulch of dung. Best thing to clean ladies' kid |
| gloves. Dirty cleans. Ashes too. Reclaim the whole place. Grow peas in |
| that corner there. Lettuce. Always have fresh greens then. Still gardens |
| have their drawbacks. That bee or bluebottle here Whitmonday. |
| |
| He walked on. Where is my hat, by the way? Must have put it back on the |
| peg. Or hanging up on the floor. Funny I don't remember that. Hallstand |
| too full. Four umbrellas, her raincloak. Picking up the letters. |
| Drago's shopbell ringing. Queer I was just thinking that moment. Brown |
| brillantined hair over his collar. Just had a wash and brushup. Wonder |
| have I time for a bath this morning. Tara street. Chap in the paybox |
| there got away James Stephens, they say. O'Brien. |
| |
| Deep voice that fellow Dlugacz has. Agendath what is it? Now, my miss. |
| Enthusiast. |
| |
| He kicked open the crazy door of the jakes. Better be careful not to get |
| these trousers dirty for the funeral. He went in, bowing his head |
| under the low lintel. Leaving the door ajar, amid the stench of mouldy |
| limewash and stale cobwebs he undid his braces. Before sitting down he |
| peered through a chink up at the nextdoor windows. The king was in his |
| countinghouse. Nobody. |
| |
| Asquat on the cuckstool he folded out his paper, turning its pages over |
| on his bared knees. Something new and easy. No great hurry. Keep it a |
| bit. Our prize titbit: _Matcham's Masterstroke_. Written by Mr Philip |
| Beaufoy, Playgoers' Club, London. Payment at the rate of one guinea |
| a column has been made to the writer. Three and a half. Three pounds |
| three. Three pounds, thirteen and six. |
| |
| Quietly he read, restraining himself, the first column and, yielding but |
| resisting, began the second. Midway, his last resistance yielding, he |
| allowed his bowels to ease themselves quietly as he read, reading still |
| patiently that slight constipation of yesterday quite gone. Hope it's |
| not too big bring on piles again. No, just right. So. Ah! Costive. One |
| tabloid of cascara sagrada. Life might be so. It did not move or touch |
| him but it was something quick and neat. Print anything now. Silly |
| season. He read on, seated calm above his own rising smell. Neat |
| certainly. _Matcham often thinks of the masterstroke by which he won the |
| laughing witch who now_. Begins and ends morally. _Hand in hand_. Smart. |
| He glanced back through what he had read and, while feeling his water |
| flow quietly, he envied kindly Mr Beaufoy who had written it and |
| received payment of three pounds, thirteen and six. |
| |
| Might manage a sketch. By Mr and Mrs L. M. Bloom. Invent a story for |
| some proverb. Which? Time I used to try jotting down on my cuff what she |
| said dressing. Dislike dressing together. Nicked myself shaving. Biting |
| her nether lip, hooking the placket of her skirt. Timing her. 9.l5. |
| Did Roberts pay you yet? 9.20. What had Gretta Conroy on? 9.23. What |
| possessed me to buy this comb? 9.24. I'm swelled after that cabbage. A |
| speck of dust on the patent leather of her boot. |
| |
| Rubbing smartly in turn each welt against her stockinged calf. Morning |
| after the bazaar dance when May's band played Ponchielli's dance of the |
| hours. Explain that: morning hours, noon, then evening coming on, then |
| night hours. Washing her teeth. That was the first night. Her head |
| dancing. Her fansticks clicking. Is that Boylan well off? He has money. |
| Why? I noticed he had a good rich smell off his breath dancing. No use |
| humming then. Allude to it. Strange kind of music that last night. The |
| mirror was in shadow. She rubbed her handglass briskly on her woollen |
| vest against her full wagging bub. Peering into it. Lines in her eyes. |
| It wouldn't pan out somehow. |
| |
| Evening hours, girls in grey gauze. Night hours then: black with daggers |
| and eyemasks. Poetical idea: pink, then golden, then grey, then black. |
| Still, true to life also. Day: then the night. |
| |
| He tore away half the prize story sharply and wiped himself with it. |
| Then he girded up his trousers, braced and buttoned himself. He pulled |
| back the jerky shaky door of the jakes and came forth from the gloom |
| into the air. |
| |
| In the bright light, lightened and cooled in limb, he eyed carefully his |
| black trousers: the ends, the knees, the houghs of the knees. What time |
| is the funeral? Better find out in the paper. |
| |
| A creak and a dark whirr in the air high up. The bells of George's |
| church. They tolled the hour: loud dark iron. |
| |
| _Heigho! Heigho! |
| Heigho! Heigho! |
| Heigho! Heigho!_ |
| |
| |
| Quarter to. There again: the overtone following through the air, third. |
| |
| Poor Dignam! |
| |
| |
| By lorries along sir John Rogerson's quay Mr Bloom walked soberly, past |
| Windmill lane, Leask's the linseed crusher, the postal telegraph office. |
| Could have given that address too. And past the sailors' home. He turned |
| from the morning noises of the quayside and walked through Lime street. |
| By Brady's cottages a boy for the skins lolled, his bucket of offal |
| linked, smoking a chewed fagbutt. A smaller girl with scars of eczema |
| on her forehead eyed him, listlessly holding her battered caskhoop. Tell |
| him if he smokes he won't grow. O let him! His life isn't such a bed of |
| roses. Waiting outside pubs to bring da home. Come home to ma, da. |
| Slack hour: won't be many there. He crossed Townsend street, passed |
| the frowning face of Bethel. El, yes: house of: Aleph, Beth. And past |
| Nichols' the undertaker. At eleven it is. Time enough. Daresay Corny |
| Kelleher bagged the job for O'Neill's. Singing with his eyes shut. |
| Corny. Met her once in the park. In the dark. What a lark. Police tout. |
| Her name and address she then told with my tooraloom tooraloom tay. |
| O, surely he bagged it. Bury him cheap in a whatyoumaycall. With my |
| tooraloom, tooraloom, tooraloom, tooraloom. |
| |
| |
| In Westland row he halted before the window of the Belfast and Oriental |
| Tea Company and read the legends of leadpapered packets: choice blend, |
| finest quality, family tea. Rather warm. Tea. Must get some from Tom |
| Kernan. Couldn't ask him at a funeral, though. While his eyes still read |
| blandly he took off his hat quietly inhaling his hairoil and sent his |
| right hand with slow grace over his brow and hair. Very warm morning. |
| Under their dropped lids his eyes found the tiny bow of the leather |
| headband inside his high grade ha. Just there. His right hand came down |
| into the bowl of his hat. His fingers found quickly a card behind the |
| headband and transferred it to his waistcoat pocket. |
| |
| So warm. His right hand once more more slowly went over his brow and |
| hair. Then he put on his hat again, relieved: and read again: choice |
| blend, made of the finest Ceylon brands. The far east. Lovely spot it |
| must be: the garden of the world, big lazy leaves to float about on, |
| cactuses, flowery meads, snaky lianas they call them. Wonder is it like |
| that. Those Cinghalese lobbing about in the sun in _dolce far niente_, |
| not doing a hand's turn all day. Sleep six months out of twelve. Too hot |
| to quarrel. Influence of the climate. Lethargy. Flowers of idleness. The |
| air feeds most. Azotes. Hothouse in Botanic gardens. Sensitive plants. |
| Waterlilies. Petals too tired to. Sleeping sickness in the air. Walk on |
| roseleaves. Imagine trying to eat tripe and cowheel. Where was the chap |
| I saw in that picture somewhere? Ah yes, in the dead sea floating on his |
| back, reading a book with a parasol open. Couldn't sink if you tried: so |
| thick with salt. Because the weight of the water, no, the weight of |
| the body in the water is equal to the weight of the what? Or is it the |
| volume is equal to the weight? It's a law something like that. Vance in |
| High school cracking his fingerjoints, teaching. The college curriculum. |
| Cracking curriculum. What is weight really when you say the weight? |
| Thirtytwo feet per second per second. Law of falling bodies: per second |
| per second. They all fall to the ground. The earth. It's the force of |
| gravity of the earth is the weight. |
| |
| He turned away and sauntered across the road. How did she walk with her |
| sausages? Like that something. As he walked he took the folded _Freeman_ |
| from his sidepocket, unfolded it, rolled it lengthwise in a baton and |
| tapped it at each sauntering step against his trouserleg. Careless air: |
| just drop in to see. Per second per second. Per second for every second |
| it means. From the curbstone he darted a keen glance through the door of |
| the postoffice. Too late box. Post here. No-one. In. |
| |
| He handed the card through the brass grill. |
| |
| --Are there any letters for me? he asked. |
| |
| While the postmistress searched a pigeonhole he gazed at the recruiting |
| poster with soldiers of all arms on parade: and held the tip of his |
| baton against his nostrils, smelling freshprinted rag paper. No answer |
| probably. Went too far last time. |
| |
| The postmistress handed him back through the grill his card with a |
| letter. He thanked her and glanced rapidly at the typed envelope. |
| |
| Henry Flower Esq, c/o P. O. Westland Row, City. |
| |
| Answered anyhow. He slipped card and letter into his sidepocket, |
| reviewing again the soldiers on parade. Where's old Tweedy's regiment? |
| Castoff soldier. There: bearskin cap and hackle plume. No, he's a |
| grenadier. Pointed cuffs. There he is: royal Dublin fusiliers. Redcoats. |
| Too showy. That must be why the women go after them. Uniform. Easier to |
| enlist and drill. Maud Gonne's letter about taking them off O'Connell |
| street at night: disgrace to our Irish capital. Griffith's paper is on |
| the same tack now: an army rotten with venereal disease: overseas or |
| halfseasover empire. Half baked they look: hypnotised like. Eyes front. |
| Mark time. Table: able. Bed: ed. The King's own. Never see him dressed |
| up as a fireman or a bobby. A mason, yes. |
| |
| He strolled out of the postoffice and turned to the right. Talk: as if |
| that would mend matters. His hand went into his pocket and a forefinger |
| felt its way under the flap of the envelope, ripping it open in jerks. |
| Women will pay a lot of heed, I don't think. His fingers drew forth the |
| letter the letter and crumpled the envelope in his pocket. Something |
| pinned on: photo perhaps. Hair? No. |
| |
| M'Coy. Get rid of him quickly. Take me out of my way. Hate company when |
| you. |
| |
| --Hello, Bloom. Where are you off to? |
| |
| --Hello, M'Coy. Nowhere in particular. |
| |
| --How's the body? |
| |
| --Fine. How are you? |
| |
| --Just keeping alive, M'Coy said. |
| |
| His eyes on the black tie and clothes he asked with low respect: |
| |
| --Is there any... no trouble I hope? I see you're... |
| |
| --O, no, Mr Bloom said. Poor Dignam, you know. The funeral is today. |
| |
| --To be sure, poor fellow. So it is. What time? |
| |
| A photo it isn't. A badge maybe. |
| |
| --E... eleven, Mr Bloom answered. |
| |
| --I must try to get out there, M'Coy said. Eleven, is it? I only heard |
| it last night. Who was telling me? Holohan. You know Hoppy? |
| |
| --I know. |
| |
| Mr Bloom gazed across the road at the outsider drawn up before the door |
| of the Grosvenor. The porter hoisted the valise up on the well. She |
| stood still, waiting, while the man, husband, brother, like her, |
| searched his pockets for change. Stylish kind of coat with that roll |
| collar, warm for a day like this, looks like blanketcloth. Careless |
| stand of her with her hands in those patch pockets. Like that haughty |
| creature at the polo match. Women all for caste till you touch the spot. |
| Handsome is and handsome does. Reserved about to yield. The honourable |
| Mrs and Brutus is an honourable man. Possess her once take the starch |
| out of her. |
| |
| --I was with Bob Doran, he's on one of his periodical bends, and what do |
| you call him Bantam Lyons. Just down there in Conway's we were. |
| |
| Doran Lyons in Conway's. She raised a gloved hand to her hair. In came |
| Hoppy. Having a wet. Drawing back his head and gazing far from beneath |
| his vailed eyelids he saw the bright fawn skin shine in the glare, the |
| braided drums. Clearly I can see today. Moisture about gives long sight |
| perhaps. Talking of one thing or another. Lady's hand. Which side will |
| she get up? |
| |
| --And he said: _Sad thing about our poor friend Paddy! What Paddy?_ I |
| said. _Poor little Paddy Dignam_, he said. |
| |
| Off to the country: Broadstone probably. High brown boots with laces |
| dangling. Wellturned foot. What is he foostering over that change for? |
| Sees me looking. Eye out for other fellow always. Good fallback. Two |
| strings to her bow. |
| |
| --_Why?_ I said. _What's wrong with him?_ I said. |
| |
| Proud: rich: silk stockings. |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| He moved a little to the side of M'Coy's talking head. Getting up in a |
| minute. |
| |
| --_What's wrong with him_? He said. _He's dead_, he said. And, faith, |
| he filled up. _Is it Paddy Dignam_? I said. I couldn't believe it when I |
| heard it. I was with him no later than Friday last or Thursday was it in |
| the Arch. _Yes,_ he said. _He's gone. He died on Monday, poor fellow_. |
| Watch! Watch! Silk flash rich stockings white. Watch! |
| |
| A heavy tramcar honking its gong slewed between. |
| |
| Lost it. Curse your noisy pugnose. Feels locked out of it. Paradise and |
| the peri. Always happening like that. The very moment. Girl in Eustace |
| street hallway Monday was it settling her garter. Her friend covering |
| the display of _esprit de corps_. Well, what are you gaping at? |
| |
| --Yes, yes, Mr Bloom said after a dull sigh. Another gone. |
| |
| --One of the best, M'Coy said. |
| |
| The tram passed. They drove off towards the Loop Line bridge, her rich |
| gloved hand on the steel grip. Flicker, flicker: the laceflare of her |
| hat in the sun: flicker, flick. |
| |
| --Wife well, I suppose? M'Coy's changed voice said. |
| |
| --O, yes, Mr Bloom said. Tiptop, thanks. |
| |
| He unrolled the newspaper baton idly and read idly: |
| |
| _What is home without Plumtree's Potted Meat? Incomplete With it an |
| abode of bliss._ |
| |
| --My missus has just got an engagement. At least it's not settled yet. |
| |
| Valise tack again. By the way no harm. I'm off that, thanks. |
| |
| Mr Bloom turned his largelidded eyes with unhasty friendliness. |
| |
| --My wife too, he said. She's going to sing at a swagger affair in the |
| Ulster Hall, Belfast, on the twenty-fifth. |
| |
| --That so? M'Coy said. Glad to hear that, old man. Who's getting it up? |
| |
| Mrs Marion Bloom. Not up yet. Queen was in her bedroom eating bread and. |
| No book. Blackened court cards laid along her thigh by sevens. Dark lady |
| and fair man. Letter. Cat furry black ball. Torn strip of envelope. |
| |
| _Love's |
| Old |
| Sweet |
| Song |
| Comes lo-ove's old..._ |
| |
| --It's a kind of a tour, don't you see, Mr Bloom said thoughtfully. |
| _Sweeeet song_. There's a committee formed. Part shares and part |
| profits. |
| |
| M'Coy nodded, picking at his moustache stubble. |
| |
| --O, well, he said. That's good news. |
| |
| He moved to go. |
| |
| --Well, glad to see you looking fit, he said. Meet you knocking around. |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| --Tell you what, M'Coy said. You might put down my name at the funeral, |
| will you? I'd like to go but I mightn't be able, you see. There's a |
| drowning case at Sandycove may turn up and then the coroner and myself |
| would have to go down if the body is found. You just shove in my name if |
| I'm not there, will you? |
| |
| --I'll do that, Mr Bloom said, moving to get off. That'll be all right. |
| |
| --Right, M'Coy said brightly. Thanks, old man. I'd go if I possibly |
| could. Well, tolloll. Just C. P. M'Coy will do. |
| |
| --That will be done, Mr Bloom answered firmly. |
| |
| Didn't catch me napping that wheeze. The quick touch. Soft mark. I'd |
| like my job. Valise I have a particular fancy for. Leather. Capped |
| corners, rivetted edges, double action lever lock. Bob Cowley lent him |
| his for the Wicklow regatta concert last year and never heard tidings of |
| it from that good day to this. |
| |
| Mr Bloom, strolling towards Brunswick street, smiled. My missus has just |
| got an. Reedy freckled soprano. Cheeseparing nose. Nice enough in its |
| way: for a little ballad. No guts in it. You and me, don't you know: |
| in the same boat. Softsoaping. Give you the needle that would. Can't |
| he hear the difference? Think he's that way inclined a bit. Against |
| my grain somehow. Thought that Belfast would fetch him. I hope that |
| smallpox up there doesn't get worse. Suppose she wouldn't let herself be |
| vaccinated again. Your wife and my wife. |
| |
| Wonder is he pimping after me? |
| |
| Mr Bloom stood at the corner, his eyes wandering over the multicoloured |
| hoardings. Cantrell and Cochrane's Ginger Ale (Aromatic). Clery's Summer |
| Sale. No, he's going on straight. Hello. _Leah_ tonight. Mrs Bandmann |
| Palmer. Like to see her again in that. _Hamlet_ she played last night. |
| Male impersonator. Perhaps he was a woman. Why Ophelia committed |
| suicide. Poor papa! How he used to talk of Kate Bateman in that. Outside |
| the Adelphi in London waited all the afternoon to get in. Year before |
| I was born that was: sixtyfive. And Ristori in Vienna. What is this the |
| right name is? By Mosenthal it is. Rachel, is it? No. The scene he was |
| always talking about where the old blind Abraham recognises the voice |
| and puts his fingers on his face. |
| |
| Nathan's voice! His son's voice! I hear the voice of Nathan who left his |
| father to die of grief and misery in my arms, who left the house of his |
| father and left the God of his father. |
| |
| Every word is so deep, Leopold. |
| |
| Poor papa! Poor man! I'm glad I didn't go into the room to look at his |
| face. That day! O, dear! O, dear! Ffoo! Well, perhaps it was best for |
| him. |
| |
| Mr Bloom went round the corner and passed the drooping nags of the |
| hazard. No use thinking of it any more. Nosebag time. Wish I hadn't met |
| that M'Coy fellow. |
| |
| He came nearer and heard a crunching of gilded oats, the gently champing |
| teeth. Their full buck eyes regarded him as he went by, amid the sweet |
| oaten reek of horsepiss. Their Eldorado. Poor jugginses! Damn all they |
| know or care about anything with their long noses stuck in nosebags. |
| Too full for words. Still they get their feed all right and their doss. |
| Gelded too: a stump of black guttapercha wagging limp between their |
| haunches. Might be happy all the same that way. Good poor brutes they |
| look. Still their neigh can be very irritating. |
| |
| He drew the letter from his pocket and folded it into the newspaper he |
| carried. Might just walk into her here. The lane is safer. |
| |
| He passed the cabman's shelter. Curious the life of drifting cabbies. |
| All weathers, all places, time or setdown, no will of their own. _Voglio |
| e non_. Like to give them an odd cigarette. Sociable. Shout a few flying |
| syllables as they pass. He hummed: |
| |
| _La ci darem la mano |
| La la lala la la._ |
| |
| He turned into Cumberland street and, going on some paces, halted in the |
| lee of the station wall. No-one. Meade's timberyard. Piled balks. Ruins |
| and tenements. With careful tread he passed over a hopscotch court with |
| its forgotten pickeystone. Not a sinner. Near the timberyard a squatted |
| child at marbles, alone, shooting the taw with a cunnythumb. A wise |
| tabby, a blinking sphinx, watched from her warm sill. Pity to disturb |
| them. Mohammed cut a piece out of his mantle not to wake her. Open it. |
| And once I played marbles when I went to that old dame's school. She |
| liked mignonette. Mrs Ellis's. And Mr? He opened the letter within the |
| newspaper. |
| |
| A flower. I think it's a. A yellow flower with flattened petals. Not |
| annoyed then? What does she say? |
| |
| Dear Henry |
| |
| I got your last letter to me and thank you very much for it. I am sorry |
| you did not like my last letter. Why did you enclose the stamps? I am |
| awfully angry with you. I do wish I could punish you for that. I called |
| you naughty boy because I do not like that other world. Please tell me |
| what is the real meaning of that word? Are you not happy in your home |
| you poor little naughty boy? I do wish I could do something for you. |
| Please tell me what you think of poor me. I often think of the beautiful |
| name you have. Dear Henry, when will we meet? I think of you so often |
| you have no idea. I have never felt myself so much drawn to a man as |
| you. I feel so bad about. Please write me a long letter and tell me |
| more. Remember if you do not I will punish you. So now you know what I |
| will do to you, you naughty boy, if you do not wrote. O how I long to |
| meet you. Henry dear, do not deny my request before my patience are |
| exhausted. Then I will tell you all. Goodbye now, naughty darling, I |
| have such a bad headache. today. and write _by return_ to your longing |
| |
| Martha |
| |
| P. S. Do tell me what kind of perfume does your wife use. I want to |
| know. |
| |
| He tore the flower gravely from its pinhold smelt its almost no smell |
| and placed it in his heart pocket. Language of flowers. They like it |
| because no-one can hear. Or a poison bouquet to strike him down. Then |
| walking slowly forward he read the letter again, murmuring here and |
| there a word. Angry tulips with you darling manflower punish your cactus |
| if you don't please poor forgetmenot how I long violets to dear roses |
| when we soon anemone meet all naughty nightstalk wife Martha's perfume. |
| Having read it all he took it from the newspaper and put it back in his |
| sidepocket. |
| |
| Weak joy opened his lips. Changed since the first letter. Wonder did she |
| wrote it herself. Doing the indignant: a girl of good family like me, |
| respectable character. Could meet one Sunday after the rosary. Thank |
| you: not having any. Usual love scrimmage. Then running round corners. |
| Bad as a row with Molly. Cigar has a cooling effect. Narcotic. Go |
| further next time. Naughty boy: punish: afraid of words, of course. |
| Brutal, why not? Try it anyhow. A bit at a time. |
| |
| Fingering still the letter in his pocket he drew the pin out of it. |
| Common pin, eh? He threw it on the road. Out of her clothes somewhere: |
| pinned together. Queer the number of pins they always have. No roses |
| without thorns. |
| |
| Flat Dublin voices bawled in his head. Those two sluts that night in the |
| Coombe, linked together in the rain. |
| |
| _O, Mary lost the pin of her drawers. |
| She didn't know what to do |
| To keep it up |
| To keep it up._ |
| |
| It? Them. Such a bad headache. Has her roses probably. Or sitting all |
| day typing. Eyefocus bad for stomach nerves. What perfume does your wife |
| use. Now could you make out a thing like that? |
| |
| _To keep it up._ |
| |
| Martha, Mary. I saw that picture somewhere I forget now old master or |
| faked for money. He is sitting in their house, talking. Mysterious. Also |
| the two sluts in the Coombe would listen. |
| |
| _To keep it up._ |
| |
| Nice kind of evening feeling. No more wandering about. Just loll there: |
| quiet dusk: let everything rip. Forget. Tell about places you have been, |
| strange customs. The other one, jar on her head, was getting the supper: |
| fruit, olives, lovely cool water out of a well, stonecold like the hole |
| in the wall at Ashtown. Must carry a paper goblet next time I go to the |
| trottingmatches. She listens with big dark soft eyes. Tell her: more and |
| more: all. Then a sigh: silence. Long long long rest. |
| |
| Going under the railway arch he took out the envelope, tore it swiftly |
| in shreds and scattered them towards the road. The shreds fluttered |
| away, sank in the dank air: a white flutter, then all sank. |
| |
| Henry Flower. You could tear up a cheque for a hundred pounds in the |
| same way. Simple bit of paper. Lord Iveagh once cashed a sevenfigure |
| cheque for a million in the bank of Ireland. Shows you the money to be |
| made out of porter. Still the other brother lord Ardilaun has to change |
| his shirt four times a day, they say. Skin breeds lice or vermin. A |
| million pounds, wait a moment. Twopence a pint, fourpence a quart, |
| eightpence a gallon of porter, no, one and fourpence a gallon of porter. |
| One and four into twenty: fifteen about. Yes, exactly. Fifteen millions |
| of barrels of porter. |
| |
| What am I saying barrels? Gallons. About a million barrels all the same. |
| |
| An incoming train clanked heavily above his head, coach after coach. |
| Barrels bumped in his head: dull porter slopped and churned inside. |
| The bungholes sprang open and a huge dull flood leaked out, flowing |
| together, winding through mudflats all over the level land, a lazy |
| pooling swirl of liquor bearing along wideleaved flowers of its froth. |
| |
| He had reached the open backdoor of All Hallows. Stepping into the porch |
| he doffed his hat, took the card from his pocket and tucked it again |
| behind the leather headband. Damn it. I might have tried to work M'Coy |
| for a pass to Mullingar. |
| |
| Same notice on the door. Sermon by the very reverend John Conmee S.J. |
| on saint Peter Claver S.J. and the African Mission. Prayers for the |
| conversion of Gladstone they had too when he was almost unconscious. The |
| protestants are the same. Convert Dr William J. Walsh D.D. to the true |
| religion. Save China's millions. Wonder how they explain it to the |
| heathen Chinee. Prefer an ounce of opium. Celestials. Rank heresy for |
| them. Buddha their god lying on his side in the museum. Taking it easy |
| with hand under his cheek. Josssticks burning. Not like Ecce Homo. Crown |
| of thorns and cross. Clever idea Saint Patrick the shamrock. Chopsticks? |
| Conmee: Martin Cunningham knows him: distinguishedlooking. Sorry I |
| didn't work him about getting Molly into the choir instead of that |
| Father Farley who looked a fool but wasn't. They're taught that. He's |
| not going out in bluey specs with the sweat rolling off him to baptise |
| blacks, is he? The glasses would take their fancy, flashing. Like to see |
| them sitting round in a ring with blub lips, entranced, listening. Still |
| life. Lap it up like milk, I suppose. |
| |
| The cold smell of sacred stone called him. He trod the worn steps, |
| pushed the swingdoor and entered softly by the rere. |
| |
| Something going on: some sodality. Pity so empty. Nice discreet place |
| to be next some girl. Who is my neighbour? Jammed by the hour to slow |
| music. That woman at midnight mass. Seventh heaven. Women knelt in the |
| benches with crimson halters round their necks, heads bowed. A batch |
| knelt at the altarrails. The priest went along by them, murmuring, |
| holding the thing in his hands. He stopped at each, took out a |
| communion, shook a drop or two (are they in water?) off it and put it |
| neatly into her mouth. Her hat and head sank. Then the next one. Her hat |
| sank at once. Then the next one: a small old woman. The priest bent down |
| to put it into her mouth, murmuring all the time. Latin. The next one. |
| Shut your eyes and open your mouth. What? _Corpus:_ body. Corpse. Good |
| idea the Latin. Stupefies them first. Hospice for the dying. They |
| don't seem to chew it: only swallow it down. Rum idea: eating bits of a |
| corpse. Why the cannibals cotton to it. |
| |
| He stood aside watching their blind masks pass down the aisle, one by |
| one, and seek their places. He approached a bench and seated himself in |
| its corner, nursing his hat and newspaper. These pots we have to wear. |
| We ought to have hats modelled on our heads. They were about him here |
| and there, with heads still bowed in their crimson halters, waiting for |
| it to melt in their stomachs. Something like those mazzoth: it's that |
| sort of bread: unleavened shewbread. Look at them. Now I bet it makes |
| them feel happy. Lollipop. It does. Yes, bread of angels it's called. |
| There's a big idea behind it, kind of kingdom of God is within you feel. |
| First communicants. Hokypoky penny a lump. Then feel all like one family |
| party, same in the theatre, all in the same swim. They do. I'm sure of |
| that. Not so lonely. In our confraternity. Then come out a bit spreeish. |
| Let off steam. Thing is if you really believe in it. Lourdes cure, |
| waters of oblivion, and the Knock apparition, statues bleeding. Old |
| fellow asleep near that confessionbox. Hence those snores. Blind faith. |
| Safe in the arms of kingdom come. Lulls all pain. Wake this time next |
| year. |
| |
| He saw the priest stow the communion cup away, well in, and kneel an |
| instant before it, showing a large grey bootsole from under the lace |
| affair he had on. Suppose he lost the pin of his. He wouldn't know what |
| to do to. Bald spot behind. Letters on his back: I.N.R.I? No: I.H.S. |
| Molly told me one time I asked her. I have sinned: or no: I have |
| suffered, it is. And the other one? Iron nails ran in. |
| |
| Meet one Sunday after the rosary. Do not deny my request. Turn up with |
| a veil and black bag. Dusk and the light behind her. She might be here |
| with a ribbon round her neck and do the other thing all the same on the |
| sly. Their character. That fellow that turned queen's evidence on the |
| invincibles he used to receive the, Carey was his name, the communion |
| every morning. This very church. Peter Carey, yes. No, Peter Claver I am |
| thinking of. Denis Carey. And just imagine that. Wife and six children |
| at home. And plotting that murder all the time. Those crawthumpers, |
| now that's a good name for them, there's always something shiftylooking |
| about them. They're not straight men of business either. O, no, she's |
| not here: the flower: no, no. By the way, did I tear up that envelope? |
| Yes: under the bridge. |
| |
| The priest was rinsing out the chalice: then he tossed off the dregs |
| smartly. Wine. Makes it more aristocratic than for example if he drank |
| what they are used to Guinness's porter or some temperance beverage |
| Wheatley's Dublin hop bitters or Cantrell and Cochrane's ginger ale |
| (aromatic). Doesn't give them any of it: shew wine: only the other. |
| Cold comfort. Pious fraud but quite right: otherwise they'd have one old |
| booser worse than another coming along, cadging for a drink. Queer the |
| whole atmosphere of the. Quite right. Perfectly right that is. |
| |
| Mr Bloom looked back towards the choir. Not going to be any music. Pity. |
| Who has the organ here I wonder? Old Glynn he knew how to make that |
| instrument talk, the _vibrato_: fifty pounds a year they say he had in |
| Gardiner street. Molly was in fine voice that day, the _Stabat Mater_ |
| of Rossini. Father Bernard Vaughan's sermon first. Christ or Pilate? |
| Christ, but don't keep us all night over it. Music they wanted. |
| Footdrill stopped. Could hear a pin drop. I told her to pitch her voice |
| against that corner. I could feel the thrill in the air, the full, the |
| people looking up: |
| |
| _Quis est homo._ |
| |
| Some of that old sacred music splendid. Mercadante: seven last words. |
| Mozart's twelfth mass: _Gloria_ in that. Those old popes keen on music, |
| on art and statues and pictures of all kinds. Palestrina for example |
| too. They had a gay old time while it lasted. Healthy too, chanting, |
| regular hours, then brew liqueurs. Benedictine. Green Chartreuse. Still, |
| having eunuchs in their choir that was coming it a bit thick. What kind |
| of voice is it? Must be curious to hear after their own strong basses. |
| Connoisseurs. Suppose they wouldn't feel anything after. Kind of a |
| placid. No worry. Fall into flesh, don't they? Gluttons, tall, long |
| legs. Who knows? Eunuch. One way out of it. |
| |
| He saw the priest bend down and kiss the altar and then face about and |
| bless all the people. All crossed themselves and stood up. Mr Bloom |
| glanced about him and then stood up, looking over the risen hats. Stand |
| up at the gospel of course. Then all settled down on their knees again |
| and he sat back quietly in his bench. The priest came down from the |
| altar, holding the thing out from him, and he and the massboy answered |
| each other in Latin. Then the priest knelt down and began to read off a |
| card: |
| |
| --O God, our refuge and our strength... |
| |
| Mr Bloom put his face forward to catch the words. English. Throw them |
| the bone. I remember slightly. How long since your last mass? Glorious |
| and immaculate virgin. Joseph, her spouse. Peter and Paul. More |
| interesting if you understood what it was all about. Wonderful |
| organisation certainly, goes like clockwork. Confession. Everyone wants |
| to. Then I will tell you all. Penance. Punish me, please. Great weapon |
| in their hands. More than doctor or solicitor. Woman dying to. And I |
| schschschschschsch. And did you chachachachacha? And why did you? Look |
| down at her ring to find an excuse. Whispering gallery walls have ears. |
| Husband learn to his surprise. God's little joke. Then out she comes. |
| Repentance skindeep. Lovely shame. Pray at an altar. Hail Mary and Holy |
| Mary. Flowers, incense, candles melting. Hide her blushes. Salvation |
| army blatant imitation. Reformed prostitute will address the meeting. |
| How I found the Lord. Squareheaded chaps those must be in Rome: they |
| work the whole show. And don't they rake in the money too? Bequests |
| also: to the P.P. for the time being in his absolute discretion. |
| Masses for the repose of my soul to be said publicly with open doors. |
| Monasteries and convents. The priest in that Fermanagh will case in the |
| witnessbox. No browbeating him. He had his answer pat for everything. |
| Liberty and exaltation of our holy mother the church. The doctors of the |
| church: they mapped out the whole theology of it. |
| |
| The priest prayed: |
| |
| --Blessed Michael, archangel, defend us in the hour of conflict. Be |
| our safeguard against the wickedness and snares of the devil (may God |
| restrain him, we humbly pray!): and do thou, O prince of the heavenly |
| host, by the power of God thrust Satan down to hell and with him those |
| other wicked spirits who wander through the world for the ruin of souls. |
| |
| The priest and the massboy stood up and walked off. All over. The women |
| remained behind: thanksgiving. |
| |
| Better be shoving along. Brother Buzz. Come around with the plate |
| perhaps. Pay your Easter duty. |
| |
| He stood up. Hello. Were those two buttons of my waistcoat open all the |
| time? Women enjoy it. Never tell you. But we. Excuse, miss, there's a |
| (whh!) just a (whh!) fluff. Or their skirt behind, placket unhooked. |
| Glimpses of the moon. Annoyed if you don't. Why didn't you tell me |
| before. Still like you better untidy. Good job it wasn't farther south. |
| He passed, discreetly buttoning, down the aisle and out through the main |
| door into the light. He stood a moment unseeing by the cold black marble |
| bowl while before him and behind two worshippers dipped furtive hands in |
| the low tide of holy water. Trams: a car of Prescott's dyeworks: a widow |
| in her weeds. Notice because I'm in mourning myself. He covered himself. |
| How goes the time? Quarter past. Time enough yet. Better get that lotion |
| made up. Where is this? Ah yes, the last time. Sweny's in Lincoln place. |
| Chemists rarely move. Their green and gold beaconjars too heavy to stir. |
| Hamilton Long's, founded in the year of the flood. Huguenot churchyard |
| near there. Visit some day. |
| |
| He walked southward along Westland row. But the recipe is in the other |
| trousers. O, and I forgot that latchkey too. Bore this funeral affair. |
| O well, poor fellow, it's not his fault. When was it I got it made up |
| last? Wait. I changed a sovereign I remember. First of the month it must |
| have been or the second. O, he can look it up in the prescriptions book. |
| |
| The chemist turned back page after page. Sandy shrivelled smell he seems |
| to have. Shrunken skull. And old. Quest for the philosopher's stone. The |
| alchemists. Drugs age you after mental excitement. Lethargy then. Why? |
| Reaction. A lifetime in a night. Gradually changes your character. |
| Living all the day among herbs, ointments, disinfectants. All his |
| alabaster lilypots. Mortar and pestle. Aq. Dist. Fol. Laur. Te Virid. |
| Smell almost cure you like the dentist's doorbell. Doctor Whack. He |
| ought to physic himself a bit. Electuary or emulsion. The first fellow |
| that picked an herb to cure himself had a bit of pluck. Simples. Want to |
| be careful. Enough stuff here to chloroform you. Test: turns blue |
| litmus paper red. Chloroform. Overdose of laudanum. Sleeping draughts. |
| Lovephiltres. Paragoric poppysyrup bad for cough. Clogs the pores or the |
| phlegm. Poisons the only cures. Remedy where you least expect it. Clever |
| of nature. |
| |
| --About a fortnight ago, sir? |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| He waited by the counter, inhaling slowly the keen reek of drugs, the |
| dusty dry smell of sponges and loofahs. Lot of time taken up telling |
| your aches and pains. |
| |
| --Sweet almond oil and tincture of benzoin, Mr Bloom said, and then |
| orangeflower water... |
| |
| It certainly did make her skin so delicate white like wax. |
| |
| --And white wax also, he said. |
| |
| Brings out the darkness of her eyes. Looking at me, the sheet up to |
| her eyes, Spanish, smelling herself, when I was fixing the links in my |
| cuffs. Those homely recipes are often the best: strawberries for the |
| teeth: nettles and rainwater: oatmeal they say steeped in buttermilk. |
| Skinfood. One of the old queen's sons, duke of Albany was it? had only |
| one skin. Leopold, yes. Three we have. Warts, bunions and pimples to |
| make it worse. But you want a perfume too. What perfume does your? _Peau |
| d'Espagne_. That orangeflower water is so fresh. Nice smell these soaps |
| have. Pure curd soap. Time to get a bath round the corner. Hammam. |
| Turkish. Massage. Dirt gets rolled up in your navel. Nicer if a nice |
| girl did it. Also I think I. Yes I. Do it in the bath. Curious longing |
| I. Water to water. Combine business with pleasure. Pity no time for |
| massage. Feel fresh then all the day. Funeral be rather glum. |
| |
| --Yes, sir, the chemist said. That was two and nine. Have you brought a |
| bottle? |
| |
| --No, Mr Bloom said. Make it up, please. I'll call later in the day and |
| I'll take one of these soaps. How much are they? |
| |
| --Fourpence, sir. |
| |
| Mr Bloom raised a cake to his nostrils. Sweet lemony wax. |
| |
| --I'll take this one, he said. That makes three and a penny. |
| |
| --Yes, sir, the chemist said. You can pay all together, sir, when you |
| come back. |
| |
| --Good, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| He strolled out of the shop, the newspaper baton under his armpit, the |
| coolwrappered soap in his left hand. |
| |
| At his armpit Bantam Lyons' voice and hand said: |
| |
| --Hello, Bloom. What's the best news? Is that today's? Show us a minute. |
| |
| Shaved off his moustache again, by Jove! Long cold upper lip. To look |
| younger. He does look balmy. Younger than I am. |
| |
| Bantam Lyons's yellow blacknailed fingers unrolled the baton. Wants a |
| wash too. Take off the rough dirt. Good morning, have you used Pears' |
| soap? Dandruff on his shoulders. Scalp wants oiling. |
| |
| --I want to see about that French horse that's running today, Bantam |
| Lyons said. Where the bugger is it? |
| |
| He rustled the pleated pages, jerking his chin on his high collar. |
| Barber's itch. Tight collar he'll lose his hair. Better leave him the |
| paper and get shut of him. |
| |
| --You can keep it, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| --Ascot. Gold cup. Wait, Bantam Lyons muttered. Half a mo. Maximum the |
| second. |
| |
| --I was just going to throw it away, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| Bantam Lyons raised his eyes suddenly and leered weakly. |
| |
| --What's that? his sharp voice said. |
| |
| --I say you can keep it, Mr Bloom answered. I was going to throw it away |
| that moment. |
| |
| Bantam Lyons doubted an instant, leering: then thrust the outspread |
| sheets back on Mr Bloom's arms. |
| |
| --I'll risk it, he said. Here, thanks. |
| |
| He sped off towards Conway's corner. God speed scut. |
| |
| Mr Bloom folded the sheets again to a neat square and lodged the soap |
| in it, smiling. Silly lips of that chap. Betting. Regular hotbed of it |
| lately. Messenger boys stealing to put on sixpence. Raffle for large |
| tender turkey. Your Christmas dinner for threepence. Jack Fleming |
| embezzling to gamble then smuggled off to America. Keeps a hotel now. |
| They never come back. Fleshpots of Egypt. |
| |
| He walked cheerfully towards the mosque of the baths. Remind you of a |
| mosque, redbaked bricks, the minarets. College sports today I see. He |
| eyed the horseshoe poster over the gate of college park: cyclist doubled |
| up like a cod in a pot. Damn bad ad. Now if they had made it round |
| like a wheel. Then the spokes: sports, sports, sports: and the hub big: |
| college. Something to catch the eye. |
| |
| There's Hornblower standing at the porter's lodge. Keep him on hands: |
| might take a turn in there on the nod. How do you do, Mr Hornblower? How |
| do you do, sir? |
| |
| Heavenly weather really. If life was always like that. Cricket weather. |
| Sit around under sunshades. Over after over. Out. They can't play it |
| here. Duck for six wickets. Still Captain Culler broke a window in the |
| Kildare street club with a slog to square leg. Donnybrook fair more |
| in their line. And the skulls we were acracking when M'Carthy took the |
| floor. Heatwave. Won't last. Always passing, the stream of life, which |
| in the stream of life we trace is dearer than them all. |
| |
| Enjoy a bath now: clean trough of water, cool enamel, the gentle tepid |
| stream. This is my body. |
| |
| He foresaw his pale body reclined in it at full, naked, in a womb of |
| warmth, oiled by scented melting soap, softly laved. He saw his |
| trunk and limbs riprippled over and sustained, buoyed lightly upward, |
| lemonyellow: his navel, bud of flesh: and saw the dark tangled curls of |
| his bush floating, floating hair of the stream around the limp father of |
| thousands, a languid floating flower. |
| |
| |
| |
| Martin Cunningham, first, poked his silkhatted head into the creaking |
| carriage and, entering deftly, seated himself. Mr Power stepped in after |
| him, curving his height with care. |
| |
| --Come on, Simon. |
| |
| --After you, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus covered himself quickly and got in, saying: |
| |
| Yes, yes. |
| |
| --Are we all here now? Martin Cunningham asked. Come along, Bloom. |
| |
| Mr Bloom entered and sat in the vacant place. He pulled the door to |
| after him and slammed it twice till it shut tight. He passed an arm |
| through the armstrap and looked seriously from the open carriagewindow |
| at the lowered blinds of the avenue. One dragged aside: an old woman |
| peeping. Nose whiteflattened against the pane. Thanking her stars she |
| was passed over. Extraordinary the interest they take in a corpse. Glad |
| to see us go we give them such trouble coming. Job seems to suit them. |
| Huggermugger in corners. Slop about in slipperslappers for fear he'd |
| wake. Then getting it ready. Laying it out. Molly and Mrs Fleming making |
| the bed. Pull it more to your side. Our windingsheet. Never know who |
| will touch you dead. Wash and shampoo. I believe they clip the nails and |
| the hair. Keep a bit in an envelope. Grows all the same after. Unclean |
| job. |
| |
| All waited. Nothing was said. Stowing in the wreaths probably. I am |
| sitting on something hard. Ah, that soap: in my hip pocket. Better shift |
| it out of that. Wait for an opportunity. |
| |
| All waited. Then wheels were heard from in front, turning: then nearer: |
| then horses' hoofs. A jolt. Their carriage began to move, creaking and |
| swaying. Other hoofs and creaking wheels started behind. The blinds of |
| the avenue passed and number nine with its craped knocker, door ajar. At |
| walking pace. |
| |
| They waited still, their knees jogging, till they had turned and were |
| passing along the tramtracks. Tritonville road. Quicker. The wheels |
| rattled rolling over the cobbled causeway and the crazy glasses shook |
| rattling in the doorframes. |
| |
| --What way is he taking us? Mr Power asked through both windows. |
| |
| --Irishtown, Martin Cunningham said. Ringsend. Brunswick street. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus nodded, looking out. |
| |
| --That's a fine old custom, he said. I am glad to see it has not died |
| out. |
| |
| All watched awhile through their windows caps and hats lifted by |
| passers. Respect. The carriage swerved from the tramtrack to the |
| smoother road past Watery lane. Mr Bloom at gaze saw a lithe young man, |
| clad in mourning, a wide hat. |
| |
| --There's a friend of yours gone by, Dedalus, he said. |
| |
| --Who is that? |
| |
| --Your son and heir. |
| |
| --Where is he? Mr Dedalus said, stretching over across. |
| |
| The carriage, passing the open drains and mounds of rippedup roadway |
| before the tenement houses, lurched round the corner and, swerving back |
| to the tramtrack, rolled on noisily with chattering wheels. Mr Dedalus |
| fell back, saying: |
| |
| --Was that Mulligan cad with him? His _fidus Achates_! |
| |
| --No, Mr Bloom said. He was alone. |
| |
| --Down with his aunt Sally, I suppose, Mr Dedalus said, the Goulding |
| faction, the drunken little costdrawer and Crissie, papa's little lump |
| of dung, the wise child that knows her own father. |
| |
| Mr Bloom smiled joylessly on Ringsend road. Wallace Bros: the |
| bottleworks: Dodder bridge. |
| |
| Richie Goulding and the legal bag. Goulding, Collis and Ward he calls |
| the firm. His jokes are getting a bit damp. Great card he was. Waltzing |
| in Stamer street with Ignatius Gallaher on a Sunday morning, the |
| landlady's two hats pinned on his head. Out on the rampage all night. |
| Beginning to tell on him now: that backache of his, I fear. Wife ironing |
| his back. Thinks he'll cure it with pills. All breadcrumbs they are. |
| About six hundred per cent profit. |
| |
| --He's in with a lowdown crowd, Mr Dedalus snarled. That Mulligan is a |
| contaminated bloody doubledyed ruffian by all accounts. His name stinks |
| all over Dublin. But with the help of God and His blessed mother I'll |
| make it my business to write a letter one of those days to his mother |
| or his aunt or whatever she is that will open her eye as wide as a gate. |
| I'll tickle his catastrophe, believe you me. |
| |
| He cried above the clatter of the wheels: |
| |
| --I won't have her bastard of a nephew ruin my son. A counterjumper's |
| son. Selling tapes in my cousin, Peter Paul M'Swiney's. Not likely. |
| |
| He ceased. Mr Bloom glanced from his angry moustache to Mr Power's mild |
| face and Martin Cunningham's eyes and beard, gravely shaking. Noisy |
| selfwilled man. Full of his son. He is right. Something to hand on. If |
| little Rudy had lived. See him grow up. Hear his voice in the house. |
| Walking beside Molly in an Eton suit. My son. Me in his eyes. Strange |
| feeling it would be. From me. Just a chance. Must have been that morning |
| in Raymond terrace she was at the window watching the two dogs at it by |
| the wall of the cease to do evil. And the sergeant grinning up. She had |
| that cream gown on with the rip she never stitched. Give us a touch, |
| Poldy. God, I'm dying for it. How life begins. |
| |
| Got big then. Had to refuse the Greystones concert. My son inside her. |
| I could have helped him on in life. I could. Make him independent. Learn |
| German too. |
| |
| --Are we late? Mr Power asked. |
| |
| --Ten minutes, Martin Cunningham said, looking at his watch. |
| |
| Molly. Milly. Same thing watered down. Her tomboy oaths. O jumping |
| Jupiter! Ye gods and little fishes! Still, she's a dear girl. Soon be a |
| woman. Mullingar. Dearest Papli. Young student. Yes, yes: a woman too. |
| Life, life. |
| |
| The carriage heeled over and back, their four trunks swaying. |
| |
| --Corny might have given us a more commodious yoke, Mr Power said. |
| |
| --He might, Mr Dedalus said, if he hadn't that squint troubling him. Do |
| you follow me? |
| |
| He closed his left eye. Martin Cunningham began to brush away |
| crustcrumbs from under his thighs. |
| |
| --What is this, he said, in the name of God? Crumbs? |
| |
| --Someone seems to have been making a picnic party here lately, Mr Power |
| said. |
| |
| All raised their thighs and eyed with disfavour the mildewed buttonless |
| leather of the seats. Mr Dedalus, twisting his nose, frowned downward |
| and said: |
| |
| --Unless I'm greatly mistaken. What do you think, Martin? |
| |
| --It struck me too, Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| Mr Bloom set his thigh down. Glad I took that bath. Feel my feet quite |
| clean. But I wish Mrs Fleming had darned these socks better. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus sighed resignedly. |
| |
| --After all, he said, it's the most natural thing in the world. |
| |
| --Did Tom Kernan turn up? Martin Cunningham asked, twirling the peak of |
| his beard gently. |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Bloom answered. He's behind with Ned Lambert and Hynes. |
| |
| --And Corny Kelleher himself? Mr Power asked. |
| |
| --At the cemetery, Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| --I met M'Coy this morning, Mr Bloom said. He said he'd try to come. |
| |
| The carriage halted short. |
| |
| --What's wrong? |
| |
| --We're stopped. |
| |
| --Where are we? |
| |
| Mr Bloom put his head out of the window. |
| |
| --The grand canal, he said. |
| |
| Gasworks. Whooping cough they say it cures. Good job Milly never got |
| it. Poor children! Doubles them up black and blue in convulsions. Shame |
| really. Got off lightly with illnesses compared. Only measles. Flaxseed |
| tea. Scarlatina, influenza epidemics. Canvassing for death. Don't miss |
| this chance. Dogs' home over there. Poor old Athos! Be good to Athos, |
| Leopold, is my last wish. Thy will be done. We obey them in the grave. |
| A dying scrawl. He took it to heart, pined away. Quiet brute. Old men's |
| dogs usually are. |
| |
| A raindrop spat on his hat. He drew back and saw an instant of shower |
| spray dots over the grey flags. Apart. Curious. Like through a colander. |
| I thought it would. My boots were creaking I remember now. |
| |
| --The weather is changing, he said quietly. |
| |
| --A pity it did not keep up fine, Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| --Wanted for the country, Mr Power said. There's the sun again coming |
| out. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus, peering through his glasses towards the veiled sun, hurled a |
| mute curse at the sky. |
| |
| --It's as uncertain as a child's bottom, he said. |
| |
| --We're off again. |
| |
| The carriage turned again its stiff wheels and their trunks swayed |
| gently. Martin Cunningham twirled more quickly the peak of his beard. |
| |
| --Tom Kernan was immense last night, he said. And Paddy Leonard taking |
| him off to his face. |
| |
| --O, draw him out, Martin, Mr Power said eagerly. Wait till you hear |
| him, Simon, on Ben Dollard's singing of _The Croppy Boy_. |
| |
| --Immense, Martin Cunningham said pompously. _His singing of that simple |
| ballad, Martin, is the most trenchant rendering I ever heard in the |
| whole course of my experience._ |
| |
| --Trenchant, Mr Power said laughing. He's dead nuts on that. And the |
| retrospective arrangement. |
| |
| --Did you read Dan Dawson's speech? Martin Cunningham asked. |
| |
| --I did not then, Mr Dedalus said. Where is it? |
| |
| --In the paper this morning. |
| |
| Mr Bloom took the paper from his inside pocket. That book I must change |
| for her. |
| |
| --No, no, Mr Dedalus said quickly. Later on please. |
| |
| Mr Bloom's glance travelled down the edge of the paper, scanning the |
| deaths: Callan, Coleman, Dignam, Fawcett, Lowry, Naumann, Peake, what |
| Peake is that? is it the chap was in Crosbie and Alleyne's? no, Sexton, |
| Urbright. Inked characters fast fading on the frayed breaking paper. |
| Thanks to the Little Flower. Sadly missed. To the inexpressible grief of |
| his. Aged 88 after a long and tedious illness. Month's mind: Quinlan. On |
| whose soul Sweet Jesus have mercy. |
| |
| _It is now a month since dear Henry fled To his home up above in the sky |
| While his family weeps and mourns his loss Hoping some day to meet him |
| on high._ |
| |
| I tore up the envelope? Yes. Where did I put her letter after I read it |
| in the bath? He patted his waistcoatpocket. There all right. Dear Henry |
| fled. Before my patience are exhausted. |
| |
| National school. Meade's yard. The hazard. Only two there now. Nodding. |
| Full as a tick. Too much bone in their skulls. The other trotting round |
| with a fare. An hour ago I was passing there. The jarvies raised their |
| hats. |
| |
| A pointsman's back straightened itself upright suddenly against a |
| tramway standard by Mr Bloom's window. Couldn't they invent something |
| automatic so that the wheel itself much handier? Well but that fellow |
| would lose his job then? Well but then another fellow would get a job |
| making the new invention? |
| |
| Antient concert rooms. Nothing on there. A man in a buff suit with a |
| crape armlet. Not much grief there. Quarter mourning. People in law |
| perhaps. |
| |
| They went past the bleak pulpit of saint Mark's, under the railway |
| bridge, past the Queen's theatre: in silence. Hoardings: Eugene |
| Stratton, Mrs Bandmann Palmer. Could I go to see LEAH tonight, I wonder. |
| I said I. Or the _Lily of Killarney_? Elster Grimes Opera Company. Big |
| powerful change. Wet bright bills for next week. _Fun on the Bristol_. |
| Martin Cunningham could work a pass for the Gaiety. Have to stand a |
| drink or two. As broad as it's long. |
| |
| He's coming in the afternoon. Her songs. |
| |
| Plasto's. Sir Philip Crampton's memorial fountain bust. Who was he? |
| |
| --How do you do? Martin Cunningham said, raising his palm to his brow in |
| salute. |
| |
| --He doesn't see us, Mr Power said. Yes, he does. How do you do? |
| |
| --Who? Mr Dedalus asked. |
| |
| --Blazes Boylan, Mr Power said. There he is airing his quiff. |
| |
| Just that moment I was thinking. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus bent across to salute. From the door of the Red Bank the |
| white disc of a straw hat flashed reply: spruce figure: passed. |
| |
| Mr Bloom reviewed the nails of his left hand, then those of his right |
| hand. The nails, yes. Is there anything more in him that they she sees? |
| Fascination. Worst man in Dublin. That keeps him alive. They sometimes |
| feel what a person is. Instinct. But a type like that. My nails. I |
| am just looking at them: well pared. And after: thinking alone. Body |
| getting a bit softy. I would notice that: from remembering. What causes |
| that? I suppose the skin can't contract quickly enough when the flesh |
| falls off. But the shape is there. The shape is there still. Shoulders. |
| Hips. Plump. Night of the dance dressing. Shift stuck between the cheeks |
| behind. |
| |
| He clasped his hands between his knees and, satisfied, sent his vacant |
| glance over their faces. |
| |
| Mr Power asked: |
| |
| --How is the concert tour getting on, Bloom? |
| |
| --O, very well, Mr Bloom said. I hear great accounts of it. It's a good |
| idea, you see... |
| |
| --Are you going yourself? |
| |
| --Well no, Mr Bloom said. In point of fact I have to go down to the |
| county Clare on some private business. You see the idea is to tour the |
| chief towns. What you lose on one you can make up on the other. |
| |
| --Quite so, Martin Cunningham said. Mary Anderson is up there now. |
| |
| Have you good artists? |
| |
| --Louis Werner is touring her, Mr Bloom said. O yes, we'll have all |
| topnobbers. J. C. Doyle and John MacCormack I hope and. The best, in |
| fact. |
| |
| --And _Madame_, Mr Power said smiling. Last but not least. |
| |
| Mr Bloom unclasped his hands in a gesture of soft politeness and clasped |
| them. Smith O'Brien. Someone has laid a bunch of flowers there. Woman. |
| Must be his deathday. For many happy returns. The carriage wheeling by |
| Farrell's statue united noiselessly their unresisting knees. |
| |
| Oot: a dullgarbed old man from the curbstone tendered his wares, his |
| mouth opening: oot. |
| |
| --Four bootlaces for a penny. |
| |
| Wonder why he was struck off the rolls. Had his office in Hume street. |
| Same house as Molly's namesake, Tweedy, crown solicitor for Waterford. |
| Has that silk hat ever since. Relics of old decency. Mourning too. |
| Terrible comedown, poor wretch! Kicked about like snuff at a wake. |
| O'Callaghan on his last legs. |
| |
| And _Madame_. Twenty past eleven. Up. Mrs Fleming is in to clean. Doing |
| her hair, humming. _voglio e non vorrei_. No. _vorrei e non_. Looking at |
| the tips of her hairs to see if they are split. _Mi trema un poco |
| il_. Beautiful on that _tre_ her voice is: weeping tone. A thrush. A |
| throstle. There is a word throstle that expresses that. |
| |
| His eyes passed lightly over Mr Power's goodlooking face. Greyish over |
| the ears. _Madame_: smiling. I smiled back. A smile goes a long way. |
| Only politeness perhaps. Nice fellow. Who knows is that true about the |
| woman he keeps? Not pleasant for the wife. Yet they say, who was it |
| told me, there is no carnal. You would imagine that would get played |
| out pretty quick. Yes, it was Crofton met him one evening bringing her |
| a pound of rumpsteak. What is this she was? Barmaid in Jury's. Or the |
| Moira, was it? |
| |
| They passed under the hugecloaked Liberator's form. |
| |
| Martin Cunningham nudged Mr Power. |
| |
| --Of the tribe of Reuben, he said. |
| |
| A tall blackbearded figure, bent on a stick, stumping round the corner |
| of Elvery's Elephant house, showed them a curved hand open on his spine. |
| |
| --In all his pristine beauty, Mr Power said. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus looked after the stumping figure and said mildly: |
| |
| --The devil break the hasp of your back! |
| |
| Mr Power, collapsing in laughter, shaded his face from the window as the |
| carriage passed Gray's statue. |
| |
| --We have all been there, Martin Cunningham said broadly. |
| |
| His eyes met Mr Bloom's eyes. He caressed his beard, adding: |
| |
| --Well, nearly all of us. |
| |
| Mr Bloom began to speak with sudden eagerness to his companions' faces. |
| |
| --That's an awfully good one that's going the rounds about Reuben J and |
| the son. |
| |
| --About the boatman? Mr Power asked. |
| |
| --Yes. Isn't it awfully good? |
| |
| --What is that? Mr Dedalus asked. I didn't hear it. |
| |
| --There was a girl in the case, Mr Bloom began, and he determined to |
| send him to the Isle of Man out of harm's way but when they were both |
| ... |
| |
| --What? Mr Dedalus asked. That confirmed bloody hobbledehoy is it? |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Bloom said. They were both on the way to the boat and he tried |
| to drown... |
| |
| --Drown Barabbas! Mr Dedalus cried. I wish to Christ he did! |
| |
| Mr Power sent a long laugh down his shaded nostrils. |
| |
| --No, Mr Bloom said, the son himself... |
| |
| Martin Cunningham thwarted his speech rudely: |
| |
| --Reuben and the son were piking it down the quay next the river on |
| their way to the Isle of Man boat and the young chiseller suddenly got |
| loose and over the wall with him into the Liffey. |
| |
| --For God's sake! Mr Dedalus exclaimed in fright. Is he dead? |
| |
| --Dead! Martin Cunningham cried. Not he! A boatman got a pole and fished |
| him out by the slack of the breeches and he was landed up to the father |
| on the quay more dead than alive. Half the town was there. |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Bloom said. But the funny part is... |
| |
| --And Reuben J, Martin Cunningham said, gave the boatman a florin for |
| saving his son's life. |
| |
| A stifled sigh came from under Mr Power's hand. |
| |
| --O, he did, Martin Cunningham affirmed. Like a hero. A silver florin. |
| |
| --Isn't it awfully good? Mr Bloom said eagerly. |
| |
| --One and eightpence too much, Mr Dedalus said drily. |
| |
| Mr Power's choked laugh burst quietly in the carriage. |
| |
| Nelson's pillar. |
| |
| --Eight plums a penny! Eight for a penny! |
| |
| --We had better look a little serious, Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus sighed. |
| |
| --Ah then indeed, he said, poor little Paddy wouldn't grudge us a laugh. |
| Many a good one he told himself. |
| |
| --The Lord forgive me! Mr Power said, wiping his wet eyes with his |
| fingers. Poor Paddy! I little thought a week ago when I saw him last and |
| he was in his usual health that I'd be driving after him like this. He's |
| gone from us. |
| |
| --As decent a little man as ever wore a hat, Mr Dedalus said. He went |
| very suddenly. |
| |
| --Breakdown, Martin Cunningham said. Heart. |
| |
| He tapped his chest sadly. |
| |
| Blazing face: redhot. Too much John Barleycorn. Cure for a red nose. |
| Drink like the devil till it turns adelite. A lot of money he spent |
| colouring it. |
| |
| Mr Power gazed at the passing houses with rueful apprehension. |
| |
| --He had a sudden death, poor fellow, he said. |
| |
| --The best death, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| Their wide open eyes looked at him. |
| |
| --No suffering, he said. A moment and all is over. Like dying in sleep. |
| |
| No-one spoke. |
| |
| Dead side of the street this. Dull business by day, land agents, |
| temperance hotel, Falconer's railway guide, civil service college, |
| Gill's, catholic club, the industrious blind. Why? Some reason. Sun or |
| wind. At night too. Chummies and slaveys. Under the patronage of the |
| late Father Mathew. Foundation stone for Parnell. Breakdown. Heart. |
| |
| White horses with white frontlet plumes came round the Rotunda corner, |
| galloping. A tiny coffin flashed by. In a hurry to bury. A mourning |
| coach. Unmarried. Black for the married. Piebald for bachelors. Dun for |
| a nun. |
| |
| --Sad, Martin Cunningham said. A child. |
| |
| A dwarf's face, mauve and wrinkled like little Rudy's was. Dwarf's body, |
| weak as putty, in a whitelined deal box. Burial friendly society |
| pays. Penny a week for a sod of turf. Our. Little. Beggar. Baby. Meant |
| nothing. Mistake of nature. If it's healthy it's from the mother. If not |
| from the man. Better luck next time. |
| |
| --Poor little thing, Mr Dedalus said. It's well out of it. |
| |
| The carriage climbed more slowly the hill of Rutland square. Rattle his |
| bones. Over the stones. Only a pauper. Nobody owns. |
| |
| --In the midst of life, Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| --But the worst of all, Mr Power said, is the man who takes his own |
| life. |
| |
| Martin Cunningham drew out his watch briskly, coughed and put it back. |
| |
| --The greatest disgrace to have in the family, Mr Power added. |
| |
| --Temporary insanity, of course, Martin Cunningham said decisively. We |
| must take a charitable view of it. |
| |
| --They say a man who does it is a coward, Mr Dedalus said. |
| |
| --It is not for us to judge, Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| Mr Bloom, about to speak, closed his lips again. Martin Cunningham's |
| large eyes. Looking away now. Sympathetic human man he is. Intelligent. |
| Like Shakespeare's face. Always a good word to say. They have no mercy |
| on that here or infanticide. Refuse christian burial. They used to drive |
| a stake of wood through his heart in the grave. As if it wasn't broken |
| already. Yet sometimes they repent too late. Found in the riverbed |
| clutching rushes. He looked at me. And that awful drunkard of a wife |
| of his. Setting up house for her time after time and then pawning the |
| furniture on him every Saturday almost. Leading him the life of the |
| damned. Wear the heart out of a stone, that. Monday morning. Start |
| afresh. Shoulder to the wheel. Lord, she must have looked a sight |
| that night Dedalus told me he was in there. Drunk about the place and |
| capering with Martin's umbrella. |
| |
| _And they call me the jewel of Asia, |
| Of Asia, |
| The Geisha._ |
| |
| He looked away from me. He knows. Rattle his bones. |
| |
| That afternoon of the inquest. The redlabelled bottle on the table. The |
| room in the hotel with hunting pictures. Stuffy it was. Sunlight through |
| the slats of the Venetian blind. The coroner's sunlit ears, big and |
| hairy. Boots giving evidence. Thought he was asleep first. Then saw like |
| yellow streaks on his face. Had slipped down to the foot of the bed. |
| Verdict: overdose. Death by misadventure. The letter. For my son |
| Leopold. |
| |
| No more pain. Wake no more. Nobody owns. |
| |
| The carriage rattled swiftly along Blessington street. Over the stones. |
| |
| --We are going the pace, I think, Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| --God grant he doesn't upset us on the road, Mr Power said. |
| |
| --I hope not, Martin Cunningham said. That will be a great race tomorrow |
| in Germany. The Gordon Bennett. |
| |
| --Yes, by Jove, Mr Dedalus said. That will be worth seeing, faith. |
| |
| As they turned into Berkeley street a streetorgan near the Basin sent |
| over and after them a rollicking rattling song of the halls. Has anybody |
| here seen Kelly? Kay ee double ell wy. Dead March from _Saul._ He's |
| as bad as old Antonio. He left me on my ownio. Pirouette! The _Mater |
| Misericordiae_. Eccles street. My house down there. Big place. Ward for |
| incurables there. Very encouraging. Our Lady's Hospice for the dying. |
| Deadhouse handy underneath. Where old Mrs Riordan died. They look |
| terrible the women. Her feeding cup and rubbing her mouth with the |
| spoon. Then the screen round her bed for her to die. Nice young student |
| that was dressed that bite the bee gave me. He's gone over to the |
| lying-in hospital they told me. From one extreme to the other. The |
| carriage galloped round a corner: stopped. |
| |
| --What's wrong now? |
| |
| A divided drove of branded cattle passed the windows, lowing, slouching |
| by on padded hoofs, whisking their tails slowly on their clotted bony |
| croups. Outside them and through them ran raddled sheep bleating their |
| fear. |
| |
| --Emigrants, Mr Power said. |
| |
| --Huuuh! the drover's voice cried, his switch sounding on their flanks. |
| |
| Huuuh! out of that! |
| |
| Thursday, of course. Tomorrow is killing day. Springers. Cuffe sold them |
| about twentyseven quid each. For Liverpool probably. Roastbeef for old |
| England. They buy up all the juicy ones. And then the fifth quarter |
| lost: all that raw stuff, hide, hair, horns. Comes to a big thing in a |
| year. Dead meat trade. Byproducts of the slaughterhouses for tanneries, |
| soap, margarine. Wonder if that dodge works now getting dicky meat off |
| the train at Clonsilla. |
| |
| The carriage moved on through the drove. |
| |
| --I can't make out why the corporation doesn't run a tramline from the |
| parkgate to the quays, Mr Bloom said. All those animals could be taken |
| in trucks down to the boats. |
| |
| --Instead of blocking up the thoroughfare, Martin Cunningham said. Quite |
| right. They ought to. |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Bloom said, and another thing I often thought, is to have |
| municipal funeral trams like they have in Milan, you know. Run the line |
| out to the cemetery gates and have special trams, hearse and carriage |
| and all. Don't you see what I mean? |
| |
| --O, that be damned for a story, Mr Dedalus said. Pullman car and saloon |
| diningroom. |
| |
| --A poor lookout for Corny, Mr Power added. |
| |
| --Why? Mr Bloom asked, turning to Mr Dedalus. Wouldn't it be more decent |
| than galloping two abreast? |
| |
| --Well, there's something in that, Mr Dedalus granted. |
| |
| --And, Martin Cunningham said, we wouldn't have scenes like that when |
| the hearse capsized round Dunphy's and upset the coffin on to the road. |
| |
| --That was terrible, Mr Power's shocked face said, and the corpse fell |
| about the road. Terrible! |
| |
| --First round Dunphy's, Mr Dedalus said, nodding. Gordon Bennett cup. |
| |
| --Praises be to God! Martin Cunningham said piously. |
| |
| Bom! Upset. A coffin bumped out on to the road. Burst open. Paddy Dignam |
| shot out and rolling over stiff in the dust in a brown habit too large |
| for him. Red face: grey now. Mouth fallen open. Asking what's up now. |
| Quite right to close it. Looks horrid open. Then the insides decompose |
| quickly. Much better to close up all the orifices. Yes, also. With wax. |
| The sphincter loose. Seal up all. |
| |
| --Dunphy's, Mr Power announced as the carriage turned right. |
| |
| Dunphy's corner. Mourning coaches drawn up, drowning their grief. A |
| pause by the wayside. Tiptop position for a pub. Expect we'll pull up |
| here on the way back to drink his health. Pass round the consolation. |
| Elixir of life. |
| |
| But suppose now it did happen. Would he bleed if a nail say cut him |
| in the knocking about? He would and he wouldn't, I suppose. Depends on |
| where. The circulation stops. Still some might ooze out of an artery. It |
| would be better to bury them in red: a dark red. |
| |
| In silence they drove along Phibsborough road. An empty hearse trotted |
| by, coming from the cemetery: looks relieved. |
| |
| Crossguns bridge: the royal canal. |
| |
| Water rushed roaring through the sluices. A man stood on his |
| dropping barge, between clamps of turf. On the towpath by the lock a |
| slacktethered horse. Aboard of the _Bugabu._ |
| |
| Their eyes watched him. On the slow weedy waterway he had floated on his |
| raft coastward over Ireland drawn by a haulage rope past beds of |
| reeds, over slime, mudchoked bottles, carrion dogs. Athlone, Mullingar, |
| Moyvalley, I could make a walking tour to see Milly by the canal. Or |
| cycle down. Hire some old crock, safety. Wren had one the other day at |
| the auction but a lady's. Developing waterways. James M'Cann's hobby |
| to row me o'er the ferry. Cheaper transit. By easy stages. Houseboats. |
| Camping out. Also hearses. To heaven by water. Perhaps I will without |
| writing. Come as a surprise, Leixlip, Clonsilla. Dropping down lock by |
| lock to Dublin. With turf from the midland bogs. Salute. He lifted his |
| brown straw hat, saluting Paddy Dignam. |
| |
| They drove on past Brian Boroimhe house. Near it now. |
| |
| --I wonder how is our friend Fogarty getting on, Mr Power said. |
| |
| --Better ask Tom Kernan, Mr Dedalus said. |
| |
| --How is that? Martin Cunningham said. Left him weeping, I suppose? |
| |
| --Though lost to sight, Mr Dedalus said, to memory dear. |
| |
| The carriage steered left for Finglas road. |
| |
| The stonecutter's yard on the right. Last lap. Crowded on the spit of |
| land silent shapes appeared, white, sorrowful, holding out calm hands, |
| knelt in grief, pointing. Fragments of shapes, hewn. In white silence: |
| appealing. The best obtainable. Thos. H. Dennany, monumental builder and |
| sculptor. |
| |
| Passed. |
| |
| On the curbstone before Jimmy Geary, the sexton's, an old tramp sat, |
| grumbling, emptying the dirt and stones out of his huge dustbrown |
| yawning boot. After life's journey. |
| |
| Gloomy gardens then went by: one by one: gloomy houses. |
| |
| Mr Power pointed. |
| |
| --That is where Childs was murdered, he said. The last house. |
| |
| --So it is, Mr Dedalus said. A gruesome case. Seymour Bushe got him off. |
| Murdered his brother. Or so they said. |
| |
| --The crown had no evidence, Mr Power said. |
| |
| --Only circumstantial, Martin Cunningham added. That's the maxim of the |
| law. Better for ninetynine guilty to escape than for one innocent person |
| to be wrongfully condemned. |
| |
| They looked. Murderer's ground. It passed darkly. Shuttered, tenantless, |
| unweeded garden. Whole place gone to hell. Wrongfully condemned. Murder. |
| The murderer's image in the eye of the murdered. They love reading about |
| it. Man's head found in a garden. Her clothing consisted of. How she met |
| her death. Recent outrage. The weapon used. Murderer is still at large. |
| Clues. A shoelace. The body to be exhumed. Murder will out. |
| |
| Cramped in this carriage. She mightn't like me to come that way without |
| letting her know. Must be careful about women. Catch them once with |
| their pants down. Never forgive you after. Fifteen. |
| |
| The high railings of Prospect rippled past their gaze. Dark poplars, |
| rare white forms. Forms more frequent, white shapes thronged amid the |
| trees, white forms and fragments streaming by mutely, sustaining vain |
| gestures on the air. |
| |
| The felly harshed against the curbstone: stopped. Martin Cunningham put |
| out his arm and, wrenching back the handle, shoved the door open with |
| his knee. He stepped out. Mr Power and Mr Dedalus followed. |
| |
| Change that soap now. Mr Bloom's hand unbuttoned his hip pocket swiftly |
| and transferred the paperstuck soap to his inner handkerchief pocket. |
| He stepped out of the carriage, replacing the newspaper his other hand |
| still held. |
| |
| Paltry funeral: coach and three carriages. It's all the same. |
| Pallbearers, gold reins, requiem mass, firing a volley. Pomp of death. |
| Beyond the hind carriage a hawker stood by his barrow of cakes and |
| fruit. Simnel cakes those are, stuck together: cakes for the dead. |
| Dogbiscuits. Who ate them? Mourners coming out. |
| |
| He followed his companions. Mr Kernan and Ned Lambert followed, Hynes |
| walking after them. Corny Kelleher stood by the opened hearse and took |
| out the two wreaths. He handed one to the boy. |
| |
| Where is that child's funeral disappeared to? |
| |
| A team of horses passed from Finglas with toiling plodding tread, |
| dragging through the funereal silence a creaking waggon on which lay a |
| granite block. The waggoner marching at their head saluted. |
| |
| Coffin now. Got here before us, dead as he is. Horse looking round at it |
| with his plume skeowways. Dull eye: collar tight on his neck, pressing |
| on a bloodvessel or something. Do they know what they cart out here |
| every day? Must be twenty or thirty funerals every day. Then Mount |
| Jerome for the protestants. Funerals all over the world everywhere every |
| minute. Shovelling them under by the cartload doublequick. Thousands |
| every hour. Too many in the world. |
| |
| Mourners came out through the gates: woman and a girl. Leanjawed harpy, |
| hard woman at a bargain, her bonnet awry. Girl's face stained with dirt |
| and tears, holding the woman's arm, looking up at her for a sign to cry. |
| Fish's face, bloodless and livid. |
| |
| The mutes shouldered the coffin and bore it in through the gates. So |
| much dead weight. Felt heavier myself stepping out of that bath. First |
| the stiff: then the friends of the stiff. Corny Kelleher and the |
| boy followed with their wreaths. Who is that beside them? Ah, the |
| brother-in-law. |
| |
| All walked after. |
| |
| Martin Cunningham whispered: |
| |
| --I was in mortal agony with you talking of suicide before Bloom. |
| |
| --What? Mr Power whispered. How so? |
| |
| --His father poisoned himself, Martin Cunningham whispered. Had the |
| Queen's hotel in Ennis. You heard him say he was going to Clare. |
| Anniversary. |
| |
| --O God! Mr Power whispered. First I heard of it. Poisoned himself? |
| |
| He glanced behind him to where a face with dark thinking eyes followed |
| towards the cardinal's mausoleum. Speaking. |
| |
| --Was he insured? Mr Bloom asked. |
| |
| --I believe so, Mr Kernan answered. But the policy was heavily |
| mortgaged. Martin is trying to get the youngster into Artane. |
| |
| --How many children did he leave? |
| |
| --Five. Ned Lambert says he'll try to get one of the girls into Todd's. |
| |
| --A sad case, Mr Bloom said gently. Five young children. |
| |
| --A great blow to the poor wife, Mr Kernan added. |
| |
| --Indeed yes, Mr Bloom agreed. |
| |
| Has the laugh at him now. |
| |
| He looked down at the boots he had blacked and polished. She had |
| outlived him. Lost her husband. More dead for her than for me. One must |
| outlive the other. Wise men say. There are more women than men in the |
| world. Condole with her. Your terrible loss. I hope you'll soon follow |
| him. For Hindu widows only. She would marry another. Him? No. Yet who |
| knows after. Widowhood not the thing since the old queen died. Drawn on |
| a guncarriage. Victoria and Albert. Frogmore memorial mourning. But |
| in the end she put a few violets in her bonnet. Vain in her heart of |
| hearts. All for a shadow. Consort not even a king. Her son was the |
| substance. Something new to hope for not like the past she wanted back, |
| waiting. It never comes. One must go first: alone, under the ground: and |
| lie no more in her warm bed. |
| |
| --How are you, Simon? Ned Lambert said softly, clasping hands. Haven't |
| seen you for a month of Sundays. |
| |
| --Never better. How are all in Cork's own town? |
| |
| --I was down there for the Cork park races on Easter Monday, Ned Lambert |
| said. Same old six and eightpence. Stopped with Dick Tivy. |
| |
| --And how is Dick, the solid man? |
| |
| --Nothing between himself and heaven, Ned Lambert answered. |
| |
| --By the holy Paul! Mr Dedalus said in subdued wonder. Dick Tivy bald? |
| |
| --Martin is going to get up a whip for the youngsters, Ned Lambert said, |
| pointing ahead. A few bob a skull. Just to keep them going till the |
| insurance is cleared up. |
| |
| --Yes, yes, Mr Dedalus said dubiously. Is that the eldest boy in front? |
| |
| --Yes, Ned Lambert said, with the wife's brother. John Henry Menton is |
| behind. He put down his name for a quid. |
| |
| --I'll engage he did, Mr Dedalus said. I often told poor Paddy he ought |
| to mind that job. John Henry is not the worst in the world. |
| |
| --How did he lose it? Ned Lambert asked. Liquor, what? |
| |
| --Many a good man's fault, Mr Dedalus said with a sigh. |
| |
| They halted about the door of the mortuary chapel. Mr Bloom stood behind |
| the boy with the wreath looking down at his sleekcombed hair and at the |
| slender furrowed neck inside his brandnew collar. Poor boy! Was he there |
| when the father? Both unconscious. Lighten up at the last moment |
| and recognise for the last time. All he might have done. I owe three |
| shillings to O'Grady. Would he understand? The mutes bore the coffin |
| into the chapel. Which end is his head? |
| |
| After a moment he followed the others in, blinking in the screened |
| light. The coffin lay on its bier before the chancel, four tall yellow |
| candles at its corners. Always in front of us. Corny Kelleher, laying a |
| wreath at each fore corner, beckoned to the boy to kneel. The mourners |
| knelt here and there in prayingdesks. Mr Bloom stood behind near the |
| font and, when all had knelt, dropped carefully his unfolded newspaper |
| from his pocket and knelt his right knee upon it. He fitted his black |
| hat gently on his left knee and, holding its brim, bent over piously. |
| |
| A server bearing a brass bucket with something in it came out through a |
| door. The whitesmocked priest came after him, tidying his stole with one |
| hand, balancing with the other a little book against his toad's belly. |
| Who'll read the book? I, said the rook. |
| |
| They halted by the bier and the priest began to read out of his book |
| with a fluent croak. |
| |
| Father Coffey. I knew his name was like a coffin. _Domine-namine._ Bully |
| about the muzzle he looks. Bosses the show. Muscular christian. Woe |
| betide anyone that looks crooked at him: priest. Thou art Peter. Burst |
| sideways like a sheep in clover Dedalus says he will. With a belly on |
| him like a poisoned pup. Most amusing expressions that man finds. Hhhn: |
| burst sideways. |
| |
| _--Non intres in judicium cum servo tuo, Domine._ |
| |
| Makes them feel more important to be prayed over in Latin. Requiem mass. |
| Crape weepers. Blackedged notepaper. Your name on the altarlist. Chilly |
| place this. Want to feed well, sitting in there all the morning in the |
| gloom kicking his heels waiting for the next please. Eyes of a toad too. |
| What swells him up that way? Molly gets swelled after cabbage. Air of |
| the place maybe. Looks full up of bad gas. Must be an infernal lot |
| of bad gas round the place. Butchers, for instance: they get like raw |
| beefsteaks. Who was telling me? Mervyn Browne. Down in the vaults of |
| saint Werburgh's lovely old organ hundred and fifty they have to bore a |
| hole in the coffins sometimes to let out the bad gas and burn it. Out it |
| rushes: blue. One whiff of that and you're a goner. |
| |
| My kneecap is hurting me. Ow. That's better. |
| |
| The priest took a stick with a knob at the end of it out of the boy's |
| bucket and shook it over the coffin. Then he walked to the other end and |
| shook it again. Then he came back and put it back in the bucket. As you |
| were before you rested. It's all written down: he has to do it. |
| |
| _--Et ne nos inducas in tentationem._ |
| |
| The server piped the answers in the treble. I often thought it would be |
| better to have boy servants. Up to fifteen or so. After that, of course |
| ... |
| |
| Holy water that was, I expect. Shaking sleep out of it. He must be fed |
| up with that job, shaking that thing over all the corpses they trot up. |
| What harm if he could see what he was shaking it over. Every mortal |
| day a fresh batch: middleaged men, old women, children, women dead in |
| childbirth, men with beards, baldheaded businessmen, consumptive girls |
| with little sparrows' breasts. All the year round he prayed the same |
| thing over them all and shook water on top of them: sleep. On Dignam |
| now. |
| |
| _--In paradisum._ |
| |
| Said he was going to paradise or is in paradise. Says that over |
| everybody. Tiresome kind of a job. But he has to say something. |
| |
| The priest closed his book and went off, followed by the server. Corny |
| Kelleher opened the sidedoors and the gravediggers came in, hoisted the |
| coffin again, carried it out and shoved it on their cart. Corny Kelleher |
| gave one wreath to the boy and one to the brother-in-law. All followed |
| them out of the sidedoors into the mild grey air. Mr Bloom came last |
| folding his paper again into his pocket. He gazed gravely at the ground |
| till the coffincart wheeled off to the left. The metal wheels ground the |
| gravel with a sharp grating cry and the pack of blunt boots followed the |
| trundled barrow along a lane of sepulchres. |
| |
| The ree the ra the ree the ra the roo. Lord, I mustn't lilt here. |
| |
| --The O'Connell circle, Mr Dedalus said about him. |
| |
| Mr Power's soft eyes went up to the apex of the lofty cone. |
| |
| --He's at rest, he said, in the middle of his people, old Dan O'. But |
| his heart is buried in Rome. How many broken hearts are buried here, |
| Simon! |
| |
| --Her grave is over there, Jack, Mr Dedalus said. I'll soon be stretched |
| beside her. Let Him take me whenever He likes. |
| |
| Breaking down, he began to weep to himself quietly, stumbling a little |
| in his walk. Mr Power took his arm. |
| |
| --She's better where she is, he said kindly. |
| |
| --I suppose so, Mr Dedalus said with a weak gasp. I suppose she is in |
| heaven if there is a heaven. |
| |
| Corny Kelleher stepped aside from his rank and allowed the mourners to |
| plod by. |
| |
| --Sad occasions, Mr Kernan began politely. |
| |
| Mr Bloom closed his eyes and sadly twice bowed his head. |
| |
| --The others are putting on their hats, Mr Kernan said. I suppose we can |
| do so too. We are the last. This cemetery is a treacherous place. |
| |
| They covered their heads. |
| |
| --The reverend gentleman read the service too quickly, don't you think? |
| Mr Kernan said with reproof. |
| |
| Mr Bloom nodded gravely looking in the quick bloodshot eyes. Secret |
| eyes, secretsearching. Mason, I think: not sure. Beside him again. We |
| are the last. In the same boat. Hope he'll say something else. |
| |
| Mr Kernan added: |
| |
| --The service of the Irish church used in Mount Jerome is simpler, more |
| impressive I must say. |
| |
| Mr Bloom gave prudent assent. The language of course was another thing. |
| |
| Mr Kernan said with solemnity: |
| |
| --_I am the resurrection and the life_. That touches a man's inmost |
| heart. |
| |
| --It does, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| Your heart perhaps but what price the fellow in the six feet by two |
| with his toes to the daisies? No touching that. Seat of the affections. |
| Broken heart. A pump after all, pumping thousands of gallons of blood |
| every day. One fine day it gets bunged up: and there you are. Lots of |
| them lying around here: lungs, hearts, livers. Old rusty pumps: damn |
| the thing else. The resurrection and the life. Once you are dead you are |
| dead. That last day idea. Knocking them all up out of their graves. Come |
| forth, Lazarus! And he came fifth and lost the job. Get up! Last day! |
| Then every fellow mousing around for his liver and his lights and the |
| rest of his traps. Find damn all of himself that morning. Pennyweight of |
| powder in a skull. Twelve grammes one pennyweight. Troy measure. |
| |
| Corny Kelleher fell into step at their side. |
| |
| --Everything went off A1, he said. What? |
| |
| He looked on them from his drawling eye. Policeman's shoulders. With |
| your tooraloom tooraloom. |
| |
| --As it should be, Mr Kernan said. |
| |
| --What? Eh? Corny Kelleher said. |
| |
| Mr Kernan assured him. |
| |
| --Who is that chap behind with Tom Kernan? John Henry Menton asked. I |
| know his face. |
| |
| Ned Lambert glanced back. |
| |
| --Bloom, he said, Madame Marion Tweedy that was, is, I mean, the |
| soprano. She's his wife. |
| |
| --O, to be sure, John Henry Menton said. I haven't seen her for some |
| time. He was a finelooking woman. I danced with her, wait, fifteen |
| seventeen golden years ago, at Mat Dillon's in Roundtown. And a good |
| armful she was. |
| |
| He looked behind through the others. |
| |
| --What is he? he asked. What does he do? Wasn't he in the stationery |
| line? I fell foul of him one evening, I remember, at bowls. |
| |
| Ned Lambert smiled. |
| |
| --Yes, he was, he said, in Wisdom Hely's. A traveller for blottingpaper. |
| |
| --In God's name, John Henry Menton said, what did she marry a coon like |
| that for? She had plenty of game in her then. |
| |
| --Has still, Ned Lambert said. He does some canvassing for ads. |
| |
| John Henry Menton's large eyes stared ahead. |
| |
| The barrow turned into a side lane. A portly man, ambushed among the |
| grasses, raised his hat in homage. The gravediggers touched their caps. |
| |
| --John O'Connell, Mr Power said pleased. He never forgets a friend. |
| |
| Mr O'Connell shook all their hands in silence. Mr Dedalus said: |
| |
| --I am come to pay you another visit. |
| |
| --My dear Simon, the caretaker answered in a low voice. I don't want |
| your custom at all. |
| |
| Saluting Ned Lambert and John Henry Menton he walked on at Martin |
| Cunningham's side puzzling two long keys at his back. |
| |
| --Did you hear that one, he asked them, about Mulcahy from the Coombe? |
| |
| --I did not, Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| They bent their silk hats in concert and Hynes inclined his ear. The |
| caretaker hung his thumbs in the loops of his gold watchchain and spoke |
| in a discreet tone to their vacant smiles. |
| |
| --They tell the story, he said, that two drunks came out here one foggy |
| evening to look for the grave of a friend of theirs. They asked for |
| Mulcahy from the Coombe and were told where he was buried. After |
| traipsing about in the fog they found the grave sure enough. One of the |
| drunks spelt out the name: Terence Mulcahy. The other drunk was blinking |
| up at a statue of Our Saviour the widow had got put up. |
| |
| The caretaker blinked up at one of the sepulchres they passed. He |
| resumed: |
| |
| --And, after blinking up at the sacred figure, _Not a bloody bit like |
| the man_, says he. _That's not Mulcahy_, says he, _whoever done it_. |
| |
| Rewarded by smiles he fell back and spoke with Corny Kelleher, accepting |
| the dockets given him, turning them over and scanning them as he walked. |
| |
| --That's all done with a purpose, Martin Cunningham explained to Hynes. |
| |
| --I know, Hynes said. I know that. |
| |
| --To cheer a fellow up, Martin Cunningham said. It's pure |
| goodheartedness: damn the thing else. |
| |
| Mr Bloom admired the caretaker's prosperous bulk. All want to be on good |
| terms with him. Decent fellow, John O'Connell, real good sort. Keys: |
| like Keyes's ad: no fear of anyone getting out. No passout checks. |
| _Habeas corpus_. I must see about that ad after the funeral. Did I |
| write Ballsbridge on the envelope I took to cover when she disturbed me |
| writing to Martha? Hope it's not chucked in the dead letter office. Be |
| the better of a shave. Grey sprouting beard. That's the first sign when |
| the hairs come out grey. And temper getting cross. Silver threads among |
| the grey. Fancy being his wife. Wonder he had the gumption to propose to |
| any girl. Come out and live in the graveyard. Dangle that before her. It |
| might thrill her first. Courting death... Shades of night hovering |
| here with all the dead stretched about. The shadows of the tombs when |
| churchyards yawn and Daniel O'Connell must be a descendant I suppose |
| who is this used to say he was a queer breedy man great catholic all the |
| same like a big giant in the dark. Will o' the wisp. Gas of graves. |
| Want to keep her mind off it to conceive at all. Women especially are so |
| touchy. Tell her a ghost story in bed to make her sleep. Have you ever |
| seen a ghost? Well, I have. It was a pitchdark night. The clock was on |
| the stroke of twelve. Still they'd kiss all right if properly keyed up. |
| Whores in Turkish graveyards. Learn anything if taken young. You might |
| pick up a young widow here. Men like that. Love among the tombstones. |
| Romeo. Spice of pleasure. In the midst of death we are in life. Both |
| ends meet. Tantalising for the poor dead. Smell of grilled beefsteaks to |
| the starving. Gnawing their vitals. Desire to grig people. Molly wanting |
| to do it at the window. Eight children he has anyway. |
| |
| He has seen a fair share go under in his time, lying around him field |
| after field. Holy fields. More room if they buried them standing. |
| Sitting or kneeling you couldn't. Standing? His head might come up some |
| day above ground in a landslip with his hand pointing. All honeycombed |
| the ground must be: oblong cells. And very neat he keeps it too: trim |
| grass and edgings. His garden Major Gamble calls Mount Jerome. Well, |
| so it is. Ought to be flowers of sleep. Chinese cemeteries with giant |
| poppies growing produce the best opium Mastiansky told me. The Botanic |
| Gardens are just over there. It's the blood sinking in the earth gives |
| new life. Same idea those jews they said killed the christian boy. Every |
| man his price. Well preserved fat corpse, gentleman, epicure, invaluable |
| for fruit garden. A bargain. By carcass of William Wilkinson, auditor |
| and accountant, lately deceased, three pounds thirteen and six. With |
| thanks. |
| |
| I daresay the soil would be quite fat with corpsemanure, bones, flesh, |
| nails. Charnelhouses. Dreadful. Turning green and pink decomposing. Rot |
| quick in damp earth. The lean old ones tougher. Then a kind of a tallowy |
| kind of a cheesy. Then begin to get black, black treacle oozing out of |
| them. Then dried up. Deathmoths. Of course the cells or whatever they |
| are go on living. Changing about. Live for ever practically. Nothing to |
| feed on feed on themselves. |
| |
| But they must breed a devil of a lot of maggots. Soil must be simply |
| swirling with them. Your head it simply swurls. Those pretty little |
| seaside gurls. He looks cheerful enough over it. Gives him a sense of |
| power seeing all the others go under first. Wonder how he looks at life. |
| Cracking his jokes too: warms the cockles of his heart. The one about |
| the bulletin. Spurgeon went to heaven 4 a.m. this morning. 11 p.m. |
| (closing time). Not arrived yet. Peter. The dead themselves the men |
| anyhow would like to hear an odd joke or the women to know what's in |
| fashion. A juicy pear or ladies' punch, hot, strong and sweet. Keep |
| out the damp. You must laugh sometimes so better do it that way. |
| Gravediggers in _Hamlet_. Shows the profound knowledge of the human |
| heart. Daren't joke about the dead for two years at least. _De mortuis |
| nil nisi prius_. Go out of mourning first. Hard to imagine his funeral. |
| Seems a sort of a joke. Read your own obituary notice they say you live |
| longer. Gives you second wind. New lease of life. |
| |
| --How many have-you for tomorrow? the caretaker asked. |
| |
| --Two, Corny Kelleher said. Half ten and eleven. |
| |
| The caretaker put the papers in his pocket. The barrow had ceased to |
| trundle. The mourners split and moved to each side of the hole, stepping |
| with care round the graves. The gravediggers bore the coffin and set its |
| nose on the brink, looping the bands round it. |
| |
| Burying him. We come to bury Caesar. His ides of March or June. He |
| doesn't know who is here nor care. Now who is that lankylooking galoot |
| over there in the macintosh? Now who is he I'd like to know? Now I'd |
| give a trifle to know who he is. Always someone turns up you never |
| dreamt of. A fellow could live on his lonesome all his life. Yes, he |
| could. Still he'd have to get someone to sod him after he died though he |
| could dig his own grave. We all do. Only man buries. No, ants too. First |
| thing strikes anybody. Bury the dead. Say Robinson Crusoe was true to |
| life. Well then Friday buried him. Every Friday buries a Thursday if you |
| come to look at it. |
| |
| _O, poor Robinson Crusoe! |
| How could you possibly do so?_ |
| |
| Poor Dignam! His last lie on the earth in his box. When you think of |
| them all it does seem a waste of wood. All gnawed through. They could |
| invent a handsome bier with a kind of panel sliding, let it down that |
| way. Ay but they might object to be buried out of another fellow's. |
| They're so particular. Lay me in my native earth. Bit of clay from |
| the holy land. Only a mother and deadborn child ever buried in the one |
| coffin. I see what it means. I see. To protect him as long as possible |
| even in the earth. The Irishman's house is his coffin. Embalming in |
| catacombs, mummies the same idea. |
| |
| Mr Bloom stood far back, his hat in his hand, counting the bared heads. |
| Twelve. I'm thirteen. No. The chap in the macintosh is thirteen. Death's |
| number. Where the deuce did he pop out of? He wasn't in the chapel, that |
| I'll swear. Silly superstition that about thirteen. |
| |
| Nice soft tweed Ned Lambert has in that suit. Tinge of purple. I had |
| one like that when we lived in Lombard street west. Dressy fellow he was |
| once. Used to change three suits in the day. Must get that grey suit |
| of mine turned by Mesias. Hello. It's dyed. His wife I forgot he's not |
| married or his landlady ought to have picked out those threads for him. |
| |
| The coffin dived out of sight, eased down by the men straddled on the |
| gravetrestles. They struggled up and out: and all uncovered. Twenty. |
| |
| Pause. |
| |
| If we were all suddenly somebody else. |
| |
| Far away a donkey brayed. Rain. No such ass. Never see a dead one, they |
| say. Shame of death. They hide. Also poor papa went away. |
| |
| Gentle sweet air blew round the bared heads in a whisper. Whisper. The |
| boy by the gravehead held his wreath with both hands staring quietly in |
| the black open space. Mr Bloom moved behind the portly kindly caretaker. |
| Wellcut frockcoat. Weighing them up perhaps to see which will go next. |
| Well, it is a long rest. Feel no more. It's the moment you feel. Must be |
| damned unpleasant. Can't believe it at first. Mistake must be: someone |
| else. Try the house opposite. Wait, I wanted to. I haven't yet. Then |
| darkened deathchamber. Light they want. Whispering around you. Would you |
| like to see a priest? Then rambling and wandering. Delirium all you hid |
| all your life. The death struggle. His sleep is not natural. Press his |
| lower eyelid. Watching is his nose pointed is his jaw sinking are the |
| soles of his feet yellow. Pull the pillow away and finish it off on the |
| floor since he's doomed. Devil in that picture of sinner's death showing |
| him a woman. Dying to embrace her in his shirt. Last act of _Lucia. |
| Shall i nevermore behold thee_? Bam! He expires. Gone at last. People |
| talk about you a bit: forget you. Don't forget to pray for him. Remember |
| him in your prayers. Even Parnell. Ivy day dying out. Then they follow: |
| dropping into a hole, one after the other. |
| |
| We are praying now for the repose of his soul. Hoping you're well and |
| not in hell. Nice change of air. Out of the fryingpan of life into the |
| fire of purgatory. |
| |
| Does he ever think of the hole waiting for himself? They say you do when |
| you shiver in the sun. Someone walking over it. Callboy's warning. Near |
| you. Mine over there towards Finglas, the plot I bought. Mamma, poor |
| mamma, and little Rudy. |
| |
| The gravediggers took up their spades and flung heavy clods of clay in |
| on the coffin. Mr Bloom turned away his face. And if he was alive all |
| the time? Whew! By jingo, that would be awful! No, no: he is dead, of |
| course. Of course he is dead. Monday he died. They ought to have |
| some law to pierce the heart and make sure or an electric clock or |
| a telephone in the coffin and some kind of a canvas airhole. Flag of |
| distress. Three days. Rather long to keep them in summer. Just as well |
| to get shut of them as soon as you are sure there's no. |
| |
| The clay fell softer. Begin to be forgotten. Out of sight, out of mind. |
| |
| The caretaker moved away a few paces and put on his hat. Had enough of |
| it. The mourners took heart of grace, one by one, covering themselves |
| without show. Mr Bloom put on his hat and saw the portly figure make its |
| way deftly through the maze of graves. Quietly, sure of his ground, he |
| traversed the dismal fields. |
| |
| Hynes jotting down something in his notebook. Ah, the names. But he |
| knows them all. No: coming to me. |
| |
| --I am just taking the names, Hynes said below his breath. What is your |
| christian name? I'm not sure. |
| |
| --L, Mr Bloom said. Leopold. And you might put down M'Coy's name too. He |
| asked me to. |
| |
| --Charley, Hynes said writing. I know. He was on the _Freeman_ once. |
| |
| So he was before he got the job in the morgue under Louis Byrne. Good |
| idea a postmortem for doctors. Find out what they imagine they know. |
| He died of a Tuesday. Got the run. Levanted with the cash of a few ads. |
| Charley, you're my darling. That was why he asked me to. O well, does |
| no harm. I saw to that, M'Coy. Thanks, old chap: much obliged. Leave him |
| under an obligation: costs nothing. |
| |
| --And tell us, Hynes said, do you know that fellow in the, fellow was |
| over there in the... |
| |
| He looked around. |
| |
| --Macintosh. Yes, I saw him, Mr Bloom said. Where is he now? |
| |
| --M'Intosh, Hynes said scribbling. I don't know who he is. Is that his |
| name? |
| |
| He moved away, looking about him. |
| |
| --No, Mr Bloom began, turning and stopping. I say, Hynes! |
| |
| Didn't hear. What? Where has he disappeared to? Not a sign. Well of all |
| the. Has anybody here seen? Kay ee double ell. Become invisible. Good |
| Lord, what became of him? |
| |
| A seventh gravedigger came beside Mr Bloom to take up an idle spade. |
| |
| --O, excuse me! |
| |
| He stepped aside nimbly. |
| |
| Clay, brown, damp, began to be seen in the hole. It rose. Nearly over. |
| A mound of damp clods rose more, rose, and the gravediggers rested their |
| spades. All uncovered again for a few instants. The boy propped |
| his wreath against a corner: the brother-in-law his on a lump. The |
| gravediggers put on their caps and carried their earthy spades towards |
| the barrow. Then knocked the blades lightly on the turf: clean. One bent |
| to pluck from the haft a long tuft of grass. One, leaving his mates, |
| walked slowly on with shouldered weapon, its blade blueglancing. |
| Silently at the gravehead another coiled the coffinband. His navelcord. |
| The brother-in-law, turning away, placed something in his free hand. |
| Thanks in silence. Sorry, sir: trouble. Headshake. I know that. For |
| yourselves just. |
| |
| The mourners moved away slowly without aim, by devious paths, staying at |
| whiles to read a name on a tomb. |
| |
| --Let us go round by the chief's grave, Hynes said. We have time. |
| |
| --Let us, Mr Power said. |
| |
| They turned to the right, following their slow thoughts. With awe Mr |
| Power's blank voice spoke: |
| |
| --Some say he is not in that grave at all. That the coffin was filled |
| with stones. That one day he will come again. |
| |
| Hynes shook his head. |
| |
| --Parnell will never come again, he said. He's there, all that was |
| mortal of him. Peace to his ashes. |
| |
| Mr Bloom walked unheeded along his grove by saddened angels, crosses, |
| broken pillars, family vaults, stone hopes praying with upcast eyes, |
| old Ireland's hearts and hands. More sensible to spend the money on some |
| charity for the living. Pray for the repose of the soul of. Does anybody |
| really? Plant him and have done with him. Like down a coalshoot. Then |
| lump them together to save time. All souls' day. Twentyseventh I'll be |
| at his grave. Ten shillings for the gardener. He keeps it free of weeds. |
| Old man himself. Bent down double with his shears clipping. Near death's |
| door. Who passed away. Who departed this life. As if they did it of |
| their own accord. Got the shove, all of them. Who kicked the |
| bucket. More interesting if they told you what they were. So and So, |
| wheelwright. I travelled for cork lino. I paid five shillings in the |
| pound. Or a woman's with her saucepan. I cooked good Irish stew. |
| Eulogy in a country churchyard it ought to be that poem of whose is it |
| Wordsworth or Thomas Campbell. Entered into rest the protestants put it. |
| Old Dr Murren's. The great physician called him home. Well it's God's |
| acre for them. Nice country residence. Newly plastered and painted. |
| Ideal spot to have a quiet smoke and read the _Church Times._ Marriage |
| ads they never try to beautify. Rusty wreaths hung on knobs, garlands of |
| bronzefoil. Better value that for the money. Still, the flowers are more |
| poetical. The other gets rather tiresome, never withering. Expresses |
| nothing. Immortelles. |
| |
| A bird sat tamely perched on a poplar branch. Like stuffed. Like the |
| wedding present alderman Hooper gave us. Hoo! Not a budge out of him. |
| Knows there are no catapults to let fly at him. Dead animal even sadder. |
| Silly-Milly burying the little dead bird in the kitchen matchbox, a |
| daisychain and bits of broken chainies on the grave. |
| |
| The Sacred Heart that is: showing it. Heart on his sleeve. Ought to be |
| sideways and red it should be painted like a real heart. Ireland was |
| dedicated to it or whatever that. Seems anything but pleased. Why this |
| infliction? Would birds come then and peck like the boy with the basket |
| of fruit but he said no because they ought to have been afraid of the |
| boy. Apollo that was. |
| |
| How many! All these here once walked round Dublin. Faithful departed. As |
| you are now so once were we. |
| |
| Besides how could you remember everybody? Eyes, walk, voice. Well, the |
| voice, yes: gramophone. Have a gramophone in every grave or keep it in |
| the house. After dinner on a Sunday. Put on poor old greatgrandfather. |
| Kraahraark! Hellohellohello amawfullyglad kraark awfullygladaseeagain |
| hellohello amawf krpthsth. Remind you of the voice like the photograph |
| reminds you of the face. Otherwise you couldn't remember the face after |
| fifteen years, say. For instance who? For instance some fellow that died |
| when I was in Wisdom Hely's. |
| |
| Rtststr! A rattle of pebbles. Wait. Stop! |
| |
| He looked down intently into a stone crypt. Some animal. Wait. There he |
| goes. |
| |
| An obese grey rat toddled along the side of the crypt, moving the |
| pebbles. An old stager: greatgrandfather: he knows the ropes. The grey |
| alive crushed itself in under the plinth, wriggled itself in under it. |
| Good hidingplace for treasure. |
| |
| Who lives there? Are laid the remains of Robert Emery. Robert Emmet was |
| buried here by torchlight, wasn't he? Making his rounds. |
| |
| Tail gone now. |
| |
| One of those chaps would make short work of a fellow. Pick the bones |
| clean no matter who it was. Ordinary meat for them. A corpse is meat |
| gone bad. Well and what's cheese? Corpse of milk. I read in that |
| _Voyages in China_ that the Chinese say a white man smells like a |
| corpse. Cremation better. Priests dead against it. Devilling for the |
| other firm. Wholesale burners and Dutch oven dealers. Time of the |
| plague. Quicklime feverpits to eat them. Lethal chamber. Ashes to ashes. |
| Or bury at sea. Where is that Parsee tower of silence? Eaten by birds. |
| Earth, fire, water. Drowning they say is the pleasantest. See your whole |
| life in a flash. But being brought back to life no. Can't bury in the |
| air however. Out of a flying machine. Wonder does the news go about |
| whenever a fresh one is let down. Underground communication. We learned |
| that from them. Wouldn't be surprised. Regular square feed for them. |
| Flies come before he's well dead. Got wind of Dignam. They wouldn't care |
| about the smell of it. Saltwhite crumbling mush of corpse: smell, taste |
| like raw white turnips. |
| |
| The gates glimmered in front: still open. Back to the world again. |
| Enough of this place. Brings you a bit nearer every time. Last time I |
| was here was Mrs Sinico's funeral. Poor papa too. The love that kills. |
| And even scraping up the earth at night with a lantern like that case |
| I read of to get at fresh buried females or even putrefied with running |
| gravesores. Give you the creeps after a bit. I will appear to you after |
| death. You will see my ghost after death. My ghost will haunt you after |
| death. There is another world after death named hell. I do not like that |
| other world she wrote. No more do I. Plenty to see and hear and feel |
| yet. Feel live warm beings near you. Let them sleep in their maggoty |
| beds. They are not going to get me this innings. Warm beds: warm |
| fullblooded life. |
| |
| Martin Cunningham emerged from a sidepath, talking gravely. |
| |
| Solicitor, I think. I know his face. Menton, John Henry, solicitor, |
| commissioner for oaths and affidavits. Dignam used to be in his office. |
| Mat Dillon's long ago. Jolly Mat. Convivial evenings. Cold fowl, cigars, |
| the Tantalus glasses. Heart of gold really. Yes, Menton. Got his rag out |
| that evening on the bowlinggreen because I sailed inside him. Pure fluke |
| of mine: the bias. Why he took such a rooted dislike to me. Hate |
| at first sight. Molly and Floey Dillon linked under the lilactree, |
| laughing. Fellow always like that, mortified if women are by. |
| |
| Got a dinge in the side of his hat. Carriage probably. |
| |
| --Excuse me, sir, Mr Bloom said beside them. |
| |
| They stopped. |
| |
| --Your hat is a little crushed, Mr Bloom said pointing. |
| |
| John Henry Menton stared at him for an instant without moving. |
| |
| --There, Martin Cunningham helped, pointing also. John Henry Menton took |
| off his hat, bulged out the dinge and smoothed the nap with care on his |
| coatsleeve. He clapped the hat on his head again. |
| |
| --It's all right now, Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| John Henry Menton jerked his head down in acknowledgment. |
| |
| --Thank you, he said shortly. |
| |
| They walked on towards the gates. Mr Bloom, chapfallen, drew behind |
| a few paces so as not to overhear. Martin laying down the law. Martin |
| could wind a sappyhead like that round his little finger, without his |
| seeing it. |
| |
| Oyster eyes. Never mind. Be sorry after perhaps when it dawns on him. |
| Get the pull over him that way. |
| |
| Thank you. How grand we are this morning! |
| |
| |
| IN THE HEART OF THE HIBERNIAN METROPOLIS |
| |
| |
| Before Nelson's pillar trams slowed, shunted, changed trolley, started |
| for Blackrock, Kingstown and Dalkey, Clonskea, Rathgar and Terenure, |
| Palmerston Park and upper Rathmines, Sandymount Green, Rathmines, |
| Ringsend and Sandymount Tower, Harold's Cross. The hoarse Dublin United |
| Tramway Company's timekeeper bawled them off: |
| |
| --Rathgar and Terenure! |
| |
| --Come on, Sandymount Green! |
| |
| Right and left parallel clanging ringing a doubledecker and a singledeck |
| moved from their railheads, swerved to the down line, glided parallel. |
| |
| --Start, Palmerston Park! |
| |
| |
| THE WEARER OF THE CROWN |
| |
| |
| Under the porch of the general post office shoeblacks called and |
| polished. Parked in North Prince's street His Majesty's vermilion |
| mailcars, bearing on their sides the royal initials, E. R., received |
| loudly flung sacks of letters, postcards, lettercards, parcels, insured |
| and paid, for local, provincial, British and overseas delivery. |
| |
| GENTLEMEN OF THE PRESS |
| |
| |
| Grossbooted draymen rolled barrels dullthudding out of Prince's stores |
| and bumped them up on the brewery float. On the brewery float bumped |
| dullthudding barrels rolled by grossbooted draymen out of Prince's |
| stores. |
| |
| --There it is, Red Murray said. Alexander Keyes. |
| |
| --Just cut it out, will you? Mr Bloom said, and I'll take it round to |
| the _Telegraph_ office. |
| |
| The door of Ruttledge's office creaked again. Davy Stephens, minute in a |
| large capecoat, a small felt hat crowning his ringlets, passed out with |
| a roll of papers under his cape, a king's courier. |
| |
| Red Murray's long shears sliced out the advertisement from the newspaper |
| in four clean strokes. Scissors and paste. |
| |
| --I'll go through the printingworks, Mr Bloom said, taking the cut |
| square. |
| |
| --Of course, if he wants a par, Red Murray said earnestly, a pen behind |
| his ear, we can do him one. |
| |
| --Right, Mr Bloom said with a nod. I'll rub that in. |
| |
| We. |
| |
| WILLIAM BRAYDEN, ESQUIRE, OF OAKLANDS, SANDYMOUNT |
| |
| |
| Red Murray touched Mr Bloom's arm with the shears and whispered: |
| |
| --Brayden. |
| |
| Mr Bloom turned and saw the liveried porter raise his lettered cap as a |
| stately figure entered between the newsboards of the _Weekly Freeman |
| and National Press_ and the _Freeman's Journal and National Press_. |
| Dullthudding Guinness's barrels. It passed statelily up the staircase, |
| steered by an umbrella, a solemn beardframed face. The broadcloth back |
| ascended each step: back. All his brains are in the nape of his neck, |
| Simon Dedalus says. Welts of flesh behind on him. Fat folds of neck, |
| fat, neck, fat, neck. |
| |
| --Don't you think his face is like Our Saviour? Red Murray whispered. |
| |
| The door of Ruttledge's office whispered: ee: cree. They always build |
| one door opposite another for the wind to. Way in. Way out. |
| |
| Our Saviour: beardframed oval face: talking in the dusk. Mary, Martha. |
| Steered by an umbrella sword to the footlights: Mario the tenor. |
| |
| --Or like Mario, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| --Yes, Red Murray agreed. But Mario was said to be the picture of Our |
| Saviour. |
| |
| Jesusmario with rougy cheeks, doublet and spindle legs. Hand on his |
| heart. In _Martha._ |
| |
| _Co-ome thou lost one, |
| Co-ome thou dear one!_ |
| |
| THE CROZIER AND THE PEN |
| |
| |
| --His grace phoned down twice this morning, Red Murray said gravely. |
| |
| They watched the knees, legs, boots vanish. Neck. |
| |
| A telegram boy stepped in nimbly, threw an envelope on the counter and |
| stepped off posthaste with a word: |
| |
| _--Freeman!_ |
| |
| Mr Bloom said slowly: |
| |
| --Well, he is one of our saviours also. |
| |
| A meek smile accompanied him as he lifted the counterflap, as he passed |
| in through a sidedoor and along the warm dark stairs and passage, |
| along the now reverberating boards. But will he save the circulation? |
| Thumping. Thumping. |
| |
| He pushed in the glass swingdoor and entered, stepping over strewn |
| packing paper. Through a lane of clanking drums he made his way towards |
| Nannetti's reading closet. |
| |
| WITH UNFEIGNED REGRET IT IS WE ANNOUNCE THE DISSOLUTION OF A MOST |
| RESPECTED DUBLIN BURGESS |
| |
| |
| Hynes here too: account of the funeral probably. Thumping. Thump. This |
| morning the remains of the late Mr Patrick Dignam. Machines. Smash a man |
| to atoms if they got him caught. Rule the world today. His machineries |
| are pegging away too. Like these, got out of hand: fermenting. Working |
| away, tearing away. And that old grey rat tearing to get in. |
| |
| HOW A GREAT DAILY ORGAN IS TURNED OUT |
| |
| |
| Mr Bloom halted behind the foreman's spare body, admiring a glossy |
| crown. |
| |
| Strange he never saw his real country. Ireland my country. Member for |
| College green. He boomed that workaday worker tack for all it was worth. |
| It's the ads and side features sell a weekly, not the stale news in the |
| official gazette. Queen Anne is dead. Published by authority in the year |
| one thousand and. Demesne situate in the townland of Rosenallis, barony |
| of Tinnahinch. To all whom it may concern schedule pursuant to statute |
| showing return of number of mules and jennets exported from Ballina. |
| Nature notes. Cartoons. Phil Blake's weekly Pat and Bull story. Uncle |
| Toby's page for tiny tots. Country bumpkin's queries. Dear Mr Editor, |
| what is a good cure for flatulence? I'd like that part. Learn a lot |
| teaching others. The personal note. M. A. P. Mainly all pictures. |
| Shapely bathers on golden strand. World's biggest balloon. Double |
| marriage of sisters celebrated. Two bridegrooms laughing heartily at |
| each other. Cuprani too, printer. More Irish than the Irish. |
| |
| The machines clanked in threefour time. Thump, thump, thump. Now if he |
| got paralysed there and no-one knew how to stop them they'd clank on and |
| on the same, print it over and over and up and back. Monkeydoodle the |
| whole thing. Want a cool head. |
| |
| --Well, get it into the evening edition, councillor, Hynes said. |
| |
| Soon be calling him my lord mayor. Long John is backing him, they say. |
| |
| The foreman, without answering, scribbled press on a corner of the sheet |
| and made a sign to a typesetter. He handed the sheet silently over the |
| dirty glass screen. |
| |
| --Right: thanks, Hynes said moving off. |
| |
| Mr Bloom stood in his way. |
| |
| --If you want to draw the cashier is just going to lunch, he said, |
| pointing backward with his thumb. |
| |
| --Did you? Hynes asked. |
| |
| --Mm, Mr Bloom said. Look sharp and you'll catch him. |
| |
| --Thanks, old man, Hynes said. I'll tap him too. |
| |
| He hurried on eagerly towards the _Freeman's Journal_. |
| |
| Three bob I lent him in Meagher's. Three weeks. Third hint. |
| |
| WE SEE THE CANVASSER AT WORK |
| |
| |
| Mr Bloom laid his cutting on Mr Nannetti's desk. |
| |
| --Excuse me, councillor, he said. This ad, you see. Keyes, you remember? |
| |
| Mr Nannetti considered the cutting awhile and nodded. |
| |
| --He wants it in for July, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| The foreman moved his pencil towards it. |
| |
| --But wait, Mr Bloom said. He wants it changed. Keyes, you see. He wants |
| two keys at the top. |
| |
| Hell of a racket they make. He doesn't hear it. Nannan. Iron nerves. |
| Maybe he understands what I. |
| |
| The foreman turned round to hear patiently and, lifting an elbow, began |
| to scratch slowly in the armpit of his alpaca jacket. |
| |
| --Like that, Mr Bloom said, crossing his forefingers at the top. |
| |
| Let him take that in first. |
| |
| Mr Bloom, glancing sideways up from the cross he had made, saw the |
| foreman's sallow face, think he has a touch of jaundice, and beyond the |
| obedient reels feeding in huge webs of paper. Clank it. Clank it. Miles |
| of it unreeled. What becomes of it after? O, wrap up meat, parcels: |
| various uses, thousand and one things. |
| |
| Slipping his words deftly into the pauses of the clanking he drew |
| swiftly on the scarred woodwork. |
| |
| HOUSE OF KEY(E)S |
| |
| |
| --Like that, see. Two crossed keys here. A circle. Then here the name. |
| Alexander Keyes, tea, wine and spirit merchant. So on. |
| |
| Better not teach him his own business. |
| |
| --You know yourself, councillor, just what he wants. Then round the top |
| in leaded: the house of keys. You see? Do you think that's a good idea? |
| |
| The foreman moved his scratching hand to his lower ribs and scratched |
| there quietly. |
| |
| --The idea, Mr Bloom said, is the house of keys. You know, councillor, |
| the Manx parliament. Innuendo of home rule. Tourists, you know, from the |
| isle of Man. Catches the eye, you see. Can you do that? |
| |
| I could ask him perhaps about how to pronounce that _voglio._ But then |
| if he didn't know only make it awkward for him. Better not. |
| |
| --We can do that, the foreman said. Have you the design? |
| |
| --I can get it, Mr Bloom said. It was in a Kilkenny paper. He has a |
| house there too. I'll just run out and ask him. Well, you can do that |
| and just a little par calling attention. You know the usual. Highclass |
| licensed premises. Longfelt want. So on. |
| |
| The foreman thought for an instant. |
| |
| --We can do that, he said. Let him give us a three months' renewal. |
| |
| A typesetter brought him a limp galleypage. He began to check it |
| silently. Mr Bloom stood by, hearing the loud throbs of cranks, watching |
| the silent typesetters at their cases. |
| |
| ORTHOGRAPHICAL |
| |
| |
| Want to be sure of his spelling. Proof fever. Martin Cunningham forgot |
| to give us his spellingbee conundrum this morning. It is amusing to view |
| the unpar one ar alleled embarra two ars is it? double ess ment of a |
| harassed pedlar while gauging au the symmetry with a y of a peeled pear |
| under a cemetery wall. Silly, isn't it? Cemetery put in of course on |
| account of the symmetry. |
| |
| I should have said when he clapped on his topper. Thank you. I ought |
| to have said something about an old hat or something. No. I could have |
| said. Looks as good as new now. See his phiz then. |
| |
| Sllt. The nethermost deck of the first machine jogged forward its |
| flyboard with sllt the first batch of quirefolded papers. Sllt. Almost |
| human the way it sllt to call attention. Doing its level best to speak. |
| That door too sllt creaking, asking to be shut. Everything speaks in its |
| own way. Sllt. |
| |
| NOTED CHURCHMAN AN OCCASIONAL CONTRIBUTOR |
| |
| |
| The foreman handed back the galleypage suddenly, saying: |
| |
| --Wait. Where's the archbishop's letter? It's to be repeated in the |
| _Telegraph._ Where's what's his name? |
| |
| He looked about him round his loud unanswering machines. |
| |
| --Monks, sir? a voice asked from the castingbox. |
| |
| --Ay. Where's Monks? |
| |
| --Monks! |
| |
| Mr Bloom took up his cutting. Time to get out. |
| |
| --Then I'll get the design, Mr Nannetti, he said, and you'll give it a |
| good place I know. |
| |
| --Monks! |
| |
| --Yes, sir. |
| |
| Three months' renewal. Want to get some wind off my chest first. Try it |
| anyhow. Rub in August: good idea: horseshow month. Ballsbridge. Tourists |
| over for the show. |
| |
| A DAYFATHER |
| |
| |
| He walked on through the caseroom passing an old man, bowed, spectacled, |
| aproned. Old Monks, the dayfather. Queer lot of stuff he must have put |
| through his hands in his time: obituary notices, pubs' ads, speeches, |
| divorce suits, found drowned. Nearing the end of his tether now. Sober |
| serious man with a bit in the savingsbank I'd say. Wife a good cook and |
| washer. Daughter working the machine in the parlour. Plain Jane, no damn |
| nonsense. AND IT WAS THE FEAST OF THE PASSOVER |
| |
| |
| He stayed in his walk to watch a typesetter neatly distributing type. |
| Reads it backwards first. Quickly he does it. Must require some practice |
| that. mangiD kcirtaP. Poor papa with his hagadah book, reading backwards |
| with his finger to me. Pessach. Next year in Jerusalem. Dear, O dear! |
| All that long business about that brought us out of the land of Egypt |
| and into the house of bondage _Alleluia. Shema Israel Adonai Elohenu_. |
| No, that's the other. Then the twelve brothers, Jacob's sons. And then |
| the lamb and the cat and the dog and the stick and the water and the |
| butcher. And then the angel of death kills the butcher and he kills the |
| ox and the dog kills the cat. Sounds a bit silly till you come to look |
| into it well. Justice it means but it's everybody eating everyone else. |
| That's what life is after all. How quickly he does that job. Practice |
| makes perfect. Seems to see with his fingers. |
| |
| Mr Bloom passed on out of the clanking noises through the gallery on to |
| the landing. Now am I going to tram it out all the way and then catch |
| him out perhaps. Better phone him up first. Number? Yes. Same as |
| Citron's house. Twentyeight. Twentyeight double four. |
| |
| ONLY ONCE MORE THAT SOAP |
| |
| |
| He went down the house staircase. Who the deuce scrawled all over those |
| walls with matches? Looks as if they did it for a bet. Heavy greasy |
| smell there always is in those works. Lukewarm glue in Thom's next door |
| when I was there. |
| |
| He took out his handkerchief to dab his nose. Citronlemon? Ah, the soap |
| I put there. Lose it out of that pocket. Putting back his handkerchief |
| he took out the soap and stowed it away, buttoned, into the hip pocket |
| of his trousers. |
| |
| What perfume does your wife use? I could go home still: tram: something |
| I forgot. Just to see: before: dressing. No. Here. No. |
| |
| A sudden screech of laughter came from the _Evening Telegraph_ office. |
| Know who that is. What's up? Pop in a minute to phone. Ned Lambert it |
| is. |
| |
| He entered softly. |
| |
| ERIN, GREEN GEM OF THE SILVER SEA |
| |
| |
| --The ghost walks, professor MacHugh murmured softly, biscuitfully to |
| the dusty windowpane. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus, staring from the empty fireplace at Ned Lambert's quizzing |
| face, asked of it sourly: |
| |
| --Agonising Christ, wouldn't it give you a heartburn on your arse? |
| |
| Ned Lambert, seated on the table, read on: |
| |
| --_Or again, note the meanderings of some purling rill as it babbles |
| on its way, tho' quarrelling with the stony obstacles, to the tumbling |
| waters of Neptune's blue domain, 'mid mossy banks, fanned by gentlest |
| zephyrs, played on by the glorious sunlight or 'neath the shadows cast |
| o'er its pensive bosom by the overarching leafage of the giants of |
| the forest_. What about that, Simon? he asked over the fringe of his |
| newspaper. How's that for high? |
| |
| --Changing his drink, Mr Dedalus said. |
| |
| Ned Lambert, laughing, struck the newspaper on his knees, repeating: |
| |
| --_The pensive bosom and the overarsing leafage_. O boys! O boys! |
| |
| --And Xenophon looked upon Marathon, Mr Dedalus said, looking again on |
| the fireplace and to the window, and Marathon looked on the sea. |
| |
| --That will do, professor MacHugh cried from the window. I don't want to |
| hear any more of the stuff. |
| |
| He ate off the crescent of water biscuit he had been nibbling and, |
| hungered, made ready to nibble the biscuit in his other hand. |
| |
| High falutin stuff. Bladderbags. Ned Lambert is taking a day off I see. |
| Rather upsets a man's day, a funeral does. He has influence they |
| say. Old Chatterton, the vicechancellor, is his granduncle or his |
| greatgranduncle. Close on ninety they say. Subleader for his death |
| written this long time perhaps. Living to spite them. Might go first |
| himself. Johnny, make room for your uncle. The right honourable Hedges |
| Eyre Chatterton. Daresay he writes him an odd shaky cheque or two on |
| gale days. Windfall when he kicks out. Alleluia. |
| |
| --Just another spasm, Ned Lambert said. |
| |
| --What is it? Mr Bloom asked. |
| |
| --A recently discovered fragment of Cicero, professor MacHugh answered |
| with pomp of tone. _Our lovely land_. SHORT BUT TO THE POINT |
| |
| |
| --Whose land? Mr Bloom said simply. |
| |
| --Most pertinent question, the professor said between his chews. With an |
| accent on the whose. |
| |
| --Dan Dawson's land Mr Dedalus said. |
| |
| --Is it his speech last night? Mr Bloom asked. |
| |
| Ned Lambert nodded. |
| |
| --But listen to this, he said. |
| |
| The doorknob hit Mr Bloom in the small of the back as the door was |
| pushed in. |
| |
| --Excuse me, J. J. O'Molloy said, entering. |
| |
| Mr Bloom moved nimbly aside. |
| |
| --I beg yours, he said. |
| |
| --Good day, Jack. |
| |
| --Come in. Come in. |
| |
| --Good day. |
| |
| --How are you, Dedalus? |
| |
| --Well. And yourself? |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy shook his head. |
| |
| SAD |
| |
| |
| Cleverest fellow at the junior bar he used to be. Decline, poor chap. |
| That hectic flush spells finis for a man. Touch and go with him. What's |
| in the wind, I wonder. Money worry. |
| |
| --_Or again if we but climb the serried mountain peaks._ |
| |
| --You're looking extra. |
| |
| --Is the editor to be seen? J. J. O'Molloy asked, looking towards the |
| inner door. |
| |
| --Very much so, professor MacHugh said. To be seen and heard. He's in |
| his sanctum with Lenehan. |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy strolled to the sloping desk and began to turn back the |
| pink pages of the file. |
| |
| Practice dwindling. A mighthavebeen. Losing heart. Gambling. Debts of |
| honour. Reaping the whirlwind. Used to get good retainers from D. and T. |
| Fitzgerald. Their wigs to show the grey matter. Brains on their sleeve |
| like the statue in Glasnevin. Believe he does some literary work for the |
| _Express_ with Gabriel Conroy. Wellread fellow. Myles Crawford began |
| on the _Independent._ Funny the way those newspaper men veer about when |
| they get wind of a new opening. Weathercocks. Hot and cold in the same |
| breath. Wouldn't know which to believe. One story good till you hear |
| the next. Go for one another baldheaded in the papers and then all blows |
| over. Hail fellow well met the next moment. |
| |
| --Ah, listen to this for God' sake, Ned Lambert pleaded. _Or again if we |
| but climb the serried mountain peaks..._ |
| |
| --Bombast! the professor broke in testily. Enough of the inflated |
| windbag! |
| |
| --_Peaks_, Ned Lambert went on, _towering high on high, to bathe our |
| souls, as it were..._ |
| |
| --Bathe his lips, Mr Dedalus said. Blessed and eternal God! Yes? Is he |
| taking anything for it? |
| |
| _--As 'twere, in the peerless panorama of Ireland's portfolio, |
| unmatched, despite their wellpraised prototypes in other vaunted prize |
| regions, for very beauty, of bosky grove and undulating plain and |
| luscious pastureland of vernal green, steeped in the transcendent |
| translucent glow of our mild mysterious Irish twilight..._ |
| |
| HIS NATIVE DORIC |
| |
| |
| --The moon, professor MacHugh said. He forgot Hamlet. |
| |
| _--That mantles the vista far and wide and wait till the glowing orb of |
| the moon shine forth to irradiate her silver effulgence..._ |
| |
| --O! Mr Dedalus cried, giving vent to a hopeless groan. Shite and |
| onions! That'll do, Ned. Life is too short. |
| |
| He took off his silk hat and, blowing out impatiently his bushy |
| moustache, welshcombed his hair with raking fingers. |
| |
| Ned Lambert tossed the newspaper aside, chuckling with delight. An |
| instant after a hoarse bark of laughter burst over professor MacHugh's |
| unshaven blackspectacled face. |
| |
| --Doughy Daw! he cried. |
| |
| WHAT WETHERUP SAID |
| |
| |
| All very fine to jeer at it now in cold print but it goes down like hot |
| cake that stuff. He was in the bakery line too, wasn't he? Why they call |
| him Doughy Daw. Feathered his nest well anyhow. Daughter engaged to that |
| chap in the inland revenue office with the motor. Hooked that nicely. |
| Entertainments. Open house. Big blowout. Wetherup always said that. Get |
| a grip of them by the stomach. |
| |
| The inner door was opened violently and a scarlet beaked face, crested |
| by a comb of feathery hair, thrust itself in. The bold blue eyes stared |
| about them and the harsh voice asked: |
| |
| --What is it? |
| |
| --And here comes the sham squire himself! professor MacHugh said |
| grandly. |
| |
| --Getonouthat, you bloody old pedagogue! the editor said in recognition. |
| |
| --Come, Ned, Mr Dedalus said, putting on his hat. I must get a drink |
| after that. |
| |
| --Drink! the editor cried. No drinks served before mass. |
| |
| --Quite right too, Mr Dedalus said, going out. Come on, Ned. |
| |
| Ned Lambert sidled down from the table. The editor's blue eyes roved |
| towards Mr Bloom's face, shadowed by a smile. |
| |
| --Will you join us, Myles? Ned Lambert asked. |
| |
| MEMORABLE BATTLES RECALLED |
| |
| |
| --North Cork militia! the editor cried, striding to the mantelpiece. We |
| won every time! North Cork and Spanish officers! |
| |
| --Where was that, Myles? Ned Lambert asked with a reflective glance at |
| his toecaps. |
| |
| --In Ohio! the editor shouted. |
| |
| --So it was, begad, Ned Lambert agreed. |
| |
| Passing out he whispered to J. J. O'Molloy: |
| |
| --Incipient jigs. Sad case. |
| |
| --Ohio! the editor crowed in high treble from his uplifted scarlet face. |
| My Ohio! |
| |
| --A perfect cretic! the professor said. Long, short and long. |
| |
| O, HARP EOLIAN! |
| |
| |
| He took a reel of dental floss from his waistcoat pocket and, breaking |
| off a piece, twanged it smartly between two and two of his resonant |
| unwashed teeth. |
| |
| --Bingbang, bangbang. |
| |
| Mr Bloom, seeing the coast clear, made for the inner door. |
| |
| --Just a moment, Mr Crawford, he said. I just want to phone about an ad. |
| |
| He went in. |
| |
| --What about that leader this evening? professor MacHugh asked, coming |
| to the editor and laying a firm hand on his shoulder. |
| |
| --That'll be all right, Myles Crawford said more calmly. Never you fret. |
| Hello, Jack. That's all right. |
| |
| --Good day, Myles, J. J. O'Molloy said, letting the pages he held slip |
| limply back on the file. Is that Canada swindle case on today? |
| |
| The telephone whirred inside. |
| |
| --Twentyeight... No, twenty... Double four... Yes. |
| |
| SPOT THE WINNER |
| |
| |
| Lenehan came out of the inner office with SPORT'S tissues. |
| |
| --Who wants a dead cert for the Gold cup? he asked. Sceptre with O. |
| Madden up. |
| |
| He tossed the tissues on to the table. |
| |
| Screams of newsboys barefoot in the hall rushed near and the door was |
| flung open. |
| |
| --Hush, Lenehan said. I hear feetstoops. |
| |
| Professor MacHugh strode across the room and seized the cringing urchin |
| by the collar as the others scampered out of the hall and down the |
| steps. The tissues rustled up in the draught, floated softly in the air |
| blue scrawls and under the table came to earth. |
| |
| --It wasn't me, sir. It was the big fellow shoved me, sir. |
| |
| --Throw him out and shut the door, the editor said. There's a hurricane |
| blowing. |
| |
| Lenehan began to paw the tissues up from the floor, grunting as he |
| stooped twice. |
| |
| --Waiting for the racing special, sir, the newsboy said. It was Pat |
| Farrell shoved me, sir. |
| |
| He pointed to two faces peering in round the doorframe. |
| |
| --Him, sir. |
| |
| --Out of this with you, professor MacHugh said gruffly. |
| |
| He hustled the boy out and banged the door to. |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy turned the files crackingly over, murmuring, seeking: |
| |
| --Continued on page six, column four. |
| |
| --Yes, _Evening Telegraph_ here, Mr Bloom phoned from the inner office. |
| Is the boss...? Yes, _Telegraph_... To where? Aha! Which auction rooms |
| ?... Aha! I see... Right. I'll catch him. |
| |
| A COLLISION ENSUES |
| |
| |
| The bell whirred again as he rang off. He came in quickly and bumped |
| against Lenehan who was struggling up with the second tissue. |
| |
| --_Pardon, monsieur_, Lenehan said, clutching him for an instant and |
| making a grimace. |
| |
| --My fault, Mr Bloom said, suffering his grip. Are you hurt? I'm in a |
| hurry. |
| |
| --Knee, Lenehan said. |
| |
| He made a comic face and whined, rubbing his knee: |
| |
| --The accumulation of the _anno Domini_. |
| |
| --Sorry, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| He went to the door and, holding it ajar, paused. J. J. O'Molloy slapped |
| the heavy pages over. The noise of two shrill voices, a mouthorgan, |
| echoed in the bare hallway from the newsboys squatted on the doorsteps: |
| |
| _--We are the boys of Wexford |
| Who fought with heart and hand._ |
| |
| EXIT BLOOM |
| |
| |
| --I'm just running round to Bachelor's walk, Mr Bloom said, about this |
| ad of Keyes's. Want to fix it up. They tell me he's round there in |
| Dillon's. |
| |
| He looked indecisively for a moment at their faces. The editor who, |
| leaning against the mantelshelf, had propped his head on his hand, |
| suddenly stretched forth an arm amply. |
| |
| --Begone! he said. The world is before you. |
| |
| --Back in no time, Mr Bloom said, hurrying out. |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy took the tissues from Lenehan's hand and read them, |
| blowing them apart gently, without comment. |
| |
| --He'll get that advertisement, the professor said, staring through his |
| blackrimmed spectacles over the crossblind. Look at the young scamps |
| after him. |
| |
| --Show. Where? Lenehan cried, running to the window. |
| |
| A STREET CORTEGE |
| |
| |
| Both smiled over the crossblind at the file of capering newsboys in Mr |
| Bloom's wake, the last zigzagging white on the breeze a mocking kite, a |
| tail of white bowknots. |
| |
| --Look at the young guttersnipe behind him hue and cry, Lenehan said, |
| and you'll kick. O, my rib risible! Taking off his flat spaugs and the |
| walk. Small nines. Steal upon larks. |
| |
| He began to mazurka in swift caricature across the floor on sliding |
| feet past the fireplace to J. J. O'Molloy who placed the tissues in his |
| receiving hands. |
| |
| --What's that? Myles Crawford said with a start. Where are the other two |
| gone? |
| |
| --Who? the professor said, turning. They're gone round to the Oval for a |
| drink. Paddy Hooper is there with Jack Hall. Came over last night. |
| |
| --Come on then, Myles Crawford said. Where's my hat? |
| |
| He walked jerkily into the office behind, parting the vent of his |
| jacket, jingling his keys in his back pocket. They jingled then in the |
| air and against the wood as he locked his desk drawer. |
| |
| --He's pretty well on, professor MacHugh said in a low voice. |
| |
| --Seems to be, J. J. O'Molloy said, taking out a cigarettecase in |
| murmuring meditation, but it is not always as it seems. Who has the most |
| matches? |
| |
| THE CALUMET OF PEACE |
| |
| |
| He offered a cigarette to the professor and took one himself. Lenehan |
| promptly struck a match for them and lit their cigarettes in turn. J. J. |
| O'Molloy opened his case again and offered it. |
| |
| --_Thanky vous_, Lenehan said, helping himself. |
| |
| The editor came from the inner office, a straw hat awry on his brow. He |
| declaimed in song, pointing sternly at professor MacHugh: |
| |
| _--'Twas rank and fame that tempted thee, 'Twas empire charmed thy |
| heart._ |
| |
| The professor grinned, locking his long lips. |
| |
| --Eh? You bloody old Roman empire? Myles Crawford said. |
| |
| He took a cigarette from the open case. Lenehan, lighting it for him |
| with quick grace, said: |
| |
| --Silence for my brandnew riddle! |
| |
| --_Imperium romanum_, J. J. O'Molloy said gently. It sounds nobler than |
| British or Brixton. The word reminds one somehow of fat in the fire. |
| |
| Myles Crawford blew his first puff violently towards the ceiling. |
| |
| --That's it, he said. We are the fat. You and I are the fat in the fire. |
| We haven't got the chance of a snowball in hell. |
| |
| THE GRANDEUR THAT WAS ROME |
| |
| |
| --Wait a moment, professor MacHugh said, raising two quiet claws. We |
| mustn't be led away by words, by sounds of words. We think of Rome, |
| imperial, imperious, imperative. |
| |
| He extended elocutionary arms from frayed stained shirtcuffs, pausing: |
| |
| --What was their civilisation? Vast, I allow: but vile. Cloacae: sewers. |
| The Jews in the wilderness and on the mountaintop said: _It is meet |
| to be here. Let us build an altar to Jehovah_. The Roman, like the |
| Englishman who follows in his footsteps, brought to every new shore on |
| which he set his foot (on our shore he never set it) only his cloacal |
| obsession. He gazed about him in his toga and he said: _It is meet to be |
| here. Let us construct a watercloset._ |
| |
| --Which they accordingly did do, Lenehan said. Our old ancient |
| ancestors, as we read in the first chapter of Guinness's, were partial |
| to the running stream. |
| |
| --They were nature's gentlemen, J. J. O'Molloy murmured. But we have |
| also Roman law. |
| |
| --And Pontius Pilate is its prophet, professor MacHugh responded. |
| |
| --Do you know that story about chief baron Palles? J. J. O'Molloy asked. |
| It was at the royal university dinner. Everything was going swimmingly |
| ... |
| |
| --First my riddle, Lenehan said. Are you ready? |
| |
| Mr O'Madden Burke, tall in copious grey of Donegal tweed, came in from |
| the hallway. Stephen Dedalus, behind him, uncovered as he entered. |
| |
| --_Entrez, mes enfants!_ Lenehan cried. |
| |
| --I escort a suppliant, Mr O'Madden Burke said melodiously. Youth led by |
| Experience visits Notoriety. |
| |
| --How do you do? the editor said, holding out a hand. Come in. Your |
| governor is just gone.??? |
| |
| |
| Lenehan said to all: |
| |
| --Silence! What opera resembles a railwayline? Reflect, ponder, |
| excogitate, reply. |
| |
| Stephen handed over the typed sheets, pointing to the title and |
| signature. |
| |
| --Who? the editor asked. |
| |
| Bit torn off. |
| |
| --Mr Garrett Deasy, Stephen said. |
| |
| --That old pelters, the editor said. Who tore it? Was he short taken? |
| |
| _On swift sail flaming |
| From storm and south |
| He comes, pale vampire, |
| Mouth to my mouth._ |
| |
| --Good day, Stephen, the professor said, coming to peer over their |
| shoulders. Foot and mouth? Are you turned...? |
| |
| Bullockbefriending bard. |
| |
| SHINDY IN WELLKNOWN RESTAURANT |
| |
| |
| --Good day, sir, Stephen answered blushing. The letter is not mine. Mr |
| Garrett Deasy asked me to... |
| |
| --O, I know him, Myles Crawford said, and I knew his wife too. The |
| bloodiest old tartar God ever made. By Jesus, she had the foot and mouth |
| disease and no mistake! The night she threw the soup in the waiter's |
| face in the Star and Garter. Oho! |
| |
| A woman brought sin into the world. For Helen, the runaway wife of |
| Menelaus, ten years the Greeks. O'Rourke, prince of Breffni. |
| |
| --Is he a widower? Stephen asked. |
| |
| --Ay, a grass one, Myles Crawford said, his eye running down the |
| typescript. Emperor's horses. Habsburg. An Irishman saved his life on |
| the ramparts of Vienna. Don't you forget! Maximilian Karl O'Donnell, |
| graf von Tirconnell in Ireland. Sent his heir over to make the king |
| an Austrian fieldmarshal now. Going to be trouble there one day. Wild |
| geese. O yes, every time. Don't you forget that! |
| |
| --The moot point is did he forget it, J. J. O'Molloy said quietly, |
| turning a horseshoe paperweight. Saving princes is a thank you job. |
| |
| Professor MacHugh turned on him. |
| |
| --And if not? he said. |
| |
| --I'll tell you how it was, Myles Crawford began. A Hungarian it was one |
| day... LOST CAUSES |
| |
| NOBLE MARQUESS MENTIONED |
| |
| |
| --We were always loyal to lost causes, the professor said. Success for |
| us is the death of the intellect and of the imagination. We were never |
| loyal to the successful. We serve them. I teach the blatant Latin |
| language. I speak the tongue of a race the acme of whose mentality is |
| the maxim: time is money. Material domination. _Dominus!_ Lord! Where is |
| the spirituality? Lord Jesus? Lord Salisbury? A sofa in a westend club. |
| But the Greek! |
| |
| KYRIE ELEISON! |
| |
| |
| A smile of light brightened his darkrimmed eyes, lengthened his long |
| lips. |
| |
| --The Greek! he said again. _Kyrios!_ Shining word! The vowels the |
| Semite and the Saxon know not. _Kyrie!_ The radiance of the intellect. |
| I ought to profess Greek, the language of the mind. _Kyrie eleison!_ The |
| closetmaker and the cloacamaker will never be lords of our spirit. We |
| are liege subjects of the catholic chivalry of Europe that foundered at |
| Trafalgar and of the empire of the spirit, not an _imperium,_ that |
| went under with the Athenian fleets at Aegospotami. Yes, yes. They went |
| under. Pyrrhus, misled by an oracle, made a last attempt to retrieve the |
| fortunes of Greece. Loyal to a lost cause. |
| |
| He strode away from them towards the window. |
| |
| --They went forth to battle, Mr O'Madden Burke said greyly, but they |
| always fell. |
| |
| --Boohoo! Lenehan wept with a little noise. Owing to a brick received in |
| the latter half of the _matinée_. Poor, poor, poor Pyrrhus! |
| |
| He whispered then near Stephen's ear: |
| |
| LENEHAN'S LIMERICK |
| |
| |
| _There's a ponderous pundit MacHugh |
| Who wears goggles of ebony hue. |
| As he mostly sees double |
| To wear them why trouble? |
| I can't see the Joe Miller. Can you?_ |
| |
| In mourning for Sallust, Mulligan says. Whose mother is beastly dead. |
| |
| Myles Crawford crammed the sheets into a sidepocket. |
| |
| --That'll be all right, he said. I'll read the rest after. That'll be |
| all right. |
| |
| Lenehan extended his hands in protest. |
| |
| --But my riddle! he said. What opera is like a railwayline? |
| |
| --Opera? Mr O'Madden Burke's sphinx face reriddled. |
| |
| Lenehan announced gladly: |
| |
| --_The Rose of Castile_. See the wheeze? Rows of cast steel. Gee! |
| |
| He poked Mr O'Madden Burke mildly in the spleen. Mr O'Madden Burke fell |
| back with grace on his umbrella, feigning a gasp. |
| |
| --Help! he sighed. I feel a strong weakness. |
| |
| Lenehan, rising to tiptoe, fanned his face rapidly with the rustling |
| tissues. |
| |
| The professor, returning by way of the files, swept his hand across |
| Stephen's and Mr O'Madden Burke's loose ties. |
| |
| --Paris, past and present, he said. You look like communards. |
| |
| --Like fellows who had blown up the Bastile, J. J. O'Molloy said in |
| quiet mockery. Or was it you shot the lord lieutenant of Finland between |
| you? You look as though you had done the deed. General Bobrikoff. |
| |
| OMNIUM GATHERUM |
| |
| |
| --We were only thinking about it, Stephen said. |
| |
| --All the talents, Myles Crawford said. Law, the classics... |
| |
| --The turf, Lenehan put in. |
| |
| --Literature, the press. |
| |
| --If Bloom were here, the professor said. The gentle art of |
| advertisement. |
| |
| --And Madam Bloom, Mr O'Madden Burke added. The vocal muse. Dublin's |
| prime favourite. |
| |
| Lenehan gave a loud cough. |
| |
| --Ahem! he said very softly. O, for a fresh of breath air! I caught a |
| cold in the park. The gate was open. |
| |
| YOU CAN DO IT! |
| |
| |
| The editor laid a nervous hand on Stephen's shoulder. |
| |
| --I want you to write something for me, he said. Something with a bite |
| in it. You can do it. I see it in your face. _In the lexicon of youth_ |
| ... |
| |
| See it in your face. See it in your eye. Lazy idle little schemer. |
| |
| --Foot and mouth disease! the editor cried in scornful invective. Great |
| nationalist meeting in Borris-in-Ossory. All balls! Bulldosing the |
| public! Give them something with a bite in it. Put us all into it, damn |
| its soul. Father, Son and Holy Ghost and Jakes M'Carthy. |
| |
| --We can all supply mental pabulum, Mr O'Madden Burke said. |
| |
| Stephen raised his eyes to the bold unheeding stare. |
| |
| --He wants you for the pressgang, J. J. O'Molloy said. |
| |
| THE GREAT GALLAHER |
| |
| |
| --You can do it, Myles Crawford repeated, clenching his hand in |
| emphasis. Wait a minute. We'll paralyse Europe as Ignatius Gallaher |
| used to say when he was on the shaughraun, doing billiardmarking in the |
| Clarence. Gallaher, that was a pressman for you. That was a pen. You |
| know how he made his mark? I'll tell you. That was the smartest piece of |
| journalism ever known. That was in eightyone, sixth of May, time of |
| the invincibles, murder in the Phoenix park, before you were born, I |
| suppose. I'll show you. |
| |
| He pushed past them to the files. |
| |
| --Look at here, he said turning. The _New York World_ cabled for a |
| special. Remember that time? |
| |
| Professor MacHugh nodded. |
| |
| --_New York World_, the editor said, excitedly pushing back his straw |
| hat. Where it took place. Tim Kelly, or Kavanagh I mean. Joe Brady and |
| the rest of them. Where Skin-the-Goat drove the car. Whole route, see? |
| |
| --Skin-the-Goat, Mr O'Madden Burke said. Fitzharris. He has that |
| cabman's shelter, they say, down there at Butt bridge. Holohan told me. |
| You know Holohan? |
| |
| --Hop and carry one, is it? Myles Crawford said. |
| |
| --And poor Gumley is down there too, so he told me, minding stones for |
| the corporation. A night watchman. |
| |
| Stephen turned in surprise. |
| |
| --Gumley? he said. You don't say so? A friend of my father's, is it? |
| |
| --Never mind Gumley, Myles Crawford cried angrily. Let Gumley mind |
| the stones, see they don't run away. Look at here. What did Ignatius |
| Gallaher do? I'll tell you. Inspiration of genius. Cabled right away. |
| Have you _Weekly Freeman_ of 17 March? Right. Have you got that? |
| |
| He flung back pages of the files and stuck his finger on a point. |
| |
| --Take page four, advertisement for Bransome's coffee, let us say. Have |
| you got that? Right. |
| |
| The telephone whirred. |
| |
| A DISTANT VOICE |
| |
| |
| --I'll answer it, the professor said, going. |
| |
| --B is parkgate. Good. |
| |
| His finger leaped and struck point after point, vibrating. |
| |
| --T is viceregal lodge. C is where murder took place. K is Knockmaroon |
| gate. |
| |
| The loose flesh of his neck shook like a cock's wattles. An illstarched |
| dicky jutted up and with a rude gesture he thrust it back into his |
| waistcoat. |
| |
| --Hello? _Evening Telegraph_ here... Hello?... Who's there?... Yes... |
| Yes... Yes. |
| |
| --F to P is the route Skin-the-Goat drove the car for an alibi, |
| Inchicore, Roundtown, Windy Arbour, Palmerston Park, Ranelagh. F.A.B.P. |
| Got that? X is Davy's publichouse in upper Leeson street. |
| |
| The professor came to the inner door. |
| |
| --Bloom is at the telephone, he said. |
| |
| --Tell him go to hell, the editor said promptly. X is Davy's |
| publichouse, see? CLEVER, VERY |
| |
| |
| --Clever, Lenehan said. Very. |
| |
| --Gave it to them on a hot plate, Myles Crawford said, the whole bloody |
| history. |
| |
| Nightmare from which you will never awake. |
| |
| --I saw it, the editor said proudly. I was present. Dick Adams, the |
| besthearted bloody Corkman the Lord ever put the breath of life in, and |
| myself. |
| |
| Lenehan bowed to a shape of air, announcing: |
| |
| --Madam, I'm Adam. And Able was I ere I saw Elba. |
| |
| --History! Myles Crawford cried. The Old Woman of Prince's street was |
| there first. There was weeping and gnashing of teeth over that. Out of |
| an advertisement. Gregor Grey made the design for it. That gave him the |
| leg up. Then Paddy Hooper worked Tay Pay who took him on to the _Star._ |
| Now he's got in with Blumenfeld. That's press. That's talent. Pyatt! He |
| was all their daddies! |
| |
| --The father of scare journalism, Lenehan confirmed, and the |
| brother-in-law of Chris Callinan. |
| |
| --Hello?... Are you there?... Yes, he's here still. Come across |
| yourself. |
| |
| --Where do you find a pressman like that now, eh? the editor cried. He |
| flung the pages down. |
| |
| --Clamn dever, Lenehan said to Mr O'Madden Burke. |
| |
| --Very smart, Mr O'Madden Burke said. |
| |
| Professor MacHugh came from the inner office. |
| |
| --Talking about the invincibles, he said, did you see that some hawkers |
| were up before the recorder? |
| |
| --O yes, J. J. O'Molloy said eagerly. Lady Dudley was walking home |
| through the park to see all the trees that were blown down by that |
| cyclone last year and thought she'd buy a view of Dublin. And it |
| turned out to be a commemoration postcard of Joe Brady or Number One or |
| Skin-the-Goat. Right outside the viceregal lodge, imagine! |
| |
| --They're only in the hook and eye department, Myles Crawford said. |
| Psha! Press and the bar! Where have you a man now at the bar like those |
| fellows, like Whiteside, like Isaac Butt, like silvertongued O'Hagan. |
| Eh? Ah, bloody nonsense. Psha! Only in the halfpenny place. |
| |
| His mouth continued to twitch unspeaking in nervous curls of disdain. |
| |
| Would anyone wish that mouth for her kiss? How do you know? Why did you |
| write it then? |
| |
| RHYMES AND REASONS |
| |
| |
| Mouth, south. Is the mouth south someway? Or the south a mouth? Must be |
| some. South, pout, out, shout, drouth. Rhymes: two men dressed the same, |
| looking the same, two by two. |
| |
| _........................ la tua pace |
| .................. che parlar ti piace |
| .... mentreché il vento, come fa, si tace._ |
| |
| He saw them three by three, approaching girls, in green, in rose, in |
| russet, entwining, _per l'aer perso_, in mauve, in purple, _quella |
| pacifica oriafiamma_, gold of oriflamme, _di rimirar fe piu ardenti._ |
| But I old men, penitent, leadenfooted, underdarkneath the night: mouth |
| south: tomb womb. |
| |
| --Speak up for yourself, Mr O'Madden Burke said. |
| |
| SUFFICIENT FOR THE DAY... |
| |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy, smiling palely, took up the gage. |
| |
| --My dear Myles, he said, flinging his cigarette aside, you put a false |
| construction on my words. I hold no brief, as at present advised, for |
| the third profession qua profession but your Cork legs are running away |
| with you. Why not bring in Henry Grattan and Flood and Demosthenes and |
| Edmund Burke? Ignatius Gallaher we all know and his Chapelizod boss, |
| Harmsworth of the farthing press, and his American cousin of the Bowery |
| guttersheet not to mention _Paddy Kelly's Budget, Pue's Occurrences_ |
| and our watchful friend _The Skibbereen Eagle_. Why bring in a master |
| of forensic eloquence like Whiteside? Sufficient for the day is the |
| newspaper thereof. LINKS WITH BYGONE DAYS OF YORE |
| |
| |
| --Grattan and Flood wrote for this very paper, the editor cried in his |
| face. Irish volunteers. Where are you now? Established 1763. Dr Lucas. |
| Who have you now like John Philpot Curran? Psha! |
| |
| --Well, J. J. O'Molloy said, Bushe K.C., for example. |
| |
| --Bushe? the editor said. Well, yes: Bushe, yes. He has a strain of it |
| in his blood. Kendal Bushe or I mean Seymour Bushe. |
| |
| --He would have been on the bench long ago, the professor said, only for |
| ... But no matter. |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy turned to Stephen and said quietly and slowly: |
| |
| --One of the most polished periods I think I ever listened to in my life |
| fell from the lips of Seymour Bushe. It was in that case of fratricide, |
| the Childs murder case. Bushe defended him. _And in the porches of mine |
| ear did pour._ |
| |
| |
| By the way how did he find that out? He died in his sleep. Or the other |
| story, beast with two backs? |
| |
| --What was that? the professor asked. |
| |
| ITALIA, MAGISTRA ARTIUM |
| |
| |
| --He spoke on the law of evidence, J. J. O'Molloy said, of Roman justice |
| as contrasted with the earlier Mosaic code, the _lex talionis_. And he |
| cited the Moses of Michelangelo in the vatican. |
| |
| --Ha. |
| |
| --A few wellchosen words, Lenehan prefaced. Silence! |
| |
| Pause. J. J. O'Molloy took out his cigarettecase. |
| |
| False lull. Something quite ordinary. |
| |
| Messenger took out his matchbox thoughtfully and lit his cigar. |
| |
| I have often thought since on looking back over that strange time that |
| it was that small act, trivial in itself, that striking of that match, |
| that determined the whole aftercourse of both our lives. A POLISHED |
| PERIOD |
| |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy resumed, moulding his words: |
| |
| --He said of it: _that stony effigy in frozen music, horned and |
| terrible, of the human form divine, that eternal symbol of wisdom and |
| of prophecy which, if aught that the imagination or the hand of sculptor |
| has wrought in marble of soultransfigured and of soultransfiguring |
| deserves to live, deserves to live._ |
| |
| His slim hand with a wave graced echo and fall. |
| |
| --Fine! Myles Crawford said at once. |
| |
| --The divine afflatus, Mr O'Madden Burke said. |
| |
| --You like it? J. J. O'Molloy asked Stephen. |
| |
| Stephen, his blood wooed by grace of language and gesture, blushed. He |
| took a cigarette from the case. J. J. O'Molloy offered his case to Myles |
| Crawford. Lenehan lit their cigarettes as before and took his trophy, |
| saying: |
| |
| --Muchibus thankibus. |
| |
| A MAN OF HIGH MORALE |
| |
| |
| --Professor Magennis was speaking to me about you, J. J. O'Molloy said |
| to Stephen. What do you think really of that hermetic crowd, the opal |
| hush poets: A. E. the mastermystic? That Blavatsky woman started it. |
| She was a nice old bag of tricks. A. E. has been telling some yankee |
| interviewer that you came to him in the small hours of the morning to |
| ask him about planes of consciousness. Magennis thinks you must have |
| been pulling A. E.'s leg. He is a man of the very highest morale, |
| Magennis. |
| |
| Speaking about me. What did he say? What did he say? What did he say |
| about me? Don't ask. |
| |
| --No, thanks, professor MacHugh said, waving the cigarettecase aside. |
| Wait a moment. Let me say one thing. The finest display of oratory I |
| ever heard was a speech made by John F Taylor at the college historical |
| society. Mr Justice Fitzgibbon, the present lord justice of appeal, had |
| spoken and the paper under debate was an essay (new for those days), |
| advocating the revival of the Irish tongue. |
| |
| He turned towards Myles Crawford and said: |
| |
| --You know Gerald Fitzgibbon. Then you can imagine the style of his |
| discourse. |
| |
| --He is sitting with Tim Healy, J. J. O'Molloy said, rumour has it, on |
| the Trinity college estates commission. |
| |
| --He is sitting with a sweet thing, Myles Crawford said, in a child's |
| frock. Go on. Well? |
| |
| --It was the speech, mark you, the professor said, of a finished orator, |
| full of courteous haughtiness and pouring in chastened diction I will |
| not say the vials of his wrath but pouring the proud man's contumely |
| upon the new movement. It was then a new movement. We were weak, |
| therefore worthless. |
| |
| He closed his long thin lips an instant but, eager to be on, raised |
| an outspanned hand to his spectacles and, with trembling thumb and |
| ringfinger touching lightly the black rims, steadied them to a new |
| focus. |
| |
| IMPROMPTU |
| |
| |
| In ferial tone he addressed J. J. O'Molloy: |
| |
| --Taylor had come there, you must know, from a sickbed. That he |
| had prepared his speech I do not believe for there was not even one |
| shorthandwriter in the hall. His dark lean face had a growth of shaggy |
| beard round it. He wore a loose white silk neckcloth and altogether he |
| looked (though he was not) a dying man. |
| |
| His gaze turned at once but slowly from J. J. O'Molloy's towards |
| Stephen's face and then bent at once to the ground, seeking. His |
| unglazed linen collar appeared behind his bent head, soiled by his |
| withering hair. Still seeking, he said: |
| |
| --When Fitzgibbon's speech had ended John F Taylor rose to reply. |
| Briefly, as well as I can bring them to mind, his words were these. |
| |
| He raised his head firmly. His eyes bethought themselves once more. |
| Witless shellfish swam in the gross lenses to and fro, seeking outlet. |
| |
| He began: |
| |
| _--Mr Chairman, ladies and gentlemen: Great was my admiration in |
| listening to the remarks addressed to the youth of Ireland a moment |
| since by my learned friend. It seemed to me that I had been transported |
| into a country far away from this country, into an age remote from |
| this age, that I stood in ancient Egypt and that I was listening to the |
| speech of some highpriest of that land addressed to the youthful Moses._ |
| |
| His listeners held their cigarettes poised to hear, their smokes |
| ascending in frail stalks that flowered with his speech. _And let our |
| crooked smokes._ Noble words coming. Look out. Could you try your hand |
| at it yourself? |
| |
| _--And it seemed to me that I heard the voice of that Egyptian |
| highpriest raised in a tone of like haughtiness and like pride. I heard |
| his words and their meaning was revealed to me._ |
| |
| FROM THE FATHERS |
| |
| |
| It was revealed to me that those things are good which yet are corrupted |
| which neither if they were supremely good nor unless they were good |
| could be corrupted. Ah, curse you! That's saint Augustine. |
| |
| _--Why will you jews not accept our culture, our religion and our |
| language? You are a tribe of nomad herdsmen: we are a mighty people. You |
| have no cities nor no wealth: our cities are hives of humanity and |
| our galleys, trireme and quadrireme, laden with all manner merchandise |
| furrow the waters of the known globe. You have but emerged from |
| primitive conditions: we have a literature, a priesthood, an agelong |
| history and a polity._ |
| |
| Nile. |
| |
| Child, man, effigy. |
| |
| By the Nilebank the babemaries kneel, cradle of bulrushes: a man supple |
| in combat: stonehorned, stonebearded, heart of stone. |
| |
| _--You pray to a local and obscure idol: our temples, majestic and |
| mysterious, are the abodes of Isis and Osiris, of Horus and Ammon Ra. |
| Yours serfdom, awe and humbleness: ours thunder and the seas. Israel |
| is weak and few are her children: Egypt is an host and terrible are her |
| arms. Vagrants and daylabourers are you called: the world trembles at |
| our name._ |
| |
| A dumb belch of hunger cleft his speech. He lifted his voice above it |
| boldly: |
| |
| _--But, ladies and gentlemen, had the youthful Moses listened to and |
| accepted that view of life, had he bowed his head and bowed his will |
| and bowed his spirit before that arrogant admonition he would never have |
| brought the chosen people out of their house of bondage, nor followed |
| the pillar of the cloud by day. He would never have spoken with the |
| Eternal amid lightnings on Sinai's mountaintop nor ever have come down |
| with the light of inspiration shining in his countenance and bearing in |
| his arms the tables of the law, graven in the language of the outlaw._ |
| |
| He ceased and looked at them, enjoying a silence. |
| |
| OMINOUS--FOR HIM! |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy said not without regret: |
| |
| --And yet he died without having entered the land of promise. |
| |
| --A sudden--at--the--moment--though--from--lingering--illness--often-- |
| previously--expectorated--demise, Lenehan added. And with a great future |
| behind him. |
| |
| The troop of bare feet was heard rushing along the hallway and pattering |
| up the staircase. |
| |
| --That is oratory, the professor said uncontradicted. Gone with the |
| wind. Hosts at Mullaghmast and Tara of the kings. Miles of ears of |
| porches. The tribune's words, howled and scattered to the four winds. |
| A people sheltered within his voice. Dead noise. Akasic records of all |
| that ever anywhere wherever was. Love and laud him: me no more. |
| |
| I have money. |
| |
| --Gentlemen, Stephen said. As the next motion on the agenda paper may I |
| suggest that the house do now adjourn? |
| |
| --You take my breath away. It is not perchance a French compliment? |
| Mr O'Madden Burke asked. 'Tis the hour, methinks, when the winejug, |
| metaphorically speaking, is most grateful in Ye ancient hostelry. |
| |
| --That it be and hereby is resolutely resolved. All that are in favour |
| say ay, Lenehan announced. The contrary no. I declare it carried. To |
| which particular boosing shed?... My casting vote is: Mooney's! |
| |
| He led the way, admonishing: |
| |
| --We will sternly refuse to partake of strong waters, will we not? Yes, |
| we will not. By no manner of means. |
| |
| Mr O'Madden Burke, following close, said with an ally's lunge of his |
| umbrella: |
| |
| --Lay on, Macduff! |
| |
| --Chip of the old block! the editor cried, clapping Stephen on the |
| shoulder. Let us go. Where are those blasted keys? |
| |
| He fumbled in his pocket pulling out the crushed typesheets. |
| |
| --Foot and mouth. I know. That'll be all right. That'll go in. Where are |
| they? That's all right. |
| |
| He thrust the sheets back and went into the inner office. LET US HOPE |
| |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy, about to follow him in, said quietly to Stephen: |
| |
| --I hope you will live to see it published. Myles, one moment. |
| |
| He went into the inner office, closing the door behind him. |
| |
| --Come along, Stephen, the professor said. That is fine, isn't it? It |
| has the prophetic vision. _Fuit Ilium!_ The sack of windy Troy. Kingdoms |
| of this world. The masters of the Mediterranean are fellaheen today. |
| |
| The first newsboy came pattering down the stairs at their heels and |
| rushed out into the street, yelling: |
| |
| --Racing special! |
| |
| Dublin. I have much, much to learn. |
| |
| They turned to the left along Abbey street. |
| |
| --I have a vision too, Stephen said. |
| |
| --Yes? the professor said, skipping to get into step. Crawford will |
| follow. |
| |
| Another newsboy shot past them, yelling as he ran: |
| |
| --Racing special! |
| |
| DEAR DIRTY DUBLIN |
| |
| |
| Dubliners. |
| |
| --Two Dublin vestals, Stephen said, elderly and pious, have lived fifty |
| and fiftythree years in Fumbally's lane. |
| |
| --Where is that? the professor asked. |
| |
| --Off Blackpitts, Stephen said. |
| |
| Damp night reeking of hungry dough. Against the wall. Face glistering |
| tallow under her fustian shawl. Frantic hearts. Akasic records. Quicker, |
| darlint! |
| |
| On now. Dare it. Let there be life. |
| |
| --They want to see the views of Dublin from the top of Nelson's pillar. |
| They save up three and tenpence in a red tin letterbox moneybox. They |
| shake out the threepenny bits and sixpences and coax out the pennies |
| with the blade of a knife. Two and three in silver and one and seven |
| in coppers. They put on their bonnets and best clothes and take their |
| umbrellas for fear it may come on to rain. |
| |
| --Wise virgins, professor MacHugh said. |
| |
| LIFE ON THE RAW |
| |
| |
| --They buy one and fourpenceworth of brawn and four slices of panloaf at |
| the north city diningrooms in Marlborough street from Miss Kate Collins, |
| proprietress... They purchase four and twenty ripe plums from a girl |
| at the foot of Nelson's pillar to take off the thirst of the brawn. They |
| give two threepenny bits to the gentleman at the turnstile and begin |
| to waddle slowly up the winding staircase, grunting, encouraging each |
| other, afraid of the dark, panting, one asking the other have you the |
| brawn, praising God and the Blessed Virgin, threatening to come down, |
| peeping at the airslits. Glory be to God. They had no idea it was that |
| high. |
| |
| Their names are Anne Kearns and Florence MacCabe. Anne Kearns has the |
| lumbago for which she rubs on Lourdes water, given her by a lady who got |
| a bottleful from a passionist father. Florence MacCabe takes a crubeen |
| and a bottle of double X for supper every Saturday. |
| |
| --Antithesis, the professor said nodding twice. Vestal virgins. I can |
| see them. What's keeping our friend? |
| |
| He turned. |
| |
| A bevy of scampering newsboys rushed down the steps, scattering in all |
| directions, yelling, their white papers fluttering. Hard after them |
| Myles Crawford appeared on the steps, his hat aureoling his scarlet |
| face, talking with J. J. O'Molloy. |
| |
| --Come along, the professor cried, waving his arm. |
| |
| He set off again to walk by Stephen's side. RETURN OF BLOOM |
| |
| |
| --Yes, he said. I see them. |
| |
| Mr Bloom, breathless, caught in a whirl of wild newsboys near the |
| offices of the _Irish Catholic and Dublin Penny Journal_, called: |
| |
| --Mr Crawford! A moment! |
| |
| --_Telegraph_! Racing special! |
| |
| --What is it? Myles Crawford said, falling back a pace. |
| |
| A newsboy cried in Mr Bloom's face: |
| |
| --Terrible tragedy in Rathmines! A child bit by a bellows! |
| |
| INTERVIEW WITH THE EDITOR |
| |
| |
| --Just this ad, Mr Bloom said, pushing through towards the steps, |
| puffing, and taking the cutting from his pocket. I spoke with Mr Keyes |
| just now. He'll give a renewal for two months, he says. After he'll |
| see. But he wants a par to call attention in the _Telegraph_ too, |
| the Saturday pink. And he wants it copied if it's not too late I told |
| councillor Nannetti from the _Kilkenny People_. I can have access to |
| it in the national library. House of keys, don't you see? His name is |
| Keyes. It's a play on the name. But he practically promised he'd give |
| the renewal. But he wants just a little puff. What will I tell him, Mr |
| Crawford? K.M.A. |
| |
| |
| --Will you tell him he can kiss my arse? Myles Crawford said throwing |
| out his arm for emphasis. Tell him that straight from the stable. |
| |
| A bit nervy. Look out for squalls. All off for a drink. Arm in arm. |
| Lenehan's yachting cap on the cadge beyond. Usual blarney. Wonder is |
| that young Dedalus the moving spirit. Has a good pair of boots on him |
| today. Last time I saw him he had his heels on view. Been walking in |
| muck somewhere. Careless chap. What was he doing in Irishtown? |
| |
| --Well, Mr Bloom said, his eyes returning, if I can get the design I |
| suppose it's worth a short par. He'd give the ad, I think. I'll tell him |
| ... K.M.R.I.A. |
| |
| |
| --He can kiss my royal Irish arse, Myles Crawford cried loudly over his |
| shoulder. Any time he likes, tell him. |
| |
| While Mr Bloom stood weighing the point and about to smile he strode on |
| jerkily. |
| |
| RAISING THE WIND |
| |
| |
| --_Nulla bona_, Jack, he said, raising his hand to his chin. I'm up to |
| here. I've been through the hoop myself. I was looking for a fellow to |
| back a bill for me no later than last week. Sorry, Jack. You must take |
| the will for the deed. With a heart and a half if I could raise the wind |
| anyhow. |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy pulled a long face and walked on silently. They caught up |
| on the others and walked abreast. |
| |
| --When they have eaten the brawn and the bread and wiped their twenty |
| fingers in the paper the bread was wrapped in they go nearer to the |
| railings. |
| |
| --Something for you, the professor explained to Myles Crawford. Two old |
| Dublin women on the top of Nelson's pillar. |
| |
| SOME COLUMN!--THAT'S WHAT WADDLER ONE SAID |
| |
| |
| --That's new, Myles Crawford said. That's copy. Out for the waxies |
| Dargle. Two old trickies, what? |
| |
| --But they are afraid the pillar will fall, Stephen went on. They see |
| the roofs and argue about where the different churches are: Rathmines' |
| blue dome, Adam and Eve's, saint Laurence O'Toole's. But it makes them |
| giddy to look so they pull up their skirts... |
| |
| THOSE SLIGHTLY RAMBUNCTIOUS FEMALES |
| |
| |
| --Easy all, Myles Crawford said. No poetic licence. We're in the |
| archdiocese here. |
| |
| --And settle down on their striped petticoats, peering up at the statue |
| of the onehandled adulterer. |
| |
| --Onehandled adulterer! the professor cried. I like that. I see the |
| idea. I see what you mean. |
| |
| DAMES DONATE DUBLIN'S CITS SPEEDPILLS VELOCITOUS AEROLITHS, BELIEF |
| |
| |
| --It gives them a crick in their necks, Stephen said, and they are too |
| tired to look up or down or to speak. They put the bag of plums between |
| them and eat the plums out of it, one after another, wiping off with |
| their handkerchiefs the plumjuice that dribbles out of their mouths and |
| spitting the plumstones slowly out between the railings. |
| |
| He gave a sudden loud young laugh as a close. Lenehan and Mr O'Madden |
| Burke, hearing, turned, beckoned and led on across towards Mooney's. |
| |
| --Finished? Myles Crawford said. So long as they do no worse. |
| |
| SOPHIST WALLOPS HAUGHTY HELEN SQUARE ON PROBOSCIS. SPARTANS GNASH |
| MOLARS. ITHACANS VOW PEN IS CHAMP. |
| |
| |
| --You remind me of Antisthenes, the professor said, a disciple of |
| Gorgias, the sophist. It is said of him that none could tell if he were |
| bitterer against others or against himself. He was the son of a noble |
| and a bondwoman. And he wrote a book in which he took away the palm of |
| beauty from Argive Helen and handed it to poor Penelope. |
| |
| Poor Penelope. Penelope Rich. |
| |
| They made ready to cross O'Connell street. |
| |
| HELLO THERE, CENTRAL! |
| |
| |
| At various points along the eight lines tramcars with motionless |
| trolleys stood in their tracks, bound for or from Rathmines, |
| Rathfarnham, Blackrock, Kingstown and Dalkey, Sandymount Green, Ringsend |
| and Sandymount Tower, Donnybrook, Palmerston Park and Upper Rathmines, |
| all still, becalmed in short circuit. Hackney cars, cabs, delivery |
| waggons, mailvans, private broughams, aerated mineral water floats with |
| rattling crates of bottles, rattled, rolled, horsedrawn, rapidly. |
| |
| WHAT?--AND LIKEWISE--WHERE? |
| |
| |
| --But what do you call it? Myles Crawford asked. Where did they get the |
| plums? |
| |
| VIRGILIAN, SAYS PEDAGOGUE. SOPHOMORE PLUMPS FOR OLD MAN MOSES. |
| |
| |
| --Call it, wait, the professor said, opening his long lips wide to |
| reflect. Call it, let me see. Call it: _deus nobis haec otia fecit._ |
| |
| --No, Stephen said. I call it _A Pisgah Sight of Palestine or the |
| Parable of The Plums._ |
| |
| --I see, the professor said. |
| |
| He laughed richly. |
| |
| --I see, he said again with new pleasure. Moses and the promised land. |
| We gave him that idea, he added to J. J. O'Molloy. |
| |
| HORATIO IS CYNOSURE THIS FAIR JUNE DAY |
| |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy sent a weary sidelong glance towards the statue and held |
| his peace. |
| |
| --I see, the professor said. |
| |
| He halted on sir John Gray's pavement island and peered aloft at Nelson |
| through the meshes of his wry smile. |
| |
| DIMINISHED DIGITS PROVE TOO TITILLATING FOR FRISKY FRUMPS. ANNE WIMBLES, |
| FLO WANGLES--YET CAN YOU BLAME THEM? |
| |
| |
| --Onehandled adulterer, he said smiling grimly. That tickles me, I must |
| say. |
| |
| --Tickled the old ones too, Myles Crawford said, if the God Almighty's |
| truth was known. |
| |
| |
| Pineapple rock, lemon platt, butter scotch. A sugarsticky girl |
| shovelling scoopfuls of creams for a christian brother. Some school |
| treat. Bad for their tummies. Lozenge and comfit manufacturer to His |
| Majesty the King. God. Save. Our. Sitting on his throne sucking red |
| jujubes white. |
| |
| |
| A sombre Y.M.C.A. young man, watchful among the warm sweet fumes of |
| Graham Lemon's, placed a throwaway in a hand of Mr Bloom. |
| |
| Heart to heart talks. |
| |
| Bloo... Me? No. |
| |
| Blood of the Lamb. |
| |
| His slow feet walked him riverward, reading. Are you saved? All are |
| washed in the blood of the lamb. God wants blood victim. Birth, hymen, |
| martyr, war, foundation of a building, sacrifice, kidney burntoffering, |
| druids' altars. Elijah is coming. Dr John Alexander Dowie restorer of |
| the church in Zion is coming. |
| |
| _Is coming! Is coming!! Is coming!!! All heartily welcome._ Paying game. |
| Torry and Alexander last year. Polygamy. His wife will put the stopper |
| on that. Where was that ad some Birmingham firm the luminous crucifix. |
| Our Saviour. Wake up in the dead of night and see him on the wall, |
| hanging. Pepper's ghost idea. Iron nails ran in. |
| |
| |
| Phosphorus it must be done with. If you leave a bit of codfish for |
| instance. I could see the bluey silver over it. Night I went down to the |
| pantry in the kitchen. Don't like all the smells in it waiting to rush |
| out. What was it she wanted? The Malaga raisins. Thinking of Spain. |
| Before Rudy was born. The phosphorescence, that bluey greeny. Very good |
| for the brain. |
| |
| From Butler's monument house corner he glanced along Bachelor's walk. |
| Dedalus' daughter there still outside Dillon's auctionrooms. Must be |
| selling off some old furniture. Knew her eyes at once from the father. |
| Lobbing about waiting for him. Home always breaks up when the mother |
| goes. Fifteen children he had. Birth every year almost. That's in their |
| theology or the priest won't give the poor woman the confession, the |
| absolution. Increase and multiply. Did you ever hear such an idea? Eat |
| you out of house and home. No families themselves to feed. Living on the |
| fat of the land. Their butteries and larders. I'd like to see them do |
| the black fast Yom Kippur. Crossbuns. One meal and a collation for fear |
| he'd collapse on the altar. A housekeeper of one of those fellows if you |
| could pick it out of her. Never pick it out of her. Like getting l.s.d. |
| out of him. Does himself well. No guests. All for number one. Watching |
| his water. Bring your own bread and butter. His reverence: mum's the |
| word. |
| |
| Good Lord, that poor child's dress is in flitters. Underfed she looks |
| too. Potatoes and marge, marge and potatoes. It's after they feel it. |
| Proof of the pudding. Undermines the constitution. |
| |
| As he set foot on O'Connell bridge a puffball of smoke plumed up from |
| the parapet. Brewery barge with export stout. England. Sea air sours it, |
| I heard. Be interesting some day get a pass through Hancock to see the |
| brewery. Regular world in itself. Vats of porter wonderful. Rats get in |
| too. Drink themselves bloated as big as a collie floating. Dead drunk on |
| the porter. Drink till they puke again like christians. Imagine drinking |
| that! Rats: vats. Well, of course, if we knew all the things. |
| |
| Looking down he saw flapping strongly, wheeling between the gaunt |
| quaywalls, gulls. Rough weather outside. If I threw myself down? Reuben |
| J's son must have swallowed a good bellyful of that sewage. One and |
| eightpence too much. Hhhhm. It's the droll way he comes out with the |
| things. Knows how to tell a story too. |
| |
| They wheeled lower. Looking for grub. Wait. |
| |
| He threw down among them a crumpled paper ball. Elijah thirtytwo feet |
| per sec is com. Not a bit. The ball bobbed unheeded on the wake of |
| swells, floated under by the bridgepiers. Not such damn fools. Also the |
| day I threw that stale cake out of the Erin's King picked it up in the |
| wake fifty yards astern. Live by their wits. They wheeled, flapping. |
| |
| _The hungry famished gull |
| Flaps o'er the waters dull._ |
| |
| That is how poets write, the similar sounds. But then Shakespeare has |
| no rhymes: blank verse. The flow of the language it is. The thoughts. |
| Solemn. |
| |
| |
| _Hamlet, I am thy father's spirit |
| Doomed for a certain time to walk the earth._ |
| --Two apples a penny! Two for a penny! |
| |
| |
| His gaze passed over the glazed apples serried on her stand. Australians |
| they must be this time of year. Shiny peels: polishes them up with a rag |
| or a handkerchief. |
| |
| Wait. Those poor birds. |
| |
| He halted again and bought from the old applewoman two Banbury cakes for |
| a penny and broke the brittle paste and threw its fragments down into |
| the Liffey. See that? The gulls swooped silently, two, then all from |
| their heights, pouncing on prey. Gone. Every morsel. |
| |
| Aware of their greed and cunning he shook the powdery crumb from his |
| hands. They never expected that. Manna. Live on fish, fishy flesh they |
| have, all seabirds, gulls, seagoose. Swans from Anna Liffey swim down |
| here sometimes to preen themselves. No accounting for tastes. Wonder |
| what kind is swanmeat. Robinson Crusoe had to live on them. |
| |
| They wheeled flapping weakly. I'm not going to throw any more. Penny |
| quite enough. Lot of thanks I get. Not even a caw. They spread foot and |
| mouth disease too. If you cram a turkey say on chestnutmeal it tastes |
| like that. Eat pig like pig. But then why is it that saltwater fish are |
| not salty? How is that? |
| |
| His eyes sought answer from the river and saw a rowboat rock at anchor |
| on the treacly swells lazily its plastered board. |
| |
| _Kino's_ 11/- _Trousers_ |
| |
| Good idea that. Wonder if he pays rent to the corporation. How can you |
| own water really? It's always flowing in a stream, never the same, which |
| in the stream of life we trace. Because life is a stream. All kinds of |
| places are good for ads. That quack doctor for the clap used to be stuck |
| up in all the greenhouses. Never see it now. Strictly confidential. Dr |
| Hy Franks. Didn't cost him a red like Maginni the dancing master self |
| advertisement. Got fellows to stick them up or stick them up himself for |
| that matter on the q. t. running in to loosen a button. Flybynight. |
| Just the place too. POST NO BILLS. POST 110 PILLS. Some chap with a dose |
| burning him. |
| |
| If he...? |
| |
| O! |
| |
| Eh? |
| |
| No... No. |
| |
| No, no. I don't believe it. He wouldn't surely? |
| |
| No, no. |
| |
| Mr Bloom moved forward, raising his troubled eyes. Think no more about |
| that. After one. Timeball on the ballastoffice is down. Dunsink time. |
| Fascinating little book that is of sir Robert Ball's. Parallax. I never |
| exactly understood. There's a priest. Could ask him. Par it's Greek: |
| parallel, parallax. Met him pike hoses she called it till I told her |
| about the transmigration. O rocks! |
| |
| Mr Bloom smiled O rocks at two windows of the ballastoffice. She's right |
| after all. Only big words for ordinary things on account of the sound. |
| She's not exactly witty. Can be rude too. Blurt out what I was thinking. |
| Still, I don't know. She used to say Ben Dollard had a base barreltone |
| voice. He has legs like barrels and you'd think he was singing into a |
| barrel. Now, isn't that wit. They used to call him big Ben. Not half as |
| witty as calling him base barreltone. Appetite like an albatross. Get |
| outside of a baron of beef. Powerful man he was at stowing away number |
| one Bass. Barrel of Bass. See? It all works out. |
| |
| A procession of whitesmocked sandwichmen marched slowly towards him |
| along the gutter, scarlet sashes across their boards. Bargains. Like |
| that priest they are this morning: we have sinned: we have suffered. He |
| read the scarlet letters on their five tall white hats: H. E. L. Y. S. |
| Wisdom Hely's. Y lagging behind drew a chunk of bread from under his |
| foreboard, crammed it into his mouth and munched as he walked. Our |
| staple food. Three bob a day, walking along the gutters, street after |
| street. Just keep skin and bone together, bread and skilly. They are |
| not Boyl: no, M Glade's men. Doesn't bring in any business either. |
| I suggested to him about a transparent showcart with two smart girls |
| sitting inside writing letters, copybooks, envelopes, blottingpaper. I |
| bet that would have caught on. Smart girls writing something catch the |
| eye at once. Everyone dying to know what she's writing. Get twenty of |
| them round you if you stare at nothing. Have a finger in the pie. Women |
| too. Curiosity. Pillar of salt. Wouldn't have it of course because he |
| didn't think of it himself first. Or the inkbottle I suggested with a |
| false stain of black celluloid. His ideas for ads like Plumtree's potted |
| under the obituaries, cold meat department. You can't lick 'em. What? |
| Our envelopes. Hello, Jones, where are you going? Can't stop, Robinson, |
| I am hastening to purchase the only reliable inkeraser _Kansell,_ sold |
| by Hely's Ltd, 85 Dame street. Well out of that ruck I am. Devil of a |
| job it was collecting accounts of those convents. Tranquilla convent. |
| That was a nice nun there, really sweet face. Wimple suited her small |
| head. Sister? Sister? I am sure she was crossed in love by her eyes. |
| Very hard to bargain with that sort of a woman. I disturbed her at her |
| devotions that morning. But glad to communicate with the outside world. |
| Our great day, she said. Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. Sweet name |
| too: caramel. She knew I, I think she knew by the way she. If she had |
| married she would have changed. I suppose they really were short of |
| money. Fried everything in the best butter all the same. No lard for |
| them. My heart's broke eating dripping. They like buttering themselves |
| in and out. Molly tasting it, her veil up. Sister? Pat Claffey, the |
| pawnbroker's daughter. It was a nun they say invented barbed wire. |
| |
| He crossed Westmoreland street when apostrophe S had plodded by. Rover |
| cycleshop. Those races are on today. How long ago is that? Year Phil |
| Gilligan died. We were in Lombard street west. Wait: was in Thom's. |
| Got the job in Wisdom Hely's year we married. Six years. Ten years ago: |
| ninetyfour he died yes that's right the big fire at Arnott's. Val Dillon |
| was lord mayor. The Glencree dinner. Alderman Robert O'Reilly emptying |
| the port into his soup before the flag fell. Bobbob lapping it for the |
| inner alderman. Couldn't hear what the band played. For what we have |
| already received may the Lord make us. Milly was a kiddy then. Molly |
| had that elephantgrey dress with the braided frogs. Mantailored with |
| selfcovered buttons. She didn't like it because I sprained my ankle |
| first day she wore choir picnic at the Sugarloaf. As if that. Old |
| Goodwin's tall hat done up with some sticky stuff. Flies' picnic |
| too. Never put a dress on her back like it. Fitted her like a glove, |
| shoulders and hips. Just beginning to plump it out well. Rabbitpie we |
| had that day. People looking after her. |
| |
| Happy. Happier then. Snug little room that was with the red wallpaper. |
| Dockrell's, one and ninepence a dozen. Milly's tubbing night. American |
| soap I bought: elderflower. Cosy smell of her bathwater. Funny she |
| looked soaped all over. Shapely too. Now photography. Poor papa's |
| daguerreotype atelier he told me of. Hereditary taste. |
| |
| He walked along the curbstone. |
| |
| Stream of life. What was the name of that priestylooking chap was always |
| squinting in when he passed? Weak eyes, woman. Stopped in Citron's saint |
| Kevin's parade. Pen something. Pendennis? My memory is getting. Pen |
| ...? Of course it's years ago. Noise of the trams probably. Well, if he |
| couldn't remember the dayfather's name that he sees every day. |
| |
| Bartell d'Arcy was the tenor, just coming out then. Seeing her home |
| after practice. Conceited fellow with his waxedup moustache. Gave her |
| that song _Winds that blow from the south_. |
| |
| Windy night that was I went to fetch her there was that lodge meeting on |
| about those lottery tickets after Goodwin's concert in the supperroom or |
| oakroom of the Mansion house. He and I behind. Sheet of her music blew |
| out of my hand against the High school railings. Lucky it didn't. |
| Thing like that spoils the effect of a night for her. Professor Goodwin |
| linking her in front. Shaky on his pins, poor old sot. His farewell |
| concerts. Positively last appearance on any stage. May be for months and |
| may be for never. Remember her laughing at the wind, her blizzard collar |
| up. Corner of Harcourt road remember that gust. Brrfoo! Blew up all her |
| skirts and her boa nearly smothered old Goodwin. She did get flushed |
| in the wind. Remember when we got home raking up the fire and frying up |
| those pieces of lap of mutton for her supper with the Chutney sauce she |
| liked. And the mulled rum. Could see her in the bedroom from the hearth |
| unclamping the busk of her stays: white. |
| |
| Swish and soft flop her stays made on the bed. Always warm from her. |
| Always liked to let her self out. Sitting there after till near two |
| taking out her hairpins. Milly tucked up in beddyhouse. Happy. Happy. |
| That was the night... |
| |
| --O, Mr Bloom, how do you do? |
| |
| --O, how do you do, Mrs Breen? |
| |
| --No use complaining. How is Molly those times? Haven't seen her for |
| ages. |
| |
| --In the pink, Mr Bloom said gaily. Milly has a position down in |
| Mullingar, you know. |
| |
| --Go away! Isn't that grand for her? |
| |
| --Yes. In a photographer's there. Getting on like a house on fire. How |
| are all your charges? |
| |
| --All on the baker's list, Mrs Breen said. |
| |
| How many has she? No other in sight. |
| |
| --You're in black, I see. You have no... |
| |
| --No, Mr Bloom said. I have just come from a funeral. |
| |
| Going to crop up all day, I foresee. Who's dead, when and what did he |
| die of? Turn up like a bad penny. |
| |
| --O, dear me, Mrs Breen said. I hope it wasn't any near relation. |
| |
| May as well get her sympathy. |
| |
| --Dignam, Mr Bloom said. An old friend of mine. He died quite suddenly, |
| poor fellow. Heart trouble, I believe. Funeral was this morning. |
| |
| _Your funeral's tomorrow While you're coming through the rye. |
| Diddlediddle dumdum Diddlediddle..._ |
| |
| --Sad to lose the old friends, Mrs Breen's womaneyes said melancholily. |
| |
| Now that's quite enough about that. Just: quietly: husband. |
| |
| --And your lord and master? |
| |
| Mrs Breen turned up her two large eyes. Hasn't lost them anyhow. |
| |
| --O, don't be talking! she said. He's a caution to rattlesnakes. He's |
| in there now with his lawbooks finding out the law of libel. He has me |
| heartscalded. Wait till I show you. |
| |
| Hot mockturtle vapour and steam of newbaked jampuffs rolypoly poured |
| out from Harrison's. The heavy noonreek tickled the top of Mr Bloom's |
| gullet. Want to make good pastry, butter, best flour, Demerara sugar, |
| or they'd taste it with the hot tea. Or is it from her? A barefoot |
| arab stood over the grating, breathing in the fumes. Deaden the gnaw of |
| hunger that way. Pleasure or pain is it? Penny dinner. Knife and fork |
| chained to the table. |
| |
| Opening her handbag, chipped leather. Hatpin: ought to have a guard on |
| those things. Stick it in a chap's eye in the tram. Rummaging. Open. |
| Money. Please take one. Devils if they lose sixpence. Raise Cain. |
| Husband barging. Where's the ten shillings I gave you on Monday? Are |
| you feeding your little brother's family? Soiled handkerchief: |
| medicinebottle. Pastille that was fell. What is she?... |
| |
| --There must be a new moon out, she said. He's always bad then. Do you |
| know what he did last night? |
| |
| Her hand ceased to rummage. Her eyes fixed themselves on him, wide in |
| alarm, yet smiling. |
| |
| --What? Mr Bloom asked. |
| |
| Let her speak. Look straight in her eyes. I believe you. Trust me. |
| |
| --Woke me up in the night, she said. Dream he had, a nightmare. |
| |
| Indiges. |
| |
| --Said the ace of spades was walking up the stairs. |
| |
| --The ace of spades! Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| She took a folded postcard from her handbag. |
| |
| --Read that, she said. He got it this morning. |
| |
| --What is it? Mr Bloom asked, taking the card. U.P.? |
| |
| --U.P.: up, she said. Someone taking a rise out of him. It's a great |
| shame for them whoever he is. |
| |
| --Indeed it is, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| She took back the card, sighing. |
| |
| --And now he's going round to Mr Menton's office. He's going to take an |
| action for ten thousand pounds, he says. |
| |
| She folded the card into her untidy bag and snapped the catch. |
| |
| Same blue serge dress she had two years ago, the nap bleaching. Seen its |
| best days. Wispish hair over her ears. And that dowdy toque: three old |
| grapes to take the harm out of it. Shabby genteel. She used to be a |
| tasty dresser. Lines round her mouth. Only a year or so older than |
| Molly. |
| |
| See the eye that woman gave her, passing. Cruel. The unfair sex. |
| |
| He looked still at her, holding back behind his look his discontent. |
| Pungent mockturtle oxtail mulligatawny. I'm hungry too. Flakes of pastry |
| on the gusset of her dress: daub of sugary flour stuck to her cheek. |
| Rhubarb tart with liberal fillings, rich fruit interior. Josie Powell |
| that was. In Luke Doyle's long ago. Dolphin's Barn, the charades. U.P.: |
| up. |
| |
| Change the subject. |
| |
| --Do you ever see anything of Mrs Beaufoy? Mr Bloom asked. |
| |
| --Mina Purefoy? she said. |
| |
| Philip Beaufoy I was thinking. Playgoers' Club. Matcham often thinks of |
| the masterstroke. Did I pull the chain? Yes. The last act. |
| |
| --Yes. |
| |
| --I just called to ask on the way in is she over it. She's in the |
| lying-in hospital in Holles street. Dr Horne got her in. She's three |
| days bad now. |
| |
| --O, Mr Bloom said. I'm sorry to hear that. |
| |
| --Yes, Mrs Breen said. And a houseful of kids at home. It's a very stiff |
| birth, the nurse told me. |
| |
| ---O, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| His heavy pitying gaze absorbed her news. His tongue clacked in |
| compassion. Dth! Dth! |
| |
| --I'm sorry to hear that, he said. Poor thing! Three days! That's |
| terrible for her. |
| |
| Mrs Breen nodded. |
| |
| --She was taken bad on the Tuesday... |
| |
| Mr Bloom touched her funnybone gently, warning her: |
| |
| --Mind! Let this man pass. |
| |
| A bony form strode along the curbstone from the river staring with a |
| rapt gaze into the sunlight through a heavystringed glass. Tight as a |
| skullpiece a tiny hat gripped his head. From his arm a folded dustcoat, |
| a stick and an umbrella dangled to his stride. |
| |
| --Watch him, Mr Bloom said. He always walks outside the lampposts. |
| Watch! |
| |
| --Who is he if it's a fair question? Mrs Breen asked. Is he dotty? |
| |
| --His name is Cashel Boyle O'Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell, Mr |
| Bloom said smiling. Watch! |
| |
| --He has enough of them, she said. Denis will be like that one of these |
| days. |
| |
| She broke off suddenly. |
| |
| --There he is, she said. I must go after him. Goodbye. Remember me to |
| Molly, won't you? |
| |
| --I will, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| He watched her dodge through passers towards the shopfronts. Denis Breen |
| in skimpy frockcoat and blue canvas shoes shuffled out of Harrison's |
| hugging two heavy tomes to his ribs. Blown in from the bay. Like old |
| times. He suffered her to overtake him without surprise and thrust |
| his dull grey beard towards her, his loose jaw wagging as he spoke |
| earnestly. |
| |
| Meshuggah. Off his chump. |
| |
| Mr Bloom walked on again easily, seeing ahead of him in sunlight the |
| tight skullpiece, the dangling stickumbrelladustcoat. Going the two |
| days. Watch him! Out he goes again. One way of getting on in the world. |
| And that other old mosey lunatic in those duds. Hard time she must have |
| with him. |
| |
| U.P.: up. I'll take my oath that's Alf Bergan or Richie Goulding. Wrote |
| it for a lark in the Scotch house I bet anything. Round to Menton's |
| office. His oyster eyes staring at the postcard. Be a feast for the |
| gods. |
| |
| He passed the _Irish Times_. There might be other answers Iying there. |
| Like to answer them all. Good system for criminals. Code. At their lunch |
| now. Clerk with the glasses there doesn't know me. O, leave them there |
| to simmer. Enough bother wading through fortyfour of them. Wanted, smart |
| lady typist to aid gentleman in literary work. I called you naughty |
| darling because I do not like that other world. Please tell me what is |
| the meaning. Please tell me what perfume does your wife. Tell me who |
| made the world. The way they spring those questions on you. And the |
| other one Lizzie Twigg. My literary efforts have had the good fortune to |
| meet with the approval of the eminent poet A. E. (Mr Geo. Russell). No |
| time to do her hair drinking sloppy tea with a book of poetry. |
| |
| Best paper by long chalks for a small ad. Got the provinces now. Cook |
| and general, exc. cuisine, housemaid kept. Wanted live man for spirit |
| counter. Resp. girl (R.C.) wishes to hear of post in fruit or pork shop. |
| James Carlisle made that. Six and a half per cent dividend. Made a big |
| deal on Coates's shares. Ca' canny. Cunning old Scotch hunks. All the |
| toady news. Our gracious and popular vicereine. Bought the _Irish Field_ |
| now. Lady Mountcashel has quite recovered after her confinement and |
| rode out with the Ward Union staghounds at the enlargement yesterday |
| at Rathoath. Uneatable fox. Pothunters too. Fear injects juices make |
| it tender enough for them. Riding astride. Sit her horse like a man. |
| Weightcarrying huntress. No sidesaddle or pillion for her, not for Joe. |
| First to the meet and in at the death. Strong as a brood mare some of |
| those horsey women. Swagger around livery stables. Toss off a glass |
| of brandy neat while you'd say knife. That one at the Grosvenor this |
| morning. Up with her on the car: wishswish. Stonewall or fivebarred gate |
| put her mount to it. Think that pugnosed driver did it out of spite. Who |
| is this she was like? O yes! Mrs Miriam Dandrade that sold me her old |
| wraps and black underclothes in the Shelbourne hotel. Divorced Spanish |
| American. Didn't take a feather out of her my handling them. As if I was |
| her clotheshorse. Saw her in the viceregal party when Stubbs the park |
| ranger got me in with Whelan of the _Express._ Scavenging what the |
| quality left. High tea. Mayonnaise I poured on the plums thinking it was |
| custard. Her ears ought to have tingled for a few weeks after. Want to |
| be a bull for her. Born courtesan. No nursery work for her, thanks. |
| |
| Poor Mrs Purefoy! Methodist husband. Method in his madness. Saffron bun |
| and milk and soda lunch in the educational dairy. Y. M. C. A. Eating |
| with a stopwatch, thirtytwo chews to the minute. And still his |
| muttonchop whiskers grew. Supposed to be well connected. Theodore's |
| cousin in Dublin Castle. One tony relative in every family. Hardy |
| annuals he presents her with. Saw him out at the Three Jolly Topers |
| marching along bareheaded and his eldest boy carrying one in a |
| marketnet. The squallers. Poor thing! Then having to give the breast |
| year after year all hours of the night. Selfish those t.t's are. Dog in |
| the manger. Only one lump of sugar in my tea, if you please. |
| |
| He stood at Fleet street crossing. Luncheon interval. A sixpenny at |
| Rowe's? Must look up that ad in the national library. An eightpenny in |
| the Burton. Better. On my way. |
| |
| He walked on past Bolton's Westmoreland house. Tea. Tea. Tea. I forgot |
| to tap Tom Kernan. |
| |
| Sss. Dth, dth, dth! Three days imagine groaning on a bed with a |
| vinegared handkerchief round her forehead, her belly swollen out. Phew! |
| Dreadful simply! Child's head too big: forceps. Doubled up inside her |
| trying to butt its way out blindly, groping for the way out. Kill me |
| that would. Lucky Molly got over hers lightly. They ought to invent |
| something to stop that. Life with hard labour. Twilight sleep idea: |
| queen Victoria was given that. Nine she had. A good layer. Old |
| woman that lived in a shoe she had so many children. Suppose he was |
| consumptive. Time someone thought about it instead of gassing about the |
| what was it the pensive bosom of the silver effulgence. Flapdoodle to |
| feed fools on. They could easily have big establishments whole thing |
| quite painless out of all the taxes give every child born five quid at |
| compound interest up to twentyone five per cent is a hundred shillings |
| and five tiresome pounds multiply by twenty decimal system encourage |
| people to put by money save hundred and ten and a bit twentyone years |
| want to work it out on paper come to a tidy sum more than you think. |
| |
| Not stillborn of course. They are not even registered. Trouble for |
| nothing. |
| |
| Funny sight two of them together, their bellies out. Molly and Mrs |
| Moisel. Mothers' meeting. Phthisis retires for the time being, then |
| returns. How flat they look all of a sudden after. Peaceful eyes. Weight |
| off their mind. Old Mrs Thornton was a jolly old soul. All my babies, |
| she said. The spoon of pap in her mouth before she fed them. O, that's |
| nyumnyum. Got her hand crushed by old Tom Wall's son. His first bow to |
| the public. Head like a prize pumpkin. Snuffy Dr Murren. People knocking |
| them up at all hours. For God' sake, doctor. Wife in her throes. Then |
| keep them waiting months for their fee. To attendance on your wife. No |
| gratitude in people. Humane doctors, most of them. |
| |
| Before the huge high door of the Irish house of parliament a flock of |
| pigeons flew. Their little frolic after meals. Who will we do it on? I |
| pick the fellow in black. Here goes. Here's good luck. Must be thrilling |
| from the air. Apjohn, myself and Owen Goldberg up in the trees near |
| Goose green playing the monkeys. Mackerel they called me. |
| |
| A squad of constables debouched from College street, marching in Indian |
| file. Goosestep. Foodheated faces, sweating helmets, patting their |
| truncheons. After their feed with a good load of fat soup under their |
| belts. Policeman's lot is oft a happy one. They split up in groups and |
| scattered, saluting, towards their beats. Let out to graze. Best moment |
| to attack one in pudding time. A punch in his dinner. A squad of others, |
| marching irregularly, rounded Trinity railings making for the station. |
| Bound for their troughs. Prepare to receive cavalry. Prepare to receive |
| soup. |
| |
| He crossed under Tommy Moore's roguish finger. They did right to put him |
| up over a urinal: meeting of the waters. Ought to be places for women. |
| Running into cakeshops. Settle my hat straight. _There is not in this |
| wide world a vallee_. Great song of Julia Morkan's. Kept her voice up to |
| the very last. Pupil of Michael Balfe's, wasn't she? |
| |
| He gazed after the last broad tunic. Nasty customers to tackle. Jack |
| Power could a tale unfold: father a G man. If a fellow gave them trouble |
| being lagged they let him have it hot and heavy in the bridewell. |
| Can't blame them after all with the job they have especially the young |
| hornies. That horsepoliceman the day Joe Chamberlain was given his |
| degree in Trinity he got a run for his money. My word he did! His |
| horse's hoofs clattering after us down Abbey street. Lucky I had the |
| presence of mind to dive into Manning's or I was souped. He did come a |
| wallop, by George. Must have cracked his skull on the cobblestones. I |
| oughtn't to have got myself swept along with those medicals. And the |
| Trinity jibs in their mortarboards. Looking for trouble. Still I got to |
| know that young Dixon who dressed that sting for me in the Mater and now |
| he's in Holles street where Mrs Purefoy. Wheels within wheels. Police |
| whistle in my ears still. All skedaddled. Why he fixed on me. Give me in |
| charge. Right here it began. |
| |
| --Up the Boers! |
| |
| --Three cheers for De Wet! |
| |
| --We'll hang Joe Chamberlain on a sourapple tree. |
| |
| Silly billies: mob of young cubs yelling their guts out. Vinegar hill. |
| The Butter exchange band. Few years' time half of them magistrates and |
| civil servants. War comes on: into the army helterskelter: same fellows |
| used to. Whether on the scaffold high. |
| |
| Never know who you're talking to. Corny Kelleher he has Harvey Duff in |
| his eye. Like that Peter or Denis or James Carey that blew the gaff on |
| the invincibles. Member of the corporation too. Egging raw youths on to |
| get in the know all the time drawing secret service pay from the castle. |
| Drop him like a hot potato. Why those plainclothes men are always |
| courting slaveys. Easily twig a man used to uniform. Squarepushing up |
| against a backdoor. Maul her a bit. Then the next thing on the menu. And |
| who is the gentleman does be visiting there? Was the young master saying |
| anything? Peeping Tom through the keyhole. Decoy duck. Hotblooded young |
| student fooling round her fat arms ironing. |
| |
| --Are those yours, Mary? |
| |
| --I don't wear such things... Stop or I'll tell the missus on you. Out |
| half the night. |
| |
| --There are great times coming, Mary. Wait till you see. |
| |
| --Ah, gelong with your great times coming. |
| |
| Barmaids too. Tobaccoshopgirls. |
| |
| James Stephens' idea was the best. He knew them. Circles of ten so that |
| a fellow couldn't round on more than his own ring. Sinn Fein. Back out |
| you get the knife. Hidden hand. Stay in. The firing squad. Turnkey's |
| daughter got him out of Richmond, off from Lusk. Putting up in the |
| Buckingham Palace hotel under their very noses. Garibaldi. |
| |
| You must have a certain fascination: Parnell. Arthur Griffith is a |
| squareheaded fellow but he has no go in him for the mob. Or gas about |
| our lovely land. Gammon and spinach. Dublin Bakery Company's tearoom. |
| Debating societies. That republicanism is the best form of government. |
| That the language question should take precedence of the economic |
| question. Have your daughters inveigling them to your house. Stuff them |
| up with meat and drink. Michaelmas goose. Here's a good lump of thyme |
| seasoning under the apron for you. Have another quart of goosegrease |
| before it gets too cold. Halffed enthusiasts. Penny roll and a walk with |
| the band. No grace for the carver. The thought that the other chap pays |
| best sauce in the world. Make themselves thoroughly at home. Show us |
| over those apricots, meaning peaches. The not far distant day. Homerule |
| sun rising up in the northwest. |
| |
| His smile faded as he walked, a heavy cloud hiding the sun slowly, |
| shadowing Trinity's surly front. Trams passed one another, ingoing, |
| outgoing, clanging. Useless words. Things go on same, day after day: |
| squads of police marching out, back: trams in, out. Those two loonies |
| mooching about. Dignam carted off. Mina Purefoy swollen belly on a |
| bed groaning to have a child tugged out of her. One born every second |
| somewhere. Other dying every second. Since I fed the birds five minutes. |
| Three hundred kicked the bucket. Other three hundred born, washing the |
| blood off, all are washed in the blood of the lamb, bawling maaaaaa. |
| |
| Cityful passing away, other cityful coming, passing away too: other |
| coming on, passing on. Houses, lines of houses, streets, miles of |
| pavements, piledup bricks, stones. Changing hands. This owner, that. |
| Landlord never dies they say. Other steps into his shoes when he gets |
| his notice to quit. They buy the place up with gold and still they have |
| all the gold. Swindle in it somewhere. Piled up in cities, worn away age |
| after age. Pyramids in sand. Built on bread and onions. Slaves Chinese |
| wall. Babylon. Big stones left. Round towers. Rest rubble, sprawling |
| suburbs, jerrybuilt. Kerwan's mushroom houses built of breeze. Shelter, |
| for the night. |
| |
| No-one is anything. |
| |
| This is the very worst hour of the day. Vitality. Dull, gloomy: hate |
| this hour. Feel as if I had been eaten and spewed. |
| |
| Provost's house. The reverend Dr Salmon: tinned salmon. Well tinned in |
| there. Like a mortuary chapel. Wouldn't live in it if they paid me. Hope |
| they have liver and bacon today. Nature abhors a vacuum. |
| |
| The sun freed itself slowly and lit glints of light among the silverware |
| opposite in Walter Sexton's window by which John Howard Parnell passed, |
| unseeing. |
| |
| There he is: the brother. Image of him. Haunting face. Now that's a |
| coincidence. Course hundreds of times you think of a person and don't |
| meet him. Like a man walking in his sleep. No-one knows him. Must be a |
| corporation meeting today. They say he never put on the city marshal's |
| uniform since he got the job. Charley Kavanagh used to come out on |
| his high horse, cocked hat, puffed, powdered and shaved. Look at the |
| woebegone walk of him. Eaten a bad egg. Poached eyes on ghost. I have a |
| pain. Great man's brother: his brother's brother. He'd look nice on the |
| city charger. Drop into the D.B.C. probably for his coffee, play chess |
| there. His brother used men as pawns. Let them all go to pot. Afraid to |
| pass a remark on him. Freeze them up with that eye of his. That's the |
| fascination: the name. All a bit touched. Mad Fanny and his other sister |
| Mrs Dickinson driving about with scarlet harness. Bolt upright lik |
| surgeon M'Ardle. Still David Sheehy beat him for south Meath. Apply |
| for the Chiltern Hundreds and retire into public life. The patriot's |
| banquet. Eating orangepeels in the park. Simon Dedalus said when they |
| put him in parliament that Parnell would come back from the grave and |
| lead him out of the house of commons by the arm. |
| |
| --Of the twoheaded octopus, one of whose heads is the head upon which |
| the ends of the world have forgotten to come while the other speaks with |
| a Scotch accent. The tentacles... |
| |
| They passed from behind Mr Bloom along the curbstone. Beard and bicycle. |
| Young woman. |
| |
| And there he is too. Now that's really a coincidence: second time. |
| Coming events cast their shadows before. With the approval of the |
| eminent poet, Mr Geo. Russell. That might be Lizzie Twigg with him. A. |
| E.: what does that mean? Initials perhaps. Albert Edward, Arthur Edmund, |
| Alphonsus Eb Ed El Esquire. What was he saying? The ends of the world |
| with a Scotch accent. Tentacles: octopus. Something occult: symbolism. |
| Holding forth. She's taking it all in. Not saying a word. To aid |
| gentleman in literary work. |
| |
| His eyes followed the high figure in homespun, beard and bicycle, |
| a listening woman at his side. Coming from the vegetarian. Only |
| weggebobbles and fruit. Don't eat a beefsteak. If you do the eyes of |
| that cow will pursue you through all eternity. They say it's healthier. |
| Windandwatery though. Tried it. Keep you on the run all day. Bad as |
| a bloater. Dreams all night. Why do they call that thing they gave me |
| nutsteak? Nutarians. Fruitarians. To give you the idea you are eating |
| rumpsteak. Absurd. Salty too. They cook in soda. Keep you sitting by the |
| tap all night. |
| |
| Her stockings are loose over her ankles. I detest that: so tasteless. |
| Those literary etherial people they are all. Dreamy, cloudy, |
| symbolistic. Esthetes they are. I wouldn't be surprised if it was that |
| kind of food you see produces the like waves of the brain the poetical. |
| For example one of those policemen sweating Irish stew into their shirts |
| you couldn't squeeze a line of poetry out of him. Don't know what poetry |
| is even. Must be in a certain mood. |
| |
| _The dreamy cloudy gull |
| Waves o'er the waters dull._ |
| |
| He crossed at Nassau street corner and stood before the window of Yeates |
| and Son, pricing the fieldglasses. Or will I drop into old Harris's and |
| have a chat with young Sinclair? Wellmannered fellow. Probably at his |
| lunch. Must get those old glasses of mine set right. Goerz lenses six |
| guineas. Germans making their way everywhere. Sell on easy terms to |
| capture trade. Undercutting. Might chance on a pair in the railway lost |
| property office. Astonishing the things people leave behind them in |
| trains and cloakrooms. What do they be thinking about? Women too. |
| Incredible. Last year travelling to Ennis had to pick up that farmer's |
| daughter's ba and hand it to her at Limerick junction. Unclaimed money |
| too. There's a little watch up there on the roof of the bank to test |
| those glasses by. |
| |
| |
| His lids came down on the lower rims of his irides. Can't see it. If you |
| imagine it's there you can almost see it. Can't see it. |
| |
| He faced about and, standing between the awnings, held out his right |
| hand at arm's length towards the sun. Wanted to try that often. Yes: |
| completely. The tip of his little finger blotted out the sun's disk. |
| Must be the focus where the rays cross. If I had black glasses. |
| Interesting. There was a lot of talk about those sunspots when we |
| were in Lombard street west. Looking up from the back garden. Terrific |
| explosions they are. There will be a total eclipse this year: autumn |
| some time. |
| |
| Now that I come to think of it that ball falls at Greenwich time. It's |
| the clock is worked by an electric wire from Dunsink. Must go out there |
| some first Saturday of the month. If I could get an introduction to |
| professor Joly or learn up something about his family. That would do to: |
| man always feels complimented. Flattery where least expected. Nobleman |
| proud to be descended from some king's mistress. His foremother. Lay it |
| on with a trowel. Cap in hand goes through the land. Not go in and blurt |
| out what you know you're not to: what's parallax? Show this gentleman |
| the door. |
| |
| Ah. |
| |
| His hand fell to his side again. |
| |
| Never know anything about it. Waste of time. Gasballs spinning about, |
| crossing each other, passing. Same old dingdong always. Gas: then solid: |
| then world: then cold: then dead shell drifting around, frozen rock, |
| like that pineapple rock. The moon. Must be a new moon out, she said. I |
| believe there is. |
| |
| He went on by la maison Claire. |
| |
| Wait. The full moon was the night we were Sunday fortnight exactly there |
| is a new moon. Walking down by the Tolka. Not bad for a Fairview moon. |
| She was humming. The young May moon she's beaming, love. He other side |
| of her. Elbow, arm. He. Glowworm's la-amp is gleaming, love. Touch. |
| Fingers. Asking. Answer. Yes. |
| |
| Stop. Stop. If it was it was. Must. |
| |
| Mr Bloom, quickbreathing, slowlier walking passed Adam court. |
| |
| With a keep quiet relief his eyes took note this is the street here |
| middle of the day of Bob Doran's bottle shoulders. On his annual bend, |
| M Coy said. They drink in order to say or do something or _cherchez la |
| femme_. Up in the Coombe with chummies and streetwalkers and then the |
| rest of the year sober as a judge. |
| |
| Yes. Thought so. Sloping into the Empire. Gone. Plain soda would do him |
| good. Where Pat Kinsella had his Harp theatre before Whitbred ran the |
| Queen's. Broth of a boy. Dion Boucicault business with his harvestmoon |
| face in a poky bonnet. Three Purty Maids from School. How time flies, |
| eh? Showing long red pantaloons under his skirts. Drinkers, drinking, |
| laughed spluttering, their drink against their breath. More power, Pat. |
| Coarse red: fun for drunkards: guffaw and smoke. Take off that white |
| hat. His parboiled eyes. Where is he now? Beggar somewhere. The harp |
| that once did starve us all. |
| |
| I was happier then. Or was that I? Or am I now I? Twentyeight I was. She |
| twentythree. When we left Lombard street west something changed. Could |
| never like it again after Rudy. Can't bring back time. Like holding |
| water in your hand. Would you go back to then? Just beginning then. |
| Would you? Are you not happy in your home you poor little naughty boy? |
| Wants to sew on buttons for me. I must answer. Write it in the library. |
| |
| Grafton street gay with housed awnings lured his senses. Muslin prints, |
| silkdames and dowagers, jingle of harnesses, hoofthuds lowringing in the |
| baking causeway. Thick feet that woman has in the white stockings. Hope |
| the rain mucks them up on her. Countrybred chawbacon. All the beef to |
| the heels were in. Always gives a woman clumsy feet. Molly looks out of |
| plumb. |
| |
| He passed, dallying, the windows of Brown Thomas, silk mercers. Cascades |
| of ribbons. Flimsy China silks. A tilted urn poured from its mouth a |
| flood of bloodhued poplin: lustrous blood. The huguenots brought that |
| here. _La causa è santa_! Tara tara. Great chorus that. Taree tara. Must |
| be washed in rainwater. Meyerbeer. Tara: bom bom bom. |
| |
| Pincushions. I'm a long time threatening to buy one. Sticking them all |
| over the place. Needles in window curtains. |
| |
| He bared slightly his left forearm. Scrape: nearly gone. Not today |
| anyhow. Must go back for that lotion. For her birthday perhaps. |
| Junejulyaugseptember eighth. Nearly three months off. Then she mightn't |
| like it. Women won't pick up pins. Say it cuts lo. |
| |
| Gleaming silks, petticoats on slim brass rails, rays of flat silk |
| stockings. |
| |
| Useless to go back. Had to be. Tell me all. |
| |
| High voices. Sunwarm silk. Jingling harnesses. All for a woman, home and |
| houses, silkwebs, silver, rich fruits spicy from Jaffa. Agendath Netaim. |
| Wealth of the world. |
| |
| A warm human plumpness settled down on his brain. His brain yielded. |
| Perfume of embraces all him assailed. With hungered flesh obscurely, he |
| mutely craved to adore. |
| |
| Duke street. Here we are. Must eat. The Burton. Feel better then. |
| |
| He turned Combridge's corner, still pursued. Jingling, hoofthuds. |
| Perfumed bodies, warm, full. All kissed, yielded: in deep summer fields, |
| tangled pressed grass, in trickling hallways of tenements, along sofas, |
| creaking beds. |
| |
| --Jack, love! |
| |
| --Darling! |
| |
| --Kiss me, Reggy! |
| |
| --My boy! |
| |
| --Love! |
| |
| His heart astir he pushed in the door of the Burton restaurant. Stink |
| gripped his trembling breath: pungent meatjuice, slush of greens. See |
| the animals feed. |
| |
| Men, men, men. |
| |
| Perched on high stools by the bar, hats shoved back, at the tables |
| calling for more bread no charge, swilling, wolfing gobfuls of sloppy |
| food, their eyes bulging, wiping wetted moustaches. A pallid suetfaced |
| young man polished his tumbler knife fork and spoon with his napkin. New |
| set of microbes. A man with an infant's saucestained napkin tucked round |
| him shovelled gurgling soup down his gullet. A man spitting back on his |
| plate: halfmasticated gristle: gums: no teeth to chewchewchew it. Chump |
| chop from the grill. Bolting to get it over. Sad booser's eyes. Bitten |
| off more than he can chew. Am I like that? See ourselves as others see |
| us. Hungry man is an angry man. Working tooth and jaw. Don't! O! A bone! |
| That last pagan king of Ireland Cormac in the schoolpoem choked himself |
| at Sletty southward of the Boyne. Wonder what he was eating. Something |
| galoptious. Saint Patrick converted him to Christianity. Couldn't |
| swallow it all however. |
| |
| --Roast beef and cabbage. |
| |
| --One stew. |
| |
| Smells of men. His gorge rose. Spaton sawdust, sweetish warmish |
| cigarette smoke, reek of plug, spilt beer, men's beery piss, the stale |
| of ferment. |
| |
| Couldn't eat a morsel here. Fellow sharpening knife and fork to eat all |
| before him, old chap picking his tootles. Slight spasm, full, chewing |
| the cud. Before and after. Grace after meals. Look on this picture then |
| on that. Scoffing up stewgravy with sopping sippets of bread. Lick it |
| off the plate, man! Get out of this. |
| |
| He gazed round the stooled and tabled eaters, tightening the wings of |
| his nose. |
| |
| --Two stouts here. |
| |
| --One corned and cabbage. |
| |
| That fellow ramming a knifeful of cabbage down as if his life depended |
| on it. Good stroke. Give me the fidgets to look. Safer to eat from his |
| three hands. Tear it limb from limb. Second nature to him. Born with a |
| silver knife in his mouth. That's witty, I think. Or no. Silver means |
| born rich. Born with a knife. But then the allusion is lost. |
| |
| An illgirt server gathered sticky clattering plates. Rock, the head |
| bailiff, standing at the bar blew the foamy crown from his tankard. Well |
| up: it splashed yellow near his boot. A diner, knife and fork upright, |
| elbows on table, ready for a second helping stared towards the foodlift |
| across his stained square of newspaper. Other chap telling him something |
| with his mouth full. Sympathetic listener. Table talk. I munched hum un |
| thu Unchster Bunk un Munchday. Ha? Did you, faith? |
| |
| Mr Bloom raised two fingers doubtfully to his lips. His eyes said: |
| |
| --Not here. Don't see him. |
| |
| Out. I hate dirty eaters. |
| |
| He backed towards the door. Get a light snack in Davy Byrne's. Stopgap. |
| Keep me going. Had a good breakfast. |
| |
| --Roast and mashed here. |
| |
| --Pint of stout. |
| |
| Every fellow for his own, tooth and nail. Gulp. Grub. Gulp. Gobstuff. |
| |
| He came out into clearer air and turned back towards Grafton street. Eat |
| or be eaten. Kill! Kill! |
| |
| Suppose that communal kitchen years to come perhaps. All trotting down |
| with porringers and tommycans to be filled. Devour contents in the |
| street. John Howard Parnell example the provost of Trinity every |
| mother's son don't talk of your provosts and provost of Trinity women |
| and children cabmen priests parsons fieldmarshals archbishops. From |
| Ailesbury road, Clyde road, artisans' dwellings, north Dublin union, |
| lord mayor in his gingerbread coach, old queen in a bathchair. My |
| plate's empty. After you with our incorporated drinkingcup. Like sir |
| Philip Crampton's fountain. Rub off the microbes with your handkerchief. |
| Next chap rubs on a new batch with his. Father O'Flynn would make |
| hares of them all. Have rows all the same. All for number one. Children |
| fighting for the scrapings of the pot. Want a souppot as big as the |
| Phoenix park. Harpooning flitches and hindquarters out of it. Hate |
| people all round you. City Arms hotel _table d'hôte_ she called it. |
| Soup, joint and sweet. Never know whose thoughts you're chewing. Then |
| who'd wash up all the plates and forks? Might be all feeding on tabloids |
| that time. Teeth getting worse and worse. |
| |
| After all there's a lot in that vegetarian fine flavour of things from |
| the earth garlic of course it stinks after Italian organgrinders crisp |
| of onions mushrooms truffles. Pain to the animal too. Pluck and draw |
| fowl. Wretched brutes there at the cattlemarket waiting for the poleaxe |
| to split their skulls open. Moo. Poor trembling calves. Meh. Staggering |
| bob. Bubble and squeak. Butchers' buckets wobbly lights. Give us that |
| brisket off the hook. Plup. Rawhead and bloody bones. Flayed glasseyed |
| sheep hung from their haunches, sheepsnouts bloodypapered snivelling |
| nosejam on sawdust. Top and lashers going out. Don't maul them pieces, |
| young one. |
| |
| Hot fresh blood they prescribe for decline. Blood always needed. |
| Insidious. Lick it up smokinghot, thick sugary. Famished ghosts. |
| |
| Ah, I'm hungry. |
| |
| He entered Davy Byrne's. Moral pub. He doesn't chat. Stands a drink now |
| and then. But in leapyear once in four. Cashed a cheque for me once. |
| |
| What will I take now? He drew his watch. Let me see now. Shandygaff? |
| |
| --Hello, Bloom, Nosey Flynn said from his nook. |
| |
| --Hello, Flynn. |
| |
| --How's things? |
| |
| --Tiptop... Let me see. I'll take a glass of burgundy and... let me |
| see. |
| |
| Sardines on the shelves. Almost taste them by looking. Sandwich? Ham |
| and his descendants musterred and bred there. Potted meats. What is home |
| without Plumtree's potted meat? Incomplete. What a stupid ad! Under the |
| obituary notices they stuck it. All up a plumtree. Dignam's potted meat. |
| Cannibals would with lemon and rice. White missionary too salty. Like |
| pickled pork. Expect the chief consumes the parts of honour. Ought to be |
| tough from exercise. His wives in a row to watch the effect. _There was |
| a right royal old nigger. Who ate or something the somethings of the |
| reverend Mr MacTrigger_. With it an abode of bliss. Lord knows what |
| concoction. Cauls mouldy tripes windpipes faked and minced up. Puzzle |
| find the meat. Kosher. No meat and milk together. Hygiene that was what |
| they call now. Yom Kippur fast spring cleaning of inside. Peace and |
| war depend on some fellow's digestion. Religions. Christmas turkeys and |
| geese. Slaughter of innocents. Eat drink and be merry. Then casual wards |
| full after. Heads bandaged. Cheese digests all but itself. Mity cheese. |
| |
| --Have you a cheese sandwich? |
| |
| --Yes, sir. |
| |
| Like a few olives too if they had them. Italian I prefer. Good glass of |
| burgundy take away that. Lubricate. A nice salad, cool as a cucumber, |
| Tom Kernan can dress. Puts gusto into it. Pure olive oil. Milly served |
| me that cutlet with a sprig of parsley. Take one Spanish onion. God made |
| food, the devil the cooks. Devilled crab. |
| |
| --Wife well? |
| |
| --Quite well, thanks... A cheese sandwich, then. Gorgonzola, have you? |
| |
| --Yes, sir. |
| |
| Nosey Flynn sipped his grog. |
| |
| --Doing any singing those times? |
| |
| Look at his mouth. Could whistle in his own ear. Flap ears to match. |
| Music. Knows as much about it as my coachman. Still better tell him. |
| Does no harm. Free ad. |
| |
| --She's engaged for a big tour end of this month. You may have heard |
| perhaps. |
| |
| --No. O, that's the style. Who's getting it up? |
| |
| The curate served. |
| |
| --How much is that? |
| |
| --Seven d., sir... Thank you, sir. |
| |
| Mr Bloom cut his sandwich into slender strips. _Mr MacTrigger_. Easier |
| than the dreamy creamy stuff. _His five hundred wives. Had the time of |
| their lives._ |
| |
| --Mustard, sir? |
| |
| --Thank you. |
| |
| He studded under each lifted strip yellow blobs. _Their lives_. I have |
| it. _It grew bigger and bigger and bigger_. |
| |
| --Getting it up? he said. Well, it's like a company idea, you see. Part |
| shares and part profits. |
| |
| --Ay, now I remember, Nosey Flynn said, putting his hand in his pocket |
| to scratch his groin. Who is this was telling me? Isn't Blazes Boylan |
| mixed up in it? |
| |
| A warm shock of air heat of mustard hanched on Mr Bloom's heart. He |
| raised his eyes and met the stare of a bilious clock. Two. Pub clock |
| five minutes fast. Time going on. Hands moving. Two. Not yet. |
| |
| His midriff yearned then upward, sank within him, yearned more longly, |
| longingly. |
| |
| Wine. |
| |
| He smellsipped the cordial juice and, bidding his throat strongly to |
| speed it, set his wineglass delicately down. |
| |
| --Yes, he said. He's the organiser in point of fact. |
| |
| No fear: no brains. |
| |
| Nosey Flynn snuffled and scratched. Flea having a good square meal. |
| |
| --He had a good slice of luck, Jack Mooney was telling me, over that |
| boxingmatch Myler Keogh won again that soldier in the Portobello |
| barracks. By God, he had the little kipper down in the county Carlow he |
| was telling me... |
| |
| Hope that dewdrop doesn't come down into his glass. No, snuffled it up. |
| |
| --For near a month, man, before it came off. Sucking duck eggs by God |
| till further orders. Keep him off the boose, see? O, by God, Blazes is a |
| hairy chap. |
| |
| Davy Byrne came forward from the hindbar in tuckstitched shirtsleeves, |
| cleaning his lips with two wipes of his napkin. Herring's blush. Whose |
| smile upon each feature plays with such and such replete. Too much fat |
| on the parsnips. |
| |
| --And here's himself and pepper on him, Nosey Flynn said. Can you give |
| us a good one for the Gold cup? |
| |
| --I'm off that, Mr Flynn, Davy Byrne answered. I never put anything on a |
| horse. |
| |
| --You're right there, Nosey Flynn said. |
| |
| Mr Bloom ate his strips of sandwich, fresh clean bread, with relish of |
| disgust pungent mustard, the feety savour of green cheese. Sips of his |
| wine soothed his palate. Not logwood that. Tastes fuller this weather |
| with the chill off. |
| |
| Nice quiet bar. Nice piece of wood in that counter. Nicely planed. Like |
| the way it curves there. |
| |
| --I wouldn't do anything at all in that line, Davy Byrne said. It ruined |
| many a man, the same horses. |
| |
| Vintners' sweepstake. Licensed for the sale of beer, wine and spirits |
| for consumption on the premises. Heads I win tails you lose. |
| |
| --True for you, Nosey Flynn said. Unless you're in the know. There's |
| no straight sport going now. Lenehan gets some good ones. He's giving |
| Sceptre today. Zinfandel's the favourite, lord Howard de Walden's, won |
| at Epsom. Morny Cannon is riding him. I could have got seven to one |
| against Saint Amant a fortnight before. |
| |
| --That so? Davy Byrne said... |
| |
| He went towards the window and, taking up the pettycash book, scanned |
| its pages. |
| |
| --I could, faith, Nosey Flynn said, snuffling. That was a rare bit of |
| horseflesh. Saint Frusquin was her sire. She won in a thunderstorm, |
| Rothschild's filly, with wadding in her ears. Blue jacket and yellow |
| cap. Bad luck to big Ben Dollard and his John O'Gaunt. He put me off it. |
| Ay. |
| |
| He drank resignedly from his tumbler, running his fingers down the |
| flutes. |
| |
| --Ay, he said, sighing. |
| |
| Mr Bloom, champing, standing, looked upon his sigh. Nosey numbskull. |
| Will I tell him that horse Lenehan? He knows already. Better let him |
| forget. Go and lose more. Fool and his money. Dewdrop coming down again. |
| Cold nose he'd have kissing a woman. Still they might like. Prickly |
| beards they like. Dogs' cold noses. Old Mrs Riordan with the rumbling |
| stomach's Skye terrier in the City Arms hotel. Molly fondling him in her |
| lap. O, the big doggybowwowsywowsy! |
| |
| Wine soaked and softened rolled pith of bread mustard a moment mawkish |
| cheese. Nice wine it is. Taste it better because I'm not thirsty. Bath |
| of course does that. Just a bite or two. Then about six o'clock I can. |
| Six. Six. Time will be gone then. She... |
| |
| Mild fire of wine kindled his veins. I wanted that badly. Felt so |
| off colour. His eyes unhungrily saw shelves of tins: sardines, gaudy |
| lobsters' claws. All the odd things people pick up for food. Out of |
| shells, periwinkles with a pin, off trees, snails out of the ground the |
| French eat, out of the sea with bait on a hook. Silly fish learn nothing |
| in a thousand years. If you didn't know risky putting anything into your |
| mouth. Poisonous berries. Johnny Magories. Roundness you think good. |
| Gaudy colour warns you off. One fellow told another and so on. Try it |
| on the dog first. Led on by the smell or the look. Tempting fruit. |
| Ice cones. Cream. Instinct. Orangegroves for instance. Need artificial |
| irrigation. Bleibtreustrasse. Yes but what about oysters. Unsightly like |
| a clot of phlegm. Filthy shells. Devil to open them too. Who found them |
| out? Garbage, sewage they feed on. Fizz and Red bank oysters. Effect |
| on the sexual. Aphrodis. He was in the Red Bank this morning. Was he |
| oysters old fish at table perhaps he young flesh in bed no June has |
| no ar no oysters. But there are people like things high. Tainted game. |
| Jugged hare. First catch your hare. Chinese eating eggs fifty years old, |
| blue and green again. Dinner of thirty courses. Each dish harmless might |
| mix inside. Idea for a poison mystery. That archduke Leopold was it no |
| yes or was it Otto one of those Habsburgs? Or who was it used to eat the |
| scruff off his own head? Cheapest lunch in town. Of course aristocrats, |
| then the others copy to be in the fashion. Milly too rock oil and flour. |
| Raw pastry I like myself. Half the catch of oysters they throw back in |
| the sea to keep up the price. Cheap no-one would buy. Caviare. Do the |
| grand. Hock in green glasses. Swell blowout. Lady this. Powdered bosom |
| pearls. The _élite. Crème de la crème_. They want special dishes to |
| pretend they're. Hermit with a platter of pulse keep down the stings |
| of the flesh. Know me come eat with me. Royal sturgeon high sheriff, |
| Coffey, the butcher, right to venisons of the forest from his ex. Send |
| him back the half of a cow. Spread I saw down in the Master of the |
| Rolls' kitchen area. Whitehatted _chef_ like a rabbi. Combustible duck. |
| Curly cabbage _Ã la duchesse de Parme_. Just as well to write it on the |
| bill of fare so you can know what you've eaten. Too many drugs spoil the |
| broth. I know it myself. Dosing it with Edwards' desiccated soup. Geese |
| stuffed silly for them. Lobsters boiled alive. Do ptake some ptarmigan. |
| Wouldn't mind being a waiter in a swell hotel. Tips, evening dress, |
| halfnaked ladies. May I tempt you to a little more filleted lemon sole, |
| miss Dubedat? Yes, do bedad. And she did bedad. Huguenot name I expect |
| that. A miss Dubedat lived in Killiney, I remember. _Du, de la_ French. |
| Still it's the same fish perhaps old Micky Hanlon of Moore street ripped |
| the guts out of making money hand over fist finger in fishes' gills |
| can't write his name on a cheque think he was painting the landscape |
| with his mouth twisted. Moooikill A Aitcha Ha ignorant as a kish of |
| brogues, worth fifty thousand pounds. |
| |
| Stuck on the pane two flies buzzed, stuck. |
| |
| Glowing wine on his palate lingered swallowed. Crushing in the winepress |
| grapes of Burgundy. Sun's heat it is. Seems to a secret touch telling me |
| memory. Touched his sense moistened remembered. Hidden under wild ferns |
| on Howth below us bay sleeping: sky. No sound. The sky. The bay purple |
| by the Lion's head. Green by Drumleck. Yellowgreen towards Sutton. |
| Fields of undersea, the lines faint brown in grass, buried cities. |
| Pillowed on my coat she had her hair, earwigs in the heather scrub |
| my hand under her nape, you'll toss me all. O wonder! Coolsoft with |
| ointments her hand touched me, caressed: her eyes upon me did not turn |
| away. Ravished over her I lay, full lips full open, kissed her mouth. |
| Yum. Softly she gave me in my mouth the seedcake warm and chewed. |
| Mawkish pulp her mouth had mumbled sweetsour of her spittle. Joy: I ate |
| it: joy. Young life, her lips that gave me pouting. Soft warm sticky |
| gumjelly lips. Flowers her eyes were, take me, willing eyes. Pebbles |
| fell. She lay still. A goat. No-one. High on Ben Howth rhododendrons a |
| nannygoat walking surefooted, dropping currants. Screened under ferns |
| she laughed warmfolded. Wildly I lay on her, kissed her: eyes, her lips, |
| her stretched neck beating, woman's breasts full in her blouse of nun's |
| veiling, fat nipples upright. Hot I tongued her. She kissed me. I was |
| kissed. All yielding she tossed my hair. Kissed, she kissed me. |
| |
| Me. And me now. |
| |
| Stuck, the flies buzzed. |
| |
| His downcast eyes followed the silent veining of the oaken slab. Beauty: |
| it curves: curves are beauty. Shapely goddesses, Venus, Juno: curves the |
| world admires. Can see them library museum standing in the round hall, |
| naked goddesses. Aids to digestion. They don't care what man looks. All |
| to see. Never speaking. I mean to say to fellows like Flynn. Suppose she |
| did Pygmalion and Galatea what would she say first? Mortal! Put you in |
| your proper place. Quaffing nectar at mess with gods golden dishes, all |
| ambrosial. Not like a tanner lunch we have, boiled mutton, carrots and |
| turnips, bottle of Allsop. Nectar imagine it drinking electricity: gods' |
| food. Lovely forms of women sculped Junonian. Immortal lovely. And we |
| stuffing food in one hole and out behind: food, chyle, blood, dung, |
| earth, food: have to feed it like stoking an engine. They have no. Never |
| looked. I'll look today. Keeper won't see. Bend down let something drop |
| see if she. |
| |
| Dribbling a quiet message from his bladder came to go to do not to |
| do there to do. A man and ready he drained his glass to the lees and |
| walked, to men too they gave themselves, manly conscious, lay with men |
| lovers, a youth enjoyed her, to the yard. |
| |
| When the sound of his boots had ceased Davy Byrne said from his book: |
| |
| --What is this he is? Isn't he in the insurance line? |
| |
| --He's out of that long ago, Nosey Flynn said. He does canvassing for |
| the _Freeman._ |
| |
| --I know him well to see, Davy Byrne said. Is he in trouble? |
| |
| --Trouble? Nosey Flynn said. Not that I heard of. Why? |
| |
| --I noticed he was in mourning. |
| |
| --Was he? Nosey Flynn said. So he was, faith. I asked him how was all at |
| home. You're right, by God. So he was. |
| |
| --I never broach the subject, Davy Byrne said humanely, if I see a |
| gentleman is in trouble that way. It only brings it up fresh in their |
| minds. |
| |
| --It's not the wife anyhow, Nosey Flynn said. I met him the day before |
| yesterday and he coming out of that Irish farm dairy John Wyse Nolan's |
| wife has in Henry street with a jar of cream in his hand taking it home |
| to his better half. She's well nourished, I tell you. Plovers on toast. |
| |
| --And is he doing for the _Freeman?_ Davy Byrne said. |
| |
| Nosey Flynn pursed his lips. |
| |
| ---He doesn't buy cream on the ads he picks up. You can make bacon of |
| that. |
| |
| --How so? Davy Byrne asked, coming from his book. |
| |
| Nosey Flynn made swift passes in the air with juggling fingers. He |
| winked. |
| |
| --He's in the craft, he said. |
| |
| ---Do you tell me so? Davy Byrne said. |
| |
| --Very much so, Nosey Flynn said. Ancient free and accepted order. He's |
| an excellent brother. Light, life and love, by God. They give him a leg |
| up. I was told that by a--well, I won't say who. |
| |
| --Is that a fact? |
| |
| --O, it's a fine order, Nosey Flynn said. They stick to you when you're |
| down. I know a fellow was trying to get into it. But they're as close as |
| damn it. By God they did right to keep the women out of it. |
| |
| Davy Byrne smiledyawnednodded all in one: |
| |
| --Iiiiiichaaaaaaach! |
| |
| --There was one woman, Nosey Flynn said, hid herself in a clock to find |
| out what they do be doing. But be damned but they smelt her out and |
| swore her in on the spot a master mason. That was one of the saint |
| Legers of Doneraile. |
| |
| Davy Byrne, sated after his yawn, said with tearwashed eyes: |
| |
| --And is that a fact? Decent quiet man he is. I often saw him in here |
| and I never once saw him--you know, over the line. |
| |
| --God Almighty couldn't make him drunk, Nosey Flynn said firmly. Slips |
| off when the fun gets too hot. Didn't you see him look at his watch? Ah, |
| you weren't there. If you ask him to have a drink first thing he does |
| he outs with the watch to see what he ought to imbibe. Declare to God he |
| does. |
| |
| --There are some like that, Davy Byrne said. He's a safe man, I'd say. |
| |
| --He's not too bad, Nosey Flynn said, snuffling it up. He's been known |
| to put his hand down too to help a fellow. Give the devil his due. O, |
| Bloom has his good points. But there's one thing he'll never do. |
| |
| His hand scrawled a dry pen signature beside his grog. |
| |
| --I know, Davy Byrne said. |
| |
| --Nothing in black and white, Nosey Flynn said. |
| |
| Paddy Leonard and Bantam Lyons came in. Tom Rochford followed frowning, |
| a plaining hand on his claret waistcoat. |
| |
| --Day, Mr Byrne. |
| |
| --Day, gentlemen. |
| |
| They paused at the counter. |
| |
| --Who's standing? Paddy Leonard asked. |
| |
| --I'm sitting anyhow, Nosey Flynn answered. |
| |
| --Well, what'll it be? Paddy Leonard asked. |
| |
| --I'll take a stone ginger, Bantam Lyons said. |
| |
| --How much? Paddy Leonard cried. Since when, for God' sake? What's |
| yours, Tom? |
| |
| --How is the main drainage? Nosey Flynn asked, sipping. |
| |
| For answer Tom Rochford pressed his hand to his breastbone and |
| hiccupped. |
| |
| --Would I trouble you for a glass of fresh water, Mr Byrne? he said. |
| |
| --Certainly, sir. |
| |
| Paddy Leonard eyed his alemates. |
| |
| --Lord love a duck, he said. Look at what I'm standing drinks to! Cold |
| water and gingerpop! Two fellows that would suck whisky off a sore leg. |
| He has some bloody horse up his sleeve for the Gold cup. A dead snip. |
| |
| --Zinfandel is it? Nosey Flynn asked. |
| |
| Tom Rochford spilt powder from a twisted paper into the water set before |
| him. |
| |
| --That cursed dyspepsia, he said before drinking. |
| |
| --Breadsoda is very good, Davy Byrne said. |
| |
| Tom Rochford nodded and drank. |
| |
| --Is it Zinfandel? |
| |
| --Say nothing! Bantam Lyons winked. I'm going to plunge five bob on my |
| own. |
| |
| --Tell us if you're worth your salt and be damned to you, Paddy Leonard |
| said. Who gave it to you? |
| |
| Mr Bloom on his way out raised three fingers in greeting. |
| |
| --So long! Nosey Flynn said. |
| |
| The others turned. |
| |
| --That's the man now that gave it to me, Bantam Lyons whispered. |
| |
| --Prrwht! Paddy Leonard said with scorn. Mr Byrne, sir, we'll take two |
| of your small Jamesons after that and a... |
| |
| --Stone ginger, Davy Byrne added civilly. |
| |
| --Ay, Paddy Leonard said. A suckingbottle for the baby. |
| |
| Mr Bloom walked towards Dawson street, his tongue brushing his teeth |
| smooth. Something green it would have to be: spinach, say. Then with |
| those Rontgen rays searchlight you could. |
| |
| At Duke lane a ravenous terrier choked up a sick knuckly cud on the |
| cobblestones and lapped it with new zest. Surfeit. Returned with thanks |
| having fully digested the contents. First sweet then savoury. Mr Bloom |
| coasted warily. Ruminants. His second course. Their upper jaw they move. |
| Wonder if Tom Rochford will do anything with that invention of his? |
| Wasting time explaining it to Flynn's mouth. Lean people long mouths. |
| Ought to be a hall or a place where inventors could go in and invent |
| free. Course then you'd have all the cranks pestering. |
| |
| He hummed, prolonging in solemn echo the closes of the bars: |
| |
| _Don Giovanni, a cenar teco M'invitasti._ |
| |
| Feel better. Burgundy. Good pick me up. Who distilled first? Some chap |
| in the blues. Dutch courage. That _Kilkenny People_ in the national |
| library now I must. |
| |
| Bare clean closestools waiting in the window of William Miller, plumber, |
| turned back his thoughts. They could: and watch it all the way down, |
| swallow a pin sometimes come out of the ribs years after, tour round the |
| body changing biliary duct spleen squirting liver gastric juice coils of |
| intestines like pipes. But the poor buffer would have to stand all the |
| time with his insides entrails on show. Science. |
| |
| --_A cenar teco._ |
| |
| What does that _teco_ mean? Tonight perhaps. |
| |
| _Don Giovanni, thou hast me invited |
| To come to supper tonight, |
| The rum the rumdum._ |
| |
| Doesn't go properly. |
| |
| Keyes: two months if I get Nannetti to. That'll be two pounds ten about |
| two pounds eight. Three Hynes owes me. Two eleven. Prescott's dyeworks |
| van over there. If I get Billy Prescott's ad: two fifteen. Five guineas |
| about. On the pig's back. |
| |
| Could buy one of those silk petticoats for Molly, colour of her new |
| garters. |
| |
| Today. Today. Not think. |
| |
| Tour the south then. What about English wateringplaces? Brighton, |
| Margate. Piers by moonlight. Her voice floating out. Those lovely |
| seaside girls. Against John Long's a drowsing loafer lounged in heavy |
| thought, gnawing a crusted knuckle. Handy man wants job. Small wages. |
| Will eat anything. |
| |
| Mr Bloom turned at Gray's confectioner's window of unbought tarts and |
| passed the reverend Thomas Connellan's bookstore. _Why I left the church |
| of Rome? Birds' Nest._ Women run him. They say they used to give pauper |
| children soup to change to protestants in the time of the potato blight. |
| Society over the way papa went to for the conversion of poor jews. Same |
| bait. Why we left the church of Rome. |
| |
| A blind stripling stood tapping the curbstone with his slender cane. No |
| tram in sight. Wants to cross. |
| |
| --Do you want to cross? Mr Bloom asked. |
| |
| The blind stripling did not answer. His wallface frowned weakly. He |
| moved his head uncertainly. |
| |
| --You're in Dawson street, Mr Bloom said. Molesworth street is opposite. |
| Do you want to cross? There's nothing in the way. |
| |
| The cane moved out trembling to the left. Mr Bloom's eye followed its |
| line and saw again the dyeworks' van drawn up before Drago's. Where I |
| saw his brillantined hair just when I was. Horse drooping. Driver in |
| John Long's. Slaking his drouth. |
| |
| --There's a van there, Mr Bloom said, but it's not moving. I'll see you |
| across. Do you want to go to Molesworth street? |
| |
| --Yes, the stripling answered. South Frederick street. |
| |
| --Come, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| He touched the thin elbow gently: then took the limp seeing hand to |
| guide it forward. |
| |
| Say something to him. Better not do the condescending. They mistrust |
| what you tell them. Pass a common remark. |
| |
| --The rain kept off. |
| |
| No answer. |
| |
| Stains on his coat. Slobbers his food, I suppose. Tastes all different |
| for him. Have to be spoonfed first. Like a child's hand, his hand. Like |
| Milly's was. Sensitive. Sizing me up I daresay from my hand. Wonder |
| if he has a name. Van. Keep his cane clear of the horse's legs: tired |
| drudge get his doze. That's right. Clear. Behind a bull: in front of a |
| horse. |
| |
| --Thanks, sir. |
| |
| Knows I'm a man. Voice. |
| |
| --Right now? First turn to the left. |
| |
| The blind stripling tapped the curbstone and went on his way, drawing |
| his cane back, feeling again. |
| |
| Mr Bloom walked behind the eyeless feet, a flatcut suit of herringbone |
| tweed. Poor young fellow! How on earth did he know that van was there? |
| Must have felt it. See things in their forehead perhaps: kind of sense |
| of volume. Weight or size of it, something blacker than the dark. Wonder |
| would he feel it if something was removed. Feel a gap. Queer idea of |
| Dublin he must have, tapping his way round by the stones. Could he walk |
| in a beeline if he hadn't that cane? Bloodless pious face like a fellow |
| going in to be a priest. |
| |
| Penrose! That was that chap's name. |
| |
| Look at all the things they can learn to do. Read with their fingers. |
| Tune pianos. Or we are surprised they have any brains. Why we think a |
| deformed person or a hunchback clever if he says something we might say. |
| Of course the other senses are more. Embroider. Plait baskets. People |
| ought to help. Workbasket I could buy for Molly's birthday. Hates |
| sewing. Might take an objection. Dark men they call them. |
| |
| Sense of smell must be stronger too. Smells on all sides, bunched |
| together. Each street different smell. Each person too. Then the spring, |
| the summer: smells. Tastes? They say you can't taste wines with your |
| eyes shut or a cold in the head. Also smoke in the dark they say get no |
| pleasure. |
| |
| And with a woman, for instance. More shameless not seeing. That girl |
| passing the Stewart institution, head in the air. Look at me. I have |
| them all on. Must be strange not to see her. Kind of a form in his |
| mind's eye. The voice, temperatures: when he touches her with his |
| fingers must almost see the lines, the curves. His hands on her hair, |
| for instance. Say it was black, for instance. Good. We call it black. |
| Then passing over her white skin. Different feel perhaps. Feeling of |
| white. |
| |
| Postoffice. Must answer. Fag today. Send her a postal order two |
| shillings, half a crown. Accept my little present. Stationer's just here |
| too. Wait. Think over it. |
| |
| With a gentle finger he felt ever so slowly the hair combed back above |
| his ears. Again. Fibres of fine fine straw. Then gently his finger felt |
| the skin of his right cheek. Downy hair there too. Not smooth enough. |
| The belly is the smoothest. No-one about. There he goes into Frederick |
| street. Perhaps to Levenston's dancing academy piano. Might be settling |
| my braces. |
| |
| Walking by Doran's publichouse he slid his hand between his waistcoat |
| and trousers and, pulling aside his shirt gently, felt a slack fold of |
| his belly. But I know it's whitey yellow. Want to try in the dark to |
| see. |
| |
| He withdrew his hand and pulled his dress to. |
| |
| Poor fellow! Quite a boy. Terrible. Really terrible. What dreams would |
| he have, not seeing? Life a dream for him. Where is the justice being |
| born that way? All those women and children excursion beanfeast burned |
| and drowned in New York. Holocaust. Karma they call that transmigration |
| for sins you did in a past life the reincarnation met him pike hoses. |
| Dear, dear, dear. Pity, of course: but somehow you can't cotton on to |
| them someway. |
| |
| Sir Frederick Falkiner going into the freemasons' hall. Solemn as Troy. |
| After his good lunch in Earlsfort terrace. Old legal cronies cracking |
| a magnum. Tales of the bench and assizes and annals of the bluecoat |
| school. I sentenced him to ten years. I suppose he'd turn up his nose |
| at that stuff I drank. Vintage wine for them, the year marked on a |
| dusty bottle. Has his own ideas of justice in the recorder's court. |
| Wellmeaning old man. Police chargesheets crammed with cases get their |
| percentage manufacturing crime. Sends them to the rightabout. The devil |
| on moneylenders. Gave Reuben J. a great strawcalling. Now he's really |
| what they call a dirty jew. Power those judges have. Crusty old topers |
| in wigs. Bear with a sore paw. And may the Lord have mercy on your soul. |
| |
| Hello, placard. Mirus bazaar. His Excellency the lord lieutenant. |
| Sixteenth. Today it is. In aid of funds for Mercer's hospital. _The |
| Messiah_ was first given for that. Yes. Handel. What about going out |
| there: Ballsbridge. Drop in on Keyes. No use sticking to him like a |
| leech. Wear out my welcome. Sure to know someone on the gate. |
| |
| Mr Bloom came to Kildare street. First I must. Library. |
| |
| Straw hat in sunlight. Tan shoes. Turnedup trousers. It is. It is. |
| |
| His heart quopped softly. To the right. Museum. Goddesses. He swerved to |
| the right. |
| |
| Is it? Almost certain. Won't look. Wine in my face. Why did I? Too |
| heady. Yes, it is. The walk. Not see. Get on. |
| |
| Making for the museum gate with long windy steps he lifted his eyes. |
| Handsome building. Sir Thomas Deane designed. Not following me? |
| |
| Didn't see me perhaps. Light in his eyes. |
| |
| The flutter of his breath came forth in short sighs. Quick. Cold |
| statues: quiet there. Safe in a minute. |
| |
| No. Didn't see me. After two. Just at the gate. |
| |
| My heart! |
| |
| His eyes beating looked steadfastly at cream curves of stone. Sir Thomas |
| Deane was the Greek architecture. |
| |
| Look for something I. |
| |
| His hasty hand went quick into a pocket, took out, read unfolded |
| Agendath Netaim. Where did I? |
| |
| Busy looking. |
| |
| He thrust back quick Agendath. |
| |
| Afternoon she said. |
| |
| I am looking for that. Yes, that. Try all pockets. Handker. _Freeman._ |
| Where did I? Ah, yes. Trousers. Potato. Purse. Where? |
| |
| Hurry. Walk quietly. Moment more. My heart. |
| |
| His hand looking for the where did I put found in his hip pocket soap |
| lotion have to call tepid paper stuck. Ah soap there I yes. Gate. |
| |
| Safe! |
| |
| |
| Urbane, to comfort them, the quaker librarian purred: |
| |
| |
| --And we have, have we not, those priceless pages of _Wilhelm Meister_. |
| A great poet on a great brother poet. A hesitating soul taking arms |
| against a sea of troubles, torn by conflicting doubts, as one sees in |
| real life. |
| |
| He came a step a sinkapace forward on neatsleather creaking and a step |
| backward a sinkapace on the solemn floor. |
| |
| A noiseless attendant setting open the door but slightly made him a |
| noiseless beck. |
| |
| --Directly, said he, creaking to go, albeit lingering. The beautiful |
| ineffectual dreamer who comes to grief against hard facts. One always |
| feels that Goethe's judgments are so true. True in the larger analysis. |
| |
| Twicreakingly analysis he corantoed off. Bald, most zealous by the door |
| he gave his large ear all to the attendant's words: heard them: and was |
| gone. |
| |
| Two left. |
| |
| --Monsieur de la Palice, Stephen sneered, was alive fifteen minutes |
| before his death. |
| |
| --Have you found those six brave medicals, John Eglinton asked with |
| elder's gall, to write _Paradise Lost_ at your dictation? _The Sorrows |
| of Satan_ he calls it. |
| |
| Smile. Smile Cranly's smile. |
| |
| _First he tickled her |
| Then he patted her |
| Then he passed the female catheter. |
| For he was a medical |
| Jolly old medi..._ |
| |
| --I feel you would need one more for _Hamlet._ Seven is dear to the |
| mystic mind. The shining seven W.B. calls them. |
| |
| Glittereyed his rufous skull close to his greencapped desklamp sought |
| the face bearded amid darkgreener shadow, an ollav, holyeyed. He laughed |
| low: a sizar's laugh of Trinity: unanswered. |
| |
| _Orchestral Satan, weeping many a rood |
| Tears such as angels weep. |
| Ed egli avea del cul fatto trombetta._ |
| |
| He holds my follies hostage. |
| |
| Cranly's eleven true Wicklowmen to free their sireland. Gaptoothed |
| Kathleen, her four beautiful green fields, the stranger in her house. |
| And one more to hail him: _ave, rabbi_: the Tinahely twelve. In the |
| shadow of the glen he cooees for them. My soul's youth I gave him, night |
| by night. God speed. Good hunting. |
| |
| Mulligan has my telegram. |
| |
| Folly. Persist. |
| |
| --Our young Irish bards, John Eglinton censured, have yet to create a |
| figure which the world will set beside Saxon Shakespeare's Hamlet though |
| I admire him, as old Ben did, on this side idolatry. |
| |
| --All these questions are purely academic, Russell oracled out of his |
| shadow. I mean, whether Hamlet is Shakespeare or James I or Essex. |
| Clergymen's discussions of the historicity of Jesus. Art has to reveal |
| to us ideas, formless spiritual essences. The supreme question about a |
| work of art is out of how deep a life does it spring. The painting of |
| Gustave Moreau is the painting of ideas. The deepest poetry of Shelley, |
| the words of Hamlet bring our minds into contact with the eternal |
| wisdom, Plato's world of ideas. All the rest is the speculation of |
| schoolboys for schoolboys. |
| |
| A. E. has been telling some yankee interviewer. Wall, tarnation strike |
| me! |
| |
| --The schoolmen were schoolboys first, Stephen said superpolitely. |
| Aristotle was once Plato's schoolboy. |
| |
| --And has remained so, one should hope, John Eglinton sedately said. One |
| can see him, a model schoolboy with his diploma under his arm. |
| |
| He laughed again at the now smiling bearded face. |
| |
| Formless spiritual. Father, Word and Holy Breath. Allfather, the |
| heavenly man. Hiesos Kristos, magician of the beautiful, the Logos who |
| suffers in us at every moment. This verily is that. I am the fire upon |
| the altar. I am the sacrificial butter. |
| |
| Dunlop, Judge, the noblest Roman of them all, A.E., Arval, the Name |
| Ineffable, in heaven hight: K.H., their master, whose identity is no |
| secret to adepts. Brothers of the great white lodge always watching |
| to see if they can help. The Christ with the bridesister, moisture of |
| light, born of an ensouled virgin, repentant sophia, departed to the |
| plane of buddhi. The life esoteric is not for ordinary person. O.P. |
| must work off bad karma first. Mrs Cooper Oakley once glimpsed our very |
| illustrious sister H.P.B.'s elemental. |
| |
| O, fie! Out on't! _Pfuiteufel!_ You naughtn't to look, missus, so you |
| naughtn't when a lady's ashowing of her elemental. |
| |
| Mr Best entered, tall, young, mild, light. He bore in his hand with |
| grace a notebook, new, large, clean, bright. |
| |
| --That model schoolboy, Stephen said, would find Hamlet's musings about |
| the afterlife of his princely soul, the improbable, insignificant and |
| undramatic monologue, as shallow as Plato's. |
| |
| John Eglinton, frowning, said, waxing wroth: |
| |
| --Upon my word it makes my blood boil to hear anyone compare Aristotle |
| with Plato. |
| |
| --Which of the two, Stephen asked, would have banished me from his |
| commonwealth? |
| |
| Unsheathe your dagger definitions. Horseness is the whatness of |
| allhorse. Streams of tendency and eons they worship. God: noise in the |
| street: very peripatetic. Space: what you damn well have to see. Through |
| spaces smaller than red globules of man's blood they creepycrawl after |
| Blake's buttocks into eternity of which this vegetable world is but a |
| shadow. Hold to the now, the here, through which all future plunges to |
| the past. |
| |
| Mr Best came forward, amiable, towards his colleague. |
| |
| --Haines is gone, he said. |
| |
| --Is he? |
| |
| --I was showing him Jubainville's book. He's quite enthusiastic, don't |
| you know, about Hyde's _Lovesongs of Connacht._ I couldn't bring him in |
| to hear the discussion. He's gone to Gill's to buy it. |
| |
| _Bound thee forth, my booklet, quick |
| To greet the callous public. |
| Writ, I ween, 'twas not my wish |
| In lean unlovely English._ |
| |
| --The peatsmoke is going to his head, John Eglinton opined. |
| |
| We feel in England. Penitent thief. Gone. I smoked his baccy. Green |
| twinkling stone. An emerald set in the ring of the sea. |
| |
| --People do not know how dangerous lovesongs can be, the auric egg of |
| Russell warned occultly. The movements which work revolutions in the |
| world are born out of the dreams and visions in a peasant's heart on the |
| hillside. For them the earth is not an exploitable ground but the |
| living mother. The rarefied air of the academy and the arena produce the |
| sixshilling novel, the musichall song. France produces the finest flower |
| of corruption in Mallarme but the desirable life is revealed only to the |
| poor of heart, the life of Homer's Phaeacians. |
| |
| From these words Mr Best turned an unoffending face to Stephen. |
| |
| --Mallarme, don't you know, he said, has written those wonderful prose |
| poems Stephen MacKenna used to read to me in Paris. The one about |
| _Hamlet._ He says: _il se promène, lisant au livre de lui-même_, don't |
| you know, _reading the book of himself_. He describes _Hamlet_ given in |
| a French town, don't you know, a provincial town. They advertised it. |
| |
| His free hand graciously wrote tiny signs in air. |
| |
| _HAMLET |
| ou |
| LE DISTRAIT |
| Pièce de Shakespeare_ |
| |
| He repeated to John Eglinton's newgathered frown: |
| |
| --_Pièce de Shakespeare_, don't you know. It's so French. The French |
| point of view. _Hamlet ou_... |
| |
| --The absentminded beggar, Stephen ended. |
| |
| John Eglinton laughed. |
| |
| --Yes, I suppose it would be, he said. Excellent people, no doubt, but |
| distressingly shortsighted in some matters. |
| |
| Sumptuous and stagnant exaggeration of murder. |
| |
| --A deathsman of the soul Robert Greene called him, Stephen said. Not |
| for nothing was he a butcher's son, wielding the sledded poleaxe and |
| spitting in his palms. Nine lives are taken off for his father's one. |
| Our Father who art in purgatory. Khaki Hamlets don't hesitate to |
| shoot. The bloodboltered shambles in act five is a forecast of the |
| concentration camp sung by Mr Swinburne. |
| |
| Cranly, I his mute orderly, following battles from afar. |
| |
| _Whelps and dams of murderous foes whom none But we had spared..._ |
| |
| Between the Saxon smile and yankee yawp. The devil and the deep sea. |
| |
| --He will have it that _Hamlet_ is a ghoststory, John Eglinton said |
| for Mr Best's behoof. Like the fat boy in Pickwick he wants to make our |
| flesh creep. |
| |
| _List! List! O List!_ |
| |
| My flesh hears him: creeping, hears. |
| |
| _If thou didst ever..._ |
| |
| --What is a ghost? Stephen said with tingling energy. One who has faded |
| into impalpability through death, through absence, through change of |
| manners. Elizabethan London lay as far from Stratford as corrupt Paris |
| lies from virgin Dublin. Who is the ghost from _limbo patrum_, returning |
| to the world that has forgotten him? Who is King Hamlet? |
| |
| John Eglinton shifted his spare body, leaning back to judge. |
| |
| Lifted. |
| |
| --It is this hour of a day in mid June, Stephen said, begging with |
| a swift glance their hearing. The flag is up on the playhouse by the |
| bankside. The bear Sackerson growls in the pit near it, Paris garden. |
| Canvasclimbers who sailed with Drake chew their sausages among the |
| groundlings. |
| |
| Local colour. Work in all you know. Make them accomplices. |
| |
| --Shakespeare has left the huguenot's house in Silver street and walks |
| by the swanmews along the riverbank. But he does not stay to feed the |
| pen chivying her game of cygnets towards the rushes. The swan of Avon |
| has other thoughts. |
| |
| Composition of place. Ignatius Loyola, make haste to help me! |
| |
| --The play begins. A player comes on under the shadow, made up in the |
| castoff mail of a court buck, a wellset man with a bass voice. It is the |
| ghost, the king, a king and no king, and the player is Shakespeare who |
| has studied _Hamlet_ all the years of his life which were not vanity in |
| order to play the part of the spectre. He speaks the words to Burbage, |
| the young player who stands before him beyond the rack of cerecloth, |
| calling him by a name: |
| |
| _Hamlet, I am thy father's spirit,_ |
| |
| bidding him list. To a son he speaks, the son of his soul, the prince, |
| young Hamlet and to the son of his body, Hamnet Shakespeare, who has |
| died in Stratford that his namesake may live for ever. |
| |
| Is it possible that that player Shakespeare, a ghost by absence, and in |
| the vesture of buried Denmark, a ghost by death, speaking his own words |
| to his own son's name (had Hamnet Shakespeare lived he would have been |
| prince Hamlet's twin), is it possible, I want to know, or probable that |
| he did not draw or foresee the logical conclusion of those premises: you |
| are the dispossessed son: I am the murdered father: your mother is the |
| guilty queen, Ann Shakespeare, born Hathaway? |
| |
| --But this prying into the family life of a great man, Russell began |
| impatiently. |
| |
| Art thou there, truepenny? |
| |
| --Interesting only to the parish clerk. I mean, we have the plays. I |
| mean when we read the poetry of _King Lear_ what is it to us how the |
| poet lived? As for living our servants can do that for us, Villiers de |
| l'Isle has said. Peeping and prying into greenroom gossip of the day, |
| the poet's drinking, the poet's debts. We have _King Lear_: and it is |
| immortal. |
| |
| Mr Best's face, appealed to, agreed. |
| |
| _Flow over them with your waves and with your waters, Mananaan, Mananaan |
| MacLir..._ |
| |
| How now, sirrah, that pound he lent you when you were hungry? |
| |
| Marry, I wanted it. |
| |
| Take thou this noble. |
| |
| Go to! You spent most of it in Georgina Johnson's bed, clergyman's |
| daughter. Agenbite of inwit. |
| |
| Do you intend to pay it back? |
| |
| O, yes. |
| |
| When? Now? |
| |
| Well... No. |
| |
| When, then? |
| |
| I paid my way. I paid my way. |
| |
| Steady on. He's from beyant Boyne water. The northeast corner. You owe |
| it. |
| |
| Wait. Five months. Molecules all change. I am other I now. Other I got |
| pound. |
| |
| Buzz. Buzz. |
| |
| But I, entelechy, form of forms, am I by memory because under |
| everchanging forms. |
| |
| I that sinned and prayed and fasted. |
| |
| A child Conmee saved from pandies. |
| |
| I, I and I. I. |
| |
| A.E.I.O.U. |
| |
| --Do you mean to fly in the face of the tradition of three centuries? |
| John Eglinton's carping voice asked. Her ghost at least has been laid |
| for ever. She died, for literature at least, before she was born. |
| |
| --She died, Stephen retorted, sixtyseven years after she was born. She |
| saw him into and out of the world. She took his first embraces. She bore |
| his children and she laid pennies on his eyes to keep his eyelids closed |
| when he lay on his deathbed. |
| |
| Mother's deathbed. Candle. The sheeted mirror. Who brought me into |
| this world lies there, bronzelidded, under few cheap flowers. _Liliata |
| rutilantium._ |
| |
| I wept alone. |
| |
| John Eglinton looked in the tangled glowworm of his lamp. |
| |
| --The world believes that Shakespeare made a mistake, he said, and got |
| out of it as quickly and as best he could. |
| |
| --Bosh! Stephen said rudely. A man of genius makes no mistakes. His |
| errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery. |
| |
| Portals of discovery opened to let in the quaker librarian, |
| softcreakfooted, bald, eared and assiduous. |
| |
| --A shrew, John Eglinton said shrewdly, is not a useful portal of |
| discovery, one should imagine. What useful discovery did Socrates learn |
| from Xanthippe? |
| |
| --Dialectic, Stephen answered: and from his mother how to bring thoughts |
| into the world. What he learnt from his other wife Myrto (_absit |
| nomen!_), Socratididion's Epipsychidion, no man, not a woman, will ever |
| know. But neither the midwife's lore nor the caudlelectures saved him |
| from the archons of Sinn Fein and their naggin of hemlock. |
| |
| --But Ann Hathaway? Mr Best's quiet voice said forgetfully. Yes, we seem |
| to be forgetting her as Shakespeare himself forgot her. |
| |
| His look went from brooder's beard to carper's skull, to remind, to |
| chide them not unkindly, then to the baldpink lollard costard, guiltless |
| though maligned. |
| |
| --He had a good groatsworth of wit, Stephen said, and no truant memory. |
| He carried a memory in his wallet as he trudged to Romeville whistling |
| _The girl I left behind me._ If the earthquake did not time it we should |
| know where to place poor Wat, sitting in his form, the cry of hounds, |
| the studded bridle and her blue windows. That memory, _Venus and |
| Adonis_, lay in the bedchamber of every light-of-love in London. |
| Is Katharine the shrew illfavoured? Hortensio calls her young and |
| beautiful. Do you think the writer of _Antony and Cleopatra_, a |
| passionate pilgrim, had his eyes in the back of his head that he chose |
| the ugliest doxy in all Warwickshire to lie withal? Good: he left her |
| and gained the world of men. But his boywomen are the women of a boy. |
| Their life, thought, speech are lent them by males. He chose badly? He |
| was chosen, it seems to me. If others have their will Ann hath a way. |
| By cock, she was to blame. She put the comether on him, sweet and |
| twentysix. The greyeyed goddess who bends over the boy Adonis, stooping |
| to conquer, as prologue to the swelling act, is a boldfaced Stratford |
| wench who tumbles in a cornfield a lover younger than herself. |
| |
| And my turn? When? |
| |
| Come! |
| |
| --Ryefield, Mr Best said brightly, gladly, raising his new book, gladly, |
| brightly. |
| |
| He murmured then with blond delight for all: |
| |
| _Between the acres of the rye These pretty countryfolk would lie._ |
| |
| Paris: the wellpleased pleaser. |
| |
| A tall figure in bearded homespun rose from shadow and unveiled its |
| cooperative watch. |
| |
| --I am afraid I am due at the _Homestead._ |
| |
| Whither away? Exploitable ground. |
| |
| --Are you going? John Eglinton's active eyebrows asked. Shall we see you |
| at Moore's tonight? Piper is coming. |
| |
| --Piper! Mr Best piped. Is Piper back? |
| |
| Peter Piper pecked a peck of pick of peck of pickled pepper. |
| |
| --I don't know if I can. Thursday. We have our meeting. If I can get |
| away in time. |
| |
| Yogibogeybox in Dawson chambers. _Isis Unveiled._ Their Pali book we |
| tried to pawn. Crosslegged under an umbrel umbershoot he thrones an |
| Aztec logos, functioning on astral levels, their oversoul, mahamahatma. |
| The faithful hermetists await the light, ripe for chelaship, |
| ringroundabout him. Louis H. Victory. T. Caulfield Irwin. Lotus ladies |
| tend them i'the eyes, their pineal glands aglow. Filled with his god, |
| he thrones, Buddh under plantain. Gulfer of souls, engulfer. Hesouls, |
| shesouls, shoals of souls. Engulfed with wailing creecries, whirled, |
| whirling, they bewail. |
| |
| _In quintessential triviality |
| For years in this fleshcase a shesoul dwelt._ |
| |
| --They say we are to have a literary surprise, the quaker librarian |
| said, friendly and earnest. Mr Russell, rumour has it, is gathering |
| together a sheaf of our younger poets' verses. We are all looking |
| forward anxiously. |
| |
| Anxiously he glanced in the cone of lamplight where three faces, |
| lighted, shone. |
| |
| See this. Remember. |
| |
| Stephen looked down on a wide headless caubeen, hung on his |
| ashplanthandle over his knee. My casque and sword. Touch lightly with |
| two index fingers. Aristotle's experiment. One or two? Necessity is that |
| in virtue of which it is impossible that one can be otherwise. Argal, |
| one hat is one hat. |
| |
| Listen. |
| |
| Young Colum and Starkey. George Roberts is doing the commercial part. |
| Longworth will give it a good puff in the _Express._ O, will he? I liked |
| Colum's _Drover._ Yes, I think he has that queer thing genius. Do you |
| think he has genius really? Yeats admired his line: _As in wild earth |
| a Grecian vase_. Did he? I hope you'll be able to come tonight. Malachi |
| Mulligan is coming too. Moore asked him to bring Haines. Did you hear |
| Miss Mitchell's joke about Moore and Martyn? That Moore is Martyn's |
| wild oats? Awfully clever, isn't it? They remind one of Don Quixote and |
| Sancho Panza. Our national epic has yet to be written, Dr Sigerson says. |
| Moore is the man for it. A knight of the rueful countenance here in |
| Dublin. With a saffron kilt? O'Neill Russell? O, yes, he must speak the |
| grand old tongue. And his Dulcinea? James Stephens is doing some clever |
| sketches. We are becoming important, it seems. |
| |
| Cordelia. _Cordoglio._ Lir's loneliest daughter. |
| |
| Nookshotten. Now your best French polish. |
| |
| --Thank you very much, Mr Russell, Stephen said, rising. If you will be |
| so kind as to give the letter to Mr Norman... |
| |
| --O, yes. If he considers it important it will go in. We have so much |
| correspondence. |
| |
| --I understand, Stephen said. Thanks. |
| |
| God ild you. The pigs' paper. Bullockbefriending. |
| |
| Synge has promised me an article for _Dana_ too. Are we going to be |
| read? I feel we are. The Gaelic league wants something in Irish. I hope |
| you will come round tonight. Bring Starkey. |
| |
| Stephen sat down. |
| |
| The quaker librarian came from the leavetakers. Blushing, his mask said: |
| |
| --Mr Dedalus, your views are most illuminating. |
| |
| He creaked to and fro, tiptoing up nearer heaven by the altitude of a |
| chopine, and, covered by the noise of outgoing, said low: |
| |
| --Is it your view, then, that she was not faithful to the poet? |
| |
| Alarmed face asks me. Why did he come? Courtesy or an inward light? |
| |
| --Where there is a reconciliation, Stephen said, there must have been |
| first a sundering. |
| |
| --Yes. |
| |
| Christfox in leather trews, hiding, a runaway in blighted treeforks, |
| from hue and cry. Knowing no vixen, walking lonely in the chase. Women |
| he won to him, tender people, a whore of Babylon, ladies of justices, |
| bully tapsters' wives. Fox and geese. And in New Place a slack |
| dishonoured body that once was comely, once as sweet, as fresh as |
| cinnamon, now her leaves falling, all, bare, frighted of the narrow |
| grave and unforgiven. |
| |
| --Yes. So you think... |
| |
| The door closed behind the outgoer. |
| |
| Rest suddenly possessed the discreet vaulted cell, rest of warm and |
| brooding air. |
| |
| A vestal's lamp. |
| |
| Here he ponders things that were not: what Caesar would have lived to do |
| had he believed the soothsayer: what might have been: possibilities of |
| the possible as possible: things not known: what name Achilles bore when |
| he lived among women. |
| |
| Coffined thoughts around me, in mummycases, embalmed in spice of words. |
| Thoth, god of libraries, a birdgod, moonycrowned. And I heard the |
| voice of that Egyptian highpriest. _In painted chambers loaded with |
| tilebooks._ |
| |
| They are still. Once quick in the brains of men. Still: but an itch of |
| death is in them, to tell me in my ear a maudlin tale, urge me to wreak |
| their will. |
| |
| --Certainly, John Eglinton mused, of all great men he is the most |
| enigmatic. We know nothing but that he lived and suffered. Not even so |
| much. Others abide our question. A shadow hangs over all the rest. |
| |
| --But _Hamlet_ is so personal, isn't it? Mr Best pleaded. I mean, a kind |
| of private paper, don't you know, of his private life. I mean, I don't |
| care a button, don't you know, who is killed or who is guilty... |
| |
| He rested an innocent book on the edge of the desk, smiling his |
| defiance. His private papers in the original. _Ta an bad ar an tir. Taim |
| in mo shagart_. Put beurla on it, littlejohn. |
| |
| Quoth littlejohn Eglinton: |
| |
| --I was prepared for paradoxes from what Malachi Mulligan told us but |
| I may as well warn you that if you want to shake my belief that |
| Shakespeare is Hamlet you have a stern task before you. |
| |
| Bear with me. |
| |
| Stephen withstood the bane of miscreant eyes glinting stern under |
| wrinkled brows. A basilisk. _E quando vede l'uomo l'attosca_. Messer |
| Brunetto, I thank thee for the word. |
| |
| --As we, or mother Dana, weave and unweave our bodies, Stephen said, |
| from day to day, their molecules shuttled to and fro, so does the artist |
| weave and unweave his image. And as the mole on my right breast is where |
| it was when I was born, though all my body has been woven of new stuff |
| time after time, so through the ghost of the unquiet father the image |
| of the unliving son looks forth. In the intense instant of imagination, |
| when the mind, Shelley says, is a fading coal, that which I was is that |
| which I am and that which in possibility I may come to be. So in the |
| future, the sister of the past, I may see myself as I sit here now but |
| by reflection from that which then I shall be. |
| |
| Drummond of Hawthornden helped you at that stile. |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Best said youngly. I feel Hamlet quite young. The bitterness |
| might be from the father but the passages with Ophelia are surely from |
| the son. |
| |
| Has the wrong sow by the lug. He is in my father. I am in his son. |
| |
| --That mole is the last to go, Stephen said, laughing. |
| |
| John Eglinton made a nothing pleasing mow. |
| |
| --If that were the birthmark of genius, he said, genius would be a |
| drug in the market. The plays of Shakespeare's later years which Renan |
| admired so much breathe another spirit. |
| |
| --The spirit of reconciliation, the quaker librarian breathed. |
| |
| --There can be no reconciliation, Stephen said, if there has not been a |
| sundering. |
| |
| Said that. |
| |
| --If you want to know what are the events which cast their shadow over |
| the hell of time of _King Lear, Othello, Hamlet, Troilus and Cressida,_ |
| look to see when and how the shadow lifts. What softens the heart of a |
| man, shipwrecked in storms dire, Tried, like another Ulysses, Pericles, |
| prince of Tyre? |
| |
| Head, redconecapped, buffeted, brineblinded. |
| |
| --A child, a girl, placed in his arms, Marina. |
| |
| --The leaning of sophists towards the bypaths of apocrypha is a constant |
| quantity, John Eglinton detected. The highroads are dreary but they lead |
| to the town. |
| |
| Good Bacon: gone musty. Shakespeare Bacon's wild oats. Cypherjugglers |
| going the highroads. Seekers on the great quest. What town, good |
| masters? Mummed in names: A. E., eon: Magee, John Eglinton. East of the |
| sun, west of the moon: _Tir na n-og_. Booted the twain and staved. |
| |
| _How many miles to Dublin? Three score and ten, sir. Will we be there by |
| candlelight?_ |
| |
| --Mr Brandes accepts it, Stephen said, as the first play of the closing |
| period. |
| |
| --Does he? What does Mr Sidney Lee, or Mr Simon Lazarus as some aver his |
| name is, say of it? |
| |
| --Marina, Stephen said, a child of storm, Miranda, a wonder, Perdita, |
| that which was lost. What was lost is given back to him: his daughter's |
| child. _My dearest wife_, Pericles says, _was like this maid._ Will any |
| man love the daughter if he has not loved the mother? |
| |
| --The art of being a grandfather, Mr Best gan murmur. _l'art d'être |
| grand_... |
| |
| --Will he not see reborn in her, with the memory of his own youth added, |
| another image? |
| |
| Do you know what you are talking about? Love, yes. Word known to all |
| men. Amor vero aliquid alicui bonum vult unde et ea quae concupiscimus |
| ... |
| |
| --His own image to a man with that queer thing genius is the standard of |
| all experience, material and moral. Such an appeal will touch him. The |
| images of other males of his blood will repel him. He will see in them |
| grotesque attempts of nature to foretell or to repeat himself. |
| |
| The benign forehead of the quaker librarian enkindled rosily with hope. |
| |
| --I hope Mr Dedalus will work out his theory for the enlightenment of |
| the public. And we ought to mention another Irish commentator, Mr George |
| Bernard Shaw. Nor should we forget Mr Frank Harris. His articles on |
| Shakespeare in the _Saturday Review_ were surely brilliant. Oddly |
| enough he too draws for us an unhappy relation with the dark lady of the |
| sonnets. The favoured rival is William Herbert, earl of Pembroke. I own |
| that if the poet must be rejected such a rejection would seem more in |
| harmony with--what shall I say?--our notions of what ought not to have |
| been. |
| |
| Felicitously he ceased and held a meek head among them, auk's egg, prize |
| of their fray. |
| |
| He thous and thees her with grave husbandwords. Dost love, Miriam? Dost |
| love thy man? |
| |
| --That may be too, Stephen said. There's a saying of Goethe's which Mr |
| Magee likes to quote. Beware of what you wish for in youth because |
| you will get it in middle life. Why does he send to one who is |
| a _buonaroba,_ a bay where all men ride, a maid of honour with a |
| scandalous girlhood, a lordling to woo for him? He was himself a lord |
| of language and had made himself a coistrel gentleman and he had written |
| _Romeo and Juliet_. Why? Belief in himself has been untimely killed. He |
| was overborne in a cornfield first (ryefield, I should say) and he will |
| never be a victor in his own eyes after nor play victoriously the game |
| of laugh and lie down. Assumed dongiovannism will not save him. No later |
| undoing will undo the first undoing. The tusk of the boar has wounded |
| him there where love lies ableeding. If the shrew is worsted yet there |
| remains to her woman's invisible weapon. There is, I feel in the words, |
| some goad of the flesh driving him into a new passion, a darker shadow |
| of the first, darkening even his own understanding of himself. A like |
| fate awaits him and the two rages commingle in a whirlpool. |
| |
| They list. And in the porches of their ears I pour. |
| |
| --The soul has been before stricken mortally, a poison poured in the |
| porch of a sleeping ear. But those who are done to death in sleep cannot |
| know the manner of their quell unless their Creator endow their souls |
| with that knowledge in the life to come. The poisoning and the beast |
| with two backs that urged it King Hamlet's ghost could not know of were |
| he not endowed with knowledge by his creator. That is why the speech |
| (his lean unlovely English) is always turned elsewhere, backward. |
| Ravisher and ravished, what he would but would not, go with him from |
| Lucrece's bluecircled ivory globes to Imogen's breast, bare, with its |
| mole cinquespotted. He goes back, weary of the creation he has piled up |
| to hide him from himself, an old dog licking an old sore. But, because |
| loss is his gain, he passes on towards eternity in undiminished |
| personality, untaught by the wisdom he has written or by the laws he |
| has revealed. His beaver is up. He is a ghost, a shadow now, the wind by |
| Elsinore's rocks or what you will, the sea's voice, a voice heard |
| only in the heart of him who is the substance of his shadow, the son |
| consubstantial with the father. |
| |
| --Amen! was responded from the doorway. |
| |
| Hast thou found me, O mine enemy? |
| |
| _Entr'acte_. |
| |
| A ribald face, sullen as a dean's, Buck Mulligan came forward, then |
| blithe in motley, towards the greeting of their smiles. My telegram. |
| |
| --You were speaking of the gaseous vertebrate, if I mistake not? he |
| asked of Stephen. |
| |
| Primrosevested he greeted gaily with his doffed Panama as with a bauble. |
| |
| They make him welcome. _Was Du verlachst wirst Du noch dienen._ |
| |
| Brood of mockers: Photius, pseudomalachi, Johann Most. |
| |
| He Who Himself begot middler the Holy Ghost and Himself sent Himself, |
| Agenbuyer, between Himself and others, Who, put upon by His fiends, |
| stripped and whipped, was nailed like bat to barndoor, starved on |
| crosstree, Who let Him bury, stood up, harrowed hell, fared into heaven |
| and there these nineteen hundred years sitteth on the right hand of His |
| Own Self but yet shall come in the latter day to doom the quick and dead |
| when all the quick shall be dead already. |
| |
| Glo--o--ri--a in ex--cel--sis De--o. |
| |
| He lifts his hands. Veils fall. O, flowers! Bells with bells with bells |
| aquiring. |
| |
| --Yes, indeed, the quaker librarian said. A most instructive discussion. |
| Mr Mulligan, I'll be bound, has his theory too of the play and of |
| Shakespeare. All sides of life should be represented. |
| |
| He smiled on all sides equally. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan thought, puzzled: |
| |
| --Shakespeare? he said. I seem to know the name. |
| |
| A flying sunny smile rayed in his loose features. |
| |
| --To be sure, he said, remembering brightly. The chap that writes like |
| Synge. |
| |
| Mr Best turned to him. |
| |
| --Haines missed you, he said. Did you meet him? He'll see you after at |
| the D. B. C. He's gone to Gill's to buy Hyde's _Lovesongs of Connacht_. |
| |
| --I came through the museum, Buck Mulligan said. Was he here? |
| |
| --The bard's fellowcountrymen, John Eglinton answered, are rather tired |
| perhaps of our brilliancies of theorising. I hear that an actress played |
| Hamlet for the fourhundredandeighth time last night in Dublin. Vining |
| held that the prince was a woman. Has no-one made him out to be an |
| Irishman? Judge Barton, I believe, is searching for some clues. He |
| swears (His Highness not His Lordship) by saint Patrick. |
| |
| --The most brilliant of all is that story of Wilde's, Mr Best said, |
| lifting his brilliant notebook. That _Portrait of Mr W. H._ where he |
| proves that the sonnets were written by a Willie Hughes, a man all hues. |
| |
| --For Willie Hughes, is it not? the quaker librarian asked. |
| |
| Or Hughie Wills? Mr William Himself. W. H.: who am I? |
| |
| --I mean, for Willie Hughes, Mr Best said, amending his gloss easily. Of |
| course it's all paradox, don't you know, Hughes and hews and hues, |
| the colour, but it's so typical the way he works it out. It's the very |
| essence of Wilde, don't you know. The light touch. |
| |
| His glance touched their faces lightly as he smiled, a blond ephebe. |
| Tame essence of Wilde. |
| |
| You're darned witty. Three drams of usquebaugh you drank with Dan |
| Deasy's ducats. |
| |
| How much did I spend? O, a few shillings. |
| |
| For a plump of pressmen. Humour wet and dry. |
| |
| Wit. You would give your five wits for youth's proud livery he pranks |
| in. Lineaments of gratified desire. |
| |
| There be many mo. Take her for me. In pairing time. Jove, a cool ruttime |
| send them. Yea, turtledove her. |
| |
| Eve. Naked wheatbellied sin. A snake coils her, fang in's kiss. |
| |
| --Do you think it is only a paradox? the quaker librarian was asking. |
| The mocker is never taken seriously when he is most serious. |
| |
| They talked seriously of mocker's seriousness. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan's again heavy face eyed Stephen awhile. Then, his head |
| wagging, he came near, drew a folded telegram from his pocket. His |
| mobile lips read, smiling with new delight. |
| |
| --Telegram! he said. Wonderful inspiration! Telegram! A papal bull! |
| |
| He sat on a corner of the unlit desk, reading aloud joyfully: |
| |
| --_The sentimentalist is he who would enjoy without incurring the |
| immense debtorship for a thing done._ Signed: Dedalus. Where did you |
| launch it from? The kips? No. College Green. Have you drunk the four |
| quid? The aunt is going to call on your unsubstantial father. Telegram! |
| Malachi Mulligan, The Ship, lower Abbey street. O, you peerless mummer! |
| O, you priestified Kinchite! |
| |
| Joyfully he thrust message and envelope into a pocket but keened in a |
| querulous brogue: |
| |
| --It's what I'm telling you, mister honey, it's queer and sick we were, |
| Haines and myself, the time himself brought it in. 'Twas murmur we did |
| for a gallus potion would rouse a friar, I'm thinking, and he limp with |
| leching. And we one hour and two hours and three hours in Connery's |
| sitting civil waiting for pints apiece. |
| |
| He wailed: |
| |
| --And we to be there, mavrone, and you to be unbeknownst sending us your |
| conglomerations the way we to have our tongues out a yard long like the |
| drouthy clerics do be fainting for a pussful. |
| |
| Stephen laughed. |
| |
| Quickly, warningfully Buck Mulligan bent down. |
| |
| --The tramper Synge is looking for you, he said, to murder you. He |
| heard you pissed on his halldoor in Glasthule. He's out in pampooties to |
| murder you. |
| |
| --Me! Stephen exclaimed. That was your contribution to literature. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan gleefully bent back, laughing to the dark eavesdropping |
| ceiling. |
| |
| --Murder you! he laughed. |
| |
| Harsh gargoyle face that warred against me over our mess of hash |
| of lights in rue Saint-André-des-Arts. In words of words for words, |
| palabras. Oisin with Patrick. Faunman he met in Clamart woods, |
| brandishing a winebottle. _C'est vendredi saint!_ Murthering Irish. His |
| image, wandering, he met. I mine. I met a fool i'the forest. |
| |
| --Mr Lyster, an attendant said from the door ajar. |
| |
| --... in which everyone can find his own. So Mr Justice Madden in his |
| _Diary of Master William Silence_ has found the hunting terms... Yes? |
| What is it? |
| |
| --There's a gentleman here, sir, the attendant said, coming forward and |
| offering a card. From the _Freeman._ He wants to see the files of the |
| _Kilkenny People_ for last year. |
| |
| --Certainly, certainly, certainly. Is the gentleman?... |
| |
| He took the eager card, glanced, not saw, laid down unglanced, looked, |
| asked, creaked, asked: |
| |
| --Is he?... O, there! |
| |
| Brisk in a galliard he was off, out. In the daylit corridor he talked |
| with voluble pains of zeal, in duty bound, most fair, most kind, most |
| honest broadbrim. |
| |
| --This gentleman? _Freeman's Journal? Kilkenny People?_ To be sure. Good |
| day, sir. _Kilkenny_... We have certainly... |
| |
| A patient silhouette waited, listening. |
| |
| --All the leading provincial... _Northern Whig, Cork Examiner, |
| Enniscorthy Guardian,_ 1903... Will you please?... Evans, conduct this |
| gentleman... If you just follow the atten... Or, please allow me... |
| This way... Please, sir... |
| |
| Voluble, dutiful, he led the way to all the provincial papers, a bowing |
| dark figure following his hasty heels. |
| |
| The door closed. |
| |
| --The sheeny! Buck Mulligan cried. |
| |
| He jumped up and snatched the card. |
| |
| --What's his name? Ikey Moses? Bloom. |
| |
| He rattled on: |
| |
| --Jehovah, collector of prepuces, is no more. I found him over in the |
| museum where I went to hail the foamborn Aphrodite. The Greek mouth that |
| has never been twisted in prayer. Every day we must do homage to her. |
| _Life of life, thy lips enkindle._ |
| |
| Suddenly he turned to Stephen: |
| |
| --He knows you. He knows your old fellow. O, I fear me, he is Greeker |
| than the Greeks. His pale Galilean eyes were upon her mesial groove. |
| Venus Kallipyge. O, the thunder of those loins! _The god pursuing the |
| maiden hid_. |
| |
| --We want to hear more, John Eglinton decided with Mr Best's approval. |
| We begin to be interested in Mrs S. Till now we had thought of her, if |
| at all, as a patient Griselda, a Penelope stayathome. |
| |
| --Antisthenes, pupil of Gorgias, Stephen said, took the palm of beauty |
| from Kyrios Menelaus' brooddam, Argive Helen, the wooden mare of Troy |
| in whom a score of heroes slept, and handed it to poor Penelope. Twenty |
| years he lived in London and, during part of that time, he drew a salary |
| equal to that of the lord chancellor of Ireland. His life was rich. His |
| art, more than the art of feudalism as Walt Whitman called it, is the |
| art of surfeit. Hot herringpies, green mugs of sack, honeysauces, sugar |
| of roses, marchpane, gooseberried pigeons, ringocandies. Sir Walter |
| Raleigh, when they arrested him, had half a million francs on his |
| back including a pair of fancy stays. The gombeenwoman Eliza Tudor had |
| underlinen enough to vie with her of Sheba. Twenty years he dallied |
| there between conjugial love and its chaste delights and scortatory love |
| and its foul pleasures. You know Manningham's story of the burgher's |
| wife who bade Dick Burbage to her bed after she had seen him in _Richard |
| III_ and how Shakespeare, overhearing, without more ado about nothing, |
| took the cow by the horns and, when Burbage came knocking at the gate, |
| answered from the capon's blankets: _William the conqueror came before |
| Richard III_. And the gay lakin, mistress Fitton, mount and cry O, |
| and his dainty birdsnies, lady Penelope Rich, a clean quality woman is |
| suited for a player, and the punks of the bankside, a penny a time. |
| |
| Cours la Reine. _Encore vingt sous. Nous ferons de petites cochonneries. |
| Minette? Tu veux?_ |
| |
| --The height of fine society. And sir William Davenant of oxford's |
| mother with her cup of canary for any cockcanary. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan, his pious eyes upturned, prayed: |
| |
| --Blessed Margaret Mary Anycock! |
| |
| --And Harry of six wives' daughter. And other lady friends from |
| neighbour seats as Lawn Tennyson, gentleman poet, sings. But all those |
| twenty years what do you suppose poor Penelope in Stratford was doing |
| behind the diamond panes? |
| |
| Do and do. Thing done. In a rosery of Fetter lane of Gerard, herbalist, |
| he walks, greyedauburn. An azured harebell like her veins. Lids of |
| Juno's eyes, violets. He walks. One life is all. One body. Do. But do. |
| Afar, in a reek of lust and squalor, hands are laid on whiteness. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan rapped John Eglinton's desk sharply. |
| |
| --Whom do you suspect? he challenged. |
| |
| --Say that he is the spurned lover in the sonnets. Once spurned twice |
| spurned. But the court wanton spurned him for a lord, his dearmylove. |
| |
| Love that dare not speak its name. |
| |
| --As an Englishman, you mean, John sturdy Eglinton put in, he loved a |
| lord. |
| |
| Old wall where sudden lizards flash. At Charenton I watched them. |
| |
| --It seems so, Stephen said, when he wants to do for him, and for all |
| other and singular uneared wombs, the holy office an ostler does for the |
| stallion. Maybe, like Socrates, he had a midwife to mother as he had a |
| shrew to wife. But she, the giglot wanton, did not break a bedvow. Two |
| deeds are rank in that ghost's mind: a broken vow and the dullbrained |
| yokel on whom her favour has declined, deceased husband's brother. Sweet |
| Ann, I take it, was hot in the blood. Once a wooer, twice a wooer. |
| |
| Stephen turned boldly in his chair. |
| |
| --The burden of proof is with you not with me, he said frowning. If you |
| deny that in the fifth scene of _Hamlet_ he has branded her with infamy |
| tell me why there is no mention of her during the thirtyfour years |
| between the day she married him and the day she buried him. All those |
| women saw their men down and under: Mary, her goodman John, Ann, her |
| poor dear Willun, when he went and died on her, raging that he was the |
| first to go, Joan, her four brothers, Judith, her husband and all her |
| sons, Susan, her husband too, while Susan's daughter, Elizabeth, to use |
| granddaddy's words, wed her second, having killed her first. |
| |
| O, yes, mention there is. In the years when he was living richly in |
| royal London to pay a debt she had to borrow forty shillings from her |
| father's shepherd. Explain you then. Explain the swansong too wherein he |
| has commended her to posterity. |
| |
| He faced their silence. |
| |
| To whom thus Eglinton: |
| You mean the will. |
| But that has been explained, I believe, by jurists. |
| She was entitled to her widow's dower |
| At common law. His legal knowledge was great |
| Our judges tell us. |
| Him Satan fleers, |
| Mocker: |
| And therefore he left out her name |
| From the first draft but he did not leave out |
| The presents for his granddaughter, for his daughters, |
| For his sister, for his old cronies in Stratford |
| And in London. And therefore when he was urged, |
| As I believe, to name her |
| He left her his |
| Secondbest |
| Bed. |
| _Punkt._ |
| Leftherhis |
| Secondbest |
| Leftherhis |
| Bestabed |
| Secabest |
| Leftabed. |
| |
| |
| Woa! |
| |
| --Pretty countryfolk had few chattels then, John Eglinton observed, as |
| they have still if our peasant plays are true to type. |
| |
| --He was a rich country gentleman, Stephen said, with a coat of arms |
| and landed estate at Stratford and a house in Ireland yard, a capitalist |
| shareholder, a bill promoter, a tithefarmer. Why did he not leave her |
| his best bed if he wished her to snore away the rest of her nights in |
| peace? |
| |
| --It is clear that there were two beds, a best and a secondbest, Mr |
| Secondbest Best said finely. |
| |
| --_Separatio a mensa et a thalamo_, bettered Buck Mulligan and was |
| smiled on. |
| |
| --Antiquity mentions famous beds, Second Eglinton puckered, bedsmiling. |
| Let me think. |
| |
| --Antiquity mentions that Stagyrite schoolurchin and bald heathen sage, |
| Stephen said, who when dying in exile frees and endows his slaves, pays |
| tribute to his elders, wills to be laid in earth near the bones of his |
| dead wife and bids his friends be kind to an old mistress (don't forget |
| Nell Gwynn Herpyllis) and let her live in his villa. |
| |
| --Do you mean he died so? Mr Best asked with slight concern. I mean... |
| |
| --He died dead drunk, Buck Mulligan capped. A quart of ale is a dish for |
| a king. O, I must tell you what Dowden said! |
| |
| --What? asked Besteglinton. |
| |
| William Shakespeare and company, limited. The people's William. For |
| terms apply: E. Dowden, Highfield house... |
| |
| --Lovely! Buck Mulligan suspired amorously. I asked him what he thought |
| of the charge of pederasty brought against the bard. He lifted his hands |
| and said: _All we can say is that life ran very high in those days._ |
| Lovely! |
| |
| Catamite. |
| |
| --The sense of beauty leads us astray, said beautifulinsadness Best to |
| ugling Eglinton. |
| |
| Steadfast John replied severe: |
| |
| --The doctor can tell us what those words mean. You cannot eat your cake |
| and have it. |
| |
| Sayest thou so? Will they wrest from us, from me, the palm of beauty? |
| |
| --And the sense of property, Stephen said. He drew Shylock out of his |
| own long pocket. The son of a maltjobber and moneylender he was himself |
| a cornjobber and moneylender, with ten tods of corn hoarded in the |
| famine riots. His borrowers are no doubt those divers of worship |
| mentioned by Chettle Falstaff who reported his uprightness of dealing. |
| He sued a fellowplayer for the price of a few bags of malt and exacted |
| his pound of flesh in interest for every money lent. How else could |
| Aubrey's ostler and callboy get rich quick? All events brought grist to |
| his mill. Shylock chimes with the jewbaiting that followed the hanging |
| and quartering of the queen's leech Lopez, his jew's heart being plucked |
| forth while the sheeny was yet alive: _Hamlet_ and _Macbeth_ with |
| the coming to the throne of a Scotch philosophaster with a turn for |
| witchroasting. The lost armada is his jeer in _Love's Labour Lost_. |
| His pageants, the histories, sail fullbellied on a tide of Mafeking |
| enthusiasm. Warwickshire jesuits are tried and we have a porter's theory |
| of equivocation. The _Sea Venture_ comes home from Bermudas and the play |
| Renan admired is written with Patsy Caliban, our American cousin. |
| The sugared sonnets follow Sidney's. As for fay Elizabeth, otherwise |
| carrotty Bess, the gross virgin who inspired _The Merry Wives of |
| Windsor_, let some meinherr from Almany grope his life long for deephid |
| meanings in the depths of the buckbasket. |
| |
| I think you're getting on very nicely. Just mix up a mixture of |
| theolologicophilolological. _Mingo, minxi, mictum, mingere._ |
| |
| --Prove that he was a jew, John Eglinton dared,'expectantly. Your dean |
| of studies holds he was a holy Roman. |
| |
| _Sufflaminandus sum._ |
| |
| --He was made in Germany, Stephen replied, as the champion French |
| polisher of Italian scandals. |
| |
| --A myriadminded man, Mr Best reminded. Coleridge called him |
| myriadminded. |
| |
| _Amplius. In societate humana hoc est maxime necessarium ut sit amicitia |
| inter multos._ |
| |
| --Saint Thomas, Stephen began... |
| |
| --_Ora pro nobis_, Monk Mulligan groaned, sinking to a chair. |
| |
| There he keened a wailing rune. |
| |
| --_Pogue mahone! Acushla machree!_ It's destroyed we are from this day! |
| It's destroyed we are surely! |
| |
| All smiled their smiles. |
| |
| --Saint Thomas, Stephen smiling said, whose gorbellied works I enjoy |
| reading in the original, writing of incest from a standpoint different |
| from that of the new Viennese school Mr Magee spoke of, likens it in his |
| wise and curious way to an avarice of the emotions. He means that the |
| love so given to one near in blood is covetously withheld from some |
| stranger who, it may be, hungers for it. Jews, whom christians tax with |
| avarice, are of all races the most given to intermarriage. Accusations |
| are made in anger. The christian laws which built up the hoards of the |
| jews (for whom, as for the lollards, storm was shelter) bound their |
| affections too with hoops of steel. Whether these be sins or virtues old |
| Nobodaddy will tell us at doomsday leet. But a man who holds so tightly |
| to what he calls his rights over what he calls his debts will hold |
| tightly also to what he calls his rights over her whom he calls his |
| wife. No sir smile neighbour shall covet his ox or his wife or his |
| manservant or his maidservant or his jackass. |
| |
| --Or his jennyass, Buck Mulligan antiphoned. |
| |
| --Gentle Will is being roughly handled, gentle Mr Best said gently. |
| |
| --Which will? gagged sweetly Buck Mulligan. We are getting mixed. |
| |
| --The will to live, John Eglinton philosophised, for poor Ann, Will's |
| widow, is the will to die. |
| |
| _--Requiescat!_ Stephen prayed. |
| |
| _What of all the will to do? |
| It has vanished long ago..._ |
| |
| --She lies laid out in stark stiffness in that secondbest bed, the |
| mobled queen, even though you prove that a bed in those days was as |
| rare as a motorcar is now and that its carvings were the wonder of seven |
| parishes. In old age she takes up with gospellers (one stayed with her |
| at New Place and drank a quart of sack the town council paid for but in |
| which bed he slept it skills not to ask) and heard she had a soul. She |
| read or had read to her his chapbooks preferring them to the _Merry |
| Wives_ and, loosing her nightly waters on the jordan, she thought |
| over _Hooks and Eyes for Believers' Breeches_ and _The most Spiritual |
| Snuffbox to Make the Most Devout Souls Sneeze_. Venus has twisted her |
| lips in prayer. Agenbite of inwit: remorse of conscience. It is an age |
| of exhausted whoredom groping for its god. |
| |
| --History shows that to be true, _inquit Eglintonus Chronolologos_. The |
| ages succeed one another. But we have it on high authority that a man's |
| worst enemies shall be those of his own house and family. I feel that |
| Russell is right. What do we care for his wife or father? I should say |
| that only family poets have family lives. Falstaff was not a family man. |
| I feel that the fat knight is his supreme creation. |
| |
| Lean, he lay back. Shy, deny thy kindred, the unco guid. Shy, supping |
| with the godless, he sneaks the cup. A sire in Ultonian Antrim bade it |
| him. Visits him here on quarter days. Mr Magee, sir, there's a gentleman |
| to see you. Me? Says he's your father, sir. Give me my Wordsworth. Enter |
| Magee Mor Matthew, a rugged rough rugheaded kern, in strossers with |
| a buttoned codpiece, his nether stocks bemired with clauber of ten |
| forests, a wand of wilding in his hand. |
| |
| Your own? He knows your old fellow. The widower. |
| |
| Hurrying to her squalid deathlair from gay Paris on the quayside I |
| touched his hand. The voice, new warmth, speaking. Dr Bob Kenny is |
| attending her. The eyes that wish me well. But do not know me. |
| |
| --A father, Stephen said, battling against hopelessness, is a necessary |
| evil. He wrote the play in the months that followed his father's death. |
| If you hold that he, a greying man with two marriageable daughters, with |
| thirtyfive years of life, _nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita_, with |
| fifty of experience, is the beardless undergraduate from Wittenberg then |
| you must hold that his seventyyear old mother is the lustful queen. No. |
| The corpse of John Shakespeare does not walk the night. From hour to |
| hour it rots and rots. He rests, disarmed of fatherhood, having devised |
| that mystical estate upon his son. Boccaccio's Calandrino was the first |
| and last man who felt himself with child. Fatherhood, in the sense of |
| conscious begetting, is unknown to man. It is a mystical estate, an |
| apostolic succession, from only begetter to only begotten. On that |
| mystery and not on the madonna which the cunning Italian intellect |
| flung to the mob of Europe the church is founded and founded irremovably |
| because founded, like the world, macro and microcosm, upon the void. |
| Upon incertitude, upon unlikelihood. _Amor matris_, subjective and |
| objective genitive, may be the only true thing in life. Paternity may be |
| a legal fiction. Who is the father of any son that any son should love |
| him or he any son? |
| |
| What the hell are you driving at? |
| |
| I know. Shut up. Blast you. I have reasons. |
| |
| _Amplius. Adhuc. Iterum. Postea._ |
| |
| Are you condemned to do this? |
| |
| --They are sundered by a bodily shame so steadfast that the criminal |
| annals of the world, stained with all other incests and bestialities, |
| hardly record its breach. Sons with mothers, sires with daughters, |
| lesbic sisters, loves that dare not speak their name, nephews with |
| grandmothers, jailbirds with keyholes, queens with prize bulls. The son |
| unborn mars beauty: born, he brings pain, divides affection, increases |
| care. He is a new male: his growth is his father's decline, his youth |
| his father's envy, his friend his father's enemy. |
| |
| In rue Monsieur-le-Prince I thought it. |
| |
| --What links them in nature? An instant of blind rut. |
| |
| Am I a father? If I were? |
| |
| Shrunken uncertain hand. |
| |
| --Sabellius, the African, subtlest heresiarch of all the beasts of the |
| field, held that the Father was Himself His Own Son. The bulldog of |
| Aquin, with whom no word shall be impossible, refutes him. Well: if |
| the father who has not a son be not a father can the son who has not a |
| father be a son? When Rutlandbaconsouthamptonshakespeare or another poet |
| of the same name in the comedy of errors wrote _Hamlet_ he was not the |
| father of his own son merely but, being no more a son, he was and felt |
| himself the father of all his race, the father of his own grandfather, |
| the father of his unborn grandson who, by the same token, never was |
| born, for nature, as Mr Magee understands her, abhors perfection. |
| |
| Eglintoneyes, quick with pleasure, looked up shybrightly. Gladly |
| glancing, a merry puritan, through the twisted eglantine. |
| |
| Flatter. Rarely. But flatter. |
| |
| --Himself his own father, Sonmulligan told himself. Wait. I am big with |
| child. I have an unborn child in my brain. Pallas Athena! A play! The |
| play's the thing! Let me parturiate! |
| |
| He clasped his paunchbrow with both birthaiding hands. |
| |
| --As for his family, Stephen said, his mother's name lives in the |
| forest of Arden. Her death brought from him the scene with Volumnia in |
| _Coriolanus._ His boyson's death is the deathscene of young Arthur in |
| _King John._ Hamlet, the black prince, is Hamnet Shakespeare. Who the |
| girls in _The Tempest_, in _Pericles,_ in _Winter's Tale_ are we know. |
| Who Cleopatra, fleshpot of Egypt, and Cressid and Venus are we may |
| guess. But there is another member of his family who is recorded. |
| |
| --The plot thickens, John Eglinton said. |
| |
| The quaker librarian, quaking, tiptoed in, quake, his mask, quake, with |
| haste, quake, quack. |
| |
| Door closed. Cell. Day. |
| |
| They list. Three. They. |
| |
| I you he they. |
| |
| Come, mess. |
| |
| STEPHEN: He had three brothers, Gilbert, Edmund, Richard. Gilbert in his |
| old age told some cavaliers he got a pass for nowt from Maister Gatherer |
| one time mass he did and he seen his brud Maister Wull the playwriter up |
| in Lunnon in a wrastling play wud a man on's back. The playhouse sausage |
| filled Gilbert's soul. He is nowhere: but an Edmund and a Richard are |
| recorded in the works of sweet William. |
| |
| MAGEEGLINJOHN: Names! What's in a name? |
| |
| BEST: That is my name, Richard, don't you know. I hope you are going to |
| say a good word for Richard, don't you know, for my sake. _(Laughter)_ |
| |
| |
| BUCKMULLIGAN: (_Piano, diminuendo_) |
| |
| _Then outspoke medical Dick |
| To his comrade medical Davy..._ |
| |
| STEPHEN: In his trinity of black Wills, the villain shakebags, Iago, |
| Richard Crookback, Edmund in _King Lear_, two bear the wicked uncles' |
| names. Nay, that last play was written or being written while his |
| brother Edmund lay dying in Southwark. |
| |
| BEST: I hope Edmund is going to catch it. I don't want Richard, my name |
| ... |
| |
| _(Laughter)_ |
| |
| QUAKERLYSTER: (_A tempo_) But he that filches from me my good name... |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Stringendo)_ He has hidden his own name, a fair name, |
| William, in the plays, a super here, a clown there, as a painter of old |
| Italy set his face in a dark corner of his canvas. He has revealed it in |
| the sonnets where there is Will in overplus. Like John o'Gaunt his name |
| is dear to him, as dear as the coat and crest he toadied for, on a bend |
| sable a spear or steeled argent, honorificabilitudinitatibus, dearer |
| than his glory of greatest shakescene in the country. What's in a name? |
| That is what we ask ourselves in childhood when we write the name that |
| we are told is ours. A star, a daystar, a firedrake, rose at his birth. |
| It shone by day in the heavens alone, brighter than Venus in the |
| night, and by night it shone over delta in Cassiopeia, the recumbent |
| constellation which is the signature of his initial among the stars. His |
| eyes watched it, lowlying on the horizon, eastward of the bear, as |
| he walked by the slumberous summer fields at midnight returning from |
| Shottery and from her arms. |
| |
| Both satisfied. I too. |
| |
| Don't tell them he was nine years old when it was quenched. |
| |
| And from her arms. |
| |
| Wait to be wooed and won. Ay, meacock. Who will woo you? |
| |
| Read the skies. _Autontimorumenos. Bous Stephanoumenos._ Where's your |
| configuration? Stephen, Stephen, cut the bread even. S. D: _sua donna. |
| Già : di lui. gelindo risolve di non amare_ S. D. |
| |
| --What is that, Mr Dedalus? the quaker librarian asked. Was it a |
| celestial phenomenon? |
| |
| --A star by night, Stephen said. A pillar of the cloud by day. |
| |
| What more's to speak? |
| |
| Stephen looked on his hat, his stick, his boots. |
| |
| _Stephanos,_ my crown. My sword. His boots are spoiling the shape of my |
| feet. Buy a pair. Holes in my socks. Handkerchief too. |
| |
| --You make good use of the name, John Eglinton allowed. Your own name is |
| strange enough. I suppose it explains your fantastical humour. |
| |
| Me, Magee and Mulligan. |
| |
| Fabulous artificer. The hawklike man. You flew. Whereto? |
| Newhaven-Dieppe, steerage passenger. Paris and back. Lapwing. Icarus. |
| _Pater, ait._ Seabedabbled, fallen, weltering. Lapwing you are. Lapwing |
| be. |
| |
| Mr Best eagerquietly lifted his book to say: |
| |
| --That's very interesting because that brother motive, don't you know, |
| we find also in the old Irish myths. Just what you say. The three |
| brothers Shakespeare. In Grimm too, don't you know, the fairytales. The |
| third brother that always marries the sleeping beauty and wins the best |
| prize. |
| |
| Best of Best brothers. Good, better, best. |
| |
| The quaker librarian springhalted near. |
| |
| --I should like to know, he said, which brother you... I understand you |
| to suggest there was misconduct with one of the brothers... But perhaps |
| I am anticipating? |
| |
| He caught himself in the act: looked at all: refrained. |
| |
| An attendant from the doorway called: |
| |
| --Mr Lyster! Father Dineen wants... |
| |
| --O, Father Dineen! Directly. |
| |
| Swiftly rectly creaking rectly rectly he was rectly gone. |
| |
| John Eglinton touched the foil. |
| |
| --Come, he said. Let us hear what you have to say of Richard and Edmund. |
| You kept them for the last, didn't you? |
| |
| --In asking you to remember those two noble kinsmen nuncle Richie and |
| nuncle Edmund, Stephen answered, I feel I am asking too much perhaps. A |
| brother is as easily forgotten as an umbrella. |
| |
| Lapwing. |
| |
| Where is your brother? Apothecaries' hall. My whetstone. Him, then |
| Cranly, Mulligan: now these. Speech, speech. But act. Act speech. They |
| mock to try you. Act. Be acted on. |
| |
| Lapwing. |
| |
| I am tired of my voice, the voice of Esau. My kingdom for a drink. |
| |
| On. |
| |
| --You will say those names were already in the chronicles from which he |
| took the stuff of his plays. Why did he take them rather than others? |
| Richard, a whoreson crookback, misbegotten, makes love to a widowed Ann |
| (what's in a name?), woos and wins her, a whoreson merry widow. Richard |
| the conqueror, third brother, came after William the conquered. The |
| other four acts of that play hang limply from that first. Of all his |
| kings Richard is the only king unshielded by Shakespeare's reverence, |
| the angel of the world. Why is the underplot of _King Lear_ in which |
| Edmund figures lifted out of Sidney's _Arcadia_ and spatchcocked on to a |
| Celtic legend older than history? |
| |
| --That was Will's way, John Eglinton defended. We should not now combine |
| a Norse saga with an excerpt from a novel by George Meredith. _Que |
| voulez-vous?_ Moore would say. He puts Bohemia on the seacoast and makes |
| Ulysses quote Aristotle. |
| |
| --Why? Stephen answered himself. Because the theme of the false or |
| the usurping or the adulterous brother or all three in one is to |
| Shakespeare, what the poor are not, always with him. The note of |
| banishment, banishment from the heart, banishment from home, sounds |
| uninterruptedly from _The Two Gentlemen of Verona_ onward till Prospero |
| breaks his staff, buries it certain fathoms in the earth and drowns his |
| book. It doubles itself in the middle of his life, reflects itself in |
| another, repeats itself, protasis, epitasis, catastasis, catastrophe. |
| It repeats itself again when he is near the grave, when his married |
| daughter Susan, chip of the old block, is accused of adultery. But it |
| was the original sin that darkened his understanding, weakened his will |
| and left in him a strong inclination to evil. The words are those of |
| my lords bishops of Maynooth. An original sin and, like original sin, |
| committed by another in whose sin he too has sinned. It is between the |
| lines of his last written words, it is petrified on his tombstone under |
| which her four bones are not to be laid. Age has not withered it. Beauty |
| and peace have not done it away. It is in infinite variety everywhere in |
| the world he has created, in _Much Ado about Nothing_, twice in _As you |
| like It_, in _The Tempest_, in _Hamlet,_ in _Measure for Measure_--and |
| in all the other plays which I have not read. |
| |
| He laughed to free his mind from his mind's bondage. |
| |
| Judge Eglinton summed up. |
| |
| --The truth is midway, he affirmed. He is the ghost and the prince. He |
| is all in all. |
| |
| --He is, Stephen said. The boy of act one is the mature man of act five. |
| All in all. In _Cymbeline,_ in _Othello_ he is bawd and cuckold. He acts |
| and is acted on. Lover of an ideal or a perversion, like Jose he |
| kills the real Carmen. His unremitting intellect is the hornmad Iago |
| ceaselessly willing that the moor in him shall suffer. |
| |
| --Cuckoo! Cuckoo! Cuck Mulligan clucked lewdly. O word of fear! |
| |
| Dark dome received, reverbed. |
| |
| --And what a character is Iago! undaunted John Eglinton exclaimed. When |
| all is said Dumas _fils_ (or is it Dumas _père?)_ is right. After God |
| Shakespeare has created most. |
| |
| --Man delights him not nor woman neither, Stephen said. He returns after |
| a life of absence to that spot of earth where he was born, where he has |
| always been, man and boy, a silent witness and there, his journey of |
| life ended, he plants his mulberrytree in the earth. Then dies. The |
| motion is ended. Gravediggers bury Hamlet _(père?)_ and Hamlet _fils._ |
| A king and a prince at last in death, with incidental music. And, what |
| though murdered and betrayed, bewept by all frail tender hearts for, |
| Dane or Dubliner, sorrow for the dead is the only husband from whom |
| they refuse to be divorced. If you like the epilogue look long on it: |
| prosperous Prospero, the good man rewarded, Lizzie, grandpa's lump of |
| love, and nuncle Richie, the bad man taken off by poetic justice to the |
| place where the bad niggers go. Strong curtain. He found in the world |
| without as actual what was in his world within as possible. Maeterlinck |
| says: _If Socrates leave his house today he will find the sage seated |
| on his doorstep. If Judas go forth tonight it is to Judas his steps |
| will tend._ Every life is many days, day after day. We walk through |
| ourselves, meeting robbers, ghosts, giants, old men, young men, wives, |
| widows, brothers-in-love, but always meeting ourselves. The playwright |
| who wrote the folio of this world and wrote it badly (He gave us light |
| first and the sun two days later), the lord of things as they are whom |
| the most Roman of catholics call _dio boia_, hangman god, is doubtless |
| all in all in all of us, ostler and butcher, and would be bawd and |
| cuckold too but that in the economy of heaven, foretold by Hamlet, there |
| are no more marriages, glorified man, an androgynous angel, being a wife |
| unto himself. |
| |
| _--Eureka!_ Buck Mulligan cried. _Eureka!_ |
| |
| Suddenly happied he jumped up and reached in a stride John Eglinton's |
| desk. |
| |
| --May I? he said. The Lord has spoken to Malachi. |
| |
| He began to scribble on a slip of paper. |
| |
| Take some slips from the counter going out. |
| |
| --Those who are married, Mr Best, douce herald, said, all save one, |
| shall live. The rest shall keep as they are. |
| |
| He laughed, unmarried, at Eglinton Johannes, of arts a bachelor. |
| |
| Unwed, unfancied, ware of wiles, they fingerponder nightly each his |
| variorum edition of _The Taming of the Shrew._ |
| |
| --You are a delusion, said roundly John Eglinton to Stephen. You have |
| brought us all this way to show us a French triangle. Do you believe |
| your own theory? |
| |
| --No, Stephen said promptly. |
| |
| --Are you going to write it? Mr Best asked. You ought to make it a |
| dialogue, don't you know, like the Platonic dialogues Wilde wrote. |
| |
| John Eclecticon doubly smiled. |
| |
| --Well, in that case, he said, I don't see why you should expect payment |
| for it since you don't believe it yourself. Dowden believes there is |
| some mystery in _Hamlet_ but will say no more. Herr Bleibtreu, the man |
| Piper met in Berlin, who is working up that Rutland theory, believes |
| that the secret is hidden in the Stratford monument. He is going to |
| visit the present duke, Piper says, and prove to him that his ancestor |
| wrote the plays. It will come as a surprise to his grace. But he |
| believes his theory. |
| |
| I believe, O Lord, help my unbelief. That is, help me to believe or help |
| me to unbelieve? Who helps to believe? _Egomen._ Who to unbelieve? Other |
| chap. |
| |
| --You are the only contributor to _Dana_ who asks for pieces of silver. |
| Then I don't know about the next number. Fred Ryan wants space for an |
| article on economics. |
| |
| Fraidrine. Two pieces of silver he lent me. Tide you over. Economics. |
| |
| --For a guinea, Stephen said, you can publish this interview. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan stood up from his laughing scribbling, laughing: and then |
| gravely said, honeying malice: |
| |
| --I called upon the bard Kinch at his summer residence in upper |
| Mecklenburgh street and found him deep in the study of the _Summa contra |
| Gentiles_ in the company of two gonorrheal ladies, Fresh Nelly and |
| Rosalie, the coalquay whore. |
| |
| He broke away. |
| |
| --Come, Kinch. Come, wandering Aengus of the birds. |
| |
| Come, Kinch. You have eaten all we left. Ay. I will serve you your orts |
| and offals. |
| |
| Stephen rose. |
| |
| Life is many days. This will end. |
| |
| --We shall see you tonight, John Eglinton said. _Notre ami_ Moore says |
| Malachi Mulligan must be there. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan flaunted his slip and panama. |
| |
| --Monsieur Moore, he said, lecturer on French letters to the youth of |
| Ireland. I'll be there. Come, Kinch, the bards must drink. Can you walk |
| straight? |
| |
| Laughing, he... |
| |
| Swill till eleven. Irish nights entertainment. |
| |
| Lubber... |
| |
| Stephen followed a lubber... |
| |
| One day in the national library we had a discussion. Shakes. After. His |
| lub back: I followed. I gall his kibe. |
| |
| Stephen, greeting, then all amort, followed a lubber jester, a wellkempt |
| head, newbarbered, out of the vaulted cell into a shattering daylight of |
| no thought. |
| |
| What have I learned? Of them? Of me? |
| |
| Walk like Haines now. |
| |
| The constant readers' room. In the readers' book Cashel Boyle O'Connor |
| Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell parafes his polysyllables. Item: was Hamlet |
| mad? The quaker's pate godlily with a priesteen in booktalk. |
| |
| --O please do, sir... I shall be most pleased... |
| |
| Amused Buck Mulligan mused in pleasant murmur with himself, selfnodding: |
| |
| --A pleased bottom. |
| |
| The turnstile. |
| |
| Is that?... Blueribboned hat... Idly writing... What? Looked?... |
| |
| The curving balustrade: smoothsliding Mincius. |
| |
| Puck Mulligan, panamahelmeted, went step by step, iambing, trolling: |
| |
| _John Eglinton, my jo, John, Why won't you wed a wife?_ |
| |
| He spluttered to the air: |
| |
| --O, the chinless Chinaman! Chin Chon Eg Lin Ton. We went over to their |
| playbox, Haines and I, the plumbers' hall. Our players are creating a |
| new art for Europe like the Greeks or M. Maeterlinck. Abbey Theatre! I |
| smell the pubic sweat of monks. |
| |
| He spat blank. |
| |
| Forgot: any more than he forgot the whipping lousy Lucy gave him. And |
| left the _femme de trente ans._ And why no other children born? And his |
| first child a girl? |
| |
| Afterwit. Go back. |
| |
| The dour recluse still there (he has his cake) and the douce youngling, |
| minion of pleasure, Phedo's toyable fair hair. |
| |
| Eh... I just eh... wanted... I forgot... he... |
| |
| --Longworth and M'Curdy Atkinson were there... |
| |
| Puck Mulligan footed featly, trilling: |
| |
| _I hardly hear the purlieu cry |
| Or a tommy talk as I pass one by |
| Before my thoughts begin to run |
| On F. M'Curdy Atkinson, |
| The same that had the wooden leg |
| And that filibustering filibeg |
| That never dared to slake his drouth, |
| Magee that had the chinless mouth. |
| Being afraid to marry on earth |
| They masturbated for all they were worth._ |
| |
| |
| Jest on. Know thyself. |
| |
| Halted, below me, a quizzer looks at me. I halt. |
| |
| --Mournful mummer, Buck Mulligan moaned. Synge has left off wearing |
| black to be like nature. Only crows, priests and English coal are black. |
| |
| A laugh tripped over his lips. |
| |
| --Longworth is awfully sick, he said, after what you wrote about that |
| old hake Gregory. O you inquisitional drunken jewjesuit! She gets you |
| a job on the paper and then you go and slate her drivel to Jaysus. |
| Couldn't you do the Yeats touch? |
| |
| He went on and down, mopping, chanting with waving graceful arms: |
| |
| --The most beautiful book that has come out of our country in my time. |
| One thinks of Homer. |
| |
| He stopped at the stairfoot. |
| |
| --I have conceived a play for the mummers, he said solemnly. |
| |
| The pillared Moorish hall, shadows entwined. Gone the nine men's morrice |
| with caps of indices. |
| |
| In sweetly varying voices Buck Mulligan read his tablet: _Everyman His |
| own Wife or A Honeymoon in the Hand (a national immorality in three |
| orgasms) by Ballocky Mulligan._ |
| |
| |
| He turned a happy patch's smirk to Stephen, saying: |
| |
| --The disguise, I fear, is thin. But listen. |
| |
| He read, _marcato:_ |
| |
| --Characters: |
| |
| TODY TOSTOFF (a ruined Pole) |
| CRAB (a bushranger) |
| MEDICAL DICK ) |
| and ) (two birds with one stone) |
| MEDICAL DAVY ) |
| MOTHER GROGAN (a watercarrier) |
| FRESH NELLY |
| and |
| ROSALIE (the coalquay whore). |
| |
| He laughed, lolling a to and fro head, walking on, followed by Stephen: |
| and mirthfully he told the shadows, souls of men: |
| |
| --O, the night in the Camden hall when the daughters of Erin had to |
| lift their skirts to step over you as you lay in your mulberrycoloured, |
| multicoloured, multitudinous vomit! |
| |
| --The most innocent son of Erin, Stephen said, for whom they ever lifted |
| them. |
| |
| About to pass through the doorway, feeling one behind, he stood aside. |
| |
| Part. The moment is now. Where then? If Socrates leave his house today, |
| if Judas go forth tonight. Why? That lies in space which I in time must |
| come to, ineluctably. |
| |
| My will: his will that fronts me. Seas between. |
| |
| A man passed out between them, bowing, greeting. |
| |
| --Good day again, Buck Mulligan said. |
| |
| The portico. |
| |
| Here I watched the birds for augury. Aengus of the birds. They go, they |
| come. Last night I flew. Easily flew. Men wondered. Street of harlots |
| after. A creamfruit melon he held to me. In. You will see. |
| |
| --The wandering jew, Buck Mulligan whispered with clown's awe. Did you |
| see his eye? He looked upon you to lust after you. I fear thee, ancient |
| mariner. O, Kinch, thou art in peril. Get thee a breechpad. |
| |
| Manner of Oxenford. |
| |
| Day. Wheelbarrow sun over arch of bridge. |
| |
| A dark back went before them, step of a pard, down, out by the gateway, |
| under portcullis barbs. |
| |
| They followed. |
| |
| Offend me still. Speak on. |
| |
| Kind air defined the coigns of houses in Kildare street. No birds. Frail |
| from the housetops two plumes of smoke ascended, pluming, and in a flaw |
| of softness softly were blown. |
| |
| Cease to strive. Peace of the druid priests of Cymbeline: hierophantic: |
| from wide earth an altar. |
| |
| _Laud we the gods |
| And let our crooked smokes climb to their nostrils |
| From our bless'd altars._ |
| |
| |
| The superior, the very reverend John Conmee S.J. reset his smooth watch |
| in his interior pocket as he came down the presbytery steps. Five to |
| three. Just nice time to walk to Artane. What was that boy's name again? |
| Dignam. Yes. _Vere dignum et iustum est._ Brother Swan was the person |
| to see. Mr Cunningham's letter. Yes. Oblige him, if possible. Good |
| practical catholic: useful at mission time. |
| |
| A onelegged sailor, swinging himself onward by lazy jerks of his |
| crutches, growled some notes. He jerked short before the convent of the |
| sisters of charity and held out a peaked cap for alms towards the very |
| reverend John Conmee S. J. Father Conmee blessed him in the sun for his |
| purse held, he knew, one silver crown. |
| |
| Father Conmee crossed to Mountjoy square. He thought, but not for long, |
| of soldiers and sailors, whose legs had been shot off by cannonballs, |
| ending their days in some pauper ward, and of cardinal Wolsey's words: |
| _If I had served my God as I have served my king He would not have |
| abandoned me in my old days._ He walked by the treeshade of sunnywinking |
| leaves: and towards him came the wife of Mr David Sheehy M.P. |
| |
| --Very well, indeed, father. And you, father? |
| |
| Father Conmee was wonderfully well indeed. He would go to Buxton |
| probably for the waters. And her boys, were they getting on well at |
| Belvedere? Was that so? Father Conmee was very glad indeed to hear that. |
| And Mr Sheehy himself? Still in London. The house was still sitting, to |
| be sure it was. Beautiful weather it was, delightful indeed. Yes, it was |
| very probable that Father Bernard Vaughan would come again to preach. O, |
| yes: a very great success. A wonderful man really. |
| |
| Father Conmee was very glad to see the wife of Mr David Sheehy M.P. |
| Iooking so well and he begged to be remembered to Mr David Sheehy M.P. |
| Yes, he would certainly call. |
| |
| --Good afternoon, Mrs Sheehy. |
| |
| Father Conmee doffed his silk hat and smiled, as he took leave, at the |
| jet beads of her mantilla inkshining in the sun. And smiled yet again, |
| in going. He had cleaned his teeth, he knew, with arecanut paste. |
| |
| Father Conmee walked and, walking, smiled for he thought on Father |
| Bernard Vaughan's droll eyes and cockney voice. |
| |
| --Pilate! Wy don't you old back that owlin mob? |
| |
| A zealous man, however. Really he was. And really did great good in his |
| way. Beyond a doubt. He loved Ireland, he said, and he loved the Irish. |
| Of good family too would one think it? Welsh, were they not? |
| |
| O, lest he forget. That letter to father provincial. |
| |
| Father Conmee stopped three little schoolboys at the corner of Mountjoy |
| square. Yes: they were from Belvedere. The little house. Aha. And were |
| they good boys at school? O. That was very good now. And what was his |
| name? Jack Sohan. And his name? Ger. Gallaher. And the other little man? |
| His name was Brunny Lynam. O, that was a very nice name to have. |
| |
| Father Conmee gave a letter from his breast to Master Brunny Lynam and |
| pointed to the red pillarbox at the corner of Fitzgibbon street. |
| |
| --But mind you don't post yourself into the box, little man, he said. |
| |
| The boys sixeyed Father Conmee and laughed: |
| |
| --O, sir. |
| |
| --Well, let me see if you can post a letter, Father Conmee said. |
| |
| Master Brunny Lynam ran across the road and put Father Conmee's letter |
| to father provincial into the mouth of the bright red letterbox. Father |
| Conmee smiled and nodded and smiled and walked along Mountjoy square |
| east. |
| |
| Mr Denis J Maginni, professor of dancing &c, in silk hat, slate |
| frockcoat with silk facings, white kerchief tie, tight lavender |
| trousers, canary gloves and pointed patent boots, walking with grave |
| deportment most respectfully took the curbstone as he passed lady |
| Maxwell at the corner of Dignam's court. |
| |
| Was that not Mrs M'Guinness? |
| |
| Mrs M'Guinness, stately, silverhaired, bowed to Father Conmee from the |
| farther footpath along which she sailed. And Father Conmee smiled and |
| saluted. How did she do? |
| |
| A fine carriage she had. Like Mary, queen of Scots, something. And to |
| think that she was a pawnbroker! Well, now! Such a... what should he |
| say?... such a queenly mien. |
| |
| Father Conmee walked down Great Charles street and glanced at the shutup |
| free church on his left. The reverend T. R. Greene B.A. will (D.V.) |
| speak. The incumbent they called him. He felt it incumbent on him to say |
| a few words. But one should be charitable. Invincible ignorance. They |
| acted according to their lights. |
| |
| Father Conmee turned the corner and walked along the North Circular |
| road. It was a wonder that there was not a tramline in such an important |
| thoroughfare. Surely, there ought to be. |
| |
| A band of satchelled schoolboys crossed from Richmond street. All |
| raised untidy caps. Father Conmee greeted them more than once benignly. |
| Christian brother boys. |
| |
| Father Conmee smelt incense on his right hand as he walked. Saint |
| Joseph's church, Portland row. For aged and virtuous females. |
| Father Conmee raised his hat to the Blessed Sacrament. Virtuous: but |
| occasionally they were also badtempered. |
| |
| Near Aldborough house Father Conmee thought of that spendthrift |
| nobleman. And now it was an office or something. |
| |
| Father Conmee began to walk along the North Strand road and was saluted |
| by Mr William Gallagher who stood in the doorway of his shop. Father |
| Conmee saluted Mr William Gallagher and perceived the odours that came |
| from baconflitches and ample cools of butter. He passed Grogan's the |
| Tobacconist against which newsboards leaned and told of a dreadful |
| catastrophe in New York. In America those things were continually |
| happening. Unfortunate people to die like that, unprepared. Still, an |
| act of perfect contrition. |
| |
| Father Conmee went by Daniel Bergin's publichouse against the window of |
| which two unlabouring men lounged. They saluted him and were saluted. |
| |
| Father Conmee passed H. J. O'Neill's funeral establishment where Corny |
| Kelleher totted figures in the daybook while he chewed a blade of hay. |
| A constable on his beat saluted Father Conmee and Father Conmee saluted |
| the constable. In Youkstetter's, the porkbutcher's, Father Conmee |
| observed pig's puddings, white and black and red, lie neatly curled in |
| tubes. |
| |
| Moored under the trees of Charleville Mall Father Conmee saw a |
| turfbarge, a towhorse with pendent head, a bargeman with a hat of dirty |
| straw seated amidships, smoking and staring at a branch of poplar above |
| him. It was idyllic: and Father Conmee reflected on the providence of |
| the Creator who had made turf to be in bogs whence men might dig it |
| out and bring it to town and hamlet to make fires in the houses of poor |
| people. |
| |
| On Newcomen bridge the very reverend John Conmee S.J. of saint Francis |
| Xavier's church, upper Gardiner street, stepped on to an outward bound |
| tram. |
| |
| Off an inward bound tram stepped the reverend Nicholas Dudley C. C. of |
| saint Agatha's church, north William street, on to Newcomen bridge. |
| |
| At Newcomen bridge Father Conmee stepped into an outward bound tram for |
| he disliked to traverse on foot the dingy way past Mud Island. |
| |
| Father Conmee sat in a corner of the tramcar, a blue ticket tucked with |
| care in the eye of one plump kid glove, while four shillings, a sixpence |
| and five pennies chuted from his other plump glovepalm into his purse. |
| Passing the ivy church he reflected that the ticket inspector usually |
| made his visit when one had carelessly thrown away the ticket. The |
| solemnity of the occupants of the car seemed to Father Conmee excessive |
| for a journey so short and cheap. Father Conmee liked cheerful decorum. |
| |
| It was a peaceful day. The gentleman with the glasses opposite Father |
| Conmee had finished explaining and looked down. His wife, Father Conmee |
| supposed. A tiny yawn opened the mouth of the wife of the gentleman with |
| the glasses. She raised her small gloved fist, yawned ever so gently, |
| tiptapping her small gloved fist on her opening mouth and smiled tinily, |
| sweetly. |
| |
| Father Conmee perceived her perfume in the car. He perceived also that |
| the awkward man at the other side of her was sitting on the edge of the |
| seat. |
| |
| Father Conmee at the altarrails placed the host with difficulty in the |
| mouth of the awkward old man who had the shaky head. |
| |
| At Annesley bridge the tram halted and, when it was about to go, an old |
| woman rose suddenly from her place to alight. The conductor pulled the |
| bellstrap to stay the car for her. She passed out with her basket and |
| a marketnet: and Father Conmee saw the conductor help her and net and |
| basket down: and Father Conmee thought that, as she had nearly passed |
| the end of the penny fare, she was one of those good souls who had |
| always to be told twice _bless you, my child,_ that they have been |
| absolved, _pray for me._ But they had so many worries in life, so many |
| cares, poor creatures. |
| |
| From the hoardings Mr Eugene Stratton grimaced with thick niggerlips at |
| Father Conmee. |
| |
| Father Conmee thought of the souls of black and brown and yellow men and |
| of his sermon on saint Peter Claver S.J. and the African mission and of |
| the propagation of the faith and of the millions of black and brown and |
| yellow souls that had not received the baptism of water when their last |
| hour came like a thief in the night. That book by the Belgian jesuit, |
| _Le Nombre des Élus,_ seemed to Father Conmee a reasonable plea. Those |
| were millions of human souls created by God in His Own likeness to |
| whom the faith had not (D.V.) been brought. But they were God's souls, |
| created by God. It seemed to Father Conmee a pity that they should all |
| be lost, a waste, if one might say. |
| |
| At the Howth road stop Father Conmee alighted, was saluted by the |
| conductor and saluted in his turn. |
| |
| The Malahide road was quiet. It pleased Father Conmee, road and name. |
| The joybells were ringing in gay Malahide. Lord Talbot de Malahide, |
| immediate hereditary lord admiral of Malahide and the seas adjoining. |
| Then came the call to arms and she was maid, wife and widow in one day. |
| Those were old worldish days, loyal times in joyous townlands, old times |
| in the barony. |
| |
| Father Conmee, walking, thought of his little book _Old Times in the |
| Barony_ and of the book that might be written about jesuit houses and of |
| Mary Rochfort, daughter of lord Molesworth, first countess of Belvedere. |
| |
| A listless lady, no more young, walked alone the shore of lough Ennel, |
| Mary, first countess of Belvedere, listlessly walking in the evening, |
| not startled when an otter plunged. Who could know the truth? Not the |
| jealous lord Belvedere and not her confessor if she had not committed |
| adultery fully, _eiaculatio seminis inter vas naturale mulieris,_ with |
| her husband's brother? She would half confess if she had not all sinned |
| as women did. Only God knew and she and he, her husband's brother. |
| |
| Father Conmee thought of that tyrannous incontinence, needed however for |
| man's race on earth, and of the ways of God which were not our ways. |
| |
| Don John Conmee walked and moved in times of yore. He was humane and |
| honoured there. He bore in mind secrets confessed and he smiled at |
| smiling noble faces in a beeswaxed drawingroom, ceiled with full fruit |
| clusters. And the hands of a bride and of a bridegroom, noble to noble, |
| were impalmed by Don John Conmee. |
| |
| It was a charming day. |
| |
| The lychgate of a field showed Father Conmee breadths of cabbages, |
| curtseying to him with ample underleaves. The sky showed him a flock of |
| small white clouds going slowly down the wind. _Moutonner,_ the French |
| said. A just and homely word. |
| |
| Father Conmee, reading his office, watched a flock of muttoning clouds |
| over Rathcoffey. His thinsocked ankles were tickled by the stubble of |
| Clongowes field. He walked there, reading in the evening, and heard |
| the cries of the boys' lines at their play, young cries in the quiet |
| evening. He was their rector: his reign was mild. |
| |
| Father Conmee drew off his gloves and took his rededged breviary out. An |
| ivory bookmark told him the page. |
| |
| Nones. He should have read that before lunch. But lady Maxwell had come. |
| |
| Father Conmee read in secret _Pater_ and _Ave_ and crossed his breast. |
| _Deus in adiutorium._ |
| |
| He walked calmly and read mutely the nones, walking and reading till he |
| came to _Res_ in _Beati immaculati: Principium verborum tuorum veritas: |
| in eternum omnia indicia iustitiae tuae._ |
| |
| A flushed young man came from a gap of a hedge and after him came a |
| young woman with wild nodding daisies in her hand. The young man raised |
| his cap abruptly: the young woman abruptly bent and with slow care |
| detached from her light skirt a clinging twig. |
| |
| Father Conmee blessed both gravely and turned a thin page of his |
| breviary. _Sin: Principes persecuti sunt me gratis: et a verbis tuis |
| formidavit cor meum._ |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| Corny Kelleher closed his long daybook and glanced with his drooping eye |
| at a pine coffinlid sentried in a corner. He pulled himself erect, |
| went to it and, spinning it on its axle, viewed its shape and brass |
| furnishings. Chewing his blade of hay he laid the coffinlid by and came |
| to the doorway. There he tilted his hatbrim to give shade to his eyes |
| and leaned against the doorcase, looking idly out. |
| |
| Father John Conmee stepped into the Dollymount tram on Newcomen bridge. |
| |
| Corny Kelleher locked his largefooted boots and gazed, his hat |
| downtilted, chewing his blade of hay. |
| |
| Constable 57C, on his beat, stood to pass the time of day. |
| |
| --That's a fine day, Mr Kelleher. |
| |
| --Ay, Corny Kelleher said. |
| |
| --It's very close, the constable said. |
| |
| Corny Kelleher sped a silent jet of hayjuice arching from his mouth |
| while a generous white arm from a window in Eccles street flung forth a |
| coin. |
| |
| --What's the best news? he asked. |
| |
| --I seen that particular party last evening, the constable said with |
| bated breath. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| A onelegged sailor crutched himself round MacConnell's corner, skirting |
| Rabaiotti's icecream car, and jerked himself up Eccles street. Towards |
| Larry O'Rourke, in shirtsleeves in his doorway, he growled unamiably: |
| |
| --_For England_... |
| |
| He swung himself violently forward past Katey and Boody Dedalus, halted |
| and growled: |
| |
| --_home and beauty._ |
| |
| J. J. O'Molloy's white careworn face was told that Mr Lambert was in the |
| warehouse with a visitor. |
| |
| A stout lady stopped, took a copper coin from her purse and dropped it |
| into the cap held out to her. The sailor grumbled thanks, glanced sourly |
| at the unheeding windows, sank his head and swung himself forward four |
| strides. |
| |
| He halted and growled angrily: |
| |
| --_For England_... |
| |
| Two barefoot urchins, sucking long liquorice laces, halted near him, |
| gaping at his stump with their yellowslobbered mouths. |
| |
| He swung himself forward in vigorous jerks, halted, lifted his head |
| towards a window and bayed deeply: |
| |
| --_home and beauty._ |
| |
| The gay sweet chirping whistling within went on a bar or two, ceased. |
| The blind of the window was drawn aside. A card _Unfurnished Apartments_ |
| slipped from the sash and fell. A plump bare generous arm shone, was |
| seen, held forth from a white petticoatbodice and taut shiftstraps. A |
| woman's hand flung forth a coin over the area railings. It fell on the |
| path. |
| |
| One of the urchins ran to it, picked it up and dropped it into the |
| minstrel's cap, saying: |
| |
| --There, sir. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| Katey and Boody Dedalus shoved in the door of the closesteaming kitchen. |
| |
| --Did you put in the books? Boody asked. |
| |
| Maggy at the range rammed down a greyish mass beneath bubbling suds |
| twice with her potstick and wiped her brow. |
| |
| --They wouldn't give anything on them, she said. |
| |
| Father Conmee walked through Clongowes fields, his thinsocked ankles |
| tickled by stubble. |
| |
| --Where did you try? Boody asked. |
| |
| --M'Guinness's. |
| |
| Boody stamped her foot and threw her satchel on the table. |
| |
| --Bad cess to her big face! she cried. |
| |
| Katey went to the range and peered with squinting eyes. |
| |
| --What's in the pot? she asked. |
| |
| --Shirts, Maggy said. |
| |
| Boody cried angrily: |
| |
| --Crickey, is there nothing for us to eat? |
| |
| Katey, lifting the kettlelid in a pad of her stained skirt, asked: |
| |
| --And what's in this? |
| |
| A heavy fume gushed in answer. |
| |
| --Peasoup, Maggy said. |
| |
| --Where did you get it? Katey asked. |
| |
| --Sister Mary Patrick, Maggy said. |
| |
| The lacquey rang his bell. |
| |
| --Barang! |
| |
| Boody sat down at the table and said hungrily: |
| |
| --Give us it here. |
| |
| Maggy poured yellow thick soup from the kettle into a bowl. Katey, |
| sitting opposite Boody, said quietly, as her fingertip lifted to her |
| mouth random crumbs: |
| |
| --A good job we have that much. Where's Dilly? |
| |
| --Gone to meet father, Maggy said. |
| |
| Boody, breaking big chunks of bread into the yellow soup, added: |
| |
| --Our father who art not in heaven. |
| |
| Maggy, pouring yellow soup in Katey's bowl, exclaimed: |
| |
| --Boody! For shame! |
| |
| A skiff, a crumpled throwaway, Elijah is coming, rode lightly down the |
| Liffey, under Loopline bridge, shooting the rapids where water chafed |
| around the bridgepiers, sailing eastward past hulls and anchorchains, |
| between the Customhouse old dock and George's quay. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| The blond girl in Thornton's bedded the wicker basket with rustling |
| fibre. Blazes Boylan handed her the bottle swathed in pink tissue paper |
| and a small jar. |
| |
| --Put these in first, will you? he said. |
| |
| --Yes, sir, the blond girl said. And the fruit on top. |
| |
| --That'll do, game ball, Blazes Boylan said. |
| |
| She bestowed fat pears neatly, head by tail, and among them ripe |
| shamefaced peaches. |
| |
| Blazes Boylan walked here and there in new tan shoes about the |
| fruitsmelling shop, lifting fruits, young juicy crinkled and plump red |
| tomatoes, sniffing smells. |
| |
| H. E. L. Y.'S filed before him, tallwhitehatted, past Tangier lane, |
| plodding towards their goal. |
| |
| He turned suddenly from a chip of strawberries, drew a gold watch from |
| his fob and held it at its chain's length. |
| |
| --Can you send them by tram? Now? |
| |
| A darkbacked figure under Merchants' arch scanned books on the hawker's |
| cart. |
| |
| --Certainly, sir. Is it in the city? |
| |
| --O, yes, Blazes Boylan said. Ten minutes. |
| |
| The blond girl handed him a docket and pencil. |
| |
| --Will you write the address, sir? |
| |
| Blazes Boylan at the counter wrote and pushed the docket to her. |
| |
| --Send it at once, will you? he said. It's for an invalid. |
| |
| --Yes, sir. I will, sir. |
| |
| Blazes Boylan rattled merry money in his trousers' pocket. |
| |
| --What's the damage? he asked. |
| |
| The blond girl's slim fingers reckoned the fruits. |
| |
| Blazes Boylan looked into the cut of her blouse. A young pullet. He took |
| a red carnation from the tall stemglass. |
| |
| --This for me? he asked gallantly. |
| |
| The blond girl glanced sideways at him, got up regardless, with his tie |
| a bit crooked, blushing. |
| |
| --Yes, sir, she said. |
| |
| Bending archly she reckoned again fat pears and blushing peaches. |
| |
| Blazes Boylan looked in her blouse with more favour, the stalk of the |
| red flower between his smiling teeth. |
| |
| --May I say a word to your telephone, missy? he asked roguishly. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| _--Ma!_ Almidano Artifoni said. |
| |
| He gazed over Stephen's shoulder at Goldsmith's knobby poll. |
| |
| Two carfuls of tourists passed slowly, their women sitting fore, |
| gripping the handrests. Palefaces. Men's arms frankly round their |
| stunted forms. They looked from Trinity to the blind columned porch of |
| the bank of Ireland where pigeons roocoocooed. |
| |
| --_Anch'io ho avuto di queste idee, ALMIDANO ARTIFONI SAID, quand' ero |
| giovine come Lei. Eppoi mi sono convinto che il mondo è una bestia. |
| É peccato. Perchè la sua voce... sarebbe un cespite di rendita, via. |
| Invece, Lei si sacrifica._ |
| |
| --_Sacrifizio incruento,_ Stephen said smiling, swaying his ashplant in |
| slow swingswong from its midpoint, lightly. |
| |
| _--Speriamo,_ the round mustachioed face said pleasantly. _Ma, dia retta |
| a me. Ci rifletta_. |
| |
| By the stern stone hand of Grattan, bidding halt, an Inchicore tram |
| unloaded straggling Highland soldiers of a band. |
| |
| --_Ci rifletterò,_ Stephen said, glancing down the solid trouserleg. |
| |
| --_Ma, sul serio, eh?_ Almidano Artifoni said. |
| |
| His heavy hand took Stephen's firmly. Human eyes. They gazed curiously |
| an instant and turned quickly towards a Dalkey tram. |
| |
| _--Eccolo,_ Almidano Artifoni said in friendly haste. _Venga a trovarmi |
| e ci pensi. Addio, caro._ |
| |
| --_Arrivederla, maestro,_ Stephen said, raising his hat when his hand |
| was freed. _E grazie._ |
| |
| --_Di che?_ Almidano Artifoni said. _Scusi, eh? Tante belle cose!_ |
| |
| Almidano Artifoni, holding up a baton of rolled music as a signal, |
| trotted on stout trousers after the Dalkey tram. In vain he trotted, |
| signalling in vain among the rout of barekneed gillies smuggling |
| implements of music through Trinity gates. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| Miss Dunne hid the Capel street library copy of _The Woman in White_ |
| far back in her drawer and rolled a sheet of gaudy notepaper into her |
| typewriter. |
| |
| Too much mystery business in it. Is he in love with that one, Marion? |
| Change it and get another by Mary Cecil Haye. |
| |
| The disk shot down the groove, wobbled a while, ceased and ogled them: |
| six. |
| |
| Miss Dunne clicked on the keyboard: |
| |
| --16 June 1904. |
| |
| Five tallwhitehatted sandwichmen between Monypeny's corner and the slab |
| where Wolfe Tone's statue was not, eeled themselves turning H. E. L. |
| Y.'S and plodded back as they had come. |
| |
| Then she stared at the large poster of Marie Kendall, charming |
| soubrette, and, listlessly lolling, scribbled on the jotter sixteens and |
| capital esses. Mustard hair and dauby cheeks. She's not nicelooking, |
| is she? The way she's holding up her bit of a skirt. Wonder will that |
| fellow be at the band tonight. If I could get that dressmaker to make a |
| concertina skirt like Susy Nagle's. They kick out grand. Shannon and |
| all the boatclub swells never took his eyes off her. Hope to goodness he |
| won't keep me here till seven. |
| |
| The telephone rang rudely by her ear. |
| |
| --Hello. Yes, sir. No, sir. Yes, sir. I'll ring them up after five. Only |
| those two, sir, for Belfast and Liverpool. All right, sir. Then I can go |
| after six if you're not back. A quarter after. Yes, sir. Twentyseven and |
| six. I'll tell him. Yes: one, seven, six. |
| |
| She scribbled three figures on an envelope. |
| |
| --Mr Boylan! Hello! That gentleman from SPORT was in looking for you. Mr |
| Lenehan, yes. He said he'll be in the Ormond at four. No, sir. Yes, sir. |
| I'll ring them up after five. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| Two pink faces turned in the flare of the tiny torch. |
| |
| --Who's that? Ned Lambert asked. Is that Crotty? |
| |
| --Ringabella and Crosshaven, a voice replied groping for foothold. |
| |
| --Hello, Jack, is that yourself? Ned Lambert said, raising in salute his |
| pliant lath among the flickering arches. Come on. Mind your steps there. |
| |
| The vesta in the clergyman's uplifted hand consumed itself in a long |
| soft flame and was let fall. At their feet its red speck died: and |
| mouldy air closed round them. |
| |
| --How interesting! a refined accent said in the gloom. |
| |
| --Yes, sir, Ned Lambert said heartily. We are standing in the historic |
| council chamber of saint Mary's abbey where silken Thomas proclaimed |
| himself a rebel in 1534. This is the most historic spot in all Dublin. |
| O'Madden Burke is going to write something about it one of these days. |
| The old bank of Ireland was over the way till the time of the union and |
| the original jews' temple was here too before they built their synagogue |
| over in Adelaide road. You were never here before, Jack, were you? |
| |
| --No, Ned. |
| |
| --He rode down through Dame walk, the refined accent said, if my memory |
| serves me. The mansion of the Kildares was in Thomas court. |
| |
| --That's right, Ned Lambert said. That's quite right, sir. |
| |
| --If you will be so kind then, the clergyman said, the next time to |
| allow me perhaps... |
| |
| --Certainly, Ned Lambert said. Bring the camera whenever you like. I'll |
| get those bags cleared away from the windows. You can take it from here |
| or from here. |
| |
| In the still faint light he moved about, tapping with his lath the piled |
| seedbags and points of vantage on the floor. |
| |
| From a long face a beard and gaze hung on a chessboard. |
| |
| --I'm deeply obliged, Mr Lambert, the clergyman said. I won't trespass |
| on your valuable time... |
| |
| --You're welcome, sir, Ned Lambert said. Drop in whenever you like. Next |
| week, say. Can you see? |
| |
| --Yes, yes. Good afternoon, Mr Lambert. Very pleased to have met you. |
| |
| --Pleasure is mine, sir, Ned Lambert answered. |
| |
| He followed his guest to the outlet and then whirled his lath away among |
| the pillars. With J. J. O'Molloy he came forth slowly into Mary's abbey |
| where draymen were loading floats with sacks of carob and palmnut meal, |
| O'Connor, Wexford. |
| |
| He stood to read the card in his hand. |
| |
| --The reverend Hugh C. Love, Rathcoffey. Present address: Saint |
| Michael's, Sallins. Nice young chap he is. He's writing a book about the |
| Fitzgeralds he told me. He's well up in history, faith. |
| |
| The young woman with slow care detached from her light skirt a clinging |
| twig. |
| |
| --I thought you were at a new gunpowder plot, J. J. O'Molloy said. |
| |
| Ned Lambert cracked his fingers in the air. |
| |
| --God! he cried. I forgot to tell him that one about the earl of Kildare |
| after he set fire to Cashel cathedral. You know that one? _I'm bloody |
| sorry I did it,_ says he, _but I declare to God I thought the archbishop |
| was inside._ He mightn't like it, though. What? God, I'll tell him |
| anyhow. That was the great earl, the Fitzgerald Mor. Hot members they |
| were all of them, the Geraldines. |
| |
| The horses he passed started nervously under their slack harness. He |
| slapped a piebald haunch quivering near him and cried: |
| |
| --Woa, sonny! |
| |
| He turned to J. J. O'Molloy and asked: |
| |
| --Well, Jack. What is it? What's the trouble? Wait awhile. Hold hard. |
| |
| With gaping mouth and head far back he stood still and, after an |
| instant, sneezed loudly. |
| |
| --Chow! he said. Blast you! |
| |
| --The dust from those sacks, J. J. O'Molloy said politely. |
| |
| --No, Ned Lambert gasped, I caught a... cold night before... blast |
| your soul... night before last... and there was a hell of a lot of |
| draught... |
| |
| He held his handkerchief ready for the coming... |
| |
| --I was... Glasnevin this morning... poor little... what do you call |
| him... Chow!... Mother of Moses! |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| Tom Rochford took the top disk from the pile he clasped against his |
| claret waistcoat. |
| |
| --See? he said. Say it's turn six. In here, see. Turn Now On. |
| |
| He slid it into the left slot for them. It shot down the groove, wobbled |
| a while, ceased, ogling them: six. |
| |
| Lawyers of the past, haughty, pleading, beheld pass from the |
| consolidated taxing office to Nisi Prius court Richie Goulding carrying |
| the costbag of Goulding, Collis and Ward and heard rustling from the |
| admiralty division of king's bench to the court of appeal an elderly |
| female with false teeth smiling incredulously and a black silk skirt of |
| great amplitude. |
| |
| --See? he said. See now the last one I put in is over here: Turns Over. |
| The impact. Leverage, see? |
| |
| He showed them the rising column of disks on the right. |
| |
| --Smart idea, Nosey Flynn said, snuffling. So a fellow coming in late |
| can see what turn is on and what turns are over. |
| |
| --See? Tom Rochford said. |
| |
| He slid in a disk for himself: and watched it shoot, wobble, ogle, stop: |
| four. Turn Now On. |
| |
| --I'll see him now in the Ormond, Lenehan said, and sound him. One good |
| turn deserves another. |
| |
| --Do, Tom Rochford said. Tell him I'm Boylan with impatience. |
| |
| --Goodnight, M'Coy said abruptly. When you two begin |
| |
| Nosey Flynn stooped towards the lever, snuffling at it. |
| |
| --But how does it work here, Tommy? he asked. |
| |
| --Tooraloo, Lenehan said. See you later. |
| |
| He followed M'Coy out across the tiny square of Crampton court. |
| |
| --He's a hero, he said simply. |
| |
| --I know, M'Coy said. The drain, you mean. |
| |
| --Drain? Lenehan said. It was down a manhole. |
| |
| They passed Dan Lowry's musichall where Marie Kendall, charming |
| soubrette, smiled on them from a poster a dauby smile. |
| |
| Going down the path of Sycamore street beside the Empire musichall |
| Lenehan showed M'Coy how the whole thing was. One of those manholes like |
| a bloody gaspipe and there was the poor devil stuck down in it, half |
| choked with sewer gas. Down went Tom Rochford anyhow, booky's vest and |
| all, with the rope round him. And be damned but he got the rope round |
| the poor devil and the two were hauled up. |
| |
| --The act of a hero, he said. |
| |
| At the Dolphin they halted to allow the ambulance car to gallop past |
| them for Jervis street. |
| |
| --This way, he said, walking to the right. I want to pop into Lynam's |
| to see Sceptre's starting price. What's the time by your gold watch and |
| chain? |
| |
| M'Coy peered into Marcus Tertius Moses' sombre office, then at O'Neill's |
| clock. |
| |
| --After three, he said. Who's riding her? |
| |
| --O. Madden, Lenehan said. And a game filly she is. |
| |
| While he waited in Temple bar M'Coy dodged a banana peel with gentle |
| pushes of his toe from the path to the gutter. Fellow might damn easy |
| get a nasty fall there coming along tight in the dark. |
| |
| The gates of the drive opened wide to give egress to the viceregal |
| cavalcade. |
| |
| --Even money, Lenehan said returning. I knocked against Bantam Lyons |
| in there going to back a bloody horse someone gave him that hasn't an |
| earthly. Through here. |
| |
| They went up the steps and under Merchants' arch. A darkbacked figure |
| scanned books on the hawker's cart. |
| |
| --There he is, Lenehan said. |
| |
| --Wonder what he's buying, M'Coy said, glancing behind. |
| |
| --_Leopoldo or the Bloom is on the Rye,_ Lenehan said. |
| |
| --He's dead nuts on sales, M'Coy said. I was with him one day and he |
| bought a book from an old one in Liffey street for two bob. There were |
| fine plates in it worth double the money, the stars and the moon and |
| comets with long tails. Astronomy it was about. |
| |
| Lenehan laughed. |
| |
| --I'll tell you a damn good one about comets' tails, he said. Come over |
| in the sun. |
| |
| They crossed to the metal bridge and went along Wellington quay by the |
| riverwall. |
| |
| Master Patrick Aloysius Dignam came out of Mangan's, late Fehrenbach's, |
| carrying a pound and a half of porksteaks. |
| |
| --There was a long spread out at Glencree reformatory, Lenehan said |
| eagerly. The annual dinner, you know. Boiled shirt affair. The lord |
| mayor was there, Val Dillon it was, and sir Charles Cameron and Dan |
| Dawson spoke and there was music. Bartell d'Arcy sang and Benjamin |
| Dollard... |
| |
| --I know, M'Coy broke in. My missus sang there once. |
| |
| --Did she? Lenehan said. |
| |
| A card _Unfurnished Apartments_ reappeared on the windowsash of number 7 |
| Eccles street. |
| |
| He checked his tale a moment but broke out in a wheezy laugh. |
| |
| --But wait till I tell you, he said. Delahunt of Camden street had the |
| catering and yours truly was chief bottlewasher. Bloom and the wife were |
| there. Lashings of stuff we put up: port wine and sherry and curacao to |
| which we did ample justice. Fast and furious it was. After liquids came |
| solids. Cold joints galore and mince pies... |
| |
| --I know, M'Coy said. The year the missus was there... |
| |
| Lenehan linked his arm warmly. |
| |
| --But wait till I tell you, he said. We had a midnight lunch too after |
| all the jollification and when we sallied forth it was blue o'clock the |
| morning after the night before. Coming home it was a gorgeous winter's |
| night on the Featherbed Mountain. Bloom and Chris Callinan were on one |
| side of the car and I was with the wife on the other. We started singing |
| glees and duets: _Lo, the early beam of morning_. She was well primed |
| with a good load of Delahunt's port under her bellyband. Every jolt the |
| bloody car gave I had her bumping up against me. Hell's delights! She |
| has a fine pair, God bless her. Like that. |
| |
| He held his caved hands a cubit from him, frowning: |
| |
| --I was tucking the rug under her and settling her boa all the time. |
| Know what I mean? |
| |
| His hands moulded ample curves of air. He shut his eyes tight in |
| delight, his body shrinking, and blew a sweet chirp from his lips. |
| |
| --The lad stood to attention anyhow, he said with a sigh. She's a gamey |
| mare and no mistake. Bloom was pointing out all the stars and the comets |
| in the heavens to Chris Callinan and the jarvey: the great bear and |
| Hercules and the dragon, and the whole jingbang lot. But, by God, I was |
| lost, so to speak, in the milky way. He knows them all, faith. At last |
| she spotted a weeny weeshy one miles away. _And what star is that, |
| Poldy?_ says she. By God, she had Bloom cornered. _That one, is it?_ |
| says Chris Callinan, _sure that's only what you might call a pinprick._ |
| By God, he wasn't far wide of the mark. |
| |
| Lenehan stopped and leaned on the riverwall, panting with soft laughter. |
| |
| --I'm weak, he gasped. |
| |
| M'Coy's white face smiled about it at instants and grew grave. Lenehan |
| walked on again. He lifted his yachtingcap and scratched his hindhead |
| rapidly. He glanced sideways in the sunlight at M'Coy. |
| |
| --He's a cultured allroundman, Bloom is, he said seriously. He's not one |
| of your common or garden... you know... There's a touch of the artist |
| about old Bloom. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| Mr Bloom turned over idly pages of _The Awful Disclosures of Maria |
| Monk,_ then of Aristotle's _Masterpiece._ Crooked botched print. Plates: |
| infants cuddled in a ball in bloodred wombs like livers of slaughtered |
| cows. Lots of them like that at this moment all over the world. All |
| butting with their skulls to get out of it. Child born every minute |
| somewhere. Mrs Purefoy. |
| |
| He laid both books aside and glanced at the third: _Tales of the Ghetto_ |
| by Leopold von Sacher Masoch. |
| |
| --That I had, he said, pushing it by. |
| |
| The shopman let two volumes fall on the counter. |
| |
| --Them are two good ones, he said. |
| |
| Onions of his breath came across the counter out of his ruined mouth. |
| He bent to make a bundle of the other books, hugged them against his |
| unbuttoned waistcoat and bore them off behind the dingy curtain. |
| |
| On O'Connell bridge many persons observed the grave deportment and gay |
| apparel of Mr Denis J Maginni, professor of dancing &c. |
| |
| Mr Bloom, alone, looked at the titles. _Fair Tyrants_ by James |
| Lovebirch. Know the kind that is. Had it? Yes. |
| |
| He opened it. Thought so. |
| |
| A woman's voice behind the dingy curtain. Listen: the man. |
| |
| No: she wouldn't like that much. Got her it once. |
| |
| He read the other title: _Sweets of Sin_. More in her line. Let us see. |
| |
| He read where his finger opened. |
| |
| _--All the dollarbills her husband gave her were spent in the stores on |
| wondrous gowns and costliest frillies. For him! For raoul!_ |
| |
| Yes. This. Here. Try. |
| |
| --_Her mouth glued on his in a luscious voluptuous kiss while his hands |
| felt for the opulent curves inside her deshabillé._ |
| |
| Yes. Take this. The end. |
| |
| --_You are late, he spoke hoarsely, eying her with a suspicious glare. |
| The beautiful woman threw off her sabletrimmed wrap, displaying her |
| queenly shoulders and heaving embonpoint. An imperceptible smile played |
| round her perfect lips as she turned to him calmly._ |
| |
| Mr Bloom read again: _The beautiful woman._ |
| |
| Warmth showered gently over him, cowing his flesh. Flesh yielded amply |
| amid rumpled clothes: whites of eyes swooning up. His nostrils arched |
| themselves for prey. Melting breast ointments (_for Him! For Raoul!_). |
| Armpits' oniony sweat. Fishgluey slime (_her heaving embonpoint!_). |
| Feel! Press! Crushed! Sulphur dung of lions! |
| |
| Young! Young! |
| |
| An elderly female, no more young, left the building of the courts of |
| chancery, king's bench, exchequer and common pleas, having heard in |
| the lord chancellor's court the case in lunacy of Potterton, in the |
| admiralty division the summons, exparte motion, of the owners of the |
| Lady Cairns versus the owners of the barque Mona, in the court of appeal |
| reservation of judgment in the case of Harvey versus the Ocean Accident |
| and Guarantee Corporation. |
| |
| Phlegmy coughs shook the air of the bookshop, bulging out the dingy |
| curtains. The shopman's uncombed grey head came out and his unshaven |
| reddened face, coughing. He raked his throat rudely, puked phlegm on the |
| floor. He put his boot on what he had spat, wiping his sole along it, |
| and bent, showing a rawskinned crown, scantily haired. |
| |
| Mr Bloom beheld it. |
| |
| Mastering his troubled breath, he said: |
| |
| --I'll take this one. |
| |
| The shopman lifted eyes bleared with old rheum. |
| |
| --_Sweets of Sin,_ he said, tapping on it. That's a good one. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| The lacquey by the door of Dillon's auctionrooms shook his handbell |
| twice again and viewed himself in the chalked mirror of the cabinet. |
| |
| Dilly Dedalus, loitering by the curbstone, heard the beats of the |
| bell, the cries of the auctioneer within. Four and nine. Those lovely |
| curtains. Five shillings. Cosy curtains. Selling new at two guineas. Any |
| advance on five shillings? Going for five shillings. |
| |
| The lacquey lifted his handbell and shook it: |
| |
| --Barang! |
| |
| Bang of the lastlap bell spurred the halfmile wheelmen to their sprint. |
| J. A. Jackson, W. E. Wylie, A. Munro and H. T. Gahan, their stretched |
| necks wagging, negotiated the curve by the College library. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus, tugging a long moustache, came round from Williams's row. He |
| halted near his daughter. |
| |
| --It's time for you, she said. |
| |
| --Stand up straight for the love of the lord Jesus, Mr Dedalus said. |
| Are you trying to imitate your uncle John, the cornetplayer, head upon |
| shoulder? Melancholy God! |
| |
| Dilly shrugged her shoulders. Mr Dedalus placed his hands on them and |
| held them back. |
| |
| --Stand up straight, girl, he said. You'll get curvature of the spine. |
| Do you know what you look like? |
| |
| He let his head sink suddenly down and forward, hunching his shoulders |
| and dropping his underjaw. |
| |
| --Give it up, father, Dilly said. All the people are looking at you. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus drew himself upright and tugged again at his moustache. |
| |
| --Did you get any money? Dilly asked. |
| |
| --Where would I get money? Mr Dedalus said. There is no-one in Dublin |
| would lend me fourpence. |
| |
| --You got some, Dilly said, looking in his eyes. |
| |
| --How do you know that? Mr Dedalus asked, his tongue in his cheek. |
| |
| Mr Kernan, pleased with the order he had booked, walked boldly along |
| James's street. |
| |
| --I know you did, Dilly answered. Were you in the Scotch house now? |
| |
| --I was not, then, Mr Dedalus said, smiling. Was it the little nuns |
| taught you to be so saucy? Here. |
| |
| He handed her a shilling. |
| |
| --See if you can do anything with that, he said. |
| |
| --I suppose you got five, Dilly said. Give me more than that. |
| |
| --Wait awhile, Mr Dedalus said threateningly. You're like the rest of |
| them, are you? An insolent pack of little bitches since your poor mother |
| died. But wait awhile. You'll all get a short shrift and a long day from |
| me. Low blackguardism! I'm going to get rid of you. Wouldn't care if I |
| was stretched out stiff. He's dead. The man upstairs is dead. |
| |
| He left her and walked on. Dilly followed quickly and pulled his coat. |
| |
| --Well, what is it? he said, stopping. |
| |
| The lacquey rang his bell behind their backs. |
| |
| --Barang! |
| |
| --Curse your bloody blatant soul, Mr Dedalus cried, turning on him. |
| |
| The lacquey, aware of comment, shook the lolling clapper of his bell but |
| feebly: |
| |
| --Bang! |
| |
| Mr Dedalus stared at him. |
| |
| --Watch him, he said. It's instructive. I wonder will he allow us to |
| talk. |
| |
| --You got more than that, father, Dilly said. |
| |
| --I'm going to show you a little trick, Mr Dedalus said. I'll leave |
| you all where Jesus left the jews. Look, there's all I have. I got |
| two shillings from Jack Power and I spent twopence for a shave for the |
| funeral. |
| |
| He drew forth a handful of copper coins, nervously. |
| |
| --Can't you look for some money somewhere? Dilly said. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus thought and nodded. |
| |
| --I will, he said gravely. I looked all along the gutter in O'Connell |
| street. I'll try this one now. |
| |
| --You're very funny, Dilly said, grinning. |
| |
| --Here, Mr Dedalus said, handing her two pennies. Get a glass of milk |
| for yourself and a bun or a something. I'll be home shortly. |
| |
| He put the other coins in his pocket and started to walk on. |
| |
| The viceregal cavalcade passed, greeted by obsequious policemen, out of |
| Parkgate. |
| |
| --I'm sure you have another shilling, Dilly said. |
| |
| The lacquey banged loudly. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus amid the din walked off, murmuring to himself with a pursing |
| mincing mouth gently: |
| |
| --The little nuns! Nice little things! O, sure they wouldn't do |
| anything! O, sure they wouldn't really! Is it little sister Monica! |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| From the sundial towards James's gate walked Mr Kernan, pleased with the |
| order he had booked for Pulbrook Robertson, boldly along James's street, |
| past Shackleton's offices. Got round him all right. How do you do, Mr |
| Crimmins? First rate, sir. I was afraid you might be up in your other |
| establishment in Pimlico. How are things going? Just keeping alive. |
| Lovely weather we're having. Yes, indeed. Good for the country. Those |
| farmers are always grumbling. I'll just take a thimbleful of your best |
| gin, Mr Crimmins. A small gin, sir. Yes, sir. Terrible affair that |
| General Slocum explosion. Terrible, terrible! A thousand casualties. And |
| heartrending scenes. Men trampling down women and children. Most brutal |
| thing. What do they say was the cause? Spontaneous combustion. Most |
| scandalous revelation. Not a single lifeboat would float and the |
| firehose all burst. What I can't understand is how the inspectors ever |
| allowed a boat like that... Now, you're talking straight, Mr Crimmins. |
| You know why? Palm oil. Is that a fact? Without a doubt. Well now, look |
| at that. And America they say is the land of the free. I thought we were |
| bad here. |
| |
| I smiled at him. _America,_ I said quietly, just like that. _What is |
| it? The sweepings of every country including our own. Isn't that true?_ |
| That's a fact. |
| |
| Graft, my dear sir. Well, of course, where there's money going there's |
| always someone to pick it up. |
| |
| Saw him looking at my frockcoat. Dress does it. Nothing like a dressy |
| appearance. Bowls them over. |
| |
| --Hello, Simon, Father Cowley said. How are things? |
| |
| --Hello, Bob, old man, Mr Dedalus answered, stopping. |
| |
| Mr Kernan halted and preened himself before the sloping mirror of Peter |
| Kennedy, hairdresser. Stylish coat, beyond a doubt. Scott of Dawson |
| street. Well worth the half sovereign I gave Neary for it. Never built |
| under three guineas. Fits me down to the ground. Some Kildare street |
| club toff had it probably. John Mulligan, the manager of the Hibernian |
| bank, gave me a very sharp eye yesterday on Carlisle bridge as if he |
| remembered me. |
| |
| Aham! Must dress the character for those fellows. Knight of the road. |
| Gentleman. And now, Mr Crimmins, may we have the honour of your custom |
| again, sir. The cup that cheers but not inebriates, as the old saying |
| has it. |
| |
| North wall and sir John Rogerson's quay, with hulls and anchorchains, |
| sailing westward, sailed by a skiff, a crumpled throwaway, rocked on the |
| ferrywash, Elijah is coming. |
| |
| Mr Kernan glanced in farewell at his image. High colour, of course. |
| Grizzled moustache. Returned Indian officer. Bravely he bore his stumpy |
| body forward on spatted feet, squaring his shoulders. Is that Ned |
| Lambert's brother over the way, Sam? What? Yes. He's as like it as damn |
| it. No. The windscreen of that motorcar in the sun there. Just a flash |
| like that. Damn like him. |
| |
| Aham! Hot spirit of juniper juice warmed his vitals and his breath. Good |
| drop of gin, that was. His frocktails winked in bright sunshine to his |
| fat strut. |
| |
| Down there Emmet was hanged, drawn and quartered. Greasy black rope. |
| Dogs licking the blood off the street when the lord lieutenant's wife |
| drove by in her noddy. |
| |
| Bad times those were. Well, well. Over and done with. Great topers too. |
| Fourbottle men. |
| |
| Let me see. Is he buried in saint Michan's? Or no, there was a midnight |
| burial in Glasnevin. Corpse brought in through a secret door in the |
| wall. Dignam is there now. Went out in a puff. Well, well. Better turn |
| down here. Make a detour. |
| |
| Mr Kernan turned and walked down the slope of Watling street by |
| the corner of Guinness's visitors' waitingroom. Outside the Dublin |
| Distillers Company's stores an outside car without fare or jarvey stood, |
| the reins knotted to the wheel. Damn dangerous thing. Some Tipperary |
| bosthoon endangering the lives of the citizens. Runaway horse. |
| |
| Denis Breen with his tomes, weary of having waited an hour in John |
| Henry Menton's office, led his wife over O'Connell bridge, bound for the |
| office of Messrs Collis and Ward. |
| |
| Mr Kernan approached Island street. |
| |
| Times of the troubles. Must ask Ned Lambert to lend me those |
| reminiscences of sir Jonah Barrington. When you look back on it all |
| now in a kind of retrospective arrangement. Gaming at Daly's. No |
| cardsharping then. One of those fellows got his hand nailed to the table |
| by a dagger. Somewhere here lord Edward Fitzgerald escaped from major |
| Sirr. Stables behind Moira house. |
| |
| Damn good gin that was. |
| |
| Fine dashing young nobleman. Good stock, of course. That ruffian, that |
| sham squire, with his violet gloves gave him away. Course they were |
| on the wrong side. They rose in dark and evil days. Fine poem that |
| is: Ingram. They were gentlemen. Ben Dollard does sing that ballad |
| touchingly. Masterly rendition. |
| |
| _At the siege of Ross did my father fall._ |
| |
| A cavalcade in easy trot along Pembroke quay passed, outriders leaping, |
| leaping in their, in their saddles. Frockcoats. Cream sunshades. |
| |
| Mr Kernan hurried forward, blowing pursily. |
| |
| His Excellency! Too bad! Just missed that by a hair. Damn it! What a |
| pity! |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| Stephen Dedalus watched through the webbed window the lapidary's fingers |
| prove a timedulled chain. Dust webbed the window and the showtrays. Dust |
| darkened the toiling fingers with their vulture nails. Dust slept |
| on dull coils of bronze and silver, lozenges of cinnabar, on rubies, |
| leprous and winedark stones. |
| |
| Born all in the dark wormy earth, cold specks of fire, evil, lights |
| shining in the darkness. Where fallen archangels flung the stars of |
| their brows. Muddy swinesnouts, hands, root and root, gripe and wrest |
| them. |
| |
| She dances in a foul gloom where gum bums with garlic. A sailorman, |
| rustbearded, sips from a beaker rum and eyes her. A long and seafed |
| silent rut. She dances, capers, wagging her sowish haunches and her |
| hips, on her gross belly flapping a ruby egg. |
| |
| Old Russell with a smeared shammy rag burnished again his gem, turned it |
| and held it at the point of his Moses' beard. Grandfather ape gloating |
| on a stolen hoard. |
| |
| And you who wrest old images from the burial earth? The brainsick words |
| of sophists: Antisthenes. A lore of drugs. Orient and immortal wheat |
| standing from everlasting to everlasting. |
| |
| Two old women fresh from their whiff of the briny trudged through |
| Irishtown along London bridge road, one with a sanded tired umbrella, |
| one with a midwife's bag in which eleven cockles rolled. |
| |
| The whirr of flapping leathern bands and hum of dynamos from the |
| powerhouse urged Stephen to be on. Beingless beings. Stop! Throb always |
| without you and the throb always within. Your heart you sing of. I |
| between them. Where? Between two roaring worlds where they swirl, I. |
| Shatter them, one and both. But stun myself too in the blow. Shatter me |
| you who can. Bawd and butcher were the words. I say! Not yet awhile. A |
| look around. |
| |
| Yes, quite true. Very large and wonderful and keeps famous time. You say |
| right, sir. A Monday morning, 'twas so, indeed. |
| |
| Stephen went down Bedford row, the handle of the ash clacking against |
| his shoulderblade. In Clohissey's window a faded 1860 print of Heenan |
| boxing Sayers held his eye. Staring backers with square hats stood |
| round the roped prizering. The heavyweights in tight loincloths proposed |
| gently each to other his bulbous fists. And they are throbbing: heroes' |
| hearts. |
| |
| He turned and halted by the slanted bookcart. |
| |
| --Twopence each, the huckster said. Four for sixpence. |
| |
| Tattered pages. _The Irish Beekeeper. Life and Miracles of the Curé of |
| Ars. Pocket Guide to Killarney._ |
| |
| I might find here one of my pawned schoolprizes. _Stephano Dedalo, |
| alumno optimo, palmam ferenti._ |
| |
| Father Conmee, having read his little hours, walked through the hamlet |
| of Donnycarney, murmuring vespers. |
| |
| Binding too good probably. What is this? Eighth and ninth book of Moses. |
| Secret of all secrets. Seal of King David. Thumbed pages: read and read. |
| Who has passed here before me? How to soften chapped hands. Recipe for |
| white wine vinegar. How to win a woman's love. For me this. Say the |
| following talisman three times with hands folded: |
| |
| --_Se el yilo nebrakada femininum! Amor me solo! Sanktus! Amen._ |
| |
| Who wrote this? Charms and invocations of the most blessed abbot Peter |
| Salanka to all true believers divulged. As good as any other abbot's |
| charms, as mumbling Joachim's. Down, baldynoddle, or we'll wool your |
| wool. |
| |
| --What are you doing here, Stephen? |
| |
| Dilly's high shoulders and shabby dress. |
| |
| Shut the book quick. Don't let see. |
| |
| --What are you doing? Stephen said. |
| |
| A Stuart face of nonesuch Charles, lank locks falling at its sides. It |
| glowed as she crouched feeding the fire with broken boots. I told her |
| of Paris. Late lieabed under a quilt of old overcoats, fingering a |
| pinchbeck bracelet, Dan Kelly's token. _Nebrakada femininum._ |
| |
| --What have you there? Stephen asked. |
| |
| --I bought it from the other cart for a penny, Dilly said, laughing |
| nervously. Is it any good? |
| |
| My eyes they say she has. Do others see me so? Quick, far and daring. |
| Shadow of my mind. |
| |
| He took the coverless book from her hand. Chardenal's French primer. |
| |
| --What did you buy that for? he asked. To learn French? |
| |
| She nodded, reddening and closing tight her lips. |
| |
| Show no surprise. Quite natural. |
| |
| --Here, Stephen said. It's all right. Mind Maggy doesn't pawn it on you. |
| I suppose all my books are gone. |
| |
| --Some, Dilly said. We had to. |
| |
| She is drowning. Agenbite. Save her. Agenbite. All against us. She will |
| drown me with her, eyes and hair. Lank coils of seaweed hair around me, |
| my heart, my soul. Salt green death. |
| |
| We. |
| |
| Agenbite of inwit. Inwit's agenbite. |
| |
| Misery! Misery! |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| --Hello, Simon, Father Cowley said. How are things? |
| |
| --Hello, Bob, old man, Mr Dedalus answered, stopping. |
| |
| They clasped hands loudly outside Reddy and Daughter's. Father Cowley |
| brushed his moustache often downward with a scooping hand. |
| |
| --What's the best news? Mr Dedalus said. |
| |
| --Why then not much, Father Cowley said. I'm barricaded up, Simon, with |
| two men prowling around the house trying to effect an entrance. |
| |
| --Jolly, Mr Dedalus said. Who is it? |
| |
| --O, Father Cowley said. A certain gombeen man of our acquaintance. |
| |
| --With a broken back, is it? Mr Dedalus asked. |
| |
| --The same, Simon, Father Cowley answered. Reuben of that ilk. I'm just |
| waiting for Ben Dollard. He's going to say a word to long John to get |
| him to take those two men off. All I want is a little time. |
| |
| He looked with vague hope up and down the quay, a big apple bulging in |
| his neck. |
| |
| --I know, Mr Dedalus said, nodding. Poor old bockedy Ben! He's always |
| doing a good turn for someone. Hold hard! |
| |
| He put on his glasses and gazed towards the metal bridge an instant. |
| |
| --There he is, by God, he said, arse and pockets. |
| |
| Ben Dollard's loose blue cutaway and square hat above large slops |
| crossed the quay in full gait from the metal bridge. He came towards |
| them at an amble, scratching actively behind his coattails. |
| |
| As he came near Mr Dedalus greeted: |
| |
| --Hold that fellow with the bad trousers. |
| |
| --Hold him now, Ben Dollard said. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus eyed with cold wandering scorn various points of Ben |
| Dollard's figure. Then, turning to Father Cowley with a nod, he muttered |
| sneeringly: |
| |
| --That's a pretty garment, isn't it, for a summer's day? |
| |
| --Why, God eternally curse your soul, Ben Dollard growled furiously, I |
| threw out more clothes in my time than you ever saw. |
| |
| He stood beside them beaming, on them first and on his roomy clothes |
| from points of which Mr Dedalus flicked fluff, saying: |
| |
| --They were made for a man in his health, Ben, anyhow. |
| |
| --Bad luck to the jewman that made them, Ben Dollard said. Thanks be to |
| God he's not paid yet. |
| |
| --And how is that _basso profondo_, Benjamin? Father Cowley asked. |
| |
| Cashel Boyle O'Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell, murmuring, |
| glassyeyed, strode past the Kildare street club. |
| |
| Ben Dollard frowned and, making suddenly a chanter's mouth, gave forth a |
| deep note. |
| |
| --Aw! he said. |
| |
| --That's the style, Mr Dedalus said, nodding to its drone. |
| |
| --What about that? Ben Dollard said. Not too dusty? What? |
| |
| He turned to both. |
| |
| --That'll do, Father Cowley said, nodding also. |
| |
| The reverend Hugh C. Love walked from the old chapterhouse of saint |
| Mary's abbey past James and Charles Kennedy's, rectifiers, attended by |
| Geraldines tall and personable, towards the Tholsel beyond the ford of |
| hurdles. |
| |
| Ben Dollard with a heavy list towards the shopfronts led them forward, |
| his joyful fingers in the air. |
| |
| --Come along with me to the subsheriff's office, he said. I want to |
| show you the new beauty Rock has for a bailiff. He's a cross between |
| Lobengula and Lynchehaun. He's well worth seeing, mind you. Come along. |
| I saw John Henry Menton casually in the Bodega just now and it will cost |
| me a fall if I don't... Wait awhile... We're on the right lay, Bob, |
| believe you me. |
| |
| --For a few days tell him, Father Cowley said anxiously. |
| |
| Ben Dollard halted and stared, his loud orifice open, a dangling button |
| of his coat wagging brightbacked from its thread as he wiped away the |
| heavy shraums that clogged his eyes to hear aright. |
| |
| --What few days? he boomed. Hasn't your landlord distrained for rent? |
| |
| --He has, Father Cowley said. |
| |
| --Then our friend's writ is not worth the paper it's printed on, Ben |
| Dollard said. The landlord has the prior claim. I gave him all the |
| particulars. 29 Windsor avenue. Love is the name? |
| |
| --That's right, Father Cowley said. The reverend Mr Love. He's a |
| minister in the country somewhere. But are you sure of that? |
| |
| --You can tell Barabbas from me, Ben Dollard said, that he can put that |
| writ where Jacko put the nuts. |
| |
| He led Father Cowley boldly forward, linked to his bulk. |
| |
| --Filberts I believe they were, Mr Dedalus said, as he dropped his |
| glasses on his coatfront, following them. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| --The youngster will be all right, Martin Cunningham said, as they |
| passed out of the Castleyard gate. |
| |
| The policeman touched his forehead. |
| |
| --God bless you, Martin Cunningham said, cheerily. |
| |
| He signed to the waiting jarvey who chucked at the reins and set on |
| towards Lord Edward street. |
| |
| Bronze by gold, Miss Kennedy's head by Miss Douce's head, appeared above |
| the crossblind of the Ormond hotel. |
| |
| --Yes, Martin Cunningham said, fingering his beard. I wrote to Father |
| Conmee and laid the whole case before him. |
| |
| --You could try our friend, Mr Power suggested backward. |
| |
| --Boyd? Martin Cunningham said shortly. Touch me not. |
| |
| John Wyse Nolan, lagging behind, reading the list, came after them |
| quickly down Cork hill. |
| |
| On the steps of the City hall Councillor Nannetti, descending, hailed |
| Alderman Cowley and Councillor Abraham Lyon ascending. |
| |
| The castle car wheeled empty into upper Exchange street. |
| |
| --Look here, Martin, John Wyse Nolan said, overtaking them at the _Mail_ |
| office. I see Bloom put his name down for five shillings. |
| |
| --Quite right, Martin Cunningham said, taking the list. And put down the |
| five shillings too. |
| |
| --Without a second word either, Mr Power said. |
| |
| --Strange but true, Martin Cunningham added. |
| |
| John Wyse Nolan opened wide eyes. |
| |
| --I'll say there is much kindness in the jew, he quoted, elegantly. |
| |
| They went down Parliament street. |
| |
| --There's Jimmy Henry, Mr Power said, just heading for Kavanagh's. |
| |
| --Righto, Martin Cunningham said. Here goes. |
| |
| Outside _la Maison Claire_ Blazes Boylan waylaid Jack Mooney's |
| brother-in-law, humpy, tight, making for the liberties. |
| |
| John Wyse Nolan fell back with Mr Power, while Martin Cunningham took |
| the elbow of a dapper little man in a shower of hail suit, who walked |
| uncertainly, with hasty steps past Micky Anderson's watches. |
| |
| --The assistant town clerk's corns are giving him some trouble, John |
| Wyse Nolan told Mr Power. |
| |
| They followed round the corner towards James Kavanagh's winerooms. The |
| empty castle car fronted them at rest in Essex gate. Martin Cunningham, |
| speaking always, showed often the list at which Jimmy Henry did not |
| glance. |
| |
| --And long John Fanning is here too, John Wyse Nolan said, as large as |
| life. |
| |
| The tall form of long John Fanning filled the doorway where he stood. |
| |
| --Good day, Mr Subsheriff, Martin Cunningham said, as all halted and |
| greeted. |
| |
| Long John Fanning made no way for them. He removed his large Henry Clay |
| decisively and his large fierce eyes scowled intelligently over all |
| their faces. |
| |
| --Are the conscript fathers pursuing their peaceful deliberations? he |
| said with rich acrid utterance to the assistant town clerk. |
| |
| Hell open to christians they were having, Jimmy Henry said pettishly, |
| about their damned Irish language. Where was the marshal, he wanted |
| to know, to keep order in the council chamber. And old Barlow the |
| macebearer laid up with asthma, no mace on the table, nothing in order, |
| no quorum even, and Hutchinson, the lord mayor, in Llandudno and little |
| Lorcan Sherlock doing _locum tenens_ for him. Damned Irish language, |
| language of our forefathers. |
| |
| Long John Fanning blew a plume of smoke from his lips. |
| |
| Martin Cunningham spoke by turns, twirling the peak of his beard, to the |
| assistant town clerk and the subsheriff, while John Wyse Nolan held his |
| peace. |
| |
| --What Dignam was that? long John Fanning asked. |
| |
| Jimmy Henry made a grimace and lifted his left foot. |
| |
| --O, my corns! he said plaintively. Come upstairs for goodness' sake |
| till I sit down somewhere. Uff! Ooo! Mind! |
| |
| Testily he made room for himself beside long John Fanning's flank and |
| passed in and up the stairs. |
| |
| --Come on up, Martin Cunningham said to the subsheriff. I don't think |
| you knew him or perhaps you did, though. |
| |
| With John Wyse Nolan Mr Power followed them in. |
| |
| --Decent little soul he was, Mr Power said to the stalwart back of long |
| John Fanning ascending towards long John Fanning in the mirror. |
| |
| --Rather lowsized. Dignam of Menton's office that was, Martin Cunningham |
| said. |
| |
| Long John Fanning could not remember him. |
| |
| Clatter of horsehoofs sounded from the air. |
| |
| --What's that? Martin Cunningham said. |
| |
| All turned where they stood. John Wyse Nolan came down again. From the |
| cool shadow of the doorway he saw the horses pass Parliament street, |
| harness and glossy pasterns in sunlight shimmering. Gaily they went past |
| before his cool unfriendly eyes, not quickly. In saddles of the leaders, |
| leaping leaders, rode outriders. |
| |
| --What was it? Martin Cunningham asked, as they went on up the |
| staircase. |
| |
| --The lord lieutenantgeneral and general governor of Ireland, John Wyse |
| Nolan answered from the stairfoot. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| As they trod across the thick carpet Buck Mulligan whispered behind his |
| Panama to Haines: |
| |
| --Parnell's brother. There in the corner. |
| |
| They chose a small table near the window, opposite a longfaced man whose |
| beard and gaze hung intently down on a chessboard. |
| |
| --Is that he? Haines asked, twisting round in his seat. |
| |
| --Yes, Mulligan said. That's John Howard, his brother, our city marshal. |
| |
| John Howard Parnell translated a white bishop quietly and his grey claw |
| went up again to his forehead whereat it rested. An instant after, under |
| its screen, his eyes looked quickly, ghostbright, at his foe and fell |
| once more upon a working corner. |
| |
| --I'll take a _mélange,_ Haines said to the waitress. |
| |
| --Two _mélanges,_ Buck Mulligan said. And bring us some scones and |
| butter and some cakes as well. |
| |
| When she had gone he said, laughing: |
| |
| --We call it D.B.C. because they have damn bad cakes. O, but you missed |
| Dedalus on _Hamlet._ |
| |
| Haines opened his newbought book. |
| |
| --I'm sorry, he said. Shakespeare is the happy huntingground of all |
| minds that have lost their balance. |
| |
| The onelegged sailor growled at the area of 14 Nelson street: |
| |
| --_England expects_... |
| |
| Buck Mulligan's primrose waistcoat shook gaily to his laughter. |
| |
| --You should see him, he said, when his body loses its balance. |
| Wandering Aengus I call him. |
| |
| --I am sure he has an _idée fixe,_ Haines said, pinching his chin |
| thoughtfully with thumb and forefinger. Now I am speculating what it |
| would be likely to be. Such persons always have. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan bent across the table gravely. |
| |
| --They drove his wits astray, he said, by visions of hell. He will never |
| capture the Attic note. The note of Swinburne, of all poets, the white |
| death and the ruddy birth. That is his tragedy. He can never be a poet. |
| The joy of creation... |
| |
| --Eternal punishment, Haines said, nodding curtly. I see. I tackled him |
| this morning on belief. There was something on his mind, I saw. |
| It's rather interesting because professor Pokorny of Vienna makes an |
| interesting point out of that. |
| |
| Buck Mulligan's watchful eyes saw the waitress come. He helped her to |
| unload her tray. |
| |
| --He can find no trace of hell in ancient Irish myth, Haines said, amid |
| the cheerful cups. The moral idea seems lacking, the sense of destiny, |
| of retribution. Rather strange he should have just that fixed idea. Does |
| he write anything for your movement? |
| |
| He sank two lumps of sugar deftly longwise through the whipped cream. |
| Buck Mulligan slit a steaming scone in two and plastered butter over its |
| smoking pith. He bit off a soft piece hungrily. |
| |
| --Ten years, he said, chewing and laughing. He is going to write |
| something in ten years. |
| |
| --Seems a long way off, Haines said, thoughtfully lifting his spoon. |
| Still, I shouldn't wonder if he did after all. |
| |
| He tasted a spoonful from the creamy cone of his cup. |
| |
| --This is real Irish cream I take it, he said with forbearance. I don't |
| want to be imposed on. |
| |
| Elijah, skiff, light crumpled throwaway, sailed eastward by flanks of |
| ships and trawlers, amid an archipelago of corks, beyond new Wapping |
| street past Benson's ferry, and by the threemasted schooner _Rosevean_ |
| from Bridgwater with bricks. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| Almidano Artifoni walked past Holles street, past Sewell's yard. |
| Behind him Cashel Boyle O'Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell, with |
| stickumbrelladustcoat dangling, shunned the lamp before Mr Law Smith's |
| house and, crossing, walked along Merrion square. Distantly behind him a |
| blind stripling tapped his way by the wall of College park. |
| |
| Cashel Boyle O'Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell walked as far as |
| Mr Lewis Werner's cheerful windows, then turned and strode back along |
| Merrion square, his stickumbrelladustcoat dangling. |
| |
| At the corner of Wilde's house he halted, frowned at Elijah's name |
| announced on the Metropolitan hall, frowned at the distant pleasance of |
| duke's lawn. His eyeglass flashed frowning in the sun. With ratsteeth |
| bared he muttered: |
| |
| --_Coactus volui._ |
| |
| He strode on for Clare street, grinding his fierce word. |
| |
| As he strode past Mr Bloom's dental windows the sway of his dustcoat |
| brushed rudely from its angle a slender tapping cane and swept onwards, |
| having buffeted a thewless body. The blind stripling turned his sickly |
| face after the striding form. |
| |
| --God's curse on you, he said sourly, whoever you are! You're blinder |
| nor I am, you bitch's bastard! |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| Opposite Ruggy O'Donohoe's Master Patrick Aloysius Dignam, pawing the |
| pound and a half of Mangan's, late Fehrenbach's, porksteaks he had been |
| sent for, went along warm Wicklow street dawdling. It was too blooming |
| dull sitting in the parlour with Mrs Stoer and Mrs Quigley and Mrs |
| MacDowell and the blind down and they all at their sniffles and sipping |
| sups of the superior tawny sherry uncle Barney brought from Tunney's. |
| And they eating crumbs of the cottage fruitcake, jawing the whole |
| blooming time and sighing. |
| |
| After Wicklow lane the window of Madame Doyle, courtdress milliner, |
| stopped him. He stood looking in at the two puckers stripped to their |
| pelts and putting up their props. From the sidemirrors two mourning |
| Masters Dignam gaped silently. Myler Keogh, Dublin's pet lamb, will |
| meet sergeantmajor Bennett, the Portobello bruiser, for a purse of fifty |
| sovereigns. Gob, that'd be a good pucking match to see. Myler Keogh, |
| that's the chap sparring out to him with the green sash. Two bar |
| entrance, soldiers half price. I could easy do a bunk on ma. Master |
| Dignam on his left turned as he turned. That's me in mourning. When |
| is it? May the twentysecond. Sure, the blooming thing is all over. He |
| turned to the right and on his right Master Dignam turned, his cap awry, |
| his collar sticking up. Buttoning it down, his chin lifted, he saw the |
| image of Marie Kendall, charming soubrette, beside the two puckers. One |
| of them mots that do be in the packets of fags Stoer smokes that his old |
| fellow welted hell out of him for one time he found out. |
| |
| Master Dignam got his collar down and dawdled on. The best pucker going |
| for strength was Fitzsimons. One puck in the wind from that fellow would |
| knock you into the middle of next week, man. But the best pucker for |
| science was Jem Corbet before Fitzsimons knocked the stuffings out of |
| him, dodging and all. |
| |
| In Grafton street Master Dignam saw a red flower in a toff's mouth and |
| a swell pair of kicks on him and he listening to what the drunk was |
| telling him and grinning all the time. |
| |
| No Sandymount tram. |
| |
| Master Dignam walked along Nassau street, shifted the porksteaks to |
| his other hand. His collar sprang up again and he tugged it down. The |
| blooming stud was too small for the buttonhole of the shirt, blooming |
| end to it. He met schoolboys with satchels. I'm not going tomorrow |
| either, stay away till Monday. He met other schoolboys. Do they notice |
| I'm in mourning? Uncle Barney said he'd get it into the paper tonight. |
| Then they'll all see it in the paper and read my name printed and pa's |
| name. |
| |
| His face got all grey instead of being red like it was and there was a |
| fly walking over it up to his eye. The scrunch that was when they |
| were screwing the screws into the coffin: and the bumps when they were |
| bringing it downstairs. |
| |
| Pa was inside it and ma crying in the parlour and uncle Barney telling |
| the men how to get it round the bend. A big coffin it was, and high and |
| heavylooking. How was that? The last night pa was boosed he was standing |
| on the landing there bawling out for his boots to go out to Tunney's for |
| to boose more and he looked butty and short in his shirt. Never see him |
| again. Death, that is. Pa is dead. My father is dead. He told me to be |
| a good son to ma. I couldn't hear the other things he said but I saw |
| his tongue and his teeth trying to say it better. Poor pa. That was |
| Mr Dignam, my father. I hope he's in purgatory now because he went to |
| confession to Father Conroy on Saturday night. |
| |
| * * * * * |
| |
| William Humble, earl of Dudley, and lady Dudley, accompanied by |
| lieutenantcolonel Heseltine, drove out after luncheon from the viceregal |
| lodge. In the following carriage were the honourable Mrs Paget, Miss de |
| Courcy and the honourable Gerald Ward A.D.C. in attendance. |
| |
| The cavalcade passed out by the lower gate of Phoenix park saluted by |
| obsequious policemen and proceeded past Kingsbridge along the northern |
| quays. The viceroy was most cordially greeted on his way through the |
| metropolis. At Bloody bridge Mr Thomas Kernan beyond the river greeted |
| him vainly from afar Between Queen's and Whitworth bridges lord Dudley's |
| viceregal carriages passed and were unsaluted by Mr Dudley White, B. |
| L., M. A., who stood on Arran quay outside Mrs M. E. White's, the |
| pawnbroker's, at the corner of Arran street west stroking his nose with |
| his forefinger, undecided whether he should arrive at Phibsborough |
| more quickly by a triple change of tram or by hailing a car or on foot |
| through Smithfield, Constitution hill and Broadstone terminus. In the |
| porch of Four Courts Richie Goulding with the costbag of Goulding, |
| Collis and Ward saw him with surprise. Past Richmond bridge at the |
| doorstep of the office of Reuben J Dodd, solicitor, agent for the |
| Patriotic Insurance Company, an elderly female about to enter changed |
| her plan and retracing her steps by King's windows smiled credulously |
| on the representative of His Majesty. From its sluice in Wood quay wall |
| under Tom Devan's office Poddle river hung out in fealty a tongue of |
| liquid sewage. Above the crossblind of the Ormond hotel, gold by bronze, |
| Miss Kennedy's head by Miss Douce's head watched and admired. On Ormond |
| quay Mr Simon Dedalus, steering his way from the greenhouse for the |
| subsheriff's office, stood still in midstreet and brought his hat low. |
| His Excellency graciously returned Mr Dedalus' greeting. From Cahill's |
| corner the reverend Hugh C. Love, M.A., made obeisance unperceived, |
| mindful of lords deputies whose hands benignant had held of yore rich |
| advowsons. On Grattan bridge Lenehan and M'Coy, taking leave of each |
| other, watched the carriages go by. Passing by Roger Greene's office and |
| Dollard's big red printinghouse Gerty MacDowell, carrying the Catesby's |
| cork lino letters for her father who was laid up, knew by the style |
| it was the lord and lady lieutenant but she couldn't see what Her |
| Excellency had on because the tram and Spring's big yellow furniture van |
| had to stop in front of her on account of its being the lord lieutenant. |
| Beyond Lundy Foot's from the shaded door of Kavanagh's winerooms |
| John Wyse Nolan smiled with unseen coldness towards the lord |
| lieutenantgeneral and general governor of Ireland. The Right Honourable |
| William Humble, earl of Dudley, G. C. V. O., passed Micky Anderson's all |
| times ticking watches and Henry and James's wax smartsuited freshcheeked |
| models, the gentleman Henry, _dernier cri_ James. Over against Dame gate |
| Tom Rochford and Nosey Flynn watched the approach of the cavalcade. Tom |
| Rochford, seeing the eyes of lady Dudley fixed on him, took his thumbs |
| quickly out of the pockets of his claret waistcoat and doffed his cap to |
| her. A charming _soubrette,_ great Marie Kendall, with dauby cheeks and |
| lifted skirt smiled daubily from her poster upon William Humble, earl |
| of Dudley, and upon lieutenantcolonel H. G. Heseltine, and also upon |
| the honourable Gerald Ward A. D. C. From the window of the D. B. C. Buck |
| Mulligan gaily, and Haines gravely, gazed down on the viceregal equipage |
| over the shoulders of eager guests, whose mass of forms darkened the |
| chessboard whereon John Howard Parnell looked intently. In Fownes's |
| street Dilly Dedalus, straining her sight upward from Chardenal's first |
| French primer, saw sunshades spanned and wheelspokes spinning in the |
| glare. John Henry Menton, filling the doorway of Commercial Buildings, |
| stared from winebig oyster eyes, holding a fat gold hunter watch not |
| looked at in his fat left hand not feeling it. Where the foreleg of King |
| Billy's horse pawed the air Mrs Breen plucked her hastening husband |
| back from under the hoofs of the outriders. She shouted in his ear the |
| tidings. Understanding, he shifted his tomes to his left breast |
| and saluted the second carriage. The honourable Gerald Ward A.D.C., |
| agreeably surprised, made haste to reply. At Ponsonby's corner a jaded |
| white flagon H. halted and four tallhatted white flagons halted behind |
| him, E.L.Y'S, while outriders pranced past and carriages. Opposite |
| Pigott's music warerooms Mr Denis J Maginni, professor of dancing &c, |
| gaily apparelled, gravely walked, outpassed by a viceroy and unobserved. |
| By the provost's wall came jauntily Blazes Boylan, stepping in tan shoes |
| and socks with skyblue clocks to the refrain of _My girl's a Yorkshire |
| girl._ |
| |
| Blazes Boylan presented to the leaders' skyblue frontlets and high |
| action a skyblue tie, a widebrimmed straw hat at a rakish angle and a |
| suit of indigo serge. His hands in his jacket pockets forgot to salute |
| but he offered to the three ladies the bold admiration of his eyes and |
| the red flower between his lips. As they drove along Nassau street His |
| Excellency drew the attention of his bowing consort to the programme of |
| music which was being discoursed in College park. Unseen brazen highland |
| laddies blared and drumthumped after the _cortège_: |
| |
| _But though she's a factory lass |
| And wears no fancy clothes. |
| Baraabum. |
| Yet I've a sort of a |
| Yorkshire relish for |
| My little Yorkshire rose. |
| Baraabum._ |
| |
| Thither of the wall the quartermile flat handicappers, M. C. Green, H. |
| Shrift, T. M. Patey, C. Scaife, J. B. Jeffs, G. N. Morphy, F. Stevenson, |
| C. Adderly and W. C. Huggard, started in pursuit. Striding past Finn's |
| hotel Cashel Boyle O'Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell stared through a |
| fierce eyeglass across the carriages at the head of Mr M. E. Solomons |
| in the window of the Austro-Hungarian viceconsulate. Deep in Leinster |
| street by Trinity's postern a loyal king's man, Hornblower, touched |
| his tallyho cap. As the glossy horses pranced by Merrion square Master |
| Patrick Aloysius Dignam, waiting, saw salutes being given to the gent |
| with the topper and raised also his new black cap with fingers greased |
| by porksteak paper. His collar too sprang up. The viceroy, on his way to |
| inaugurate the Mirus bazaar in aid of funds for Mercer's hospital, |
| drove with his following towards Lower Mount street. He passed a blind |
| stripling opposite Broadbent's. In Lower Mount street a pedestrian in a |
| brown macintosh, eating dry bread, passed swiftly and unscathed across |
| the viceroy's path. At the Royal Canal bridge, from his hoarding, |
| Mr Eugene Stratton, his blub lips agrin, bade all comers welcome to |
| Pembroke township. At Haddington road corner two sanded women halted |
| themselves, an umbrella and a bag in which eleven cockles rolled to view |
| with wonder the lord mayor and lady mayoress without his golden chain. |
| On Northumberland and Lansdowne roads His Excellency acknowledged |
| punctually salutes from rare male walkers, the salute of two small |
| schoolboys at the garden gate of the house said to have been admired |
| by the late queen when visiting the Irish capital with her husband, the |
| prince consort, in 1849 and the salute of Almidano Artifoni's sturdy |
| trousers swallowed by a closing door. |
| |
| |
| |
| Bronze by gold heard the hoofirons, steelyringing Imperthnthn thnthnthn. |
| |
| Chips, picking chips off rocky thumbnail, chips. |
| |
| Horrid! And gold flushed more. |
| |
| A husky fifenote blew. |
| |
| Blew. Blue bloom is on the. |
| |
| Goldpinnacled hair. |
| |
| A jumping rose on satiny breast of satin, rose of Castile. |
| |
| Trilling, trilling: Idolores. |
| |
| Peep! Who's in the... peepofgold? |
| |
| Tink cried to bronze in pity. |
| |
| And a call, pure, long and throbbing. Longindying call. |
| |
| Decoy. Soft word. But look: the bright stars fade. Notes chirruping |
| answer. |
| |
| O rose! Castile. The morn is breaking. |
| |
| Jingle jingle jaunted jingling. |
| |
| Coin rang. Clock clacked. |
| |
| Avowal. _Sonnez._ I could. Rebound of garter. Not leave thee. Smack. _La |
| cloche!_ Thigh smack. Avowal. Warm. Sweetheart, goodbye! |
| |
| Jingle. Bloo. |
| |
| Boomed crashing chords. When love absorbs. War! War! The tympanum. |
| |
| A sail! A veil awave upon the waves. |
| |
| Lost. Throstle fluted. All is lost now. |
| |
| Horn. Hawhorn. |
| |
| When first he saw. Alas! |
| |
| Full tup. Full throb. |
| |
| Warbling. Ah, lure! Alluring. |
| |
| Martha! Come! |
| |
| Clapclap. Clipclap. Clappyclap. |
| |
| Goodgod henev erheard inall. |
| |
| Deaf bald Pat brought pad knife took up. |
| |
| A moonlit nightcall: far, far. |
| |
| I feel so sad. P. S. So lonely blooming. |
| |
| Listen! |
| |
| The spiked and winding cold seahorn. Have you the? Each, and for other, |
| plash and silent roar. |
| |
| Pearls: when she. Liszt's rhapsodies. Hissss. |
| |
| You don't? |
| |
| Did not: no, no: believe: Lidlyd. With a cock with a carra. |
| |
| Black. Deepsounding. Do, Ben, do. |
| |
| Wait while you wait. Hee hee. Wait while you hee. |
| |
| But wait! |
| |
| Low in dark middle earth. Embedded ore. |
| |
| Naminedamine. Preacher is he: |
| |
| All gone. All fallen. |
| |
| Tiny, her tremulous fernfoils of maidenhair. |
| |
| Amen! He gnashed in fury. |
| |
| Fro. To, fro. A baton cool protruding. |
| |
| Bronzelydia by Minagold. |
| |
| By bronze, by gold, in oceangreen of shadow. Bloom. Old Bloom. |
| |
| One rapped, one tapped, with a carra, with a cock. |
| |
| Pray for him! Pray, good people! |
| |
| His gouty fingers nakkering. |
| |
| Big Benaben. Big Benben. |
| |
| Last rose Castile of summer left bloom I feel so sad alone. |
| |
| Pwee! Little wind piped wee. |
| |
| True men. Lid Ker Cow De and Doll. Ay, ay. Like you men. Will lift your |
| tschink with tschunk. |
| |
| Fff! Oo! |
| |
| Where bronze from anear? Where gold from afar? Where hoofs? |
| |
| Rrrpr. Kraa. Kraandl. |
| |
| Then not till then. My eppripfftaph. Be pfrwritt. |
| |
| Done. |
| |
| Begin! |
| |
| Bronze by gold, miss Douce's head by miss Kennedy's head, over the |
| crossblind of the Ormond bar heard the viceregal hoofs go by, ringing |
| steel. |
| |
| --Is that her? asked miss Kennedy. |
| |
| Miss Douce said yes, sitting with his ex, pearl grey and _eau de Nil._ |
| |
| --Exquisite contrast, miss Kennedy said. |
| |
| When all agog miss Douce said eagerly: |
| |
| --Look at the fellow in the tall silk. |
| |
| --Who? Where? gold asked more eagerly. |
| |
| --In the second carriage, miss Douce's wet lips said, laughing in the |
| sun. |
| |
| He's looking. Mind till I see. |
| |
| She darted, bronze, to the backmost corner, flattening her face against |
| the pane in a halo of hurried breath. |
| |
| Her wet lips tittered: |
| |
| --He's killed looking back. |
| |
| She laughed: |
| |
| --O wept! Aren't men frightful idiots? |
| |
| With sadness. |
| |
| Miss Kennedy sauntered sadly from bright light, twining a loose hair |
| behind an ear. Sauntering sadly, gold no more, she twisted twined a |
| hair. |
| |
| Sadly she twined in sauntering gold hair behind a curving ear. |
| |
| --It's them has the fine times, sadly then she said. |
| |
| A man. |
| |
| Bloowho went by by Moulang's pipes bearing in his breast the sweets |
| of sin, by Wine's antiques, in memory bearing sweet sinful words, by |
| Carroll's dusky battered plate, for Raoul. |
| |
| The boots to them, them in the bar, them barmaids came. For them |
| unheeding him he banged on the counter his tray of chattering china. And |
| |
| --There's your teas, he said. |
| |
| Miss Kennedy with manners transposed the teatray down to an upturned |
| lithia crate, safe from eyes, low. |
| |
| --What is it? loud boots unmannerly asked. |
| |
| --Find out, miss Douce retorted, leaving her spyingpoint. |
| |
| --Your _beau,_ is it? |
| |
| A haughty bronze replied: |
| |
| --I'll complain to Mrs de Massey on you if I hear any more of your |
| impertinent insolence. |
| |
| --Imperthnthn thnthnthn, bootssnout sniffed rudely, as he retreated as |
| she threatened as he had come. |
| |
| Bloom. |
| |
| On her flower frowning miss Douce said: |
| |
| --Most aggravating that young brat is. If he doesn't conduct himself |
| I'll wring his ear for him a yard long. |
| |
| Ladylike in exquisite contrast. |
| |
| --Take no notice, miss Kennedy rejoined. |
| |
| She poured in a teacup tea, then back in the teapot tea. They cowered |
| under their reef of counter, waiting on footstools, crates upturned, |
| waiting for their teas to draw. They pawed their blouses, both of black |
| satin, two and nine a yard, waiting for their teas to draw, and two and |
| seven. |
| |
| Yes, bronze from anear, by gold from afar, heard steel from anear, hoofs |
| ring from afar, and heard steelhoofs ringhoof ringsteel. |
| |
| --Am I awfully sunburnt? |
| |
| Miss bronze unbloused her neck. |
| |
| --No, said miss Kennedy. It gets brown after. Did you try the borax with |
| the cherry laurel water? |
| |
| Miss Douce halfstood to see her skin askance in the barmirror |
| gildedlettered where hock and claret glasses shimmered and in their |
| midst a shell. |
| |
| --And leave it to my hands, she said. |
| |
| --Try it with the glycerine, miss Kennedy advised. |
| |
| Bidding her neck and hands adieu miss Douce |
| |
| --Those things only bring out a rash, replied, reseated. I asked that |
| old fogey in Boyd's for something for my skin. |
| |
| Miss Kennedy, pouring now a fulldrawn tea, grimaced and prayed: |
| |
| --O, don't remind me of him for mercy' sake! |
| |
| --But wait till I tell you, miss Douce entreated. |
| |
| Sweet tea miss Kennedy having poured with milk plugged both two ears |
| with little fingers. |
| |
| --No, don't, she cried. |
| |
| --I won't listen, she cried. |
| |
| But Bloom? |
| |
| Miss Douce grunted in snuffy fogey's tone: |
| |
| --For your what? says he. |
| |
| Miss Kennedy unplugged her ears to hear, to speak: but said, but prayed |
| again: |
| |
| --Don't let me think of him or I'll expire. The hideous old wretch! That |
| night in the Antient Concert Rooms. |
| |
| She sipped distastefully her brew, hot tea, a sip, sipped, sweet tea. |
| |
| --Here he was, miss Douce said, cocking her bronze head three quarters, |
| ruffling her nosewings. Hufa! Hufa! |
| |
| Shrill shriek of laughter sprang from miss Kennedy's throat. Miss Douce |
| huffed and snorted down her nostrils that quivered imperthnthn like a |
| snout in quest. |
| |
| --O! shrieking, miss Kennedy cried. Will you ever forget his goggle eye? |
| |
| Miss Douce chimed in in deep bronze laughter, shouting: |
| |
| --And your other eye! |
| |
| Bloowhose dark eye read Aaron Figatner's name. Why do I always think |
| Figather? Gathering figs, I think. And Prosper Lore's huguenot name. |
| By Bassi's blessed virgins Bloom's dark eyes went by. Bluerobed, white |
| under, come to me. God they believe she is: or goddess. Those today. I |
| could not see. That fellow spoke. A student. After with Dedalus' son. |
| He might be Mulligan. All comely virgins. That brings those rakes of |
| fellows in: her white. |
| |
| By went his eyes. The sweets of sin. Sweet are the sweets. |
| |
| Of sin. |
| |
| In a giggling peal young goldbronze voices blended, Douce with Kennedy |
| your other eye. They threw young heads back, bronze gigglegold, to let |
| freefly their laughter, screaming, your other, signals to each other, |
| high piercing notes. |
| |
| Ah, panting, sighing, sighing, ah, fordone, their mirth died down. |
| |
| Miss Kennedy lipped her cup again, raised, drank a sip and |
| gigglegiggled. Miss Douce, bending over the teatray, ruffled again her |
| nose and rolled droll fattened eyes. Again Kennygiggles, stooping, |
| her fair pinnacles of hair, stooping, her tortoise napecomb showed, |
| spluttered out of her mouth her tea, choking in tea and laughter, |
| coughing with choking, crying: |
| |
| --O greasy eyes! Imagine being married to a man like that! she cried. |
| With his bit of beard! |
| |
| Douce gave full vent to a splendid yell, a full yell of full woman, |
| delight, joy, indignation. |
| |
| --Married to the greasy nose! she yelled. |
| |
| Shrill, with deep laughter, after, gold after bronze, they urged each |
| each to peal after peal, ringing in changes, bronzegold, goldbronze, |
| shrilldeep, to laughter after laughter. And then laughed more. Greasy I |
| knows. Exhausted, breathless, their shaken heads they laid, braided and |
| pinnacled by glossycombed, against the counterledge. All flushed (O!), |
| panting, sweating (O!), all breathless. |
| |
| Married to Bloom, to greaseabloom. |
| |
| --O saints above! miss Douce said, sighed above her jumping rose. I |
| wished |
| |
| I hadn't laughed so much. I feel all wet. |
| |
| --O, miss Douce! miss Kennedy protested. You horrid thing! |
| |
| And flushed yet more (you horrid!), more goldenly. |
| |
| By Cantwell's offices roved Greaseabloom, by Ceppi's virgins, bright of |
| their oils. Nannetti's father hawked those things about, wheedling at |
| doors as I. Religion pays. Must see him for that par. Eat first. I want. |
| Not yet. At four, she said. Time ever passing. Clockhands turning. On. |
| Where eat? The Clarence, Dolphin. On. For Raoul. Eat. If I net five |
| guineas with those ads. The violet silk petticoats. Not yet. The sweets |
| of sin. |
| |
| Flushed less, still less, goldenly paled. |
| |
| Into their bar strolled Mr Dedalus. Chips, picking chips off one of his |
| rocky thumbnails. Chips. He strolled. |
| |
| --O, welcome back, miss Douce. |
| |
| He held her hand. Enjoyed her holidays? |
| |
| --Tiptop. |
| |
| He hoped she had nice weather in Rostrevor. |
| |
| --Gorgeous, she said. Look at the holy show I am. Lying out on the |
| strand all day. |
| |
| Bronze whiteness. |
| |
| --That was exceedingly naughty of you, Mr Dedalus told her and pressed |
| her hand indulgently. Tempting poor simple males. |
| |
| Miss Douce of satin douced her arm away. |
| |
| --O go away! she said. You're very simple, I don't think. |
| |
| He was. |
| |
| --Well now I am, he mused. I looked so simple in the cradle they |
| christened me simple Simon. |
| |
| --You must have been a doaty, miss Douce made answer. And what did the |
| doctor order today? |
| |
| --Well now, he mused, whatever you say yourself. I think I'll trouble |
| you for some fresh water and a half glass of whisky. |
| |
| Jingle. |
| |
| --With the greatest alacrity, miss Douce agreed. |
| |
| With grace of alacrity towards the mirror gilt Cantrell and Cochrane's |
| she turned herself. With grace she tapped a measure of gold whisky from |
| her crystal keg. Forth from the skirt of his coat Mr Dedalus brought |
| pouch and pipe. Alacrity she served. He blew through the flue two husky |
| fifenotes. |
| |
| --By Jove, he mused, I often wanted to see the Mourne mountains. Must |
| be a great tonic in the air down there. But a long threatening comes at |
| last, they say. Yes. Yes. |
| |
| Yes. He fingered shreds of hair, her maidenhair, her mermaid's, into the |
| bowl. Chips. Shreds. Musing. Mute. |
| |
| None nought said nothing. Yes. |
| |
| Gaily miss Douce polished a tumbler, trilling: |
| |
| --_O, Idolores, queen of the eastern seas!_ |
| |
| --Was Mr Lidwell in today? |
| |
| In came Lenehan. Round him peered Lenehan. Mr Bloom reached Essex |
| bridge. Yes, Mr Bloom crossed bridge of Yessex. To Martha I must write. |
| Buy paper. Daly's. Girl there civil. Bloom. Old Bloom. Blue bloom is on |
| the rye. |
| |
| --He was in at lunchtime, miss Douce said. |
| |
| Lenehan came forward. |
| |
| --Was Mr Boylan looking for me? |
| |
| He asked. She answered: |
| |
| --Miss Kennedy, was Mr Boylan in while I was upstairs? |
| |
| She asked. Miss voice of Kennedy answered, a second teacup poised, her |
| gaze upon a page: |
| |
| --No. He was not. |
| |
| Miss gaze of Kennedy, heard, not seen, read on. Lenehan round the |
| sandwichbell wound his round body round. |
| |
| --Peep! Who's in the corner? |
| |
| No glance of Kennedy rewarding him he yet made overtures. To mind her |
| stops. To read only the black ones: round o and crooked ess. |
| |
| Jingle jaunty jingle. |
| |
| Girlgold she read and did not glance. Take no notice. She took no notice |
| while he read by rote a solfa fable for her, plappering flatly: |
| |
| --Ah fox met ah stork. Said thee fox too thee stork: Will you put your |
| bill down inn my troath and pull upp ah bone? |
| |
| He droned in vain. Miss Douce turned to her tea aside. |
| |
| He sighed aside: |
| |
| --Ah me! O my! |
| |
| He greeted Mr Dedalus and got a nod. |
| |
| --Greetings from the famous son of a famous father. |
| |
| --Who may he be? Mr Dedalus asked. |
| |
| Lenehan opened most genial arms. Who? |
| |
| --Who may he be? he asked. Can you ask? Stephen, the youthful bard. |
| |
| Dry. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus, famous father, laid by his dry filled pipe. |
| |
| --I see, he said. I didn't recognise him for the moment. I hear he is |
| keeping very select company. Have you seen him lately? |
| |
| He had. |
| |
| --I quaffed the nectarbowl with him this very day, said Lenehan. In |
| Mooney's _en ville_ and in Mooney's _sur mer._ He had received the rhino |
| for the labour of his muse. |
| |
| He smiled at bronze's teabathed lips, at listening lips and eyes: |
| |
| --The _élite_ of Erin hung upon his lips. The ponderous pundit, Hugh |
| |
| MacHugh, Dublin's most brilliant scribe and editor and that minstrel boy |
| of the wild wet west who is known by the euphonious appellation of the |
| O'Madden Burke. |
| |
| After an interval Mr Dedalus raised his grog and |
| |
| --That must have been highly diverting, said he. I see. |
| |
| He see. He drank. With faraway mourning mountain eye. Set down his |
| glass. |
| |
| He looked towards the saloon door. |
| |
| --I see you have moved the piano. |
| |
| --The tuner was in today, miss Douce replied, tuning it for the smoking |
| concert and I never heard such an exquisite player. |
| |
| --Is that a fact? |
| |
| --Didn't he, miss Kennedy? The real classical, you know. And blind too, |
| poor fellow. Not twenty I'm sure he was. |
| |
| --Is that a fact? Mr Dedalus said. |
| |
| He drank and strayed away. |
| |
| --So sad to look at his face, miss Douce condoled. |
| |
| God's curse on bitch's bastard. |
| |
| Tink to her pity cried a diner's bell. To the door of the bar and |
| diningroom came bald Pat, came bothered Pat, came Pat, waiter of Ormond. |
| Lager for diner. Lager without alacrity she served. |
| |
| With patience Lenehan waited for Boylan with impatience, for |
| jinglejaunty blazes boy. |
| |
| Upholding the lid he (who?) gazed in the coffin (coffin?) at the oblique |
| triple (piano!) wires. He pressed (the same who pressed indulgently her |
| hand), soft pedalling, a triple of keys to see the thicknesses of felt |
| advancing, to hear the muffled hammerfall in action. |
| |
| Two sheets cream vellum paper one reserve two envelopes when I was in |
| Wisdom Hely's wise Bloom in Daly's Henry Flower bought. Are you not |
| happy in your home? Flower to console me and a pin cuts lo. Means |
| something, language of flow. Was it a daisy? Innocence that is. |
| Respectable girl meet after mass. Thanks awfully muchly. Wise Bloom eyed |
| on the door a poster, a swaying mermaid smoking mid nice waves. Smoke |
| mermaids, coolest whiff of all. Hair streaming: lovelorn. For some man. |
| For Raoul. He eyed and saw afar on Essex bridge a gay hat riding on a |
| jaunting car. It is. Again. Third time. Coincidence. |
| |
| Jingling on supple rubbers it jaunted from the bridge to Ormond quay. |
| Follow. Risk it. Go quick. At four. Near now. Out. |
| |
| --Twopence, sir, the shopgirl dared to say. |
| |
| --Aha... I was forgetting... Excuse... |
| |
| --And four. |
| |
| At four she. Winsomely she on Bloohimwhom smiled. Bloo smi qui go. |
| Ternoon. Think you're the only pebble on the beach? Does that to all. |
| |
| For men. |
| |
| In drowsy silence gold bent on her page. |
| |
| From the saloon a call came, long in dying. That was a tuningfork the |
| tuner had that he forgot that he now struck. A call again. That he now |
| poised that it now throbbed. You hear? It throbbed, pure, purer, softly |
| and softlier, its buzzing prongs. Longer in dying call. |
| |
| Pat paid for diner's popcorked bottle: and over tumbler, tray and |
| popcorked bottle ere he went he whispered, bald and bothered, with miss |
| |
| Douce. |
| |
| --_The bright stars fade_... |
| |
| A voiceless song sang from within, singing: |
| |
| --... _the morn is breaking._ |
| |
| A duodene of birdnotes chirruped bright treble answer under sensitive |
| hands. Brightly the keys, all twinkling, linked, all harpsichording, |
| called to a voice to sing the strain of dewy morn, of youth, of love's |
| leavetaking, life's, love's morn. |
| |
| --_The dewdrops pearl_... |
| |
| Lenehan's lips over the counter lisped a low whistle of decoy. |
| |
| --But look this way, he said, rose of Castile. |
| |
| Jingle jaunted by the curb and stopped. |
| |
| She rose and closed her reading, rose of Castile: fretted, forlorn, |
| dreamily rose. |
| |
| --Did she fall or was she pushed? he asked her. |
| |
| She answered, slighting: |
| |
| --Ask no questions and you'll hear no lies. |
| |
| Like lady, ladylike. |
| |
| Blazes Boylan's smart tan shoes creaked on the barfloor where he strode. |
| Yes, gold from anear by bronze from afar. Lenehan heard and knew and |
| hailed him: |
| |
| --See the conquering hero comes. |
| |
| Between the car and window, warily walking, went Bloom, unconquered |
| hero. See me he might. The seat he sat on: warm. Black wary hecat walked |
| towards Richie Goulding's legal bag, lifted aloft, saluting. |
| |
| --_And I from thee_... |
| |
| --I heard you were round, said Blazes Boylan. |
| |
| He touched to fair miss Kennedy a rim of his slanted straw. She smiled |
| on him. But sister bronze outsmiled her, preening for him her richer |
| hair, a bosom and a rose. |
| |
| Smart Boylan bespoke potions. |
| |
| --What's your cry? Glass of bitter? Glass of bitter, please, and a |
| sloegin for me. Wire in yet? |
| |
| Not yet. At four she. Who said four? |
| |
| Cowley's red lugs and bulging apple in the door of the sheriff's office. |
| |
| Avoid. Goulding a chance. What is he doing in the Ormond? Car waiting. |
| |
| Wait. |
| |
| Hello. Where off to? Something to eat? I too was just. In here. What, |
| Ormond? Best value in Dublin. Is that so? Diningroom. Sit tight there. |
| See, not be seen. I think I'll join you. Come on. Richie led on. Bloom |
| followed bag. Dinner fit for a prince. |
| |
| Miss Douce reached high to take a flagon, stretching her satin arm, her |
| bust, that all but burst, so high. |
| |
| --O! O! jerked Lenehan, gasping at each stretch. O! |
| |
| But easily she seized her prey and led it low in triumph. |
| |
| --Why don't you grow? asked Blazes Boylan. |
| |
| Shebronze, dealing from her oblique jar thick syrupy liquor for his |
| lips, looked as it flowed (flower in his coat: who gave him?), and |
| syrupped with her voice: |
| |
| --Fine goods in small parcels. |
| |
| That is to say she. Neatly she poured slowsyrupy sloe. |
| |
| --Here's fortune, Blazes said. |
| |
| He pitched a broad coin down. Coin rang. |
| |
| --Hold on, said Lenehan, till I... |
| |
| --Fortune, he wished, lifting his bubbled ale. |
| |
| --Sceptre will win in a canter, he said. |
| |
| --I plunged a bit, said Boylan winking and drinking. Not on my own, you |
| know. Fancy of a friend of mine. |
| |
| Lenehan still drank and grinned at his tilted ale and at miss Douce's |
| lips that all but hummed, not shut, the oceansong her lips had trilled. |
| |
| Idolores. The eastern seas. |
| |
| Clock whirred. Miss Kennedy passed their way (flower, wonder who gave), |
| bearing away teatray. Clock clacked. |
| |
| Miss Douce took Boylan's coin, struck boldly the cashregister. It |
| clanged. Clock clacked. Fair one of Egypt teased and sorted in the till |
| and hummed and handed coins in change. Look to the west. A clack. For |
| me. |
| |
| --What time is that? asked Blazes Boylan. Four? |
| |
| O'clock. |
| |
| Lenehan, small eyes ahunger on her humming, bust ahumming, tugged Blazes |
| Boylan's elbowsleeve. |
| |
| --Let's hear the time, he said. |
| |
| The bag of Goulding, Collis, Ward led Bloom by ryebloom flowered tables. |
| Aimless he chose with agitated aim, bald Pat attending, a table near |
| the door. Be near. At four. Has he forgotten? Perhaps a trick. Not come: |
| whet appetite. I couldn't do. Wait, wait. Pat, waiter, waited. |
| |
| Sparkling bronze azure eyed Blazure's skyblue bow and eyes. |
| |
| --Go on, pressed Lenehan. There's no-one. He never heard. |
| |
| --... _to Flora's lips did hie._ |
| |
| High, a high note pealed in the treble clear. |
| |
| Bronzedouce communing with her rose that sank and rose sought |
| |
| Blazes Boylan's flower and eyes. |
| |
| --Please, please. |
| |
| He pleaded over returning phrases of avowal. |
| |
| --_I could not leave thee_... |
| |
| --Afterwits, miss Douce promised coyly. |
| |
| --No, now, urged Lenehan. _Sonnezlacloche!_ O do! There's no-one. |
| |
| She looked. Quick. Miss Kenn out of earshot. Sudden bent. Two kindling |
| faces watched her bend. |
| |
| Quavering the chords strayed from the air, found it again, lost chord, |
| and lost and found it, faltering. |
| |
| --Go on! Do! _Sonnez!_ |
| |
| Bending, she nipped a peak of skirt above her knee. Delayed. Taunted |
| them still, bending, suspending, with wilful eyes. |
| |
| _--Sonnez!_ |
| |
| Smack. She set free sudden in rebound her nipped elastic garter |
| smackwarm against her smackable a woman's warmhosed thigh. |
| |
| --_La Cloche!_ cried gleeful Lenehan. Trained by owner. No sawdust |
| there. |
| |
| She smilesmirked supercilious (wept! aren't men?), but, lightward |
| gliding, mild she smiled on Boylan. |
| |
| --You're the essence of vulgarity, she in gliding said. |
| |
| Boylan, eyed, eyed. Tossed to fat lips his chalice, drank off his |
| chalice tiny, sucking the last fat violet syrupy drops. His spellbound |
| eyes went after, after her gliding head as it went down the bar by |
| mirrors, gilded arch for ginger ale, hock and claret glasses shimmering, |
| a spiky shell, where it concerted, mirrored, bronze with sunnier bronze. |
| |
| Yes, bronze from anearby. |
| |
| --... _Sweetheart, goodbye!_ |
| |
| --I'm off, said Boylan with impatience. |
| |
| He slid his chalice brisk away, grasped his change. |
| |
| --Wait a shake, begged Lenehan, drinking quickly. I wanted to tell you. |
| |
| Tom Rochford... |
| |
| --Come on to blazes, said Blazes Boylan, going. |
| |
| Lenehan gulped to go. |
| |
| --Got the horn or what? he said. Wait. I'm coming. |
| |
| He followed the hasty creaking shoes but stood by nimbly by the |
| threshold, saluting forms, a bulky with a slender. |
| |
| --How do you do, Mr Dollard? |
| |
| --Eh? How do? How do? Ben Dollard's vague bass answered, turning an |
| instant from Father Cowley's woe. He won't give you any trouble, Bob. |
| Alf Bergan will speak to the long fellow. We'll put a barleystraw in |
| that Judas Iscariot's ear this time. |
| |
| Sighing Mr Dedalus came through the saloon, a finger soothing an eyelid. |
| |
| --Hoho, we will, Ben Dollard yodled jollily. Come on, Simon. Give us a |
| ditty. We heard the piano. |
| |
| Bald Pat, bothered waiter, waited for drink orders. Power for Richie. |
| And Bloom? Let me see. Not make him walk twice. His corns. Four now. How |
| warm this black is. Course nerves a bit. Refracts (is it?) heat. Let me |
| see. Cider. Yes, bottle of cider. |
| |
| --What's that? Mr Dedalus said. I was only vamping, man. |
| |
| --Come on, come on, Ben Dollard called. Begone dull care. Come, Bob. |
| |
| He ambled Dollard, bulky slops, before them (hold that fellow with the: |
| hold him now) into the saloon. He plumped him Dollard on the stool. His |
| gouty paws plumped chords. Plumped, stopped abrupt. |
| |
| Bald Pat in the doorway met tealess gold returning. Bothered, he wanted |
| Power and cider. Bronze by the window, watched, bronze from afar. |
| |
| Jingle a tinkle jaunted. |
| |
| Bloom heard a jing, a little sound. He's off. Light sob of breath Bloom |
| sighed on the silent bluehued flowers. Jingling. He's gone. Jingle. |
| Hear. |
| |
| --Love and War, Ben, Mr Dedalus said. God be with old times. |
| |
| Miss Douce's brave eyes, unregarded, turned from the crossblind, smitten |
| by sunlight. Gone. Pensive (who knows?), smitten (the smiting light), |
| she lowered the dropblind with a sliding cord. She drew down pensive |
| (why did he go so quick when I?) about her bronze, over the bar where |
| bald stood by sister gold, inexquisite contrast, contrast inexquisite |
| nonexquisite, slow cool dim seagreen sliding depth of shadow, _eau de |
| Nil._ |
| |
| --Poor old Goodwin was the pianist that night, Father Cowley reminded |
| them. There was a slight difference of opinion between himself and the |
| Collard grand. |
| |
| There was. |
| |
| --A symposium all his own, Mr Dedalus said. The devil wouldn't stop him. |
| He was a crotchety old fellow in the primary stage of drink. |
| |
| --God, do you remember? Ben bulky Dollard said, turning from the |
| punished keyboard. And by Japers I had no wedding garment. |
| |
| They laughed all three. He had no wed. All trio laughed. No wedding |
| garment. |
| |
| --Our friend Bloom turned in handy that night, Mr Dedalus said. Where's |
| my pipe, by the way? |
| |
| He wandered back to the bar to the lost chord pipe. Bald Pat carried two |
| diners' drinks, Richie and Poldy. And Father Cowley laughed again. |
| |
| --I saved the situation, Ben, I think. |
| |
| --You did, averred Ben Dollard. I remember those tight trousers too. |
| That was a brilliant idea, Bob. |
| |
| Father Cowley blushed to his brilliant purply lobes. He saved the situa. |
| Tight trou. Brilliant ide. |
| |
| --I knew he was on the rocks, he said. The wife was playing the piano in |
| the coffee palace on Saturdays for a very trifling consideration and |
| who was it gave me the wheeze she was doing the other business? Do you |
| remember? We had to search all Holles street to find them till the |
| chap in Keogh's gave us the number. Remember? Ben remembered, his broad |
| visage wondering. |
| |
| --By God, she had some luxurious operacloaks and things there. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus wandered back, pipe in hand. |
| |
| --Merrion square style. Balldresses, by God, and court dresses. He |
| wouldn't take any money either. What? Any God's quantity of cocked hats |
| and boleros and trunkhose. What? |
| |
| --Ay, ay, Mr Dedalus nodded. Mrs Marion Bloom has left off clothes of |
| all descriptions. |
| |
| Jingle jaunted down the quays. Blazes sprawled on bounding tyres. |
| |
| Liver and bacon. Steak and kidney pie. Right, sir. Right, Pat. |
| |
| Mrs Marion. Met him pike hoses. Smell of burn. Of Paul de Kock. Nice |
| name he. |
| |
| --What's this her name was? A buxom lassy. Marion... |
| |
| --Tweedy. |
| |
| --Yes. Is she alive? |
| |
| --And kicking. |
| |
| --She was a daughter of... |
| |
| --Daughter of the regiment. |
| |
| --Yes, begad. I remember the old drummajor. |
| |
| Mr Dedalus struck, whizzed, lit, puffed savoury puff after |
| |
| --Irish? I don't know, faith. Is she, Simon? |
| |
| Puff after stiff, a puff, strong, savoury, crackling. |
| |
| --Buccinator muscle is... What?... Bit rusty... O, she is... My |
| Irish Molly, O. |
| |
| He puffed a pungent plumy blast. |
| |
| --From the rock of Gibraltar... all the way. |
| |
| They pined in depth of ocean shadow, gold by the beerpull, bronze |
| by maraschino, thoughtful all two. Mina Kennedy, 4 Lismore terrace, |
| Drumcondra with Idolores, a queen, Dolores, silent. |
| |
| Pat served, uncovered dishes. Leopold cut liverslices. As said before he |
| ate with relish the inner organs, nutty gizzards, fried cods' roes while |
| Richie Goulding, Collis, Ward ate steak and kidney, steak then kidney, |
| bite by bite of pie he ate Bloom ate they ate. |
| |
| Bloom with Goulding, married in silence, ate. Dinners fit for princes. |
| |
| By Bachelor's walk jogjaunty jingled Blazes Boylan, bachelor, in sun in |
| heat, mare's glossy rump atrot, with flick of whip, on bounding tyres: |
| sprawled, warmseated, Boylan impatience, ardentbold. Horn. Have you the? |
| Horn. Have you the? Haw haw horn. |
| |
| Over their voices Dollard bassooned attack, booming over bombarding |
| chords: |
| |
| --_When love absorbs my ardent soul_... |
| |
| Roll of Bensoulbenjamin rolled to the quivery loveshivery roofpanes. |
| |
| --War! War! cried Father Cowley. You're the warrior. |
| |
| --So I am, Ben Warrior laughed. I was thinking of your landlord. Love or |
| money. |
| |
| He stopped. He wagged huge beard, huge face over his blunder huge. |
| |
| --Sure, you'd burst the tympanum of her ear, man, Mr Dedalus said |
| through smoke aroma, with an organ like yours. |
| |
| In bearded abundant laughter Dollard shook upon the keyboard. He would. |
| |
| --Not to mention another membrane, Father Cowley added. Half time, Ben. |
| _Amoroso ma non troppo._ Let me there. |
| |
| Miss Kennedy served two gentlemen with tankards of cool stout. She |
| passed a remark. It was indeed, first gentleman said, beautiful weather. |
| They drank cool stout. Did she know where the lord lieutenant was going? |
| And heard steelhoofs ringhoof ring. No, she couldn't say. But it would |
| be in the paper. O, she need not trouble. No trouble. She waved about |
| her outspread _Independent,_ searching, the lord lieutenant, her |
| pinnacles of hair slowmoving, lord lieuten. Too much trouble, |
| first gentleman said. O, not in the least. Way he looked that. Lord |
| lieutenant. Gold by bronze heard iron steel. |
| |
| --............ _my ardent soul_ |
| _I care not foror the morrow._ |
| |
| In liver gravy Bloom mashed mashed potatoes. Love and War someone is. |
| Ben Dollard's famous. Night he ran round to us to borrow a dress suit |
| for that concert. Trousers tight as a drum on him. Musical porkers. |
| Molly did laugh when he went out. Threw herself back across the bed, |
| screaming, kicking. With all his belongings on show. O saints above, |
| I'm drenched! O, the women in the front row! O, I never laughed so many! |
| Well, of course that's what gives him the base barreltone. For instance |
| eunuchs. Wonder who's playing. Nice touch. Must be Cowley. Musical. |
| Knows whatever note you play. Bad breath he has, poor chap. Stopped. |
| |
| Miss Douce, engaging, Lydia Douce, bowed to suave solicitor, George |
| Lidwell, gentleman, entering. Good afternoon. She gave her moist (a |
| lady's) hand to his firm clasp. Afternoon. Yes, she was back. To the old |
| dingdong again. |
| |
| --Your friends are inside, Mr Lidwell. |
| |
| George Lidwell, suave, solicited, held a lydiahand. |
| |
| Bloom ate liv as said before. Clean here at least. That chap in the |
| Burton, gummy with gristle. No-one here: Goulding and I. Clean tables, |
| flowers, mitres of napkins. Pat to and fro. Bald Pat. Nothing to do. |
| Best value in Dub. |
| |
| Piano again. Cowley it is. Way he sits in to it, like one together, |
| mutual understanding. Tiresome shapers scraping fiddles, eye on the |
| bowend, sawing the cello, remind you of toothache. Her high long snore. |
| Night we were in the box. Trombone under blowing like a grampus, between |
| the acts, other brass chap unscrewing, emptying spittle. Conductor's |
| legs too, bagstrousers, jiggedy jiggedy. Do right to hide them. |
| |
| Jiggedy jingle jaunty jaunty. |
| |
| Only the harp. Lovely. Gold glowering light. Girl touched it. Poop of a |
| lovely. Gravy's rather good fit for a. Golden ship. Erin. The harp that |
| once or twice. Cool hands. Ben Howth, the rhododendrons. We are their |
| harps. I. He. Old. Young. |
| |
| --Ah, I couldn't, man, Mr Dedalus said, shy, listless. |
| |
| Strongly. |
| |
| --Go on, blast you! Ben Dollard growled. Get it out in bits. |
| |
| --_M'appari,_ Simon, Father Cowley said. |
| |
| Down stage he strode some paces, grave, tall in affliction, his long |
| arms outheld. Hoarsely the apple of his throat hoarsed softly. Softly he |
| sang to a dusty seascape there: _A Last Farewell._ A headland, a ship, a |
| sail upon the billows. Farewell. A lovely girl, her veil awave upon the |
| wind upon the headland, wind around her. |
| |
| Cowley sang: |
| |
| _--M'appari tutt'amor: |
| Il mio sguardo l'incontr..._ |
| |
| She waved, unhearing Cowley, her veil, to one departing, dear one, to |
| wind, love, speeding sail, return. |
| |
| --Go on, Simon. |
| |
| --Ah, sure, my dancing days are done, Ben... Well... |
| |
| Mr Dedalus laid his pipe to rest beside the tuningfork and, sitting, |
| touched the obedient keys. |
| |
| --No, Simon, Father Cowley turned. Play it in the original. One flat. |
| |
| The keys, obedient, rose higher, told, faltered, confessed, confused. |
| |
| Up stage strode Father Cowley. |
| |
| --Here, Simon, I'll accompany you, he said. Get up. |
| |
| By Graham Lemon's pineapple rock, by Elvery's elephant jingly jogged. |
| Steak, kidney, liver, mashed, at meat fit for princes sat princes Bloom |
| and Goulding. Princes at meat they raised and drank, Power and cider. |
| |
| Most beautiful tenor air ever written, Richie said: _Sonnambula._ He |
| heard Joe Maas sing that one night. Ah, what M'Guckin! Yes. In his way. |
| Choirboy style. Maas was the boy. Massboy. A lyrical tenor if you like. |
| Never forget it. Never. |
| |
| Tenderly Bloom over liverless bacon saw the tightened features strain. |
| Backache he. Bright's bright eye. Next item on the programme. Paying the |
| piper. Pills, pounded bread, worth a guinea a box. Stave it off awhile. |
| Sings too: _Down among the dead men._ Appropriate. Kidney pie. Sweets to |
| the. Not making much hand of it. Best value in. Characteristic of him. |
| Power. Particular about his drink. Flaw in the glass, fresh Vartry |
| water. Fecking matches from counters to save. Then squander a sovereign |
| in dribs and drabs. And when he's wanted not a farthing. Screwed |
| refusing to pay his fare. Curious types. |
| |
| Never would Richie forget that night. As long as he lived: never. In the |
| gods of the old Royal with little Peake. And when the first note. |
| |
| Speech paused on Richie's lips. |
| |
| Coming out with a whopper now. Rhapsodies about damn all. |
| |
| Believes his own lies. Does really. Wonderful liar. But want a good |
| memory. |
| |
| --Which air is that? asked Leopold Bloom. |
| |
| --_All is lost now_. |
| |
| Richie cocked his lips apout. A low incipient note sweet banshee |
| murmured: all. A thrush. A throstle. His breath, birdsweet, good teeth |
| he's proud of, fluted with plaintive woe. Is lost. Rich sound. Two |
| notes in one there. Blackbird I heard in the hawthorn valley. Taking my |
| motives he twined and turned them. All most too new call is lost in all. |
| Echo. How sweet the answer. How is that done? All lost now. Mournful he |
| whistled. Fall, surrender, lost. |
| |
| Bloom bent leopold ear, turning a fringe of doyley down under the vase. |
| Order. Yes, I remember. Lovely air. In sleep she went to him. Innocence |
| in the moon. Brave. Don't know their danger. Still hold her back. Call |
| name. Touch water. Jingle jaunty. Too late. She longed to go. That's |
| why. Woman. As easy stop the sea. Yes: all is lost. |
| |
| --A beautiful air, said Bloom lost Leopold. I know it well. |
| |
| Never in all his life had Richie Goulding. |
| |
| He knows it well too. Or he feels. Still harping on his daughter. Wise |
| child that knows her father, Dedalus said. Me? |
| |
| Bloom askance over liverless saw. Face of the all is lost. Rollicking |
| Richie once. Jokes old stale now. Wagging his ear. Napkinring in his |
| eye. Now begging letters he sends his son with. Crosseyed Walter sir I |
| did sir. Wouldn't trouble only I was expecting some money. Apologise. |
| |
| Piano again. Sounds better than last time I heard. Tuned probably. |
| Stopped again. |
| |
| Dollard and Cowley still urged the lingering singer out with it. |
| |
| --With it, Simon. |
| |
| --It, Simon. |
| |
| --Ladies and gentlemen, I am most deeply obliged by your kind |
| solicitations. |
| |
| --It, Simon. |
| |
| --I have no money but if you will lend me your attention I shall |
| endeavour to sing to you of a heart bowed down. |
| |
| By the sandwichbell in screening shadow Lydia, her bronze and rose, a |
| lady's grace, gave and withheld: as in cool glaucous _eau de Nil_ Mina |
| to tankards two her pinnacles of gold. |
| |
| The harping chords of prelude closed. A chord, longdrawn, expectant, |
| drew a voice away. |
| |
| --_When first I saw that form endearing_... |
| |
| Richie turned. |
| |
| --Si Dedalus' voice, he said. |
| |
| Braintipped, cheek touched with flame, they listened feeling that flow |
| endearing flow over skin limbs human heart soul spine. Bloom signed to |
| Pat, bald Pat is a waiter hard of hearing, to set ajar the door of the |
| bar. The door of the bar. So. That will do. Pat, waiter, waited, waiting |
| to hear, for he was hard of hear by the door. |
| |
| --_Sorrow from me seemed to depart._ |
| |
| Through the hush of air a voice sang to them, low, not rain, not leaves |
| in murmur, like no voice of strings or reeds or whatdoyoucallthem |
| dulcimers touching their still ears with words, still hearts of their |
| each his remembered lives. Good, good to hear: sorrow from them each |
| seemed to from both depart when first they heard. When first they saw, |
| lost Richie Poldy, mercy of beauty, heard from a person wouldn't expect |
| it in the least, her first merciful lovesoft oftloved word. |
| |
| Love that is singing: love's old sweet song. Bloom unwound slowly the |
| elastic band of his packet. Love's old sweet _sonnez la_ gold. Bloom |
| wound a skein round four forkfingers, stretched it, relaxed, and wound |
| it round his troubled double, fourfold, in octave, gyved them fast. |
| |
| --_Full of hope and all delighted_... |
| |
| Tenors get women by the score. Increase their flow. Throw flower at his |
| feet. When will we meet? My head it simply. Jingle all delighted. He |
| can't sing for tall hats. Your head it simply swurls. Perfumed for him. |
| What perfume does your wife? I want to know. Jing. Stop. Knock. Last |
| look at mirror always before she answers the door. The hall. There? How |
| do you? I do well. There? What? Or? Phial of cachous, kissing comfits, |
| in her satchel. Yes? Hands felt for the opulent. |
| |
| Alas the voice rose, sighing, changed: loud, full, shining, proud. |
| |
| --_But alas, 'twas idle dreaming_... |
| |
| Glorious tone he has still. Cork air softer also their brogue. Silly |
| man! Could have made oceans of money. Singing wrong words. Wore out |
| his wife: now sings. But hard to tell. Only the two themselves. If he |
| doesn't break down. Keep a trot for the avenue. His hands and feet sing |
| too. Drink. Nerves overstrung. Must be abstemious to sing. Jenny Lind |
| soup: stock, sage, raw eggs, half pint of cream. For creamy dreamy. |
| |
| Tenderness it welled: slow, swelling, full it throbbed. That's the chat. |
| Ha, give! Take! Throb, a throb, a pulsing proud erect. |
| |
| Words? Music? No: it's what's behind. |
| |
| Bloom looped, unlooped, noded, disnoded. |
| |
| Bloom. Flood of warm jamjam lickitup secretness flowed to flow in music |
| out, in desire, dark to lick flow invading. Tipping her tepping her |
| tapping her topping her. Tup. Pores to dilate dilating. Tup. The joy |
| the feel the warm the. Tup. To pour o'er sluices pouring gushes. Flood, |
| gush, flow, joygush, tupthrob. Now! Language of love. |
| |
| --... _ray of hope is_... |
| |
| Beaming. Lydia for Lidwell squeak scarcely hear so ladylike the muse |
| unsqueaked a ray of hopk. |
| |
| _Martha_ it is. Coincidence. Just going to write. Lionel's song. |
| Lovely name you have. Can't write. Accept my little pres. Play on her |
| heartstrings pursestrings too. She's a. I called you naughty boy. Still |
| the name: Martha. How strange! Today. |
| |
| The voice of Lionel returned, weaker but unwearied. It sang again to |
| Richie Poldy Lydia Lidwell also sang to Pat open mouth ear waiting to |
| wait. How first he saw that form endearing, how sorrow seemed to part, |
| how look, form, word charmed him Gould Lidwell, won Pat Bloom's heart. |
| |
| Wish I could see his face, though. Explain better. Why the barber in |
| Drago's always looked my face when I spoke his face in the glass. Still |
| hear it better here than in the bar though farther. |
| |
| --_Each graceful look_... |
| |
| First night when first I saw her at Mat Dillon's in Terenure. Yellow, |
| black lace she wore. Musical chairs. We two the last. Fate. After her. |
| Fate. |
| |
| Round and round slow. Quick round. We two. All looked. Halt. Down she |
| sat. All ousted looked. Lips laughing. Yellow knees. |
| |
| --_Charmed my eye_... |
| |
| Singing. _Waiting_ she sang. I turned her music. Full voice of perfume |
| of what perfume does your lilactrees. Bosom I saw, both full, throat |
| warbling. First I saw. She thanked me. Why did she me? Fate. Spanishy |
| eyes. Under a peartree alone patio this hour in old Madrid one side in |
| shadow Dolores shedolores. At me. Luring. Ah, alluring. |
| |
| --_Martha! Ah, Martha!_ |
| |
| Quitting all languor Lionel cried in grief, in cry of passion dominant |
| to love to return with deepening yet with rising chords of harmony. In |
| cry of lionel loneliness that she should know, must martha feel. For |
| only her he waited. Where? Here there try there here all try where. |
| Somewhere. |
| |
| --_Co-ome, thou lost one! |
| Co-ome, thou dear one!_ |
| |
| Alone. One love. One hope. One comfort me. Martha, chestnote, return! |
| |
| _--Come!_ |
| |
| It soared, a bird, it held its flight, a swift pure cry, soar silver orb |
| it leaped serene, speeding, sustained, to come, don't spin it out too |
| long long breath he breath long life, soaring high, high resplendent, |
| aflame, crowned, high in the effulgence symbolistic, high, of the |
| etherial bosom, high, of the high vast irradiation everywhere all |
| soaring all around about the all, the endlessnessnessness... |
| |
| --_To me!_ |
| |
| Siopold! |
| |
| Consumed. |
| |
| Come. Well sung. All clapped. She ought to. Come. To me, to him, to her, |
| you too, me, us. |
| |
| --Bravo! Clapclap. Good man, Simon. Clappyclapclap. Encore! Clapclipclap |
| clap. Sound as a bell. Bravo, Simon! Clapclopclap. Encore, enclap, said, |
| cried, clapped all, Ben Dollard, Lydia Douce, George Lidwell, Pat, Mina |
| Kennedy, two gentlemen with two tankards, Cowley, first gent with tank |
| and bronze miss Douce and gold MJiss Mina. |
| |
| Blazes Boylan's smart tan shoes creaked on the barfloor, said before. |
| Jingle by monuments of sir John Gray, Horatio onehandled Nelson, |
| reverend father Theobald Mathew, jaunted, as said before just now. |
| Atrot, in heat, heatseated. _Cloche. Sonnez la. Cloche. Sonnez la._ |
| Slower the mare went up the hill by the Rotunda, Rutland square. Too |
| slow for Boylan, blazes Boylan, impatience Boylan, joggled the mare. |
| |
| An afterclang of Cowley's chords closed, died on the air made richer. |
| |
| And Richie Goulding drank his Power and Leopold Bloom his cider drank, |
| Lidwell his Guinness, second gentleman said they would partake of two |
| more tankards if she did not mind. Miss Kennedy smirked, disserving, |
| coral lips, at first, at second. She did not mind. |
| |
| --Seven days in jail, Ben Dollard said, on bread and water. Then you'd |
| sing, Simon, like a garden thrush. |
| |
| Lionel Simon, singer, laughed. Father Bob Cowley played. Mina Kennedy |
| served. Second gentleman paid. Tom Kernan strutted in. Lydia, admired, |
| admired. But Bloom sang dumb. |
| |
| Admiring. |
| |
| Richie, admiring, descanted on that man's glorious voice. He remembered |
| one night long ago. Never forget that night. Si sang _'Twas rank and |
| fame_: in Ned Lambert's 'twas. Good God he never heard in all his life a |
| note like that he never did _then false one we had better part_ so clear |
| so God he never heard _since love lives not_ a clinking voice lives not |
| ask Lambert he can tell you too. |
| |
| Goulding, a flush struggling in his pale, told Mr Bloom, face of the |
| night, Si in Ned Lambert's, Dedalus house, sang _'Twas rank and fame._ |
| |
| He, Mr Bloom, listened while he, Richie Goulding, told him, Mr Bloom, of |
| the night he, Richie, heard him, Si Dedalus, sing 'TWAS RANK AND FAME in |
| his, Ned Lambert's, house. |
| |
| Brothers-in-law: relations. We never speak as we pass by. Rift in the |
| lute I think. Treats him with scorn. See. He admires him all the more. |
| The night Si sang. The human voice, two tiny silky chords, wonderful, |
| more than all others. |
| |
| That voice was a lamentation. Calmer now. It's in the silence after you |
| feel you hear. Vibrations. Now silent air. |
| |
| Bloom ungyved his crisscrossed hands and with slack fingers plucked the |
| slender catgut thong. He drew and plucked. It buzz, it twanged. While |
| Goulding talked of Barraclough's voice production, while Tom Kernan, |
| harking back in a retrospective sort of arrangement talked to listening |
| Father Cowley, who played a voluntary, who nodded as he played. While |
| big Ben Dollard talked with Simon Dedalus, lighting, who nodded as he |
| smoked, who smoked. |
| |
| Thou lost one. All songs on that theme. Yet more Bloom stretched his |
| string. Cruel it seems. Let people get fond of each other: lure them on. |
| Then tear asunder. Death. Explos. Knock on the head. Outtohelloutofthat. |
| Human life. Dignam. Ugh, that rat's tail wriggling! Five bob I gave. |
| _Corpus paradisum._ Corncrake croaker: belly like a poisoned pup. Gone. |
| They sing. Forgotten. I too; And one day she with. Leave her: get |
| tired. Suffer then. Snivel. Big spanishy eyes goggling at nothing. Her |
| wavyavyeavyheavyeavyevyevyhair un comb:'d. |
| |
| Yet too much happy bores. He stretched more, more. Are you not happy in |
| your? Twang. It snapped. |
| |
| Jingle into Dorset street. |
| |
| Miss Douce withdrew her satiny arm, reproachful, pleased. |
| |
| --Don't make half so free, said she, till we are better acquainted. |
| |
| George Lidwell told her really and truly: but she did not believe. |
| |
| First gentleman told Mina that was so. She asked him was that so. And |
| second tankard told her so. That that was so. |
| |
| Miss Douce, miss Lydia, did not believe: miss Kennedy, Mina, did not |
| believe: George Lidwell, no: miss Dou did not: the first, the first: |
| gent with the tank: believe, no, no: did not, miss Kenn: Lidlydiawell: |
| the tank. |
| |
| Better write it here. Quills in the postoffice chewed and twisted. |
| |
| Bald Pat at a sign drew nigh. A pen and ink. He went. A pad. He went. A |
| pad to blot. He heard, deaf Pat. |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Bloom said, teasing the curling catgut line. It certainly is. |
| Few lines will do. My present. All that Italian florid music is. Who |
| is this wrote? Know the name you know better. Take out sheet notepaper, |
| envelope: unconcerned. It's so characteristic. |
| |
| --Grandest number in the whole opera, Goulding said. |
| |
| --It is, Bloom said. |
| |
| Numbers it is. All music when you come to think. Two multiplied by two |
| divided by half is twice one. Vibrations: chords those are. One plus two |
| plus six is seven. Do anything you like with figures juggling. Always |
| find out this equal to that. Symmetry under a cemetery wall. He doesn't |
| see my mourning. Callous: all for his own gut. Musemathematics. And you |
| think you're listening to the etherial. But suppose you said it like: |
| Martha, seven times nine minus x is thirtyfive thousand. Fall quite |
| flat. It's on account of the sounds it is. |
| |
| Instance he's playing now. Improvising. Might be what you like, till you |
| hear the words. Want to listen sharp. Hard. Begin all right: then hear |
| chords a bit off: feel lost a bit. In and out of sacks, over barrels, |
| through wirefences, obstacle race. Time makes the tune. Question of mood |
| you're in. Still always nice to hear. Except scales up and down, girls |
| learning. Two together nextdoor neighbours. Ought to invent dummy pianos |
| for that. _Blumenlied_ I bought for her. The name. Playing it slow, |
| a girl, night I came home, the girl. Door of the stables near Cecilia |
| street. Milly no taste. Queer because we both, I mean. |
| |
| Bald deaf Pat brought quite flat pad ink. Pat set with ink pen quite |
| flat pad. Pat took plate dish knife fork. Pat went. |
| |
| It was the only language Mr Dedalus said to Ben. He heard them as a |
| boy in Ringabella, Crosshaven, Ringabella, singing their barcaroles. |
| Queenstown harbour full of Italian ships. Walking, you know, Ben, in the |
| moonlight with those earthquake hats. Blending their voices. God, such |
| music, Ben. Heard as a boy. Cross Ringabella haven mooncarole. |
| |
| Sour pipe removed he held a shield of hand beside his lips that cooed a |
| moonlight nightcall, clear from anear, a call from afar, replying. |
| |
| Down the edge of his _Freeman_ baton ranged Bloom's, your other eye, |
| scanning for where did I see that. Callan, Coleman, Dignam Patrick. |
| Heigho! Heigho! Fawcett. Aha! Just I was looking... |
| |
| Hope he's not looking, cute as a rat. He held unfurled his _Freeman._ |
| Can't see now. Remember write Greek ees. Bloom dipped, Bloo mur: dear |
| sir. Dear Henry wrote: dear Mady. Got your lett and flow. Hell did I |
| put? Some pock or oth. It is utterl imposs. Underline _imposs._ To write |
| today. |
| |
| Bore this. Bored Bloom tambourined gently with I am just reflecting |
| fingers on flat pad Pat brought. |
| |
| On. Know what I mean. No, change that ee. Accep my poor litt pres |
| enclos. Ask her no answ. Hold on. Five Dig. Two about here. Penny the |
| gulls. Elijah is com. Seven Davy Byrne's. Is eight about. Say half a |
| crown. My poor little pres: p. o. two and six. Write me a long. Do you |
| despise? Jingle, have you the? So excited. Why do you call me naught? |
| You naughty too? O, Mairy lost the string of her. Bye for today. Yes, |
| yes, will tell you. Want to. To keep it up. Call me that other. Other |
| world she wrote. My patience are exhaust. To keep it up. You must |
| believe. Believe. The tank. It. Is. True. |
| |
| Folly am I writing? Husbands don't. That's marriage does, their wives. |
| Because I'm away from. Suppose. But how? She must. Keep young. If she |
| found out. Card in my high grade ha. No, not tell all. Useless pain. If |
| they don't see. Woman. Sauce for the gander. |
| |
| A hackney car, number three hundred and twentyfour, driver Barton James |
| of number one Harmony avenue, Donnybrook, on which sat a fare, a young |
| gentleman, stylishly dressed in an indigoblue serge suit made by George |
| Robert Mesias, tailor and cutter, of number five Eden quay, and wearing |
| a straw hat very dressy, bought of John Plasto of number one Great |
| Brunswick street, hatter. Eh? This is the jingle that joggled and |
| jingled. By Dlugacz' porkshop bright tubes of Agendath trotted a |
| gallantbuttocked mare. |
| |
| --Answering an ad? keen Richie's eyes asked Bloom. |
| |
| --Yes, Mr Bloom said. Town traveller. Nothing doing, I expect. |
| |
| Bloom mur: best references. But Henry wrote: it will excite me. You |
| know how. In haste. Henry. Greek ee. Better add postscript. What is he |
| playing now? Improvising. Intermezzo. P. S. The rum tum tum. How will |
| you pun? You punish me? Crooked skirt swinging, whack by. Tell me I want |
| to. Know. O. Course if I didn't I wouldn't ask. La la la ree. Trails off |
| there sad in minor. Why minor sad? Sign H. They like sad tail at end. P. |
| P. S. La la la ree. I feel so sad today. La ree. So lonely. Dee. |
| |
| He blotted quick on pad of Pat. Envel. Address. Just copy out of paper. |
| Murmured: Messrs Callan, Coleman and Co, limited. Henry wrote: |
| |
| Miss Martha Clifford c/o P. O. Dolphin's Barn Lane Dublin |
| |
| Blot over the other so he can't read. There. Right. Idea prize titbit. |
| Something detective read off blottingpad. Payment at the rate of guinea |
| per col. Matcham often thinks the laughing witch. Poor Mrs Purefoy. U. |
| P: up. |
| |
| Too poetical that about the sad. Music did that. Music hath charms. |
| Shakespeare said. Quotations every day in the year. To be or not to be. |
| Wisdom while you wait. |
| |
| In Gerard's rosery of Fetter lane he walks, greyedauburn. One life is |
| all. One body. Do. But do. |
| |
| Done anyhow. Postal order, stamp. Postoffice lower down. Walk now. |
| Enough. Barney Kiernan's I promised to meet them. Dislike that job. |
| |
| House of mourning. Walk. Pat! Doesn't hear. Deaf beetle he is. |
| |
| Car near there now. Talk. Talk. Pat! Doesn't. Settling those napkins. |
| Lot of ground he must cover in the day. Paint face behind on him then |
| he'd be two. Wish they'd sing more. Keep my mind off. |
| |
| Bald Pat who is bothered mitred the napkins. Pat is a waiter hard of his |
| hearing. Pat is a waiter who waits while you wait. Hee hee hee hee. He |
| waits while you wait. Hee hee. A waiter is he. Hee hee hee hee. He waits |
| while you wait. While you wait if you wait he will wait while you wait. |
| Hee hee hee hee. Hoh. Wait while you wait. |
| |
| Douce now. Douce Lydia. Bronze and rose. |
| |
| She had a gorgeous, simply gorgeous, time. And look at the lovely shell |
| she brought. |
| |
| To the end of the bar to him she bore lightly the spiked and winding |
| seahorn that he, George Lidwell, solicitor, might hear. |
| |
| --Listen! she bade him. |
| |
| Under Tom Kernan's ginhot words the accompanist wove music slow. |
| Authentic fact. How Walter Bapty lost his voice. Well, sir, the husband |
| took him by the throat. _Scoundrel,_ said he, _You'll sing no more |
| lovesongs._ He did, faith, sir Tom. Bob Cowley wove. Tenors get wom. |
| Cowley lay back. |
| |
| Ah, now he heard, she holding it to his ear. Hear! He heard. |
| |
| Wonderful. She held it to her own. And through the sifted light pale |
| gold in contrast glided. To hear. |
| |
| Tap. |
| |
| Bloom through the bardoor saw a shell held at their ears. He heard more |
| faintly that that they heard, each for herself alone, then each for |
| other, hearing the plash of waves, loudly, a silent roar. |
| |
| Bronze by a weary gold, anear, afar, they listened. |
| |
| Her ear too is a shell, the peeping lobe there. Been to the seaside. |
| Lovely seaside girls. Skin tanned raw. Should have put on coldcream |
| first make it brown. Buttered toast. O and that lotion mustn't forget. |
| Fever near her mouth. Your head it simply. Hair braided over: shell with |
| seaweed. Why do they hide their ears with seaweed hair? And Turks the |
| mouth, why? Her eyes over the sheet. Yashmak. Find the way in. A cave. |
| No admittance except on business. |
| |
| The sea they think they hear. Singing. A roar. The blood it is. Souse in |
| the ear sometimes. Well, it's a sea. Corpuscle islands. |
| |
| Wonderful really. So distinct. Again. George Lidwell held its murmur, |
| hearing: then laid it by, gently. |
| |
| --What are the wild waves saying? he asked her, smiled. |
| |
| Charming, seasmiling and unanswering Lydia on Lidwell smiled. |
| |
| Tap. |
| |
| By Larry O'Rourke's, by Larry, bold Larry O', Boylan swayed and Boylan |
| turned. |
| |
| From the forsaken shell miss Mina glided to her tankards waiting. No, |
| she was not so lonely archly miss Douce's head let Mr Lidwell know. |
| Walks in the moonlight by the sea. No, not alone. With whom? She nobly |
| answered: with a gentleman friend. |
| |
| Bob Cowley's twinkling fingers in the treble played again. The landlord |
| has the prior. A little time. Long John. Big Ben. Lightly he played a |
| light bright tinkling measure for tripping ladies, arch and smiling, |
| and for their gallants, gentlemen friends. One: one, one, one, one, one: |
| two, one, three, four. |
| |
| Sea, wind, leaves, thunder, waters, cows lowing, the cattlemarket, |
| cocks, hens don't crow, snakes hissss. There's music everywhere. |
| Ruttledge's door: ee creaking. No, that's noise. Minuet of _Don |
| Giovanni_ he's playing now. Court dresses of all descriptions in castle |
| chambers dancing. Misery. Peasants outside. Green starving faces eating |
| dockleaves. Nice that is. Look: look, look, look, look, look: you look |
| at us. |
| |
| That's joyful I can feel. Never have written it. Why? My joy is other |
| joy. But both are joys. Yes, joy it must be. Mere fact of music shows |
| you are. Often thought she was in the dumps till she began to lilt. Then |
| know. |
| |
| M'Coy valise. My wife and your wife. Squealing cat. Like tearing silk. |
| Tongue when she talks like the clapper of a bellows. They can't manage |
| men's intervals. Gap in their voices too. Fill me. I'm warm, dark, open. |
| Molly in _quis est homo_: Mercadante. My ear against the wall to hear. |
| Want a woman who can deliver the goods. |
| |
| Jog jig jogged stopped. Dandy tan shoe of dandy Boylan socks skyblue |
| clocks came light to earth. |
| |
| O, look we are so! Chamber music. Could make a kind of pun on that. |
| It is a kind of music I often thought when she. Acoustics that is. |
| Tinkling. Empty vessels make most noise. Because the acoustics, the |
| resonance changes according as the weight of the water is equal to |
| the law of falling water. Like those rhapsodies of Liszt's, Hungarian, |
| gipsyeyed. Pearls. Drops. Rain. Diddleiddle addleaddle ooddleooddle. |
| Hissss. Now. Maybe now. Before. |
| |
| One rapped on a door, one tapped with a knock, did he knock Paul de Kock |
| with a loud proud knocker with a cock carracarracarra cock. Cockcock. |
| |
| Tap. |
| |
| --_Qui sdegno,_ Ben, said Father Cowley. |
| |
| --No, Ben, Tom Kernan interfered. _The Croppy Boy._ Our native Doric. |
| |
| --Ay do, Ben, Mr Dedalus said. Good men and true. |
| |
| --Do, do, they begged in one. |
| |
| I'll go. Here, Pat, return. Come. He came, he came, he did not stay. To |
| me. How much? |
| |
| --What key? Six sharps? |
| |
| --F sharp major, Ben Dollard said. |
| |
| Bob Cowley's outstretched talons griped the black deepsounding chords. |
| |
| Must go prince Bloom told Richie prince. No, Richie said. Yes, must. Got |
| money somewhere. He's on for a razzle backache spree. Much? He seehears |
| lipspeech. One and nine. Penny for yourself. Here. Give him twopence |
| tip. Deaf, bothered. But perhaps he has wife and family waiting, waiting |
| Patty come home. Hee hee hee hee. Deaf wait while they wait. |
| |
| But wait. But hear. Chords dark. Lugugugubrious. Low. In a cave of the |
| dark middle earth. Embedded ore. Lumpmusic. |
| |
| The voice of dark age, of unlove, earth's fatigue made grave approach |
| and painful, come from afar, from hoary mountains, called on good men |
| and true. The priest he sought. With him would he speak a word. |
| |
| Tap. |
| |
| Ben Dollard's voice. Base barreltone. Doing his level best to say it. |
| Croak of vast manless moonless womoonless marsh. Other comedown. Big |
| ships' chandler's business he did once. Remember: rosiny ropes, ships' |
| lanterns. Failed to the tune of ten thousand pounds. Now in the Iveagh |
| home. Cubicle number so and so. Number one Bass did that for him. |
| |
| The priest's at home. A false priest's servant bade him welcome. Step |
| in. The holy father. With bows a traitor servant. Curlycues of chords. |
| |
| Ruin them. Wreck their lives. Then build them cubicles to end their days |
| in. Hushaby. Lullaby. Die, dog. Little dog, die. |
| |
| The voice of warning, solemn warning, told them the youth had entered |
| a lonely hall, told them how solemn fell his footsteps there, told them |
| the gloomy chamber, the vested priest sitting to shrive. |
| |
| Decent soul. Bit addled now. Thinks he'll win in _Answers,_ poets' |
| picture puzzle. We hand you crisp five pound note. Bird sitting hatching |
| in a nest. Lay of the last minstrel he thought it was. See blank tee |
| what domestic animal? Tee dash ar most courageous mariner. Good voice he |
| has still. No eunuch yet with all his belongings. |
| |
| Listen. Bloom listened. Richie Goulding listened. And by the door deaf |
| Pat, bald Pat, tipped Pat, listened. The chords harped slower. |
| |
| The voice of penance and of grief came slow, embellished, tremulous. |
| Ben's contrite beard confessed. _in nomine Domini,_ in God's name he |
| knelt. He beat his hand upon his breast, confessing: _mea culpa._ |
| |
| Latin again. That holds them like birdlime. Priest with the communion |
| corpus for those women. Chap in the mortuary, coffin or coffey, |
| _corpusnomine._ Wonder where that rat is by now. Scrape. |
| |
| Tap. |
| |
| They listened. Tankards and miss Kennedy. George Lidwell, eyelid well |
| expressive, fullbusted satin. Kernan. Si. |
| |
| The sighing voice of sorrow sang. His sins. Since Easter he had cursed |
| three times. You bitch's bast. And once at masstime he had gone to play. |
| Once by the churchyard he had passed and for his mother's rest he had |
| not prayed. A boy. A croppy boy. |
| |
| Bronze, listening, by the beerpull gazed far away. Soulfully. Doesn't |
| half know I'm. Molly great dab at seeing anyone looking. |
| |
| Bronze gazed far sideways. Mirror there. Is that best side of her face? |
| They always know. Knock at the door. Last tip to titivate. |
| |
| Cockcarracarra. |
| |
| What do they think when they hear music? Way to catch rattlesnakes. |
| Night Michael Gunn gave us the box. Tuning up. Shah of Persia liked |
| that best. Remind him of home sweet home. Wiped his nose in curtain too. |
| Custom his country perhaps. That's music too. Not as bad as it sounds. |
| Tootling. Brasses braying asses through uptrunks. Doublebasses helpless, |
| gashes in their sides. Woodwinds mooing cows. Semigrand open crocodile |
| music hath jaws. Woodwind like Goodwin's name. |
| |
| She looked fine. Her crocus dress she wore lowcut, belongings on show. |
| Clove her breath was always in theatre when she bent to ask a question. |
| Told her what Spinoza says in that book of poor papa's. Hypnotised, |
| listening. Eyes like that. She bent. Chap in dresscircle staring down |
| into her with his operaglass for all he was worth. Beauty of music you |
| must hear twice. Nature woman half a look. God made the country man the |
| tune. Met him pike hoses. Philosophy. O rocks! |
| |
| All gone. All fallen. At the siege of Ross his father, at Gorey all his |
| brothers fell. To Wexford, we are the boys of Wexford, he would. Last of |
| his name and race. |
| |
| I too. Last of my race. Milly young student. Well, my fault perhaps. No |
| son. Rudy. Too late now. Or if not? If not? If still? |
| |
| He bore no hate. |
| |
| Hate. Love. Those are names. Rudy. Soon I am old. Big Ben his voice |
| unfolded. Great voice Richie Goulding said, a flush struggling in his |
| pale, to Bloom soon old. But when was young? |
| |
| Ireland comes now. My country above the king. She listens. Who fears to |
| speak of nineteen four? Time to be shoving. Looked enough. |
| |
| --_Bless me, father,_ Dollard the croppy cried. _Bless me and let me |
| go._ |
| |
| Tap. |
| |
| Bloom looked, unblessed to go. Got up to kill: on eighteen bob a week. |
| Fellows shell out the dibs. Want to keep your weathereye open. Those |
| girls, those lovely. By the sad sea waves. Chorusgirl's romance. Letters |
| read out for breach of promise. From Chickabiddy's owny Mumpsypum. |
| Laughter in court. Henry. I never signed it. The lovely name you. |
| |
| Low sank the music, air and words. Then hastened. The false priest |
| rustling soldier from his cassock. A yeoman captain. They know it all by |
| heart. The thrill they itch for. Yeoman cap. |
| |
| Tap. Tap. |
| |
| Thrilled she listened, bending in sympathy to hear. |
| |
| Blank face. Virgin should say: or fingered only. Write something on it: |
| page. If not what becomes of them? Decline, despair. Keeps them young. |
| Even admire themselves. See. Play on her. Lip blow. Body of white woman, |
| a flute alive. Blow gentle. Loud. Three holes, all women. Goddess I |
| didn't see. They want it. Not too much polite. That's why he gets them. |
| Gold in your pocket, brass in your face. Say something. Make her hear. |
| With look to look. Songs without words. Molly, that hurdygurdy boy. |
| She knew he meant the monkey was sick. Or because so like the Spanish. |
| Understand animals too that way. Solomon did. Gift of nature. |
| |
| Ventriloquise. My lips closed. Think in my stom. What? |
| |
| Will? You? I. Want. You. To. |
| |
| With hoarse rude fury the yeoman cursed, swelling in apoplectic bitch's |
| bastard. A good thought, boy, to come. One hour's your time to live, |
| your last. |
| |
| Tap. Tap. |
| |
| Thrill now. Pity they feel. To wipe away a tear for martyrs that want |
| to, dying to, die. For all things dying, for all things born. Poor Mrs |
| Purefoy. Hope she's over. Because their wombs. |
| |
| A liquid of womb of woman eyeball gazed under a fence of lashes, calmly, |
| hearing. See real beauty of the eye when she not speaks. On yonder |
| river. At each slow satiny heaving bosom's wave (her heaving embon) red |
| rose rose slowly sank red rose. Heartbeats: her breath: breath that is |
| life. And all the tiny tiny fernfoils trembled of maidenhair. |
| |
| But look. The bright stars fade. O rose! Castile. The morn. Ha. Lidwell. |
| For him then not for. Infatuated. I like that? See her from here though. |
| Popped corks, splashes of beerfroth, stacks of empties. |
| |
| On the smooth jutting beerpull laid Lydia hand, lightly, plumply, leave |
| it to my hands. All lost in pity for croppy. Fro, to: to, fro: over |
| the polished knob (she knows his eyes, my eyes, her eyes) her thumb and |
| finger passed in pity: passed, reposed and, gently touching, then slid |
| so smoothly, slowly down, a cool firm white enamel baton protruding |
| through their sliding ring. |
| |
| With a cock with a carra. |
| |
| Tap. Tap. Tap. |
| |
| I hold this house. Amen. He gnashed in fury. Traitors swing. |
| |
| The chords consented. Very sad thing. But had to be. Get out before the |
| end. Thanks, that was heavenly. Where's my hat. Pass by her. Can leave |
| that Freeman. Letter I have. Suppose she were the? No. Walk, walk, |
| walk. Like Cashel Boylo Connoro Coylo Tisdall Maurice Tisntdall Farrell. |
| Waaaaaaalk. |
| |
| Well, I must be. Are you off? Yrfmstbyes. Blmstup. O'er ryehigh blue. |
| Ow. Bloom stood up. Soap feeling rather sticky behind. Must have |
| sweated: music. That lotion, remember. Well, so long. High grade. Card |
| inside. Yes. |
| |
| By deaf Pat in the doorway straining ear Bloom passed. |
| |
| At Geneva barrack that young man died. At Passage was his body laid. |
| Dolor! O, he dolores! The voice of the mournful chanter called to |
| dolorous prayer. |
| |
| By rose, by satiny bosom, by the fondling hand, by slops, by empties, |
| by popped corks, greeting in going, past eyes and maidenhair, bronze and |
| faint gold in deepseashadow, went Bloom, soft Bloom, I feel so lonely |
| Bloom. |
| |
| Tap. Tap. Tap. |
| |
| Pray for him, prayed the bass of Dollard. You who hear in peace. Breathe |
| a prayer, drop a tear, good men, good people. He was the croppy boy. |
| |
| Scaring eavesdropping boots croppy bootsboy Bloom in the Ormond hallway |
| heard the growls and roars of bravo, fat backslapping, their boots all |
| treading, boots not the boots the boy. General chorus off for a swill to |
| wash it down. Glad I avoided. |
| |
| --Come on, Ben, Simon Dedalus cried. By God, you're as good as ever you |
| were. |
| |
| --Better, said Tomgin Kernan. Most trenchant rendition of that ballad, |
| upon my soul and honour It is. |
| |
| --Lablache, said Father Cowley. |
| |
| Ben Dollard bulkily cachuchad towards the bar, mightily praisefed |
| and all big roseate, on heavyfooted feet, his gouty fingers nakkering |
| castagnettes in the air. |
| |
| Big Benaben Dollard. Big Benben. Big Benben. |
| |
| Rrr. |
| |
| And deepmoved all, Simon trumping compassion from foghorn nose, all |
| laughing they brought him forth, Ben Dollard, in right good cheer. |
| |
| --You're looking rubicund, George Lidwell said. |
| |
| Miss Douce composed her rose to wait. |
| |
| --Ben machree, said Mr Dedalus, clapping Ben's fat back shoulderblade. |
| Fit as a fiddle only he has a lot of adipose tissue concealed about his |
| person. |
| |
| Rrrrrrrsss. |
| |
| --Fat of death, Simon, Ben Dollard growled. |
| |
| Richie rift in the lute alone sat: Goulding, Collis, Ward. Uncertainly |
| he waited. Unpaid Pat too. |
| |
| Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. |
| |
| Miss Mina Kennedy brought near her lips to ear of tankard one. |
| |
| --Mr Dollard, they murmured low. |
| |
| --Dollard, murmured tankard. |
| |
| Tank one believed: miss Kenn when she: that doll he was: she doll: the |
| tank. |
| |
| He murmured that he knew the name. The name was familiar to him, that |
| is to say. That was to say he had heard the name of. Dollard, was it? |
| Dollard, yes. |
| |
| Yes, her lips said more loudly, Mr Dollard. He sang that song lovely, |
| murmured Mina. Mr Dollard. And _The last rose of summer_ was a lovely |
| song. Mina loved that song. Tankard loved the song that Mina. |
| |
| 'Tis the last rose of summer dollard left bloom felt wind wound round |
| inside. |
| |
| Gassy thing that cider: binding too. Wait. Postoffice near Reuben J's |
| one and eightpence too. Get shut of it. Dodge round by Greek street. |
| Wish I hadn't promised to meet. Freer in air. Music. Gets on your |
| nerves. Beerpull. Her hand that rocks the cradle rules the. Ben Howth. |
| That rules the world. |
| |
| Far. Far. Far. Far. |
| |
| Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. |
| |
| Up the quay went Lionelleopold, naughty Henry with letter for Mady, with |
| sweets of sin with frillies for Raoul with met him pike hoses went Poldy |
| on. |
| |
| Tap blind walked tapping by the tap the curbstone tapping, tap by tap. |
| |
| Cowley, he stuns himself with it: kind of drunkenness. Better give way |
| only half way the way of a man with a maid. Instance enthusiasts. All |
| ears. Not lose a demisemiquaver. Eyes shut. Head nodding in time. Dotty. |
| You daren't budge. Thinking strictly prohibited. Always talking shop. |
| Fiddlefaddle about notes. |
| |
| All a kind of attempt to talk. Unpleasant when it stops because you |
| never know exac. Organ in Gardiner street. Old Glynn fifty quid a year. |
| Queer up there in the cockloft, alone, with stops and locks and keys. |
| Seated all day at the organ. Maunder on for hours, talking to himself or |
| the other fellow blowing the bellows. Growl angry, then shriek cursing |
| (want to have wadding or something in his no don't she cried), then all |
| of a soft sudden wee little wee little pipy wind. |
| |
| Pwee! A wee little wind piped eeee. In Bloom's little wee. |
| |
| --Was he? Mr Dedalus said, returning with fetched pipe. I was with him |
| this morning at poor little Paddy Dignam's... |
| |
| --Ay, the Lord have mercy on him. |
| |
| --By the bye there's a tuningfork in there on the... |
| |
| Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. |
| |
| --The wife has a fine voice. Or had. What? Lidwell asked. |
| |
| --O, that must be the tuner, Lydia said to Simonlionel first I saw, |
| forgot it when he was here. |
| |
| Blind he was she told George Lidwell second I saw. And played so |
| exquisitely, treat to hear. Exquisite contrast: bronzelid, minagold. |
| |
| --Shout! Ben Dollard shouted, pouring. Sing out! |
| |
| --'lldo! cried Father Cowley. |
| |
| Rrrrrr. |
| |
| I feel I want... |
| |
| Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap |
| |
| --Very, Mr Dedalus said, staring hard at a headless sardine. |
| |
| Under the sandwichbell lay on a bier of bread one last, one lonely, last |
| sardine of summer. Bloom alone. |
| |
| --Very, he stared. The lower register, for choice. |
| |
| Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. |
| |
| Bloom went by Barry's. Wish I could. Wait. That wonderworker if I had. |
| Twentyfour solicitors in that one house. Counted them. Litigation. Love |
| one another. Piles of parchment. Messrs Pick and Pocket have power of |
| attorney. Goulding, Collis, Ward. |
| |
| But for example the chap that wallops the big drum. His vocation: Mickey |
| Rooney's band. Wonder how it first struck him. Sitting at home after |
| pig's cheek and cabbage nursing it in the armchair. Rehearsing his band |
| part. Pom. Pompedy. Jolly for the wife. Asses' skins. Welt them through |
| life, then wallop after death. Pom. Wallop. Seems to be what you call |
| yashmak or I mean kismet. Fate. |
| |
| Tap. Tap. A stripling, blind, with a tapping cane came taptaptapping by |
| Daly's window where a mermaid hair all streaming (but he couldn't see) |
| blew whiffs of a mermaid (blind couldn't), mermaid, coolest whiff of |
| all. |
| |
| Instruments. A blade of grass, shell of her hands, then blow. Even |
| comb and tissuepaper you can knock a tune out of. Molly in her shift in |
| Lombard street west, hair down. I suppose each kind of trade made its |
| own, don't you see? Hunter with a horn. Haw. Have you the? _Cloche. |
| Sonnez la._ Shepherd his pipe. Pwee little wee. Policeman a whistle. |
| Locks and keys! Sweep! Four o'clock's all's well! Sleep! All is lost |
| now. Drum? Pompedy. Wait. I know. Towncrier, bumbailiff. Long John. |
| Waken the dead. Pom. Dignam. Poor little _nominedomine._ Pom. It is |
| music. I mean of course it's all pom pom pom very much what they call |
| _da capo._ Still you can hear. As we march, we march along, march along. |
| Pom. |
| |
| I must really. Fff. Now if I did that at a banquet. Just a question of |
| custom shah of Persia. Breathe a prayer, drop a tear. All the same |
| he must have been a bit of a natural not to see it was a yeoman cap. |
| Muffled up. Wonder who was that chap at the grave in the brown macin. O, |
| the whore of the lane! |
| |
| A frowsy whore with black straw sailor hat askew came glazily in the day |
| along the quay towards Mr Bloom. When first he saw that form endearing? |
| Yes, it is. I feel so lonely. Wet night in the lane. Horn. Who had |
| the? Heehaw shesaw. Off her beat here. What is she? Hope she. Psst! Any |
| chance of your wash. Knew Molly. Had me decked. Stout lady does be with |
| you in the brown costume. Put you off your stroke, that. Appointment |
| we made knowing we'd never, well hardly ever. Too dear too near to home |
| sweet home. Sees me, does she? Looks a fright in the day. Face like dip. |
| Damn her. O, well, she has to live like the rest. Look in here. |
| |
| In Lionel Marks's antique saleshop window haughty Henry Lionel Leopold |
| dear Henry Flower earnestly Mr Leopold Bloom envisaged battered |
| candlesticks melodeon oozing maggoty blowbags. Bargain: six bob. Might |
| learn to play. Cheap. Let her pass. Course everything is dear if you |
| don't want it. That's what good salesman is. Make you buy what he wants |
| to sell. Chap sold me the Swedish razor he shaved me with. Wanted to |
| charge me for the edge he gave it. She's passing now. Six bob. |
| |
| Must be the cider or perhaps the burgund. |
| |
| Near bronze from anear near gold from afar they chinked their clinking |
| glasses all, brighteyed and gallant, before bronze Lydia's tempting last |
| rose of summer, rose of Castile. First Lid, De, Cow, Ker, Doll, a fifth: |
| Lidwell, Si Dedalus, Bob Cowley, Kernan and big Ben Dollard. |
| |
| Tap. A youth entered a lonely Ormond hall. |
| |
| Bloom viewed a gallant pictured hero in Lionel Marks's window. Robert |
| Emmet's last words. Seven last words. Of Meyerbeer that is. |
| |
| --True men like you men. |
| |
| --Ay, ay, Ben. |
| |
| --Will lift your glass with us. |
| |
| They lifted. |
| |
| Tschink. Tschunk. |
| |
| Tip. An unseeing stripling stood in the door. He saw not bronze. He saw |
| not gold. Nor Ben nor Bob nor Tom nor Si nor George nor tanks nor Richie |
| nor Pat. Hee hee hee hee. He did not see. |
| |
| Seabloom, greaseabloom viewed last words. Softly. _When my country takes |
| her place among._ |
| |
| Prrprr. |
| |
| Must be the bur. |
| |
| Fff! Oo. Rrpr. |
| |
| _Nations of the earth._ No-one behind. She's passed. _Then and not till |
| then._ Tram kran kran kran. Good oppor. Coming. Krandlkrankran. I'm |
| sure it's the burgund. Yes. One, two. _Let my epitaph be._ Kraaaaaa. |
| _Written. I have._ |
| |
| Pprrpffrrppffff. |
| |
| _Done._ |
| |
| |
| |
| I was just passing the time of day with old Troy of the D. M. P. at the |
| corner of Arbour hill there and be damned but a bloody sweep came along |
| and he near drove his gear into my eye. I turned around to let him have |
| the weight of my tongue when who should I see dodging along Stony Batter |
| only Joe Hynes. |
| |
| --Lo, Joe, says I. How are you blowing? Did you see that bloody |
| chimneysweep near shove my eye out with his brush? |
| |
| --Soot's luck, says Joe. Who's the old ballocks you were talking to? |
| |
| --Old Troy, says I, was in the force. I'm on two minds not to give that |
| fellow in charge for obstructing the thoroughfare with his brooms and |
| ladders. |
| |
| --What are you doing round those parts? says Joe. |
| |
| --Devil a much, says I. There's a bloody big foxy thief beyond by the |
| garrison church at the corner of Chicken lane--old Troy was just giving |
| me a wrinkle about him--lifted any God's quantity of tea and sugar |
| to pay three bob a week said he had a farm in the county Down off a |
| hop-of-my-thumb by the name of Moses Herzog over there near Heytesbury |
| street. |
| |
| --Circumcised? says Joe. |
| |
| --Ay, says I. A bit off the top. An old plumber named Geraghty. I'm |
| hanging on to his taw now for the past fortnight and I can't get a penny |
| out of him. |
| |
| --That the lay you're on now? says Joe. |
| |
| --Ay, says I. How are the mighty fallen! Collector of bad and doubtful |
| debts. But that's the most notorious bloody robber you'd meet in a day's |
| walk and the face on him all pockmarks would hold a shower of rain. |
| _Tell him,_ says he, _I dare him,_ says he, _and I doubledare him |
| to send you round here again or if he does,_ says he, _I'll have |
| him summonsed up before the court, so I will, for trading without a |
| licence._ And he after stuffing himself till he's fit to burst. Jesus, |
| I had to laugh at the little jewy getting his shirt out. _He drink me my |
| teas. He eat me my sugars. Because he no pay me my moneys?_ |
| |
| For nonperishable goods bought of Moses Herzog, of 13 Saint Kevin's |
| parade in the city of Dublin, Wood quay ward, merchant, hereinafter |
| called the vendor, and sold and delivered to Michael E. Geraghty, |
| esquire, of 29 Arbour hill in the city of Dublin, Arran quay ward, |
| gentleman, hereinafter called the purchaser, videlicet, five pounds |
| avoirdupois of first choice tea at three shillings and no pence per |
| pound avoirdupois and three stone avoirdupois of sugar, crushed crystal, |
| at threepence per pound avoirdupois, the said purchaser debtor to the |
| said vendor of one pound five shillings and sixpence sterling for value |
| received which amount shall be paid by said purchaser to said vendor in |
| weekly instalments every seven calendar days of three shillings and no |
| pence sterling: and the said nonperishable goods shall not be pawned or |
| pledged or sold or otherwise alienated by the said purchaser but shall |
| be and remain and be held to be the sole and exclusive property of the |
| said vendor to be disposed of at his good will and pleasure until the |
| said amount shall have been duly paid by the said purchaser to the said |
| vendor in the manner herein set forth as this day hereby agreed between |
| the said vendor, his heirs, successors, trustees and assigns of the one |
| part and the said purchaser, his heirs, successors, trustees and assigns |
| of the other part. |
| |
| --Are you a strict t.t.? says Joe. |
| |
| --Not taking anything between drinks, says I. |
| |
| --What about paying our respects to our friend? says Joe. |
| |
| --Who? says I. Sure, he's out in John of God's off his head, poor man. |
| |
| --Drinking his own stuff? says Joe. |
| |
| --Ay, says I. Whisky and water on the brain. |
| |
| --Come around to Barney Kiernan's, says Joe. I want to see the citizen. |
| |
| --Barney mavourneen's be it, says I. Anything strange or wonderful, Joe? |
| |
| --Not a word, says Joe. I was up at that meeting in the City Arms. |
| |
| ---What was that, Joe? says I. |
| |
| --Cattle traders, says Joe, about the foot and mouth disease. I want to |
| give the citizen the hard word about it. |
| |
| So we went around by the Linenhall barracks and the back of the |
| courthouse talking of one thing or another. Decent fellow Joe when he |
| has it but sure like that he never has it. Jesus, I couldn't get over |
| that bloody foxy Geraghty, the daylight robber. For trading without a |
| licence, says he. |
| |
| In Inisfail the fair there lies a land, the land of holy Michan. There |
| rises a watchtower beheld of men afar. There sleep the mighty dead as in |
| life they slept, warriors and princes of high renown. A pleasant land |
| it is in sooth of murmuring waters, fishful streams where sport the |
| gurnard, the plaice, the roach, the halibut, the gibbed haddock, the |
| grilse, the dab, the brill, the flounder, the pollock, the mixed coarse |
| fish generally and other denizens of the aqueous kingdom too numerous to |
| be enumerated. In the mild breezes of the west and of the east the lofty |
| trees wave in different directions their firstclass foliage, the wafty |
| sycamore, the Lebanonian cedar, the exalted planetree, the eugenic |
| eucalyptus and other ornaments of the arboreal world with which |
| that region is thoroughly well supplied. Lovely maidens sit in close |
| proximity to the roots of the lovely trees singing the most lovely songs |
| while they play with all kinds of lovely objects as for example golden |
| ingots, silvery fishes, crans of herrings, drafts of eels, codlings, |
| creels of fingerlings, purple seagems and playful insects. And heroes |
| voyage from afar to woo them, from Eblana to Slievemargy, the peerless |
| princes of unfettered Munster and of Connacht the just and of smooth |
| sleek Leinster and of Cruahan's land and of Armagh the splendid and of |
| the noble district of Boyle, princes, the sons of kings. |
| |
| And there rises a shining palace whose crystal glittering roof is seen |
| by mariners who traverse the extensive sea in barks built expressly for |
| that purpose, and thither come all herds and fatlings and firstfruits |
| of that land for O'Connell Fitzsimon takes toll of them, a chieftain |
| descended from chieftains. Thither the extremely large wains bring |
| foison of the fields, flaskets of cauliflowers, floats of spinach, |
| pineapple chunks, Rangoon beans, strikes of tomatoes, drums of figs, |
| drills of Swedes, spherical potatoes and tallies of iridescent kale, |
| York and Savoy, and trays of onions, pearls of the earth, and punnets of |
| mushrooms and custard marrows and fat vetches and bere and rape and red |
| green yellow brown russet sweet big bitter ripe pomellated apples and |
| chips of strawberries and sieves of gooseberries, pulpy and pelurious, |
| and strawberries fit for princes and raspberries from their canes. |
| |
| I dare him, says he, and I doubledare him. Come out here, Geraghty, you |
| notorious bloody hill and dale robber! |
| |
| And by that way wend the herds innumerable of bellwethers and flushed |
| ewes and shearling rams and lambs and stubble geese and medium steers |
| and roaring mares and polled calves and longwoods and storesheep and |
| Cuffe's prime springers and culls and sowpigs and baconhogs and the |
| various different varieties of highly distinguished swine and Angus |
| heifers and polly bulllocks of immaculate pedigree together with prime |
| premiated milchcows and beeves: and there is ever heard a trampling, |
| cackling, roaring, lowing, bleating, bellowing, rumbling, grunting, |
| champing, chewing, of sheep and pigs and heavyhooved kine from |
| pasturelands of Lusk and Rush and Carrickmines and from the streamy |
| vales of Thomond, from the M'Gillicuddy's reeks the inaccessible and |
| lordly Shannon the unfathomable, and from the gentle declivities of the |
| place of the race of Kiar, their udders distended with superabundance of |
| milk and butts of butter and rennets of cheese and farmer's firkins and |
| targets of lamb and crannocks of corn and oblong eggs in great hundreds, |
| various in size, the agate with this dun. |
| |
| So we turned into Barney Kiernan's and there, sure enough, was the |
| citizen up in the corner having a great confab with himself and that |
| bloody mangy mongrel, Garryowen, and he waiting for what the sky would |
| drop in the way of drink. |
| |
| --There he is, says I, in his gloryhole, with his cruiskeen lawn and his |
| load of papers, working for the cause. |
| |
| The bloody mongrel let a grouse out of him would give you the creeps. Be |
| a corporal work of mercy if someone would take the life of that bloody |
| dog. I'm told for a fact he ate a good part of the breeches off a |
| constabulary man in Santry that came round one time with a blue paper |
| about a licence. |
| |
| --Stand and deliver, says he. |
| |
| --That's all right, citizen, says Joe. Friends here. |
| |
| --Pass, friends, says he. |
| |
| Then he rubs his hand in his eye and says he: |
| |
| --What's your opinion of the times? |
| |
| Doing the rapparee and Rory of the hill. But, begob, Joe was equal to |
| the occasion. |
| |
| --I think the markets are on a rise, says he, sliding his hand down his |
| fork. |
| |
| So begob the citizen claps his paw on his knee and he says: |
| |
| --Foreign wars is the cause of it. |
| |
| And says Joe, sticking his thumb in his pocket: |
| |
| --It's the Russians wish to tyrannise. |
| |
| --Arrah, give over your bloody codding, Joe, says I. I've a thirst on me |
| I wouldn't sell for half a crown. |
| |
| --Give it a name, citizen, says Joe. |
| |
| --Wine of the country, says he. |
| |
| --What's yours? says Joe. |
| |
| --Ditto MacAnaspey, says I. |
| |
| --Three pints, Terry, says Joe. And how's the old heart, citizen? says |
| he. |
| |
| --Never better, _a chara_, says he. What Garry? Are we going to win? Eh? |
| |
| And with that he took the bloody old towser by the scruff of the neck |
| and, by Jesus, he near throttled him. |
| |
| The figure seated on a large boulder at the foot of a round tower was |
| that of a broadshouldered deepchested stronglimbed frankeyed redhaired |
| freelyfreckled shaggybearded widemouthed largenosed longheaded |
| deepvoiced barekneed brawnyhanded hairylegged ruddyfaced sinewyarmed |
| hero. From shoulder to shoulder he measured several ells and his |
| rocklike mountainous knees were covered, as was likewise the rest of his |
| body wherever visible, with a strong growth of tawny prickly hair in |
| hue and toughness similar to the mountain gorse (_Ulex Europeus_). |
| The widewinged nostrils, from which bristles of the same tawny hue |
| projected, were of such capaciousness that within their cavernous |
| obscurity the fieldlark might easily have lodged her nest. The eyes |
| in which a tear and a smile strove ever for the mastery were of the |
| dimensions of a goodsized cauliflower. A powerful current of warm breath |
| issued at regular intervals from the profound cavity of his mouth |
| while in rhythmic resonance the loud strong hale reverberations of his |
| formidable heart thundered rumblingly causing the ground, the summit of |
| the lofty tower and the still loftier walls of the cave to vibrate and |
| tremble. |
| |
| He wore a long unsleeved garment of recently flayed oxhide reaching |
| to the knees in a loose kilt and this was bound about his middle by |
| a girdle of plaited straw and rushes. Beneath this he wore trews of |
| deerskin, roughly stitched with gut. His nether extremities were encased |
| in high Balbriggan buskins dyed in lichen purple, the feet being shod |
| with brogues of salted cowhide laced with the windpipe of the same |
| beast. From his girdle hung a row of seastones which jangled at every |
| movement of his portentous frame and on these were graven with rude |
| yet striking art the tribal images of many Irish heroes and heroines of |
| antiquity, Cuchulin, Conn of hundred battles, Niall of nine hostages, |
| Brian of Kincora, the ardri Malachi, Art MacMurragh, Shane O'Neill, |
| Father John Murphy, Owen Roe, Patrick Sarsfield, Red Hugh O'Donnell, |
| Red Jim MacDermott, Soggarth Eoghan O'Growney, Michael Dwyer, Francy |
| Higgins, Henry Joy M'Cracken, Goliath, Horace Wheatley, Thomas Conneff, |
| Peg Woffington, the Village Blacksmith, Captain Moonlight, Captain |
| Boycott, Dante Alighieri, Christopher Columbus, S. Fursa, S. Brendan, |
| Marshal MacMahon, Charlemagne, Theobald Wolfe Tone, the Mother of the |
| Maccabees, the Last of the Mohicans, the Rose of Castile, the Man for |
| Galway, The Man that Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo, The Man in the Gap, |
| The Woman Who Didn't, Benjamin Franklin, Napoleon Bonaparte, John L. |
| Sullivan, Cleopatra, Savourneen Deelish, Julius Caesar, Paracelsus, sir |
| Thomas Lipton, William Tell, Michelangelo Hayes, Muhammad, the Bride of |
| Lammermoor, Peter the Hermit, Peter the Packer, Dark Rosaleen, Patrick |
| W. Shakespeare, Brian Confucius, Murtagh Gutenberg, Patricio Velasquez, |
| Captain Nemo, Tristan and Isolde, the first Prince of Wales, Thomas |
| Cook and Son, the Bold Soldier Boy, Arrah na Pogue, Dick Turpin, Ludwig |
| Beethoven, the Colleen Bawn, Waddler Healy, Angus the Culdee, Dolly |
| Mount, Sidney Parade, Ben Howth, Valentine Greatrakes, Adam and Eve, |
| Arthur Wellesley, Boss Croker, Herodotus, Jack the Giantkiller, Gautama |
| Buddha, Lady Godiva, The Lily of Killarney, Balor of the Evil Eye, |
| the Queen of Sheba, Acky Nagle, Joe Nagle, Alessandro Volta, Jeremiah |
| O'Donovan Rossa, Don Philip O'Sullivan Beare. A couched spear of |
| acuminated granite rested by him while at his feet reposed a savage |
| animal of the canine tribe whose stertorous gasps announced that he was |
| sunk in uneasy slumber, a supposition confirmed by hoarse growls and |
| spasmodic movements which his master repressed from time to time |
| by tranquilising blows of a mighty cudgel rudely fashioned out of |
| paleolithic stone. |
| |
| So anyhow Terry brought the three pints Joe was standing and begob the |
| sight nearly left my eyes when I saw him land out a quid O, as true as |
| I'm telling you. A goodlooking sovereign. |
| |
| --And there's more where that came from, says he. |
| |
| --Were you robbing the poorbox, Joe? says I. |
| |
| --Sweat of my brow, says Joe. 'Twas the prudent member gave me the |
| wheeze. |
| |
| --I saw him before I met you, says I, sloping around by Pill lane and |
| Greek street with his cod's eye counting up all the guts of the fish. |
| |
| Who comes through Michan's land, bedight in sable armour? O'Bloom, |
| the son of Rory: it is he. Impervious to fear is Rory's son: he of the |
| prudent soul. |
| |
| --For the old woman of Prince's street, says the citizen, the subsidised |
| organ. The pledgebound party on the floor of the house. And look at this |
| blasted rag, says he. Look at this, says he. _The Irish Independent,_ if |
| you please, founded by Parnell to be the workingman's friend. Listen to |
| the births and deaths in the _Irish all for Ireland Independent,_ and |
| I'll thank you and the marriages. |
| |
| And he starts reading them out: |
| |
| --Gordon, Barnfield crescent, Exeter; Redmayne of Iffley, Saint Anne's |
| on Sea: the wife of William T Redmayne of a son. How's that, eh? Wright |
| and Flint, Vincent and Gillett to Rotha Marion daughter of Rosa and the |
| late George Alfred Gillett, 179 Clapham road, Stockwell, Playwood and |
| Ridsdale at Saint Jude's, Kensington by the very reverend Dr Forrest, |
| dean of Worcester. Eh? Deaths. Bristow, at Whitehall lane, London: Carr, |
| Stoke Newington, of gastritis and heart disease: Cockburn, at the Moat |
| house, Chepstow... |
| |
| --I know that fellow, says Joe, from bitter experience. |
| |
| --Cockburn. Dimsey, wife of David Dimsey, late of the admiralty: Miller, |
| Tottenham, aged eightyfive: Welsh, June 12, at 35 Canning street, |
| Liverpool, Isabella Helen. How's that for a national press, eh, my brown |
| son! How's that for Martin Murphy, the Bantry jobber? |
| |
| --Ah, well, says Joe, handing round the boose. Thanks be to God they had |
| the start of us. Drink that, citizen. |
| |
| --I will, says he, honourable person. |
| |
| --Health, Joe, says I. And all down the form. |
| |
| Ah! Ow! Don't be talking! I was blue mouldy for the want of that pint. |
| Declare to God I could hear it hit the pit of my stomach with a click. |
| |
| And lo, as they quaffed their cup of joy, a godlike messenger came |
| swiftly in, radiant as the eye of heaven, a comely youth and behind him |
| there passed an elder of noble gait and countenance, bearing the sacred |
| scrolls of law and with him his lady wife a dame of peerless lineage, |
| fairest of her race. |
| |
| Little Alf Bergan popped in round the door and hid behind Barney's |
| snug, squeezed up with the laughing. And who was sitting up there in |
| the corner that I hadn't seen snoring drunk blind to the world only Bob |
| Doran. I didn't know what was up and Alf kept making signs out of the |
| door. And begob what was it only that bloody old pantaloon Denis Breen |
| in his bathslippers with two bloody big books tucked under his oxter and |
| the wife hotfoot after him, unfortunate wretched woman, trotting like a |
| poodle. I thought Alf would split. |
| |
| --Look at him, says he. Breen. He's traipsing all round Dublin with a |
| postcard someone sent him with U. p: up on it to take a li... |
| |
| And he doubled up. |
| |
| --Take a what? says I. |
| |
| --Libel action, says he, for ten thousand pounds. |
| |
| --O hell! says I. |
| |
| The bloody mongrel began to growl that'd put the fear of God in you |
| seeing something was up but the citizen gave him a kick in the ribs. |
| |
| _--Bi i dho husht,_ says he. |
| |
| --Who? says Joe. |
| |
| --Breen, says Alf. He was in John Henry Menton's and then he went round |
| to Collis and Ward's and then Tom Rochford met him and sent him round to |
| the subsheriff's for a lark. O God, I've a pain laughing. U. p: up. The |
| long fellow gave him an eye as good as a process and now the bloody old |
| lunatic is gone round to Green street to look for a G man. |
| |
| --When is long John going to hang that fellow in Mountjoy? says Joe. |
| |
| --Bergan, says Bob Doran, waking up. Is that Alf Bergan? |
| |
| --Yes, says Alf. Hanging? Wait till I show you. Here, Terry, give us a |
| pony. That bloody old fool! Ten thousand pounds. You should have seen |
| long John's eye. U. p... |
| |
| And he started laughing. |
| |
| --Who are you laughing at? says Bob Doran. Is that Bergan? |
| |
| --Hurry up, Terry boy, says Alf. |
| |
| Terence O'Ryan heard him and straightway brought him a crystal cup |
| full of the foamy ebon ale which the noble twin brothers Bungiveagh and |
| Bungardilaun brew ever in their divine alevats, cunning as the sons of |
| deathless Leda. For they garner the succulent berries of the hop and |
| mass and sift and bruise and brew them and they mix therewith sour |
| juices and bring the must to the sacred fire and cease not night or day |
| from their toil, those cunning brothers, lords of the vat. |
| |
| Then did you, chivalrous Terence, hand forth, as to the manner born, |
| that nectarous beverage and you offered the crystal cup to him that |
| thirsted, the soul of chivalry, in beauty akin to the immortals. |
| |
| But he, the young chief of the O'Bergan's, could ill brook to be outdone |
| in generous deeds but gave therefor with gracious gesture a testoon of |
| costliest bronze. Thereon embossed in excellent smithwork was seen |
| the image of a queen of regal port, scion of the house of Brunswick, |
| Victoria her name, Her Most Excellent Majesty, by grace of God of the |
| United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and of the British dominions |
| beyond the sea, queen, defender of the faith, Empress of India, even |
| she, who bore rule, a victress over many peoples, the wellbeloved, for |
| they knew and loved her from the rising of the sun to the going down |
| thereof, the pale, the dark, the ruddy and the ethiop. |
| |
| --What's that bloody freemason doing, says the citizen, prowling up and |
| down outside? |
| |
| --What's that? says Joe. |
| |
| --Here you are, says Alf, chucking out the rhino. Talking about hanging, |
| I'll show you something you never saw. Hangmen's letters. Look at here. |
| |
| So he took a bundle of wisps of letters and envelopes out of his pocket. |
| |
| --Are you codding? says I. |
| |
| --Honest injun, says Alf. Read them. |
| |
| So Joe took up the letters. |
| |
| --Who are you laughing at? says Bob Doran. |
| |
| So I saw there was going to be a bit of a dust Bob's a queer chap when |
| the porter's up in him so says I just to make talk: |
| |
| --How's Willy Murray those times, Alf? |
| |
| --I don't know, says Alf I saw him just now in Capel street with Paddy |
| Dignam. Only I was running after that... |
| |
| --You what? says Joe, throwing down the letters. With who? |
| |
| --With Dignam, says Alf. |
| |
| --Is it Paddy? says Joe. |
| |
| --Yes, says Alf. Why? |
| |
| --Don't you know he's dead? says Joe. |
| |
| --Paddy Dignam dead! says Alf. |
| |
| --Ay, says Joe. |
| |
| --Sure I'm after seeing him not five minutes ago, says Alf, as plain as |
| a pikestaff. |
| |
| --Who's dead? says Bob Doran. |
| |
| --You saw his ghost then, says Joe, God between us and harm. |
| |
| --What? says Alf. Good Christ, only five... What?... And Willy Murray |
| with him, the two of them there near whatdoyoucallhim's... What? Dignam |
| dead? |
| |
| --What about Dignam? says Bob Doran. Who's talking about...? |
| |
| --Dead! says Alf. He's no more dead than you are. |
| |
| --Maybe so, says Joe. They took the liberty of burying him this morning |
| anyhow. |
| |
| --Paddy? says Alf. |
| |
| --Ay, says Joe. He paid the debt of nature, God be merciful to him. |
| |
| --Good Christ! says Alf. |
| |
| Begob he was what you might call flabbergasted. |
| |
| In the darkness spirit hands were felt to flutter and when prayer by |
| tantras had been directed to the proper quarter a faint but increasing |
| luminosity of ruby light became gradually visible, the apparition of |
| the etheric double being particularly lifelike owing to the discharge |
| of jivic rays from the crown of the head and face. Communication was |
| effected through the pituitary body and also by means of the orangefiery |
| and scarlet rays emanating from the sacral region and solar plexus. |
| Questioned by his earthname as to his whereabouts in the heavenworld he |
| stated that he was now on the path of pr l ya or return but was still |
| submitted to trial at the hands of certain bloodthirsty entities on the |
| lower astral levels. In reply to a question as to his first sensations |
| in the great divide beyond he stated that previously he had seen as in a |
| glass darkly but that those who had passed over had summit possibilities |
| of atmic development opened up to them. Interrogated as to whether life |
| there resembled our experience in the flesh he stated that he had heard |
| from more favoured beings now in the spirit that their abodes were |
| equipped with every modern home comfort such as talafana, alavatar, |
| hatakalda, wataklasat and that the highest adepts were steeped in |
| waves of volupcy of the very purest nature. Having requested a quart of |
| buttermilk this was brought and evidently afforded relief. Asked if he |
| had any message for the living he exhorted all who were still at the |
| wrong side of Maya to acknowledge the true path for it was reported |
| in devanic circles that Mars and Jupiter were out for mischief on the |
| eastern angle where the ram has power. It was then queried whether there |
| were any special desires on the part of the defunct and the reply was: |
| _We greet you, friends of earth, who are still in the body. Mind C. K. |
| doesn't pile it on._ It was ascertained that the reference was to Mr |
| Cornelius Kelleher, manager of Messrs H. J. O'Neill's popular |
| funeral establishment, a personal friend of the defunct, who had been |
| responsible for the carrying out of the interment arrangements. Before |
| departing he requested that it should be told to his dear son Patsy that |
| the other boot which he had been looking for was at present under the |
| commode in the return room and that the pair should be sent to Cullen's |
| to be soled only as the heels were still good. He stated that this had |
| greatly perturbed his peace of mind in the other region and earnestly |
| requested that his desire should be made known. |
| |
| Assurances were given that the matter would be attended to and it was |
| intimated that this had given satisfaction. |
| |
| He is gone from mortal haunts: O'Dignam, sun of our morning. Fleet was |
| his foot on the bracken: Patrick of the beamy brow. Wail, Banba, with |
| your wind: and wail, O ocean, with your whirlwind. |
| |
| --There he is again, says the citizen, staring out. |
| |
| --Who? says I. |
| |
| --Bloom, says he. He's on point duty up and down there for the last ten |
| minutes. |
| |
| And, begob, I saw his physog do a peep in and then slidder off again. |
| |
| Little Alf was knocked bawways. Faith, he was. |
| |
| --Good Christ! says he. I could have sworn it was him. |
| |
| And says Bob Doran, with the hat on the back of his poll, lowest |
| blackguard in Dublin when he's under the influence: |
| |
| --Who said Christ is good? |
| |
| --I beg your parsnips, says Alf. |
| |
| --Is that a good Christ, says Bob Doran, to take away poor little Willy |
| Dignam? |
| |
| --Ah, well, says Alf, trying to pass it off. He's over all his troubles. |
| |
| But Bob Doran shouts out of him. |
| |
| --He's a bloody ruffian, I say, to take away poor little Willy Dignam. |
| |
| Terry came down and tipped him the wink to keep quiet, that they didn't |
| want that kind of talk in a respectable licensed premises. And Bob Doran |
| starts doing the weeps about Paddy Dignam, true as you're there. |
| |
| --The finest man, says he, snivelling, the finest purest character. |
| |
| The tear is bloody near your eye. Talking through his bloody hat. Fitter |
| for him go home to the little sleepwalking bitch he married, Mooney, the |
| bumbailiff's daughter, mother kept a kip in Hardwicke street, that |
| used to be stravaging about the landings Bantam Lyons told me that was |
| stopping there at two in the morning without a stitch on her, exposing |
| her person, open to all comers, fair field and no favour. |
| |
| --The noblest, the truest, says he. And he's gone, poor little Willy, |
| poor little Paddy Dignam. |
| |
| And mournful and with a heavy heart he bewept the extinction of that |
| beam of heaven. |
| |
| Old Garryowen started growling again at Bloom that was skeezing round |
| the door. |
| |
| --Come in, come on, he won't eat you, says the citizen. |
| |
| So Bloom slopes in with his cod's eye on the dog and he asks Terry was |
| Martin Cunningham there. |
| |
| --O, Christ M'Keown, says Joe, reading one of the letters. Listen to |
| this, will you? |
| |
| And he starts reading out one. |
| |
| _7 Hunter Street, Liverpool. To the High Sheriff of Dublin, Dublin._ |
| |
| _Honoured sir i beg to offer my services in the abovementioned painful |
| case i hanged Joe Gann in Bootle jail on the 12 of Febuary 1900 and i |
| hanged..._ |
| |
| --Show us, Joe, says I. |
| |
| --_... private Arthur Chace for fowl murder of Jessie Tilsit in |
| Pentonville prison and i was assistant when..._ |
| |
| --Jesus, says I. |
| |
| --_... Billington executed the awful murderer Toad Smith..._ |
| |
| The citizen made a grab at the letter. |
| |
| --Hold hard, says Joe, _i have a special nack of putting the noose once |
| in he can't get out hoping to be favoured i remain, honoured sir, my |
| terms is five ginnees._ |
| |
| _H. RUMBOLD, MASTER BARBER._ |
| |
| --And a barbarous bloody barbarian he is too, says the citizen. |
| |
| --And the dirty scrawl of the wretch, says Joe. Here, says he, take them |
| to hell out of my sight, Alf. Hello, Bloom, says he, what will you have? |
| |
| So they started arguing about the point, Bloom saying he wouldn't and he |
| couldn't and excuse him no offence and all to that and then he said well |
| he'd just take a cigar. Gob, he's a prudent member and no mistake. |
| |
| --Give us one of your prime stinkers, Terry, says Joe. |
| |
| And Alf was telling us there was one chap sent in a mourning card with a |
| black border round it. |
| |
| --They're all barbers, says he, from the black country that would hang |
| their own fathers for five quid down and travelling expenses. |
| |
| And he was telling us there's two fellows waiting below to pull his |
| heels down when he gets the drop and choke him properly and then they |
| chop up the rope after and sell the bits for a few bob a skull. |
| |
| In the dark land they bide, the vengeful knights of the razor. Their |
| deadly coil they grasp: yea, and therein they lead to Erebus whatsoever |
| wight hath done a deed of blood for I will on nowise suffer it even so |
| saith the Lord. |
| |
| So they started talking about capital punishment and of course Bloom |
| comes out with the why and the wherefore and all the codology of the |
| business and the old dog smelling him all the time I'm told those jewies |
| does have a sort of a queer odour coming off them for dogs about I don't |
| know what all deterrent effect and so forth and so on. |
| |
| --There's one thing it hasn't a deterrent effect on, says Alf. |
| |
| --What's that? says Joe. |
| |
| --The poor bugger's tool that's being hanged, says Alf. |
| |
| --That so? says Joe. |
| |
| --God's truth, says Alf. I heard that from the head warder that was in |
| |
| Kilmainham when they hanged Joe Brady, the invincible. He told me when |
| they cut him down after the drop it was standing up in their faces like |
| a poker. |
| |
| --Ruling passion strong in death, says Joe, as someone said. |
| |
| --That can be explained by science, says Bloom. It's only a natural |
| phenomenon, don't you see, because on account of the... |
| |
| And then he starts with his jawbreakers about phenomenon and science and |
| this phenomenon and the other phenomenon. |
| |
| The distinguished scientist Herr Professor Luitpold Blumenduft tendered |
| medical evidence to the effect that the instantaneous fracture of the |
| cervical vertebrae and consequent scission of the spinal cord would, |
| according to the best approved tradition of medical science, be |
| calculated to inevitably produce in the human subject a violent |
| ganglionic stimulus of the nerve centres of the genital apparatus, |
| thereby causing the elastic pores of the _corpora cavernosa_ to rapidly |
| dilate in such a way as to instantaneously facilitate the flow of blood |
| to that part of the human anatomy known as the penis or male organ |
| resulting in the phenomenon which has been denominated by the faculty |
| a morbid upwards and outwards philoprogenitive erection _in articulo |
| mortis per diminutionem capitis._ |
| |
| So of course the citizen was only waiting for the wink of the word and |
| he starts gassing out of him about the invincibles and the old guard and |
| the men of sixtyseven and who fears to speak of ninetyeight and Joe with |
| him about all the fellows that were hanged, drawn and transported for |
| the cause by drumhead courtmartial and a new Ireland and new this, that |
| and the other. Talking about new Ireland he ought to go and get a new |
| dog so he ought. Mangy ravenous brute sniffing and sneezing all round |
| the place and scratching his scabs. And round he goes to Bob Doran that |
| was standing Alf a half one sucking up for what he could get. So of |
| course Bob Doran starts doing the bloody fool with him: |
| |
| --Give us the paw! Give the paw, doggy! Good old doggy! Give the paw |
| here! Give us the paw! |
| |
| Arrah, bloody end to the paw he'd paw and Alf trying to keep him from |
| tumbling off the bloody stool atop of the bloody old dog and he talking |
| all kinds of drivel about training by kindness and thoroughbred dog and |
| intelligent dog: give you the bloody pip. Then he starts scraping a few |
| bits of old biscuit out of the bottom of a Jacobs' tin he told Terry to |
| bring. Gob, he golloped it down like old boots and his tongue hanging |
| out of him a yard long for more. Near ate the tin and all, hungry bloody |
| mongrel. |
| |
| And the citizen and Bloom having an argument about the point, the |
| brothers Sheares and Wolfe Tone beyond on Arbour Hill and Robert Emmet |
| and die for your country, the Tommy Moore touch about Sara Curran and |
| she's far from the land. And Bloom, of course, with his knockmedown |
| cigar putting on swank with his lardy face. Phenomenon! The fat heap he |
| married is a nice old phenomenon with a back on her like a ballalley. |
| Time they were stopping up in the _City Arms_ pisser Burke told me there |
| was an old one there with a cracked loodheramaun of a nephew and Bloom |
| trying to get the soft side of her doing the mollycoddle playing bézique |
| to come in for a bit of the wampum in her will and not eating meat of a |
| Friday because the old one was always thumping her craw and taking the |
| lout out for a walk. And one time he led him the rounds of Dublin and, |
| by the holy farmer, he never cried crack till he brought him home as |
| drunk as a boiled owl and he said he did it to teach him the evils of |
| alcohol and by herrings, if the three women didn't near roast him, it's |
| a queer story, the old one, Bloom's wife and Mrs O'Dowd that kept the |
| hotel. Jesus, I had to laugh at pisser Burke taking them off chewing |
| the fat. And Bloom with his _but don't you see?_ and _but on the other |
| hand_. And sure, more be token, the lout I'm told was in Power's after, |
| the blender's, round in Cope street going home footless in a cab five |
| times in the week after drinking his way through all the samples in the |
| bloody establishment. Phenomenon! |
| |
| --The memory of the dead, says the citizen taking up his pintglass and |
| glaring at Bloom. |
| |
| --Ay, ay, says Joe. |
| |
| --You don't grasp my point, says Bloom. What I mean is... |
| |
| --_Sinn Fein!_ says the citizen. _Sinn Fein amhain!_ The friends we love |
| are by our side and the foes we hate before us. |
| |
| The last farewell was affecting in the extreme. From the belfries far |
| and near the funereal deathbell tolled unceasingly while all around the |
| gloomy precincts rolled the ominous warning of a hundred muffled drums |
| punctuated by the hollow booming of pieces of ordnance. The deafening |
| claps of thunder and the dazzling flashes of lightning which lit up |
| the ghastly scene testified that the artillery of heaven had lent its |
| supernatural pomp to the already gruesome spectacle. A torrential rain |
| poured down from the floodgates of the angry heavens upon the |
| bared heads of the assembled multitude which numbered at the |
| lowest computation five hundred thousand persons. A posse of Dublin |
| Metropolitan police superintended by the Chief Commissioner in person |
| maintained order in the vast throng for whom the York street brass and |
| reed band whiled away the intervening time by admirably rendering on |
| their blackdraped instruments the matchless melody endeared to us from |
| the cradle by Speranza's plaintive muse. Special quick excursion trains |
| and upholstered charabancs had been provided for the comfort of our |
| country cousins of whom there were large contingents. Considerable |
| amusement was caused by the favourite Dublin streetsingers L-n-h-n and |
| M-ll-g-n who sang _The Night before Larry was stretched_ in their usual |
| mirth-provoking fashion. Our two inimitable drolls did a roaring trade |
| with their broadsheets among lovers of the comedy element and nobody |
| who has a corner in his heart for real Irish fun without vulgarity |
| will grudge them their hardearned pennies. The children of the Male and |
| Female Foundling Hospital who thronged the windows overlooking the scene |
| were delighted with this unexpected addition to the day's entertainment |
| and a word of praise is due to the Little Sisters of the Poor for their |
| excellent idea of affording the poor fatherless and motherless children |
| a genuinely instructive treat. The viceregal houseparty which included |
| many wellknown ladies was chaperoned by Their Excellencies to the most |
| favourable positions on the grandstand while the picturesque foreign |
| delegation known as the Friends of the Emerald Isle was accommodated |
| on a tribune directly opposite. The delegation, present in full force, |
| consisted of Commendatore Bacibaci Beninobenone (the semiparalysed |
| _doyen_ of the party who had to be assisted to his seat by the aid of a |
| powerful steam crane), Monsieur Pierrepaul Petitépatant, the Grandjoker |
| Vladinmire Pokethankertscheff, the Archjoker Leopold Rudolph von |
| Schwanzenbad-Hodenthaler, Countess Marha Virága Kisászony Putrápesthi, |
| Hiram Y. Bomboost, Count Athanatos Karamelopulos, Ali Baba Backsheesh |
| Rahat Lokum Effendi, Senor Hidalgo Caballero Don Pecadillo y Palabras |
| y Paternoster de la Malora de la Malaria, Hokopoko Harakiri, Hi Hung |
| Chang, Olaf Kobberkeddelsen, Mynheer Trik van Trumps, Pan Poleaxe |
| Paddyrisky, Goosepond Prhklstr Kratchinabritchisitch, Borus |
| Hupinkoff, Herr Hurhausdirektorpresident Hans Chuechli-Steuerli, |
| Nationalgymnasiummuseumsanatoriumandsuspensoriumsordinaryprivatdocent |
| -generalhistoryspecialprofessordoctor Kriegfried Ueberallgemein. All the |
| delegates without exception expressed themselves in the strongest |
| possible heterogeneous terms concerning the nameless barbarity which |
| they had been called upon to witness. An animated altercation (in which |
| all took part) ensued among the F. O. T. E. I. as to whether the eighth |
| or the ninth of March was the correct date of the birth of Ireland's |
| patron saint. In the course of the argument cannonballs, scimitars, |
| boomerangs, blunderbusses, stinkpots, meatchoppers, umbrellas, |
| catapults, knuckledusters, sandbags, lumps of pig iron were resorted to |
| and blows were freely exchanged. The baby policeman, Constable |
| MacFadden, summoned by special courier from Booterstown, quickly |
| restored order and with lightning promptitude proposed the seventeenth |
| of the month as a solution equally honourable for both contending |
| parties. The readywitted ninefooter's suggestion at once appealed to all |
| and was unanimously accepted. Constable MacFadden was heartily |
| congratulated by all the F.O.T.E.I., several of whom were bleeding |
| profusely. Commendatore Beninobenone having been extricated from |
| underneath the presidential armchair, it was explained by his legal |
| adviser Avvocato Pagamimi that the various articles secreted in his |
| thirtytwo pockets had been abstracted by him during the affray from the |
| pockets of his junior colleagues in the hope of bringing them to their |
| senses. The objects (which included several hundred ladies' and |
| gentlemen's gold and silver watches) were promptly restored to their |
| rightful owners and general harmony reigned supreme. |
| |
| Quietly, unassumingly Rumbold stepped on to the scaffold in faultless |
| morning dress and wearing his favourite flower, the _Gladiolus |
| Cruentus_. He announced his presence by that gentle Rumboldian cough |
| which so many have tried (unsuccessfully) to imitate--short, |
| painstaking yet withal so characteristic of the man. The arrival of the |
| worldrenowned headsman was greeted by a roar of acclamation from the |
| huge concourse, the viceregal ladies waving their handkerchiefs in |
| their excitement while the even more excitable foreign delegates |
| cheered vociferously in a medley of cries, _hoch, banzai, eljen, zivio, |
| chinchin, polla kronia, hiphip, vive, Allah_, amid which the ringing |
| _evviva_ of the delegate of the land of song (a high double F recalling |
| those piercingly lovely notes with which the eunuch Catalani beglamoured |
| our greatgreatgrandmothers) was easily distinguishable. It was exactly |
| seventeen o'clock. The signal for prayer was then promptly given by |
| megaphone and in an instant all heads were bared, the commendatore's |
| patriarchal sombrero, which has been in the possession of his family |
| since the revolution of Rienzi, being removed by his medical adviser |
| in attendance, Dr Pippi. The learned prelate who administered the last |
| comforts of holy religion to the hero martyr when about to pay the death |
| penalty knelt in a most christian spirit in a pool of rainwater, his |
| cassock above his hoary head, and offered up to the throne of grace |
| fervent prayers of supplication. Hand by the block stood the grim figure |
| of the executioner, his visage being concealed in a tengallon pot |
| with two circular perforated apertures through which his eyes glowered |
| furiously. As he awaited the fatal signal he tested the edge of his |
| horrible weapon by honing it upon his brawny forearm or decapitated |
| in rapid succession a flock of sheep which had been provided by the |
| admirers of his fell but necessary office. On a handsome mahogany table |
| near him were neatly arranged the quartering knife, the various |
| finely tempered disembowelling appliances (specially supplied by the |
| worldfamous firm of cutlers, Messrs John Round and Sons, Sheffield), |
| a terra cotta saucepan for the reception of the duodenum, colon, |
| blind intestine and appendix etc when successfully extracted and two |
| commodious milkjugs destined to receive the most precious blood of the |
| most precious victim. The housesteward of the amalgamated cats' and |
| dogs' home was in attendance to convey these vessels when replenished |
| to that beneficent institution. Quite an excellent repast consisting of |
| rashers and eggs, fried steak and onions, done to a nicety, delicious |
| hot breakfast rolls and invigorating tea had been considerately provided |
| by the authorities for the consumption of the central figure of the |
| tragedy who was in capital spirits when prepared for death and evinced |
| the keenest interest in the proceedings from beginning to end but he, |
| with an abnegation rare in these our times, rose nobly to the occasion |
| and expressed the dying wish (immediately acceded to) that the meal |
| should be divided in aliquot parts among the members of the sick and |
| indigent roomkeepers' association as a token of his regard and esteem. |
| The _nec_ and _non plus ultra_ of emotion were reached when the blushing |
| bride elect burst her way through the serried ranks of the bystanders |
| and flung herself upon the muscular bosom of him who was about to be |
| launched into eternity for her sake. The hero folded her willowy form in |
| a loving embrace murmuring fondly _Sheila, my own_. Encouraged by |
| this use of her christian name she kissed passionately all the various |
| suitable areas of his person which the decencies of prison garb |
| permitted her ardour to reach. She swore to him as they mingled the salt |
| streams of their tears that she would ever cherish his memory, that she |
| would never forget her hero boy who went to his death with a song on his |
| lips as if he were but going to a hurling match in Clonturk park. She |
| brought back to his recollection the happy days of blissful childhood |
| together on the banks of Anna Liffey when they had indulged in the |
| innocent pastimes of the young and, oblivious of the dreadful present, |
| they both laughed heartily, all the spectators, including the venerable |
| pastor, joining in the general merriment. That monster audience simply |
| rocked with delight. But anon they were overcome with grief and clasped |
| their hands for the last time. A fresh torrent of tears burst from their |
| lachrymal ducts and the vast concourse of people, touched to the inmost |
| core, broke into heartrending sobs, not the least affected being the |
| aged prebendary himself. Big strong men, officers of the peace and |
| genial giants of the royal Irish constabulary, were making frank use of |
| their handkerchiefs and it is safe to say that there was not a dry eye |
| in that record assemblage. A most romantic incident occurred when a |
| handsome young Oxford graduate, noted for his chivalry towards the fair |
| sex, stepped forward and, presenting his visiting card, bankbook |
| and genealogical tree, solicited the hand of the hapless young lady, |
| requesting her to name the day, and was accepted on the spot. Every lady |
| in the audience was presented with a tasteful souvenir of the occasion |
| in the shape of a skull and crossbones brooch, a timely and generous |
| act which evoked a fresh outburst of emotion: and when the gallant young |
| Oxonian (the bearer, by the way, of one of the most timehonoured names |
| in Albion's history) placed on the finger of his blushing _fiancée_ an |
| expensive engagement ring with emeralds set in the form of a |
| fourleaved shamrock the excitement knew no bounds. Nay, even the |
| ster provostmarshal, lieutenantcolonel Tomkin-Maxwell ffrenchmullan |
| Tomlinson, who presided on the sad occasion, he who had blown a |
| considerable number of sepoys from the cannonmouth without flinching, |
| could not now restrain his natural emotion. With his mailed gauntlet |
| he brushed away a furtive tear and was overheard, by those privileged |
| burghers who happened to be in his immediate _entourage,_ to murmur to |
| himself in a faltering undertone: |
| |
| --God blimey if she aint a clinker, that there bleeding tart. Blimey it |
| makes me kind of bleeding cry, straight, it does, when I sees her cause |
| I thinks of my old mashtub what's waiting for me down Limehouse way. |
| |
| So then the citizen begins talking about the Irish language and the |
| corporation meeting and all to that and the shoneens that can't speak |
| their own language and Joe chipping in because he stuck someone for a |
| quid and Bloom putting in his old goo with his twopenny stump that |
| he cadged off of Joe and talking about the Gaelic league and the |
| antitreating league and drink, the curse of Ireland. Antitreating is |
| about the size of it. Gob, he'd let you pour all manner of drink down |
| his throat till the Lord would call him before you'd ever see the froth |
| of his pint. And one night I went in with a fellow into one of their |
| musical evenings, song and dance about she could get up on a truss of |
| hay she could my Maureen Lay and there was a fellow with a Ballyhooly |
| blue ribbon badge spiffing out of him in Irish and a lot of colleen |
| bawns going about with temperance beverages and selling medals |
| and oranges and lemonade and a few old dry buns, gob, flahoolagh |
| entertainment, don't be talking. Ireland sober is Ireland free. And |
| then an old fellow starts blowing into his bagpipes and all the gougers |
| shuffling their feet to the tune the old cow died of. And one or two |
| sky pilots having an eye around that there was no goings on with the |
| females, hitting below the belt. |
| |
| So howandever, as I was saying, the old dog seeing the tin was empty |
| starts mousing around by Joe and me. I'd train him by kindness, so I |
| would, if he was my dog. Give him a rousing fine kick now and again |
| where it wouldn't blind him. |
| |
| --Afraid he'll bite you? says the citizen, jeering. |
| |
| --No, says I. But he might take my leg for a lamppost. |
| |
| So he calls the old dog over. |
| |
| --What's on you, Garry? says he. |
| |
| Then he starts hauling and mauling and talking to him in Irish and the |
| old towser growling, letting on to answer, like a duet in the opera. |
| Such growling you never heard as they let off between them. Someone that |
| has nothing better to do ought to write a letter _pro bono publico_ to |
| the papers about the muzzling order for a dog the like of that. Growling |
| and grousing and his eye all bloodshot from the drouth is in it and the |
| hydrophobia dropping out of his jaws. |
| |
| All those who are interested in the spread of human culture among the |
| lower animals (and their name is legion) should make a point of not |
| missing the really marvellous exhibition of cynanthropy given by the |
| famous old Irish red setter wolfdog formerly known by the _sobriquet_ of |
| Garryowen and recently rechristened by his large circle of friends and |
| acquaintances Owen Garry. The exhibition, which is the result of years |
| of training by kindness and a carefully thoughtout dietary system, |
| comprises, among other achievements, the recitation of verse. Our |
| greatest living phonetic expert (wild horses shall not drag it from us!) |
| has left no stone unturned in his efforts to delucidate and compare |
| the verse recited and has found it bears a _striking_ resemblance (the |
| italics are ours) to the ranns of ancient Celtic bards. We are not |
| speaking so much of those delightful lovesongs with which the writer who |
| conceals his identity under the graceful pseudonym of the Little |
| Sweet Branch has familiarised the bookloving world but rather (as |
| a contributor D. O. C. points out in an interesting communication |
| published by an evening contemporary) of the harsher and more personal |
| note which is found in the satirical effusions of the famous Raftery and |
| of Donal MacConsidine to say nothing of a more modern lyrist at present |
| very much in the public eye. We subjoin a specimen which has been |
| rendered into English by an eminent scholar whose name for the moment we |
| are not at liberty to disclose though we believe that our readers will |
| find the topical allusion rather more than an indication. The metrical |
| system of the canine original, which recalls the intricate alliterative |
| and isosyllabic rules of the Welsh englyn, is infinitely more |
| complicated but we believe our readers will agree that the spirit has |
| been well caught. Perhaps it should be added that the effect is greatly |
| increased if Owen's verse be spoken somewhat slowly and indistinctly in |
| a tone suggestive of suppressed rancour. |
| |
| _The curse of my curses |
| Seven days every day |
| And seven dry Thursdays |
| On you, Barney Kiernan, |
| Has no sup of water |
| To cool my courage, |
| And my guts red roaring |
| After Lowry's lights._ |
| |
| So he told Terry to bring some water for the dog and, gob, you could |
| hear him lapping it up a mile off. And Joe asked him would he have |
| another. |
| |
| --I will, says he, _a chara_, to show there's no ill feeling. |
| |
| Gob, he's not as green as he's cabbagelooking. Arsing around from one |
| pub to another, leaving it to your own honour, with old Giltrap's dog |
| and getting fed up by the ratepayers and corporators. Entertainment for |
| man and beast. And says Joe: |
| |
| --Could you make a hole in another pint? |
| |
| --Could a swim duck? says I. |
| |
| --Same again, Terry, says Joe. Are you sure you won't have anything in |
| the way of liquid refreshment? says he. |
| |
| --Thank you, no, says Bloom. As a matter of fact I just wanted to meet |
| Martin Cunningham, don't you see, about this insurance of poor Dignam's. |
| Martin asked me to go to the house. You see, he, Dignam, I mean, didn't |
| serve any notice of the assignment on the company at the time and |
| nominally under the act the mortgagee can't recover on the policy. |
| |
| --Holy Wars, says Joe, laughing, that's a good one if old Shylock is |
| landed. So the wife comes out top dog, what? |
| |
| --Well, that's a point, says Bloom, for the wife's admirers. |
| |
| --Whose admirers? says Joe. |
| |
| --The wife's advisers, I mean, says Bloom. |
| |
| Then he starts all confused mucking it up about mortgagor under the act |
| like the lord chancellor giving it out on the bench and for the benefit |
| of the wife and that a trust is created but on the other hand that |
| Dignam owed Bridgeman the money and if now the wife or the widow |
| contested the mortgagee's right till he near had the head of me addled |
| with his mortgagor under the act. He was bloody safe he wasn't run in |
| himself under the act that time as a rogue and vagabond only he had a |
| friend in court. Selling bazaar tickets or what do you call it royal |
| Hungarian privileged lottery. True as you're there. O, commend me to an |
| israelite! Royal and privileged Hungarian robbery. |
| |
| So Bob Doran comes lurching around asking Bloom to tell Mrs Dignam he |
| was sorry for her trouble and he was very sorry about the funeral and |
| to tell her that he said and everyone who knew him said that there was |
| never a truer, a finer than poor little Willy that's dead to tell her. |
| Choking with bloody foolery. And shaking Bloom's hand doing the tragic |
| to tell her that. Shake hands, brother. You're a rogue and I'm another. |
| |
| --Let me, said he, so far presume upon our acquaintance which, however |
| slight it may appear if judged by the standard of mere time, is founded, |
| as I hope and believe, on a sentiment of mutual esteem as to request of |
| you this favour. But, should I have overstepped the limits of reserve |
| let the sincerity of my feelings be the excuse for my boldness. |
| |
| --No, rejoined the other, I appreciate to the full the motives which |
| actuate your conduct and I shall discharge the office you entrust to |
| me consoled by the reflection that, though the errand be one of sorrow, |
| this proof of your confidence sweetens in some measure the bitterness of |
| the cup. |
| |
| --Then suffer me to take your hand, said he. The goodness of your heart, |
| I feel sure, will dictate to you better than my inadequate words |
| the expressions which are most suitable to convey an emotion whose |
| poignancy, were I to give vent to my feelings, would deprive me even of |
| speech. |
| |
| And off with him and out trying to walk straight. Boosed at five |
| o'clock. Night he was near being lagged only Paddy Leonard knew the |
| bobby, 14A. Blind to the world up in a shebeen in Bride street after |
| closing time, fornicating with two shawls and a bully on guard, drinking |
| porter out of teacups. And calling himself a Frenchy for the shawls, |
| Joseph Manuo, and talking against the Catholic religion, and he serving |
| mass in Adam and Eve's when he was young with his eyes shut, who wrote |
| the new testament, and the old testament, and hugging and smugging. And |
| the two shawls killed with the laughing, picking his pockets, the bloody |
| fool and he spilling the porter all over the bed and the two shawls |
| screeching laughing at one another. _How is your testament? Have you got |
| an old testament?_ Only Paddy was passing there, I tell you what. Then |
| see him of a Sunday with his little concubine of a wife, and she wagging |
| her tail up the aisle of the chapel with her patent boots on her, no |
| less, and her violets, nice as pie, doing the little lady. Jack Mooney's |
| sister. And the old prostitute of a mother procuring rooms to street |
| couples. Gob, Jack made him toe the line. Told him if he didn't patch up |
| the pot, Jesus, he'd kick the shite out of him. |
| |
| So Terry brought the three pints. |
| |
| --Here, says Joe, doing the honours. Here, citizen. |
| |
| --_Slan leat_, says he. |
| |
| --Fortune, Joe, says I. Good health, citizen. |
| |
| Gob, he had his mouth half way down the tumbler already. Want a small |
| fortune to keep him in drinks. |
| |
| --Who is the long fellow running for the mayoralty, Alf? says Joe. |
| |
| --Friend of yours, says Alf. |
| |
| --Nannan? says Joe. The mimber? |
| |
| --I won't mention any names, says Alf. |
| |
| --I thought so, says Joe. I saw him up at that meeting now with William |
| Field, M. P., the cattle traders. |
| |
| --Hairy Iopas, says the citizen, that exploded volcano, the darling of |
| all countries and the idol of his own. |
| |
| So Joe starts telling the citizen about the foot and mouth disease |
| and the cattle traders and taking action in the matter and the citizen |
| sending them all to the rightabout and Bloom coming out with his |
| sheepdip for the scab and a hoose drench for coughing calves and the |
| guaranteed remedy for timber tongue. Because he was up one time in a |
| knacker's yard. Walking about with his book and pencil here's my head |
| and my heels are coming till Joe Cuffe gave him the order of the boot |
| for giving lip to a grazier. Mister Knowall. Teach your grandmother how |
| to milk ducks. Pisser Burke was telling me in the hotel the wife used |
| to be in rivers of tears some times with Mrs O'Dowd crying her eyes out |
| with her eight inches of fat all over her. Couldn't loosen her farting |
| strings but old cod's eye was waltzing around her showing her how to do |
| it. What's your programme today? Ay. Humane methods. Because the poor |
| animals suffer and experts say and the best known remedy that doesn't |
| cause pain to the animal and on the sore spot administer gently. Gob, |
| he'd have a soft hand under a hen. |
| |
| Ga Ga Gara. Klook Klook Klook. Black Liz is our hen. She lays eggs for |
| us. When she lays her egg she is so glad. Gara. Klook Klook Klook. Then |
| comes good uncle Leo. He puts his hand under black Liz and takes her |
| fresh egg. Ga ga ga ga Gara. Klook Klook Klook. |
| |
| --Anyhow, says Joe, Field and Nannetti are going over tonight to London |
| to ask about it on the floor of the house of commons. |
| |
| --Are you sure, says Bloom, the councillor is going? I wanted to see |
| him, as it happens. |
| |
| --Well, he's going off by the mailboat, says Joe, tonight. |
| |
| --That's too bad, says Bloom. I wanted particularly. Perhaps only Mr |
| Field is going. I couldn't phone. No. You're sure? |
| |
| --Nannan's going too, says Joe. The league told him to ask a question |
| tomorrow about the commissioner of police forbidding Irish games in the |
| park. What do you think of that, citizen? _The Sluagh na h-Eireann_. |
| |
| Mr Cowe Conacre (Multifarnham. Nat.): Arising out of the question of |
| my honourable friend, the member for Shillelagh, may I ask the right |
| honourable gentleman whether the government has issued orders that these |
| animals shall be slaughtered though no medical evidence is forthcoming |
| as to their pathological condition? |
| |
| Mr Allfours (Tamoshant. Con.): Honourable members are already in |
| possession of the evidence produced before a committee of the whole |
| house. I feel I cannot usefully add anything to that. The answer to the |
| honourable member's question is in the affirmative. |
| |
| Mr Orelli O'Reilly (Montenotte. Nat.): Have similar orders been issued |
| for the slaughter of human animals who dare to play Irish games in the |
| Phoenix park? |
| |
| Mr Allfours: The answer is in the negative. |
| |
| Mr Cowe Conacre: Has the right honourable gentleman's famous |
| Mitchelstown telegram inspired the policy of gentlemen on the Treasury |
| bench? (O! O!) |
| |
| Mr Allfours: I must have notice of that question. |
| |
| Mr Staylewit (Buncombe. Ind.): Don't hesitate to shoot. |
| |
| (Ironical opposition cheers.) |
| |
| The speaker: Order! Order! |
| |
| (The house rises. Cheers.) |
| |
| --There's the man, says Joe, that made the Gaelic sports revival. There |
| he is sitting there. The man that got away James Stephens. The champion |
| of all Ireland at putting the sixteen pound shot. What was your best |
| throw, citizen? |
| |
| --_Na bacleis_, says the citizen, letting on to be modest. There was a |
| time I was as good as the next fellow anyhow. |
| |
| --Put it there, citizen, says Joe. You were and a bloody sight better. |
| |
| --Is that really a fact? says Alf. |
| |
| --Yes, says Bloom. That's well known. Did you not know that? |
| |
| So off they started about Irish sports and shoneen games the like of |
| lawn tennis and about hurley and putting the stone and racy of the soil |
| and building up a nation once again and all to that. And of course Bloom |
| had to have his say too about if a fellow had a rower's heart violent |
| exercise was bad. I declare to my antimacassar if you took up a straw |
| from the bloody floor and if you said to Bloom: _Look at, Bloom. Do you |
| see that straw? That's a straw_. Declare to my aunt he'd talk about it |
| for an hour so he would and talk steady. |
| |
| A most interesting discussion took place in the ancient hall of _Brian |
| O'ciarnain's_ in _Sraid na Bretaine Bheag_, under the auspices of |
| _Sluagh na h-Eireann_, on the revival of ancient Gaelic sports and the |
| importance of physical culture, as understood in ancient Greece and |
| ancient Rome and ancient Ireland, for the development of the race. |
| The venerable president of the noble order was in the chair and the |
| attendance was of large dimensions. After an instructive discourse by |
| the chairman, a magnificent oration eloquently and forcibly expressed, |
| a most interesting and instructive discussion of the usual high standard |
| of excellence ensued as to the desirability of the revivability of |
| the ancient games and sports of our ancient Panceltic forefathers. The |
| wellknown and highly respected worker in the cause of our old tongue, Mr |
| Joseph M'Carthy Hynes, made an eloquent appeal for the resuscitation of |
| the ancient Gaelic sports and pastimes, practised morning and evening |
| by Finn MacCool, as calculated to revive the best traditions of manly |
| strength and prowess handed down to us from ancient ages. L. Bloom, who |
| met with a mixed reception of applause and hisses, having espoused the |
| negative the vocalist chairman brought the discussion to a close, in |
| response to repeated requests and hearty plaudits from all parts of |
| a bumper house, by a remarkably noteworthy rendering of the immortal |
| Thomas Osborne Davis' evergreen verses (happily too familiar to need |
| recalling here) _A nation once again_ in the execution of which the |
| veteran patriot champion may be said without fear of contradiction |
| to have fairly excelled himself. The Irish Caruso-Garibaldi was in |
| superlative form and his stentorian notes were heard to the greatest |
| advantage in the timehonoured anthem sung as only our citizen can sing |
| it. His superb highclass vocalism, which by its superquality greatly |
| enhanced his already international reputation, was vociferously |
| applauded by the large audience among which were to be noticed many |
| prominent members of the clergy as well as representatives of the press |
| and the bar and the other learned professions. The proceedings then |
| terminated. |
| |
| Amongst the clergy present were the very rev. William Delany, S. J., L. |
| L. D.; the rt rev. Gerald Molloy, D. D.; the rev. P. J. Kavanagh, C. S. |
| Sp.; the rev. T. Waters, C. C.; the rev. John M. Ivers, P. P.; the rev. |
| P. J. Cleary, O. S. F.; the rev. L. J. Hickey, O. P.; the very rev. Fr. |
| Nicholas, O. S. F. C.; the very rev. B. Gorman, O. D. C.; the rev. T. |
| Maher, S. J.; the very rev. James Murphy, S. J.; the rev. John Lavery, |
| V. F.; the very rev. William Doherty, D. D.; the rev. Peter Fagan, O. |
| M.; the rev. T. Brangan, O. S. A.; the rev. J. Flavin, C. C.; the |
| rev. M. A. Hackett, C. C.; the rev. W. Hurley, C. C.; the rt rev. Mgr |
| M'Manus, V. G.; the rev. B. R. Slattery, O. M. I.; the very rev. M. |
| D. Scally, P. P.; the rev. F. T. Purcell, O. P.; the very rev. Timothy |
| canon Gorman, P. P.; the rev. J. Flanagan, C. C. The laity included P. |
| Fay, T. Quirke, etc., etc. |
| |
| --Talking about violent exercise, says Alf, were you at that |
| Keogh-Bennett match? |
| |
| --No, says Joe. |
| |
| --I heard So and So made a cool hundred quid over it, says Alf. |
| |
| --Who? Blazes? says Joe. |
| |
| And says Bloom: |
| |
| --What I meant about tennis, for example, is the agility and training |
| the eye. |
| |
| --Ay, Blazes, says Alf. He let out that Myler was on the beer to run up |
| the odds and he swatting all the time. |
| |
| --We know him, says the citizen. The traitor's son. We know what put |
| English gold in his pocket. |
| |
| ---True for you, says Joe. |
| |
| And Bloom cuts in again about lawn tennis and the circulation of the |
| blood, asking Alf: |
| |
| --Now, don't you think, Bergan? |
| |
| --Myler dusted the floor with him, says Alf. Heenan and Sayers was only |
| a bloody fool to it. Handed him the father and mother of a beating. See |
| the little kipper not up to his navel and the big fellow swiping. God, |
| he gave him one last puck in the wind, Queensberry rules and all, made |
| him puke what he never ate. |
| |
| It was a historic and a hefty battle when Myler and Percy were scheduled |
| to don the gloves for the purse of fifty sovereigns. Handicapped as he |
| was by lack of poundage, Dublin's pet lamb made up for it by superlative |
| skill in ringcraft. The final bout of fireworks was a gruelling for both |
| champions. The welterweight sergeantmajor had tapped some lively claret |
| in the previous mixup during which Keogh had been receivergeneral of |
| rights and lefts, the artilleryman putting in some neat work on the |
| pet's nose, and Myler came on looking groggy. The soldier got to |
| business, leading off with a powerful left jab to which the Irish |
| gladiator retaliated by shooting out a stiff one flush to the point of |
| Bennett's jaw. The redcoat ducked but the Dubliner lifted him with a |
| left hook, the body punch being a fine one. The men came to handigrips. |
| Myler quickly became busy and got his man under, the bout ending with |
| the bulkier man on the ropes, Myler punishing him. The Englishman, whose |
| right eye was nearly closed, took his corner where he was liberally |
| drenched with water and when the bell went came on gamey and brimful of |
| pluck, confident of knocking out the fistic Eblanite in jigtime. It was |
| a fight to a finish and the best man for it. The two fought like tigers |
| and excitement ran fever high. The referee twice cautioned Pucking Percy |
| for holding but the pet was tricky and his footwork a treat to watch. |
| After a brisk exchange of courtesies during which a smart upper cut of |
| the military man brought blood freely from his opponent's mouth the |
| lamb suddenly waded in all over his man and landed a terrific left to |
| Battling Bennett's stomach, flooring him flat. It was a knockout clean |
| and clever. Amid tense expectation the Portobello bruiser was being |
| counted out when Bennett's second Ole Pfotts Wettstein threw in the |
| towel and the Santry boy was declared victor to the frenzied cheers of |
| the public who broke through the ringropes and fairly mobbed him with |
| delight. |
| |
| --He knows which side his bread is buttered, says Alf. I hear he's |
| running a concert tour now up in the north. |
| |
| --He is, says Joe. Isn't he? |
| |
| --Who? says Bloom. Ah, yes. That's quite true. Yes, a kind of summer |
| tour, you see. Just a holiday. |
| |
| --Mrs B. is the bright particular star, isn't she? says Joe. |
| |
| --My wife? says Bloom. She's singing, yes. I think it will be a success |
| too. |
| |
| He's an excellent man to organise. Excellent. |
| |
| Hoho begob says I to myself says I. That explains the milk in the |
| cocoanut and absence of hair on the animal's chest. Blazes doing the |
| tootle on the flute. Concert tour. Dirty Dan the dodger's son off Island |
| bridge that sold the same horses twice over to the government to fight |
| the Boers. Old Whatwhat. I called about the poor and water rate, Mr |
| Boylan. You what? The water rate, Mr Boylan. You whatwhat? That's the |
| bucko that'll organise her, take my tip. 'Twixt me and you Caddareesh. |
| |
| Pride of Calpe's rocky mount, the ravenhaired daughter of Tweedy. There |
| grew she to peerless beauty where loquat and almond scent the air. The |
| gardens of Alameda knew her step: the garths of olives knew and bowed. |
| The chaste spouse of Leopold is she: Marion of the bountiful bosoms. |
| |
| And lo, there entered one of the clan of the O'Molloy's, a comely hero |
| of white face yet withal somewhat ruddy, his majesty's counsel learned |
| in the law, and with him the prince and heir of the noble line of |
| Lambert. |
| |
| --Hello, Ned. |
| |
| --Hello, Alf. |
| |
| --Hello, Jack. |
| |
| --Hello, Joe. |
| |
| --God save you, says the citizen. |
| |
| --Save you kindly, says J. J. What'll it be, Ned? |
| |
| --Half one, says Ned. |
| |
| So J. J. ordered the drinks. |
| |
| --Were you round at the court? says Joe. |
| |
| --Yes, says J. J. He'll square that, Ned, says he. |
| |
| --Hope so, says Ned. |
| |
| Now what were those two at? J. J. getting him off the grand jury list |
| and the other give him a leg over the stile. With his name in Stubbs's. |
| Playing cards, hobnobbing with flash toffs with a swank glass in their |
| eye, adrinking fizz and he half smothered in writs and garnishee orders. |
| Pawning his gold watch in Cummins of Francis street where no-one would |
| know him in the private office when I was there with Pisser releasing |
| his boots out of the pop. What's your name, sir? Dunne, says he. Ay, and |
| done says I. Gob, he'll come home by weeping cross one of those days, |
| I'm thinking. |
| |
| --Did you see that bloody lunatic Breen round there? says Alf. U. p: up. |
| |
| --Yes, says J. J. Looking for a private detective. |
| |
| --Ay, says Ned. And he wanted right go wrong to address the court only |
| Corny Kelleher got round him telling him to get the handwriting examined |
| first. |
| |
| --Ten thousand pounds, says Alf, laughing. God, I'd give anything to |
| hear him before a judge and jury. |
| |
| --Was it you did it, Alf? says Joe. The truth, the whole truth and |
| nothing but the truth, so help you Jimmy Johnson. |
| |
| --Me? says Alf. Don't cast your nasturtiums on my character. |
| |
| --Whatever statement you make, says Joe, will be taken down in evidence |
| against you. |
| |
| --Of course an action would lie, says J. J. It implies that he is not |
| _compos mentis_. U. p: up. |
| |
| _--Compos_ your eye! says Alf, laughing. Do you know that he's balmy? |
| Look at his head. Do you know that some mornings he has to get his hat |
| on with a shoehorn. |
| |
| --Yes, says J. J., but the truth of a libel is no defence to an |
| indictment for publishing it in the eyes of the law. |
| |
| --Ha ha, Alf, says Joe. |
| |
| --Still, says Bloom, on account of the poor woman, I mean his wife. |
| |
| --Pity about her, says the citizen. Or any other woman marries a half |
| and half. |
| |
| --How half and half? says Bloom. Do you mean he... |
| |
| --Half and half I mean, says the citizen. A fellow that's neither fish |
| nor flesh. |
| |
| --Nor good red herring, says Joe. |
| |
| --That what's I mean, says the citizen. A pishogue, if you know what |
| that is. |
| |
| Begob I saw there was trouble coming. And Bloom explaining he meant on |
| account of it being cruel for the wife having to go round after the |
| old stuttering fool. Cruelty to animals so it is to let that bloody |
| povertystricken Breen out on grass with his beard out tripping him, |
| bringing down the rain. And she with her nose cockahoop after she |
| married him because a cousin of his old fellow's was pewopener to the |
| pope. Picture of him on the wall with his Smashall Sweeney's moustaches, |
| the signior Brini from Summerhill, the eyetallyano, papal Zouave to the |
| Holy Father, has left the quay and gone to Moss street. And who was |
| he, tell us? A nobody, two pair back and passages, at seven shillings a |
| week, and he covered with all kinds of breastplates bidding defiance to |
| the world. |
| |
| --And moreover, says J. J., a postcard is publication. It was held to |
| be sufficient evidence of malice in the testcase Sadgrove v. Hole. In my |
| opinion an action might lie. |
| |
| Six and eightpence, please. Who wants your opinion? Let us drink our |
| pints in peace. Gob, we won't be let even do that much itself. |
| |
| --Well, good health, Jack, says Ned. |
| |
| --Good health, Ned, says J. J. |
| |
| ---There he is again, says Joe. |
| |
| --Where? says Alf. |
| |
| And begob there he was passing the door with his books under his oxter |
| and the wife beside him and Corny Kelleher with his wall eye looking in |
| as they went past, talking to him like a father, trying to sell him a |
| secondhand coffin. |
| |
| --How did that Canada swindle case go off? says Joe. |
| |
| --Remanded, says J. J. |
| |
| One of the bottlenosed fraternity it was went by the name of James |
| Wought alias Saphiro alias Spark and Spiro, put an ad in the papers |
| saying he'd give a passage to Canada for twenty bob. What? Do you see |
| any green in the white of my eye? Course it was a bloody barney. What? |
| Swindled them all, skivvies and badhachs from the county Meath, ay, and |
| his own kidney too. J. J. was telling us there was an ancient Hebrew |
| Zaretsky or something weeping in the witnessbox with his hat on him, |
| swearing by the holy Moses he was stuck for two quid. |
| |
| --Who tried the case? says Joe. |
| |
| --Recorder, says Ned. |
| |
| --Poor old sir Frederick, says Alf, you can cod him up to the two eyes. |
| |
| --Heart as big as a lion, says Ned. Tell him a tale of woe about arrears |
| of rent and a sick wife and a squad of kids and, faith, he'll dissolve |
| in tears on the bench. |
| |
| --Ay, says Alf. Reuben J was bloody lucky he didn't clap him in the dock |
| the other day for suing poor little Gumley that's minding stones, for |
| the corporation there near Butt bridge. |
| |
| And he starts taking off the old recorder letting on to cry: |
| |
| --A most scandalous thing! This poor hardworking man! How many children? |
| Ten, did you say? |
| |
| --Yes, your worship. And my wife has the typhoid. |
| |
| --And the wife with typhoid fever! Scandalous! Leave the court |
| immediately, sir. No, sir, I'll make no order for payment. How dare you, |
| sir, come up before me and ask me to make an order! A poor hardworking |
| industrious man! I dismiss the case. |
| |
| And whereas on the sixteenth day of the month of the oxeyed goddess and |
| in the third week after the feastday of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, |
| the daughter of the skies, the virgin moon being then in her first |
| quarter, it came to pass that those learned judges repaired them to the |
| halls of law. There master Courtenay, sitting in his own chamber, gave |
| his rede and master Justice Andrews, sitting without a jury in the |
| probate court, weighed well and pondered the claim of the first |
| chargeant upon the property in the matter of the will propounded and |
| final testamentary disposition _in re_ the real and personal estate of |
| the late lamented Jacob Halliday, vintner, deceased, versus Livingstone, |
| an infant, of unsound mind, and another. And to the solemn court of |
| Green street there came sir Frederick the Falconer. And he sat him there |
| about the hour of five o'clock to administer the law of the brehons at |
| the commission for all that and those parts to be holden in and for the |
| county of the city of Dublin. And there sat with him the high sinhedrim |
| of the twelve tribes of Iar, for every tribe one man, of the tribe of |
| Patrick and of the tribe of Hugh and of the tribe of Owen and of the |
| tribe of Conn and of the tribe of Oscar and of the tribe of Fergus and |
| of the tribe of Finn and of the tribe of Dermot and of the tribe of |
| Cormac and of the tribe of Kevin and of the tribe of Caolte and of the |
| tribe of Ossian, there being in all twelve good men and true. And he |
| conjured them by Him who died on rood that they should well and |
| truly try and true deliverance make in the issue joined between their |
| sovereign lord the king and the prisoner at the bar and true verdict |
| give according to the evidence so help them God and kiss the book. And |
| they rose in their seats, those twelve of Iar, and they swore by |
| the name of Him Who is from everlasting that they would do His |
| rightwiseness. And straightway the minions of the law led forth from |
| their donjon keep one whom the sleuthhounds of justice had apprehended |
| in consequence of information received. And they shackled him hand and |
| foot and would take of him ne bail ne mainprise but preferred a charge |
| against him for he was a malefactor. |
| |
| --Those are nice things, says the citizen, coming over here to Ireland |
| filling the country with bugs. |
| |
| So Bloom lets on he heard nothing and he starts talking with Joe, |
| telling him he needn't trouble about that little matter till the first |
| but if he would just say a word to Mr Crawford. And so Joe swore high |
| and holy by this and by that he'd do the devil and all. |
| |
| --Because, you see, says Bloom, for an advertisement you must have |
| repetition. That's the whole secret. |
| |
| --Rely on me, says Joe. |
| |
| --Swindling the peasants, says the citizen, and the poor of Ireland. We |
| want no more strangers in our house. |
| |
| --O, I'm sure that will be all right, Hynes, says Bloom. It's just that |
| Keyes, you see. |
| |
| --Consider that done, says Joe. |
| |
| --Very kind of you, says Bloom. |
| |
| --The strangers, says the citizen. Our own fault. We let them come in. |
| We brought them in. The adulteress and her paramour brought the Saxon |
| robbers here. |
| |
| --Decree _nisi,_ says J. J. |
| |
| And Bloom letting on to be awfully deeply interested in nothing, a |
| spider's web in the corner behind the barrel, and the citizen scowling |
| after him and the old dog at his feet looking up to know who to bite and |
| when. |
| |
| --A dishonoured wife, says the citizen, that's what's the cause of all |
| our misfortunes. |
| |
| --And here she is, says Alf, that was giggling over the _Police Gazette_ |
| with Terry on the counter, in all her warpaint. |
| |
| --Give us a squint at her, says I. |
| |
| And what was it only one of the smutty yankee pictures Terry borrows off |
| of Corny Kelleher. Secrets for enlarging your private parts. Misconduct |
| of society belle. Norman W. Tupper, wealthy Chicago contractor, finds |
| pretty but faithless wife in lap of officer Taylor. Belle in her |
| bloomers misconducting herself, and her fancyman feeling for her tickles |
| and Norman W. Tupper bouncing in with his peashooter just in time to be |
| late after she doing the trick of the loop with officer Taylor. |
| |
| --O jakers, Jenny, says Joe, how short your shirt is! |
| |
| --There's hair, Joe, says I. Get a queer old tailend of corned beef off |
| of that one, what? |
| |
| So anyhow in came John Wyse Nolan and Lenehan with him with a face on |
| him as long as a late breakfast. |
| |
| --Well, says the citizen, what's the latest from the scene of action? |
| What did those tinkers in the city hall at their caucus meeting decide |
| about the Irish language? |
| |
| O'Nolan, clad in shining armour, low bending made obeisance to the |
| puissant and high and mighty chief of all Erin and did him to wit of |
| that which had befallen, how that the grave elders of the most obedient |
| city, second of the realm, had met them in the tholsel, and there, after |
| due prayers to the gods who dwell in ether supernal, had taken solemn |
| counsel whereby they might, if so be it might be, bring once more into |
| honour among mortal men the winged speech of the seadivided Gael. |
| |
| --It's on the march, says the citizen. To hell with the bloody brutal |
| Sassenachs and their _patois._ |
| |
| So J. J. puts in a word, doing the toff about one story was good till |
| you heard another and blinking facts and the Nelson policy, putting your |
| blind eye to the telescope and drawing up a bill of attainder to impeach |
| a nation, and Bloom trying to back him up moderation and botheration and |
| their colonies and their civilisation. |
| |
| --Their syphilisation, you mean, says the citizen. To hell with |
| them! The curse of a goodfornothing God light sideways on the bloody |
| thicklugged sons of whores' gets! No music and no art and no literature |
| worthy of the name. Any civilisation they have they stole from us. |
| Tonguetied sons of bastards' ghosts. |
| |
| --The European family, says J. J.... |
| |
| --They're not European, says the citizen. I was in Europe with Kevin |
| Egan of Paris. You wouldn't see a trace of them or their language |
| anywhere in Europe except in a _cabinet d'aisance._ |
| |
| And says John Wyse: |
| |
| --Full many a flower is born to blush unseen. |
| |
| And says Lenehan that knows a bit of the lingo: |
| |
| --_Conspuez les Anglais! Perfide Albion!_ |
| |
| He said and then lifted he in his rude great brawny strengthy hands the |
| medher of dark strong foamy ale and, uttering his tribal slogan _Lamh |
| Dearg Abu_, he drank to the undoing of his foes, a race of mighty |
| valorous heroes, rulers of the waves, who sit on thrones of alabaster |
| silent as the deathless gods. |
| |
| --What's up with you, says I to Lenehan. You look like a fellow that had |
| lost a bob and found a tanner. |
| |
| --Gold cup, says he. |
| |
| --Who won, Mr Lenehan? says Terry. |
| |
| _--Throwaway,_ says he, at twenty to one. A rank outsider. And the rest |
| nowhere. |
| |
| --And Bass's mare? says Terry. |
| |
| --Still running, says he. We're all in a cart. Boylan plunged two quid |
| on my tip _Sceptre_ for himself and a lady friend. |
| |
| --I had half a crown myself, says Terry, on _Zinfandel_ that Mr Flynn |
| gave me. Lord Howard de Walden's. |
| |
| --Twenty to one, says Lenehan. Such is life in an outhouse. _Throwaway,_ |
| says he. Takes the biscuit, and talking about bunions. Frailty, thy name |
| is _Sceptre._ |
| |
| So he went over to the biscuit tin Bob Doran left to see if there was |
| anything he could lift on the nod, the old cur after him backing his |
| luck with his mangy snout up. Old Mother Hubbard went to the cupboard. |
| |
| --Not there, my child, says he. |
| |
| --Keep your pecker up, says Joe. She'd have won the money only for the |
| other dog. |
| |
| And J. J. and the citizen arguing about law and history with Bloom |
| sticking in an odd word. |
| |
| --Some people, says Bloom, can see the mote in others' eyes but they |
| can't see the beam in their own. |
| |
| --_Raimeis_, says the citizen. There's no-one as blind as the fellow |
| that won't see, if you know what that means. Where are our missing |
| twenty millions of Irish should be here today instead of four, our lost |
| tribes? And our potteries and textiles, the finest in the whole world! |
| And our wool that was sold in Rome in the time of Juvenal and our flax |
| and our damask from the looms of Antrim and our Limerick lace, our |
| tanneries and our white flint glass down there by Ballybough and our |
| Huguenot poplin that we have since Jacquard de Lyon and our woven silk |
| and our Foxford tweeds and ivory raised point from the Carmelite convent |
| in New Ross, nothing like it in the whole wide world. Where are the |
| Greek merchants that came through the pillars of Hercules, the Gibraltar |
| now grabbed by the foe of mankind, with gold and Tyrian purple to |
| sell in Wexford at the fair of Carmen? Read Tacitus and Ptolemy, even |
| Giraldus Cambrensis. Wine, peltries, Connemara marble, silver from |
| Tipperary, second to none, our farfamed horses even today, the Irish |
| hobbies, with king Philip of Spain offering to pay customs duties for |
| the right to fish in our waters. What do the yellowjohns of Anglia owe |
| us for our ruined trade and our ruined hearths? And the beds of the |
| Barrow and Shannon they won't deepen with millions of acres of marsh and |
| bog to make us all die of consumption? |
| |
| --As treeless as Portugal we'll be soon, says John Wyse, or Heligoland |
| with its one tree if something is not done to reafforest the land. |
| Larches, firs, all the trees of the conifer family are going fast. I was |
| reading a report of lord Castletown's... |
| |
| --Save them, says the citizen, the giant ash of Galway and the chieftain |
| elm of Kildare with a fortyfoot bole and an acre of foliage. Save the |
| trees of Ireland for the future men of Ireland on the fair hills of |
| Eire, O. |
| |
| --Europe has its eyes on you, says Lenehan. |
| |
| The fashionable international world attended EN MASSE this afternoon |
| at the wedding of the chevalier Jean Wyse de Neaulan, grand high chief |
| ranger of the Irish National Foresters, with Miss Fir Conifer of Pine |
| Valley. Lady Sylvester Elmshade, Mrs Barbara Lovebirch, Mrs Poll Ash, |
| Mrs Holly Hazeleyes, Miss Daphne Bays, Miss Dorothy Canebrake, Mrs Clyde |
| Twelvetrees, Mrs Rowan Greene, Mrs Helen Vinegadding, Miss Virginia |
| Creeper, Miss Gladys Beech, Miss Olive Garth, Miss Blanche Maple, Mrs |
| Maud Mahogany, Miss Myra Myrtle, Miss Priscilla Elderflower, Miss |
| Bee Honeysuckle, Miss Grace Poplar, Miss O Mimosa San, Miss Rachel |
| Cedarfrond, the Misses Lilian and Viola Lilac, Miss Timidity Aspenall, |
| Mrs Kitty Dewey-Mosse, Miss May Hawthorne, Mrs Gloriana Palme, Mrs Liana |
| Forrest, Mrs Arabella Blackwood and Mrs Norma Holyoake of Oakholme Regis |
| graced the ceremony by their presence. The bride who was given away by |
| her father, the M'Conifer of the Glands, looked exquisitely charming in |
| a creation carried out in green mercerised silk, moulded on an underslip |
| of gloaming grey, sashed with a yoke of broad emerald and finished with |
| a triple flounce of darkerhued fringe, the scheme being relieved by |
| bretelles and hip insertions of acorn bronze. The maids of honour, Miss |
| Larch Conifer and Miss Spruce Conifer, sisters of the bride, wore very |
| becoming costumes in the same tone, a dainty _motif_ of plume rose being |
| worked into the pleats in a pinstripe and repeated capriciously in the |
| jadegreen toques in the form of heron feathers of paletinted coral. |
| Senhor Enrique Flor presided at the organ with his wellknown ability |
| and, in addition to the prescribed numbers of the nuptial mass, played |
| a new and striking arrangement of _Woodman, spare that tree_ at the |
| conclusion of the service. On leaving the church of Saint Fiacre _in |
| Horto_ after the papal blessing the happy pair were subjected to a |
| playful crossfire of hazelnuts, beechmast, bayleaves, catkins of willow, |
| ivytod, hollyberries, mistletoe sprigs and quicken shoots. Mr and Mrs |
| Wyse Conifer Neaulan will spend a quiet honeymoon in the Black Forest. |
| |
| --And our eyes are on Europe, says the citizen. We had our trade with |
| Spain and the French and with the Flemings before those mongrels were |
| pupped, Spanish ale in Galway, the winebark on the winedark waterway. |
| |
| --And will again, says Joe. |
| |
| --And with the help of the holy mother of God we will again, says the |
| citizen, clapping his thigh, our harbours that are empty will be full |
| again, Queenstown, Kinsale, Galway, Blacksod Bay, Ventry in the kingdom |
| of Kerry, Killybegs, the third largest harbour in the wide world with |
| a fleet of masts of the Galway Lynches and the Cavan O'Reillys and the |
| O'Kennedys of Dublin when the earl of Desmond could make a treaty with |
| the emperor Charles the Fifth himself. And will again, says he, when the |
| first Irish battleship is seen breasting the waves with our own flag to |
| the fore, none of your Henry Tudor's harps, no, the oldest flag afloat, |
| the flag of the province of Desmond and Thomond, three crowns on a blue |
| field, the three sons of Milesius. |
| |
| And he took the last swig out of the pint. Moya. All wind and piss like |
| a tanyard cat. Cows in Connacht have long horns. As much as his bloody |
| life is worth to go down and address his tall talk to the assembled |
| multitude in Shanagolden where he daren't show his nose with the Molly |
| Maguires looking for him to let daylight through him for grabbing the |
| holding of an evicted tenant. |
| |
| --Hear, hear to that, says John Wyse. What will you have? |
| |
| --An imperial yeomanry, says Lenehan, to celebrate the occasion. |
| |
| --Half one, Terry, says John Wyse, and a hands up. Terry! Are you |
| asleep? |
| |
| --Yes, sir, says Terry. Small whisky and bottle of Allsop. Right, sir. |
| |
| Hanging over the bloody paper with Alf looking for spicy bits instead of |
| attending to the general public. Picture of a butting match, trying to |
| crack their bloody skulls, one chap going for the other with his head |
| down like a bull at a gate. And another one: _Black Beast Burned in |
| Omaha, Ga_. A lot of Deadwood Dicks in slouch hats and they firing at a |
| Sambo strung up in a tree with his tongue out and a bonfire under |
| him. Gob, they ought to drown him in the sea after and electrocute and |
| crucify him to make sure of their job. |
| |
| --But what about the fighting navy, says Ned, that keeps our foes at |
| bay? |
| |
| --I'll tell you what about it, says the citizen. Hell upon earth it is. |
| Read the revelations that's going on in the papers about flogging on |
| the training ships at Portsmouth. A fellow writes that calls himself |
| _Disgusted One_. |
| |
| So he starts telling us about corporal punishment and about the crew |
| of tars and officers and rearadmirals drawn up in cocked hats and the |
| parson with his protestant bible to witness punishment and a young lad |
| brought out, howling for his ma, and they tie him down on the buttend of |
| a gun. |
| |
| --A rump and dozen, says the citizen, was what that old ruffian sir John |
| Beresford called it but the modern God's Englishman calls it caning on |
| the breech. |
| |
| And says John Wyse: |
| |
| --'Tis a custom more honoured in the breach than in the observance. |
| |
| Then he was telling us the master at arms comes along with a long cane |
| and he draws out and he flogs the bloody backside off of the poor lad |
| till he yells meila murder. |
| |
| --That's your glorious British navy, says the citizen, that bosses the |
| earth. |
| |
| The fellows that never will be slaves, with the only hereditary chamber |
| on the face of God's earth and their land in the hands of a dozen |
| gamehogs and cottonball barons. That's the great empire they boast about |
| of drudges and whipped serfs. |
| |
| --On which the sun never rises, says Joe. |
| |
| --And the tragedy of it is, says the citizen, they believe it. The |
| unfortunate yahoos believe it. |
| |
| They believe in rod, the scourger almighty, creator of hell upon earth, |
| and in Jacky Tar, the son of a gun, who was conceived of unholy boast, |
| born of the fighting navy, suffered under rump and dozen, was scarified, |
| flayed and curried, yelled like bloody hell, the third day he arose |
| again from the bed, steered into haven, sitteth on his beamend till |
| further orders whence he shall come to drudge for a living and be paid. |
| |
| --But, says Bloom, isn't discipline the same everywhere. I mean wouldn't |
| it be the same here if you put force against force? |
| |
| Didn't I tell you? As true as I'm drinking this porter if he was at his |
| last gasp he'd try to downface you that dying was living. |
| |
| --We'll put force against force, says the citizen. We have our greater |
| Ireland beyond the sea. They were driven out of house and home in the |
| black 47. Their mudcabins and their shielings by the roadside were laid |
| low by the batteringram and the _Times_ rubbed its hands and told the |
| whitelivered Saxons there would soon be as few Irish in Ireland as |
| redskins in America. Even the Grand Turk sent us his piastres. But the |
| Sassenach tried to starve the nation at home while the land was full |
| of crops that the British hyenas bought and sold in Rio de Janeiro. Ay, |
| they drove out the peasants in hordes. Twenty thousand of them died in |
| the coffinships. But those that came to the land of the free remember |
| the land of bondage. And they will come again and with a vengeance, no |
| cravens, the sons of Granuaile, the champions of Kathleen ni Houlihan. |
| |
| --Perfectly true, says Bloom. But my point was... |
| |
| --We are a long time waiting for that day, citizen, says Ned. Since the |
| poor old woman told us that the French were on the sea and landed at |
| Killala. |
| |
| --Ay, says John Wyse. We fought for the royal Stuarts that reneged us |
| against the Williamites and they betrayed us. Remember Limerick and the |
| broken treatystone. We gave our best blood to France and Spain, the |
| wild geese. Fontenoy, eh? And Sarsfield and O'Donnell, duke of Tetuan |
| in Spain, and Ulysses Browne of Camus that was fieldmarshal to Maria |
| Teresa. But what did we ever get for it? |
| |
| --The French! says the citizen. Set of dancing masters! Do you know |
| what it is? They were never worth a roasted fart to Ireland. Aren't they |
| trying to make an _Entente cordiale_ now at Tay Pay's dinnerparty with |
| perfidious Albion? Firebrands of Europe and they always were. |
| |
| --_Conspuez les Français_, says Lenehan, nobbling his beer. |
| |
| --And as for the Prooshians and the Hanoverians, says Joe, haven't we |
| had enough of those sausageeating bastards on the throne from George the |
| elector down to the German lad and the flatulent old bitch that's dead? |
| |
| Jesus, I had to laugh at the way he came out with that about the old one |
| with the winkers on her, blind drunk in her royal palace every night of |
| God, old Vic, with her jorum of mountain dew and her coachman carting |
| her up body and bones to roll into bed and she pulling him by the |
| whiskers and singing him old bits of songs about _Ehren on the Rhine_ |
| and come where the boose is cheaper. |
| |
| --Well, says J. J. We have Edward the peacemaker now. |
| |
| --Tell that to a fool, says the citizen. There's a bloody sight more pox |
| than pax about that boyo. Edward Guelph-Wettin! |
| |
| --And what do you think, says Joe, of the holy boys, the priests |
| and bishops of Ireland doing up his room in Maynooth in His Satanic |
| Majesty's racing colours and sticking up pictures of all the horses his |
| jockeys rode. The earl of Dublin, no less. |
| |
| --They ought to have stuck up all the women he rode himself, says little |
| Alf. |
| |
| And says J. J.: |
| |
| --Considerations of space influenced their lordships' decision. |
| |
| --Will you try another, citizen? says Joe. |
| |
| --Yes, sir, says he. I will. |
| |
| --You? says Joe. |
| |
| --Beholden to you, Joe, says I. May your shadow never grow less. |
| |
| --Repeat that dose, says Joe. |
| |
| Bloom was talking and talking with John Wyse and he quite excited with |
| his dunducketymudcoloured mug on him and his old plumeyes rolling about. |
| |
| --Persecution, says he, all the history of the world is full of it. |
| Perpetuating national hatred among nations. |
| |
| --But do you know what a nation means? says John Wyse. |
| |
| --Yes, says Bloom. |
| |
| --What is it? says John Wyse. |
| |
| --A nation? says Bloom. A nation is the same people living in the same |
| place. |
| |
| --By God, then, says Ned, laughing, if that's so I'm a nation for I'm |
| living in the same place for the past five years. |
| |
| So of course everyone had the laugh at Bloom and says he, trying to muck |
| out of it: |
| |
| --Or also living in different places. |
| |
| --That covers my case, says Joe. |
| |
| --What is your nation if I may ask? says the citizen. |
| |
| --Ireland, says Bloom. I was born here. Ireland. |
| |
| The citizen said nothing only cleared the spit out of his gullet and, |
| gob, he spat a Red bank oyster out of him right in the corner. |
| |
| --After you with the push, Joe, says he, taking out his handkerchief to |
| swab himself dry. |
| |
| --Here you are, citizen, says Joe. Take that in your right hand and |
| repeat after me the following words. |
| |
| The muchtreasured and intricately embroidered ancient Irish facecloth |
| attributed to Solomon of Droma and Manus Tomaltach og MacDonogh, authors |
| of the Book of Ballymote, was then carefully produced and called forth |
| prolonged admiration. No need to dwell on the legendary beauty of the |
| cornerpieces, the acme of art, wherein one can distinctly discern each |
| of the four evangelists in turn presenting to each of the four masters |
| his evangelical symbol, a bogoak sceptre, a North American puma (a far |
| nobler king of beasts than the British article, be it said in passing), |
| a Kerry calf and a golden eagle from Carrantuohill. The scenes depicted |
| on the emunctory field, showing our ancient duns and raths and cromlechs |
| and grianauns and seats of learning and maledictive stones, are as |
| wonderfully beautiful and the pigments as delicate as when the Sligo |
| illuminators gave free rein to their artistic fantasy long long ago in |
| the time of the Barmecides. Glendalough, the lovely lakes of Killarney, |
| the ruins of Clonmacnois, Cong Abbey, Glen Inagh and the Twelve Pins, |
| Ireland's Eye, the Green Hills of Tallaght, Croagh Patrick, the brewery |
| of Messrs Arthur Guinness, Son and Company (Limited), Lough Neagh's |
| banks, the vale of Ovoca, Isolde's tower, the Mapas obelisk, Sir Patrick |
| Dun's hospital, Cape Clear, the glen of Aherlow, Lynch's castle, the |
| Scotch house, Rathdown Union Workhouse at Loughlinstown, Tullamore jail, |
| Castleconnel rapids, Kilballymacshonakill, the cross at Monasterboice, |
| Jury's Hotel, S. Patrick's Purgatory, the Salmon Leap, Maynooth college |
| refectory, Curley's hole, the three birthplaces of the first duke of |
| Wellington, the rock of Cashel, the bog of Allen, the Henry Street |
| Warehouse, Fingal's Cave--all these moving scenes are still there for us |
| today rendered more beautiful still by the waters of sorrow which have |
| passed over them and by the rich incrustations of time. |
| |
| --Show us over the drink, says I. Which is which? |
| |
| --That's mine, says Joe, as the devil said to the dead policeman. |
| |
| --And I belong to a race too, says Bloom, that is hated and persecuted. |
| Also now. This very moment. This very instant. |
| |
| Gob, he near burnt his fingers with the butt of his old cigar. |
| |
| --Robbed, says he. Plundered. Insulted. Persecuted. Taking what belongs |
| to us by right. At this very moment, says he, putting up his fist, sold |
| by auction in Morocco like slaves or cattle. |
| |
| --Are you talking about the new Jerusalem? says the citizen. |
| |
| --I'm talking about injustice, says Bloom. |
| |
| --Right, says John Wyse. Stand up to it then with force like men. |
| |
| That's an almanac picture for you. Mark for a softnosed bullet. Old |
| lardyface standing up to the business end of a gun. Gob, he'd adorn a |
| sweepingbrush, so he would, if he only had a nurse's apron on him. And |
| then he collapses all of a sudden, twisting around all the opposite, as |
| limp as a wet rag. |
| |
| --But it's no use, says he. Force, hatred, history, all that. That's not |
| life for men and women, insult and hatred. And everybody knows that it's |
| the very opposite of that that is really life. |
| |
| --What? says Alf. |
| |
| --Love, says Bloom. I mean the opposite of hatred. I must go now, says |
| he to John Wyse. Just round to the court a moment to see if Martin is |
| there. If he comes just say I'll be back in a second. Just a moment. |
| |
| Who's hindering you? And off he pops like greased lightning. |
| |
| --A new apostle to the gentiles, says the citizen. Universal love. |
| |
| --Well, says John Wyse. Isn't that what we're told. Love your neighbour. |
| |
| --That chap? says the citizen. Beggar my neighbour is his motto. Love, |
| moya! He's a nice pattern of a Romeo and Juliet. |
| |
| Love loves to love love. Nurse loves the new chemist. Constable 14A |
| loves Mary Kelly. Gerty MacDowell loves the boy that has the bicycle. M. |
| B. loves a fair gentleman. Li Chi Han lovey up kissy Cha Pu Chow. Jumbo, |
| the elephant, loves Alice, the elephant. Old Mr Verschoyle with the ear |
| trumpet loves old Mrs Verschoyle with the turnedin eye. The man in the |
| brown macintosh loves a lady who is dead. His Majesty the King loves Her |
| Majesty the Queen. Mrs Norman W. Tupper loves officer Taylor. You love |
| a certain person. And this person loves that other person because |
| everybody loves somebody but God loves everybody. |
| |
| --Well, Joe, says I, your very good health and song. More power, |
| citizen. |
| |
| --Hurrah, there, says Joe. |
| |
| --The blessing of God and Mary and Patrick on you, says the citizen. |
| |
| And he ups with his pint to wet his whistle. |
| |
| --We know those canters, says he, preaching and picking your pocket. |
| What about sanctimonious Cromwell and his ironsides that put the women |
| and children of Drogheda to the sword with the bible text _God is love_ |
| pasted round the mouth of his cannon? The bible! Did you read that skit |
| in the _United Irishman_ today about that Zulu chief that's visiting |
| England? |
| |
| --What's that? says Joe. |
| |
| So the citizen takes up one of his paraphernalia papers and he starts |
| reading out: |
| |
| --A delegation of the chief cotton magnates of Manchester was presented |
| yesterday to His Majesty the Alaki of Abeakuta by Gold Stick in Waiting, |
| Lord Walkup of Walkup on Eggs, to tender to His Majesty the heartfelt |
| thanks of British traders for the facilities afforded them in his |
| dominions. The delegation partook of luncheon at the conclusion of which |
| the dusky potentate, in the course of a happy speech, freely translated |
| by the British chaplain, the reverend Ananias Praisegod Barebones, |
| tendered his best thanks to Massa Walkup and emphasised the cordial |
| relations existing between Abeakuta and the British empire, stating that |
| he treasured as one of his dearest possessions an illuminated bible, |
| the volume of the word of God and the secret of England's greatness, |
| graciously presented to him by the white chief woman, the great squaw |
| Victoria, with a personal dedication from the august hand of the Royal |
| Donor. The Alaki then drank a lovingcup of firstshot usquebaugh to the |
| toast _Black and White_ from the skull of his immediate predecessor in |
| the dynasty Kakachakachak, surnamed Forty Warts, after which he visited |
| the chief factory of Cottonopolis and signed his mark in the visitors' |
| book, subsequently executing a charming old Abeakutic wardance, in the |
| course of which he swallowed several knives and forks, amid hilarious |
| applause from the girl hands. |
| |
| --Widow woman, says Ned. I wouldn't doubt her. Wonder did he put that |
| bible to the same use as I would. |
| |
| --Same only more so, says Lenehan. And thereafter in that fruitful land |
| the broadleaved mango flourished exceedingly. |
| |
| --Is that by Griffith? says John Wyse. |
| |
| --No, says the citizen. It's not signed Shanganagh. It's only |
| initialled: P. |
| |
| --And a very good initial too, says Joe. |
| |
| --That's how it's worked, says the citizen. Trade follows the flag. |
| |
| --Well, says J. J., if they're any worse than those Belgians in the |
| Congo Free State they must be bad. Did you read that report by a man |
| what's this his name is? |
| |
| --Casement, says the citizen. He's an Irishman. |
| |
| --Yes, that's the man, says J. J. Raping the women and girls and |
| flogging the natives on the belly to squeeze all the red rubber they can |
| out of them. |
| |
| --I know where he's gone, says Lenehan, cracking his fingers. |
| |
| --Who? says I. |
| |
| --Bloom, says he. The courthouse is a blind. He had a few bob on |
| _Throwaway_ and he's gone to gather in the shekels. |
| |
| --Is it that whiteeyed kaffir? says the citizen, that never backed a |
| horse in anger in his life? |
| |
| --That's where he's gone, says Lenehan. I met Bantam Lyons going to back |
| that horse only I put him off it and he told me Bloom gave him the tip. |
| Bet you what you like he has a hundred shillings to five on. He's the |
| only man in Dublin has it. A dark horse. |
| |
| --He's a bloody dark horse himself, says Joe. |
| |
| --Mind, Joe, says I. Show us the entrance out. |
| |
| --There you are, says Terry. |
| |
| Goodbye Ireland I'm going to Gort. So I just went round the back of |
| the yard to pumpship and begob (hundred shillings to five) while I was |
| letting off my _(Throwaway_ twenty to) letting off my load gob says I |
| to myself I knew he was uneasy in his (two pints off of Joe and one in |
| Slattery's off) in his mind to get off the mark to (hundred shillings |
| is five quid) and when they were in the (dark horse) pisser Burke was |
| telling me card party and letting on the child was sick (gob, must have |
| done about a gallon) flabbyarse of a wife speaking down the tube _she's |
| better_ or _she's_ (ow!) all a plan so he could vamoose with the pool if |
| he won or (Jesus, full up I was) trading without a licence (ow!) Ireland |
| my nation says he (hoik! phthook!) never be up to those bloody (there's |
| the last of it) Jerusalem (ah!) cuckoos. |
| |
| So anyhow when I got back they were at it dingdong, John Wyse saying it |
| was Bloom gave the ideas for Sinn Fein to Griffith to put in his paper |
| all kinds of jerrymandering, packed juries and swindling the taxes off |
| of the government and appointing consuls all over the world to walk |
| about selling Irish industries. Robbing Peter to pay Paul. Gob, that |
| puts the bloody kybosh on it if old sloppy eyes is mucking up the show. |
| Give us a bloody chance. God save Ireland from the likes of that bloody |
| mouseabout. Mr Bloom with his argol bargol. And his old fellow before |
| him perpetrating frauds, old Methusalem Bloom, the robbing bagman, that |
| poisoned himself with the prussic acid after he swamping the country |
| with his baubles and his penny diamonds. Loans by post on easy terms. |
| Any amount of money advanced on note of hand. Distance no object. No |
| security. Gob, he's like Lanty MacHale's goat that'd go a piece of the |
| road with every one. |
| |
| --Well, it's a fact, says John Wyse. And there's the man now that'll |
| tell you all about it, Martin Cunningham. |
| |
| Sure enough the castle car drove up with Martin on it and Jack Power |
| with him and a fellow named Crofter or Crofton, pensioner out of |
| the collector general's, an orangeman Blackburn does have on the |
| registration and he drawing his pay or Crawford gallivanting around the |
| country at the king's expense. |
| |
| Our travellers reached the rustic hostelry and alighted from their |
| palfreys. |
| |
| --Ho, varlet! cried he, who by his mien seemed the leader of the party. |
| Saucy knave! To us! |
| |
| So saying he knocked loudly with his swordhilt upon the open lattice. |
| |
| Mine host came forth at the summons, girding him with his tabard. |
| |
| --Give you good den, my masters, said he with an obsequious bow. |
| |
| --Bestir thyself, sirrah! cried he who had knocked. Look to our steeds. |
| And for ourselves give us of your best for ifaith we need it. |
| |
| --Lackaday, good masters, said the host, my poor house has but a bare |
| larder. I know not what to offer your lordships. |
| |
| --How now, fellow? cried the second of the party, a man of pleasant |
| countenance, So servest thou the king's messengers, master Taptun? |
| |
| An instantaneous change overspread the landlord's visage. |
| |
| --Cry you mercy, gentlemen, he said humbly. An you be the king's |
| messengers (God shield His Majesty!) you shall not want for aught. The |
| king's friends (God bless His Majesty!) shall not go afasting in my |
| house I warrant me. |
| |
| --Then about! cried the traveller who had not spoken, a lusty |
| trencherman by his aspect. Hast aught to give us? |
| |
| Mine host bowed again as he made answer: |
| |
| --What say you, good masters, to a squab pigeon pasty, some collops of |
| venison, a saddle of veal, widgeon with crisp hog's bacon, a boar's head |
| with pistachios, a bason of jolly custard, a medlar tansy and a flagon |
| of old Rhenish? |
| |
| --Gadzooks! cried the last speaker. That likes me well. Pistachios! |
| |
| --Aha! cried he of the pleasant countenance. A poor house and a bare |
| larder, quotha! 'Tis a merry rogue. |
| |
| So in comes Martin asking where was Bloom. |
| |
| --Where is he? says Lenehan. Defrauding widows and orphans. |
| |
| --Isn't that a fact, says John Wyse, what I was telling the citizen |
| about Bloom and the Sinn Fein? |
| |
| --That's so, says Martin. Or so they allege. |
| |
| --Who made those allegations? says Alf. |
| |
| --I, says Joe. I'm the alligator. |
| |
| --And after all, says John Wyse, why can't a jew love his country like |
| the next fellow? |
| |
| --Why not? says J. J., when he's quite sure which country it is. |
| |
| --Is he a jew or a gentile or a holy Roman or a swaddler or what the |
| hell is he? says Ned. Or who is he? No offence, Crofton. |
| |
| --Who is Junius? says J. J. |
| |
| --We don't want him, says Crofter the Orangeman or presbyterian. |
| |
| --He's a perverted jew, says Martin, from a place in Hungary and it was |
| he drew up all the plans according to the Hungarian system. We know that |
| in the castle. |
| |
| --Isn't he a cousin of Bloom the dentist? says Jack Power. |
| |
| --Not at all, says Martin. Only namesakes. His name was Virag, the |
| father's name that poisoned himself. He changed it by deedpoll, the |
| father did. |
| |
| --That's the new Messiah for Ireland! says the citizen. Island of saints |
| and sages! |
| |
| --Well, they're still waiting for their redeemer, says Martin. For that |
| matter so are we. |
| |
| --Yes, says J. J., and every male that's born they think it may be their |
| Messiah. And every jew is in a tall state of excitement, I believe, till |
| he knows if he's a father or a mother. |
| |
| --Expecting every moment will be his next, says Lenehan. |
| |
| --O, by God, says Ned, you should have seen Bloom before that son of his |
| that died was born. I met him one day in the south city markets buying a |
| tin of Neave's food six weeks before the wife was delivered. |
| |
| --_En ventre sa mère_, says J. J. |
| |
| --Do you call that a man? says the citizen. |
| |
| --I wonder did he ever put it out of sight, says Joe. |
| |
| --Well, there were two children born anyhow, says Jack Power. |
| |
| --And who does he suspect? says the citizen. |
| |
| Gob, there's many a true word spoken in jest. One of those mixed |
| middlings he is. Lying up in the hotel Pisser was telling me once a |
| month with headache like a totty with her courses. Do you know what I'm |
| telling you? It'd be an act of God to take a hold of a fellow the like |
| of that and throw him in the bloody sea. Justifiable homicide, so it |
| would. Then sloping off with his five quid without putting up a pint of |
| stuff like a man. Give us your blessing. Not as much as would blind your |
| eye. |
| |
| --Charity to the neighbour, says Martin. But where is he? We can't wait. |
| |
| --A wolf in sheep's clothing, says the citizen. That's what he is. Virag |
| from Hungary! Ahasuerus I call him. Cursed by God. |
| |
| --Have you time for a brief libation, Martin? says Ned. |
| |
| --Only one, says Martin. We must be quick. J. J. and S. |
| |
| --You, Jack? Crofton? Three half ones, Terry. |
| |
| --Saint Patrick would want to land again at Ballykinlar and convert us, |
| says the citizen, after allowing things like that to contaminate our |
| shores. |
| |
| --Well, says Martin, rapping for his glass. God bless all here is my |
| prayer. |
| |
| --Amen, says the citizen. |
| |
| --And I'm sure He will, says Joe. |
| |
| And at the sound of the sacring bell, headed by a crucifer with |
| acolytes, thurifers, boatbearers, readers, ostiarii, deacons and |
| subdeacons, the blessed company drew nigh of mitred abbots and priors |
| and guardians and monks and friars: the monks of Benedict of Spoleto, |
| Carthusians and Camaldolesi, Cistercians and Olivetans, Oratorians |
| and Vallombrosans, and the friars of Augustine, Brigittines, |
| Premonstratensians, Servi, Trinitarians, and the children of Peter |
| Nolasco: and therewith from Carmel mount the children of Elijah prophet |
| led by Albert bishop and by Teresa of Avila, calced and other: and |
| friars, brown and grey, sons of poor Francis, capuchins, cordeliers, |
| minimes and observants and the daughters of Clara: and the sons of |
| Dominic, the friars preachers, and the sons of Vincent: and the monks |
| of S. Wolstan: and Ignatius his children: and the confraternity of the |
| christian brothers led by the reverend brother Edmund Ignatius Rice. And |
| after came all saints and martyrs, virgins and confessors: S. Cyr and |
| S. Isidore Arator and S. James the Less and S. Phocas of Sinope and S. |
| Julian Hospitator and S. Felix de Cantalice and S. Simon Stylites and |
| S. Stephen Protomartyr and S. John of God and S. Ferreol and S. Leugarde |
| and S. Theodotus and S. Vulmar and S. Richard and S. Vincent de Paul and |
| S. Martin of Todi and S. Martin of Tours and S. Alfred and S. Joseph and |
| S. Denis and S. Cornelius and S. Leopold and S. Bernard and S. Terence |
| and S. Edward and S. Owen Caniculus and S. Anonymous and S. Eponymous |
| and S. Pseudonymous and S. Homonymous and S. Paronymous and S. |
| Synonymous and S. Laurence O'Toole and S. James of Dingle and |
| Compostella and S. Columcille and S. Columba and S. Celestine and S. |
| Colman and S. Kevin and S. Brendan and S. Frigidian and S. Senan and S. |
| Fachtna and S. Columbanus and S. Gall and S. Fursey and S. Fintan and S. |
| Fiacre and S. John Nepomuc and S. Thomas Aquinas and S. Ives of Brittany |
| and S. Michan and S. Herman-Joseph and the three patrons of holy youth |
| S. Aloysius Gonzaga and S. Stanislaus Kostka and S. John Berchmans |
| and the saints Gervasius, Servasius and Bonifacius and S. Bride and S. |
| Kieran and S. Canice of Kilkenny and S. Jarlath of Tuam and S. Finbarr |
| and S. Pappin of Ballymun and Brother Aloysius Pacificus and Brother |
| Louis Bellicosus and the saints Rose of Lima and of Viterbo and S. |
| Martha of Bethany and S. Mary of Egypt and S. Lucy and S. Brigid and |
| S. Attracta and S. Dympna and S. Ita and S. Marion Calpensis and |
| the Blessed Sister Teresa of the Child Jesus and S. Barbara and S. |
| Scholastica and S. Ursula with eleven thousand virgins. And all came |
| with nimbi and aureoles and gloriae, bearing palms and harps and swords |
| and olive crowns, in robes whereon were woven the blessed symbols of |
| their efficacies, inkhorns, arrows, loaves, cruses, fetters, axes, |
| trees, bridges, babes in a bathtub, shells, wallets, shears, keys, |
| dragons, lilies, buckshot, beards, hogs, lamps, bellows, beehives, |
| soupladles, stars, snakes, anvils, boxes of vaseline, bells, crutches, |
| forceps, stags' horns, watertight boots, hawks, millstones, eyes on a |
| dish, wax candles, aspergills, unicorns. And as they wended their way by |
| Nelson's Pillar, Henry street, Mary street, Capel street, Little Britain |
| street chanting the introit in _Epiphania Domini_ which beginneth |
| _Surge, illuminare_ and thereafter most sweetly the gradual _Omnes_ |
| which saith _de Saba venient_ they did divers wonders such as casting |
| out devils, raising the dead to life, multiplying fishes, healing the |
| halt and the blind, discovering various articles which had been mislaid, |
| interpreting and fulfilling the scriptures, blessing and prophesying. |
| And last, beneath a canopy of cloth of gold came the reverend Father |
| O'Flynn attended by Malachi and Patrick. And when the good fathers |
| had reached the appointed place, the house of Bernard Kiernan and Co, |
| limited, 8, 9 and 10 little Britain street, wholesale grocers, wine |
| and brandy shippers, licensed fo the sale of beer, wine and spirits for |
| consumption on the premises, the celebrant blessed the house and censed |
| the mullioned windows and the groynes and the vaults and the arrises and |
| the capitals and the pediments and the cornices and the engrailed arches |
| and the spires and the cupolas and sprinkled the lintels thereof with |
| blessed water and prayed that God might bless that house as he had |
| blessed the house of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and make the angels of |
| His light to inhabit therein. And entering he blessed the viands and the |
| beverages and the company of all the blessed answered his prayers. |
| |
| --_Adiutorium nostrum in nomine Domini._ |
| |
| --_Qui fecit coelum et terram._ |
| |
| --_Dominus vobiscum._ |
| |
| --_Et cum spiritu tuo._ |
| |
| And he laid his hands upon that he blessed and gave thanks and he prayed |
| and they all with him prayed: |
| |
| --_Deus, cuius verbo sanctificantur omnia, benedictionem tuam effunde |
| super creaturas istas: et praesta ut quisquis eis secundum legem et |
| voluntatem Tuam cum gratiarum actione usus fuerit per invocationem |
| sanctissimi nominis Tui corporis sanitatem et animae tutelam Te auctore |
| percipiat per Christum Dominum nostrum._ |
| |
| --And so say all of us, says Jack. |
| |
| --Thousand a year, Lambert, says Crofton or Crawford. |
| |
| --Right, says Ned, taking up his John Jameson. And butter for fish. |
| |
| I was just looking around to see who the happy thought would strike when |
| be damned but in he comes again letting on to be in a hell of a hurry. |
| |
| --I was just round at the courthouse, says he, looking for you. I hope |
| I'm not... |
| |
| --No, says Martin, we're ready. |
| |
| Courthouse my eye and your pockets hanging down with gold and silver. |
| Mean bloody scut. Stand us a drink itself. Devil a sweet fear! There's |
| a jew for you! All for number one. Cute as a shithouse rat. Hundred to |
| five. |
| |
| --Don't tell anyone, says the citizen, |
| |
| --Beg your pardon, says he. |
| |
| --Come on boys, says Martin, seeing it was looking blue. Come along now. |
| |
| --Don't tell anyone, says the citizen, letting a bawl out of him. It's a |
| secret. |
| |
| And the bloody dog woke up and let a growl. |
| |
| --Bye bye all, says Martin. |
| |
| And he got them out as quick as he could, Jack Power and Crofton or |
| whatever you call him and him in the middle of them letting on to be all |
| at sea and up with them on the bloody jaunting car. |
| |
| ---Off with you, says |
| |
| Martin to the jarvey. |
| |
| The milkwhite dolphin tossed his mane and, rising in the golden poop the |
| helmsman spread the bellying sail upon the wind and stood off forward |
| with all sail set, the spinnaker to larboard. A many comely nymphs drew |
| nigh to starboard and to larboard and, clinging to the sides of |
| the noble bark, they linked their shining forms as doth the cunning |
| wheelwright when he fashions about the heart of his wheel the |
| equidistant rays whereof each one is sister to another and he binds them |
| all with an outer ring and giveth speed to the feet of men whenas they |
| ride to a hosting or contend for the smile of ladies fair. Even so did |
| they come and set them, those willing nymphs, the undying sisters. And |
| they laughed, sporting in a circle of their foam: and the bark clave the |
| waves. |
| |
| But begob I was just lowering the heel of the pint when I saw the |
| citizen getting up to waddle to the door, puffing and blowing with the |
| dropsy, and he cursing the curse of Cromwell on him, bell, book and |
| candle in Irish, spitting and spatting out of him and Joe and little Alf |
| round him like a leprechaun trying to peacify him. |
| |
| --Let me alone, says he. |
| |
| And begob he got as far as the door and they holding him and he bawls |
| out of him: |
| |
| --Three cheers for Israel! |
| |
| Arrah, sit down on the parliamentary side of your arse for Christ' sake |
| and don't be making a public exhibition of yourself. Jesus, there's |
| always some bloody clown or other kicking up a bloody murder about |
| bloody nothing. Gob, it'd turn the porter sour in your guts, so it |
| would. |
| |
| And all the ragamuffins and sluts of the nation round the door and |
| Martin telling the jarvey to drive ahead and the citizen bawling and Alf |
| and Joe at him to whisht and he on his high horse about the jews and |
| the loafers calling for a speech and Jack Power trying to get him to sit |
| down on the car and hold his bloody jaw and a loafer with a patch over |
| his eye starts singing _If the man in the moon was a jew, jew, jew_ and |
| a slut shouts out of her: |
| |
| --Eh, mister! Your fly is open, mister! |
| |
| And says he: |
| |
| --Mendelssohn was a jew and Karl Marx and Mercadante and Spinoza. And |
| the Saviour was a jew and his father was a jew. Your God. |
| |
| --He had no father, says Martin. That'll do now. Drive ahead. |
| |
| --Whose God? says the citizen. |
| |
| --Well, his uncle was a jew, says he. Your God was a jew. Christ was a |
| jew like me. |
| |
| Gob, the citizen made a plunge back into the shop. |
| |
| --By Jesus, says he, I'll brain that bloody jewman for using the holy |
| name. |
| |
| By Jesus, I'll crucify him so I will. Give us that biscuitbox here. |
| |
| --Stop! Stop! says Joe. |
| |
| A large and appreciative gathering of friends and acquaintances from |
| the metropolis and greater Dublin assembled in their thousands to bid |
| farewell to Nagyasagos uram Lipoti Virag, late of Messrs Alexander |
| Thom's, printers to His Majesty, on the occasion of his departure |
| for the distant clime of Szazharminczbrojugulyas-Dugulas (Meadow of |
| Murmuring Waters). The ceremony which went off with great _éclat_ was |
| characterised by the most affecting cordiality. An illuminated scroll |
| of ancient Irish vellum, the work of Irish artists, was presented to |
| the distinguished phenomenologist on behalf of a large section of the |
| community and was accompanied by the gift of a silver casket, tastefully |
| executed in the style of ancient Celtic ornament, a work which reflects |
| every credit on the makers, Messrs Jacob _agus_ Jacob. The departing |
| guest was the recipient of a hearty ovation, many of those who were |
| present being visibly moved when the select orchestra of Irish pipes |
| struck up the wellknown strains of _Come back to Erin_, followed |
| immediately by _Rakoczsy's March_. Tarbarrels and bonfires were lighted |
| along the coastline of the four seas on the summits of the Hill of |
| Howth, Three Rock Mountain, Sugarloaf, Bray Head, the mountains of |
| Mourne, the Galtees, the Ox and Donegal and Sperrin peaks, the Nagles |
| and the Bograghs, the Connemara hills, the reeks of M Gillicuddy, Slieve |
| Aughty, Slieve Bernagh and Slieve Bloom. Amid cheers that rent the |
| welkin, responded to by answering cheers from a big muster of |
| henchmen on the distant Cambrian and Caledonian hills, the mastodontic |
| pleasureship slowly moved away saluted by a final floral tribute from |
| the representatives of the fair sex who were present in large numbers |
| while, as it proceeded down the river, escorted by a flotilla of barges, |
| the flags of the Ballast office and Custom House were dipped in salute |
| as were also those of the electrical power station at the |
| Pigeonhouse and the Poolbeg Light. _Visszontlátásra, kedves baráton! |
| Visszontlátásra!_ Gone but not forgotten. |
| |
| Gob, the devil wouldn't stop him till he got hold of the bloody tin |
| anyhow and out with him and little Alf hanging on to his elbow and he |
| shouting like a stuck pig, as good as any bloody play in the Queen's |
| royal theatre: |
| |
| --Where is he till I murder him? |
| |
| And Ned and J. J. paralysed with the laughing. |
| |
| --Bloody wars, says I, I'll be in for the last gospel. |
| |
| But as luck would have it the jarvey got the nag's head round the other |
| way and off with him. |
| |
| --Hold on, citizen, says Joe. Stop! |
| |
| Begob he drew his hand and made a swipe and let fly. Mercy of God the |
| sun was in his eyes or he'd have left him for dead. Gob, he near sent it |
| into the county Longford. The bloody nag took fright and the old |
| mongrel after the car like bloody hell and all the populace shouting and |
| laughing and the old tinbox clattering along the street. |
| |
| The catastrophe was terrific and instantaneous in its effect. The |
| observatory of Dunsink registered in all eleven shocks, all of the fifth |
| grade of Mercalli's scale, and there is no record extant of a similar |
| seismic disturbance in our island since the earthquake of 1534, the year |
| of the rebellion of Silken Thomas. The epicentre appears to have been |
| that part of the metropolis which constitutes the Inn's Quay ward and |
| parish of Saint Michan covering a surface of fortyone acres, two roods |
| and one square pole or perch. All the lordly residences in the vicinity |
| of the palace of justice were demolished and that noble edifice itself, |
| in which at the time of the catastrophe important legal debates were in |
| progress, is literally a mass of ruins beneath which it is to be |
| feared all the occupants have been buried alive. From the reports of |
| eyewitnesses it transpires that the seismic waves were accompanied by |
| a violent atmospheric perturbation of cyclonic character. An article of |
| headgear since ascertained to belong to the much respected clerk of the |
| crown and peace Mr George Fottrell and a silk umbrella with gold handle |
| with the engraved initials, crest, coat of arms and house number of |
| the erudite and worshipful chairman of quarter sessions sir Frederick |
| Falkiner, recorder of Dublin, have been discovered by search parties |
| in remote parts of the island respectively, the former on the third |
| basaltic ridge of the giant's causeway, the latter embedded to the |
| extent of one foot three inches in the sandy beach of Holeopen bay near |
| the old head of Kinsale. Other eyewitnesses depose that they observed |
| an incandescent object of enormous proportions hurtling through the |
| atmosphere at a terrifying velocity in a trajectory directed southwest |
| by west. Messages of condolence and sympathy are being hourly received |
| from all parts of the different continents and the sovereign pontiff has |
| been graciously pleased to decree that a special _missa pro defunctis_ |
| shall be celebrated simultaneously by the ordinaries of each and every |
| cathedral church of all the episcopal dioceses subject to the spiritual |
| authority of the Holy See in suffrage of the souls of those faithful |
| departed who have been so unexpectedly called away from our midst. |
| The work of salvage, removal of _débris,_ human remains etc has been |
| entrusted to Messrs Michael Meade and Son, 159 Great Brunswick street, |
| and Messrs T. and C. Martin, 77, 78, 79 and 80 North Wall, assisted by |
| the men and officers of the Duke of Cornwall's light infantry under the |
| general supervision of H. R. H., rear admiral, the right honourable sir |
| Hercules Hannibal Habeas Corpus Anderson, K. G., K. P., K. T., P. C., K. |
| C. B., M. P, J. P., M. B., D. S. O., S. O. D., M. F. H., M. R. I. A., B. |
| L., Mus. Doc., P. L. G., F. T. C. D., F. R. U. I., F. R. C. P. I. and F. |
| R. C. S. I. |
| |
| You never saw the like of it in all your born puff. Gob, if he got that |
| lottery ticket on the side of his poll he'd remember the gold cup, he |
| would so, but begob the citizen would have been lagged for assault and |
| battery and Joe for aiding and abetting. The jarvey saved his life by |
| furious driving as sure as God made Moses. What? O, Jesus, he did. And |
| he let a volley of oaths after him. |
| |
| --Did I kill him, says he, or what? |
| |
| And he shouting to the bloody dog: |
| |
| --After him, Garry! After him, boy! |
| |
| And the last we saw was the bloody car rounding the corner and old |
| sheepsface on it gesticulating and the bloody mongrel after it with his |
| lugs back for all he was bloody well worth to tear him limb from limb. |
| Hundred to five! Jesus, he took the value of it out of him, I promise |
| you. |
| |
| When, lo, there came about them all a great brightness and they beheld |
| the chariot wherein He stood ascend to heaven. And they beheld Him in |
| the chariot, clothed upon in the glory of the brightness, having raiment |
| as of the sun, fair as the moon and terrible that for awe they durst not |
| look upon Him. And there came a voice out of heaven, calling: _Elijah! |
| Elijah!_ And He answered with a main cry: _Abba! Adonai!_ And they |
| beheld Him even Him, ben Bloom Elijah, amid clouds of angels ascend |
| to the glory of the brightness at an angle of fortyfive degrees over |
| Donohoe's in Little Green street like a shot off a shovel. |
| |
| |
| |
| The summer evening had begun to fold the world in its mysterious |
| embrace. Far away in the west the sun was setting and the last glow of |
| all too fleeting day lingered lovingly on sea and strand, on the proud |
| promontory of dear old Howth guarding as ever the waters of the bay, on |
| the weedgrown rocks along Sandymount shore and, last but not least, on |
| the quiet church whence there streamed forth at times upon the stillness |
| the voice of prayer to her who is in her pure radiance a beacon ever to |
| the stormtossed heart of man, Mary, star of the sea. |
| |
| The three girl friends were seated on the rocks, enjoying the evening |
| scene and the air which was fresh but not too chilly. Many a time and |
| oft were they wont to come there to that favourite nook to have a cosy |
| chat beside the sparkling waves and discuss matters feminine, Cissy |
| Caffrey and Edy Boardman with the baby in the pushcar and Tommy and |
| Jacky Caffrey, two little curlyheaded boys, dressed in sailor suits with |
| caps to match and the name H.M.S. Belleisle printed on both. For Tommy |
| and Jacky Caffrey were twins, scarce four years old and very noisy and |
| spoiled twins sometimes but for all that darling little fellows with |
| bright merry faces and endearing ways about them. They were dabbling in |
| the sand with their spades and buckets, building castles as children do, |
| or playing with their big coloured ball, happy as the day was long. And |
| Edy Boardman was rocking the chubby baby to and fro in the pushcar while |
| that young gentleman fairly chuckled with delight. He was but eleven |
| months and nine days old and, though still a tiny toddler, was just |
| beginning to lisp his first babyish words. Cissy Caffrey bent over to |
| him to tease his fat little plucks and the dainty dimple in his chin. |
| |
| --Now, baby, Cissy Caffrey said. Say out big, big. I want a drink of |
| water. |
| |
| And baby prattled after her: |
| |
| --A jink a jink a jawbo. |
| |
| Cissy Caffrey cuddled the wee chap for she was awfully fond of children, |
| so patient with little sufferers and Tommy Caffrey could never be got to |
| take his castor oil unless it was Cissy Caffrey that held his nose and |
| promised him the scatty heel of the loaf or brown bread with golden |
| syrup on. What a persuasive power that girl had! But to be sure baby |
| Boardman was as good as gold, a perfect little dote in his new fancy |
| bib. None of your spoilt beauties, Flora MacFlimsy sort, was Cissy |
| Caffrey. A truerhearted lass never drew the breath of life, always with |
| a laugh in her gipsylike eyes and a frolicsome word on her cherryripe |
| red lips, a girl lovable in the extreme. And Edy Boardman laughed too at |
| the quaint language of little brother. |
| |
| But just then there was a slight altercation between Master Tommy and |
| Master Jacky. Boys will be boys and our two twins were no exception |
| to this golden rule. The apple of discord was a certain castle of sand |
| which Master Jacky had built and Master Tommy would have it right go |
| wrong that it was to be architecturally improved by a frontdoor like the |
| Martello tower had. But if Master Tommy was headstrong Master Jacky was |
| selfwilled too and, true to the maxim that every little Irishman's house |
| is his castle, he fell upon his hated rival and to such purpose that the |
| wouldbe assailant came to grief and (alas to relate!) the coveted castle |
| too. Needless to say the cries of discomfited Master Tommy drew the |
| attention of the girl friends. |
| |
| --Come here, Tommy, his sister called imperatively. At once! And you, |
| Jacky, for shame to throw poor Tommy in the dirty sand. Wait till I |
| catch you for that. |
| |
| His eyes misty with unshed tears Master Tommy came at her call for their |
| big sister's word was law with the twins. And in a sad plight he was |
| too after his misadventure. His little man-o'-war top and unmentionables |
| were full of sand but Cissy was a past mistress in the art of smoothing |
| over life's tiny troubles and very quickly not one speck of sand was to |
| be seen on his smart little suit. Still the blue eyes were glistening |
| with hot tears that would well up so she kissed away the hurtness and |
| shook her hand at Master Jacky the culprit and said if she was near him |
| she wouldn't be far from him, her eyes dancing in admonition. |
| |
| --Nasty bold Jacky! she cried. |
| |
| She put an arm round the little mariner and coaxed winningly: |
| |
| --What's your name? Butter and cream? |
| |
| --Tell us who is your sweetheart, spoke Edy Boardman. Is Cissy your |
| sweetheart? |
| |
| --Nao, tearful Tommy said. |
| |
| --Is Edy Boardman your sweetheart? Cissy queried. |
| |
| --Nao, Tommy said. |
| |
| --I know, Edy Boardman said none too amiably with an arch glance from |
| her shortsighted eyes. I know who is Tommy's sweetheart. Gerty is |
| Tommy's sweetheart. |
| |
| --Nao, Tommy said on the verge of tears. |
| |
| Cissy's quick motherwit guessed what was amiss and she whispered to |
| Edy Boardman to take him there behind the pushcar where the gentleman |
| couldn't see and to mind he didn't wet his new tan shoes. |
| |
| But who was Gerty? |
| |
| Gerty MacDowell who was seated near her companions, lost in thought, |
| gazing far away into the distance was, in very truth, as fair a specimen |
| of winsome Irish girlhood as one could wish to see. She was pronounced |
| beautiful by all who knew her though, as folks often said, she was |
| more a Giltrap than a MacDowell. Her figure was slight and graceful, |
| inclining even to fragility but those iron jelloids she had been taking |
| of late had done her a world of good much better than the Widow Welch's |
| female pills and she was much better of those discharges she used to |
| get and that tired feeling. The waxen pallor of her face was almost |
| spiritual in its ivorylike purity though her rosebud mouth was a genuine |
| Cupid's bow, Greekly perfect. Her hands were of finely veined alabaster |
| with tapering fingers and as white as lemonjuice and queen of ointments |
| could make them though it was not true that she used to wear kid gloves |
| in bed or take a milk footbath either. Bertha Supple told that once to |
| Edy Boardman, a deliberate lie, when she was black out at daggers drawn |
| with Gerty (the girl chums had of course their little tiffs from time to |
| time like the rest of mortals) and she told her not to let on whatever |
| she did that it was her that told her or she'd never speak to her |
| again. No. Honour where honour is due. There was an innate refinement, |
| a languid queenly _hauteur_ about Gerty which was unmistakably evidenced |
| in her delicate hands and higharched instep. Had kind fate but willed |
| her to be born a gentlewoman of high degree in her own right and had |
| she only received the benefit of a good education Gerty MacDowell might |
| easily have held her own beside any lady in the land and have seen |
| herself exquisitely gowned with jewels on her brow and patrician suitors |
| at her feet vying with one another to pay their devoirs to her. |
| Mayhap it was this, the love that might have been, that lent to her |
| softlyfeatured face at whiles a look, tense with suppressed meaning, |
| that imparted a strange yearning tendency to the beautiful eyes, a charm |
| few could resist. Why have women such eyes of witchery? Gerty's were of |
| the bluest Irish blue, set off by lustrous lashes and dark expressive |
| brows. Time was when those brows were not so silkily seductive. It |
| was Madame Vera Verity, directress of the Woman Beautiful page of the |
| Princess Novelette, who had first advised her to try eyebrowleine which |
| gave that haunting expression to the eyes, so becoming in leaders |
| of fashion, and she had never regretted it. Then there was blushing |
| scientifically cured and how to be tall increase your height and you |
| have a beautiful face but your nose? That would suit Mrs Dignam because |
| she had a button one. But Gerty's crowning glory was her wealth of |
| wonderful hair. It was dark brown with a natural wave in it. She had cut |
| it that very morning on account of the new moon and it nestled about |
| her pretty head in a profusion of luxuriant clusters and pared her nails |
| too, Thursday for wealth. And just now at Edy's words as a telltale |
| flush, delicate as the faintest rosebloom, crept into her cheeks she |
| looked so lovely in her sweet girlish shyness that of a surety God's |
| fair land of Ireland did not hold her equal. |
| |
| For an instant she was silent with rather sad downcast eyes. She |
| was about to retort but something checked the words on her tongue. |
| Inclination prompted her to speak out: dignity told her to be silent. |
| The pretty lips pouted awhile but then she glanced up and broke out into |
| a joyous little laugh which had in it all the freshness of a young May |
| morning. She knew right well, no-one better, what made squinty Edy |
| say that because of him cooling in his attentions when it was simply a |
| lovers' quarrel. As per usual somebody's nose was out of joint about the |
| boy that had the bicycle off the London bridge road always riding up |
| and down in front of her window. Only now his father kept him in in the |
| evenings studying hard to get an exhibition in the intermediate that was |
| on and he was going to go to Trinity college to study for a doctor when |
| he left the high school like his brother W. E. Wylie who was racing |
| in the bicycle races in Trinity college university. Little recked he |
| perhaps for what she felt, that dull aching void in her heart sometimes, |
| piercing to the core. Yet he was young and perchance he might learn |
| to love her in time. They were protestants in his family and of course |
| Gerty knew Who came first and after Him the Blessed Virgin and then |
| Saint Joseph. But he was undeniably handsome with an exquisite nose and |
| he was what he looked, every inch a gentleman, the shape of his head too |
| at the back without his cap on that she would know anywhere something |
| off the common and the way he turned the bicycle at the lamp with his |
| hands off the bars and also the nice perfume of those good cigarettes |
| and besides they were both of a size too he and she and that was why Edy |
| Boardman thought she was so frightfully clever because he didn't go and |
| ride up and down in front of her bit of a garden. |
| |
| Gerty was dressed simply but with the instinctive taste of a votary of |
| Dame Fashion for she felt that there was just a might that he might be |
| out. A neat blouse of electric blue selftinted by dolly dyes (because it |
| was expected in the _Lady's Pictorial_ that electric blue would be worn) |
| with a smart vee opening down to the division and kerchief pocket (in |
| which she always kept a piece of cottonwool scented with her |
| favourite perfume because the handkerchief spoiled the sit) and a navy |
| threequarter skirt cut to the stride showed off her slim graceful figure |
| to perfection. She wore a coquettish little love of a hat of wideleaved |
| nigger straw contrast trimmed with an underbrim of eggblue chenille and |
| at the side a butterfly bow of silk to tone. All Tuesday week afternoon |
| she was hunting to match that chenille but at last she found what she |
| wanted at Clery's summer sales, the very it, slightly shopsoiled but you |
| would never notice, seven fingers two and a penny. She did it up all by |
| herself and what joy was hers when she tried it on then, smiling at the |
| lovely reflection which the mirror gave back to her! And when she put |
| it on the waterjug to keep the shape she knew that that would take the |
| shine out of some people she knew. Her shoes were the newest thing in |
| footwear (Edy Boardman prided herself that she was very _petite_ but she |
| never had a foot like Gerty MacDowell, a five, and never would ash, |
| oak or elm) with patent toecaps and just one smart buckle over |
| her higharched instep. Her wellturned ankle displayed its perfect |
| proportions beneath her skirt and just the proper amount and no more of |
| her shapely limbs encased in finespun hose with highspliced heels and |
| wide garter tops. As for undies they were Gerty's chief care and who |
| that knows the fluttering hopes and fears of sweet seventeen (though |
| Gerty would never see seventeen again) can find it in his heart to |
| blame her? She had four dinky sets with awfully pretty stitchery, |
| three garments and nighties extra, and each set slotted with different |
| coloured ribbons, rosepink, pale blue, mauve and peagreen, and she aired |
| them herself and blued them when they came home from the wash and ironed |
| them and she had a brickbat to keep the iron on because she wouldn't |
| trust those washerwomen as far as she'd see them scorching the things. |
| She was wearing the blue for luck, hoping against hope, her own colour |
| and lucky too for a bride to have a bit of blue somewhere on her because |
| the green she wore that day week brought grief because his father |
| brought him in to study for the intermediate exhibition and because |
| she thought perhaps he might be out because when she was dressing that |
| morning she nearly slipped up the old pair on her inside out and that |
| was for luck and lovers' meeting if you put those things on inside |
| out or if they got untied that he was thinking about you so long as it |
| wasn't of a Friday. |
| |
| And yet and yet! That strained look on her face! A gnawing sorrow is |
| there all the time. Her very soul is in her eyes and she would give |
| worlds to be in the privacy of her own familiar chamber where, |
| giving way to tears, she could have a good cry and relieve her pentup |
| feelingsthough not too much because she knew how to cry nicely before |
| the mirror. You are lovely, Gerty, it said. The paly light of evening |
| falls upon a face infinitely sad and wistful. Gerty MacDowell yearns |
| in vain. Yes, she had known from the very first that her daydream of a |
| marriage has been arranged and the weddingbells ringing for Mrs Reggy |
| Wylie T. C. D. (because the one who married the elder brother would be |
| Mrs Wylie) and in the fashionable intelligence Mrs Gertrude Wylie was |
| wearing a sumptuous confection of grey trimmed with expensive blue fox |
| was not to be. He was too young to understand. He would not believe in |
| love, a woman's birthright. The night of the party long ago in Stoer's |
| (he was still in short trousers) when they were alone and he stole |
| an arm round her waist she went white to the very lips. He called her |
| little one in a strangely husky voice and snatched a half kiss (the |
| first!) but it was only the end of her nose and then he hastened from |
| the room with a remark about refreshments. Impetuous fellow! Strength of |
| character had never been Reggy Wylie's strong point and he who would |
| woo and win Gerty MacDowell must be a man among men. But waiting, always |
| waiting to be asked and it was leap year too and would soon be over. No |
| prince charming is her beau ideal to lay a rare and wondrous love at her |
| feet but rather a manly man with a strong quiet face who had not found |
| his ideal, perhaps his hair slightly flecked with grey, and who would |
| understand, take her in his sheltering arms, strain her to him in all |
| the strength of his deep passionate nature and comfort her with a long |
| long kiss. It would be like heaven. For such a one she yearns this balmy |
| summer eve. With all the heart of her she longs to be his only, his |
| affianced bride for riches for poor, in sickness in health, till death |
| us two part, from this to this day forward. |
| |
| And while Edy Boardman was with little Tommy behind the pushcar she was |
| just thinking would the day ever come when she could call herself his |
| little wife to be. Then they could talk about her till they went blue in |
| the face, Bertha Supple too, and Edy, little spitfire, because she would |
| be twentytwo in November. She would care for him with creature comforts |
| too for Gerty was womanly wise and knew that a mere man liked that |
| feeling of hominess. Her griddlecakes done to a goldenbrown hue and |
| queen Ann's pudding of delightful creaminess had won golden opinions |
| from all because she had a lucky hand also for lighting a fire, dredge |
| in the fine selfraising flour and always stir in the same direction, |
| then cream the milk and sugar and whisk well the white of eggs though |
| she didn't like the eating part when there were any people that made her |
| shy and often she wondered why you couldn't eat something poetical like |
| violets or roses and they would have a beautifully appointed drawingroom |
| with pictures and engravings and the photograph of grandpapa Giltrap's |
| lovely dog Garryowen that almost talked it was so human and chintz |
| covers for the chairs and that silver toastrack in Clery's summer |
| jumble sales like they have in rich houses. He would be tall with |
| broad shoulders (she had always admired tall men for a husband) with |
| glistening white teeth under his carefully trimmed sweeping moustache |
| and they would go on the continent for their honeymoon (three wonderful |
| weeks!) and then, when they settled down in a nice snug and cosy little |
| homely house, every morning they would both have brekky, simple but |
| perfectly served, for their own two selves and before he went out to |
| business he would give his dear little wifey a good hearty hug and gaze |
| for a moment deep down into her eyes. |
| |
| Edy Boardman asked Tommy Caffrey was he done and he said yes so then she |
| buttoned up his little knickerbockers for him and told him to run off |
| and play with Jacky and to be good now and not to fight. But Tommy said |
| he wanted the ball and Edy told him no that baby was playing with the |
| ball and if he took it there'd be wigs on the green but Tommy said it |
| was his ball and he wanted his ball and he pranced on the ground, if |
| you please. The temper of him! O, he was a man already was little Tommy |
| Caffrey since he was out of pinnies. Edy told him no, no and to be off |
| now with him and she told Cissy Caffrey not to give in to him. |
| |
| --You're not my sister, naughty Tommy said. It's my ball. |
| |
| But Cissy Caffrey told baby Boardman to look up, look up high at her |
| finger and she snatched the ball quickly and threw it along the sand and |
| Tommy after it in full career, having won the day. |
| |
| --Anything for a quiet life, laughed Ciss. |
| |
| And she tickled tiny tot's two cheeks to make him forget and played |
| here's the lord mayor, here's his two horses, here's his gingerbread |
| carriage and here he walks in, chinchopper, chinchopper, chinchopper |
| chin. But Edy got as cross as two sticks about him getting his own way |
| like that from everyone always petting him. |
| |
| --I'd like to give him something, she said, so I would, where I won't |
| say. |
| |
| --On the beeoteetom, laughed Cissy merrily. |
| |
| Gerty MacDowell bent down her head and crimsoned at the idea of Cissy |
| saying an unladylike thing like that out loud she'd be ashamed of her |
| life to say, flushing a deep rosy red, and Edy Boardman said she was |
| sure the gentleman opposite heard what she said. But not a pin cared |
| Ciss. |
| |
| --Let him! she said with a pert toss of her head and a piquant tilt of |
| her nose. Give it to him too on the same place as quick as I'd look at |
| him. |
| |
| Madcap Ciss with her golliwog curls. You had to laugh at her sometimes. |
| For instance when she asked you would you have some more Chinese tea and |
| jaspberry ram and when she drew the jugs too and the men's faces on her |
| nails with red ink make you split your sides or when she wanted to go |
| where you know she said she wanted to run and pay a visit to the Miss |
| White. That was just like Cissycums. O, and will you ever forget her the |
| evening she dressed up in her father's suit and hat and the burned cork |
| moustache and walked down Tritonville road, smoking a cigarette. There |
| was none to come up to her for fun. But she was sincerity itself, one of |
| the bravest and truest hearts heaven ever made, not one of your twofaced |
| things, too sweet to be wholesome. |
| |
| And then there came out upon the air the sound of voices and the pealing |
| anthem of the organ. It was the men's temperance retreat conducted |
| by the missioner, the reverend John Hughes S. J., rosary, sermon and |
| benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament. They were there gathered |
| together without distinction of social class (and a most edifying |
| spectacle it was to see) in that simple fane beside the waves, after the |
| storms of this weary world, kneeling before the feet of the immaculate, |
| reciting the litany of Our Lady of Loreto, beseeching her to intercede |
| for them, the old familiar words, holy Mary, holy virgin of virgins. How |
| sad to poor Gerty's ears! Had her father only avoided the clutches of |
| the demon drink, by taking the pledge or those powders the drink habit |
| cured in Pearson's Weekly, she might now be rolling in her carriage, |
| second to none. Over and over had she told herself that as she mused by |
| the dying embers in a brown study without the lamp because she hated two |
| lights or oftentimes gazing out of the window dreamily by the hour at |
| the rain falling on the rusty bucket, thinking. But that vile decoction |
| which has ruined so many hearths and homes had cist its shadow over her |
| childhood days. Nay, she had even witnessed in the home circle deeds of |
| violence caused by intemperance and had seen her own father, a prey to |
| the fumes of intoxication, forget himself completely for if there was |
| one thing of all things that Gerty knew it was that the man who lifts |
| his hand to a woman save in the way of kindness, deserves to be branded |
| as the lowest of the low. |
| |
| And still the voices sang in supplication to the Virgin most powerful, |
| Virgin most merciful. And Gerty, rapt in thought, scarce saw or heard |
| her companions or the twins at their boyish gambols or the gentleman |
| off Sandymount green that Cissy Caffrey called the man that was so like |
| himself passing along the strand taking a short walk. You never saw him |
| any way screwed but still and for all that she would not like him for a |
| father because he was too old or something or on account of his face |
| (it was a palpable case of Doctor Fell) or his carbuncly nose with the |
| pimples on it and his sandy moustache a bit white under his nose. Poor |
| father! With all his faults she loved him still when he sang _Tell me, |
| Mary, how to woo thee_ or _My love and cottage near Rochelle_ and they |
| had stewed cockles and lettuce with Lazenby's salad dressing for |
| supper and when he sang _The moon hath raised_ with Mr Dignam that |
| died suddenly and was buried, God have mercy on him, from a stroke. Her |
| mother's birthday that was and Charley was home on his holidays and Tom |
| and Mr Dignam and Mrs and Patsy and Freddy Dignam and they were to have |
| had a group taken. No-one would have thought the end was so near. Now he |
| was laid to rest. And her mother said to him to let that be a warning to |
| him for the rest of his days and he couldn't even go to the funeral on |
| account of the gout and she had to go into town to bring him the |
| letters and samples from his office about Catesby's cork lino, artistic, |
| standard designs, fit for a palace, gives tiptop wear and always bright |
| and cheery in the home. |
| |
| A sterling good daughter was Gerty just like a second mother in the |
| house, a ministering angel too with a little heart worth its weight in |
| gold. And when her mother had those raging splitting headaches who was |
| it rubbed the menthol cone on her forehead but Gerty though she didn't |
| like her mother's taking pinches of snuff and that was the only single |
| thing they ever had words about, taking snuff. Everyone thought the |
| world of her for her gentle ways. It was Gerty who turned off the gas at |
| the main every night and it was Gerty who tacked up on the wall of that |
| place where she never forgot every fortnight the chlorate of lime Mr |
| Tunney the grocer's christmas almanac, the picture of halcyon days |
| where a young gentleman in the costume they used to wear then with a |
| threecornered hat was offering a bunch of flowers to his ladylove with |
| oldtime chivalry through her lattice window. You could see there was a |
| story behind it. The colours were done something lovely. She was in |
| a soft clinging white in a studied attitude and the gentleman was in |
| chocolate and he looked a thorough aristocrat. She often looked at them |
| dreamily when she went there for a certain purpose and felt her own |
| arms that were white and soft just like hers with the sleeves back |
| and thought about those times because she had found out in Walker's |
| pronouncing dictionary that belonged to grandpapa Giltrap about the |
| halcyon days what they meant. |
| |
| The twins were now playing in the most approved brotherly fashion |
| till at last Master Jacky who was really as bold as brass there was |
| no getting behind that deliberately kicked the ball as hard as ever he |
| could down towards the seaweedy rocks. Needless to say poor Tommy was |
| not slow to voice his dismay but luckily the gentleman in black who was |
| sitting there by himself came gallantly to the rescue and intercepted |
| the ball. Our two champions claimed their plaything with lusty cries and |
| to avoid trouble Cissy Caffrey called to the gentleman to throw it to |
| her please. The gentleman aimed the ball once or twice and then threw |
| it up the strand towards Cissy Caffrey but it rolled down the slope and |
| stopped right under Gerty's skirt near the little pool by the rock. The |
| twins clamoured again for it and Cissy told her to kick it away and |
| let them fight for it so Gerty drew back her foot but she wished their |
| stupid ball hadn't come rolling down to her and she gave a kick but she |
| missed and Edy and Cissy laughed. |
| |
| --If you fail try again, Edy Boardman said. |
| |
| Gerty smiled assent and bit her lip. A delicate pink crept into her |
| pretty cheek but she was determined to let them see so she just lifted |
| her skirt a little but just enough and took good aim and gave the ball a |
| jolly good kick and it went ever so far and the two twins after it down |
| towards the shingle. Pure jealousy of course it was nothing else to draw |
| attention on account of the gentleman opposite looking. She felt the |
| warm flush, a danger signal always with Gerty MacDowell, surging and |
| flaming into her cheeks. Till then they had only exchanged glances of |
| the most casual but now under the brim of her new hat she ventured a |
| look at him and the face that met her gaze there in the twilight, wan |
| and strangely drawn, seemed to her the saddest she had ever seen. |
| |
| Through the open window of the church the fragrant incense was wafted |
| and with it the fragrant names of her who was conceived without stain of |
| original sin, spiritual vessel, pray for us, honourable vessel, pray |
| for us, vessel of singular devotion, pray for us, mystical rose. And |
| careworn hearts were there and toilers for their daily bread and many |
| who had erred and wandered, their eyes wet with contrition but for all |
| that bright with hope for the reverend father Father Hughes had told |
| them what the great saint Bernard said in his famous prayer of Mary, the |
| most pious Virgin's intercessory power that it was not recorded in any |
| age that those who implored her powerful protection were ever abandoned |
| by her. |
| |
| The twins were now playing again right merrily for the troubles of |
| childhood are but as fleeting summer showers. Cissy Caffrey played with |
| baby Boardman till he crowed with glee, clapping baby hands in air. Peep |
| she cried behind the hood of the pushcar and Edy asked where was Cissy |
| gone and then Cissy popped up her head and cried ah! and, my word, |
| didn't the little chap enjoy that! And then she told him to say papa. |
| |
| --Say papa, baby. Say pa pa pa pa pa pa pa. |
| |
| And baby did his level best to say it for he was very intelligent for |
| eleven months everyone said and big for his age and the picture of |
| health, a perfect little bunch of love, and he would certainly turn out |
| to be something great, they said. |
| |
| --Haja ja ja haja. |
| |
| Cissy wiped his little mouth with the dribbling bib and wanted him to |
| sit up properly and say pa pa pa but when she undid the strap she cried |
| out, holy saint Denis, that he was possing wet and to double the half |
| blanket the other way under him. Of course his infant majesty was most |
| obstreperous at such toilet formalities and he let everyone know it: |
| |
| --Habaa baaaahabaaa baaaa. |
| |
| And two great big lovely big tears coursing down his cheeks. It was all |
| no use soothering him with no, nono, baby, no and telling him about the |
| geegee and where was the puffpuff but Ciss, always readywitted, gave |
| him in his mouth the teat of the suckingbottle and the young heathen was |
| quickly appeased. |
| |
| Gerty wished to goodness they would take their squalling baby home out |
| of that and not get on her nerves, no hour to be out, and the little |
| brats of twins. She gazed out towards the distant sea. It was like the |
| paintings that man used to do on the pavement with all the coloured |
| chalks and such a pity too leaving them there to be all blotted out, the |
| evening and the clouds coming out and the Bailey light on Howth and to |
| hear the music like that and the perfume of those incense they burned |
| in the church like a kind of waft. And while she gazed her heart went |
| pitapat. Yes, it was her he was looking at, and there was meaning in his |
| look. His eyes burned into her as though they would search her through |
| and through, read her very soul. Wonderful eyes they were, superbly |
| expressive, but could you trust them? People were so queer. She could |
| see at once by his dark eyes and his pale intellectual face that he |
| was a foreigner, the image of the photo she had of Martin Harvey, the |
| matinee idol, only for the moustache which she preferred because she |
| wasn't stagestruck like Winny Rippingham that wanted they two to always |
| dress the same on account of a play but she could not see whether he had |
| an aquiline nose or a slightly _retroussé_ from where he was sitting. |
| He was in deep mourning, she could see that, and the story of a haunting |
| sorrow was written on his face. She would have given worlds to know what |
| it was. He was looking up so intently, so still, and he saw her kick the |
| ball and perhaps he could see the bright steel buckles of her shoes if |
| she swung them like that thoughtfully with the toes down. She was glad |
| that something told her to put on the transparent stockings thinking |
| Reggy Wylie might be out but that was far away. Here was that of which |
| she had so often dreamed. It was he who mattered and there was joy on |
| her face because she wanted him because she felt instinctively that he |
| was like no-one else. The very heart of the girlwoman went out to him, |
| her dreamhusband, because she knew on the instant it was him. If he had |
| suffered, more sinned against than sinning, or even, even, if he had |
| been himself a sinner, a wicked man, she cared not. Even if he was a |
| protestant or methodist she could convert him easily if he truly loved |
| her. There were wounds that wanted healing with heartbalm. She was a |
| womanly woman not like other flighty girls unfeminine he had known, |
| those cyclists showing off what they hadn't got and she just yearned to |
| know all, to forgive all if she could make him fall in love with her, |
| make him forget the memory of the past. Then mayhap he would embrace her |
| gently, like a real man, crushing her soft body to him, and love her, |
| his ownest girlie, for herself alone. |
| |
| Refuge of sinners. Comfortress of the afflicted. _Ora pro nobis_. Well |
| has it been said that whosoever prays to her with faith and constancy |
| can never be lost or cast away: and fitly is she too a haven of refuge |
| for the afflicted because of the seven dolours which transpierced |
| her own heart. Gerty could picture the whole scene in the church, the |
| stained glass windows lighted up, the candles, the flowers and the blue |
| banners of the blessed Virgin's sodality and Father Conroy was helping |
| Canon O'Hanlon at the altar, carrying things in and out with his eyes |
| cast down. He looked almost a saint and his confessionbox was so quiet |
| and clean and dark and his hands were just like white wax and if ever |
| she became a Dominican nun in their white habit perhaps he might come to |
| the convent for the novena of Saint Dominic. He told her that time when |
| she told him about that in confession, crimsoning up to the roots of her |
| hair for fear he could see, not to be troubled because that was only the |
| voice of nature and we were all subject to nature's laws, he said, in |
| this life and that that was no sin because that came from the nature of |
| woman instituted by God, he said, and that Our Blessed Lady herself said |
| to the archangel Gabriel be it done unto me according to Thy Word. He |
| was so kind and holy and often and often she thought and thought could |
| she work a ruched teacosy with embroidered floral design for him as a |
| present or a clock but they had a clock she noticed on the mantelpiece |
| white and gold with a canarybird that came out of a little house to tell |
| the time the day she went there about the flowers for the forty hours' |
| adoration because it was hard to know what sort of a present to give or |
| perhaps an album of illuminated views of Dublin or some place. |
| |
| The exasperating little brats of twins began to quarrel again and Jacky |
| threw the ball out towards the sea and they both ran after it. Little |
| monkeys common as ditchwater. Someone ought to take them and give them |
| a good hiding for themselves to keep them in their places, the both of |
| them. And Cissy and Edy shouted after them to come back because they |
| were afraid the tide might come in on them and be drowned. |
| |
| --Jacky! Tommy! |
| |
| Not they! What a great notion they had! So Cissy said it was the very |
| last time she'd ever bring them out. She jumped up and called them and |
| she ran down the slope past him, tossing her hair behind her which had |
| a good enough colour if there had been more of it but with all the |
| thingamerry she was always rubbing into it she couldn't get it to grow |
| long because it wasn't natural so she could just go and throw her hat at |
| it. She ran with long gandery strides it was a wonder she didn't rip up |
| her skirt at the side that was too tight on her because there was a lot |
| of the tomboy about Cissy Caffrey and she was a forward piece whenever |
| she thought she had a good opportunity to show and just because she was |
| a good runner she ran like that so that he could see all the end of her |
| petticoat running and her skinny shanks up as far as possible. It |
| would have served her just right if she had tripped up over something |
| accidentally on purpose with her high crooked French heels on her to |
| make her look tall and got a fine tumble. _Tableau!_ That would have |
| been a very charming expose for a gentleman like that to witness. |
| |
| Queen of angels, queen of patriarchs, queen of prophets, of all saints, |
| they prayed, queen of the most holy rosary and then Father Conroy handed |
| the thurible to Canon O'Hanlon and he put in the incense and censed the |
| Blessed Sacrament and Cissy Caffrey caught the two twins and she was |
| itching to give them a ringing good clip on the ear but she didn't |
| because she thought he might be watching but she never made a bigger |
| mistake in all her life because Gerty could see without looking that |
| he never took his eyes off of her and then Canon O'Hanlon handed the |
| thurible back to Father Conroy and knelt down looking up at the Blessed |
| Sacrament and the choir began to sing the _Tantum ergo_ and she just |
| swung her foot in and out in time as the music rose and fell to |
| the _Tantumer gosa cramen tum_. Three and eleven she paid for those |
| stockings in Sparrow's of George's street on the Tuesday, no the Monday |
| before Easter and there wasn't a brack on them and that was what he |
| was looking at, transparent, and not at her insignificant ones that had |
| neither shape nor form (the cheek of her!) because he had eyes in his |
| head to see the difference for himself. |
| |
| Cissy came up along the strand with the two twins and their ball with |
| her hat anyhow on her to one side after her run and she did look a |
| streel tugging the two kids along with the flimsy blouse she bought only |
| a fortnight before like a rag on her back and a bit of her petticoat |
| hanging like a caricature. Gerty just took off her hat for a moment to |
| settle her hair and a prettier, a daintier head of nutbrown tresses was |
| never seen on a girl's shoulders--a radiant little vision, in sooth, |
| almost maddening in its sweetness. You would have to travel many a long |
| mile before you found a head of hair the like of that. She could almost |
| see the swift answering flash of admiration in his eyes that set her |
| tingling in every nerve. She put on her hat so that she could see from |
| underneath the brim and swung her buckled shoe faster for her breath |
| caught as she caught the expression in his eyes. He was eying her as a |
| snake eyes its prey. Her woman's instinct told her that she had raised |
| the devil in him and at the thought a burning scarlet swept from throat |
| to brow till the lovely colour of her face became a glorious rose. |
| |
| Edy Boardman was noticing it too because she was squinting at Gerty, |
| half smiling, with her specs like an old maid, pretending to nurse the |
| baby. Irritable little gnat she was and always would be and that was why |
| no-one could get on with her poking her nose into what was no concern of |
| hers. And she said to Gerty: |
| |
| --A penny for your thoughts. |
| |
| --What? replied Gerty with a smile reinforced by the whitest of teeth. I |
| was only wondering was it late. |
| |
| Because she wished to goodness they'd take the snottynosed twins and |
| their babby home to the mischief out of that so that was why she just |
| gave a gentle hint about its being late. And when Cissy came up Edy |
| asked her the time and Miss Cissy, as glib as you like, said it was half |
| past kissing time, time to kiss again. But Edy wanted to know because |
| they were told to be in early. |
| |
| --Wait, said Cissy, I'll run ask my uncle Peter over there what's the |
| time by his conundrum. |
| |
| So over she went and when he saw her coming she could see him take his |
| hand out of his pocket, getting nervous, and beginning to play with his |
| watchchain, looking up at the church. Passionate nature though he was |
| Gerty could see that he had enormous control over himself. One moment he |
| had been there, fascinated by a loveliness that made him gaze, and the |
| next moment it was the quiet gravefaced gentleman, selfcontrol expressed |
| in every line of his distinguishedlooking figure. |
| |
| Cissy said to excuse her would he mind please telling her what was the |
| right time and Gerty could see him taking out his watch, listening to it |
| and looking up and clearing his throat and he said he was very sorry his |
| watch was stopped but he thought it must be after eight because the |
| sun was set. His voice had a cultured ring in it and though he spoke in |
| measured accents there was a suspicion of a quiver in the mellow tones. |
| Cissy said thanks and came back with her tongue out and said uncle said |
| his waterworks were out of order. |
| |
| Then they sang the second verse of the _Tantum ergo_ and Canon O'Hanlon |
| got up again and censed the Blessed Sacrament and knelt down and he told |
| Father Conroy that one of the candles was just going to set fire to the |
| flowers and Father Conroy got up and settled it all right and she could |
| see the gentleman winding his watch and listening to the works and she |
| swung her leg more in and out in time. It was getting darker but he |
| could see and he was looking all the time that he was winding the watch |
| or whatever he was doing to it and then he put it back and put his hands |
| back into his pockets. She felt a kind of a sensation rushing all over |
| her and she knew by the feel of her scalp and that irritation against |
| her stays that that thing must be coming on because the last time too |
| was when she clipped her hair on account of the moon. His dark eyes |
| fixed themselves on her again drinking in her every contour, literally |
| worshipping at her shrine. If ever there was undisguised admiration in a |
| man's passionate gaze it was there plain to be seen on that man's face. |
| It is for you, Gertrude MacDowell, and you know it. |
| |
| Edy began to get ready to go and it was high time for her and Gerty |
| noticed that that little hint she gave had had the desired effect |
| because it was a long way along the strand to where there was the place |
| to push up the pushcar and Cissy took off the twins' caps and tidied |
| their hair to make herself attractive of course and Canon O'Hanlon stood |
| up with his cope poking up at his neck and Father Conroy handed him the |
| card to read off and he read out _Panem de coelo praestitisti eis_ and |
| Edy and Cissy were talking about the time all the time and asking her |
| but Gerty could pay them back in their own coin and she just answered |
| with scathing politeness when Edy asked her was she heartbroken about |
| her best boy throwing her over. Gerty winced sharply. A brief cold blaze |
| shone from her eyes that spoke volumes of scorn immeasurable. It hurt--O |
| yes, it cut deep because Edy had her own quiet way of saying things |
| like that she knew would wound like the confounded little cat she was. |
| Gerty's lips parted swiftly to frame the word but she fought back |
| the sob that rose to her throat, so slim, so flawless, so beautifully |
| moulded it seemed one an artist might have dreamed of. She had loved him |
| better than he knew. Lighthearted deceiver and fickle like all his sex |
| he would never understand what he had meant to her and for an instant |
| there was in the blue eyes a quick stinging of tears. Their eyes were |
| probing her mercilessly but with a brave effort she sparkled back in |
| sympathy as she glanced at her new conquest for them to see. |
| |
| --O, responded Gerty, quick as lightning, laughing, and the proud head |
| flashed up. I can throw my cap at who I like because it's leap year. |
| |
| Her words rang out crystalclear, more musical than the cooing of the |
| ringdove, but they cut the silence icily. There was that in her young |
| voice that told that she was not a one to be lightly trifled with. As |
| for Mr Reggy with his swank and his bit of money she could just chuck |
| him aside as if he was so much filth and never again would she cast as |
| much as a second thought on him and tear his silly postcard into a dozen |
| pieces. And if ever after he dared to presume she could give him one |
| look of measured scorn that would make him shrivel up on the spot. Miss |
| puny little Edy's countenance fell to no slight extent and Gerty could |
| see by her looking as black as thunder that she was simply in a towering |
| rage though she hid it, the little kinnatt, because that shaft had |
| struck home for her petty jealousy and they both knew that she was |
| something aloof, apart, in another sphere, that she was not of them and |
| never would be and there was somebody else too that knew it and saw it |
| so they could put that in their pipe and smoke it. |
| |
| Edy straightened up baby Boardman to get ready to go and Cissy tucked in |
| the ball and the spades and buckets and it was high time too because the |
| sandman was on his way for Master Boardman junior. And Cissy told him |
| too that billy winks was coming and that baby was to go deedaw and baby |
| looked just too ducky, laughing up out of his gleeful eyes, and Cissy |
| poked him like that out of fun in his wee fat tummy and baby, without as |
| much as by your leave, sent up his compliments to all and sundry on to |
| his brandnew dribbling bib. |
| |
| --O my! Puddeny pie! protested Ciss. He has his bib destroyed. |
| |
| The slight _contretemps_ claimed her attention but in two twos she set |
| that little matter to rights. |
| |
| Gerty stifled a smothered exclamation and gave a nervous cough and Edy |
| asked what and she was just going to tell her to catch it while it was |
| flying but she was ever ladylike in her deportment so she simply passed |
| it off with consummate tact by saying that that was the benediction |
| because just then the bell rang out from the steeple over the quiet |
| seashore because Canon O'Hanlon was up on the altar with the veil that |
| Father Conroy put round his shoulders giving the benediction with the |
| Blessed Sacrament in his hands. |
| |
| How moving the scene there in the gathering twilight, the last glimpse |
| of Erin, the touching chime of those evening bells and at the same |
| time a bat flew forth from the ivied belfry through the dusk, hither, |
| thither, with a tiny lost cry. And she could see far away the lights of |
| the lighthouses so picturesque she would have loved to do with a box of |
| paints because it was easier than to make a man and soon the lamplighter |
| would be going his rounds past the presbyterian church grounds and along |
| by shady Tritonville avenue where the couples walked and lighting the |
| lamp near her window where Reggy Wylie used to turn his freewheel like |
| she read in that book _The Lamplighter_ by Miss Cummins, author of |
| _Mabel Vaughan_ and other tales. For Gerty had her dreams that no-one |
| knew of. She loved to read poetry and when she got a keepsake from |
| Bertha Supple of that lovely confession album with the coralpink cover |
| to write her thoughts in she laid it in the drawer of her toilettable |
| which, though it did not err on the side of luxury, was scrupulously |
| neat and clean. It was there she kept her girlish treasure trove, the |
| tortoiseshell combs, her child of Mary badge, the whiterose scent, the |
| eyebrowleine, her alabaster pouncetbox and the ribbons to change |
| when her things came home from the wash and there were some beautiful |
| thoughts written in it in violet ink that she bought in Hely's of Dame |
| Street for she felt that she too could write poetry if she could only |
| express herself like that poem that appealed to her so deeply that |
| she had copied out of the newspaper she found one evening round the |
| potherbs. _Art thou real, my ideal?_ it was called by Louis J Walsh, |
| Magherafelt, and after there was something about _twilight, wilt thou |
| ever?_ and ofttimes the beauty of poetry, so sad in its transient |
| loveliness, had misted her eyes with silent tears for she felt that |
| the years were slipping by for her, one by one, and but for that one |
| shortcoming she knew she need fear no competition and that was an |
| accident coming down Dalkey hill and she always tried to conceal it. |
| But it must end, she felt. If she saw that magic lure in his eyes there |
| would be no holding back for her. Love laughs at locksmiths. She |
| would make the great sacrifice. Her every effort would be to share his |
| thoughts. Dearer than the whole world would she be to him and gild his |
| days with happiness. There was the allimportant question and she was |
| dying to know was he a married man or a widower who had lost his wife |
| or some tragedy like the nobleman with the foreign name from the land |
| of song had to have her put into a madhouse, cruel only to be kind. |
| But even if--what then? Would it make a very great difference? From |
| everything in the least indelicate her finebred nature instinctively |
| recoiled. She loathed that sort of person, the fallen women off the |
| accommodation walk beside the Dodder that went with the soldiers and |
| coarse men with no respect for a girl's honour, degrading the sex and |
| being taken up to the police station. No, no: not that. They would be |
| just good friends like a big brother and sister without all that other |
| in spite of the conventions of Society with a big ess. Perhaps it was |
| an old flame he was in mourning for from the days beyond recall. She |
| thought she understood. She would try to understand him because men were |
| so different. The old love was waiting, waiting with little white |
| hands stretched out, with blue appealing eyes. Heart of mine! She would |
| follow, her dream of love, the dictates of her heart that told her he |
| was her all in all, the only man in all the world for her for love was |
| the master guide. Nothing else mattered. Come what might she would be |
| wild, untrammelled, free. |
| |
| Canon O'Hanlon put the Blessed Sacrament back into the tabernacle and |
| genuflected and the choir sang _Laudate Dominum omnes gentes_ and then |
| he locked the tabernacle door because the benediction was over and |
| Father Conroy handed him his hat to put on and crosscat Edy asked wasn't |
| she coming but Jacky Caffrey called out: |
| |
| --O, look, Cissy! |
| |
| And they all looked was it sheet lightning but Tommy saw it too over the |
| trees beside the church, blue and then green and purple. |
| |
| --It's fireworks, Cissy Caffrey said. |
| |
| And they all ran down the strand to see over the houses and the church, |
| helterskelter, Edy with the pushcar with baby Boardman in it and Cissy |
| holding Tommy and Jacky by the hand so they wouldn't fall running. |
| |
| --Come on, Gerty, Cissy called. It's the bazaar fireworks. |
| |
| But Gerty was adamant. She had no intention of being at their beck and |
| call. If they could run like rossies she could sit so she said she could |
| see from where she was. The eyes that were fastened upon her set her |
| pulses tingling. She looked at him a moment, meeting his glance, and |
| a light broke in upon her. Whitehot passion was in that face, passion |
| silent as the grave, and it had made her his. At last they were left |
| alone without the others to pry and pass remarks and she knew he could |
| be trusted to the death, steadfast, a sterling man, a man of inflexible |
| honour to his fingertips. His hands and face were working and a tremour |
| went over her. She leaned back far to look up where the fireworks were |
| and she caught her knee in her hands so as not to fall back looking up |
| and there was no-one to see only him and her when she revealed all her |
| graceful beautifully shaped legs like that, supply soft and delicately |
| rounded, and she seemed to hear the panting of his heart, his hoarse |
| breathing, because she knew too about the passion of men like that, |
| hotblooded, because Bertha Supple told her once in dead secret and made |
| her swear she'd never about the gentleman lodger that was staying with |
| them out of the Congested Districts Board that had pictures cut out of |
| papers of those skirtdancers and highkickers and she said he used to do |
| something not very nice that you could imagine sometimes in the bed. But |
| this was altogether different from a thing like that because there was |
| all the difference because she could almost feel him draw her face to |
| his and the first quick hot touch of his handsome lips. Besides there |
| was absolution so long as you didn't do the other thing before being |
| married and there ought to be women priests that would understand |
| without your telling out and Cissy Caffrey too sometimes had that dreamy |
| kind of dreamy look in her eyes so that she too, my dear, and Winny |
| Rippingham so mad about actors' photographs and besides it was on |
| account of that other thing coming on the way it did. |
| |
| And Jacky Caffrey shouted to look, there was another and she leaned back |
| and the garters were blue to match on account of the transparent and |
| they all saw it and they all shouted to look, look, there it was and |
| she leaned back ever so far to see the fireworks and something queer was |
| flying through the air, a soft thing, to and fro, dark. And she saw a |
| long Roman candle going up over the trees, up, up, and, in the tense |
| hush, they were all breathless with excitement as it went higher and |
| higher and she had to lean back more and more to look up after it, high, |
| high, almost out of sight, and her face was suffused with a divine, an |
| entrancing blush from straining back and he could see her other things |
| too, nainsook knickers, the fabric that caresses the skin, better than |
| those other pettiwidth, the green, four and eleven, on account of being |
| white and she let him and she saw that he saw and then it went so high |
| it went out of sight a moment and she was trembling in every limb from |
| being bent so far back that he had a full view high up above her knee |
| where no-one ever not even on the swing or wading and she wasn't ashamed |
| and he wasn't either to look in that immodest way like that because he |
| couldn't resist the sight of the wondrous revealment half offered like |
| those skirtdancers behaving so immodest before gentlemen looking and he |
| kept on looking, looking. She would fain have cried to him chokingly, |
| held out her snowy slender arms to him to come, to feel his lips laid on |
| her white brow, the cry of a young girl's love, a little strangled cry, |
| wrung from her, that cry that has rung through the ages. And then a |
| rocket sprang and bang shot blind blank and O! then the Roman candle |
| burst and it was like a sigh of O! and everyone cried O! O! in raptures |
| and it gushed out of it a stream of rain gold hair threads and they |
| shed and ah! they were all greeny dewy stars falling with golden, O so |
| lovely, O, soft, sweet, soft! |
| |
| Then all melted away dewily in the grey air: all was silent. Ah! She |
| glanced at him as she bent forward quickly, a pathetic little glance of |
| piteous protest, of shy reproach under which he coloured like a girl He |
| was leaning back against the rock behind. Leopold Bloom (for it is he) |
| stands silent, with bowed head before those young guileless eyes. What a |
| brute he had been! At it again? A fair unsullied soul had called to him |
| and, wretch that he was, how had he answered? An utter cad he had been! |
| He of all men! But there was an infinite store of mercy in those eyes, |
| for him too a word of pardon even though he had erred and sinned and |
| wandered. Should a girl tell? No, a thousand times no. That was their |
| secret, only theirs, alone in the hiding twilight and there was none to |
| know or tell save the little bat that flew so softly through the evening |
| to and fro and little bats don't tell. |
| |
| Cissy Caffrey whistled, imitating the boys in the football field to show |
| what a great person she was: and then she cried: |
| |
| --Gerty! Gerty! We're going. Come on. We can see from farther up. |
| |
| Gerty had an idea, one of love's little ruses. She slipped a hand into |
| her kerchief pocket and took out the wadding and waved in reply of |
| course without letting him and then slipped it back. Wonder if he's too |
| far to. She rose. Was it goodbye? No. She had to go but they would meet |
| again, there, and she would dream of that till then, tomorrow, of her |
| dream of yester eve. She drew herself up to her full height. Their souls |
| met in a last lingering glance and the eyes that reached her heart, full |
| of a strange shining, hung enraptured on her sweet flowerlike face. She |
| half smiled at him wanly, a sweet forgiving smile, a smile that verged |
| on tears, and then they parted. |
| |
| Slowly, without looking back she went down the uneven strand to Cissy, |
| to Edy to Jacky and Tommy Caffrey, to little baby Boardman. It was |
| darker now and there were stones and bits of wood on the strand and |
| slippy seaweed. She walked with a certain quiet dignity characteristic |
| of her but with care and very slowly because--because Gerty MacDowell |
| was... |
| |
| Tight boots? No. She's lame! O! |
| |
| Mr Bloom watched her as she limped away. Poor girl! That's why she's |
| left on the shelf and the others did a sprint. Thought something was |
| wrong by the cut of her jib. Jilted beauty. A defect is ten times worse |
| in a woman. But makes them polite. Glad I didn't know it when she was on |
| show. Hot little devil all the same. I wouldn't mind. Curiosity like a |
| nun or a negress or a girl with glasses. That squinty one is delicate. |
| Near her monthlies, I expect, makes them feel ticklish. I have such |
| a bad headache today. Where did I put the letter? Yes, all right. All |
| kinds of crazy longings. Licking pennies. Girl in Tranquilla convent |
| that nun told me liked to smell rock oil. Virgins go mad in the end I |
| suppose. Sister? How many women in Dublin have it today? Martha, she. |
| Something in the air. That's the moon. But then why don't all women |
| menstruate at the same time with the same moon, I mean? Depends on the |
| time they were born I suppose. Or all start scratch then get out of |
| step. Sometimes Molly and Milly together. Anyhow I got the best of that. |
| Damned glad I didn't do it in the bath this morning over her silly I |
| will punish you letter. Made up for that tramdriver this morning. That |
| gouger M'Coy stopping me to say nothing. And his wife engagement in the |
| country valise, voice like a pickaxe. Thankful for small mercies. |
| Cheap too. Yours for the asking. Because they want it themselves. Their |
| natural craving. Shoals of them every evening poured out of offices. |
| Reserve better. Don't want it they throw it at you. Catch em alive, O. |
| Pity they can't see themselves. A dream of wellfilled hose. Where was |
| that? Ah, yes. Mutoscope pictures in Capel street: for men only. Peeping |
| Tom. Willy's hat and what the girls did with it. Do they snapshot those |
| girls or is it all a fake? _Lingerie_ does it. Felt for the curves |
| inside her _deshabillé._ Excites them also when they're. I'm all clean |
| come and dirty me. And they like dressing one another for the sacrifice. |
| Milly delighted with Molly's new blouse. At first. Put them all on to |
| take them all off. Molly. Why I bought her the violet garters. Us too: |
| the tie he wore, his lovely socks and turnedup trousers. He wore a pair |
| of gaiters the night that first we met. His lovely shirt was shining |
| beneath his what? of jet. Say a woman loses a charm with every pin she |
| takes out. Pinned together. O, Mairy lost the pin of her. Dressed up to |
| the nines for somebody. Fashion part of their charm. Just changes when |
| you're on the track of the secret. Except the east: Mary, Martha: now as |
| then. No reasonable offer refused. She wasn't in a hurry either. Always |
| off to a fellow when they are. They never forget an appointment. Out on |
| spec probably. They believe in chance because like themselves. And the |
| others inclined to give her an odd dig. Girl friends at school, arms |
| round each other's necks or with ten fingers locked, kissing and |
| whispering secrets about nothing in the convent garden. Nuns with |
| whitewashed faces, cool coifs and their rosaries going up and down, |
| vindictive too for what they can't get. Barbed wire. Be sure now and |
| write to me. And I'll write to you. Now won't you? Molly and Josie |
| Powell. Till Mr Right comes along, then meet once in a blue moon. |
| _Tableau!_ O, look who it is for the love of God! How are you at all? |
| What have you been doing with yourself? Kiss and delighted to, kiss, |
| to see you. Picking holes in each other's appearance. You're looking |
| splendid. Sister souls. Showing their teeth at one another. How many |
| have you left? Wouldn't lend each other a pinch of salt. |
| |
| Ah! |
| |
| Devils they are when that's coming on them. Dark devilish appearance. |
| Molly often told me feel things a ton weight. Scratch the sole of my |
| foot. O that way! O, that's exquisite! Feel it myself too. Good to rest |
| once in a way. Wonder if it's bad to go with them then. Safe in one way. |
| Turns milk, makes fiddlestrings snap. Something about withering plants I |
| read in a garden. Besides they say if the flower withers she wears she's |
| a flirt. All are. Daresay she felt 1. When you feel like that you often |
| meet what you feel. Liked me or what? Dress they look at. Always know a |
| fellow courting: collars and cuffs. Well cocks and lions do the same |
| and stags. Same time might prefer a tie undone or something. Trousers? |
| Suppose I when I was? No. Gently does it. Dislike rough and tumble. Kiss |
| in the dark and never tell. Saw something in me. Wonder what. Sooner |
| have me as I am than some poet chap with bearsgrease plastery hair, |
| lovelock over his dexter optic. To aid gentleman in literary. Ought to |
| attend to my appearance my age. Didn't let her see me in profile. Still, |
| you never know. Pretty girls and ugly men marrying. Beauty and the |
| beast. Besides I can't be so if Molly. Took off her hat to show her |
| hair. Wide brim. Bought to hide her face, meeting someone might know |
| her, bend down or carry a bunch of flowers to smell. Hair strong in rut. |
| Ten bob I got for Molly's combings when we were on the rocks in Holles |
| street. Why not? Suppose he gave her money. Why not? All a prejudice. |
| She's worth ten, fifteen, more, a pound. What? I think so. All that for |
| nothing. Bold hand: Mrs Marion. Did I forget to write address on |
| that letter like the postcard I sent to Flynn? And the day I went to |
| Drimmie's without a necktie. Wrangle with Molly it was put me off. No, |
| I remember. Richie Goulding: he's another. Weighs on his mind. Funny |
| my watch stopped at half past four. Dust. Shark liver oil they use to |
| clean. Could do it myself. Save. Was that just when he, she? |
| |
| O, he did. Into her. She did. Done. |
| |
| Ah! |
| |
| Mr Bloom with careful hand recomposed his wet shirt. O Lord, that little |
| limping devil. Begins to feel cold and clammy. Aftereffect not pleasant. |
| Still you have to get rid of it someway. They don't care. Complimented |
| perhaps. Go home to nicey bread and milky and say night prayers with the |
| kiddies. Well, aren't they? See her as she is spoil all. Must have |
| the stage setting, the rouge, costume, position, music. The name too. |
| _Amours_ of actresses. Nell Gwynn, Mrs Bracegirdle, Maud Branscombe. |
| Curtain up. Moonlight silver effulgence. Maiden discovered with pensive |
| bosom. Little sweetheart come and kiss me. Still, I feel. The strength |
| it gives a man. That's the secret of it. Good job I let off there behind |
| the wall coming out of Dignam's. Cider that was. Otherwise I couldn't |
| have. Makes you want to sing after. _Lacaus esant taratara_. Suppose I |
| spoke to her. What about? Bad plan however if you don't know how to end |
| the conversation. Ask them a question they ask you another. Good idea if |
| you're stuck. Gain time. But then you're in a cart. Wonderful of course |
| if you say: good evening, and you see she's on for it: good evening. O |
| but the dark evening in the Appian way I nearly spoke to Mrs Clinch O |
| thinking she was. Whew! Girl in Meath street that night. All the dirty |
| things I made her say. All wrong of course. My arks she called it. It's |
| so hard to find one who. Aho! If you don't answer when they solicit must |
| be horrible for them till they harden. And kissed my hand when I gave |
| her the extra two shillings. Parrots. Press the button and the bird will |
| squeak. Wish she hadn't called me sir. O, her mouth in the dark! And you |
| a married man with a single girl! That's what they enjoy. Taking a man |
| from another woman. Or even hear of it. Different with me. Glad to get |
| away from other chap's wife. Eating off his cold plate. Chap in the |
| Burton today spitting back gumchewed gristle. French letter still in |
| my pocketbook. Cause of half the trouble. But might happen sometime, |
| I don't think. Come in, all is prepared. I dreamt. What? Worst is |
| beginning. How they change the venue when it's not what they like. Ask |
| you do you like mushrooms because she once knew a gentleman who. Or ask |
| you what someone was going to say when he changed his mind and stopped. |
| Yet if I went the whole hog, say: I want to, something like that. |
| Because I did. She too. Offend her. Then make it up. Pretend to want |
| something awfully, then cry off for her sake. Flatters them. She must |
| have been thinking of someone else all the time. What harm? Must since |
| she came to the use of reason, he, he and he. First kiss does the trick. |
| The propitious moment. Something inside them goes pop. Mushy like, tell |
| by their eye, on the sly. First thoughts are best. Remember that till |
| their dying day. Molly, lieutenant Mulvey that kissed her under the |
| Moorish wall beside the gardens. Fifteen she told me. But her breasts |
| were developed. Fell asleep then. After Glencree dinner that was when we |
| drove home. Featherbed mountain. Gnashing her teeth in sleep. Lord mayor |
| had his eye on her too. Val Dillon. Apoplectic. |
| |
| There she is with them down there for the fireworks. My fireworks. Up |
| like a rocket, down like a stick. And the children, twins they must |
| be, waiting for something to happen. Want to be grownups. Dressing in |
| mother's clothes. Time enough, understand all the ways of the world. And |
| the dark one with the mop head and the nigger mouth. I knew she could |
| whistle. Mouth made for that. Like Molly. Why that highclass whore in |
| Jammet's wore her veil only to her nose. Would you mind, please, telling |
| me the right time? I'll tell you the right time up a dark lane. |
| Say prunes and prisms forty times every morning, cure for fat lips. |
| Caressing the little boy too. Onlookers see most of the game. Of course |
| they understand birds, animals, babies. In their line. |
| |
| Didn't look back when she was going down the strand. Wouldn't give that |
| satisfaction. Those girls, those girls, those lovely seaside girls. Fine |
| eyes she had, clear. It's the white of the eye brings that out not so |
| much the pupil. Did she know what I? Course. Like a cat sitting beyond |
| a dog's jump. Women never meet one like that Wilkins in the high school |
| drawing a picture of Venus with all his belongings on show. Call that |
| innocence? Poor idiot! His wife has her work cut out for her. Never see |
| them sit on a bench marked _Wet Paint_. Eyes all over them. Look under |
| the bed for what's not there. Longing to get the fright of their lives. |
| Sharp as needles they are. When I said to Molly the man at the corner of |
| Cuffe street was goodlooking, thought she might like, twigged at once he |
| had a false arm. Had, too. Where do they get that? Typist going up Roger |
| Greene's stairs two at a time to show her understandings. Handed down |
| from father to, mother to daughter, I mean. Bred in the bone. Milly for |
| example drying her handkerchief on the mirror to save the ironing. Best |
| place for an ad to catch a woman's eye on a mirror. And when I sent |
| her for Molly's Paisley shawl to Prescott's by the way that ad I must, |
| carrying home the change in her stocking! Clever little minx. I never |
| told her. Neat way she carries parcels too. Attract men, small thing |
| like that. Holding up her hand, shaking it, to let the blood flow back |
| when it was red. Who did you learn that from? Nobody. Something the |
| nurse taught me. O, don't they know! Three years old she was in front of |
| Molly's dressingtable, just before we left Lombard street west. Me have |
| a nice pace. Mullingar. Who knows? Ways of the world. Young student. |
| Straight on her pins anyway not like the other. Still she was game. |
| Lord, I am wet. Devil you are. Swell of her calf. Transparent stockings, |
| stretched to breaking point. Not like that frump today. A. E. Rumpled |
| stockings. Or the one in Grafton street. White. Wow! Beef to the heel. |
| |
| A monkey puzzle rocket burst, spluttering in darting crackles. Zrads and |
| zrads, zrads, zrads. And Cissy and Tommy and Jacky ran out to see and |
| Edy after with the pushcar and then Gerty beyond the curve of the rocks. |
| Will she? Watch! Watch! See! Looked round. She smelt an onion. Darling, |
| I saw, your. I saw all. |
| |
| Lord! |
| |
| Did me good all the same. Off colour after Kiernan's, Dignam's. For |
| this relief much thanks. In _Hamlet,_ that is. Lord! It was all things |
| combined. Excitement. When she leaned back, felt an ache at the butt |
| of my tongue. Your head it simply swirls. He's right. Might have made a |
| worse fool of myself however. Instead of talking about nothing. Then |
| I will tell you all. Still it was a kind of language between us. It |
| couldn't be? No, Gerty they called her. Might be false name however like |
| my name and the address Dolphin's barn a blind. |
| |
| _Her maiden name was Jemina Brown And she lived with her mother in |
| Irishtown._ |
| |
| Place made me think of that I suppose. All tarred with the same brush |
| Wiping pens in their stockings. But the ball rolled down to her as if |
| it understood. Every bullet has its billet. Course I never could throw |
| anything straight at school. Crooked as a ram's horn. Sad however |
| because it lasts only a few years till they settle down to potwalloping |
| and papa's pants will soon fit Willy and fuller's earth for the baby |
| when they hold him out to do ah ah. No soft job. Saves them. Keeps |
| them out of harm's way. Nature. Washing child, washing corpse. Dignam. |
| Children's hands always round them. Cocoanut skulls, monkeys, not even |
| closed at first, sour milk in their swaddles and tainted curds. Oughtn't |
| to have given that child an empty teat to suck. Fill it up with wind. |
| Mrs Beaufoy, Purefoy. Must call to the hospital. Wonder is nurse Callan |
| there still. She used to look over some nights when Molly was in the |
| Coffee Palace. That young doctor O'Hare I noticed her brushing his coat. |
| And Mrs Breen and Mrs Dignam once like that too, marriageable. Worst |
| of all at night Mrs Duggan told me in the City Arms. Husband rolling in |
| drunk, stink of pub off him like a polecat. Have that in your nose in |
| the dark, whiff of stale boose. Then ask in the morning: was I drunk |
| last night? Bad policy however to fault the husband. Chickens come home |
| to roost. They stick by one another like glue. Maybe the women's fault |
| also. That's where Molly can knock spots off them. It's the blood of the |
| south. Moorish. Also the form, the figure. Hands felt for the opulent. |
| Just compare for instance those others. Wife locked up at home, skeleton |
| in the cupboard. Allow me to introduce my. Then they trot you out some |
| kind of a nondescript, wouldn't know what to call her. Always see a |
| fellow's weak point in his wife. Still there's destiny in it, falling |
| in love. Have their own secrets between them. Chaps that would go to the |
| dogs if some woman didn't take them in hand. Then little chits of girls, |
| height of a shilling in coppers, with little hubbies. As God made them |
| he matched them. Sometimes children turn out well enough. Twice nought |
| makes one. Or old rich chap of seventy and blushing bride. Marry in May |
| and repent in December. This wet is very unpleasant. Stuck. Well the |
| foreskin is not back. Better detach. |
| |
| Ow! |
| |
| Other hand a sixfooter with a wifey up to his watchpocket. Long and |
| the short of it. Big he and little she. Very strange about my watch. |
| Wristwatches are always going wrong. Wonder is there any magnetic |
| influence between the person because that was about the time he. Yes, I |
| suppose, at once. Cat's away, the mice will play. I remember looking |
| in Pill lane. Also that now is magnetism. Back of everything magnetism. |
| Earth for instance pulling this and being pulled. That causes movement. |
| And time, well that's the time the movement takes. Then if one thing |
| stopped the whole ghesabo would stop bit by bit. Because it's all |
| arranged. Magnetic needle tells you what's going on in the sun, the |
| stars. Little piece of steel iron. When you hold out the fork. Come. |
| Come. Tip. Woman and man that is. Fork and steel. Molly, he. Dress up |
| and look and suggest and let you see and see more and defy you if you're |
| a man to see that and, like a sneeze coming, legs, look, look and if you |
| have any guts in you. Tip. Have to let fly. |
| |
| Wonder how is she feeling in that region. Shame all put on before third |
| person. More put out about a hole in her stocking. Molly, her underjaw |
| stuck out, head back, about the farmer in the ridingboots and spurs at |
| the horse show. And when the painters were in Lombard street west. |
| Fine voice that fellow had. How Giuglini began. Smell that I did. Like |
| flowers. It was too. Violets. Came from the turpentine probably in the |
| paint. Make their own use of everything. Same time doing it scraped her |
| slipper on the floor so they wouldn't hear. But lots of them can't kick |
| the beam, I think. Keep that thing up for hours. Kind of a general all |
| round over me and half down my back. |
| |
| Wait. Hm. Hm. Yes. That's her perfume. Why she waved her hand. I leave |
| you this to think of me when I'm far away on the pillow. What is it? |
| Heliotrope? No. Hyacinth? Hm. Roses, I think. She'd like scent of that |
| kind. Sweet and cheap: soon sour. Why Molly likes opoponax. Suits her, |
| with a little jessamine mixed. Her high notes and her low notes. At the |
| dance night she met him, dance of the hours. Heat brought it out. She |
| was wearing her black and it had the perfume of the time before. Good |
| conductor, is it? Or bad? Light too. Suppose there's some connection. |
| For instance if you go into a cellar where it's dark. Mysterious thing |
| too. Why did I smell it only now? Took its time in coming like herself, |
| slow but sure. Suppose it's ever so many millions of tiny grains |
| blown across. Yes, it is. Because those spice islands, Cinghalese this |
| morning, smell them leagues off. Tell you what it is. It's like a fine |
| fine veil or web they have all over the skin, fine like what do you |
| call it gossamer, and they're always spinning it out of them, fine as |
| anything, like rainbow colours without knowing it. Clings to everything |
| she takes off. Vamp of her stockings. Warm shoe. Stays. Drawers: little |
| kick, taking them off. Byby till next time. Also the cat likes to sniff |
| in her shift on the bed. Know her smell in a thousand. Bathwater too. |
| Reminds me of strawberries and cream. Wonder where it is really. There |
| or the armpits or under the neck. Because you get it out of all holes |
| and corners. Hyacinth perfume made of oil of ether or something. |
| Muskrat. Bag under their tails. One grain pour off odour for years. Dogs |
| at each other behind. Good evening. Evening. How do you sniff? Hm. Hm. |
| Very well, thank you. Animals go by that. Yes now, look at it that way. |
| We're the same. Some women, instance, warn you off when they have their |
| period. Come near. Then get a hogo you could hang your hat on. Like |
| what? Potted herrings gone stale or. Boof! Please keep off the grass. |
| |
| Perhaps they get a man smell off us. What though? Cigary gloves long |
| John had on his desk the other day. Breath? What you eat and drink gives |
| that. No. Mansmell, I mean. Must be connected with that because priests |
| that are supposed to be are different. Women buzz round it like flies |
| round treacle. Railed off the altar get on to it at any cost. The tree |
| of forbidden priest. O, father, will you? Let me be the first to. That |
| diffuses itself all through the body, permeates. Source of life. And |
| it's extremely curious the smell. Celery sauce. Let me. |
| |
| Mr Bloom inserted his nose. Hm. Into the. Hm. Opening of his waistcoat. |
| Almonds or. No. Lemons it is. Ah no, that's the soap. |
| |
| O by the by that lotion. I knew there was something on my mind. Never |
| went back and the soap not paid. Dislike carrying bottles like that hag |
| this morning. Hynes might have paid me that three shillings. I could |
| mention Meagher's just to remind him. Still if he works that paragraph. |
| Two and nine. Bad opinion of me he'll have. Call tomorrow. How much do |
| I owe you? Three and nine? Two and nine, sir. Ah. Might stop him giving |
| credit another time. Lose your customers that way. Pubs do. Fellows run |
| up a bill on the slate and then slinking around the back streets into |
| somewhere else. |
| |
| Here's this nobleman passed before. Blown in from the bay. Just went as |
| far as turn back. Always at home at dinnertime. Looks mangled out: had a |
| good tuck in. Enjoying nature now. Grace after meals. After supper walk |
| a mile. Sure he has a small bank balance somewhere, government sit. Walk |
| after him now make him awkward like those newsboys me today. Still you |
| learn something. See ourselves as others see us. So long as women don't |
| mock what matter? That's the way to find out. Ask yourself who is he |
| now. _The Mystery Man on the Beach_, prize titbit story by Mr Leopold |
| Bloom. Payment at the rate of one guinea per column. And that fellow |
| today at the graveside in the brown macintosh. Corns on his kismet |
| however. Healthy perhaps absorb all the. Whistle brings rain they say. |
| Must be some somewhere. Salt in the Ormond damp. The body feels the |
| atmosphere. Old Betty's joints are on the rack. Mother Shipton's |
| prophecy that is about ships around they fly in the twinkling. No. Signs |
| of rain it is. The royal reader. And distant hills seem coming nigh. |
| |
| Howth. Bailey light. Two, four, six, eight, nine. See. Has to change or |
| they might think it a house. Wreckers. Grace Darling. People afraid of |
| the dark. Also glowworms, cyclists: lightingup time. Jewels diamonds |
| flash better. Women. Light is a kind of reassuring. Not going to hurt |
| you. Better now of course than long ago. Country roads. Run you through |
| the small guts for nothing. Still two types there are you bob against. |
| Scowl or smile. Pardon! Not at all. Best time to spray plants too in |
| the shade after the sun. Some light still. Red rays are longest. Roygbiv |
| Vance taught us: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. A |
| star I see. Venus? Can't tell yet. Two. When three it's night. Were |
| those nightclouds there all the time? Looks like a phantom ship. No. |
| Wait. Trees are they? An optical illusion. Mirage. Land of the setting |
| sun this. Homerule sun setting in the southeast. My native land, |
| goodnight. |
| |
| Dew falling. Bad for you, dear, to sit on that stone. Brings on white |
| fluxions. Never have little baby then less he was big strong fight his |
| way up through. Might get piles myself. Sticks too like a summer cold, |
| sore on the mouth. Cut with grass or paper worst. Friction of the |
| position. Like to be that rock she sat on. O sweet little, you don't |
| know how nice you looked. I begin to like them at that age. Green |
| apples. Grab at all that offer. Suppose it's the only time we cross |
| legs, seated. Also the library today: those girl graduates. Happy chairs |
| under them. But it's the evening influence. They feel all that. Open |
| like flowers, know their hours, sunflowers, Jerusalem artichokes, in |
| ballrooms, chandeliers, avenues under the lamps. Nightstock in Mat |
| Dillon's garden where I kissed her shoulder. Wish I had a full length |
| oilpainting of her then. June that was too I wooed. The year returns. |
| History repeats itself. Ye crags and peaks I'm with you once again. |
| Life, love, voyage round your own little world. And now? Sad about her |
| lame of course but must be on your guard not to feel too much pity. They |
| take advantage. |
| |
| All quiet on Howth now. The distant hills seem. Where we. The |
| rhododendrons. I am a fool perhaps. He gets the plums, and I the |
| plumstones. Where I come in. All that old hill has seen. Names change: |
| that's all. Lovers: yum yum. |
| |
| Tired I feel now. Will I get up? O wait. Drained all the manhood out of |
| me, little wretch. She kissed me. Never again. My youth. Only once it |
| comes. Or hers. Take the train there tomorrow. No. Returning not the |
| same. Like kids your second visit to a house. The new I want. Nothing |
| new under the sun. Care of P. O. Dolphin's Barn. Are you not happy in |
| your? Naughty darling. At Dolphin's barn charades in Luke Doyle's house. |
| Mat Dillon and his bevy of daughters: Tiny, Atty, Floey, Maimy, Louy, |
| Hetty. Molly too. Eightyseven that was. Year before we. And the old |
| major, partial to his drop of spirits. Curious she an only child, I an |
| only child. So it returns. Think you're escaping and run into yourself. |
| Longest way round is the shortest way home. And just when he and she. |
| Circus horse walking in a ring. Rip van Winkle we played. Rip: tear in |
| Henny Doyle's overcoat. Van: breadvan delivering. Winkle: cockles and |
| periwinkles. Then I did Rip van Winkle coming back. She leaned on the |
| sideboard watching. Moorish eyes. Twenty years asleep in Sleepy Hollow. |
| All changed. Forgotten. The young are old. His gun rusty from the dew. |
| |
| Ba. What is that flying about? Swallow? Bat probably. Thinks I'm a tree, |
| so blind. Have birds no smell? Metempsychosis. They believed you could |
| be changed into a tree from grief. Weeping willow. Ba. There he goes. |
| Funny little beggar. Wonder where he lives. Belfry up there. Very |
| likely. Hanging by his heels in the odour of sanctity. Bell scared him |
| out, I suppose. Mass seems to be over. Could hear them all at it. Pray |
| for us. And pray for us. And pray for us. Good idea the repetition. Same |
| thing with ads. Buy from us. And buy from us. Yes, there's the light in |
| the priest's house. Their frugal meal. Remember about the mistake in the |
| valuation when I was in Thom's. Twentyeight it is. Two houses they have. |
| Gabriel Conroy's brother is curate. Ba. Again. Wonder why they come out |
| at night like mice. They're a mixed breed. Birds are like hopping mice. |
| What frightens them, light or noise? Better sit still. All instinct |
| like the bird in drouth got water out of the end of a jar by throwing |
| in pebbles. Like a little man in a cloak he is with tiny hands. Weeny |
| bones. Almost see them shimmering, kind of a bluey white. Colours depend |
| on the light you see. Stare the sun for example like the eagle then look |
| at a shoe see a blotch blob yellowish. Wants to stamp his trademark on |
| everything. Instance, that cat this morning on the staircase. Colour of |
| brown turf. Say you never see them with three colours. Not true. That |
| half tabbywhite tortoiseshell in the _City Arms_ with the letter em on |
| her forehead. Body fifty different colours. Howth a while ago amethyst. |
| Glass flashing. That's how that wise man what's his name with the |
| burning glass. Then the heather goes on fire. It can't be tourists' |
| matches. What? Perhaps the sticks dry rub together in the wind and |
| light. Or broken bottles in the furze act as a burning glass in the sun. |
| Archimedes. I have it! My memory's not so bad. |
| |
| Ba. Who knows what they're always flying for. Insects? That bee last |
| week got into the room playing with his shadow on the ceiling. Might |
| be the one bit me, come back to see. Birds too. Never find out. Or what |
| they say. Like our small talk. And says she and says he. Nerve they have |
| to fly over the ocean and back. Lots must be killed in storms, telegraph |
| wires. Dreadful life sailors have too. Big brutes of oceangoing steamers |
| floundering along in the dark, lowing out like seacows. _Faugh a |
| Ballagh!_ Out of that, bloody curse to you! Others in vessels, bit of |
| a handkerchief sail, pitched about like snuff at a wake when the stormy |
| winds do blow. Married too. Sometimes away for years at the ends of the |
| earth somewhere. No ends really because it's round. Wife in every port |
| they say. She has a good job if she minds it till Johnny comes marching |
| home again. If ever he does. Smelling the tail end of ports. How can |
| they like the sea? Yet they do. The anchor's weighed. Off he sails with |
| a scapular or a medal on him for luck. Well. And the tephilim no what's |
| this they call it poor papa's father had on his door to touch. That |
| brought us out of the land of Egypt and into the house of bondage. |
| Something in all those superstitions because when you go out never know |
| what dangers. Hanging on to a plank or astride of a beam for grim life, |
| lifebelt round him, gulping salt water, and that's the last of his nibs |
| till the sharks catch hold of him. Do fish ever get seasick? |
| |
| Then you have a beautiful calm without a cloud, smooth sea, placid, |
| crew and cargo in smithereens, Davy Jones' locker, moon looking down so |
| peaceful. Not my fault, old cockalorum. |
| |
| A last lonely candle wandered up the sky from Mirus bazaar in search of |
| funds for Mercer's hospital and broke, drooping, and shed a cluster |
| of violet but one white stars. They floated, fell: they faded. The |
| shepherd's hour: the hour of folding: hour of tryst. From house to |
| house, giving his everwelcome double knock, went the nine o'clock |
| postman, the glowworm's lamp at his belt gleaming here and there through |
| the laurel hedges. And among the five young trees a hoisted lintstock |
| lit the lamp at Leahy's terrace. By screens of lighted windows, by equal |
| gardens a shrill voice went crying, wailing: _Evening Telegraph, stop |
| press edition! Result of the Gold Cup race!_ and from the door of |
| Dignam's house a boy ran out and called. Twittering the bat flew here, |
| flew there. Far out over the sands the coming surf crept, grey. Howth |
| settled for slumber, tired of long days, of yumyum rhododendrons (he was |
| old) and felt gladly the night breeze lift, ruffle his fell of ferns. |
| He lay but opened a red eye unsleeping, deep and slowly breathing, |
| slumberous but awake. And far on Kish bank the anchored lightship |
| twinkled, winked at Mr Bloom. |
| |
| Life those chaps out there must have, stuck in the same spot. Irish |
| Lights board. Penance for their sins. Coastguards too. Rocket and |
| breeches buoy and lifeboat. Day we went out for the pleasure cruise in |
| the Erin's King, throwing them the sack of old papers. Bears in the zoo. |
| Filthy trip. Drunkards out to shake up their livers. Puking overboard |
| to feed the herrings. Nausea. And the women, fear of God in their faces. |
| Milly, no sign of funk. Her blue scarf loose, laughing. Don't know what |
| death is at that age. And then their stomachs clean. But being lost they |
| fear. When we hid behind the tree at Crumlin. I didn't want to. Mamma! |
| Mamma! Babes in the wood. Frightening them with masks too. Throwing them |
| up in the air to catch them. I'll murder you. Is it only half fun? Or |
| children playing battle. Whole earnest. How can people aim guns at each |
| other. Sometimes they go off. Poor kids! Only troubles wildfire and |
| nettlerash. Calomel purge I got her for that. After getting better |
| asleep with Molly. Very same teeth she has. What do they love? Another |
| themselves? But the morning she chased her with the umbrella. Perhaps so |
| as not to hurt. I felt her pulse. Ticking. Little hand it was: now big. |
| Dearest Papli. All that the hand says when you touch. Loved to count |
| my waistcoat buttons. Her first stays I remember. Made me laugh to see. |
| Little paps to begin with. Left one is more sensitive, I think. Mine |
| too. Nearer the heart? Padding themselves out if fat is in fashion. Her |
| growing pains at night, calling, wakening me. Frightened she was when |
| her nature came on her first. Poor child! Strange moment for the mother |
| too. Brings back her girlhood. Gibraltar. Looking from Buena Vista. |
| O'Hara's tower. The seabirds screaming. Old Barbary ape that gobbled all |
| his family. Sundown, gunfire for the men to cross the lines. Looking |
| out over the sea she told me. Evening like this, but clear, no clouds. |
| I always thought I'd marry a lord or a rich gentleman coming with a |
| private yacht. _Buenas noches, señorita. El hombre ama la muchacha |
| hermosa_. Why me? Because you were so foreign from the others. |
| |
| Better not stick here all night like a limpet. This weather makes you |
| dull. Must be getting on for nine by the light. Go home. Too late for |
| _Leah, Lily of Killarney._ No. Might be still up. Call to the hospital |
| to see. Hope she's over. Long day I've had. Martha, the bath, funeral, |
| house of Keyes, museum with those goddesses, Dedalus' song. Then that |
| bawler in Barney Kiernan's. Got my own back there. Drunken ranters what |
| I said about his God made him wince. Mistake to hit back. Or? No. |
| Ought to go home and laugh at themselves. Always want to be swilling in |
| company. Afraid to be alone like a child of two. Suppose he hit me. Look |
| at it other way round. Not so bad then. Perhaps not to hurt he meant. |
| Three cheers for Israel. Three cheers for the sister-in-law he hawked |
| about, three fangs in her mouth. Same style of beauty. Particularly nice |
| old party for a cup of tea. The sister of the wife of the wild man of |
| Borneo has just come to town. Imagine that in the early morning at close |
| range. Everyone to his taste as Morris said when he kissed the cow. But |
| Dignam's put the boots on it. Houses of mourning so depressing because |
| you never know. Anyhow she wants the money. Must call to those Scottish |
| Widows as I promised. Strange name. Takes it for granted we're going to |
| pop off first. That widow on Monday was it outside Cramer's that |
| looked at me. Buried the poor husband but progressing favourably on |
| the premium. Her widow's mite. Well? What do you expect her to do? Must |
| wheedle her way along. Widower I hate to see. Looks so forlorn. Poor man |
| O'Connor wife and five children poisoned by mussels here. The sewage. |
| Hopeless. Some good matronly woman in a porkpie hat to mother him. Take |
| him in tow, platter face and a large apron. Ladies' grey flannelette |
| bloomers, three shillings a pair, astonishing bargain. Plain and loved, |
| loved for ever, they say. Ugly: no woman thinks she is. Love, lie and be |
| handsome for tomorrow we die. See him sometimes walking about trying to |
| find out who played the trick. U. p: up. Fate that is. He, not me. Also |
| a shop often noticed. Curse seems to dog it. Dreamt last night? Wait. |
| Something confused. She had red slippers on. Turkish. Wore the breeches. |
| Suppose she does? Would I like her in pyjamas? Damned hard to answer. |
| Nannetti's gone. Mailboat. Near Holyhead by now. Must nail that ad |
| of Keyes's. Work Hynes and Crawford. Petticoats for Molly. She has |
| something to put in them. What's that? Might be money. |
| |
| Mr Bloom stooped and turned over a piece of paper on the strand. He |
| brought it near his eyes and peered. Letter? No. Can't read. Better go. |
| Better. I'm tired to move. Page of an old copybook. All those holes and |
| pebbles. Who could count them? Never know what you find. Bottle with |
| story of a treasure in it, thrown from a wreck. Parcels post. Children |
| always want to throw things in the sea. Trust? Bread cast on the waters. |
| What's this? Bit of stick. |
| |
| O! Exhausted that female has me. Not so young now. Will she come here |
| tomorrow? Wait for her somewhere for ever. Must come back. Murderers do. |
| Will I? |
| |
| Mr Bloom with his stick gently vexed the thick sand at his foot. Write a |
| message for her. Might remain. What? |
| |
| I. |
| |
| Some flatfoot tramp on it in the morning. Useless. Washed away. Tide |
| comes here. Saw a pool near her foot. Bend, see my face there, dark |
| mirror, breathe on it, stirs. All these rocks with lines and scars and |
| letters. O, those transparent! Besides they don't know. What is the |
| meaning of that other world. I called you naughty boy because I do not |
| like. |
| |
| AM. A. |
| |
| No room. Let it go. |
| |
| Mr Bloom effaced the letters with his slow boot. Hopeless thing sand. |
| Nothing grows in it. All fades. No fear of big vessels coming up here. |
| Except Guinness's barges. Round the Kish in eighty days. Done half by |
| design. |
| |
| He flung his wooden pen away. The stick fell in silted sand, stuck. Now |
| if you were trying to do that for a week on end you couldn't. Chance. |
| We'll never meet again. But it was lovely. Goodbye, dear. Thanks. Made |
| me feel so young. |
| |
| Short snooze now if I had. Must be near nine. Liverpool boat long gone.. |
| Not even the smoke. And she can do the other. Did too. And Belfast. I |
| won't go. Race there, race back to Ennis. Let him. Just close my eyes |
| a moment. Won't sleep, though. Half dream. It never comes the same. Bat |
| again. No harm in him. Just a few. |
| |
| O sweety all your little girlwhite up I saw dirty bracegirdle made me do |
| love sticky we two naughty Grace darling she him half past the bed met |
| him pike hoses frillies for Raoul de perfume your wife black hair heave |
| under embon _señorita_ young eyes Mulvey plump bubs me breadvan Winkle |
| red slippers she rusty sleep wander years of dreams return tail end |
| Agendath swoony lovey showed me her next year in drawers return next in |
| her next her next. |
| |
| A bat flew. Here. There. Here. Far in the grey a bell chimed. Mr Bloom |
| with open mouth, his left boot sanded sideways, leaned, breathed. Just |
| for a few |
| |
| _Cuckoo |
| Cuckoo |
| Cuckoo._ |
| |
| The clock on the mantelpiece in the priest's house cooed where Canon |
| O'Hanlon and Father Conroy and the reverend John Hughes S. J. were |
| taking tea and sodabread and butter and fried mutton chops with catsup |
| and talking about |
| |
| _Cuckoo |
| Cuckoo |
| Cuckoo._ |
| |
| Because it was a little canarybird that came out of its little house |
| to tell the time that Gerty MacDowell noticed the time she was there |
| because she was as quick as anything about a thing like that, was Gerty |
| MacDowell, and she noticed at once that that foreign gentleman that was |
| sitting on the rocks looking was |
| |
| _Cuckoo |
| Cuckoo |
| Cuckoo._ |
| |
| |
| Deshil Holles Eamus. Deshil Holles Eamus. Deshil Holles Eamus. |
| |
| Send us bright one, light one, Horhorn, quickening and wombfruit. Send |
| us bright one, light one, Horhorn, quickening and wombfruit. Send us |
| bright one, light one, Horhorn, quickening and wombfruit. |
| |
| Hoopsa boyaboy hoopsa! Hoopsa boyaboy hoopsa! Hoopsa boyaboy hoopsa! |
| |
| Universally that person's acumen is esteemed very little perceptive |
| concerning whatsoever matters are being held as most profitably by |
| mortals with sapience endowed to be studied who is ignorant of that |
| which the most in doctrine erudite and certainly by reason of that in |
| them high mind's ornament deserving of veneration constantly maintain |
| when by general consent they affirm that other circumstances being |
| equal by no exterior splendour is the prosperity of a nation more |
| efficaciously asserted than by the measure of how far forward may |
| have progressed the tribute of its solicitude for that proliferent |
| continuance which of evils the original if it be absent when fortunately |
| present constitutes the certain sign of omnipotent nature's incorrupted |
| benefaction. For who is there who anything of some significance has |
| apprehended but is conscious that that exterior splendour may be the |
| surface of a downwardtending lutulent reality or on the contrary anyone |
| so is there unilluminated as not to perceive that as no nature's boon |
| can contend against the bounty of increase so it behoves every most just |
| citizen to become the exhortator and admonisher of his semblables and |
| to tremble lest what had in the past been by the nation excellently |
| commenced might be in the future not with similar excellence |
| accomplished if an inverecund habit shall have gradually traduced |
| the honourable by ancestors transmitted customs to that thither of |
| profundity that that one was audacious excessively who would have the |
| hardihood to rise affirming that no more odious offence can for anyone |
| be than to oblivious neglect to consign that evangel simultaneously |
| command and promise which on all mortals with prophecy of abundance |
| or with diminution's menace that exalted of reiteratedly procreating |
| function ever irrevocably enjoined? |
| |
| It is not why therefore we shall wonder if, as the best historians |
| relate, among the Celts, who nothing that was not in its nature |
| admirable admired, the art of medicine shall have been highly honoured. |
| Not to speak of hostels, leperyards, sweating chambers, plaguegraves, |
| their greatest doctors, the O'Shiels, the O'Hickeys, the O'Lees, |
| have sedulously set down the divers methods by which the sick and the |
| relapsed found again health whether the malady had been the trembling |
| withering or loose boyconnell flux. Certainly in every public work which |
| in it anything of gravity contains preparation should be with importance |
| commensurate and therefore a plan was by them adopted (whether by having |
| preconsidered or as the maturation of experience it is difficult in |
| being said which the discrepant opinions of subsequent inquirers are not |
| up to the present congrued to render manifest) whereby maternity was so |
| far from all accident possibility removed that whatever care the patient |
| in that all hardest of woman hour chiefly required and not solely |
| for the copiously opulent but also for her who not being sufficiently |
| moneyed scarcely and often not even scarcely could subsist valiantly and |
| for an inconsiderable emolument was provided. |
| |
| To her nothing already then and thenceforward was anyway able to be |
| molestful for this chiefly felt all citizens except with proliferent |
| mothers prosperity at all not to can be and as they had received |
| eternity gods mortals generation to befit them her beholding, when the |
| case was so hoving itself, parturient in vehicle thereward carrying |
| desire immense among all one another was impelling on of her to be |
| received into that domicile. O thing of prudent nation not merely in |
| being seen but also even in being related worthy of being praised that |
| they her by anticipation went seeing mother, that she by them suddenly |
| to be about to be cherished had been begun she felt! |
| |
| Before born bliss babe had. Within womb won he worship. Whatever in that |
| one case done commodiously done was. A couch by midwives attended with |
| wholesome food reposeful, cleanest swaddles as though forthbringing were |
| now done and by wise foresight set: but to this no less of what drugs |
| there is need and surgical implements which are pertaining to her |
| case not omitting aspect of all very distracting spectacles in various |
| latitudes by our terrestrial orb offered together with images, divine |
| and human, the cogitation of which by sejunct females is to tumescence |
| conducive or eases issue in the high sunbright wellbuilt fair home of |
| mothers when, ostensibly far gone and reproductitive, it is come by her |
| thereto to lie in, her term up. |
| |
| Some man that wayfaring was stood by housedoor at night's oncoming. Of |
| Israel's folk was that man that on earth wandering far had fared. Stark |
| ruth of man his errand that him lone led till that house. |
| |
| Of that house A. Horne is lord. Seventy beds keeps he there teeming |
| mothers are wont that they lie for to thole and bring forth bairns hale |
| so God's angel to Mary quoth. Watchers tway there walk, white sisters |
| in ward sleepless. Smarts they still, sickness soothing: in twelve moons |
| thrice an hundred. Truest bedthanes they twain are, for Horne holding |
| wariest ward. |
| |
| In ward wary the watcher hearing come that man mildhearted eft rising |
| with swire ywimpled to him her gate wide undid. Lo, levin leaping |
| lightens in eyeblink Ireland's westward welkin. Full she drad that |
| God the Wreaker all mankind would fordo with water for his evil sins. |
| Christ's rood made she on breastbone and him drew that he would rathe |
| infare under her thatch. That man her will wotting worthful went in |
| Horne's house. |
| |
| Loth to irk in Horne's hall hat holding the seeker stood. On her stow he |
| ere was living with dear wife and lovesome daughter that then over land |
| and seafloor nine years had long outwandered. Once her in townhithe |
| meeting he to her bow had not doffed. Her to forgive now he craved with |
| good ground of her allowed that that of him swiftseen face, hers, so |
| young then had looked. Light swift her eyes kindled, bloom of blushes |
| his word winning. |
| |
| As her eyes then ongot his weeds swart therefor sorrow she feared. Glad |
| after she was that ere adread was. Her he asked if O'Hare Doctor tidings |
| sent from far coast and she with grameful sigh him answered that O'Hare |
| Doctor in heaven was. Sad was the man that word to hear that him so |
| heavied in bowels ruthful. All she there told him, ruing death for |
| friend so young, algate sore unwilling God's rightwiseness to withsay. |
| She said that he had a fair sweet death through God His goodness with |
| masspriest to be shriven, holy housel and sick men's oil to his limbs. |
| The man then right earnest asked the nun of which death the dead man was |
| died and the nun answered him and said that he was died in Mona Island |
| through bellycrab three year agone come Childermas and she prayed to God |
| the Allruthful to have his dear soul in his undeathliness. He heard her |
| sad words, in held hat sad staring. So stood they there both awhile in |
| wanhope sorrowing one with other. |
| |
| Therefore, everyman, look to that last end that is thy death and the |
| dust that gripeth on every man that is born of woman for as he came |
| naked forth from his mother's womb so naked shall he wend him at the |
| last for to go as he came. |
| |
| The man that was come in to the house then spoke to the nursingwoman and |
| he asked her how it fared with the woman that lay there in childbed. |
| The nursingwoman answered him and said that that woman was in throes |
| now full three days and that it would be a hard birth unneth to bear |
| but that now in a little it would be. She said thereto that she had |
| seen many births of women but never was none so hard as was that woman's |
| birth. Then she set it all forth to him for because she knew the man |
| that time was had lived nigh that house. The man hearkened to her words |
| for he felt with wonder women's woe in the travail that they have of |
| motherhood and he wondered to look on her face that was a fair face for |
| any man to see but yet was she left after long years a handmaid. Nine |
| twelve bloodflows chiding her childless. |
| |
| And whiles they spake the door of the castle was opened and there nighed |
| them a mickle noise as of many that sat there at meat. And there came |
| against the place as they stood a young learningknight yclept Dixon. And |
| the traveller Leopold was couth to him sithen it had happed that they |
| had had ado each with other in the house of misericord where this |
| learningknight lay by cause the traveller Leopold came there to be |
| healed for he was sore wounded in his breast by a spear wherewith a |
| horrible and dreadful dragon was smitten him for which he did do make |
| a salve of volatile salt and chrism as much as he might suffice. And he |
| said now that he should go in to that castle for to make merry with |
| them that were there. And the traveller Leopold said that he should go |
| otherwhither for he was a man of cautels and a subtile. Also the lady |
| was of his avis and repreved the learningknight though she trowed well |
| that the traveller had said thing that was false for his subtility. But |
| the learningknight would not hear say nay nor do her mandement ne have |
| him in aught contrarious to his list and he said how it was a marvellous |
| castle. And the traveller Leopold went into the castle for to rest him |
| for a space being sore of limb after many marches environing in divers |
| lands and sometime venery. |
| |
| And in the castle was set a board that was of the birchwood of Finlandy |
| and it was upheld by four dwarfmen of that country but they durst not |
| move more for enchantment. And on this board were frightful swords and |
| knives that are made in a great cavern by swinking demons out of white |
| flames that they fix then in the horns of buffalos and stags that there |
| abound marvellously. And there were vessels that are wrought by magic of |
| Mahound out of seasand and the air by a warlock with his breath that he |
| blases in to them like to bubbles. And full fair cheer and rich was on |
| the board that no wight could devise a fuller ne richer. And there was |
| a vat of silver that was moved by craft to open in the which lay strange |
| fishes withouten heads though misbelieving men nie that this be possible |
| thing without they see it natheless they are so. And these fishes lie |
| in an oily water brought there from Portugal land because of the fatness |
| that therein is like to the juices of the olivepress. And also it was |
| a marvel to see in that castle how by magic they make a compost out of |
| fecund wheatkidneys out of Chaldee that by aid of certain angry spirits |
| that they do in to it swells up wondrously like to a vast mountain. And |
| they teach the serpents there to entwine themselves up on long sticks |
| out of the ground and of the scales of these serpents they brew out a |
| brewage like to mead. |
| |
| And the learning knight let pour for childe Leopold a draught and halp |
| thereto the while all they that were there drank every each. And childe |
| Leopold did up his beaver for to pleasure him and took apertly somewhat |
| in amity for he never drank no manner of mead which he then put by and |
| anon full privily he voided the more part in his neighbour glass and |
| his neighbour nist not of this wile. And he sat down in that castle with |
| them for to rest him there awhile. Thanked be Almighty God. |
| |
| This meanwhile this good sister stood by the door and begged them at the |
| reverence of Jesu our alther liege Lord to leave their wassailing for |
| there was above one quick with child, a gentle dame, whose time hied |
| fast. Sir Leopold heard on the upfloor cry on high and he wondered what |
| cry that it was whether of child or woman and I marvel, said he, that it |
| be not come or now. Meseems it dureth overlong. And he was ware and saw |
| a franklin that hight Lenehan on that side the table that was older than |
| any of the tother and for that they both were knights virtuous in the |
| one emprise and eke by cause that he was elder he spoke to him full |
| gently. But, said he, or it be long too she will bring forth by God His |
| bounty and have joy of her childing for she hath waited marvellous long. |
| And the franklin that had drunken said, Expecting each moment to be her |
| next. Also he took the cup that stood tofore him for him needed never |
| none asking nor desiring of him to drink and, Now drink, said he, fully |
| delectably, and he quaffed as far as he might to their both's health for |
| he was a passing good man of his lustiness. And sir Leopold that was the |
| goodliest guest that ever sat in scholars' hall and that was the meekest |
| man and the kindest that ever laid husbandly hand under hen and that was |
| the very truest knight of the world one that ever did minion service |
| to lady gentle pledged him courtly in the cup. Woman's woe with wonder |
| pondering. |
| |
| Now let us speak of that fellowship that was there to the intent to be |
| drunken an they might. There was a sort of scholars along either side |
| the board, that is to wit, Dixon yclept junior of saint Mary Merciable's |
| with other his fellows Lynch and Madden, scholars of medicine, and the |
| franklin that hight Lenehan and one from Alba Longa, one Crotthers, and |
| young Stephen that had mien of a frere that was at head of the board |
| and Costello that men clepen Punch Costello all long of a mastery of |
| him erewhile gested (and of all them, reserved young Stephen, he was the |
| most drunken that demanded still of more mead) and beside the meek sir |
| Leopold. But on young Malachi they waited for that he promised to have |
| come and such as intended to no goodness said how he had broke his avow. |
| And sir Leopold sat with them for he bore fast friendship to sir Simon |
| and to this his son young Stephen and for that his languor becalmed him |
| there after longest wanderings insomuch as they feasted him for that |
| time in the honourablest manner. Ruth red him, love led on with will to |
| wander, loth to leave. |
| |
| For they were right witty scholars. And he heard their aresouns each gen |
| other as touching birth and righteousness, young Madden maintaining that |
| put such case it were hard the wife to die (for so it had fallen out a |
| matter of some year agone with a woman of Eblana in Horne's house that |
| now was trespassed out of this world and the self night next before her |
| death all leeches and pothecaries had taken counsel of her case). And |
| they said farther she should live because in the beginning, they said, |
| the woman should bring forth in pain and wherefore they that were of |
| this imagination affirmed how young Madden had said truth for he had |
| conscience to let her die. And not few and of these was young Lynch |
| were in doubt that the world was now right evil governed as it was never |
| other howbeit the mean people believed it otherwise but the law nor his |
| judges did provide no remedy. A redress God grant. This was scant said |
| but all cried with one acclaim nay, by our Virgin Mother, the wife |
| should live and the babe to die. In colour whereof they waxed hot |
| upon that head what with argument and what for their drinking but the |
| franklin Lenehan was prompt each when to pour them ale so that at the |
| least way mirth might not lack. Then young Madden showed all the whole |
| affair and said how that she was dead and how for holy religion sake by |
| rede of palmer and bedesman and for a vow he had made to Saint Ultan of |
| Arbraccan her goodman husband would not let her death whereby they were |
| all wondrous grieved. To whom young Stephen had these words following: |
| Murmur, sirs, is eke oft among lay folk. Both babe and parent now |
| glorify their Maker, the one in limbo gloom, the other in purgefire. |
| But, gramercy, what of those Godpossibled souls that we nightly |
| impossibilise, which is the sin against the Holy Ghost, Very God, Lord |
| and Giver of Life? For, sirs, he said, our lust is brief. We are means |
| to those small creatures within us and nature has other ends than we. |
| Then said Dixon junior to Punch Costello wist he what ends. But he had |
| overmuch drunken and the best word he could have of him was that he |
| would ever dishonest a woman whoso she were or wife or maid or leman if |
| it so fortuned him to be delivered of his spleen of lustihead. Whereat |
| Crotthers of Alba Longa sang young Malachi's praise of that beast the |
| unicorn how once in the millennium he cometh by his horn, the other all |
| this while, pricked forward with their jibes wherewith they did malice |
| him, witnessing all and several by saint Foutinus his engines that |
| he was able to do any manner of thing that lay in man to do. Thereat |
| laughed they all right jocundly only young Stephen and sir Leopold which |
| never durst laugh too open by reason of a strange humour which he would |
| not bewray and also for that he rued for her that bare whoso she might |
| be or wheresoever. Then spake young Stephen orgulous of mother Church |
| that would cast him out of her bosom, of law of canons, of Lilith, |
| patron of abortions, of bigness wrought by wind of seeds of brightness |
| or by potency of vampires mouth to mouth or, as Virgilius saith, by the |
| influence of the occident or by the reek of moonflower or an she lie |
| with a woman which her man has but lain with, _effectu secuto_, or |
| peradventure in her bath according to the opinions of Averroes and Moses |
| Maimonides. He said also how at the end of the second month a human soul |
| was infused and how in all our holy mother foldeth ever souls for God's |
| greater glory whereas that earthly mother which was but a dam to bear |
| beastly should die by canon for so saith he that holdeth the fisherman's |
| seal, even that blessed Peter on which rock was holy church for all ages |
| founded. All they bachelors then asked of sir Leopold would he in like |
| case so jeopard her person as risk life to save life. A wariness of |
| mind he would answer as fitted all and, laying hand to jaw, he said |
| dissembling, as his wont was, that as it was informed him, who had ever |
| loved the art of physic as might a layman, and agreeing also with his |
| experience of so seldomseen an accident it was good for that mother |
| Church belike at one blow had birth and death pence and in such sort |
| deliverly he scaped their questions. That is truth, pardy, said Dixon, |
| and, or I err, a pregnant word. Which hearing young Stephen was a |
| marvellous glad man and he averred that he who stealeth from the poor |
| lendeth to the Lord for he was of a wild manner when he was drunken and |
| that he was now in that taking it appeared eftsoons. |
| |
| But sir Leopold was passing grave maugre his word by cause he still had |
| pity of the terrorcausing shrieking of shrill women in their labour |
| and as he was minded of his good lady Marion that had borne him an only |
| manchild which on his eleventh day on live had died and no man of art |
| could save so dark is destiny. And she was wondrous stricken of heart |
| for that evil hap and for his burial did him on a fair corselet of |
| lamb's wool, the flower of the flock, lest he might perish utterly and |
| lie akeled (for it was then about the midst of the winter) and now Sir |
| Leopold that had of his body no manchild for an heir looked upon him his |
| friend's son and was shut up in sorrow for his forepassed happiness and |
| as sad as he was that him failed a son of such gentle courage (for all |
| accounted him of real parts) so grieved he also in no less measure |
| for young Stephen for that he lived riotously with those wastrels and |
| murdered his goods with whores. |
| |
| About that present time young Stephen filled all cups that stood empty |
| so as there remained but little mo if the prudenter had not shadowed |
| their approach from him that still plied it very busily who, praying for |
| the intentions of the sovereign pontiff, he gave them for a pledge the |
| vicar of Christ which also as he said is vicar of Bray. Now drink we, |
| quod he, of this mazer and quaff ye this mead which is not indeed parcel |
| of my body but my soul's bodiment. Leave ye fraction of bread to them |
| that live by bread alone. Be not afeard neither for any want for this |
| will comfort more than the other will dismay. See ye here. And he showed |
| them glistering coins of the tribute and goldsmith notes the worth of |
| two pound nineteen shilling that he had, he said, for a song which he |
| writ. They all admired to see the foresaid riches in such dearth of |
| money as was herebefore. His words were then these as followeth: Know |
| all men, he said, time's ruins build eternity's mansions. What means |
| this? Desire's wind blasts the thorntree but after it becomes from a |
| bramblebush to be a rose upon the rood of time. Mark me now. In woman's |
| womb word is made flesh but in the spirit of the maker all flesh |
| that passes becomes the word that shall not pass away. This is the |
| postcreation. _Omnis caro ad te veniet_. No question but her name is |
| puissant who aventried the dear corse of our Agenbuyer, Healer and Herd, |
| our mighty mother and mother most venerable and Bernardus saith aptly |
| that She hath an _omnipotentiam deiparae supplicem_, that is to wit, an |
| almightiness of petition because she is the second Eve and she won |
| us, saith Augustine too, whereas that other, our grandam, which we are |
| linked up with by successive anastomosis of navelcords sold us all, |
| seed, breed and generation, for a penny pippin. But here is the matter |
| now. Or she knew him, that second I say, and was but creature of her |
| creature, _vergine madre, figlia di tuo figlio_, or she knew him not and |
| then stands she in the one denial or ignorancy with Peter Piscator who |
| lives in the house that Jack built and with Joseph the joiner patron of |
| the happy demise of all unhappy marriages, _parceque M. Léo Taxil nous |
| a dit que qui l'avait mise dans cette fichue position c'était le |
| sacre pigeon, ventre de Dieu! Entweder_ transubstantiality ODER |
| consubstantiality but in no case subsubstantiality. And all cried out |
| upon it for a very scurvy word. A pregnancy without joy, he said, a |
| birth without pangs, a body without blemish, a belly without bigness. |
| Let the lewd with faith and fervour worship. With will will we |
| withstand, withsay. |
| |
| Hereupon Punch Costello dinged with his fist upon the board and would |
| sing a bawdy catch _Staboo Stabella_ about a wench that was put in pod |
| of a jolly swashbuckler in Almany which he did straightways now attack: |
| _The first three months she was not well, Staboo,_ when here nurse |
| Quigley from the door angerly bid them hist ye should shame you nor |
| was it not meet as she remembered them being her mind was to have all |
| orderly against lord Andrew came for because she was jealous that |
| no gasteful turmoil might shorten the honour of her guard. It was an |
| ancient and a sad matron of a sedate look and christian walking, |
| in habit dun beseeming her megrims and wrinkled visage, nor did her |
| hortative want of it effect for incontinently Punch Costello was of them |
| all embraided and they reclaimed the churl with civil rudeness some and |
| shaked him with menace of blandishments others whiles they all chode |
| with him, a murrain seize the dolt, what a devil he would be at, thou |
| chuff, thou puny, thou got in peasestraw, thou losel, thou chitterling, |
| thou spawn of a rebel, thou dykedropt, thou abortion thou, to shut up |
| his drunken drool out of that like a curse of God ape, the good sir |
| Leopold that had for his cognisance the flower of quiet, margerain |
| gentle, advising also the time's occasion as most sacred and most worthy |
| to be most sacred. In Horne's house rest should reign. |
| |
| To be short this passage was scarce by when Master Dixon of Mary in |
| Eccles, goodly grinning, asked young Stephen what was the reason why he |
| had not cided to take friar's vows and he answered him obedience in the |
| womb, chastity in the tomb but involuntary poverty all his days. Master |
| Lenehan at this made return that he had heard of those nefarious deeds |
| and how, as he heard hereof counted, he had besmirched the lily virtue |
| of a confiding female which was corruption of minors and they all |
| intershowed it too, waxing merry and toasting to his fathership. But he |
| said very entirely it was clean contrary to their suppose for he was |
| the eternal son and ever virgin. Thereat mirth grew in them the more and |
| they rehearsed to him his curious rite of wedlock for the disrobing and |
| deflowering of spouses, as the priests use in Madagascar island, she |
| to be in guise of white and saffron, her groom in white and grain, with |
| burning of nard and tapers, on a bridebed while clerks sung kyries and |
| the anthem _Ut novetur sexus omnis corporis mysterium_ till she was |
| there unmaided. He gave them then a much admirable hymen minim by those |
| delicate poets Master John Fletcher and Master Francis Beaumont that is |
| in their _Maid's Tragedy_ that was writ for a like twining of lovers: |
| _To bed, to bed_ was the burden of it to be played with accompanable |
| concent upon the virginals. An exquisite dulcet epithalame of most |
| mollificative suadency for juveniles amatory whom the odoriferous |
| flambeaus of the paranymphs have escorted to the quadrupedal proscenium |
| of connubial communion. Well met they were, said Master Dixon, joyed, |
| but, harkee, young sir, better were they named Beau Mount and Lecher |
| for, by my troth, of such a mingling much might come. Young Stephen said |
| indeed to his best remembrance they had but the one doxy between them |
| and she of the stews to make shift with in delights amorous for life ran |
| very high in those days and the custom of the country approved with it. |
| Greater love than this, he said, no man hath that a man lay down his |
| wife for his friend. Go thou and do likewise. Thus, or words to that |
| effect, saith Zarathustra, sometime regius professor of French letters |
| to the university of Oxtail nor breathed there ever that man to whom |
| mankind was more beholden. Bring a stranger within thy tower it will |
| go hard but thou wilt have the secondbest bed. _Orate, fratres, pro |
| memetipso_. And all the people shall say, Amen. Remember, Erin, thy |
| generations and thy days of old, how thou settedst little by me and by |
| my word and broughtedst in a stranger to my gates to commit fornication |
| in my sight and to wax fat and kick like Jeshurum. Therefore hast thou |
| sinned against my light and hast made me, thy lord, to be the slave of |
| servants. Return, return, Clan Milly: forget me not, O Milesian. Why |
| hast thou done this abomination before me that thou didst spurn me for |
| a merchant of jalaps and didst deny me to the Roman and to the Indian of |
| dark speech with whom thy daughters did lie luxuriously? Look forth now, |
| my people, upon the land of behest, even from Horeb and from Nebo and |
| from Pisgah and from the Horns of Hatten unto a land flowing with milk |
| and money. But thou hast suckled me with a bitter milk: my moon and my |
| sun thou hast quenched for ever. And thou hast left me alone for ever |
| in the dark ways of my bitterness: and with a kiss of ashes hast thou |
| kissed my mouth. This tenebrosity of the interior, he proceeded to say, |
| hath not been illumined by the wit of the septuagint nor so much as |
| mentioned for the Orient from on high Which brake hell's gates visited a |
| darkness that was foraneous. Assuefaction minorates atrocities (as Tully |
| saith of his darling Stoics) and Hamlet his father showeth the prince no |
| blister of combustion. The adiaphane in the noon of life is an Egypt's |
| plague which in the nights of prenativity and postmortemity is their |
| most proper _ubi_ and _quomodo_. And as the ends and ultimates of |
| all things accord in some mean and measure with their inceptions and |
| originals, that same multiplicit concordance which leads forth growth |
| from birth accomplishing by a retrogressive metamorphosis that minishing |
| and ablation towards the final which is agreeable unto nature so is it |
| with our subsolar being. The aged sisters draw us into life: we wail, |
| batten, sport, clip, clasp, sunder, dwindle, die: over us dead they |
| bend. First, saved from waters of old Nile, among bulrushes, a bed |
| of fasciated wattles: at last the cavity of a mountain, an occulted |
| sepulchre amid the conclamation of the hillcat and the ossifrage. And as |
| no man knows the ubicity of his tumulus nor to what processes we shall |
| thereby be ushered nor whether to Tophet or to Edenville in the like way |
| is all hidden when we would backward see from what region of remoteness |
| the whatness of our whoness hath fetched his whenceness. |
| |
| Thereto Punch Costello roared out mainly _Etienne chanson_ but he loudly |
| bid them, lo, wisdom hath built herself a house, this vast majestic |
| longstablished vault, the crystal palace of the Creator, all in applepie |
| order, a penny for him who finds the pea. |
| |
| _Behold the mansion reared by dedal Jack |
| See the malt stored in many a refluent sack, |
| In the proud cirque of Jackjohn's bivouac._ |
| |
| A black crack of noise in the street here, alack, bawled back. Loud on |
| left Thor thundered: in anger awful the hammerhurler. Came now the storm |
| that hist his heart. And Master Lynch bade him have a care to flout and |
| witwanton as the god self was angered for his hellprate and paganry. And |
| he that had erst challenged to be so doughty waxed wan as they might all |
| mark and shrank together and his pitch that was before so haught uplift |
| was now of a sudden quite plucked down and his heart shook within the |
| cage of his breast as he tasted the rumour of that storm. Then did some |
| mock and some jeer and Punch Costello fell hard again to his yale which |
| Master Lenehan vowed he would do after and he was indeed but a word and |
| a blow on any the least colour. But the braggart boaster cried that an |
| old Nobodaddy was in his cups it was muchwhat indifferent and he would |
| not lag behind his lead. But this was only to dye his desperation as |
| cowed he crouched in Horne's hall. He drank indeed at one draught to |
| pluck up a heart of any grace for it thundered long rumblingly over all |
| the heavens so that Master Madden, being godly certain whiles, knocked |
| him on his ribs upon that crack of doom and Master Bloom, at the |
| braggart's side, spoke to him calming words to slumber his great fear, |
| advertising how it was no other thing but a hubbub noise that he heard, |
| the discharge of fluid from the thunderhead, look you, having taken |
| place, and all of the order of a natural phenomenon. |
| |
| But was young Boasthard's fear vanquished by Calmer's words? No, for he |
| had in his bosom a spike named Bitterness which could not by words be |
| done away. And was he then neither calm like the one nor godly like the |
| other? He was neither as much as he would have liked to be either. But |
| could he not have endeavoured to have found again as in his youth the |
| bottle Holiness that then he lived withal? Indeed no for Grace was not |
| there to find that bottle. Heard he then in that clap the voice of the |
| god Bringforth or, what Calmer said, a hubbub of Phenomenon? Heard? |
| Why, he could not but hear unless he had plugged him up the tube |
| Understanding (which he had not done). For through that tube he saw that |
| he was in the land of Phenomenon where he must for a certain one day die |
| as he was like the rest too a passing show. And would he not accept to |
| die like the rest and pass away? By no means would he though he must nor |
| would he make more shows according as men do with wives which Phenomenon |
| has commanded them to do by the book Law. Then wotted he nought of that |
| other land which is called Believe-on-Me, that is the land of promise |
| which behoves to the king Delightful and shall be for ever where there |
| is no death and no birth neither wiving nor mothering at which all shall |
| come as many as believe on it? Yes, Pious had told him of that land and |
| Chaste had pointed him to the way but the reason was that in the way he |
| fell in with a certain whore of an eyepleasing exterior whose name, she |
| said, is Bird-in-the-Hand and she beguiled him wrongways from the true |
| path by her flatteries that she said to him as, Ho, you pretty man, turn |
| aside hither and I will show you a brave place, and she lay at him so |
| flatteringly that she had him in her grot which is named Two-in-the-Bush |
| or, by some learned, Carnal Concupiscence. |
| |
| This was it what all that company that sat there at commons in Manse |
| of Mothers the most lusted after and if they met with this whore |
| Bird-in-the-Hand (which was within all foul plagues, monsters and a |
| wicked devil) they would strain the last but they would make at her and |
| know her. For regarding Believe-on-Me they said it was nought else |
| but notion and they could conceive no thought of it for, first, |
| Two-in-the-Bush whither she ticed them was the very goodliest grot and |
| in it were four pillows on which were four tickets with these words |
| printed on them, Pickaback and Topsyturvy and Shameface and Cheek by |
| Jowl and, second, for that foul plague Allpox and the monsters they |
| cared not for them for Preservative had given them a stout shield of |
| oxengut and, third, that they might take no hurt neither from Offspring |
| that was that wicked devil by virtue of this same shield which was |
| named Killchild. So were they all in their blind fancy, Mr Cavil and Mr |
| Sometimes Godly, Mr Ape Swillale, Mr False Franklin, Mr Dainty Dixon, |
| Young Boasthard and Mr Cautious Calmer. Wherein, O wretched company, |
| were ye all deceived for that was the voice of the god that was in a |
| very grievous rage that he would presently lift his arm up and |
| spill their souls for their abuses and their spillings done by them |
| contrariwise to his word which forth to bring brenningly biddeth. |
| |
| So Thursday sixteenth June Patk. Dignam laid in clay of an apoplexy and |
| after hard drought, please God, rained, a bargeman coming in by water a |
| fifty mile or thereabout with turf saying the seed won't sprout, fields |
| athirst, very sadcoloured and stunk mightily, the quags and tofts too. |
| Hard to breathe and all the young quicks clean consumed without sprinkle |
| this long while back as no man remembered to be without. The rosy buds |
| all gone brown and spread out blobs and on the hills nought but dry flag |
| and faggots that would catch at first fire. All the world saying, for |
| aught they knew, the big wind of last February a year that did havoc the |
| land so pitifully a small thing beside this barrenness. But by and |
| by, as said, this evening after sundown, the wind sitting in the |
| west, biggish swollen clouds to be seen as the night increased and the |
| weatherwise poring up at them and some sheet lightnings at first and |
| after, past ten of the clock, one great stroke with a long thunder and |
| in a brace of shakes all scamper pellmell within door for the smoking |
| shower, the men making shelter for their straws with a clout or |
| kerchief, womenfolk skipping off with kirtles catched up soon as the |
| pour came. In Ely place, Baggot street, Duke's lawn, thence through |
| Merrion green up to Holles street a swash of water flowing that was |
| before bonedry and not one chair or coach or fiacre seen about but |
| no more crack after that first. Over against the Rt. Hon. Mr Justice |
| Fitzgibbon's door (that is to sit with Mr Healy the lawyer upon the |
| college lands) Mal. Mulligan a gentleman's gentleman that had but come |
| from Mr Moore's the writer's (that was a papish but is now, folk say, |
| a good Williamite) chanced against Alec. Bannon in a cut bob (which are |
| now in with dance cloaks of Kendal green) that was new got to town from |
| Mullingar with the stage where his coz and Mal M's brother will stay a |
| month yet till Saint Swithin and asks what in the earth he does there, |
| he bound home and he to Andrew Horne's being stayed for to crush a cup |
| of wine, so he said, but would tell him of a skittish heifer, big of |
| her age and beef to the heel, and all this while poured with rain and |
| so both together on to Horne's. There Leop. Bloom of Crawford's journal |
| sitting snug with a covey of wags, likely brangling fellows, Dixon jun., |
| scholar of my lady of Mercy's, Vin. Lynch, a Scots fellow, Will. Madden, |
| T. Lenehan, very sad about a racer he fancied and Stephen D. Leop. Bloom |
| there for a languor he had but was now better, be having dreamed tonight |
| a strange fancy of his dame Mrs Moll with red slippers on in a pair of |
| Turkey trunks which is thought by those in ken to be for a change and |
| Mistress Purefoy there, that got in through pleading her belly, and now |
| on the stools, poor body, two days past her term, the midwives sore put |
| to it and can't deliver, she queasy for a bowl of riceslop that is a |
| shrewd drier up of the insides and her breath very heavy more than good |
| and should be a bullyboy from the knocks, they say, but God give her |
| soon issue. 'Tis her ninth chick to live, I hear, and Lady day bit off |
| her last chick's nails that was then a twelvemonth and with other three |
| all breastfed that died written out in a fair hand in the king's bible. |
| Her hub fifty odd and a methodist but takes the sacrament and is to |
| be seen any fair sabbath with a pair of his boys off Bullock harbour |
| dapping on the sound with a heavybraked reel or in a punt he has |
| trailing for flounder and pollock and catches a fine bag, I hear. In sum |
| an infinite great fall of rain and all refreshed and will much increase |
| the harvest yet those in ken say after wind and water fire shall come |
| for a prognostication of Malachi's almanac (and I hear that Mr Russell |
| has done a prophetical charm of the same gist out of the Hindustanish |
| for his farmer's gazette) to have three things in all but this a mere |
| fetch without bottom of reason for old crones and bairns yet sometimes |
| they are found in the right guess with their queerities no telling how. |
| |
| With this came up Lenehan to the feet of the table to say how the letter |
| was in that night's gazette and he made a show to find it about him |
| (for he swore with an oath that he had been at pains about it) but on |
| Stephen's persuasion he gave over the search and was bidden to sit near |
| by which he did mighty brisk. He was a kind of sport gentleman that |
| went for a merryandrew or honest pickle and what belonged of women, |
| horseflesh or hot scandal he had it pat. To tell the truth he was mean |
| in fortunes and for the most part hankered about the coffeehouses |
| and low taverns with crimps, ostlers, bookies, Paul's men, runners, |
| flatcaps, waistcoateers, ladies of the bagnio and other rogues of the |
| game or with a chanceable catchpole or a tipstaff often at nights |
| till broad day of whom he picked up between his sackpossets much loose |
| gossip. He took his ordinary at a boilingcook's and if he had but gotten |
| into him a mess of broken victuals or a platter of tripes with a bare |
| tester in his purse he could always bring himself off with his tongue, |
| some randy quip he had from a punk or whatnot that every mother's son of |
| them would burst their sides. The other, Costello that is, hearing this |
| talk asked was it poetry or a tale. Faith, no, he says, Frank (that was |
| his name), 'tis all about Kerry cows that are to be butchered along of |
| the plague. But they can go hang, says he with a wink, for me with their |
| bully beef, a pox on it. There's as good fish in this tin as ever came |
| out of it and very friendly he offered to take of some salty sprats that |
| stood by which he had eyed wishly in the meantime and found the place |
| which was indeed the chief design of his embassy as he was sharpset. |
| _Mort aux vaches_, says Frank then in the French language that had been |
| indentured to a brandyshipper that has a winelodge in Bordeaux and he |
| spoke French like a gentleman too. From a child this Frank had been |
| a donought that his father, a headborough, who could ill keep him to |
| school to learn his letters and the use of the globes, matriculated at |
| the university to study the mechanics but he took the bit between his |
| teeth like a raw colt and was more familiar with the justiciary and the |
| parish beadle than with his volumes. One time he would be a playactor, |
| then a sutler or a welsher, then nought would keep him from the bearpit |
| and the cocking main, then he was for the ocean sea or to hoof it on |
| the roads with the romany folk, kidnapping a squire's heir by favour of |
| moonlight or fecking maids' linen or choking chicken behind a hedge. He |
| had been off as many times as a cat has lives and back again with naked |
| pockets as many more to his father the headborough who shed a pint |
| of tears as often as he saw him. What, says Mr Leopold with his hands |
| across, that was earnest to know the drift of it, will they slaughter |
| all? I protest I saw them but this day morning going to the Liverpool |
| boats, says he. I can scarce believe 'tis so bad, says he. And he had |
| experience of the like brood beasts and of springers, greasy hoggets and |
| wether wool, having been some years before actuary for Mr Joseph Cuffe, |
| a worthy salesmaster that drove his trade for live stock and meadow |
| auctions hard by Mr Gavin Low's yard in Prussia street. I question with |
| you there, says he. More like 'tis the hoose or the timber tongue. Mr |
| Stephen, a little moved but very handsomely told him no such matter and |
| that he had dispatches from the emperor's chief tailtickler thanking |
| him for the hospitality, that was sending over Doctor Rinderpest, the |
| bestquoted cowcatcher in all Muscovy, with a bolus or two of physic to |
| take the bull by the horns. Come, come, says Mr Vincent, plain dealing. |
| He'll find himself on the horns of a dilemma if he meddles with a |
| bull that's Irish, says he. Irish by name and irish by nature, says Mr |
| Stephen, and he sent the ale purling about, an Irish bull in an English |
| chinashop. I conceive you, says Mr Dixon. It is that same bull that was |
| sent to our island by farmer Nicholas, the bravest cattlebreeder of them |
| all, with an emerald ring in his nose. True for you, says Mr Vincent |
| cross the table, and a bullseye into the bargain, says he, and a plumper |
| and a portlier bull, says he, never shit on shamrock. He had horns |
| galore, a coat of cloth of gold and a sweet smoky breath coming out of |
| his nostrils so that the women of our island, leaving doughballs and |
| rollingpins, followed after him hanging his bulliness in daisychains. |
| What for that, says Mr Dixon, but before he came over farmer Nicholas |
| that was a eunuch had him properly gelded by a college of doctors who |
| were no better off than himself. So be off now, says he, and do all my |
| cousin german the lord Harry tells you and take a farmer's blessing, and |
| with that he slapped his posteriors very soundly. But the slap and the |
| blessing stood him friend, says Mr Vincent, for to make up he taught him |
| a trick worth two of the other so that maid, wife, abbess and widow to |
| this day affirm that they would rather any time of the month whisper |
| in his ear in the dark of a cowhouse or get a lick on the nape from his |
| long holy tongue than lie with the finest strapping young ravisher in |
| the four fields of all Ireland. Another then put in his word: And they |
| dressed him, says he, in a point shift and petticoat with a tippet and |
| girdle and ruffles on his wrists and clipped his forelock and rubbed him |
| all over with spermacetic oil and built stables for him at every turn of |
| the road with a gold manger in each full of the best hay in the market |
| so that he could doss and dung to his heart's content. By this time the |
| father of the faithful (for so they called him) was grown so heavy that |
| he could scarce walk to pasture. To remedy which our cozening dames and |
| damsels brought him his fodder in their apronlaps and as soon as his |
| belly was full he would rear up on his hind uarters to show their |
| ladyships a mystery and roar and bellow out of him in bulls' language |
| and they all after him. Ay, says another, and so pampered was he that he |
| would suffer nought to grow in all the land but green grass for himself |
| (for that was the only colour to his mind) and there was a board put up |
| on a hillock in the middle of the island with a printed notice, saying: |
| By the Lord Harry, Green is the grass that grows on the ground. And, |
| says Mr Dixon, if ever he got scent of a cattleraider in Roscommon or |
| the wilds of Connemara or a husbandman in Sligo that was sowing as much |
| as a handful of mustard or a bag of rapeseed out he'd run amok over half |
| the countryside rooting up with his horns whatever was planted and all |
| by lord Harry's orders. There was bad blood between them at first, says |
| Mr Vincent, and the lord Harry called farmer Nicholas all the old Nicks |
| in the world and an old whoremaster that kept seven trulls in his house |
| and I'll meddle in his matters, says he. I'll make that animal smell |
| hell, says he, with the help of that good pizzle my father left me. But |
| one evening, says Mr Dixon, when the lord Harry was cleaning his royal |
| pelt to go to dinner after winning a boatrace (he had spade oars for |
| himself but the first rule of the course was that the others were to row |
| with pitchforks) he discovered in himself a wonderful likeness to a bull |
| and on picking up a blackthumbed chapbook that he kept in the pantry |
| he found sure enough that he was a lefthanded descendant of the famous |
| champion bull of the Romans, _Bos Bovum_, which is good bog Latin for |
| boss of the show. After that, says Mr Vincent, the lord Harry put his |
| head into a cow's drinkingtrough in the presence of all his courtiers |
| and pulling it out again told them all his new name. Then, with the |
| water running off him, he got into an old smock and skirt that had |
| belonged to his grandmother and bought a grammar of the bulls' language |
| to study but he could never learn a word of it except the first personal |
| pronoun which he copied out big and got off by heart and if ever he went |
| out for a walk he filled his pockets with chalk to write it upon what |
| took his fancy, the side of a rock or a teahouse table or a bale of |
| cotton or a corkfloat. In short, he and the bull of Ireland were soon as |
| fast friends as an arse and a shirt. They were, says Mr Stephen, and |
| the end was that the men of the island seeing no help was toward, as |
| the ungrate women were all of one mind, made a wherry raft, loaded |
| themselves and their bundles of chattels on shipboard, set all masts |
| erect, manned the yards, sprang their luff, heaved to, spread three |
| sheets in the wind, put her head between wind and water, weighed anchor, |
| ported her helm, ran up the jolly Roger, gave three times three, let the |
| bullgine run, pushed off in their bumboat and put to sea to recover |
| the main of America. Which was the occasion, says Mr Vincent, of the |
| composing by a boatswain of that rollicking chanty: |
| |
| _--Pope Peter's but a pissabed. |
| A man's a man for a' that._ |
| |
| Our worthy acquaintance Mr Malachi Mulligan now appeared in the doorway |
| as the students were finishing their apologue accompanied with a friend |
| whom he had just rencountered, a young gentleman, his name Alec Bannon, |
| who had late come to town, it being his intention to buy a colour or a |
| cornetcy in the fencibles and list for the wars. Mr Mulligan was civil |
| enough to express some relish of it all the more as it jumped with a |
| project of his own for the cure of the very evil that had been touched |
| on. Whereat he handed round to the company a set of pasteboard cards |
| which he had had printed that day at Mr Quinnell's bearing a legend |
| printed in fair italics: _Mr Malachi Mulligan. Fertiliser and Incubator. |
| Lambay Island_. His project, as he went on to expound, was to withdraw |
| from the round of idle pleasures such as form the chief business of sir |
| Fopling Popinjay and sir Milksop Quidnunc in town and to devote himself |
| to the noblest task for which our bodily organism has been framed. Well, |
| let us hear of it, good my friend, said Mr Dixon. I make no doubt it |
| smacks of wenching. Come, be seated, both. 'Tis as cheap sitting as |
| standing. Mr Mulligan accepted of the invitation and, expatiating upon |
| his design, told his hearers that he had been led into this thought by |
| a consideration of the causes of sterility, both the inhibitory and the |
| prohibitory, whether the inhibition in its turn were due to conjugal |
| vexations or to a parsimony of the balance as well as whether the |
| prohibition proceeded from defects congenital or from proclivities |
| acquired. It grieved him plaguily, he said, to see the nuptial couch |
| defrauded of its dearest pledges: and to reflect upon so many agreeable |
| females with rich jointures, a prey to the vilest bonzes, who hide their |
| flambeau under a bushel in an uncongenial cloister or lose their womanly |
| bloom in the embraces of some unaccountable muskin when they might |
| multiply the inlets of happiness, sacrificing the inestimable jewel of |
| their sex when a hundred pretty fellows were at hand to caress, this, he |
| assured them, made his heart weep. To curb this inconvenient (which |
| he concluded due to a suppression of latent heat), having advised with |
| certain counsellors of worth and inspected into this matter, he had |
| resolved to purchase in fee simple for ever the freehold of Lambay |
| island from its holder, lord Talbot de Malahide, a Tory gentleman of |
| note much in favour with our ascendancy party. He proposed to set up |
| there a national fertilising farm to be named _Omphalos_ with an obelisk |
| hewn and erected after the fashion of Egypt and to offer his dutiful |
| yeoman services for the fecundation of any female of what grade of life |
| soever who should there direct to him with the desire of fulfilling the |
| functions of her natural. Money was no object, he said, nor would he |
| take a penny for his pains. The poorest kitchenwench no less than the |
| opulent lady of fashion, if so be their constructions and their tempers |
| were warm persuaders for their petitions, would find in him their man. |
| For his nutriment he shewed how he would feed himself exclusively upon a |
| diet of savoury tubercles and fish and coneys there, the flesh of these |
| latter prolific rodents being highly recommended for his purpose, both |
| broiled and stewed with a blade of mace and a pod or two of capsicum |
| chillies. After this homily which he delivered with much warmth of |
| asseveration Mr Mulligan in a trice put off from his hat a kerchief with |
| which he had shielded it. They both, it seems, had been overtaken by the |
| rain and for all their mending their pace had taken water, as might be |
| observed by Mr Mulligan's smallclothes of a hodden grey which was now |
| somewhat piebald. His project meanwhile was very favourably entertained |
| by his auditors and won hearty eulogies from all though Mr Dixon of |
| Mary's excepted to it, asking with a finicking air did he purpose also |
| to carry coals to Newcastle. Mr Mulligan however made court to the |
| scholarly by an apt quotation from the classics which, as it dwelt |
| upon his memory, seemed to him a sound and tasteful support of his |
| contention: _Talis ac tanta depravatio hujus seculi, O quirites, |
| ut matresfamiliarum nostrae lascivas cujuslibet semiviri libici |
| titillationes testibus ponderosis atque excelsis erectionibus |
| centurionum Romanorum magnopere anteponunt_, while for those of ruder |
| wit he drove home his point by analogies of the animal kingdom more |
| suitable to their stomach, the buck and doe of the forest glade, the |
| farmyard drake and duck. |
| |
| Valuing himself not a little upon his elegance, being indeed a proper |
| man of person, this talkative now applied himself to his dress with |
| animadversions of some heat upon the sudden whimsy of the atmospherics |
| while the company lavished their encomiums upon the project he had |
| advanced. The young gentleman, his friend, overjoyed as he was at a |
| passage that had late befallen him, could not forbear to tell it his |
| nearest neighbour. Mr Mulligan, now perceiving the table, asked for whom |
| were those loaves and fishes and, seeing the stranger, he made him |
| a civil bow and said, Pray, sir, was you in need of any professional |
| assistance we could give? Who, upon his offer, thanked him very |
| heartily, though preserving his proper distance, and replied that he was |
| come there about a lady, now an inmate of Horne's house, that was in an |
| interesting condition, poor body, from woman's woe (and here he fetched |
| a deep sigh) to know if her happiness had yet taken place. Mr Dixon, |
| to turn the table, took on to ask of Mr Mulligan himself whether |
| his incipient ventripotence, upon which he rallied him, betokened an |
| ovoblastic gestation in the prostatic utricle or male womb or was due, |
| as with the noted physician, Mr Austin Meldon, to a wolf in the stomach. |
| For answer Mr Mulligan, in a gale of laughter at his smalls, smote |
| himself bravely below the diaphragm, exclaiming with an admirable droll |
| mimic of Mother Grogan (the most excellent creature of her sex though |
| 'tis pity she's a trollop): There's a belly that never bore a bastard. |
| This was so happy a conceit that it renewed the storm of mirth and threw |
| the whole room into the most violent agitations of delight. The spry |
| rattle had run on in the same vein of mimicry but for some larum in the |
| antechamber. |
| |
| Here the listener who was none other than the Scotch student, a little |
| fume of a fellow, blond as tow, congratulated in the liveliest fashion |
| with the young gentleman and, interrupting the narrative at a salient |
| point, having desired his visavis with a polite beck to have the |
| obligingness to pass him a flagon of cordial waters at the same time by |
| a questioning poise of the head (a whole century of polite breeding had |
| not achieved so nice a gesture) to which was united an equivalent but |
| contrary balance of the bottle asked the narrator as plainly as was ever |
| done in words if he might treat him with a cup of it. _Mais bien sûr_, |
| noble stranger, said he cheerily, _et mille compliments_. That you may |
| and very opportunely. There wanted nothing but this cup to crown my |
| felicity. But, gracious heaven, was I left with but a crust in my wallet |
| and a cupful of water from the well, my God, I would accept of them and |
| find it in my heart to kneel down upon the ground and give thanks to |
| the powers above for the happiness vouchsafed me by the Giver of good |
| things. With these words he approached the goblet to his lips, took a |
| complacent draught of the cordial, slicked his hair and, opening his |
| bosom, out popped a locket that hung from a silk riband, that very |
| picture which he had cherished ever since her hand had wrote therein. |
| Gazing upon those features with a world of tenderness, Ah, Monsieur, he |
| said, had you but beheld her as I did with these eyes at that affecting |
| instant with her dainty tucker and her new coquette cap (a gift for her |
| feastday as she told me prettily) in such an artless disorder, of so |
| melting a tenderness, 'pon my conscience, even you, Monsieur, had been |
| impelled by generous nature to deliver yourself wholly into the hands of |
| such an enemy or to quit the field for ever. I declare, I was never so |
| touched in all my life. God, I thank thee, as the Author of my days! |
| Thrice happy will he be whom so amiable a creature will bless with her |
| favours. A sigh of affection gave eloquence to these words and, having |
| replaced the locket in his bosom, he wiped his eye and sighed again. |
| Beneficent Disseminator of blessings to all Thy creatures, how great |
| and universal must be that sweetest of Thy tyrannies which can hold in |
| thrall the free and the bond, the simple swain and the polished coxcomb, |
| the lover in the heyday of reckless passion and the husband of maturer |
| years. But indeed, sir, I wander from the point. How mingled and |
| imperfect are all our sublunary joys. Maledicity! he exclaimed in |
| anguish. Would to God that foresight had but remembered me to take my |
| cloak along! I could weep to think of it. Then, though it had poured |
| seven showers, we were neither of us a penny the worse. But beshrew me, |
| he cried, clapping hand to his forehead, tomorrow will be a new day and, |
| thousand thunders, I know of a _marchand de capotes_, Monsieur Poyntz, |
| from whom I can have for a livre as snug a cloak of the French fashion |
| as ever kept a lady from wetting. Tut, tut! cries Le Fecondateur, |
| tripping in, my friend Monsieur Moore, that most accomplished traveller |
| (I have just cracked a half bottle AVEC LUI in a circle of the best wits |
| of the town), is my authority that in Cape Horn, _ventre biche_, they |
| have a rain that will wet through any, even the stoutest cloak. A |
| drenching of that violence, he tells me, _sans blague_, has sent more |
| than one luckless fellow in good earnest posthaste to another world. |
| Pooh! A _livre!_ cries Monsieur Lynch. The clumsy things are dear at a |
| sou. One umbrella, were it no bigger than a fairy mushroom, is worth ten |
| such stopgaps. No woman of any wit would wear one. My dear Kitty told me |
| today that she would dance in a deluge before ever she would starve in |
| such an ark of salvation for, as she reminded me (blushing piquantly and |
| whispering in my ear though there was none to snap her words but giddy |
| butterflies), dame Nature, by the divine blessing, has implanted it in |
| our hearts and it has become a household word that _il y a deux choses_ |
| for which the innocence of our original garb, in other circumstances a |
| breach of the proprieties, is the fittest, nay, the only garment. The |
| first, said she (and here my pretty philosopher, as I handed her to her |
| tilbury, to fix my attention, gently tipped with her tongue the outer |
| chamber of my ear), the first is a bath... But at this point a bell |
| tinkling in the hall cut short a discourse which promised so bravely for |
| the enrichment of our store of knowledge. |
| |
| Amid the general vacant hilarity of the assembly a bell rang and, while |
| all were conjecturing what might be the cause, Miss Callan entered and, |
| having spoken a few words in a low tone to young Mr Dixon, retired with |
| a profound bow to the company. The presence even for a moment among a |
| party of debauchees of a woman endued with every quality of modesty and |
| not less severe than beautiful refrained the humourous sallies even of |
| the most licentious but her departure was the signal for an outbreak of |
| ribaldry. Strike me silly, said Costello, a low fellow who was fuddled. |
| A monstrous fine bit of cowflesh! I'll be sworn she has rendezvoused |
| you. What, you dog? Have you a way with them? Gad's bud, immensely |
| so, said Mr Lynch. The bedside manner it is that they use in the Mater |
| hospice. Demme, does not Doctor O'Gargle chuck the nuns there under the |
| chin. As I look to be saved I had it from my Kitty who has been wardmaid |
| there any time these seven months. Lawksamercy, doctor, cried the young |
| blood in the primrose vest, feigning a womanish simper and with immodest |
| squirmings of his body, how you do tease a body! Drat the man! Bless |
| me, I'm all of a wibbly wobbly. Why, you're as bad as dear little Father |
| Cantekissem, that you are! May this pot of four half choke me, cried |
| Costello, if she aint in the family way. I knows a lady what's got a |
| white swelling quick as I claps eyes on her. The young surgeon, however, |
| rose and begged the company to excuse his retreat as the nurse had just |
| then informed him that he was needed in the ward. Merciful providence |
| had been pleased to put a period to the sufferings of the lady who was |
| _enceinte_ which she had borne with a laudable fortitude and she had |
| given birth to a bouncing boy. I want patience, said he, with those |
| who, without wit to enliven or learning to instruct, revile an ennobling |
| profession which, saving the reverence due to the Deity, is the greatest |
| power for happiness upon the earth. I am positive when I say that if |
| need were I could produce a cloud of witnesses to the excellence of |
| her noble exercitations which, so far from being a byword, should be a |
| glorious incentive in the human breast. I cannot away with them. What? |
| Malign such an one, the amiable Miss Callan, who is the lustre of |
| her own sex and the astonishment of ours? And at an instant the most |
| momentous that can befall a puny child of clay? Perish the thought! I |
| shudder to think of the future of a race where the seeds of such malice |
| have been sown and where no right reverence is rendered to mother and |
| maid in house of Horne. Having delivered himself of this rebuke he |
| saluted those present on the by and repaired to the door. A murmur |
| of approval arose from all and some were for ejecting the low soaker |
| without more ado, a design which would have been effected nor would |
| he have received more than his bare deserts had he not abridged his |
| transgression by affirming with a horrid imprecation (for he swore a |
| round hand) that he was as good a son of the true fold as ever drew |
| breath. Stap my vitals, said he, them was always the sentiments of |
| honest Frank Costello which I was bred up most particular to honour thy |
| father and thy mother that had the best hand to a rolypoly or a hasty |
| pudding as you ever see what I always looks back on with a loving heart. |
| |
| To revert to Mr Bloom who, after his first entry, had been conscious of |
| some impudent mocks which he however had borne with as being the fruits |
| of that age upon which it is commonly charged that it knows not |
| pity. The young sparks, it is true, were as full of extravagancies |
| as overgrown children: the words of their tumultuary discussions |
| were difficultly understood and not often nice: their testiness and |
| outrageous _mots_ were such that his intellects resiled from: nor were |
| they scrupulously sensible of the proprieties though their fund of |
| strong animal spirits spoke in their behalf. But the word of Mr Costello |
| was an unwelcome language for him for he nauseated the wretch that |
| seemed to him a cropeared creature of a misshapen gibbosity, born out |
| of wedlock and thrust like a crookback toothed and feet first into the |
| world, which the dint of the surgeon's pliers in his skull lent indeed |
| a colour to, so as to put him in thought of that missing link of |
| creation's chain desiderated by the late ingenious Mr Darwin. It was now |
| for more than the middle span of our allotted years that he had passed |
| through the thousand vicissitudes of existence and, being of a wary |
| ascendancy and self a man of rare forecast, he had enjoined his heart |
| to repress all motions of a rising choler and, by intercepting them |
| with the readiest precaution, foster within his breast that plenitude |
| of sufferance which base minds jeer at, rash judgers scorn and all find |
| tolerable and but tolerable. To those who create themselves wits at the |
| cost of feminine delicacy (a habit of mind which he never did hold |
| with) to them he would concede neither to bear the name nor to herit |
| the tradition of a proper breeding: while for such that, having lost |
| all forbearance, can lose no more, there remained the sharp antidote of |
| experience to cause their insolency to beat a precipitate and inglorious |
| retreat. Not but what he could feel with mettlesome youth which, caring |
| nought for the mows of dotards or the gruntlings of the severe, is ever |
| (as the chaste fancy of the Holy Writer expresses it) for eating of the |
| tree forbid it yet not so far forth as to pretermit humanity upon any |
| condition soever towards a gentlewoman when she was about her lawful |
| occasions. To conclude, while from the sister's words he had reckoned |
| upon a speedy delivery he was, however, it must be owned, not a little |
| alleviated by the intelligence that the issue so auspicated after an |
| ordeal of such duress now testified once more to the mercy as well as to |
| the bounty of the Supreme Being. |
| |
| Accordingly he broke his mind to his neighbour, saying that, to express |
| his notion of the thing, his opinion (who ought not perchance to express |
| one) was that one must have a cold constitution and a frigid genius not |
| to be rejoiced by this freshest news of the fruition of her confinement |
| since she had been in such pain through no fault of hers. The dressy |
| young blade said it was her husband's that put her in that expectation |
| or at least it ought to be unless she were another Ephesian matron. I |
| must acquaint you, said Mr Crotthers, clapping on the table so as to |
| evoke a resonant comment of emphasis, old Glory Allelujurum was round |
| again today, an elderly man with dundrearies, preferring through his |
| nose a request to have word of Wilhelmina, my life, as he calls her. I |
| bade him hold himself in readiness for that the event would burst anon. |
| 'Slife, I'll be round with you. I cannot but extol the virile potency of |
| the old bucko that could still knock another child out of her. All fell |
| to praising of it, each after his own fashion, though the same young |
| blade held with his former view that another than her conjugial had |
| been the man in the gap, a clerk in orders, a linkboy (virtuous) or |
| an itinerant vendor of articles needed in every household. Singular, |
| communed the guest with himself, the wonderfully unequal faculty of |
| metempsychosis possessed by them, that the puerperal dormitory and the |
| dissecting theatre should be the seminaries of such frivolity, that the |
| mere acquisition of academic titles should suffice to transform in a |
| pinch of time these votaries of levity into exemplary practitioners of |
| an art which most men anywise eminent have esteemed the noblest. But, |
| he further added, it is mayhap to relieve the pentup feelings that in |
| common oppress them for I have more than once observed that birds of a |
| feather laugh together. |
| |
| But with what fitness, let it be asked of the noble lord, his patron, |
| has this alien, whom the concession of a gracious prince has admitted |
| to civic rights, constituted himself the lord paramount of our |
| internal polity? Where is now that gratitude which loyalty should have |
| counselled? During the recent war whenever the enemy had a temporary |
| advantage with his granados did this traitor to his kind not seize that |
| moment to discharge his piece against the empire of which he is a tenant |
| at will while he trembled for the security of his four per cents? Has he |
| forgotten this as he forgets all benefits received? Or is it that from |
| being a deluder of others he has become at last his own dupe as he is, |
| if report belie him not, his own and his only enjoyer? Far be it from |
| candour to violate the bedchamber of a respectable lady, the daughter of |
| a gallant major, or to cast the most distant reflections upon her |
| virtue but if he challenges attention there (as it was indeed highly his |
| interest not to have done) then be it so. Unhappy woman, she has been |
| too long and too persistently denied her legitimate prerogative to |
| listen to his objurgations with any other feeling than the derision of |
| the desperate. He says this, a censor of morals, a very pelican in his |
| piety, who did not scruple, oblivious of the ties of nature, to attempt |
| illicit intercourse with a female domestic drawn from the lowest strata |
| of society! Nay, had the hussy's scouringbrush not been her tutelary |
| angel, it had gone with her as hard as with Hagar, the Egyptian! In the |
| question of the grazing lands his peevish asperity is notorious and in |
| Mr Cuffe's hearing brought upon him from an indignant rancher a scathing |
| retort couched in terms as straightforward as they were bucolic. It ill |
| becomes him to preach that gospel. Has he not nearer home a seedfield |
| that lies fallow for the want of the ploughshare? A habit reprehensible |
| at puberty is second nature and an opprobrium in middle life. If he must |
| dispense his balm of Gilead in nostrums and apothegms of dubious taste |
| to restore to health a generation of unfledged profligates let his |
| practice consist better with the doctrines that now engross him. His |
| marital breast is the repository of secrets which decorum is reluctant |
| to adduce. The lewd suggestions of some faded beauty may console him for |
| a consort neglected and debauched but this new exponent of morals and |
| healer of ills is at his best an exotic tree which, when rooted in |
| its native orient, throve and flourished and was abundant in balm |
| but, transplanted to a clime more temperate, its roots have lost their |
| quondam vigour while the stuff that comes away from it is stagnant, acid |
| and inoperative. |
| |
| The news was imparted with a circumspection recalling the ceremonial |
| usage of the Sublime Porte by the second female infirmarian to the |
| junior medical officer in residence, who in his turn announced to the |
| delegation that an heir had been born, When he had betaken himself |
| to the women's apartment to assist at the prescribed ceremony of the |
| afterbirth in the presence of the secretary of state for domestic |
| affairs and the members of the privy council, silent in unanimous |
| exhaustion and approbation the delegates, chafing under the length and |
| solemnity of their vigil and hoping that the joyful occurrence would |
| palliate a licence which the simultaneous absence of abigail and |
| obstetrician rendered the easier, broke out at once into a strife of |
| tongues. In vain the voice of Mr Canvasser Bloom was heard endeavouring |
| to urge, to mollify, to refrain. The moment was too propitious for the |
| display of that discursiveness which seemed the only bond of union among |
| tempers so divergent. Every phase of the situation was successively |
| eviscerated: the prenatal repugnance of uterine brothers, the Caesarean |
| section, posthumity with respect to the father and, that rarer form, |
| with respect to the mother, the fratricidal case known as the Childs |
| Murder and rendered memorable by the impassioned plea of Mr Advocate |
| Bushe which secured the acquittal of the wrongfully accused, the |
| rights of primogeniture and king's bounty touching twins and triplets, |
| miscarriages and infanticides, simulated or dissimulated, the acardiac |
| _foetus in foetu_ and aprosopia due to a congestion, the agnathia |
| of certain chinless Chinamen (cited by Mr Candidate Mulligan) in |
| consequence of defective reunion of the maxillary knobs along the medial |
| line so that (as he said) one ear could hear what the other spoke, the |
| benefits of anesthesia or twilight sleep, the prolongation of labour |
| pains in advanced gravidancy by reason of pressure on the vein, the |
| premature relentment of the amniotic fluid (as exemplified in the |
| actual case) with consequent peril of sepsis to the matrix, artificial |
| insemination by means of syringes, involution of the womb consequent |
| upon the menopause, the problem of the perpetration of the species in |
| the case of females impregnated by delinquent rape, that distressing |
| manner of delivery called by the Brandenburghers _Sturzgeburt,_ the |
| recorded instances of multiseminal, twikindled and monstrous births |
| conceived during the catamenic period or of consanguineous parents--in |
| a word all the cases of human nativity which Aristotle has classified |
| in his masterpiece with chromolithographic illustrations. The gravest |
| problems of obstetrics and forensic medicine were examined with as much |
| animation as the most popular beliefs on the state of pregnancy such as |
| the forbidding to a gravid woman to step over a countrystile lest, |
| by her movement, the navelcord should strangle her creature and |
| the injunction upon her in the event of a yearning, ardently and |
| ineffectually entertained, to place her hand against that part of her |
| person which long usage has consecrated as the seat of castigation. |
| The abnormalities of harelip, breastmole, supernumerary digits, negro's |
| inkle, strawberry mark and portwine stain were alleged by one as a |
| _prima facie_ and natural hypothetical explanation of those swineheaded |
| (the case of Madame Grissel Steevens was not forgotten) or doghaired |
| infants occasionally born. The hypothesis of a plasmic memory, advanced |
| by the Caledonian envoy and worthy of the metaphysical traditions of |
| the land he stood for, envisaged in such cases an arrest of embryonic |
| development at some stage antecedent to the human. An outlandish |
| delegate sustained against both these views, with such heat as almost |
| carried conviction, the theory of copulation between women and the males |
| of brutes, his authority being his own avouchment in support of fables |
| such as that of the Minotaur which the genius of the elegant Latin poet |
| has handed down to us in the pages of his Metamorphoses. The impression |
| made by his words was immediate but shortlived. It was effaced as easily |
| as it had been evoked by an allocution from Mr Candidate Mulligan in |
| that vein of pleasantry which none better than he knew how to affect, |
| postulating as the supremest object of desire a nice clean old man. |
| Contemporaneously, a heated argument having arisen between Mr Delegate |
| Madden and Mr Candidate Lynch regarding the juridical and theological |
| dilemma created in the event of one Siamese twin predeceasing the other, |
| the difficulty by mutual consent was referred to Mr Canvasser Bloom |
| for instant submittal to Mr Coadjutor Deacon Dedalus. Hitherto silent, |
| whether the better to show by preternatural gravity that curious dignity |
| of the garb with which he was invested or in obedience to an inward |
| voice, he delivered briefly and, as some thought, perfunctorily the |
| ecclesiastical ordinance forbidding man to put asunder what God has |
| joined. |
| |
| But Malachias' tale began to freeze them with horror. He conjured up the |
| scene before them. The secret panel beside the chimney slid back and |
| in the recess appeared... Haines! Which of us did not feel his flesh |
| creep! He had a portfolio full of Celtic literature in one hand, in the |
| other a phial marked _Poison._ Surprise, horror, loathing were depicted |
| on all faces while he eyed them with a ghostly grin. I anticipated some |
| such reception, he began with an eldritch laugh, for which, it seems, |
| history is to blame. Yes, it is true. I am the murderer of Samuel |
| Childs. And how I am punished! The inferno has no terrors for me. This |
| is the appearance is on me. Tare and ages, what way would I be resting |
| at all, he muttered thickly, and I tramping Dublin this while back |
| with my share of songs and himself after me the like of a soulth or a |
| bullawurrus? My hell, and Ireland's, is in this life. It is what I tried |
| to obliterate my crime. Distractions, rookshooting, the Erse language |
| (he recited some), laudanum (he raised the phial to his lips), camping |
| out. In vain! His spectre stalks me. Dope is my only hope... Ah! |
| Destruction! The black panther! With a cry he suddenly vanished and the |
| panel slid back. An instant later his head appeared in the door opposite |
| and said: Meet me at Westland Row station at ten past eleven. He was |
| gone. Tears gushed from the eyes of the dissipated host. The seer |
| raised his hand to heaven, murmuring: The vendetta of Mananaun! The |
| sage repeated: _Lex talionis_. The sentimentalist is he who would enjoy |
| without incurring the immense debtorship for a thing done. Malachias, |
| overcome by emotion, ceased. The mystery was unveiled. Haines was the |
| third brother. His real name was Childs. The black panther was himself |
| the ghost of his own father. He drank drugs to obliterate. For this |
| relief much thanks. The lonely house by the graveyard is uninhabited. |
| No soul will live there. The spider pitches her web in the solitude. |
| The nocturnal rat peers from his hole. A curse is on it. It is haunted. |
| Murderer's ground. |
| |
| What is the age of the soul of man? As she hath the virtue of the |
| chameleon to change her hue at every new approach, to be gay with the |
| merry and mournful with the downcast, so too is her age changeable as |
| her mood. No longer is Leopold, as he sits there, ruminating, chewing |
| the cud of reminiscence, that staid agent of publicity and holder of a |
| modest substance in the funds. A score of years are blown away. He is |
| young Leopold. There, as in a retrospective arrangement, a mirror within |
| a mirror (hey, presto!), he beholdeth himself. That young figure of then |
| is seen, precociously manly, walking on a nipping morning from the old |
| house in Clanbrassil street to the high school, his booksatchel on |
| him bandolierwise, and in it a goodly hunk of wheaten loaf, a mother's |
| thought. Or it is the same figure, a year or so gone over, in his first |
| hard hat (ah, that was a day!), already on the road, a fullfledged |
| traveller for the family firm, equipped with an orderbook, a scented |
| handkerchief (not for show only), his case of bright trinketware (alas! |
| a thing now of the past!) and a quiverful of compliant smiles for this |
| or that halfwon housewife reckoning it out upon her fingertips or for |
| a budding virgin, shyly acknowledging (but the heart? tell me!) his |
| studied baisemoins. The scent, the smile, but, more than these, the dark |
| eyes and oleaginous address, brought home at duskfall many a commission |
| to the head of the firm, seated with Jacob's pipe after like labours in |
| the paternal ingle (a meal of noodles, you may be sure, is aheating), |
| reading through round horned spectacles some paper from the Europe of a |
| month before. But hey, presto, the mirror is breathed on and the young |
| knighterrant recedes, shrivels, dwindles to a tiny speck within the |
| mist. Now he is himself paternal and these about him might be his |
| sons. Who can say? The wise father knows his own child. He thinks of a |
| drizzling night in Hatch street, hard by the bonded stores there, the |
| first. Together (she is a poor waif, a child of shame, yours and mine |
| and of all for a bare shilling and her luckpenny), together they hear |
| the heavy tread of the watch as two raincaped shadows pass the new royal |
| university. Bridie! Bridie Kelly! He will never forget the name, ever |
| remember the night: first night, the bridenight. They are entwined |
| in nethermost darkness, the willer with the willed, and in an instant |
| (_fiat_!) light shall flood the world. Did heart leap to heart? Nay, |
| fair reader. In a breath 'twas done but--hold! Back! It must not be! In |
| terror the poor girl flees away through the murk. She is the bride of |
| darkness, a daughter of night. She dare not bear the sunnygolden babe |
| of day. No, Leopold. Name and memory solace thee not. That youthful |
| illusion of thy strength was taken from thee--and in vain. No son of thy |
| loins is by thee. There is none now to be for Leopold, what Leopold was |
| for Rudolph. |
| |
| The voices blend and fuse in clouded silence: silence that is the |
| infinite of space: and swiftly, silently the soul is wafted over regions |
| of cycles of generations that have lived. A region where grey twilight |
| ever descends, never falls on wide sagegreen pasturefields, shedding her |
| dusk, scattering a perennial dew of stars. She follows her mother with |
| ungainly steps, a mare leading her fillyfoal. Twilight phantoms |
| are they, yet moulded in prophetic grace of structure, slim shapely |
| haunches, a supple tendonous neck, the meek apprehensive skull. They |
| fade, sad phantoms: all is gone. Agendath is a waste land, a home of |
| screechowls and the sandblind upupa. Netaim, the golden, is no more. And |
| on the highway of the clouds they come, muttering thunder of rebellion, |
| the ghosts of beasts. Huuh! Hark! Huuh! Parallax stalks behind and goads |
| them, the lancinating lightnings of whose brow are scorpions. Elk and |
| yak, the bulls of Bashan and of Babylon, mammoth and mastodon, they come |
| trooping to the sunken sea, _Lacus Mortis_. Ominous revengeful zodiacal |
| host! They moan, passing upon the clouds, horned and capricorned, the |
| trumpeted with the tusked, the lionmaned, the giantantlered, snouter |
| and crawler, rodent, ruminant and pachyderm, all their moving moaning |
| multitude, murderers of the sun. |
| |
| Onward to the dead sea they tramp to drink, unslaked and with horrible |
| gulpings, the salt somnolent inexhaustible flood. And the equine portent |
| grows again, magnified in the deserted heavens, nay to heaven's own |
| magnitude, till it looms, vast, over the house of Virgo. And lo, wonder |
| of metempsychosis, it is she, the everlasting bride, harbinger of the |
| daystar, the bride, ever virgin. It is she, Martha, thou lost one, |
| Millicent, the young, the dear, the radiant. How serene does she now |
| arise, a queen among the Pleiades, in the penultimate antelucan hour, |
| shod in sandals of bright gold, coifed with a veil of what do you call |
| it gossamer. It floats, it flows about her starborn flesh and loose it |
| streams, emerald, sapphire, mauve and heliotrope, sustained on currents |
| of the cold interstellar wind, winding, coiling, simply swirling, |
| writhing in the skies a mysterious writing till, after a myriad |
| metamorphoses of symbol, it blazes, Alpha, a ruby and triangled sign |
| upon the forehead of Taurus. |
| |
| Francis was reminding Stephen of years before when they had been at |
| school together in Conmee's time. He asked about Glaucon, Alcibiades, |
| Pisistratus. Where were they now? Neither knew. You have spoken of the |
| past and its phantoms, Stephen said. Why think of them? If I call them |
| into life across the waters of Lethe will not the poor ghosts troop to |
| my call? Who supposes it? I, Bous Stephanoumenos, bullockbefriending |
| bard, am lord and giver of their life. He encircled his gadding hair |
| with a coronal of vineleaves, smiling at Vincent. That answer and those |
| leaves, Vincent said to him, will adorn you more fitly when something |
| more, and greatly more, than a capful of light odes can call your genius |
| father. All who wish you well hope this for you. All desire to see |
| you bring forth the work you meditate, to acclaim you Stephaneforos. I |
| heartily wish you may not fail them. O no, Vincent Lenehan said, laying |
| a hand on the shoulder near him. Have no fear. He could not leave his |
| mother an orphan. The young man's face grew dark. All could see how hard |
| it was for him to be reminded of his promise and of his recent loss. He |
| would have withdrawn from the feast had not the noise of voices allayed |
| the smart. Madden had lost five drachmas on Sceptre for a whim of the |
| rider's name: Lenehan as much more. He told them of the race. The flag |
| fell and, huuh! off, scamper, the mare ran out freshly with 0. Madden |
| up. She was leading the field. All hearts were beating. Even Phyllis |
| could not contain herself. She waved her scarf and cried: Huzzah! |
| Sceptre wins! But in the straight on the run home when all were in close |
| order the dark horse Throwaway drew level, reached, outstripped her. All |
| was lost now. Phyllis was silent: her eyes were sad anemones. Juno, she |
| cried, I am undone. But her lover consoled her and brought her a bright |
| casket of gold in which lay some oval sugarplums which she partook. A |
| tear fell: one only. A whacking fine whip, said Lenehan, is W. Lane. |
| Four winners yesterday and three today. What rider is like him? Mount |
| him on the camel or the boisterous buffalo the victory in a hack canter |
| is still his. But let us bear it as was the ancient wont. Mercy on the |
| luckless! Poor Sceptre! he said with a light sigh. She is not the filly |
| that she was. Never, by this hand, shall we behold such another. By gad, |
| sir, a queen of them. Do you remember her, Vincent? I wish you could |
| have seen my queen today, Vincent said. How young she was and radiant |
| (Lalage were scarce fair beside her) in her yellow shoes and frock of |
| muslin, I do not know the right name of it. The chestnuts that shaded |
| us were in bloom: the air drooped with their persuasive odour and with |
| pollen floating by us. In the sunny patches one might easily have |
| cooked on a stone a batch of those buns with Corinth fruit in them that |
| Periplipomenes sells in his booth near the bridge. But she had nought |
| for her teeth but the arm with which I held her and in that she nibbled |
| mischievously when I pressed too close. A week ago she lay ill, four |
| days on the couch, but today she was free, blithe, mocked at peril. |
| She is more taking then. Her posies tool Mad romp that she is, she had |
| pulled her fill as we reclined together. And in your ear, my friend, you |
| will not think who met us as we left the field. Conmee himself! He was |
| walking by the hedge, reading, I think a brevier book with, I doubt not, |
| a witty letter in it from Glycera or Chloe to keep the page. The sweet |
| creature turned all colours in her confusion, feigning to reprove a |
| slight disorder in her dress: a slip of underwood clung there for the |
| very trees adore her. When Conmee had passed she glanced at her lovely |
| echo in that little mirror she carries. But he had been kind. In going |
| by he had blessed us. The gods too are ever kind, Lenehan said. If I had |
| poor luck with Bass's mare perhaps this draught of his may serve me more |
| propensely. He was laying his hand upon a winejar: Malachi saw it and |
| withheld his act, pointing to the stranger and to the scarlet label. |
| Warily, Malachi whispered, preserve a druid silence. His soul is far |
| away. It is as painful perhaps to be awakened from a vision as to be |
| born. Any object, intensely regarded, may be a gate of access to the |
| incorruptible eon of the gods. Do you not think it, Stephen? Theosophos |
| told me so, Stephen answered, whom in a previous existence Egyptian |
| priests initiated into the mysteries of karmic law. The lords of the |
| moon, Theosophos told me, an orangefiery shipload from planet Alpha |
| of the lunar chain would not assume the etheric doubles and these |
| were therefore incarnated by the rubycoloured egos from the second |
| constellation. |
| |
| However, as a matter of fact though, the preposterous surmise about him |
| being in some description of a doldrums or other or mesmerised which |
| was entirely due to a misconception of the shallowest character, was |
| not the case at all. The individual whose visual organs while the above |
| was going on were at this juncture commencing to exhibit symptoms of |
| animation was as astute if not astuter than any man living and anybody |
| that conjectured the contrary would have found themselves pretty |
| speedily in the wrong shop. During the past four minutes or thereabouts |
| he had been staring hard at a certain amount of number one Bass bottled |
| by Messrs Bass and Co at Burton-on-Trent which happened to be situated |
| amongst a lot of others right opposite to where he was and which was |
| certainly calculated to attract anyone's remark on account of its |
| scarlet appearance. He was simply and solely, as it subsequently |
| transpired for reasons best known to himself, which put quite an |
| altogether different complexion on the proceedings, after the moment |
| before's observations about boyhood days and the turf, recollecting two |
| or three private transactions of his own which the other two were as |
| mutually innocent of as the babe unborn. Eventually, however, both |
| their eyes met and as soon as it began to dawn on him that the other was |
| endeavouring to help himself to the thing he involuntarily determined |
| to help him himself and so he accordingly took hold of the neck of the |
| mediumsized glass recipient which contained the fluid sought after and |
| made a capacious hole in it by pouring a lot of it out with, also at the |
| same time, however, a considerable degree of attentiveness in order not |
| to upset any of the beer that was in it about the place. |
| |
| The debate which ensued was in its scope and progress an epitome of the |
| course of life. Neither place nor council was lacking in dignity. The |
| debaters were the keenest in the land, the theme they were engaged on |
| the loftiest and most vital. The high hall of Horne's house had never |
| beheld an assembly so representative and so varied nor had the |
| old rafters of that establishment ever listened to a language so |
| encyclopaedic. A gallant scene in truth it made. Crotthers was there at |
| the foot of the table in his striking Highland garb, his face glowing |
| from the briny airs of the Mull of Galloway. There too, opposite to him, |
| was Lynch whose countenance bore already the stigmata of early depravity |
| and premature wisdom. Next the Scotchman was the place assigned to |
| Costello, the eccentric, while at his side was seated in stolid repose |
| the squat form of Madden. The chair of the resident indeed stood vacant |
| before the hearth but on either flank of it the figure of Bannon in |
| explorer's kit of tweed shorts and salted cowhide brogues contrasted |
| sharply with the primrose elegance and townbred manners of Malachi |
| Roland St John Mulligan. Lastly at the head of the board was the young |
| poet who found a refuge from his labours of pedagogy and metaphysical |
| inquisition in the convivial atmosphere of Socratic discussion, while |
| to right and left of him were accommodated the flippant prognosticator, |
| fresh from the hippodrome, and that vigilant wanderer, soiled by the |
| dust of travel and combat and stained by the mire of an indelible |
| dishonour, but from whose steadfast and constant heart no lure or peril |
| or threat or degradation could ever efface the image of that voluptuous |
| loveliness which the inspired pencil of Lafayette has limned for ages |
| yet to come. |
| |
| It had better be stated here and now at the outset that the perverted |
| transcendentalism to which Mr S. Dedalus' (Div. Scep.) contentions |
| would appear to prove him pretty badly addicted runs directly counter to |
| accepted scientific methods. Science, it cannot be too often repeated, |
| deals with tangible phenomena. The man of science like the man in the |
| street has to face hardheaded facts that cannot be blinked and explain |
| them as best he can. There may be, it is true, some questions which |
| science cannot answer--at present--such as the first problem submitted |
| by Mr L. Bloom (Pubb. Canv.) regarding the future determination of sex. |
| Must we accept the view of Empedocles of Trinacria that the right ovary |
| (the postmenstrual period, assert others) is responsible for the birth |
| of males or are the too long neglected spermatozoa or nemasperms the |
| differentiating factors or is it, as most embryologists incline to |
| opine, such as Culpepper, Spallanzani, Blumenbach, Lusk, Hertwig, |
| Leopold and Valenti, a mixture of both? This would be tantamount to |
| a cooperation (one of nature's favourite devices) between the _nisus |
| formativus_ of the nemasperm on the one hand and on the other a happily |
| chosen position, _succubitus felix_ of the passive element. The other |
| problem raised by the same inquirer is scarcely less vital: infant |
| mortality. It is interesting because, as he pertinently remarks, we |
| are all born in the same way but we all die in different ways. Mr M. |
| Mulligan (Hyg. et Eug. Doc.) blames the sanitary conditions in which |
| our greylunged citizens contract adenoids, pulmonary complaints etc. by |
| inhaling the bacteria which lurk in dust. These factors, he alleged, |
| and the revolting spectacles offered by our streets, hideous publicity |
| posters, religious ministers of all denominations, mutilated soldiers |
| and sailors, exposed scorbutic cardrivers, the suspended carcases of |
| dead animals, paranoic bachelors and unfructified duennas--these, he |
| said, were accountable for any and every fallingoff in the calibre of |
| the race. Kalipedia, he prophesied, would soon be generally adopted |
| and all the graces of life, genuinely good music, agreeable literature, |
| light philosophy, instructive pictures, plastercast reproductions of |
| the classical statues such as Venus and Apollo, artistic coloured |
| photographs of prize babies, all these little attentions would enable |
| ladies who were in a particular condition to pass the intervening months |
| in a most enjoyable manner. Mr J. Crotthers (Disc. Bacc.) attributes |
| some of these demises to abdominal trauma in the case of women workers |
| subjected to heavy labours in the workshop and to marital discipline in |
| the home but by far the vast majority to neglect, private or official, |
| culminating in the exposure of newborn infants, the practice of criminal |
| abortion or in the atrocious crime of infanticide. Although the former |
| (we are thinking of neglect) is undoubtedly only too true the case he |
| cites of nurses forgetting to count the sponges in the peritoneal cavity |
| is too rare to be normative. In fact when one comes to look into it the |
| wonder is that so many pregnancies and deliveries go off so well as they |
| do, all things considered and in spite of our human shortcomings which |
| often baulk nature in her intentions. An ingenious suggestion is |
| that thrown out by Mr V. Lynch (Bacc. Arith.) that both natality and |
| mortality, as well as all other phenomena of evolution, tidal movements, |
| lunar phases, blood temperatures, diseases in general, everything, in |
| fine, in nature's vast workshop from the extinction of some remote sun |
| to the blossoming of one of the countless flowers which beautify our |
| public parks is subject to a law of numeration as yet unascertained. |
| Still the plain straightforward question why a child of normally healthy |
| parents and seemingly a healthy child and properly looked after succumbs |
| unaccountably in early childhood (though other children of the same |
| marriage do not) must certainly, in the poet's words, give us pause. |
| Nature, we may rest assured, has her own good and cogent reasons for |
| whatever she does and in all probability such deaths are due to some law |
| of anticipation by which organisms in which morbous germs have taken |
| up their residence (modern science has conclusively shown that only the |
| plasmic substance can be said to be immortal) tend to disappear at an |
| increasingly earlier stage of development, an arrangement which, though |
| productive of pain to some of our feelings (notably the maternal), is |
| nevertheless, some of us think, in the long run beneficial to the |
| race in general in securing thereby the survival of the fittest. Mr S. |
| Dedalus' (Div. Scep.) remark (or should it be called an interruption?) |
| that an omnivorous being which can masticate, deglute, digest and |
| apparently pass through the ordinary channel with pluterperfect |
| imperturbability such multifarious aliments as cancrenous females |
| emaciated by parturition, corpulent professional gentlemen, not to speak |
| of jaundiced politicians and chlorotic nuns, might possibly find gastric |
| relief in an innocent collation of staggering bob, reveals as nought |
| else could and in a very unsavoury light the tendency above alluded to. |
| For the enlightenment of those who are not so intimately acquainted with |
| the minutiae of the municipal abattoir as this morbidminded esthete and |
| embryo philosopher who for all his overweening bumptiousness in things |
| scientific can scarcely distinguish an acid from an alkali prides |
| himself on being, it should perhaps be stated that staggering bob in |
| the vile parlance of our lowerclass licensed victuallers signifies the |
| cookable and eatable flesh of a calf newly dropped from its mother. In |
| a recent public controversy with Mr L. Bloom (Pubb. Canv.) which took |
| place in the commons' hall of the National Maternity Hospital, 29, 30 |
| and 31 Holles street, of which, as is well known, Dr A. Horne (Lic. in |
| Midw., F. K. Q. C. P. I.) is the able and popular master, he is reported |
| by eyewitnesses as having stated that once a woman has let the cat |
| into the bag (an esthete's allusion, presumably, to one of the most |
| complicated and marvellous of all nature's processes--the act of sexual |
| congress) she must let it out again or give it life, as he phrased it, |
| to save her own. At the risk of her own, was the telling rejoinder of |
| his interlocutor, none the less effective for the moderate and measured |
| tone in which it was delivered. |
| |
| Meanwhile the skill and patience of the physician had brought about a |
| happy _accouchement._ It had been a weary weary while both for patient |
| and doctor. All that surgical skill could do was done and the brave |
| woman had manfully helped. She had. She had fought the good fight and |
| now she was very very happy. Those who have passed on, who have gone |
| before, are happy too as they gaze down and smile upon the touching |
| scene. Reverently look at her as she reclines there with the motherlight |
| in her eyes, that longing hunger for baby fingers (a pretty sight it is |
| to see), in the first bloom of her new motherhood, breathing a silent |
| prayer of thanksgiving to One above, the Universal Husband. And as her |
| loving eyes behold her babe she wishes only one blessing more, to have |
| her dear Doady there with her to share her joy, to lay in his arms that |
| mite of God's clay, the fruit of their lawful embraces. He is older now |
| (you and I may whisper it) and a trifle stooped in the shoulders yet |
| in the whirligig of years a grave dignity has come to the conscientious |
| second accountant of the Ulster bank, College Green branch. O Doady, |
| loved one of old, faithful lifemate now, it may never be again, that |
| faroff time of the roses! With the old shake of her pretty head she |
| recalls those days. God! How beautiful now across the mist of years! But |
| their children are grouped in her imagination about the bedside, hers |
| and his, Charley, Mary Alice, Frederick Albert (if he had lived), Mamy, |
| Budgy (Victoria Frances), Tom, Violet Constance Louisa, darling little |
| Bobsy (called after our famous hero of the South African war, lord Bobs |
| of Waterford and Candahar) and now this last pledge of their union, a |
| Purefoy if ever there was one, with the true Purefoy nose. Young hopeful |
| will be christened Mortimer Edward after the influential third cousin of |
| Mr Purefoy in the Treasury Remembrancer's office, Dublin Castle. And so |
| time wags on: but father Cronion has dealt lightly here. No, let no sigh |
| break from that bosom, dear gentle Mina. And Doady, knock the ashes from |
| your pipe, the seasoned briar you still fancy when the curfew rings for |
| you (may it be the distant day!) and dout the light whereby you read |
| in the Sacred Book for the oil too has run low, and so with a tranquil |
| heart to bed, to rest. He knows and will call in His own good time. You |
| too have fought the good fight and played loyally your man's part. Sir, |
| to you my hand. Well done, thou good and faithful servant! |
| |
| There are sins or (let us call them as the world calls them) evil |
| memories which are hidden away by man in the darkest places of the heart |
| but they abide there and wait. He may suffer their memory to grow dim, |
| let them be as though they had not been and all but persuade himself |
| that they were not or at least were otherwise. Yet a chance word will |
| call them forth suddenly and they will rise up to confront him in the |
| most various circumstances, a vision or a dream, or while timbrel |
| and harp soothe his senses or amid the cool silver tranquility of the |
| evening or at the feast, at midnight, when he is now filled with wine. |
| Not to insult over him will the vision come as over one that lies under |
| her wrath, not for vengeance to cut him off from the living but shrouded |
| in the piteous vesture of the past, silent, remote, reproachful. |
| |
| The stranger still regarded on the face before him a slow recession of |
| that false calm there, imposed, as it seemed, by habit or some studied |
| trick, upon words so embittered as to accuse in their speaker an |
| unhealthiness, a _flair,_ for the cruder things of life. A scene |
| disengages itself in the observer's memory, evoked, it would seem, by |
| a word of so natural a homeliness as if those days were really present |
| there (as some thought) with their immediate pleasures. A shaven space |
| of lawn one soft May evening, the wellremembered grove of lilacs at |
| Roundtown, purple and white, fragrant slender spectators of the game but |
| with much real interest in the pellets as they run slowly forward over |
| the sward or collide and stop, one by its fellow, with a brief alert |
| shock. And yonder about that grey urn where the water moves at times |
| in thoughtful irrigation you saw another as fragrant sisterhood, Floey, |
| Atty, Tiny and their darker friend with I know not what of arresting in |
| her pose then, Our Lady of the Cherries, a comely brace of them pendent |
| from an ear, bringing out the foreign warmth of the skin so daintily |
| against the cool ardent fruit. A lad of four or five in linseywoolsey |
| (blossomtime but there will be cheer in the kindly hearth when ere long |
| the bowls are gathered and hutched) is standing on the urn secured by |
| that circle of girlish fond hands. He frowns a little just as this young |
| man does now with a perhaps too conscious enjoyment of the danger but |
| must needs glance at whiles towards where his mother watches from the |
| PIAZZETTA giving upon the flowerclose with a faint shadow of remoteness |
| or of reproach (_alles Vergangliche_) in her glad look. |
| |
| Mark this farther and remember. The end comes suddenly. Enter that |
| antechamber of birth where the studious are assembled and note their |
| faces. Nothing, as it seems, there of rash or violent. Quietude of |
| custody, rather, befitting their station in that house, the vigilant |
| watch of shepherds and of angels about a crib in Bethlehem of Juda long |
| ago. But as before the lightning the serried stormclouds, heavy with |
| preponderant excess of moisture, in swollen masses turgidly distended, |
| compass earth and sky in one vast slumber, impending above parched field |
| and drowsy oxen and blighted growth of shrub and verdure till in an |
| instant a flash rives their centres and with the reverberation of the |
| thunder the cloudburst pours its torrent, so and not otherwise was the |
| transformation, violent and instantaneous, upon the utterance of the |
| word. |
| |
| Burke's! outflings my lord Stephen, giving the cry, and a tag and |
| bobtail of all them after, cockerel, jackanapes, welsher, pilldoctor, |
| punctual Bloom at heels with a universal grabbing at headgear, |
| ashplants, bilbos, Panama hats and scabbards, Zermatt alpenstocks and |
| what not. A dedale of lusty youth, noble every student there. Nurse |
| Callan taken aback in the hallway cannot stay them nor smiling surgeon |
| coming downstairs with news of placentation ended, a full pound if a |
| milligramme. They hark him on. The door! It is open? Ha! They are out, |
| tumultuously, off for a minute's race, all bravely legging it, Burke's |
| of Denzille and Holles their ulterior goal. Dixon follows giving them |
| sharp language but raps out an oath, he too, and on. Bloom stays with |
| nurse a thought to send a kind word to happy mother and nurseling up |
| there. Doctor Diet and Doctor Quiet. Looks she too not other now? Ward |
| of watching in Horne's house has told its tale in that washedout pallor. |
| Then all being gone, a glance of motherwit helping, he whispers close in |
| going: Madam, when comes the storkbird for thee? |
| |
| The air without is impregnated with raindew moisture, life essence |
| celestial, glistening on Dublin stone there under starshiny _coelum._ |
| God's air, the Allfather's air, scintillant circumambient cessile air. |
| Breathe it deep into thee. By heaven, Theodore Purefoy, thou hast done a |
| doughty deed and no botch! Thou art, I vow, the remarkablest progenitor |
| barring none in this chaffering allincluding most farraginous chronicle. |
| Astounding! In her lay a Godframed Godgiven preformed possibility which |
| thou hast fructified with thy modicum of man's work. Cleave to her! |
| Serve! Toil on, labour like a very bandog and let scholarment and all |
| Malthusiasts go hang. Thou art all their daddies, Theodore. Art drooping |
| under thy load, bemoiled with butcher's bills at home and ingots (not |
| thine!) in the countinghouse? Head up! For every newbegotten thou shalt |
| gather thy homer of ripe wheat. See, thy fleece is drenched. Dost envy |
| Darby Dullman there with his Joan? A canting jay and a rheumeyed |
| curdog is all their progeny. Pshaw, I tell thee! He is a mule, a dead |
| gasteropod, without vim or stamina, not worth a cracked kreutzer. |
| Copulation without population! No, say I! Herod's slaughter of the |
| innocents were the truer name. Vegetables, forsooth, and sterile |
| cohabitation! Give her beefsteaks, red, raw, bleeding! She is a hoary |
| pandemonium of ills, enlarged glands, mumps, quinsy, bunions, hayfever, |
| bedsores, ringworm, floating kidney, Derbyshire neck, warts, bilious |
| attacks, gallstones, cold feet, varicose veins. A truce to threnes and |
| trentals and jeremies and all such congenital defunctive music! Twenty |
| years of it, regret them not. With thee it was not as with many that |
| will and would and wait and never--do. Thou sawest thy America, thy |
| lifetask, and didst charge to cover like the transpontine bison. How |
| saith Zarathustra? _Deine Kuh Trübsal melkest Du. Nun Trinkst Du die |
| süsse Milch des Euters_. See! it displodes for thee in abundance. Drink, |
| man, an udderful! Mother's milk, Purefoy, the milk of human kin, milk |
| too of those burgeoning stars overhead rutilant in thin rainvapour, |
| punch milk, such as those rioters will quaff in their guzzling den, milk |
| of madness, the honeymilk of Canaan's land. Thy cow's dug was tough, |
| what? Ay, but her milk is hot and sweet and fattening. No dollop this |
| but thick rich bonnyclaber. To her, old patriarch! Pap! _Per deam |
| Partulam et Pertundam nunc est bibendum_! |
| |
| All off for a buster, armstrong, hollering down the street. Bonafides. |
| Where you slep las nigh? Timothy of the battered naggin. Like ole |
| Billyo. Any brollies or gumboots in the fambly? Where the Henry Nevil's |
| sawbones and ole clo? Sorra one o' me knows. Hurrah there, Dix! Forward |
| to the ribbon counter. Where's Punch? All serene. Jay, look at the |
| drunken minister coming out of the maternity hospal! _Benedicat vos |
| omnipotens Deus, Pater et Filius_. A make, mister. The Denzille lane |
| boys. Hell, blast ye! Scoot. Righto, Isaacs, shove em out of the |
| bleeding limelight. Yous join uz, dear sir? No hentrusion in life. Lou |
| heap good man. Allee samee dis bunch. _En avant, mes enfants_! Fire |
| away number one on the gun. Burke's! Burke's! Thence they advanced five |
| parasangs. Slattery's mounted foot. Where's that bleeding awfur? Parson |
| Steve, apostates' creed! No, no, Mulligan! Abaft there! Shove ahead. |
| Keep a watch on the clock. Chuckingout time. Mullee! What's on you? _Ma |
| mère m'a mariée._ British Beatitudes! _Retamplatan Digidi Boumboum_. |
| Ayes have it. To be printed and bound at the Druiddrum press by two |
| designing females. Calf covers of pissedon green. Last word in art |
| shades. Most beautiful book come out of Ireland my time. _Silentium!_ |
| Get a spurt on. Tention. Proceed to nearest canteen and there annex |
| liquor stores. March! Tramp, tramp, tramp, the boys are (atitudes!) |
| parching. Beer, beef, business, bibles, bulldogs battleships, buggery |
| and bishops. Whether on the scaffold high. Beer, beef, trample the |
| bibles. When for Irelandear. Trample the trampellers. Thunderation! Keep |
| the durned millingtary step. We fall. Bishops boosebox. Halt! Heave to. |
| Rugger. Scrum in. No touch kicking. Wow, my tootsies! You hurt? Most |
| amazingly sorry! |
| |
| Query. Who's astanding this here do? Proud possessor of damnall. Declare |
| misery. Bet to the ropes. Me nantee saltee. Not a red at me this week |
| gone. Yours? Mead of our fathers for the _Ãœbermensch._ Dittoh. Five |
| number ones. You, sir? Ginger cordial. Chase me, the cabby's caudle. |
| Stimulate the caloric. Winding of his ticker. Stopped short never to go |
| again when the old. Absinthe for me, savvy? _Caramba!_ Have an eggnog or |
| a prairie oyster. Enemy? Avuncular's got my timepiece. Ten to. Obligated |
| awful. Don't mention it. Got a pectoral trauma, eh, Dix? Pos fact. Got |
| bet be a boomblebee whenever he wus settin sleepin in hes bit garten. |
| Digs up near the Mater. Buckled he is. Know his dona? Yup, sartin I do. |
| Full of a dure. See her in her dishybilly. Peels off a credit. Lovey |
| lovekin. None of your lean kine, not much. Pull down the blind, love. |
| Two Ardilauns. Same here. Look slippery. If you fall don't wait to get |
| up. Five, seven, nine. Fine! Got a prime pair of mincepies, no kid. And |
| her take me to rests and her anker of rum. Must be seen to be believed. |
| Your starving eyes and allbeplastered neck you stole my heart, O |
| gluepot. Sir? Spud again the rheumatiz? All poppycock, you'll scuse me |
| saying. For the hoi polloi. I vear thee beest a gert vool. Well, doc? |
| Back fro Lapland? Your corporosity sagaciating O K? How's the squaws |
| and papooses? Womanbody after going on the straw? Stand and deliver. |
| Password. There's hair. Ours the white death and the ruddy birth. Hi! |
| Spit in your own eye, boss! Mummer's wire. Cribbed out of Meredith. |
| Jesified, orchidised, polycimical jesuit! Aunty mine's writing Pa Kinch. |
| Baddybad Stephen lead astray goodygood Malachi. |
| |
| Hurroo! Collar the leather, youngun. Roun wi the nappy. Here, Jock braw |
| Hielentman's your barleybree. Lang may your lum reek and your kailpot |
| boil! My tipple. _Merci._ Here's to us. How's that? Leg before wicket. |
| Don't stain my brandnew sitinems. Give's a shake of peppe, you there. |
| Catch aholt. Caraway seed to carry away. Twig? Shrieks of silence. Every |
| cove to his gentry mort. Venus Pandemos. _Les petites femmes_. Bold bad |
| girl from the town of Mullingar. Tell her I was axing at her. Hauding |
| Sara by the wame. On the road to Malahide. Me? If she who seduced me had |
| left but the name. What do you want for ninepence? Machree, macruiskeen. |
| Smutty Moll for a mattress jig. And a pull all together. _Ex!_ |
| |
| Waiting, guvnor? Most deciduously. Bet your boots on. Stunned like, |
| seeing as how no shiners is acoming. Underconstumble? He've got the |
| chink _ad lib_. Seed near free poun on un a spell ago a said war hisn. |
| Us come right in on your invite, see? Up to you, matey. Out with the |
| oof. Two bar and a wing. You larn that go off of they there Frenchy |
| bilks? Won't wash here for nuts nohow. Lil chile velly solly. Ise de |
| cutest colour coon down our side. Gawds teruth, Chawley. We are nae fou. |
| We're nae tha fou. Au reservoir, mossoo. Tanks you. |
| |
| 'Tis, sure. What say? In the speakeasy. Tight. I shee you, shir. Bantam, |
| two days teetee. Bowsing nowt but claretwine. Garn! Have a glint, do. |
| Gum, I'm jiggered. And been to barber he have. Too full for words. With |
| a railway bloke. How come you so? Opera he'd like? Rose of Castile. Rows |
| of cast. Police! Some H2O for a gent fainted. Look at Bantam's flowers. |
| Gemini. He's going to holler. The colleen bawn. My colleen bawn. O, |
| cheese it! Shut his blurry Dutch oven with a firm hand. Had the winner |
| today till I tipped him a dead cert. The ruffin cly the nab of Stephen |
| Hand as give me the jady coppaleen. He strike a telegramboy paddock wire |
| big bug Bass to the depot. Shove him a joey and grahamise. Mare on form |
| hot order. Guinea to a goosegog. Tell a cram, that. Gospeltrue. Criminal |
| diversion? I think that yes. Sure thing. Land him in chokeechokee if the |
| harman beck copped the game. Madden back Madden's a maddening back. O |
| lust our refuge and our strength. Decamping. Must you go? Off to mammy. |
| Stand by. Hide my blushes someone. All in if he spots me. Come ahome, |
| our Bantam. Horryvar, mong vioo. Dinna forget the cowslips for hersel. |
| Cornfide. Wha gev ye thon colt? Pal to pal. Jannock. Of John Thomas, her |
| spouse. No fake, old man Leo. S'elp me, honest injun. Shiver my timbers |
| if I had. There's a great big holy friar. Vyfor you no me tell? Vel, |
| I ses, if that aint a sheeny nachez, vel, I vil get misha mishinnah. |
| Through yerd our lord, Amen. |
| |
| You move a motion? Steve boy, you're going it some. More bluggy |
| drunkables? Will immensely splendiferous stander permit one stooder of |
| most extreme poverty and one largesize grandacious thirst to terminate |
| one expensive inaugurated libation? Give's a breather. Landlord, |
| landlord, have you good wine, staboo? Hoots, mon, a wee drap to pree. |
| Cut and come again. Right. Boniface! Absinthe the lot. _Nos omnes |
| biberimus viridum toxicum diabolus capiat posterioria nostria_. |
| Closingtime, gents. Eh? Rome boose for the Bloom toff. I hear you say |
| onions? Bloo? Cadges ads. Photo's papli, by all that's gorgeous. Play |
| low, pardner. Slide. _Bonsoir la compagnie_. And snares of the poxfiend. |
| Where's the buck and Namby Amby? Skunked? Leg bail. Aweel, ye maun e'en |
| gang yer gates. Checkmate. King to tower. Kind Kristyann wil yu help |
| yung man hoose frend tuk bungellow kee tu find plais whear tu lay crown |
| of his hed 2 night. Crickey, I'm about sprung. Tarnally dog gone my |
| shins if this beent the bestest puttiest longbreak yet. Item, curate, |
| couple of cookies for this child. Cot's plood and prandypalls, none! Not |
| a pite of sheeses? Thrust syphilis down to hell and with him those other |
| licensed spirits. Time, gents! Who wander through the world. Health all! |
| _a la vôtre_! |
| |
| Golly, whatten tunket's yon guy in the mackintosh? Dusty Rhodes. Peep |
| at his wearables. By mighty! What's he got? Jubilee mutton. Bovril, |
| by James. Wants it real bad. D'ye ken bare socks? Seedy cuss in the |
| Richmond? Rawthere! Thought he had a deposit of lead in his penis. |
| Trumpery insanity. Bartle the Bread we calls him. That, sir, was once |
| a prosperous cit. Man all tattered and torn that married a maiden all |
| forlorn. Slung her hook, she did. Here see lost love. Walking Mackintosh |
| of lonely canyon. Tuck and turn in. Schedule time. Nix for the hornies. |
| Pardon? Seen him today at a runefal? Chum o' yourn passed in his checks? |
| Ludamassy! Pore piccaninnies! Thou'll no be telling me thot, Pold veg! |
| Did ums blubble bigsplash crytears cos fren Padney was took off in black |
| bag? Of all de darkies Massa Pat was verra best. I never see the like |
| since I was born. _Tiens, tiens_, but it is well sad, that, my faith, |
| yes. O, get, rev on a gradient one in nine. Live axle drives are souped. |
| Lay you two to one Jenatzy licks him ruddy well hollow. Jappies? High |
| angle fire, inyah! Sunk by war specials. Be worse for him, says he, nor |
| any Rooshian. Time all. There's eleven of them. Get ye gone. Forward, |
| woozy wobblers! Night. Night. May Allah the Excellent One your soul this |
| night ever tremendously conserve. |
| |
| Your attention! We're nae tha fou. The Leith police dismisseth us. The |
| least tholice. Ware hawks for the chap puking. Unwell in his abominable |
| regions. Yooka. Night. Mona, my true love. Yook. Mona, my own love. Ook. |
| |
| Hark! Shut your obstropolos. Pflaap! Pflaap! Blaze on. There she goes. |
| Brigade! Bout ship. Mount street way. Cut up! Pflaap! Tally ho. You not |
| come? Run, skelter, race. Pflaaaap! |
| |
| Lynch! Hey? Sign on long o' me. Denzille lane this way. Change here for |
| Bawdyhouse. We two, she said, will seek the kips where shady Mary is. |
| Righto, any old time. _Laetabuntur in cubilibus suis_. You coming long? |
| Whisper, who the sooty hell's the johnny in the black duds? Hush! Sinned |
| against the light and even now that day is at hand when he shall come to |
| judge the world by fire. Pflaap! _Ut implerentur scripturae_. Strike |
| up a ballad. Then outspake medical Dick to his comrade medical Davy. |
| Christicle, who's this excrement yellow gospeller on the Merrion |
| hall? Elijah is coming! Washed in the blood of the Lamb. Come on you |
| winefizzling, ginsizzling, booseguzzling existences! Come on, you |
| dog-gone, bullnecked, beetlebrowed, hogjowled, peanutbrained, weaseleyed |
| fourflushers, false alarms and excess baggage! Come on, you triple |
| extract of infamy! Alexander J Christ Dowie, that's my name, that's |
| yanked to glory most half this planet from Frisco beach to Vladivostok. |
| The Deity aint no nickel dime bumshow. I put it to you that He's on the |
| square and a corking fine business proposition. He's the grandest thing |
| yet and don't you forget it. Shout salvation in King Jesus. You'll |
| need to rise precious early you sinner there, if you want to diddle the |
| Almighty God. Pflaaaap! Not half. He's got a coughmixture with a punch |
| in it for you, my friend, in his back pocket. Just you try it on. |
| |
| |
| |
| _The Mabbot street entrance of nighttown, before which stretches |
| an uncobbled tramsiding set with skeleton tracks, red and green |
| will-o'-the-wisps and danger signals. Rows of grimy houses with gaping |
| doors. Rare lamps with faint rainbow fins. Round Rabaiotti's halted ice |
| gondola stunted men and women squabble. They grab wafers between which |
| are wedged lumps of coral and copper snow. Sucking, they scatter slowly. |
| Children. The swancomb of the gondola, highreared, forges on through the |
| murk, white and blue under a lighthouse. Whistles call and answer._ |
| |
| THE CALLS: Wait, my love, and I'll be with you. |
| |
| THE ANSWERS: Round behind the stable. |
| |
| _(A deafmute idiot with goggle eyes, his shapeless mouth dribbling, |
| jerks past, shaken in Saint Vitus' dance. A chain of children 's hands |
| imprisons him.)_ |
| |
| THE CHILDREN: Kithogue! Salute! |
| |
| THE IDIOT: _(Lifts a palsied left arm and gurgles)_ Grhahute! |
| |
| THE CHILDREN: Where's the great light? |
| |
| THE IDIOT: _(Gobbing)_ Ghaghahest. |
| |
| _(They release him. He jerks on. A pigmy woman swings on a rope slung |
| between two railings, counting. A form sprawled against a dustbin and |
| muffled by its arm and hat snores, groans, grinding growling teeth, and |
| snores again. On a step a gnome totting among a rubbishtip crouches |
| to shoulder a sack of rags and bones. A crone standing by with a smoky |
| oillamp rams her last bottle in the maw of his sack. He heaves his |
| booty, tugs askew his peaked cap and hobbles off mutely. The crone |
| makes back for her lair, swaying her lamp. A bandy child, asquat on the |
| doorstep with a paper shuttlecock, crawls sidling after her in spurts, |
| clutches her skirt, scrambles up. A drunken navvy grips with both hands |
| the railings of an area, lurching heavily. At a comer two night watch in |
| shouldercapes, their hands upon their staffholsters, loom tall. A plate |
| crashes: a woman screams: a child wails. Oaths of a man roar, mutter, |
| cease. Figures wander, lurk, peer from warrens. In a room lit by a |
| candle stuck in a bottleneck a slut combs out the tatts from the hair |
| of a scrofulous child. Cissy Caffrey's voice, still young, sings shrill |
| from a lane.)_ |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: |
| |
| _I gave it to Molly |
| Because she was jolly, |
| The leg of the duck, |
| The leg of the duck._ |
| |
| _(Private Carr and Private Compton, swaggersticks tight in their oxters, |
| as they march unsteadily rightaboutface and burst together from their |
| mouths a volleyed fart. Laughter of men from the lane. A hoarse virago |
| retorts.)_ |
| |
| THE VIRAGO: Signs on you, hairy arse. More power the Cavan girl. |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: More luck to me. Cavan, Cootehill and Belturbet. _(She |
| sings)_ |
| |
| _I gave it to Nelly |
| To stick in her belly, |
| The leg of the duck, |
| The leg of the duck._ |
| |
| _(Private Carr and Private Compton turn and counterretort, their tunics |
| bloodbright in a lampglow, black sockets of caps on their blond cropped |
| polls. Stephen Dedalus and Lynch pass through the crowd close to the |
| redcoats.)_ |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: _(Jerks his finger)_ Way for the parson. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(Turns and calls)_ What ho, parson! |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: _(Her voice soaring higher)_ |
| |
| _She has it, she got it, |
| Wherever she put it, |
| The leg of the duck._ |
| |
| _(Stephen, flourishing the ashplant in his left hand, chants with joy |
| the_ introit _for paschal time. Lynch, his jockeycap low on his brow, |
| attends him, a sneer of discontent wrinkling his face.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: _Vidi aquam egredientem de templo a latere dextro. Alleluia_. |
| |
| _(The famished snaggletusks of an elderly bawd protrude from a |
| doorway.)_ |
| |
| THE BAWD: _(Her voice whispering huskily)_ Sst! Come here till I tell |
| you. Maidenhead inside. Sst! |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Altius aliquantulum) Et omnes ad quos pervenit aqua ista_. |
| |
| THE BAWD: _(Spits in their trail her jet of venom)_ Trinity medicals. |
| Fallopian tube. All prick and no pence. |
| |
| _(Edy Boardman, sniffling, crouched with bertha supple, draws her shawl |
| across her nostrils.)_ |
| |
| EDY BOARDMAN: _(Bickering)_ And says the one: I seen you up Faithful |
| place with your squarepusher, the greaser off the railway, in his |
| cometobed hat. Did you, says I. That's not for you to say, says I. You |
| never seen me in the mantrap with a married highlander, says I. The |
| likes of her! Stag that one is! Stubborn as a mule! And her walking with |
| two fellows the one time, Kilbride, the enginedriver, and lancecorporal |
| Oliphant. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Ttriumphaliter) Salvi facti sunt._ |
| |
| _(He flourishes his ashplant, shivering the lamp image, shattering light |
| over the world. A liver and white spaniel on the prowl slinks after him, |
| growling. Lynch scares it with a kick.)_ |
| |
| LYNCH: So that? |
| |
| STEPHEN: (_Looks behind_) So that gesture, not music not odour, would be |
| a universal language, the gift of tongues rendering visible not the lay |
| sense but the first entelechy, the structural rhythm. |
| |
| LYNCH: Pornosophical philotheology. Metaphysics in Mecklenburgh street! |
| |
| STEPHEN: We have shrewridden Shakespeare and henpecked Socrates. Even |
| the allwisest Stagyrite was bitted, bridled and mounted by a light of |
| love. |
| |
| LYNCH: Ba! |
| |
| STEPHEN: Anyway, who wants two gestures to illustrate a loaf and a jug? |
| This movement illustrates the loaf and jug of bread or wine in Omar. |
| Hold my stick. |
| |
| LYNCH: Damn your yellow stick. Where are we going? |
| |
| STEPHEN: Lecherous lynx, _to la belle dame sans merci,_ Georgina |
| Johnson, _ad deam qui laetificat iuventutem meam._ |
| |
| _(Stephen thrusts the ashplant on him and slowly holds out his hands, |
| his head going back till both hands are a span from his breast, down |
| turned, in planes intersecting, the fingers about to part, the left |
| being higher.)_ |
| |
| LYNCH: Which is the jug of bread? It skills not. That or the |
| customhouse. Illustrate thou. Here take your crutch and walk. |
| |
| _(They pass. Tommy Caffrey scrambles to a gaslamp and, clasping, climbs |
| in spasms. From the top spur he slides down. Jacky Caffrey clasps to |
| climb. The navvy lurches against the lamp. The twins scuttle off in the |
| dark. The navvy, swaying, presses a forefinger against a wing of his |
| nose and ejects from the farther nostril a long liquid jet of snot. |
| Shouldering the lamp he staggers away through the crowd with his flaring |
| cresset._ |
| |
| _Snakes of river fog creep slowly. From drains, clefts, cesspools, |
| middens arise on all sides stagnant fumes. A glow leaps in the south |
| beyond the seaward reaches of the river. The navvy, staggering forward, |
| cleaves the crowd and lurches towards the tramsiding on the farther side |
| under the railway bridge bloom appears, flushed, panting, cramming bread |
| and chocolate into a sidepocket. From Gillen's hairdresser's window a |
| composite portrait shows him gallant Nelson's image. A concave mirror |
| at the side presents to him lovelorn longlost lugubru Booloohoom. Grave |
| Gladstone sees him level, Bloom for Bloom. he passes, struck by the |
| stare of truculent Wellington, but in the convex mirror grin unstruck |
| the bonham eyes and fatchuck cheekchops of Jollypoldy the rixdix doldy._ |
| |
| _At Antonio Pabaiotti's door Bloom halts, sweated under the bright |
| arclamp. He disappears. In a moment he reappears and hurries on.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Fish and taters. N. g. Ah! |
| |
| _(He disappears into Olhausen's, the porkbutcher's, under the downcoming |
| rollshutter. A few moments later he emerges from under the shutter, |
| puffing Poldy, blowing Bloohoom. In each hand he holds a parcel, one |
| containing a lukewarm pig's crubeen, the other a cold sheep's trotter, |
| sprinkled with wholepepper. He gasps, standing upright. Then bending to |
| one side he presses a parcel against his ribs and groans.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Stitch in my side. Why did I run? |
| |
| _(He takes breath with care and goes forward slowly towards the lampset |
| siding. The glow leaps again.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: What is that? A flasher? Searchlight. |
| |
| _(He stands at Cormack's corner, watching)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _Aurora borealis_ or a steel foundry? Ah, the brigade, of course. |
| South side anyhow. Big blaze. Might be his house. Beggar's bush. We're |
| safe. _(He hums cheerfully)_ London's burning, London's burning! On |
| fire, on fire! (_He catches sight of the navvy lurching through the |
| crowd at the farther side of Talbot street_) I'll miss him. Run. Quick. |
| Better cross here. |
| |
| _(He darts to cross the road. Urchins shout.)_ |
| |
| THE URCHINS: Mind out, mister! (_Two cyclists, with lighted paper |
| lanterns aswing, swim by him, grazing him, their bells rattling_) |
| |
| THE BELLS: Haltyaltyaltyall. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Halts erect, stung by a spasm)_ Ow! |
| |
| _(He looks round, darts forward suddenly. Through rising fog a dragon |
| sandstrewer, travelling at caution, slews heavily down upon him, |
| its huge red headlight winking, its trolley hissing on the wire. The |
| motorman bangs his footgong.)_ |
| |
| THE GONG: Bang Bang Bla Bak Blud Bugg Bloo. |
| |
| _(The brake cracks violently. Bloom, raising a policeman's whitegloved |
| hand, blunders stifflegged out of the track. The motorman, thrown |
| forward, pugnosed, on the guidewheel, yells as he slides past over |
| chains and keys.)_ |
| |
| THE MOTORMAN: Hey, shitbreeches, are you doing the hat trick? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Bloom trickleaps to the curbstone and halts again. He brushes a |
| mudflake from his cheek with a parcelled hand.)_ No thoroughfare. Close |
| shave that but cured the stitch. Must take up Sandow's exercises again. |
| On the hands down. Insure against street accident too. The Providential. |
| _(He feels his trouser pocket)_ Poor mamma's panacea. Heel easily catch |
| in track or bootlace in a cog. Day the wheel of the black Maria peeled |
| off my shoe at Leonard's corner. Third time is the charm. Shoe trick. |
| Insolent driver. I ought to report him. Tension makes them nervous. |
| Might be the fellow balked me this morning with that horsey woman. Same |
| style of beauty. Quick of him all the same. The stiff walk. True word |
| spoken in jest. That awful cramp in Lad lane. Something poisonous I |
| ate. Emblem of luck. Why? Probably lost cattle. Mark of the beast. _(He |
| closes his eyes an instant)_ Bit light in the head. Monthly or effect of |
| the other. Brainfogfag. That tired feeling. Too much for me now. Ow! |
| |
| (A sinister figure leans on plaited legs against o'beirne's wall, a |
| visage unknown, injected with dark mercury. From under a wideleaved |
| sombrero the figure regards him with evil eye.) |
| |
| BLOOM: _Buenas noches, señorita Blanca, que calle es esta?_ |
| |
| THE FIGURE: (_Impassive, raises a signal arm_) Password. _Sraid Mabbot._ |
| |
| BLOOM: Haha. _Merci._ Esperanto. _Slan leath. (He mutters)_ Gaelic |
| league spy, sent by that fireeater. |
| |
| _(He steps forward. A sackshouldered ragman bars his path. He steps |
| left, ragsackman left.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: I beg. (_He swerves, sidles, stepaside, slips past and on_.) |
| |
| BLOOM: Keep to the right, right, right. If there is a signpost planted |
| by the Touring Club at Stepaside who procured that public boon? I who |
| lost my way and contributed to the columns of the _Irish Cyclist_ the |
| letter headed _In darkest Stepaside_. Keep, keep, keep to the right. |
| Rags and bones at midnight. A fence more likely. First place murderer |
| makes for. Wash off his sins of the world. |
| |
| _(Jacky Caffrey, hunted by Tommy Caffrey, runs full tilt against |
| Bloom.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: O |
| |
| _(Shocked, on weak hams, he halts. Tommy and Jacky vanish there, there. |
| Bloom pats with parcelled hands watch fobpocket, bookpocket, pursepoket, |
| sweets of sin, potato soap.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Beware of pickpockets. Old thieves' dodge. Collide. Then snatch |
| your purse. |
| |
| _(The retriever approaches sniffing, nose to the ground. A sprawled form |
| sneezes. A stooped bearded figure appears garbed in the long caftan |
| of an elder in Zion and a smokingcap with magenta tassels. Horned |
| spectacles hang down at the wings of the nose. Yellow poison streaks are |
| on the drawn face.)_ |
| |
| RUDOLPH: Second halfcrown waste money today. I told you not go with |
| drunken goy ever. So you catch no money. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Hides the crubeen and trotter behind his back and, crestfallen, |
| feels warm and cold feetmeat) Ja, ich weiss, papachi._ |
| |
| RUDOLPH: What you making down this place? Have you no soul? _(with |
| feeble vulture talons he feels the silent face of Bloom)_ Are you not |
| my son Leopold, the grandson of Leopold? Are you not my dear son Leopold |
| who left the house of his father and left the god of his fathers Abraham |
| and Jacob? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(With precaution)_ I suppose so, father. Mosenthal. All that's |
| left of him. |
| |
| RUDOLPH: _(Severely)_ One night they bring you home drunk as dog after |
| spend your good money. What you call them running chaps? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In youth's smart blue Oxford suit with white vestslips, |
| narrowshouldered, in brown Alpine hat, wearing gent's sterling silver |
| waterbury keyless watch and double curb Albert with seal attached, one |
| side of him coated with stiffening mud)_ Harriers, father. Only that |
| once. |
| |
| RUDOLPH: Once! Mud head to foot. Cut your hand open. Lockjaw. They make |
| you kaputt, Leopoldleben. You watch them chaps. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Weakly)_ They challenged me to a sprint. It was muddy. I |
| slipped. |
| |
| RUDOLPH: _(With contempt) Goim nachez_! Nice spectacles for your poor |
| mother! |
| |
| BLOOM: Mamma! |
| |
| ELLEN BLOOM: _(In pantomime dame's stringed mobcap, widow Twankey's |
| crinoline and bustle, blouse with muttonleg sleeves buttoned behind, |
| grey mittens and cameo brooch, her plaited hair in a crispine net, |
| appears over the staircase banisters, a slanted candlestick in her hand, |
| and cries out in shrill alarm)_ O blessed Redeemer, what have they done |
| to him! My smelling salts! _(She hauls up a reef of skirt and ransacks |
| the pouch of her striped blay petticoat. A phial, an Agnus Dei, a |
| shrivelled potato and a celluloid doll fall out)_ Sacred Heart of Mary, |
| where were you at all at all? |
| |
| _(Bloom, mumbling, his eyes downcast, begins to bestow his parcels in |
| his filled pockets but desists, muttering.)_ |
| |
| A VOICE: _(Sharply)_ Poldy! |
| |
| BLOOM: Who? _(He ducks and wards off a blow clumsily)_ At your service. |
| |
| _(He looks up. Beside her mirage of datepalms a handsome woman in |
| Turkish costume stands before him. Opulent curves fill out her scarlet |
| trousers and jacket, slashed with gold. A wide yellow cummerbund girdles |
| her. A white yashmak, violet in the night, covers her face, leaving free |
| only her large dark eyes and raven hair.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Molly! |
| |
| MARION: Welly? Mrs Marion from this out, my dear man, when you speak to |
| me. _(Satirically)_ Has poor little hubby cold feet waiting so long? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Shifts from foot to foot)_ No, no. Not the least little bit. |
| |
| _(He breathes in deep agitation, swallowing gulps of air, questions, |
| hopes, crubeens for her supper, things to tell her, excuse, desire, |
| spellbound. A coin gleams on her forehead. On her feet are jewelled |
| toerings. Her ankles are linked by a slender fetterchain. Beside her |
| a camel, hooded with a turreting turban, waits. A silk ladder of |
| innumerable rungs climbs to his bobbing howdah. He ambles near with |
| disgruntled hindquarters. Fiercely she slaps his haunch, her goldcurb |
| wristbangles angriling, scolding him in Moorish.)_ |
| |
| MARION: Nebrakada! Femininum! |
| |
| _(The camel, lifting a foreleg, plucks from a tree a large mango fruit, |
| offers it to his mistress, blinking, in his cloven hoof, then droops his |
| head and, grunting, with uplifted neck, fumbles to kneel. Bloom stoops |
| his back for leapfrog.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: I can give you... I mean as your business menagerer... Mrs |
| Marion... if you... |
| |
| MARION: So you notice some change? _(Her hands passing slowly over her |
| trinketed stomacher, a slow friendly mockery in her eyes)_ O Poldy, |
| Poldy, you are a poor old stick in the mud! Go and see life. See the |
| wide world. |
| |
| BLOOM: I was just going back for that lotion whitewax, orangeflower |
| water. Shop closes early on Thursday. But the first thing in the |
| morning. _(He pats divers pockets)_ This moving kidney. Ah! |
| |
| _(He points to the south, then to the east. A cake of new clean lemon |
| soap arises, diffusing light and perfume.)_ |
| |
| THE SOAP: We're a capital couple are Bloom and I. He brightens the |
| earth. I polish the sky. |
| |
| |
| _(The freckled face of Sweny, the druggist, appears in the disc of the |
| soapsun.)_ |
| |
| SWENY: Three and a penny, please. |
| |
| BLOOM: Yes. For my wife. Mrs Marion. Special recipe. |
| |
| MARION: _(Softly)_ Poldy! |
| |
| BLOOM: Yes, ma'am? |
| |
| MARION: _ti trema un poco il cuore?_ |
| |
| _(In disdain she saunters away, plump as a pampered pouter pigeon, |
| humming the duet from_ Don Giovanni.) |
| |
| BLOOM: Are you sure about that _voglio_? I mean the pronunciati... |
| |
| _(He follows, followed by the sniffing terrier. The elderly bawd seizes |
| his sleeve, the bristles of her chinmole glittering.)_ |
| |
| THE BAWD: Ten shillings a maidenhead. Fresh thing was never touched. |
| Fifteen. There's no-one in it only her old father that's dead drunk. |
| |
| _(She points. In the gap of her dark den furtive, rainbedraggled, Bridie |
| Kelly stands.)_ |
| |
| BRIDIE: Hatch street. Any good in your mind? |
| |
| _(With a squeak she flaps her bat shawl and runs. A burly rough pursues |
| with booted strides. He stumbles on the steps, recovers, plunges into |
| gloom. Weak squeaks of laughter are heard, weaker.)_ |
| |
| THE BAWD: _(Her wolfeyes shining)_ He's getting his pleasure. You won't |
| get a virgin in the flash houses. Ten shillings. Don't be all night |
| before the polis in plain clothes sees us. Sixtyseven is a bitch. |
| |
| _(Leering, Gerty Macdowell limps forward. She draws from behind, ogling, |
| and shows coyly her bloodied clout.)_ |
| |
| GERTY: With all my worldly goods I thee and thou. _(She murmurs)_ You |
| did that. I hate you. |
| |
| BLOOM: I? When? You're dreaming. I never saw you. |
| |
| THE BAWD: Leave the gentleman alone, you cheat. Writing the gentleman |
| false letters. Streetwalking and soliciting. Better for your mother take |
| the strap to you at the bedpost, hussy like you. |
| |
| GERTY: _(To Bloom)_ When you saw all the secrets of my bottom drawer. |
| _(She paws his sleeve, slobbering)_ Dirty married man! I love you for |
| doing that to me. |
| |
| _(She glides away crookedly. Mrs Breen in man's frieze overcoat |
| with loose bellows pockets, stands in the causeway, her roguish eyes |
| wideopen, smiling in all her herbivorous buckteeth.)_ |
| |
| MRS BREEN: Mr... |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Coughs gravely)_ Madam, when we last had this pleasure by |
| letter dated the sixteenth instant... |
| |
| MRS BREEN: Mr Bloom! You down here in the haunts of sin! I caught you |
| nicely! Scamp! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Hurriedly)_ Not so loud my name. Whatever do you think of me? |
| Don't give me away. Walls have ears. How do you do? It's ages since I. |
| You're looking splendid. Absolutely it. Seasonable weather we are having |
| this time of year. Black refracts heat. Short cut home here. Interesting |
| quarter. Rescue of fallen women. Magdalen asylum. I am the secretary... |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(Holds up a finger)_ Now, don't tell a big fib! I know |
| somebody won't like that. O just wait till I see Molly! _(Slily)_ |
| Account for yourself this very sminute or woe betide you! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Looks behind)_ She often said she'd like to visit. Slumming. |
| The exotic, you see. Negro servants in livery too if she had money. |
| Othello black brute. Eugene Stratton. Even the bones and cornerman at |
| the Livermore christies. Bohee brothers. Sweep for that matter. |
| |
| _(Tom and Sam Bohee, coloured coons in white duck suits, scarlet socks, |
| upstarched Sambo chokers and large scarlet asters in their buttonholes, |
| leap out. Each has his banjo slung. Their paler smaller negroid hands |
| jingle the twingtwang wires. Flashing white Kaffir eyes and tusks they |
| rattle through a breakdown in clumsy clogs, twinging, singing, back to |
| back, toe heel, heel toe, with smackfatclacking nigger lips.)_ |
| |
| TOM AND SAM: |
| |
| There's someone in the house with Dina |
| There's someone in the house, I know, |
| There's someone in the house with Dina |
| Playing on the old banjo. |
| |
| _(They whisk black masks from raw babby faces: then, chuckling, |
| chortling, trumming, twanging, they diddle diddle cakewalk dance away.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(With a sour tenderish smile)_ A little frivol, shall we, if |
| you are so inclined? Would you like me perhaps to embrace you just for a |
| fraction of a second? |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(Screams gaily)_ O, you ruck! You ought to see yourself! |
| |
| BLOOM: For old sake' sake. I only meant a square party, a mixed marriage |
| mingling of our different little conjugials. You know I had a soft |
| corner for you. _(Gloomily)_ 'Twas I sent you that valentine of the dear |
| gazelle. |
| |
| MRS BREEN: Glory Alice, you do look a holy show! Killing simply. _(She |
| puts out her hand inquisitively)_ What are you hiding behind your back? |
| Tell us, there's a dear. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Seizes her wrist with his free hand)_ Josie Powell that was, |
| prettiest deb in Dublin. How time flies by! Do you remember, harking |
| back in a retrospective arrangement, Old Christmas night, Georgina |
| Simpson's housewarming while they were playing the Irving Bishop game, |
| finding the pin blindfold and thoughtreading? Subject, what is in this |
| snuffbox? |
| |
| MRS BREEN: You were the lion of the night with your seriocomic |
| recitation and you looked the part. You were always a favourite with the |
| ladies. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Squire of dames, in dinner jacket with wateredsilk facings, |
| blue masonic badge in his buttonhole, black bow and mother-of-pearl |
| studs, a prismatic champagne glass tilted in his hand)_ Ladies and |
| gentlemen, I give you Ireland, home and beauty. |
| |
| MRS BREEN: The dear dead days beyond recall. Love's old sweet song. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Meaningfully dropping his voice)_ I confess I'm teapot with |
| curiosity to find out whether some person's something is a little teapot |
| at present. |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(Gushingly)_ Tremendously teapot! London's teapot and I'm |
| simply teapot all over me! _(She rubs sides with him)_ After the parlour |
| mystery games and the crackers from the tree we sat on the staircase |
| ottoman. Under the mistletoe. Two is company. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Wearing a purple Napoleon hat with an amber halfmoon, his |
| fingers and thumb passing slowly down to her soft moist meaty palm which |
| she surrenders gently)_ The witching hour of night. I took the splinter |
| out of this hand, carefully, slowly. _(Tenderly, as he slips on her |
| finger a ruby ring) LÃ ci darem la mano._ |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(In a onepiece evening frock executed in moonlight blue, a |
| tinsel sylph's diadem on her brow with her dancecard fallen beside |
| her moonblue satin slipper, curves her palm softly, breathing quickly) |
| Voglio e non._ You're hot! You're scalding! The left hand nearest the |
| heart. |
| |
| BLOOM: When you made your present choice they said it was beauty and |
| the beast. I can never forgive you for that. _(His clenched fist at |
| his brow)_ Think what it means. All you meant to me then. _(Hoarsely)_ |
| Woman, it's breaking me! |
| |
| _(Denis Breen, whitetallhatted, with Wisdom Hely's sandwich-boards, |
| shuffles past them in carpet slippers, his dull beard thrust out, |
| muttering to right and left. Little Alf Bergan, cloaked in the pall of |
| the ace of spades, dogs him to left and right, doubled in laughter.)_ |
| |
| ALF BERGAN: _(Points jeering at the sandwichboards)_ U. p: Up. |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(To Bloom)_ High jinks below stairs. _(She gives him the |
| glad eye)_ Why didn't you kiss the spot to make it well? You wanted to. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Shocked)_ Molly's best friend! Could you? |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(Her pulpy tongue between her lips, offers a pigeon kiss)_ |
| Hnhn. The answer is a lemon. Have you a little present for me there? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Offhandedly)_ Kosher. A snack for supper. The home without |
| potted meat is incomplete. I was at _Leah._ Mrs Bandmann Palmer. |
| Trenchant exponent of Shakespeare. Unfortunately threw away the |
| programme. Rattling good place round there for pigs' feet. Feel. |
| |
| _(Richie Goulding, three ladies' hats pinned on his head, appears |
| weighted to one side by the black legal bag of Collis and Ward on which |
| a skull and crossbones are painted in white limewash. He opens it |
| and shows it full of polonies, kippered herrings, Findon haddies and |
| tightpacked pills.)_ |
| |
| RICHIE: Best value in Dub. |
| |
| _(Bald Pat, bothered beetle, stands on the curbstone, folding his |
| napkin, waiting to wait.)_ |
| |
| PAT: _(Advances with a tilted dish of spillspilling gravy)_ Steak and |
| kidney. Bottle of lager. Hee hee hee. Wait till I wait. |
| |
| RICHIE: Goodgod. Inev erate inall... |
| |
| _(With hanging head he marches doggedly forward. The navvy, lurching by, |
| gores him with his flaming pronghorn.)_ |
| |
| RICHIE: _(With a cry of pain, his hand to his back)_ Ah! Bright's! |
| Lights! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Ooints to the navvy)_ A spy. Don't attract attention. I hate |
| stupid crowds. I am not on pleasure bent. I am in a grave predicament. |
| |
| MRS BREEN: Humbugging and deluthering as per usual with your cock and |
| bull story. |
| |
| BLOOM: I want to tell you a little secret about how I came to be here. |
| But you must never tell. Not even Molly. I have a most particular |
| reason. |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(All agog)_ O, not for worlds. |
| |
| BLOOM: Let's walk on. Shall us? |
| |
| MRS BREEN: Let's. |
| |
| _(The bawd makes an unheeded sign. Bloom walks on with Mrs Breen. The |
| terrier follows, whining piteously, wagging his tail.)_ |
| |
| THE BAWD: Jewman's melt! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In an oatmeal sporting suit, a sprig of woodbine in the lapel, |
| tony buff shirt, shepherd's plaid Saint Andrew's cross scarftie, white |
| spats, fawn dustcoat on his arm, tawny red brogues, fieldglasses in |
| bandolier and a grey billycock hat)_ Do you remember a long long time, |
| years and years ago, just after Milly, Marionette we called her, was |
| weaned when we all went together to Fairyhouse races, was it? |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(In smart Saxe tailormade, white velours hat and spider |
| veil)_ Leopardstown. |
| |
| BLOOM: I mean, Leopardstown. And Molly won seven shillings on a three |
| year old named Nevertell and coming home along by Foxrock in that old |
| fiveseater shanderadan of a waggonette you were in your heyday then and |
| you had on that new hat of white velours with a surround of molefur that |
| Mrs Hayes advised you to buy because it was marked down to nineteen and |
| eleven, a bit of wire and an old rag of velveteen, and I'll lay you what |
| you like she did it on purpose... |
| |
| MRS BREEN: She did, of course, the cat! Don't tell me! Nice adviser! |
| |
| BLOOM: Because it didn't suit you one quarter as well as the other ducky |
| little tammy toque with the bird of paradise wing in it that I admired |
| on you and you honestly looked just too fetching in it though it was a |
| pity to kill it, you cruel naughty creature, little mite of a thing with |
| a heart the size of a fullstop. |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(Squeezes his arm, simpers)_ Naughty cruel I was! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Low, secretly, ever more rapidly)_ And Molly was eating a |
| sandwich of spiced beef out of Mrs Joe Gallaher's lunch basket. Frankly, |
| though she had her advisers or admirers, I never cared much for her |
| style. She was... |
| |
| MRS BREEN: Too... |
| |
| BLOOM: Yes. And Molly was laughing because Rogers and Maggot O'Reilly |
| were mimicking a cock as we passed a farmhouse and Marcus Tertius Moses, |
| the tea merchant, drove past us in a gig with his daughter, Dancer Moses |
| was her name, and the poodle in her lap bridled up and you asked me if I |
| ever heard or read or knew or came across... |
| |
| MRS BREEN: _(Eagerly)_ Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. |
| |
| _(She fades from his side. Followed by the whining dog he walks on |
| towards hellsgates. In an archway a standing woman, bent forward, her |
| feet apart, pisses cowily. Outside a shuttered pub a bunch of loiterers |
| listen to a tale which their brokensnouted gaffer rasps out with raucous |
| humour. An armless pair of them flop wrestling, growling, in maimed |
| sodden playfight.)_ |
| |
| THE GAFFER: _(Crouches, his voice twisted in his snout)_ And when Cairns |
| came down from the scaffolding in Beaver street what was he after doing |
| it into only into the bucket of porter that was there waiting on the |
| shavings for Derwan's plasterers. |
| |
| THE LOITERERS: _(Guffaw with cleft palates)_ O jays! |
| |
| _(Their paintspeckled hats wag. Spattered with size and lime of their |
| lodges they frisk limblessly about him.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Coincidence too. They think it funny. Anything but that. Broad |
| daylight. Trying to walk. Lucky no woman. |
| |
| THE LOITERERS: Jays, that's a good one. Glauber salts. O jays, into the |
| men's porter. |
| |
| _(Bloom passes. Cheap whores, singly, coupled, shawled, dishevelled, |
| call from lanes, doors, corners.)_ |
| |
| THE WHORES: |
| |
| Are you going far, queer fellow? |
| How's your middle leg? |
| Got a match on you? |
| Eh, come here till I stiffen it for you. |
| |
| |
| _(He plodges through their sump towards the lighted street beyond. From |
| a bulge of window curtains a gramophone rears a battered brazen trunk. |
| In the shadow a shebeenkeeper haggles with the navvy and the two |
| redcoats.)_ |
| |
| THE NAVVY: _(Belching)_ Where's the bloody house? |
| |
| THE SHEBEENKEEPER: Purdon street. Shilling a bottle of stout. |
| Respectable woman. |
| |
| THE NAVVY: _(Gripping the two redcoats, staggers forward with them)_ |
| Come on, you British army! |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(Behind his back)_ He aint half balmy. |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: _(Laughs)_ What ho! |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(To the navvy)_ Portobello barracks canteen. You ask for |
| Carr. Just Carr. |
| |
| THE NAVVY: _(Shouts)_ |
| |
| We are the boys. Of Wexford. |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: Say! What price the sergeantmajor? |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: Bennett? He's my pal. I love old Bennett. |
| |
| THE NAVVY: _(Shouts)_ |
| |
| The galling chain. |
| And free our native land. |
| |
| _(He staggers forward, dragging them with him. Bloom stops, at fault. |
| The dog approaches, his tongue outlolling, panting)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Wildgoose chase this. Disorderly houses. Lord knows where they |
| are gone. Drunks cover distance double quick. Nice mixup. Scene at |
| Westland row. Then jump in first class with third ticket. Then too far. |
| Train with engine behind. Might have taken me to Malahide or a siding |
| for the night or collision. Second drink does it. Once is a dose. What |
| am I following him for? Still, he's the best of that lot. If I hadn't |
| heard about Mrs Beaufoy Purefoy I wouldn't have gone and wouldn't have |
| met. Kismet. He'll lose that cash. Relieving office here. Good biz for |
| cheapjacks, organs. What do ye lack? Soon got, soon gone. Might have |
| lost my life too with that mangongwheeltracktrolleyglarejuggernaut only |
| for presence of mind. Can't always save you, though. If I had passed |
| Truelock's window that day two minutes later would have been shot. |
| Absence of body. Still if bullet only went through my coat get damages |
| for shock, five hundred pounds. What was he? Kildare street club toff. |
| God help his gamekeeper. |
| |
| _(He gazes ahead, reading on the wall a scrawled chalk legend_ Wet Dream |
| _and a phallic design._) Odd! Molly drawing on the frosted carriagepane |
| at Kingstown. What's that like? _(Gaudy dollwomen loll in the lighted |
| doorways, in window embrasures, smoking birdseye cigarettes. The |
| odour of the sicksweet weed floats towards him in slow round ovalling |
| wreaths.)_ |
| |
| THE WREATHS: Sweet are the sweets. Sweets of sin. |
| |
| BLOOM: My spine's a bit limp. Go or turn? And this food? Eat it and get |
| all pigsticky. Absurd I am. Waste of money. One and eightpence too |
| much. _(The retriever drives a cold snivelling muzzle against his hand, |
| wagging his tail.)_ Strange how they take to me. Even that brute today. |
| Better speak to him first. Like women they like _rencontres._ Stinks |
| like a polecat. _Chacun son gout_. He might be mad. Dogdays. Uncertain |
| in his movements. Good fellow! Fido! Good fellow! Garryowen! _(The |
| wolfdog sprawls on his back, wriggling obscenely with begging paws, his |
| long black tongue lolling out.)_ Influence of his surroundings. Give |
| and have done with it. Provided nobody. _(Calling encouraging words he |
| shambles back with a furtive poacher's tread, dogged by the setter into |
| a dark stalestunk corner. He unrolls one parcel and goes to dump the |
| crubeen softly but holds back and feels the trotter.)_ Sizeable for |
| threepence. But then I have it in my left hand. Calls for more effort. |
| Why? Smaller from want of use. O, let it slide. Two and six. |
| |
| _(With regret he lets the unrolled crubeen and trotter slide. The |
| mastiff mauls the bundle clumsily and gluts himself with growling greed, |
| crunching the bones. Two raincaped watch approach, silent, vigilant. |
| They murmur together.)_ |
| |
| THE WATCH: Bloom. Of Bloom. For Bloom. Bloom. |
| |
| _(Each lays hand on Bloom's shoulder.)_ |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: Caught in the act. Commit no nuisance. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Stammers)_ I am doing good to others. |
| |
| _(A covey of gulls, storm petrels, rises hungrily from Liffey slime with |
| Banbury cakes in their beaks.)_ |
| |
| THE GULLS: Kaw kave kankury kake. |
| |
| BLOOM: The friend of man. Trained by kindness. |
| |
| _(He points. Bob Doran, toppling from a high barstool, sways over the |
| munching spaniel.)_ |
| |
| BOB DORAN: Towser. Give us the paw. Give the paw. |
| |
| _(The bulldog growls, his scruff standing, a gobbet of pig's knuckle |
| between his molars through which rabid scumspittle dribbles. Bob Doran |
| fills silently into an area.)_ |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: Prevention of cruelty to animals. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Enthusiastically)_ A noble work! I scolded that tramdriver on |
| Harold's cross bridge for illusing the poor horse with his harness scab. |
| Bad French I got for my pains. Of course it was frosty and the last |
| tram. All tales of circus life are highly demoralising. |
| |
| _(Signor Maffei, passionpale, in liontamer's costume with diamond studs |
| in his shirtfront, steps forward, holding a circus paperhoop, a |
| curling carriagewhip and a revolver with which he covers the gorging |
| boarhound.)_ |
| |
| SIGNOR MAFFEI: _(With a sinister smile)_ Ladies and gentlemen, my |
| educated greyhound. It was I broke in the bucking broncho Ajax with my |
| patent spiked saddle for carnivores. Lash under the belly with a knotted |
| thong. Block tackle and a strangling pulley will bring your lion to |
| heel, no matter how fractious, even _Leo ferox_ there, the Libyan |
| maneater. A redhot crowbar and some liniment rubbing on the burning part |
| produced Fritz of Amsterdam, the thinking hyena. _(He glares)_ I possess |
| the Indian sign. The glint of my eye does it with these breastsparklers. |
| _(With a bewitching smile)_ I now introduce Mademoiselle Ruby, the pride |
| of the ring. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: Come. Name and address. |
| |
| BLOOM: I have forgotten for the moment. Ah, yes! _(He takes off his high |
| grade hat, saluting)_ Dr Bloom, Leopold, dental surgeon. You have heard |
| of von Blum Pasha. Umpteen millions. _Donnerwetter!_ Owns half Austria. |
| Egypt. Cousin. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: Proof. |
| |
| _(A card falls from inside the leather headband of Bloom's hat.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In red fez, cadi's dress coat with broad green sash, wearing |
| a false badge of the Legion of Honour, picks up the card hastily and |
| offers it)_ Allow me. My club is the Junior Army and Navy. Solicitors: |
| Messrs John Henry Menton, 27 Bachelor's Walk. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: _(Reads)_ Henry Flower. No fixed abode. Unlawfully watching |
| and besetting. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: An alibi. You are cautioned. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Produces from his heartpocket a crumpled yellow flower)_ This |
| is the flower in question. It was given me by a man I don't know his |
| name. _(Plausibly)_ You know that old joke, rose of Castile. Bloom. The |
| change of name. Virag. _(He murmurs privately and confidentially)_ We |
| are engaged you see, sergeant. Lady in the case. Love entanglement. _(He |
| shoulders the second watch gently)_ Dash it all. It's a way we gallants |
| have in the navy. Uniform that does it. _(He turns gravely to the first |
| watch)_ Still, of course, you do get your Waterloo sometimes. Drop in |
| some evening and have a glass of old Burgundy. _(To the second watch |
| gaily)_ I'll introduce you, inspector. She's game. Do it in the shake of |
| a lamb's tail. |
| |
| _(A dark mercurialised face appears, leading a veiled figure.)_ |
| |
| THE DARK MERCURY: The Castle is looking for him. He was drummed out of |
| the army. |
| |
| MARTHA: _(Thickveiled, a crimson halter round her neck, a copy of |
| the_ Irish Times _in her hand, in tone of reproach, pointing)_ Henry! |
| Leopold! Lionel, thou lost one! Clear my name. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: _(Sternly)_ Come to the station. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Scared, hats himself, steps back, then, plucking at his heart |
| and lifting his right forearm on the square, he gives the sign and |
| dueguard of fellowcraft)_ No, no, worshipful master, light of love. |
| Mistaken identity. The Lyons mail. Lesurques and Dubosc. You remember |
| the Childs fratricide case. We medical men. By striking him dead with |
| a hatchet. I am wrongfully accused. Better one guilty escape than |
| ninetynine wrongfully condemned. |
| |
| MARTHA: _(Sobbing behind her veil)_ Breach of promise. My real name |
| is Peggy Griffin. He wrote to me that he was miserable. I'll tell my |
| brother, the Bective rugger fullback, on you, heartless flirt. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Behind his hand)_ She's drunk. The woman is inebriated. _(He |
| murmurs vaguely the pass of Ephraim)_ Shitbroleeth. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: _(Tears in his eyes, to Bloom)_ You ought to be thoroughly |
| well ashamed of yourself. |
| |
| BLOOM: Gentlemen of the jury, let me explain. A pure mare's nest. I am |
| a man misunderstood. I am being made a scapegoat of. I am a respectable |
| married man, without a stain on my character. I live in Eccles street. |
| My wife, I am the daughter of a most distinguished commander, a gallant |
| upstanding gentleman, what do you call him, Majorgeneral Brian Tweedy, |
| one of Britain's fighting men who helped to win our battles. Got his |
| majority for the heroic defence of Rorke's Drift. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: Regiment. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Turns to the gallery)_ The royal Dublins, boys, the salt of the |
| earth, known the world over. I think I see some old comrades in arms |
| up there among you. The R. D. F., with our own Metropolitan police, |
| guardians of our homes, the pluckiest lads and the finest body of men, |
| as physique, in the service of our sovereign. |
| |
| A VOICE: Turncoat! Up the Boers! Who booed Joe Chamberlain? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(His hand on the shoulder of the first watch)_ My old dad too |
| was a J. P. I'm as staunch a Britisher as you are, sir. I fought with |
| the colours for king and country in the absentminded war under general |
| Gough in the park and was disabled at Spion Kop and Bloemfontein, was |
| mentioned in dispatches. I did all a white man could. _(With quiet |
| feeling)_ Jim Bludso. Hold her nozzle again the bank. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: Profession or trade. |
| |
| BLOOM: Well, I follow a literary occupation, author-journalist. In fact |
| we are just bringing out a collection of prize stories of which I am the |
| inventor, something that is an entirely new departure. I am connected |
| with the British and Irish press. If you ring up... |
| |
| _(Myles Crawford strides out jerkily, a quill between his teeth. His |
| scarlet beak blazes within the aureole of his straw hat. He dangles |
| a hank of Spanish onions in one hand and holds with the other hand a |
| telephone receiver nozzle to his ear.)_ |
| |
| MYLES CRAWFORD: _(His cock's wattles wagging)_ Hello, seventyseven |
| eightfour. Hello. _Freeman's Urinal_ and _Weekly Arsewipe_ here. |
| Paralyse Europe. You which? Bluebags? Who writes? Is it Bloom? |
| |
| _(Mr Philip Beaufoy, palefaced, stands in the witnessbox, in accurate |
| morning dress, outbreast pocket with peak of handkerchief showing, |
| creased lavender trousers and patent boots. He carries a large portfolio |
| labelled_ Matcham's Masterstrokes.) |
| |
| BEAUFOY: _(Drawls)_ No, you aren't. Not by a long shot if I know it. |
| I don't see it that's all. No born gentleman, no-one with the most |
| rudimentary promptings of a gentleman would stoop to such particularly |
| loathsome conduct. One of those, my lord. A plagiarist. A soapy sneak |
| masquerading as a litterateur. It's perfectly obvious that with the most |
| inherent baseness he has cribbed some of my bestselling copy, really |
| gorgeous stuff, a perfect gem, the love passages in which are beneath |
| suspicion. The Beaufoy books of love and great possessions, with which |
| your lordship is doubtless familiar, are a household word throughout the |
| kingdom. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Murmurs with hangdog meekness glum)_ That bit about the |
| laughing witch hand in hand I take exception to, if I may... |
| |
| BEAUFOY: _(His lip upcurled, smiles superciliously on the court)_ You |
| funny ass, you! You're too beastly awfully weird for words! I don't |
| think you need over excessively disincommodate yourself in that regard. |
| My literary agent Mr J. B. Pinker is in attendance. I presume, my |
| lord, we shall receive the usual witnesses' fees, shan't we? We are |
| considerably out of pocket over this bally pressman johnny, this jackdaw |
| of Rheims, who has not even been to a university. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Indistinctly)_ University of life. Bad art. |
| |
| BEAUFOY: _(Shouts)_ It's a damnably foul lie, showing the moral |
| rottenness of the man! _(He extends his portfolio)_ We have here damning |
| evidence, the _corpus delicti_, my lord, a specimen of my maturer work |
| disfigured by the hallmark of the beast. |
| |
| A VOICE FROM THE GALLERY: |
| |
| Moses, Moses, king of the jews, Wiped his arse in the Daily News. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Bravely)_ Overdrawn. |
| |
| BEAUFOY: You low cad! You ought to be ducked in the horsepond, you |
| rotter! _(To the court)_ Why, look at the man's private life! Leading |
| a quadruple existence! Street angel and house devil. Not fit to be |
| mentioned in mixed society! The archconspirator of the age! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(To the court)_ And he, a bachelor, how... |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: The King versus Bloom. Call the woman Driscoll. |
| |
| THE CRIER: Mary Driscoll, scullerymaid! |
| |
| _(Mary Driscoll, a slipshod servant girl, approaches. She has a bucket |
| on the crook of her arm and a scouringbrush in her hand.)_ |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: Another! Are you of the unfortunate class? |
| |
| MARY DRISCOLL: _(Indignantly)_ I'm not a bad one. I bear a respectable |
| character and was four months in my last place. I was in a situation, |
| six pounds a year and my chances with Fridays out and I had to leave |
| owing to his carryings on. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: What do you tax him with? |
| |
| MARY DRISCOLL: He made a certain suggestion but I thought more of myself |
| as poor as I am. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In housejacket of ripplecloth, flannel trousers, heelless |
| slippers, unshaven, his hair rumpled: softly)_ I treated you white. |
| I gave you mementos, smart emerald garters far above your station. |
| Incautiously I took your part when you were accused of pilfering. |
| There's a medium in all things. Play cricket. |
| |
| MARY DRISCOLL: _(Excitedly)_ As God is looking down on me this night if |
| ever I laid a hand to them oysters! |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: The offence complained of? Did something happen? |
| |
| MARY DRISCOLL: He surprised me in the rere of the premises, Your honour, |
| when the missus was out shopping one morning with a request for a safety |
| pin. He held me and I was discoloured in four places as a result. And he |
| interfered twict with my clothing. |
| |
| BLOOM: She counterassaulted. |
| |
| MARY DRISCOLL: _(Scornfully)_ I had more respect for the scouringbrush, |
| so I had. I remonstrated with him, Your lord, and he remarked: keep it |
| quiet. |
| |
| _(General laughter.)_ |
| |
| GEORGE FOTTRELL: _(Clerk of the crown and peace, resonantly)_ Order in |
| court! The accused will now make a bogus statement. |
| |
| _(Bloom, pleading not guilty and holding a fullblown waterlily, begins |
| a long unintelligible speech. They would hear what counsel had to say in |
| his stirring address to the grand jury. He was down and out but, though |
| branded as a black sheep, if he might say so, he meant to reform, to |
| retrieve the memory of the past in a purely sisterly way and return to |
| nature as a purely domestic animal. A sevenmonths' child, he had been |
| carefully brought up and nurtured by an aged bedridden parent. There |
| might have been lapses of an erring father but he wanted to turn over |
| a new leaf and now, when at long last in sight of the whipping post, |
| to lead a homely life in the evening of his days, permeated by the |
| affectionate surroundings of the heaving bosom of the family. An |
| acclimatised Britisher, he had seen that summer eve from the footplate |
| of an engine cab of the Loop line railway company while the rain |
| refrained from falling glimpses, as it were, through the windows of |
| loveful households in Dublin city and urban district of scenes truly |
| rural of happiness of the better land with Dockrell's wallpaper at one |
| and ninepence a dozen, innocent Britishborn bairns lisping prayers to |
| the Sacred Infant, youthful scholars grappling with their pensums or |
| model young ladies playing on the pianoforte or anon all with fervour |
| reciting the family rosary round the crackling Yulelog while in the |
| boreens and green lanes the colleens with their swains strolled what |
| times the strains of the organtoned melodeon Britannia metalbound with |
| four acting stops and twelvefold bellows, a sacrifice, greatest bargain |
| ever..._ |
| |
| _(Renewed laughter. He mumbles incoherently. Reporters complain that |
| they cannot hear.)_ |
| |
| LONGHAND AND SHORTHAND: _(Without looking up from their notebooks)_ |
| Loosen his boots. |
| |
| PROFESSOR MACHUGH: _(From the presstable, coughs and calls)_ Cough it |
| up, man. Get it out in bits. |
| |
| _(The crossexamination proceeds re Bloom and the bucket. A large bucket. |
| Bloom himself. Bowel trouble. In Beaver street Gripe, yes. Quite bad. |
| A plasterer's bucket. By walking stifflegged. Suffered untold misery. |
| Deadly agony. About noon. Love or burgundy. Yes, some spinach. Crucial |
| moment. He did not look in the bucket Nobody. Rather a mess. Not |
| completely._ A Titbits _back number_.) |
| |
| _(Uproar and catcalls. Bloom in a torn frockcoat stained with whitewash, |
| dinged silk hat sideways on his head, a strip of stickingplaster across |
| his nose, talks inaudibly.)_ |
| |
| J. J. O'MOLLOY: _(In barrister's grey wig and stuffgown, speaking with |
| a voice of pained protest)_ This is no place for indecent levity at |
| the expense of an erring mortal disguised in liquor. We are not in a |
| beargarden nor at an Oxford rag nor is this a travesty of justice. My |
| client is an infant, a poor foreign immigrant who started scratch as |
| a stowaway and is now trying to turn an honest penny. The trumped up |
| misdemeanour was due to a momentary aberration of heredity, brought on |
| by hallucination, such familiarities as the alleged guilty occurrence |
| being quite permitted in my client's native place, the land of the |
| Pharaoh. _Prima facie_, I put it to you that there was no attempt at |
| carnally knowing. Intimacy did not occur and the offence complained of |
| by Driscoll, that her virtue was solicited, was not repeated. I would |
| deal in especial with atavism. There have been cases of shipwreck and |
| somnambulism in my client's family. If the accused could speak he could |
| a tale unfold--one of the strangest that have ever been narrated between |
| the covers of a book. He himself, my lord, is a physical wreck from |
| cobbler's weak chest. His submission is that he is of Mongolian |
| extraction and irresponsible for his actions. Not all there, in fact. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Barefoot, pigeonbreasted, in lascar's vest and trousers, |
| apologetic toes turned in, opens his tiny mole's eyes and looks about |
| him dazedly, passing a slow hand across his forehead. Then he hitches |
| his belt sailor fashion and with a shrug of oriental obeisance salutes |
| the court, pointing one thumb heavenward.)_ Him makee velly muchee fine |
| night. _(He begins to lilt simply)_ |
| |
| Li li poo lil chile |
| Blingee pigfoot evly night |
| Payee two shilly... |
| |
| _(He is howled down.)_ |
| |
| J. J. O'MOLLOY: _(Hotly to the populace)_ This is a lonehand fight. By |
| Hades, I will not have any client of mine gagged and badgered in this |
| fashion by a pack of curs and laughing hyenas. The Mosaic code has |
| superseded the law of the jungle. I say it and I say it emphatically, |
| without wishing for one moment to defeat the ends of justice, accused |
| was not accessory before the act and prosecutrix has not been tampered |
| with. The young person was treated by defendant as if she were his very |
| own daughter. _(Bloom takes J. J. O'Molloy's hand and raises it to his |
| lips.)_ I shall call rebutting evidence to prove up to the hilt that the |
| hidden hand is again at its old game. When in doubt persecute Bloom. My |
| client, an innately bashful man, would be the last man in the world to |
| do anything ungentlemanly which injured modesty could object to or |
| cast a stone at a girl who took the wrong turning when some dastard, |
| responsible for her condition, had worked his own sweet will on her. He |
| wants to go straight. I regard him as the whitest man I know. He is down |
| on his luck at present owing to the mortgaging of his extensive property |
| at Agendath Netaim in faraway Asia Minor, slides of which will now be |
| shown. _(To Bloom)_ I suggest that you will do the handsome thing. |
| |
| BLOOM: A penny in the pound. |
| |
| _(The image of the lake of Kinnereth with blurred cattle cropping in |
| silver haze is projected on the wall. Moses Dlugacz, ferreteyed albino, |
| in blue dungarees, stands up in the gallery, holding in each hand an |
| orange citron and a pork kidney.)_ |
| |
| DLUGACZ: _(Hoarsely)_ Bleibtreustrasse, Berlin, W.13. |
| |
| _(J. J. O'Molloy steps on to a low plinth and holds the lapel of his |
| coat with solemnity. His face lengthens, grows pale and bearded, with |
| sunken eyes, the blotches of phthisis and hectic cheekbones of John F. |
| Taylor. He applies his handkerchief to his mouth and scrutinises the |
| galloping tide of rosepink blood.)_ |
| |
| J.J.O'MOLLOY: _(Almost voicelessly)_ Excuse me. I am suffering from a |
| severe chill, have recently come from a sickbed. A few wellchosen words. |
| _(He assumes the avine head, foxy moustache and proboscidal eloquence of |
| Seymour Bushe.)_ When the angel's book comes to be opened if aught |
| that the pensive bosom has inaugurated of soultransfigured and of |
| soultransfiguring deserves to live I say accord the prisoner at the bar |
| the sacred benefit of the doubt. _(A paper with something written on it |
| is handed into court._) |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In court dress)_ Can give best references. Messrs Callan, |
| Coleman. Mr Wisdom Hely J. P. My old chief Joe Cuffe. Mr V. B. Dillon, |
| ex lord mayor of Dublin. I have moved in the charmed circle of the |
| highest... Queens of Dublin society. _(Carelessly)_ I was just chatting |
| this afternoon at the viceregal lodge to my old pals, sir Robert and |
| lady Ball, astronomer royal at the levee. Sir Bob, I said... |
| |
| MRS YELVERTON BARRY: _(In lowcorsaged opal balldress and elbowlength |
| ivory gloves, wearing a sabletrimmed brickquilted dolman, a comb of |
| brilliants and panache of osprey in her hair)_ Arrest him, constable. He |
| wrote me an anonymous letter in prentice backhand when my husband was |
| in the North Riding of Tipperary on the Munster circuit, signed James |
| Lovebirch. He said that he had seen from the gods my peerless globes as |
| I sat in a box of the _Theatre Royal_ at a command performance of _La |
| Cigale_. I deeply inflamed him, he said. He made improper overtures |
| to me to misconduct myself at half past four p.m. on the following |
| Thursday, Dunsink time. He offered to send me through the post a work |
| of fiction by Monsieur Paul de Kock, entitled _The Girl with the Three |
| Pairs of Stays_. |
| |
| MRS BELLINGHAM: _(In cap and seal coney mantle, wrapped up to the |
| nose, steps out of her brougham and scans through tortoiseshell |
| quizzing-glasses which she takes from inside her huge opossum muff)_ |
| Also to me. Yes, I believe it is the same objectionable person. Because |
| he closed my carriage door outside sir Thornley Stoker's one sleety day |
| during the cold snap of February ninetythree when even the grid of the |
| wastepipe and the ballstop in my bath cistern were frozen. Subsequently |
| he enclosed a bloom of edelweiss culled on the heights, as he said, |
| in my honour. I had it examined by a botanical expert and elicited the |
| information that it was ablossom of the homegrown potato plant purloined |
| from a forcingcase of the model farm. |
| |
| MRS YELVERTON BARRY: Shame on him! |
| |
| _(A crowd of sluts and ragamuffins surges forward)_ |
| |
| THE SLUTS AND RAGAMUFFINS: _(Screaming)_ Stop thief! Hurrah there, |
| Bluebeard! Three cheers for Ikey Mo! |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: _(Produces handcuffs)_ Here are the darbies. |
| |
| MRS BELLINGHAM: He addressed me in several handwritings with fulsome |
| compliments as a Venus in furs and alleged profound pity for my |
| frostbound coachman Palmer while in the same breath he expressed himself |
| as envious of his earflaps and fleecy sheepskins and of his fortunate |
| proximity to my person, when standing behind my chair wearing my livery |
| and the armorial bearings of the Bellingham escutcheon garnished sable, |
| a buck's head couped or. He lauded almost extravagantly my nether |
| extremities, my swelling calves in silk hose drawn up to the limit, and |
| eulogised glowingly my other hidden treasures in priceless lace which, |
| he said, he could conjure up. He urged me (stating that he felt it |
| his mission in life to urge me) to defile the marriage bed, to commit |
| adultery at the earliest possible opportunity. |
| |
| THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: _(In amazon costume, hard hat, |
| jackboots cockspurred, vermilion waistcoat, fawn musketeer gauntlets |
| with braided drums, long train held up and hunting crop with which she |
| strikes her welt constantly)_ Also me. Because he saw me on the polo |
| ground of the Phoenix park at the match All Ireland versus the Rest of |
| Ireland. My eyes, I know, shone divinely as I watched Captain Slogger |
| Dennehy of the Inniskillings win the final chukkar on his darling cob |
| _Centaur._ This plebeian Don Juan observed me from behind a hackney car |
| and sent me in double envelopes an obscene photograph, such as are sold |
| after dark on Paris boulevards, insulting to any lady. I have it still. |
| It represents a partially nude señorita, frail and lovely (his wife, as |
| he solemnly assured me, taken by him from nature), practising illicit |
| intercourse with a muscular torero, evidently a blackguard. He urged me |
| to do likewise, to misbehave, to sin with officers of the garrison. He |
| implored me to soil his letter in an unspeakable manner, to chastise |
| him as he richly deserves, to bestride and ride him, to give him a most |
| vicious horsewhipping. |
| |
| MRS BELLINGHAM: Me too. |
| |
| MRS YELVERTON BARRY: Me too. |
| |
| _(Several highly respectable Dublin ladies hold up improper letters |
| received from Bloom.)_ |
| |
| THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: _(Stamps her jingling spurs in a |
| sudden paroxysm of fury)_ I will, by the God above me. I'll scourge the |
| pigeonlivered cur as long as I can stand over him. I'll flay him alive. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(His eyes closing, quails expectantly)_ Here? _(He squirms)_ |
| Again! _(He pants cringing)_ I love the danger. |
| |
| THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: Very much so! I'll make it hot for |
| you. I'll make you dance Jack Latten for that. |
| |
| MRS BELLINGHAM: Tan his breech well, the upstart! Write the stars and |
| stripes on it! |
| |
| MRS YELVERTON BARRY: Disgraceful! There's no excuse for him! A married |
| man! |
| |
| BLOOM: All these people. I meant only the spanking idea. A warm tingling |
| glow without effusion. Refined birching to stimulate the circulation. |
| |
| THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: _(Laughs derisively)_ O, did you, my |
| fine fellow? Well, by the living God, you'll get the surprise of your |
| life now, believe me, the most unmerciful hiding a man ever bargained |
| for. You have lashed the dormant tigress in my nature into fury. |
| |
| MRS BELLINGHAM: _(Shakes her muff and quizzing-glasses vindictively)_ |
| Make him smart, Hanna dear. Give him ginger. Thrash the mongrel within |
| an inch of his life. The cat-o'-nine-tails. Geld him. Vivisect him. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Shuddering, shrinking, joins his hands: with hangdog mien)_ O |
| cold! O shivery! It was your ambrosial beauty. Forget, forgive. Kismet. |
| Let me off this once. _(He offers the other cheek)_ |
| |
| MRS YELVERTON BARRY: _(Severely)_ Don't do so on any account, Mrs |
| Talboys! He should be soundly trounced! |
| |
| THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: _(Unbuttoning her gauntlet |
| violently)_ I'll do no such thing. Pigdog and always was ever since |
| he was pupped! To dare address me! I'll flog him black and blue in |
| the public streets. I'll dig my spurs in him up to the rowel. He is a |
| wellknown cuckold. _(She swishes her huntingcrop savagely in the air)_ |
| Take down his trousers without loss of time. Come here, sir! Quick! |
| Ready? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Trembling, beginning to obey)_ The weather has been so warm. |
| |
| _(Davy Stephens, ringletted, passes with a bevy of barefoot newsboys.)_ |
| |
| DAVY STEPHENS: _Messenger of the Sacred Heart and Evening Telegraph_ |
| with Saint Patrick's Day supplement. Containing the new addresses of all |
| the cuckolds in Dublin. |
| |
| _(The very reverend Canon O'Hanlon in cloth of gold cope elevates and |
| exposes a marble timepiece. Before him Father Conroy and the reverend |
| John Hughes S.J. bend low.)_ |
| |
| THE TIMEPIECE: _(Unportalling)_ |
| |
| Cuckoo. |
| Cuckoo. |
| Cuckoo. |
| |
| _(The brass quoits of a bed are heard to jingle.)_ |
| |
| THE QUOITS: Jigjag. Jigajiga. Jigjag. |
| |
| _(A panel of fog rolls back rapidly, revealing rapidly in the jurybox |
| the faces of Martin Cunningham, foreman, silkhatted, Jack Power, Simon |
| Dedalus, Tom Kernan, Ned Lambert, John Henry Menton Myles Crawford, |
| Lenehan, Paddy Leonard, Nosey Flynn, M'Coy and the featureless face of a |
| Nameless One.)_ |
| |
| THE NAMELESS ONE: Bareback riding. Weight for age. Gob, he organised |
| her. |
| |
| THE JURORS: _(All their heads turned to his voice)_ Really? |
| |
| THE NAMELESS ONE: _(Snarls)_ Arse over tip. Hundred shillings to five. |
| |
| THE JURORS: _(All their heads lowered in assent)_ Most of us thought as |
| much. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: He is a marked man. Another girl's plait cut. Wanted: Jack |
| the Ripper. A thousand pounds reward. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: _(Awed, whispers)_ And in black. A mormon. Anarchist. |
| |
| THE CRIER: _(Loudly)_ Whereas Leopold Bloom of no fixed abode is a |
| wellknown dynamitard, forger, bigamist, bawd and cuckold and a public |
| nuisance to the citizens of Dublin and whereas at this commission of |
| assizes the most honourable... |
| |
| _(His Honour, sir Frederick Falkiner, recorder of Dublin, in judicial |
| garb of grey stone rises from the bench, stonebearded. He bears in his |
| arms an umbrella sceptre. From his forehead arise starkly the Mosaic |
| ramshorns.)_ |
| |
| THE RECORDER: I will put an end to this white slave traffic and rid |
| Dublin of this odious pest. Scandalous! _(He dons the black cap)_ Let |
| him be taken, Mr Subsheriff, from the dock where he now stands and |
| detained in custody in Mountjoy prison during His Majesty's pleasure |
| and there be hanged by the neck until he is dead and therein fail not |
| at your peril or may the Lord have mercy on your soul. Remove him. _(A |
| black skullcap descends upon his head.)_ |
| |
| _(The subsheriff Long John Fanning appears, smoking a pungent Henry |
| Clay.)_ |
| |
| LONG JOHN FANNING: _(Scowls and calls with rich rolling utterance)_ |
| Who'll hang Judas Iscariot? |
| |
| _(H. Rumbold, master barber, in a bloodcoloured jerkin and tanner's |
| apron, a rope coiled over his shoulder, mounts the block. A life |
| preserver and a nailstudded bludgeon are stuck in his belt. He rubs |
| grimly his grappling hands, knobbed with knuckledusters.)_ |
| |
| RUMBOLD: _(To the recorder with sinister familiarity)_ Hanging Harry, |
| your Majesty, the Mersey terror. Five guineas a jugular. Neck or |
| nothing. |
| |
| _(The bells of George's church toll slowly, loud dark iron.)_ |
| |
| THE BELLS: Heigho! Heigho! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Desperately)_ Wait. Stop. Gulls. Good heart. I saw. Innocence. |
| Girl in the monkeyhouse. Zoo. Lewd chimpanzee. _(Breathlessly)_ Pelvic |
| basin. Her artless blush unmanned me. _(Overcome with emotion)_ I left |
| the precincts. (He turns to a figure in the crowd, appealing) Hynes, may |
| I speak to you? You know me. That three shillings you can keep. If you |
| want a little more... |
| |
| HYNES: _(Coldly)_ You are a perfect stranger. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: _(Points to the corner)_ The bomb is here. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: Infernal machine with a time fuse. |
| |
| BLOOM: No, no. Pig's feet. I was at a funeral. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: _(Draws his truncheon)_ Liar! |
| |
| _(The beagle lifts his snout, showing the grey scorbutic face of Paddy |
| Dignam. He has gnawed all. He exhales a putrid carcasefed breath. |
| He grows to human size and shape. His dachshund coat becomes a brown |
| mortuary habit. His green eye flashes bloodshot. Half of one ear, all |
| the nose and both thumbs are ghouleaten.)_ |
| |
| PADDY DIGNAM: _(In a hollow voice)_ It is true. It was my funeral. |
| Doctor Finucane pronounced life extinct when I succumbed to the disease |
| from natural causes. |
| |
| _(He lifts his mutilated ashen face moonwards and bays lugubriously.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In triumph)_ You hear? |
| |
| PADDY DIGNAM: Bloom, I am Paddy Dignam's spirit. List, list, O list! |
| |
| BLOOM: The voice is the voice of Esau. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: _(Blesses himself)_ How is that possible? |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: It is not in the penny catechism. |
| |
| PADDY DIGNAM: By metempsychosis. Spooks. |
| |
| A VOICE: O rocks. |
| |
| PADDY DIGNAM: _(Earnestly)_ Once I was in the employ of Mr J. H. Menton, |
| solicitor, commissioner for oaths and affidavits, of 27 Bachelor's Walk. |
| Now I am defunct, the wall of the heart hypertrophied. Hard lines. The |
| poor wife was awfully cut up. How is she bearing it? Keep her off that |
| bottle of sherry. _(He looks round him)_ A lamp. I must satisfy an |
| animal need. That buttermilk didn't agree with me. |
| |
| _(The portly figure of John O'Connell, caretaker, stands forth, holding |
| a bunch of keys tied with crape. Beside him stands Father Coffey, |
| chaplain, toadbellied, wrynecked, in a surplice and bandanna nightcap, |
| holding sleepily a staff twisted poppies.)_ |
| |
| FATHER COFFEY: _(Yawns, then chants with a hoarse croak)_ Namine. |
| Jacobs. Vobiscuits. Amen. |
| |
| JOHN O'CONNELL: _(Foghorns stormily through his megaphone)_ Dignam, |
| Patrick T, deceased. |
| |
| PADDY DIGNAM: _(With pricked up ears, winces)_ Overtones. _(He wriggles |
| forward and places an ear to the ground)_ My master's voice! |
| |
| JOHN O'CONNELL: Burial docket letter number U. P. eightyfive thousand. |
| Field seventeen. House of Keys. Plot, one hundred and one. |
| |
| _(Paddy Dignam listens with visible effort, thinking, his tail |
| stiffpointcd, his ears cocked.)_ |
| |
| PADDY DIGNAM: Pray for the repose of his soul. |
| |
| _(He worms down through a coalhole, his brown habit trailing its tether |
| over rattling pebbles. After him toddles an obese grandfather rat on |
| fungus turtle paws under a grey carapace. Dignam's voice, muffled, is |
| heard baying under ground:_ Dignam's dead and gone below. _Tom Rochford, |
| robinredbreasted, in cap and breeches, jumps from his twocolumned |
| machine.)_ |
| |
| TOM ROCHFORD: _(A hand to his breastbone, bows)_ Reuben J. A florin I |
| find him. _(He fixes the manhole with a resolute stare)_ My turn now on. |
| Follow me up to Carlow. |
| |
| _(He executes a daredevil salmon leap in the air and is engulfed in the |
| coalhole. Two discs on the columns wobble, eyes of nought. All recedes. |
| Bloom plodges forward again through the sump. Kisses chirp amid |
| the rifts of fog a piano sounds. He stands before a lighted house, |
| listening. The kisses, winging from their bowers fly about him, |
| twittering, warbling, cooing.)_ |
| |
| THE KISSES: _(Warbling)_ Leo! _(Twittering)_ Icky licky micky sticky for |
| Leo! _(Cooing)_ Coo coocoo! Yummyyum, Womwom! _(Warbling)_ Big comebig! |
| Pirouette! Leopopold! _(Twittering)_ Leeolee! _(Warbling)_ O Leo! |
| |
| _(They rustle, flutter upon his garments, alight, bright giddy flecks, |
| silvery sequins.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: A man's touch. Sad music. Church music. Perhaps here. |
| |
| _(Zoe Higgins, a young whore in a sapphire slip, closed with three |
| bronze buckles, a slim black velvet fillet round her throat, nods, trips |
| down the steps and accosts him.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: Are you looking for someone? He's inside with his friend. |
| |
| BLOOM: Is this Mrs Mack's? |
| |
| ZOE: No, eightyone. Mrs Cohen's. You might go farther and fare worse. |
| Mother Slipperslapper. _(Familiarly)_ She's on the job herself tonight |
| with the vet her tipster that gives her all the winners and pays for |
| her son in Oxford. Working overtime but her luck's turned today. |
| _(Suspiciously)_ You're not his father, are you? |
| |
| BLOOM: Not I! |
| |
| ZOE: You both in black. Has little mousey any tickles tonight? |
| |
| _(His skin, alert, feels her fingertips approach. A hand glides over his |
| left thigh.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: How's the nuts? |
| |
| BLOOM: Off side. Curiously they are on the right. Heavier, I suppose. |
| One in a million my tailor, Mesias, says. |
| |
| ZOE: _(In sudden alarm)_ You've a hard chancre. |
| |
| BLOOM: Not likely. |
| |
| ZOE: I feel it. |
| |
| _(Her hand slides into his left trouser pocket and brings out a hard |
| black shrivelled potato. She regards it and Bloom with dumb moist |
| lips.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: A talisman. Heirloom. |
| |
| ZOE: For Zoe? For keeps? For being so nice, eh? |
| |
| _(She puts the potato greedily into a pocket then links his arm, |
| cuddling him with supple warmth. He smiles uneasily. Slowly, note by |
| note, oriental music is played. He gazes in the tawny crystal of her |
| eyes, ringed with kohol. His smile softens.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: You'll know me the next time. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Forlornly)_ I never loved a dear gazelle but it was sure to... |
| |
| _(Gazelles are leaping, feeding on the mountains. Near are lakes. Round |
| their shores file shadows black of cedargroves. Aroma rises, a strong |
| hairgrowth of resin. It burns, the orient, a sky of sapphire, cleft by |
| the bronze flight of eagles. Under it lies the womancity nude, white, |
| still, cool, in luxury. A fountain murmurs among damask roses. Mammoth |
| roses murmur of scarlet winegrapes. A wine of shame, lust, blood exudes, |
| strangely murmuring.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: _(Murmuring singsong with the music, her odalisk lips lusciously |
| smeared with salve of swinefat and rosewater) Schorach ani wenowach, |
| benoith Hierushaloim._ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Fascinated)_ I thought you were of good stock by your accent. |
| |
| ZOE: And you know what thought did? |
| |
| _(She bites his ear gently with little goldstopped teeth, sending on |
| him a cloying breath of stale garlic. The roses draw apart, disclose a |
| sepulchre of the gold of kings and their mouldering bones.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Draws back, mechanically caressing her right bub with a flat |
| awkward hand)_ Are you a Dublin girl? |
| |
| ZOE: _(Catches a stray hair deftly and twists it to her coil)_ No bloody |
| fear. I'm English. Have you a swaggerroot? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(As before)_ Rarely smoke, dear. Cigar now and then. Childish |
| device. _(Lewdly)_ The mouth can be better engaged than with a cylinder |
| of rank weed. |
| |
| ZOE: Go on. Make a stump speech out of it. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In workman's corduroy overalls, black gansy with red floating |
| tie and apache cap)_ Mankind is incorrigible. Sir Walter Ralegh brought |
| from the new world that potato and that weed, the one a killer of |
| pestilence by absorption, the other a poisoner of the ear, eye, heart, |
| memory, will understanding, all. That is to say he brought the poison |
| a hundred years before another person whose name I forget brought the |
| food. Suicide. Lies. All our habits. Why, look at our public life! |
| |
| _(Midnight chimes from distant steeples.)_ |
| |
| THE CHIMES: Turn again, Leopold! Lord mayor of Dublin! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In alderman's gown and chain)_ Electors of Arran Quay, Inns |
| Quay, Rotunda, Mountjoy and North Dock, better run a tramline, I say, |
| from the cattlemarket to the river. That's the music of the future. |
| That's my programme. _Cui bono_? But our bucaneering Vanderdeckens in |
| their phantom ship of finance... |
| |
| AN ELECTOR: Three times three for our future chief magistrate! |
| |
| _(The aurora borealis of the torchlight procession leaps.)_ |
| |
| THE TORCHBEARERS: Hooray! |
| |
| _(Several wellknown burgesses, city magnates and freemen of the city |
| shake hands with Bloom and congratulate him. Timothy Harrington, late |
| thrice Lord Mayor of Dublin, imposing in mayoral scarlet, gold chain and |
| white silk tie, confers with councillor Lorcan Sherlock, locum tenens. |
| They nod vigorously in agreement.)_ |
| |
| LATE LORD MAYOR HARRINGTON: _(In scarlet robe with mace, gold mayoral |
| chain and large white silk scarf)_ That alderman sir Leo Bloom's speech |
| be printed at the expense of the ratepayers. That the house in which |
| he was born be ornamented with a commemorative tablet and that the |
| thoroughfare hitherto known as Cow Parlour off Cork street be henceforth |
| designated Boulevard Bloom. |
| |
| COUNCILLOR LORCAN SHERLOCK: Carried unanimously. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Impassionedly)_ These flying Dutchmen or lying Dutchmen as |
| they recline in their upholstered poop, casting dice, what reck they? |
| Machines is their cry, their chimera, their panacea. Laboursaving |
| apparatuses, supplanters, bugbears, manufactured monsters for mutual |
| murder, hideous hobgoblins produced by a horde of capitalistic lusts |
| upon our prostituted labour. The poor man starves while they are |
| grassing their royal mountain stags or shooting peasants and phartridges |
| in their purblind pomp of pelf and power. But their reign is rover for |
| rever and ever and ev... |
| |
| _(Prolonged applause. Venetian masts, maypoles and festal arches spring |
| up. A streamer bearing the legends_ Cead Mile Failte _and_ Mah Ttob |
| Melek Israel _Spans the street. All the windows are thronged with |
| sightseers, chiefly ladies. Along the route the regiments of the |
| royal Dublin Fusiliers, the King's own Scottish Borderers, the Cameron |
| Highlanders and the Welsh Fusiliers standing to attention, keep back |
| the crowd. Boys from High school are perched on the lampposts, |
| telegraph poles, windowsills, cornices, gutters, chimneypots, railings, |
| rainspouts, whistling and cheering the pillar of the cloud appears. A |
| fife and drum band is heard in the distance playing the Kol Nidre. The |
| beaters approach with imperial eagles hoisted, trailing banners and |
| waving oriental palms. The chryselephantine papal standard rises high, |
| surrounded by pennons of the civic flag. The van of the procession |
| appears headed by John Howard Parnell, city marshal, in a chessboard |
| tabard, the Athlone Poursuivant and Ulster King of Arms. They are |
| followed by the Right Honourable Joseph Hutchinson, lord mayor of |
| Dublin, his lordship the lord mayor of Cork, their worships the |
| mayors of Limerick, Galway, Sligo and Waterford, twentyeight Irish |
| representative peers, sirdars, grandees and maharajahs bearing the cloth |
| of estate, the Dublin Metropolitan Fire Brigade, the chapter of the |
| saints of finance in their plutocratic order of precedence, the bishop |
| of Down and Connor, His Eminence Michael cardinal Logue, archbishop of |
| Armagh, primate of all Ireland, His Grace, the most reverend Dr William |
| Alexander, archbishop of Armagh, primate of all Ireland, the chief |
| rabbi, the presbyterian moderator, the heads of the baptist, anabaptist, |
| methodist and Moravian chapels and the honorary secretary of the society |
| of friends. After them march the guilds and trades and trainbands |
| with flying colours: coopers, bird fanciers, millwrights, newspaper |
| canvassers, law scriveners, masseurs, vintners, trussmakers, |
| chimneysweeps, lard refiners, tabinet and poplin weavers, farriers, |
| Italian warehousemen, church decorators, bootjack manufacturers, |
| undertakers, silk mercers, lapidaries, salesmasters, corkcutters, |
| assessors of fire losses, dyers and cleaners, export bottlers, |
| fellmongers, ticketwriters, heraldic seal engravers, horse repository |
| hands, bullion brokers, cricket and archery outfitters, riddlemakers, |
| egg and potato factors, hosiers and glovers, plumbing contractors. After |
| them march gentlemen of the bedchamber, Black Rod, Deputy Garter, |
| Gold Stick, the master of horse, the lord great chamberlain, the earl |
| marshal, the high constable carrying the sword of state, saint Stephen's |
| iron crown, the chalice and bible. Four buglers on foot blow a sennet. |
| Beefeaters reply, winding clarions of welcome. Under an arch of triumph |
| Bloom appears, bareheaded, in a crimson velvet mantle trimmed with |
| ermine, bearing Saint Edward's staff the orb and sceptre with the dove, |
| the curtana. He is seated on a milkwhite horse with long flowing crimson |
| tail, richly caparisoned, with golden headstall. Wild excitement. The |
| ladies from their balconies throw down rosepetals. The air is perfumed |
| with essences. The men cheer. Bloom's boys run amid the bystanders with |
| branches of hawthorn and wrenbushes.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM'S BOYS: |
| |
| The wren, the wren, |
| The king of all birds, |
| Saint Stephen's his day |
| Was caught in the furze. |
| |
| |
| A BLACKSMITH: _(Murmurs)_ For the honour of God! And is that Bloom? He |
| scarcely looks thirtyone. |
| |
| A PAVIOR AND FLAGGER: That's the famous Bloom now, the world's greatest |
| reformer. Hats off! |
| |
| _(All uncover their heads. Women whisper eagerly.)_ |
| |
| A MILLIONAIRESS: _(Richly)_ Isn't he simply wonderful? |
| |
| A NOBLEWOMAN: _(Nobly)_ All that man has seen! |
| |
| A FEMINIST: _(Masculinely)_ And done! |
| |
| A BELLHANGER: A classic face! He has the forehead of a thinker. |
| |
| _(Bloom's weather. A sunburst appears in the northwest.)_ |
| |
| THE BISHOP OF DOWN AND CONNOR: I here present your undoubted |
| emperor-president and king-chairman, the most serene and potent and very |
| puissant ruler of this realm. God save Leopold the First! |
| |
| ALL: God save Leopold the First! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In dalmatic and purple mantle, to the bishop of Down and |
| Connor, with dignity)_ Thanks, somewhat eminent sir. |
| |
| WILLIAM, ARCHBISHOP OF ARMAGH: _(In purple stock and shovel hat)_ |
| Will you to your power cause law and mercy to be executed in all your |
| judgments in Ireland and territories thereunto belonging? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Placing his right hand on his testicles, swears)_ So may the |
| Creator deal with me. All this I promise to do. |
| |
| MICHAEL, ARCHBISHOP OF ARMAGH: _(Pours a cruse of hairoil over Bloom's |
| head) Gaudium magnum annuntio vobis. Habemus carneficem._ Leopold, |
| Patrick, Andrew, David, George, be thou anointed! |
| |
| _(Bloom assumes a mantle of cloth of gold and puts on a ruby ring. He |
| ascends and stands on the stone of destiny. The representative peers put |
| on at the same time their twentyeight crowns. Joybells ring in Christ |
| church, Saint Patrick's, George's and gay Malahide. Mirus bazaar |
| fireworks go up from all sides with symbolical phallopyrotechnic |
| designs. The peers do homage, one by one, approaching and |
| genuflecting.)_ |
| |
| THE PEERS: I do become your liege man of life and limb to earthly |
| worship. |
| |
| _(Bloom holds up his right hand on which sparkles the Koh-i-Noor |
| diamond. His palfrey neighs. Immediate silence. Wireless |
| intercontinental and interplanetary transmitters are set for reception |
| of message.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: My subjects! We hereby nominate our faithful charger Copula Felix |
| hereditary Grand Vizier and announce that we have this day repudiated |
| our former spouse and have bestowed our royal hand upon the princess |
| Selene, the splendour of night. |
| |
| _(The former morganatic spouse of Bloom is hastily removed in the Black |
| Maria. The princess Selene, in moonblue robes, a silver crescent on her |
| head, descends from a Sedan chair, borne by two giants. An outburst of |
| cheering.)_ |
| |
| JOHN HOWARD PARNELL: _(Raises the royal standard)_ Illustrious Bloom! |
| Successor to my famous brother! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Embraces John Howard Parnell)_ We thank you from our heart, |
| John, for this right royal welcome to green Erin, the promised land of |
| our common ancestors. |
| |
| _(The freedom of the city is presented to him embodied in a charter. The |
| keys of Dublin, crossed on a crimson cushion, are given to him. He shows |
| all that he is wearing green socks.)_ |
| |
| TOM KERNAN: You deserve it, your honour. |
| |
| BLOOM: On this day twenty years ago we overcame the hereditary enemy at |
| Ladysmith. Our howitzers and camel swivel guns played on his lines with |
| telling effect. Half a league onward! They charge! All is lost now! Do |
| we yield? No! We drive them headlong! Lo! We charge! Deploying to the |
| left our light horse swept across the heights of Plevna and, uttering |
| their warcry _Bonafide Sabaoth_, sabred the Saracen gunners to a man. |
| |
| THE CHAPEL OF FREEMAN TYPESETTERS: Hear! Hear! |
| |
| JOHN WYSE NOLAN: There's the man that got away James Stephens. |
| |
| A BLUECOAT SCHOOLBOY: Bravo! |
| |
| AN OLD RESIDENT: You're a credit to your country, sir, that's what you |
| are. |
| |
| AN APPLEWOMAN: He's a man like Ireland wants. |
| |
| BLOOM: My beloved subjects, a new era is about to dawn. I, Bloom, tell |
| you verily it is even now at hand. Yea, on the word of a Bloom, ye shall |
| ere long enter into the golden city which is to be, the new Bloomusalem |
| in the Nova Hibernia of the future. |
| |
| _(Thirtytwo workmen, wearing rosettes, from all the counties of Ireland, |
| under the guidance of Derwan the builder, construct the new Bloomusalem. |
| It is a colossal edifice with crystal roof, built in the shape of a |
| huge pork kidney, containing forty thousand rooms. In the course of its |
| extension several buildings and monuments are demolished. Government |
| offices are temporarily transferred to railway sheds. Numerous houses |
| are razed to the ground. The inhabitants are lodged in barrels and |
| boxes, all marked in red with the letters: L. B. several paupers |
| fill from a ladder. A part of the walls of Dublin, crowded with loyal |
| sightseers, collapses.)_ |
| |
| THE SIGHTSEERS: _(Dying) Morituri te salutant. (They die)_ |
| |
| _(A man in a brown macintosh springs up through a trapdoor. He points an |
| elongated finger at Bloom.)_ |
| |
| THE MAN IN THE MACINTOSH: Don't you believe a word he says. That man is |
| Leopold M'Intosh, the notorious fireraiser. His real name is Higgins. |
| |
| BLOOM: Shoot him! Dog of a christian! So much for M'Intosh! |
| |
| _(A cannonshot. The man in the macintosh disappears. Bloom with his |
| sceptre strikes down poppies. The instantaneous deaths of many |
| powerful enemies, graziers, members of parliament, members of standing |
| committees, are reported. Bloom's bodyguard distribute Maundy money, |
| commemoration medals, loaves and fishes, temperance badges, expensive |
| Henry Clay cigars, free cowbones for soup, rubber preservatives in |
| sealed envelopes tied with gold thread, butter scotch, pineapple rock,_ |
| billets doux _in the form of cocked hats, readymade suits, porringers |
| of toad in the hole, bottles of Jeyes' Fluid, purchase stamps, 40 days' |
| indulgences, spurious coins, dairyfed pork sausages, theatre passes, |
| season tickets available for all tramlines, coupons of the royal and |
| privileged Hungarian lottery, penny dinner counters, cheap reprints of |
| the World's Twelve Worst Books: Froggy And Fritz (politic), Care of the |
| Baby (infantilic), 50 Meals for 7/6 (culinic), Was Jesus a Sun Myth? |
| (historic), Expel that Pain (medic), Infant's Compendium of the |
| Universe (cosmic), Let's All Chortle (hilaric), Canvasser's Vade Mecum |
| (journalic), Loveletters of Mother Assistant (erotic), Who's Who in |
| Space (astric), Songs that Reached Our Heart (melodic), Pennywise's Way |
| to Wealth (parsimonic). A general rush and scramble. Women press forward |
| to touch the hem of Bloom's robe. The Lady Gwendolen Dubedat bursts |
| through the throng, leaps on his horse and kisses him on both cheeks |
| amid great acclamation. A magnesium flashlight photograph is taken. |
| Babes and sucklings are held up.)_ |
| |
| THE WOMEN: Little father! Little father! |
| |
| THE BABES AND SUCKLINGS: |
| |
| Clap clap hands till Poldy comes home, |
| Cakes in his pocket for Leo alone. |
| |
| |
| _(Bloom, bending down, pokes Baby Boardman gently in the stomach.)_ |
| |
| BABY BOARDMAN: _(Hiccups, curdled milk flowing from his mouth)_ |
| Hajajaja. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Shaking hands with a blind stripling)_ My more than Brother! |
| _(Placing his arms round the shoulders of an old couple)_ Dear old |
| friends! _(He plays pussy fourcorners with ragged boys and girls)_ |
| Peep! Bopeep! _(He wheels twins in a perambulator)_ Ticktacktwo |
| wouldyousetashoe? _(He performs juggler's tricks, draws red, orange, |
| yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet silk handkerchiefs from his |
| mouth)_ Roygbiv. 32 feet per second. _(He consoles a widow)_ Absence |
| makes the heart grow younger. _(He dances the Highland fling with |
| grotesque antics)_ Leg it, ye devils! _(He kisses the bedsores of a |
| palsied veteran_) Honourable wounds! _(He trips up a fit policeman)_ |
| U. p: up. U. p: up. _(He whispers in the ear of a blushing waitress and |
| laughs kindly)_ Ah, naughty, naughty! _(He eats a raw turnip offered |
| him by Maurice Butterly, farmer)_ Fine! Splendid! _(He refuses to |
| accept three shillings offered him by Joseph Hynes, journalist)_ My dear |
| fellow, not at all! (He gives his coat to a beggar) Please accept. _(He |
| takes part in a stomach race with elderly male and female cripples)_ |
| Come on, boys! Wriggle it, girls! |
| |
| THE CITIZEN: _(Choked with emotion, brushes aside a tear in his emerald |
| muffler)_ May the good God bless him! |
| |
| _(The rams' horns sound for silence. The standard of Zion is hoisted.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Uncloaks impressively, revealing obesity, unrolls a paper and |
| reads solemnly)_ Aleph Beth Ghimel Daleth Hagadah Tephilim Kosher Yom |
| Kippur Hanukah Roschaschana Beni Brith Bar Mitzvah Mazzoth Askenazim |
| Meshuggah Talith. |
| |
| _(An official translation is read by Jimmy Henry, assistant town |
| clerk.)_ |
| |
| JIMMY HENRY: The Court of Conscience is now open. His Most Catholic |
| Majesty will now administer open air justice. Free medical and legal |
| advice, solution of doubles and other problems. All cordially invited. |
| Given at this our loyal city of Dublin in the year I of the Paradisiacal |
| Era. |
| |
| PADDY LEONARD: What am I to do about my rates and taxes? |
| |
| BLOOM: Pay them, my friend. |
| |
| PADDY LEONARD: Thank you. |
| |
| NOSEY FLYNN: Can I raise a mortgage on my fire insurance? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Obdurately)_ Sirs, take notice that by the law of torts you are |
| bound over in your own recognisances for six months in the sum of five |
| pounds. |
| |
| J. J. O'MOLLOY: A Daniel did I say? Nay! A Peter O'Brien! |
| |
| NOSEY FLYNN: Where do I draw the five pounds? |
| |
| PISSER BURKE: For bladder trouble? |
| |
| BLOOM: |
| |
| _Acid. nit. hydrochlor. dil.,_ 20 minims |
| _Tinct. nux vom.,_ 5 minims |
| _Extr. taraxel. iiq.,_ 30 minims. |
| _Aq. dis. ter in die._ |
| |
| CHRIS CALLINAN: What is the parallax of the subsolar ecliptic of |
| Aldebaran? |
| |
| BLOOM: Pleased to hear from you, Chris. K. II. |
| |
| JOE HYNES: Why aren't you in uniform? |
| |
| BLOOM: When my progenitor of sainted memory wore the uniform of the |
| Austrian despot in a dank prison where was yours? |
| |
| BEN DOLLARD: Pansies? |
| |
| BLOOM: Embellish (beautify) suburban gardens. |
| |
| BEN DOLLARD: When twins arrive? |
| |
| BLOOM: Father (pater, dad) starts thinking. |
| |
| LARRY O'ROURKE: An eightday licence for my new premises. You remember |
| me, sir Leo, when you were in number seven. I'm sending around a dozen |
| of stout for the missus. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Coldly)_ You have the advantage of me. Lady Bloom accepts no |
| presents. |
| |
| CROFTON: This is indeed a festivity. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Solemnly)_ You call it a festivity. I call it a sacrament. |
| |
| ALEXANDER KEYES: When will we have our own house of keys? |
| |
| BLOOM: I stand for the reform of municipal morals and the plain ten |
| commandments. New worlds for old. Union of all, jew, moslem and gentile. |
| Three acres and a cow for all children of nature. Saloon motor hearses. |
| Compulsory manual labour for all. All parks open to the public day and |
| night. Electric dishscrubbers. Tuberculosis, lunacy, war and mendicancy |
| must now cease. General amnesty, weekly carnival with masked licence, |
| bonuses for all, esperanto the universal language with universal |
| brotherhood. No more patriotism of barspongers and dropsical impostors. |
| Free money, free rent, free love and a free lay church in a free lay |
| state. |
| |
| O'MADDEN BURKE: Free fox in a free henroost. |
| |
| DAVY BYRNE: _(Yawning)_ Iiiiiiiiiaaaaaaach! |
| |
| BLOOM: Mixed races and mixed marriage. |
| |
| LENEHAN: What about mixed bathing? |
| |
| _(bloom explains to those near him his schemes for social regeneration. |
| All agree with him. The keeper of the Kildare Street Museum appears, |
| dragging a lorry on which are the shaking statues of several naked |
| goddesses, Venus Callipyge, Venus Pandemos, Venus Metempsychosis, and |
| plaster figures, also naked, representing the new nine muses, Commerce, |
| Operatic Music, Amor, Publicity, Manufacture, Liberty of Speech, Plural |
| Voting, Gastronomy, Private Hygiene, Seaside Concert Entertainments, |
| Painless Obstetrics and Astronomy for the People.)_ |
| |
| FATHER FARLEY: He is an episcopalian, an agnostic, an anythingarian |
| seeking to overthrow our holy faith. |
| |
| MRS RIORDAN: _(Tears up her will)_ I'm disappointed in you! You bad man! |
| |
| MOTHER GROGAN: _(Removes her boot to throw it at Bloom)_ You beast! You |
| abominable person! |
| |
| NOSEY FLYNN: Give us a tune, Bloom. One of the old sweet songs. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(With rollicking humour)_ |
| |
| I vowed that I never would leave her, |
| She turned out a cruel deceiver. |
| With my tooraloom tooraloom tooraloom tooraloom. |
| |
| HOPPY HOLOHAN: Good old Bloom! There's nobody like him after all. |
| |
| PADDY LEONARD: Stage Irishman! |
| |
| BLOOM: What railway opera is like a tramline in Gibraltar? The Rows of |
| Casteele._(Laughter.)_ |
| |
| LENEHAN: Plagiarist! Down with Bloom! |
| |
| THE VEILED SIBYL: _(Enthusiastically)_ I'm a Bloomite and I glory in it. |
| I believe in him in spite of all. I'd give my life for him, the funniest |
| man on earth. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Winks at the bystanders)_ I bet she's a bonny lassie. |
| |
| THEODORE PUREFOY: _(In fishingcap and oilskin jacket)_ He employs a |
| mechanical device to frustrate the sacred ends of nature. |
| |
| THE VEILED SIBYL: _(Stabs herself)_ My hero god! _(She dies)_ |
| |
| _(Many most attractive and enthusiastic women also commit suicide by |
| stabbing, drowning, drinking prussic acid, aconite, arsenic, opening |
| their veins, refusing food, casting themselves under steamrollers, from |
| the top of Nelson's Pillar, into the great vat of Guinness's brewery, |
| asphyxiating themselves by placing their heads in gasovens, hanging |
| themselves in stylish garters, leaping from windows of different |
| storeys.)_ |
| |
| ALEXANDER J DOWIE: _(Violently)_ Fellowchristians and antiBloomites, the |
| man called Bloom is from the roots of hell, a disgrace to christian |
| men. A fiendish libertine from his earliest years this stinking goat |
| of Mendes gave precocious signs of infantile debauchery, recalling the |
| cities of the plain, with a dissolute granddam. This vile hypocrite, |
| bronzed with infamy, is the white bull mentioned in the Apocalypse. |
| A worshipper of the Scarlet Woman, intrigue is the very breath of his |
| nostrils. The stake faggots and the caldron of boiling oil are for him. |
| Caliban! |
| |
| THE MOB: Lynch him! Roast him! He's as bad as Parnell was. Mr Fox! |
| |
| _(Mother Grogan throws her boot at Bloom. Several shopkeepers from upper |
| and lower Dorset street throw objects of little or no commercial value, |
| hambones, condensed milk tins, unsaleable cabbage, stale bread, sheep's |
| tails, odd pieces of fat.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Excitedly)_ This is midsummer madness, some ghastly joke again. |
| By heaven, I am guiltless as the unsunned snow! It was my brother Henry. |
| He is my double. He lives in number 2 Dolphin's Barn. Slander, the |
| viper, has wrongfully accused me. Fellowcountrymen, _sgenl inn ban bata |
| coisde gan capall._ I call on my old friend, Dr Malachi Mulligan, sex |
| specialist, to give medical testimony on my behalf. |
| |
| DR MULLIGAN: _(In motor jerkin, green motorgoggles on his brow)_ Dr |
| Bloom is bisexually abnormal. He has recently escaped from Dr Eustace's |
| private asylum for demented gentlemen. Born out of bedlock hereditary |
| epilepsy is present, the consequence of unbridled lust. Traces of |
| elephantiasis have been discovered among his ascendants. There are |
| marked symptoms of chronic exhibitionism. Ambidexterity is also |
| latent. He is prematurely bald from selfabuse, perversely idealistic in |
| consequence, a reformed rake, and has metal teeth. In consequence of a |
| family complex he has temporarily lost his memory and I believe him |
| to be more sinned against than sinning. I have made a pervaginal |
| examination and, after application of the acid test to 5427 anal, |
| axillary, pectoral and pubic hairs, I declare him to be _virgo intacta._ |
| |
| _(Bloom holds his high grade hat over his genital organs.)_ |
| |
| DR MADDEN: Hypsospadia is also marked. In the interest of coming |
| generations I suggest that the parts affected should be preserved in |
| spirits of wine in the national teratological museum. |
| |
| DR CROTTHERS: I have examined the patient's urine. It is albuminoid. |
| Salivation is insufficient, the patellar reflex intermittent. |
| |
| DR PUNCH COSTELLO: The _fetor judaicus_ is most perceptible. |
| |
| DR DIXON: _(Reads a bill of health)_ Professor Bloom is a finished |
| example of the new womanly man. His moral nature is simple and lovable. |
| Many have found him a dear man, a dear person. He is a rather quaint |
| fellow on the whole, coy though not feebleminded in the medical sense. |
| He has written a really beautiful letter, a poem in itself, to the court |
| missionary of the Reformed Priests' Protection Society which clears up |
| everything. He is practically a total abstainer and I can affirm that |
| he sleeps on a straw litter and eats the most Spartan food, cold dried |
| grocer's peas. He wears a hairshirt of pure Irish manufacture winter and |
| summer and scourges himself every Saturday. He was, I understand, at one |
| time a firstclass misdemeanant in Glencree reformatory. Another report |
| states that he was a very posthumous child. I appeal for clemency in the |
| name of the most sacred word our vocal organs have ever been called upon |
| to speak. He is about to have a baby. |
| |
| _(General commotion and compassion. Women faint. A wealthy American |
| makes a street collection for Bloom. Gold and silver coins, blank |
| cheques, banknotes, jewels, treasury bonds, maturing bills of exchange, |
| I. O. U's, wedding rings, watchchains, lockets, necklaces and bracelets |
| are rapidly collected.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: O, I so want to be a mother. |
| |
| MRS THORNTON: _(In nursetender's gown)_ Embrace me tight, dear. You'll |
| be soon over it. Tight, dear. |
| |
| _(Bloom embraces her tightly and bears eight male yellow and white |
| children. They appear on a redcarpeted staircase adorned with expensive |
| plants. All the octuplets are handsome, with valuable metallic faces, |
| wellmade, respectably dressed and wellconducted, speaking five modern |
| languages fluently and interested in various arts and sciences. Each |
| has his name printed in legible letters on his shirtfront: Nasodoro, |
| Goldfinger, Chrysostomos, Maindoree, Silversmile, Silberselber, |
| Vifargent, Panargyros. They are immediately appointed to positions of |
| high public trust in several different countries as managing directors |
| of banks, traffic managers of railways, chairmen of limited liability |
| companies, vicechairmen of hotel syndicates.)_ |
| |
| A VOICE: Bloom, are you the Messiah ben Joseph or ben David? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Darkly)_ You have said it. |
| |
| BROTHER BUZZ: Then perform a miracle like Father Charles. |
| |
| BANTAM LYONS: Prophesy who will win the Saint Leger. |
| |
| _(Bloom walks on a net, covers his left eye with his left ear, passes |
| through several walls, climbs Nelson's Pillar, hangs from the top ledge |
| by his eyelids, eats twelve dozen oysters (shells included), heals |
| several sufferers from king's evil, contracts his face so as to resemble |
| many historical personages, Lord Beaconsfield, Lord Byron, Wat Tyler, |
| Moses of Egypt, Moses Maimonides, Moses Mendelssohn, Henry Irving, Rip |
| van Winkle, Kossuth, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Baron Leopold Rothschild, |
| Robinson Crusoe, Sherlock Holmes, Pasteur, turns each foot |
| simultaneously in different directions, bids the tide turn back, |
| eclipses the sun by extending his little finger.)_ |
| |
| BRINI, PAPAL NUNCIO: _(In papal zouave's uniform, steel cuirasses as |
| breastplate, armplates, thighplates, legplates, large profane moustaches |
| and brown paper mitre) Leopoldi autem generatio._ Moses begat Noah |
| and Noah begat Eunuch and Eunuch begat O'Halloran and O'Halloran begat |
| Guggenheim and Guggenheim begat Agendath and Agendath begat Netaim and |
| Netaim begat Le Hirsch and Le Hirsch begat Jesurum and Jesurum begat |
| MacKay and MacKay begat Ostrolopsky and Ostrolopsky begat Smerdoz |
| and Smerdoz begat Weiss and Weiss begat Schwarz and Schwarz begat |
| Adrianopoli and Adrianopoli begat Aranjuez and Aranjuez begat Lewy |
| Lawson and Lewy Lawson begat Ichabudonosor and Ichabudonosor begat |
| O'Donnell Magnus and O'Donnell Magnus begat Christbaum and Christbaum |
| begat ben Maimun and ben Maimun begat Dusty Rhodes and Dusty Rhodes |
| begat Benamor and Benamor begat Jones-Smith and Jones-Smith begat |
| Savorgnanovich and Savorgnanovich begat Jasperstone and Jasperstone |
| begat Vingtetunieme and Vingtetunieme begat Szombathely and Szombathely |
| begat Virag and Virag begat Bloom _et vocabitur nomen eius Emmanuel._ |
| |
| A DEADHAND: _(Writes on the wall)_ Bloom is a cod. |
| |
| CRAB: _(In bushranger's kit)_ What did you do in the cattlecreep behind |
| Kilbarrack? |
| |
| A FEMALE INFANT: _(Shakes a rattle)_ And under Ballybough bridge? |
| |
| A HOLLYBUSH: And in the devil's glen? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Blushes furiously all over from frons to nates, three tears |
| filling from his left eye)_ Spare my past. |
| |
| THE IRISH EVICTED TENANTS: _(In bodycoats, kneebreeches, with Donnybrook |
| fair shillelaghs)_ Sjambok him! |
| |
| _(Bloom with asses' ears seats himself in the pillory with crossed arms, |
| his feet protruding. He whistles_ Don Giovanni, a cenar teco. _Artane |
| orphans, joining hands, caper round him. Girls of the Prison Gate |
| Mission, joining hands, caper round in the opposite direction.)_ |
| |
| THE ARTANE ORPHANS: |
| |
| You hig, you hog, you dirty dog! |
| You think the ladies love you! |
| THE PRISON GATE GIRLS: |
| |
| |
| If you see Kay |
| Tell him he may |
| See you in tea |
| Tell him from me. |
| |
| HORNBLOWER: _(In ephod and huntingcap, announces)_ And he shall carry |
| the sins of the people to Azazel, the spirit which is in the wilderness, |
| and to Lilith, the nighthag. And they shall stone him and defile him, |
| yea, all from Agendath Netaim and from Mizraim, the land of Ham. |
| |
| _(All the people cast soft pantomime stones at Bloom. Many bonafide |
| travellers and ownerless dogs come near him and defile him. Mastiansky |
| and Citron approach in gaberdines, wearing long earlocks. They wag their |
| beards at Bloom.)_ |
| |
| MASTIANSKY AND CITRON: Belial! Laemlein of Istria, the false Messiah! |
| Abulafia! Recant! |
| |
| _(George R Mesias, Bloom's tailor, appears, a tailor's goose under his |
| arm, presenting a bill)_ |
| |
| MESIAS: To alteration one pair trousers eleven shillings. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Rubs his hands cheerfully)_ Just like old times. Poor Bloom! |
| |
| _(Reuben J Dodd, blackbearded iscariot, bad shepherd, bearing on his |
| shoulders the drowned corpse of his son, approaches the pillory.)_ |
| |
| REUBEN J: _(Whispers hoarsely)_ The squeak is out. A split is gone for |
| the flatties. Nip the first rattler. |
| |
| THE FIRE BRIGADE: Pflaap! |
| |
| BROTHER BUZZ: _(Invests Bloom in a yellow habit with embroidery of |
| painted flames and high pointed hat. He places a bag of gunpowder round |
| his neck and hands him over to the civil power, saying)_ Forgive him his |
| trespasses. |
| |
| _(Lieutenant Myers of the Dublin Fire Brigade by general request sets |
| fire to Bloom. Lamentations.)_ |
| |
| THE CITIZEN: Thank heaven! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In a seamless garment marked I. H. S. stands upright amid |
| phoenix flames)_ Weep not for me, O daughters of Erin. |
| |
| _(He exhibits to Dublin reporters traces of burning. The daughters of |
| Erin, in black garments, with large prayerbooks and long lighted candles |
| in their hands, kneel down and pray.)_ |
| |
| THE DAUGHTERS OF ERIN: |
| |
| Kidney of Bloom, pray for us |
| Flower of the Bath, pray for us |
| Mentor of Menton, pray for us |
| Canvasser for the Freeman, pray for us |
| Charitable Mason, pray for us |
| Wandering Soap, pray for us |
| Sweets of Sin, pray for us |
| Music without Words, pray for us |
| Reprover of the Citizen, pray for us |
| Friend of all Frillies, pray for us |
| Midwife Most Merciful, pray for us |
| Potato Preservative against Plague and Pestilence, pray for us. |
| |
| _(A choir of six hundred voices, conducted by Vincent O'brien, sings |
| the chorus from Handel's Messiah alleluia for the lord god omnipotent |
| reigneth, accompanied on the organ by Joseph Glynn. Bloom becomes mute, |
| shrunken, carbonised.)_ |
| |
| |
| ZOE: Talk away till you're black in the face. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In caubeen with clay pipe stuck in the band, dusty brogues, an |
| emigrant's red handkerchief bundle in his hand, leading a black bogoak |
| pig by a sugaun, with a smile in his eye)_ Let me be going now, woman of |
| the house, for by all the goats in Connemara I'm after having the |
| father and mother of a bating. _(With a tear in his eye)_ All insanity. |
| Patriotism, sorrow for the dead, music, future of the race. To be or not |
| to be. Life's dream is o'er. End it peacefully. They can live on. _(He |
| gazes far away mournfully)_ I am ruined. A few pastilles of aconite. The |
| blinds drawn. A letter. Then lie back to rest. _(He breathes softly)_ No |
| more. I have lived. Fare. Farewell. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Stiffly, her finger in her neckfillet)_ Honest? Till the next |
| time. _(She sneers)_ Suppose you got up the wrong side of the bed or |
| came too quick with your best girl. O, I can read your thoughts! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Bitterly)_ Man and woman, love, what is it? A cork and bottle. |
| I'm sick of it. Let everything rip. |
| |
| ZOE: _(In sudden sulks)_ I hate a rotter that's insincere. Give a |
| bleeding whore a chance. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Repentantly)_ I am very disagreeable. You are a necessary evil. |
| Where are you from? London? |
| |
| ZOE: _(Glibly)_ Hog's Norton where the pigs plays the organs. I'm |
| Yorkshire born. _(She holds his hand which is feeling for her nipple)_ |
| I say, Tommy Tittlemouse. Stop that and begin worse. Have you cash for a |
| short time? Ten shillings? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Smiles, nods slowly)_ More, houri, more. |
| |
| ZOE: And more's mother? _(She pats him offhandedly with velvet paws)_ |
| Are you coming into the musicroom to see our new pianola? Come and I'll |
| peel off. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Feeling his occiput dubiously with the unparalleled |
| embarrassment of a harassed pedlar gauging the symmetry of her peeled |
| pears)_ Somebody would be dreadfully jealous if she knew. The greeneyed |
| monster. _(Earnestly)_ You know how difficult it is. I needn't tell you. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Flattered)_ What the eye can't see the heart can't grieve for. |
| _(She pats him)_ Come. |
| |
| BLOOM: Laughing witch! The hand that rocks the cradle. |
| |
| ZOE: Babby! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In babylinen and pelisse, bigheaded, with a caul of dark hair, |
| fixes big eyes on her fluid slip and counts its bronze buckles with a |
| chubby finger, his moist tongue lolling and lisping)_ One two tlee: tlee |
| tlwo tlone. |
| |
| THE BUCKLES: Love me. Love me not. Love me. |
| |
| ZOE: Silent means consent. _(With little parted talons she captures his |
| hand, her forefinger giving to his palm the passtouch of secret monitor, |
| luring him to doom.)_ Hot hands cold gizzard. |
| |
| _(He hesitates amid scents, music, temptations. She leads him towards |
| the steps, drawing him by the odour of her armpits, the vice of her |
| painted eyes, the rustle of her slip in whose sinuous folds lurks the |
| lion reek of all the male brutes that have possessed her.)_ |
| |
| THE MALE BRUTES: _(Exhaling sulphur of rut and dung and ramping in their |
| loosebox, faintly roaring, their drugged heads swaying to and fro)_ |
| Good! |
| |
| _(Zoe and Bloom reach the doorway where two sister whores are seated. |
| They examine him curiously from under their pencilled brows and smile to |
| his hasty bow. He trips awkwardly.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: _(Her lucky hand instantly saving him)_ Hoopsa! Don't fall |
| upstairs. |
| |
| BLOOM: The just man falls seven times. _(He stands aside at the |
| threshold)_ After you is good manners. |
| |
| ZOE: Ladies first, gentlemen after. |
| |
| _(She crosses the threshold. He hesitates. She turns and, holding out |
| her hands, draws him over. He hops. On the antlered rack of the hall |
| hang a man 's hat and waterproof. Bloom uncovers himself but, seeing |
| them, frowns, then smiles, preoccupied. A door on the return landing is |
| flung open. A man in purple shirt and grey trousers, brownsocked, passes |
| with an ape's gait, his bald head and goatee beard upheld, hugging a |
| full waterjugjar, his twotailed black braces dangling at heels. Averting |
| his face quickly Bloom bends to examine on the halltable the spaniel |
| eyes of a running fox: then, his lifted head sniffing, follows Zoe |
| into the musicroom. A shade of mauve tissuepaper dims the light of the |
| chandelier. Round and round a moth flies, colliding, escaping. The |
| floor is covered with an oilcloth mosaic of jade and azure and cinnabar |
| rhomboids. Footmarks are stamped over it in all senses, heel to heel, |
| heel to hollow, toe to toe, feet locked, a morris of shuffling feet |
| without body phantoms, all in a scrimmage higgledypiggledy. The walls |
| are tapestried with a paper of yewfronds and clear glades. In the grate |
| is spread a screen of peacock feathers. Lynch squats crosslegged on |
| the hearthrug of matted hair, his cap back to the front. With a wand he |
| beats time slowly. Kitty Ricketts, a bony pallid whore in navy costume, |
| doeskin gloves rolled back from a coral wristlet, a chain purse in |
| her hand, sits perched on the edge of the table swinging her leg and |
| glancing at herself in the gilt mirror over the mantelpiece. A tag |
| of her corsetlace hangs slightly below her jacket. Lynch indicates |
| mockingly the couple at the piano.)_ |
| |
| KITTY: _(Coughs behind her hand)_ She's a bit imbecillic. _(She signs |
| with a waggling forefinger)_ Blemblem. _(Lynch lifts up her skirt and |
| white petticoat with his wand she settles them down quickly.)_ Respect |
| yourself. _(She hiccups, then bends quickly her sailor hat under which |
| her hair glows, red with henna)_ O, excuse! |
| |
| ZOE: More limelight, Charley. _(She goes to the chandelier and turns the |
| gas full cock)_ |
| |
| KITTY: _(Peers at the gasjet)_ What ails it tonight? |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Deeply)_ Enter a ghost and hobgoblins. |
| |
| ZOE: Clap on the back for Zoe. |
| |
| _(The wand in Lynch's hand flashes: a brass poker. Stephen stands at |
| the pianola on which sprawl his hat and ashplant. With two fingers he |
| repeats once more the series of empty fifths. Florry Talbot, a blond |
| feeble goosefat whore in a tatterdemalion gown of mildewed strawberry, |
| lolls spreadeagle in the sofacorner, her limp forearm pendent over the |
| bolster, listening. A heavy stye droops over her sleepy eyelid.)_ |
| |
| KITTY: _(Hiccups again with a kick of her horsed foot)_ O, excuse! |
| |
| ZOE: _(Promptly)_ Your boy's thinking of you. Tie a knot on your shift. |
| |
| _(Kitty Ricketts bends her head. Her boa uncoils, slides, glides over |
| her shoulder, back, arm, chair to the ground. Lynch lifts the curled |
| caterpillar on his wand. She snakes her neck, nestling. Stephen glances |
| behind at the squatted figure with its cap back to the front.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: As a matter of fact it is of no importance whether Benedetto |
| Marcello found it or made it. The rite is the poet's rest. It may be an |
| old hymn to Demeter or also illustrate _Coela enarrant gloriam Domini._ |
| It is susceptible of nodes or modes as far apart as hyperphrygian and |
| mixolydian and of texts so divergent as priests haihooping round David's |
| that is Circe's or what am I saying Ceres' altar and David's tip |
| from the stable to his chief bassoonist about the alrightness of his |
| almightiness. _Mais nom de nom,_ that is another pair of trousers. |
| _Jetez la gourme. Faut que jeunesse se passe. (He stops, points at |
| Lynch's cap, smiles, laughs)_ Which side is your knowledge bump? |
| |
| THE CAP: _(With saturnine spleen)_ Bah! It is because it is. Woman's |
| reason. Jewgreek is greekjew. Extremes meet. Death is the highest form |
| of life. Bah! |
| |
| STEPHEN: You remember fairly accurately all my errors, boasts, mistakes. |
| How long shall I continue to close my eyes to disloyalty? Whetstone! |
| |
| THE CAP: Bah! |
| |
| STEPHEN: Here's another for you. _(He frowns)_ The reason is because |
| the fundamental and the dominant are separated by the greatest possible |
| interval which... |
| |
| THE CAP: Which? Finish. You can't. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(With an effort)_ Interval which. Is the greatest possible |
| ellipse. Consistent with. The ultimate return. The octave. Which. |
| |
| THE CAP: Which? |
| |
| _(Outside the gramophone begins to blare_ The Holy City.) |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Abruptly)_ What went forth to the ends of the world to |
| traverse not itself, God, the sun, Shakespeare, a commercial traveller, |
| having itself traversed in reality itself becomes that self. Wait a |
| moment. Wait a second. Damn that fellow's noise in the street. Self |
| which it itself was ineluctably preconditioned to become. _Ecco!_ |
| |
| LYNCH: _(With a mocking whinny of laughter grins at Bloom and Zoe |
| Higgins)_ What a learned speech, eh? |
| |
| ZOE: _(Briskly)_ God help your head, he knows more than you have |
| forgotten. |
| |
| _(With obese stupidity Florry Talbot regards Stephen.)_ |
| |
| FLORRY: They say the last day is coming this summer. |
| |
| KITTY: No! |
| |
| ZOE: _(Explodes in laughter)_ Great unjust God! |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Offended)_ Well, it was in the papers about Antichrist. O, my |
| foot's tickling. |
| |
| _(Ragged barefoot newsboys, jogging a wagtail kite, patter past, |
| yelling.)_ |
| |
| THE NEWSBOYS: Stop press edition. Result of the rockinghorse races. Sea |
| serpent in the royal canal. Safe arrival of Antichrist. |
| |
| _(Stephen turns and sees Bloom.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: A time, times and half a time. |
| |
| _(Reuben I Antichrist, wandering jew, a clutching hand open on his |
| spine, stumps forward. Across his loins is slung a pilgrim's wallet from |
| which protrude promissory notes and dishonoured bills. Aloft over his |
| shoulder he bears a long boatpole from the hook of which the sodden |
| huddled mass of his only son, saved from Liffey waters, hangs from |
| the slack of its breeches. A hobgoblin in the image of Punch Costello, |
| hipshot, crookbacked, hydrocephalic, prognathic with receding forehead |
| and Ally Sloper nose, tumbles in somersaults through the gathering |
| darkness.)_ |
| |
| ALL: What? |
| |
| THE HOBGOBLIN: _(His jaws chattering, capers to and fro, goggling his |
| eyes, squeaking, kangaroohopping with outstretched clutching arms, then |
| all at once thrusts his lipless face through the fork of his thighs) Il |
| vient! C'est moi! L'homme qui rit! L'homme primigene! (He whirls round |
| and round with dervish howls) Sieurs et dames, faites vos jeux! (He |
| crouches juggling. Tiny roulette planets fly from his hands.) Les jeux |
| sont faits! (The planets rush together, uttering crepitant cracks) Rien |
| va plus! (The planets, buoyant balloons, sail swollen up and away. He |
| springs off into vacuum.)_ |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Sinking into torpor, crossing herself secretly)_ The end of |
| the world! |
| |
| _(A female tepid effluvium leaks out from her. Nebulous obscurity |
| occupies space. Through the drifting fog without the gramophone blares |
| over coughs and feetshuffling.)_ |
| |
| THE GRAMOPHONE: Jerusalem! |
| |
| Open your gates and sing |
| |
| Hosanna... |
| |
| _(A rocket rushes up the sky and bursts. A white star fills from it, |
| proclaiming the consummation of all things and second coming of Elijah. |
| Along an infinite invisible tightrope taut from zenith to nadir the End |
| of the World, a twoheaded octopus in gillie's kilts, busby and tartan |
| filibegs, whirls through the murk, head over heels, in the form of the |
| Three Legs of Man.)_ |
| |
| THE END OF THE WORLD: _(with a Scotch accent)_ Wha'll dance the keel |
| row, the keel row, the keel row? |
| |
| _(Over the possing drift and choking breathcoughs, Elijah's voice, harsh |
| as a corncrake's, jars on high. Perspiring in a loose lawn surplice with |
| funnel sleeves he is seen, vergerfaced, above a rostrum about which the |
| banner of old glory is draped. He thumps the parapet.)_ |
| |
| ELIJAH: No yapping, if you please, in this booth. Jake Crane, Creole |
| Sue, Dove Campbell, Abe Kirschner, do your coughing with your mouths |
| shut. Say, I am operating all this trunk line. Boys, do it now. God's |
| time is 12.25. Tell mother you'll be there. Rush your order and you play |
| a slick ace. Join on right here. Book through to eternity junction, the |
| nonstop run. Just one word more. Are you a god or a doggone clod? If the |
| second advent came to Coney Island are we ready? Florry Christ, Stephen |
| Christ, Zoe Christ, Bloom Christ, Kitty Christ, Lynch Christ, it's up to |
| you to sense that cosmic force. Have we cold feet about the cosmos? |
| No. Be on the side of the angels. Be a prism. You have that something |
| within, the higher self. You can rub shoulders with a Jesus, a Gautama, |
| an Ingersoll. Are you all in this vibration? I say you are. You once |
| nobble that, congregation, and a buck joyride to heaven becomes a back |
| number. You got me? It's a lifebrightener, sure. The hottest stuff ever |
| was. It's the whole pie with jam in. It's just the cutest snappiest line |
| out. It is immense, supersumptuous. It restores. It vibrates. I know |
| and I am some vibrator. Joking apart and, getting down to bedrock, A. |
| J. Christ Dowie and the harmonial philosophy, have you got that? O. K. |
| Seventyseven west sixtyninth street. Got me? That's it. You call me up |
| by sunphone any old time. Bumboosers, save your stamps. _(He shouts)_ |
| Now then our glory song. All join heartily in the singing. Encore! _(He |
| sings)_ Jeru... |
| |
| THE GRAMOPHONE: _(Drowning his voice)_ Whorusalaminyourhighhohhhh... |
| _(The disc rasps gratingly against the needle)_ |
| |
| THE THREE WHORES: _(Covering their ears, squawk)_ Ahhkkk! |
| |
| ELIJAH: _(In rolledup shirtsleeves, black in the face, shouts at the top |
| of his voice, his arms uplifted)_ Big Brother up there, Mr President, |
| you hear what I done just been saying to you. Certainly, I sort of |
| believe strong in you, Mr President. I certainly am thinking now Miss |
| Higgins and Miss Ricketts got religion way inside them. Certainly seems |
| to me I don't never see no wusser scared female than the way you been, |
| Miss Florry, just now as I done seed you. Mr President, you come long |
| and help me save our sisters dear. _(He winks at his audience)_ Our Mr |
| President, he twig the whole lot and he aint saying nothing. |
| |
| KITTY-KATE: I forgot myself. In a weak moment I erred and did what I did |
| on Constitution hill. I was confirmed by the bishop and enrolled in |
| the brown scapular. My mother's sister married a Montmorency. It was a |
| working plumber was my ruination when I was pure. |
| |
| ZOE-FANNY: I let him larrup it into me for the fun of it. |
| |
| FLORRY-TERESA: It was in consequence of a portwine beverage on top of |
| Hennessy's three star. I was guilty with Whelan when he slipped into the |
| bed. |
| |
| STEPHEN: In the beginning was the word, in the end the world without |
| end. Blessed be the eight beatitudes. |
| |
| _(The beatitudes, Dixon, Madden, Crotthers, Costello, Lenehan, Bannon, |
| Mulligan and Lynch in white surgical students' gowns, four abreast, |
| goosestepping, tramp fist past in noisy marching)_ |
| |
| THE BEATITUDES: _(Incoherently)_ Beer beef battledog buybull businum |
| barnum buggerum bishop. |
| |
| LYSTER: _(In quakergrey kneebreeches and broadbrimmed hat, says |
| discreetly)_ He is our friend. I need not mention names. Seek thou the |
| light. |
| |
| _(He corantos by. Best enters in hairdresser's attire, shinily |
| laundered, his locks in curlpapers. He leads John Eglinton who wears a |
| mandarin's kimono of Nankeen yellow, lizardlettered, and a high pagoda |
| hat.)_ |
| |
| BEST: _(Smiling, lifts the hat and displays a shaven poll from the crown |
| of which bristles a pigtail toupee tied with an orange topknot)_ I was |
| just beautifying him, don't you know. A thing of beauty, don't you know, |
| Yeats says, or I mean, Keats says. |
| |
| JOHN EGLINTON: _(Produces a greencapped dark lantern and flashes it |
| towards a corner: with carping accent)_ Esthetics and cosmetics are for |
| the boudoir. I am out for truth. Plain truth for a plain man. Tanderagee |
| wants the facts and means to get them. |
| |
| _(In the cone of the searchlight behind the coalscuttle, ollave, |
| holyeyed, the bearded figure of Mananaun Maclir broods, chin on knees. |
| He rises slowly. A cold seawind blows from his druid mouth. About his |
| head writhe eels and elvers. He is encrusted with weeds and shells. His |
| right hand holds a bicycle pump. His left hand grasps a huge crayfish by |
| its two talons.)_ |
| |
| MANANAUN MACLIR: _(With a voice of waves)_ Aum! Hek! Wal! Ak! Lub! Mor! |
| Ma! White yoghin of the gods. Occult pimander of Hermes Trismegistos. |
| _(With a voice of whistling seawind)_ Punarjanam patsypunjaub! I won't |
| have my leg pulled. It has been said by one: beware the left, the cult |
| of Shakti. _(With a cry of stormbirds)_ Shakti Shiva, darkhidden Father! |
| _(He smites with his bicycle pump the crayfish in his left hand. On its |
| cooperative dial glow the twelve signs of the zodiac. He wails with |
| the vehemence of the ocean.)_ Aum! Baum! Pyjaum! I am the light of the |
| homestead! I am the dreamery creamery butter. |
| |
| _(A skeleton judashand strangles the light. The green light wanes to |
| mauve. The gasjet wails whistling.)_ |
| |
| THE GASJET: Pooah! Pfuiiiiiii! |
| |
| _(Zoe runs to the chandelier and, crooking her leg, adjusts the |
| mantle.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: Who has a fag as I'm here? |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Tossing a cigarette on to the table)_ Here. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Her head perched aside in mock pride)_ Is that the way to hand |
| the _pot_ to a lady? _(She stretches up to light the cigarette over the |
| flame, twirling it slowly, showing the brown tufts of her armpits. Lynch |
| with his poker lifts boldly a side of her slip. Bare from her garters up |
| her flesh appears under the sapphire a nixie's green. She puffs calmly |
| at her cigarette.)_ Can you see the beautyspot of my behind? |
| |
| LYNCH: I'm not looking |
| |
| ZOE: _(Makes sheep's eyes)_ No? You wouldn't do a less thing. Would you |
| suck a lemon? |
| |
| _(Squinting in mock shame she glances with sidelong meaning at Bloom, |
| then twists round towards him, pulling her slip free of the poker. Blue |
| fluid again flows over her flesh. Bloom stands, smiling desirously, |
| twirling his thumbs. Kitty Ricketts licks her middle finger with her |
| spittle and, gazing in the mirror, smooths both eyebrows. Lipoti Virag, |
| basilicogrammate, chutes rapidly down through the chimneyflue and struts |
| two steps to the left on gawky pink stilts. He is sausaged into several |
| overcoats and wears a brown macintosh under which he holds a roll of |
| parchment. In his left eye flashes the monocle of Cashel Boyle O'connor |
| Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell. On his head is perched an Egyptian pshent. |
| Two quills project over his ears.)_ |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Heels together, bows)_ My name is Virag Lipoti, of Szombathely. |
| _(He coughs thoughtfully, drily)_ Promiscuous nakedness is much in |
| evidence hereabouts, eh? Inadvertently her backview revealed the fact |
| that she is not wearing those rather intimate garments of which you |
| are a particular devotee. The injection mark on the thigh I hope you |
| perceived? Good. |
| |
| BLOOM: Granpapachi. But... |
| |
| VIRAG: Number two on the other hand, she of the cherry rouge and |
| coiffeuse white, whose hair owes not a little to our tribal elixir of |
| gopherwood, is in walking costume and tightly staysed by her sit, I |
| should opine. Backbone in front, so to say. Correct me but I always |
| understood that the act so performed by skittish humans with glimpses of |
| lingerie appealed to you in virtue of its exhibitionististicicity. In a |
| word. Hippogriff. Am I right? |
| |
| BLOOM: She is rather lean. |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Not unpleasantly)_ Absolutely! Well observed and those pannier |
| pockets of the skirt and slightly pegtop effect are devised to suggest |
| bunchiness of hip. A new purchase at some monster sale for which a gull |
| has been mulcted. Meretricious finery to deceive the eye. Observe the |
| attention to details of dustspecks. Never put on you tomorrow what you |
| can wear today. Parallax! _(With a nervous twitch of his head)_ Did you |
| hear my brain go snap? Pollysyllabax! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(An elbow resting in a hand, a forefinger against his cheek)_ |
| She seems sad. |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Cynically, his weasel teeth bared yellow, draws down his left |
| eye with a finger and barks hoarsely)_ Hoax! Beware of the flapper |
| and bogus mournful. Lily of the alley. All possess bachelor's button |
| discovered by Rualdus Columbus. Tumble her. Columble her. Chameleon. |
| _(More genially)_ Well then, permit me to draw your attention to item |
| number three. There is plenty of her visible to the naked eye. Observe |
| the mass of oxygenated vegetable matter on her skull. What ho, she |
| bumps! The ugly duckling of the party, longcasted and deep in keel. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Regretfully)_ When you come out without your gun. |
| |
| VIRAG: We can do you all brands, mild, medium and strong. Pay your |
| money, take your choice. How happy could you be with either... |
| |
| BLOOM: With...? |
| |
| VIRAG: _(His tongue upcurling)_ Lyum! Look. Her beam is broad. She |
| is coated with quite a considerable layer of fat. Obviously mammal in |
| weight of bosom you remark that she has in front well to the fore two |
| protuberances of very respectable dimensions, inclined to fall in the |
| noonday soupplate, while on her rere lower down are two additional |
| protuberances, suggestive of potent rectum and tumescent for palpation, |
| which leave nothing to be desired save compactness. Such fleshy parts |
| are the product of careful nurture. When coopfattened their livers |
| reach an elephantine size. Pellets of new bread with fennygreek and |
| gumbenjamin swamped down by potions of green tea endow them during their |
| brief existence with natural pincushions of quite colossal blubber. That |
| suits your book, eh? Fleshhotpots of Egypt to hanker after. Wallow in |
| it. Lycopodium. _(His throat twitches)_ Slapbang! There he goes again. |
| |
| BLOOM: The stye I dislike. |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Arches his eyebrows)_ Contact with a goldring, they say. |
| _Argumentum ad feminam_, as we said in old Rome and ancient Greece |
| in the consulship of Diplodocus and Ichthyosauros. For the rest Eve's |
| sovereign remedy. Not for sale. Hire only. Huguenot. _(He twitches)_ It |
| is a funny sound. _(He coughs encouragingly)_ But possibly it is only a |
| wart. I presume you shall have remembered what I will have taught you on |
| that head? Wheatenmeal with honey and nutmeg. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Reflecting)_ Wheatenmeal with lycopodium and syllabax. This |
| searching ordeal. It has been an unusually fatiguing day, a chapter of |
| accidents. Wait. I mean, wartsblood spreads warts, you said... |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Severely, his nose hardhumped, his side eye winking)_ Stop |
| twirling your thumbs and have a good old thunk. See, you have forgotten. |
| Exercise your mnemotechnic. _La causa è santa_. Tara. Tara. _(Aside)_ He |
| will surely remember. |
| |
| BLOOM: Rosemary also did I understand you to say or willpower over |
| parasitic tissues. Then nay no I have an inkling. The touch of a |
| deadhand cures. Mnemo? |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Excitedly)_ I say so. I say so. E'en so. Technic. _(He taps his |
| parchmentroll energetically)_ This book tells you how to act with all |
| descriptive particulars. Consult index for agitated fear of aconite, |
| melancholy of muriatic, priapic pulsatilla. Virag is going to talk about |
| amputation. Our old friend caustic. They must be starved. Snip off with |
| horsehair under the denned neck. But, to change the venue to the Bulgar |
| and the Basque, have you made up your mind whether you like or dislike |
| women in male habiliments? _(With a dry snigger)_ You intended to devote |
| an entire year to the study of the religious problem and the summer |
| months of 1886 to square the circle and win that million. Pomegranate! |
| From the sublime to the ridiculous is but a step. Pyjamas, let us say? |
| Or stockingette gussetted knickers, closed? Or, put we the case, |
| those complicated combinations, camiknickers? _(He crows derisively)_ |
| Keekeereekee! |
| |
| _(Bloom surveys uncertainly the three whores then gazes at the veiled |
| mauve light, hearing the everflying moth.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: I wanted then to have now concluded. Nightdress was never. Hence |
| this. But tomorrow is a new day will be. Past was is today. What now is |
| will then morrow as now was be past yester. |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Prompts in a pig's whisper)_ Insects of the day spend their |
| brief existence in reiterated coition, lured by the smell of the |
| inferiorly pulchritudinous fumale possessing extendified pudendal nerve |
| in dorsal region. Pretty Poll! _(His yellow parrotbeak gabbles nasally)_ |
| They had a proverb in the Carpathians in or about the year five thousand |
| five hundred and fifty of our era. One tablespoonful of honey will |
| attract friend Bruin more than half a dozen barrels of first choice malt |
| vinegar. Bear's buzz bothers bees. But of this apart. At another time |
| we may resume. We were very pleased, we others. _(He coughs and, bending |
| his brow, rubs his nose thoughtfully with a scooping hand)_ You shall |
| find that these night insects follow the light. An illusion for remember |
| their complex unadjustable eye. For all these knotty points see the |
| seventeenth book of my Fundamentals of Sexology or the Love Passion |
| which Doctor L.B. says is the book sensation of the year. Some, to |
| example, there are again whose movements are automatic. Perceive. That |
| is his appropriate sun. Nightbird nightsun nighttown. Chase me, Charley! |
| _(He blows into bloom's ear)_ Buzz! |
| |
| BLOOM: Bee or bluebottle too other day butting shadow on wall dazed self |
| then me wandered dazed down shirt good job I... |
| |
| VIRAG: _(His face impassive, laughs in a rich feminine key)_ Splendid! |
| Spanish fly in his fly or mustard plaster on his dibble. _(He gobbles |
| gluttonously with turkey wattles)_ Bubbly jock! Bubbly jock! Where are |
| we? Open Sesame! Cometh forth! _(He unrolls his parchment rapidly and |
| reads, his glowworm's nose running backwards over the letters which he |
| claws)_ Stay, good friend. I bring thee thy answer. Redbank oysters will |
| shortly be upon us. I'm the best o'cook. Those succulent bivalves may |
| help us and the truffles of Perigord, tubers dislodged through mister |
| omnivorous porker, were unsurpassed in cases of nervous debility or |
| viragitis. Though they stink yet they sting. _(He wags his head with |
| cackling raillery)_ Jocular. With my eyeglass in my ocular. _(He |
| sneezes)_ Amen! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Absently)_ Ocularly woman's bivalve case is worse. Always open |
| sesame. The cloven sex. Why they fear vermin, creeping things. Yet Eve |
| and the serpent contradicts. Not a historical fact. Obvious analogy |
| to my idea. Serpents too are gluttons for woman's milk. Wind their way |
| through miles of omnivorous forest to sucksucculent her breast dry. Like |
| those bubblyjocular Roman matrons one reads of in Elephantuliasis. |
| |
| VIRAG: _(His mouth projected in hard wrinkles, eyes stonily forlornly |
| closed, psalms in outlandish monotone)_ That the cows with their those |
| distended udders that they have been the the known... |
| |
| BLOOM: I am going to scream. I beg your pardon. Ah? So. _(He repeats)_ |
| Spontaneously to seek out the saurian's lair in order to entrust their |
| teats to his avid suction. Ant milks aphis. _(Profoundly)_ Instinct |
| rules the world. In life. In death. |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Head askew, arches his back and hunched wingshoulders, peers |
| at the moth out of blear bulged eyes, points a horning claw and cries)_ |
| Who's moth moth? Who's dear Gerald? Dear Ger, that you? O dear, he is |
| Gerald. O, I much fear he shall be most badly burned. Will some pleashe |
| pershon not now impediment so catastrophics mit agitation of firstclass |
| tablenumpkin? _(He mews)_ Puss puss puss puss! _(He sighs, draws back |
| and stares sideways down with dropping underjaw)_ Well, well. He doth |
| rest anon. (He snaps his jaws suddenly on the air) |
| |
| THE MOTH: |
| |
| I'm a tiny tiny thing |
| Ever flying in the spring |
| Round and round a ringaring. |
| Long ago I was a king |
| Now I do this kind of thing |
| On the wing, on the wing! |
| Bing! |
| |
| _(He rushes against the mauve shade, flapping noisily)_ Pretty pretty |
| pretty pretty pretty pretty petticoats. |
| |
| _(From left upper entrance with two gliding steps Henry Flower comes |
| forward to left front centre. He wears a dark mantle and drooping plumed |
| sombrero. He carries a silverstringed inlaid dulcimer and a longstemmed |
| bamboo Jacob's pipe, its clay bowl fashioned as a female head. He wears |
| dark velvet hose and silverbuckled pumps. He has the romantic Saviour's |
| face with flowing locks, thin beard and moustache. His spindlelegs and |
| sparrow feet are those of the tenor Mario, prince of Candia. He settles |
| down his goffered ruffs and moistens his lips with a passage of his |
| amorous tongue.)_ |
| |
| HENRY: _(In a low dulcet voice, touching the strings of his guitar)_ |
| There is a flower that bloometh. |
| |
| _(Virag truculent, his jowl set, stares at the lamp. Grave Bloom regards |
| Zoe's neck. Henry gallant turns with pendant dewlap to the piano.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(To himself)_ Play with your eyes shut. Imitate pa. Filling my |
| belly with husks of swine. Too much of this. I will arise and go to my. |
| Expect this is the. Steve, thou art in a parlous way. Must visit old |
| Deasy or telegraph. Our interview of this morning has left on me a deep |
| impression. Though our ages. Will write fully tomorrow. I'm partially |
| drunk, by the way. _(He touches the keys again)_ Minor chord comes now. |
| Yes. Not much however. |
| |
| _(Almidano Artifoni holds out a batonroll of music with vigorous |
| moustachework.)_ |
| |
| ARTIFONI: _Ci rifletta. Lei rovina tutto._ |
| |
| FLORRY: Sing us something. Love's old sweet song. |
| |
| STEPHEN: No voice. I am a most finished artist. Lynch, did I show you |
| the letter about the lute? |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Smirking)_ The bird that can sing and won't sing. |
| |
| _(The Siamese twins, Philip Drunk and Philip Sober, two Oxford dons with |
| lawnmowers, appear in the window embrasure. Both are masked with Matthew |
| Arnold's face.)_ |
| |
| PHILIP SOBER: Take a fool's advice. All is not well. Work it out with |
| the buttend of a pencil, like a good young idiot. Three pounds twelve |
| you got, two notes, one sovereign, two crowns, if youth but knew. |
| Mooney's en ville, Mooney's sur mer, the Moira, Larchet's, Holles street |
| hospital, Burke's. Eh? I am watching you. |
| |
| PHILIP DRUNK: _(Impatiently)_ Ah, bosh, man. Go to hell! I paid my way. |
| If I could only find out about octaves. Reduplication of personality. |
| Who was it told me his name? _(His lawnmower begins to purr)_ Aha, yes. |
| _Zoe mou sas agapo_. Have a notion I was here before. When was it not |
| Atkinson his card I have somewhere. Mac Somebody. Unmack I have it. He |
| told me about, hold on, Swinburne, was it, no? |
| |
| FLORRY: And the song? |
| |
| STEPHEN: Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. |
| |
| FLORRY: Are you out of Maynooth? You're like someone I knew once. |
| |
| STEPHEN: Out of it now. _(To himself)_ Clever. |
| |
| PHILIP DRUNK AND PHILIP SOBER: _(Their lawnmowers purring with a |
| rigadoon of grasshalms)_ Clever ever. Out of it out of it. By the |
| bye have you the book, the thing, the ashplant? Yes, there it, yes. |
| Cleverever outofitnow. Keep in condition. Do like us. |
| |
| ZOE: There was a priest down here two nights ago to do his bit of |
| business with his coat buttoned up. You needn't try to hide, I says to |
| him. I know you've a Roman collar. |
| |
| VIRAG: Perfectly logical from his standpoint. Fall of man. _(Harshly, |
| his pupils waxing)_ To hell with the pope! Nothing new under the sun. I |
| am the Virag who disclosed the Sex Secrets of Monks and Maidens. Why |
| I left the church of Rome. Read the Priest, the Woman and the |
| Confessional. Penrose. Flipperty Jippert. _(He wriggles)_ Woman, undoing |
| with sweet pudor her belt of rushrope, offers her allmoist yoni to man's |
| lingam. Short time after man presents woman with pieces of jungle meat. |
| Woman shows joy and covers herself with featherskins. Man loves her yoni |
| fiercely with big lingam, the stiff one. _(He cries) Coactus volui._ |
| Then giddy woman will run about. Strong man grapses woman's wrist. |
| Woman squeals, bites, spucks. Man, now fierce angry, strikes woman's fat |
| yadgana. _(He chases his tail)_ Piffpaff! Popo! _(He stops, sneezes)_ |
| Pchp! _(He worries his butt)_ Prrrrrht! |
| |
| LYNCH: I hope you gave the good father a penance. Nine glorias for |
| shooting a bishop. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Spouts walrus smoke through her nostrils)_ He couldn't get a |
| connection. Only, you know, sensation. A dry rush. |
| |
| BLOOM: Poor man! |
| |
| ZOE: _(Lightly)_ Only for what happened him. |
| |
| BLOOM: How? |
| |
| VIRAG: _(A diabolic rictus of black luminosity contracting his visage, |
| cranes his scraggy neck forward. He lifts a mooncalf nozzle and howls.) |
| Verfluchte Goim!_ He had a father, forty fathers. He never existed. Pig |
| God! He had two left feet. He was Judas Iacchia, a Libyan eunuch, the |
| pope's bastard. _(He leans out on tortured forepaws, elbows bent rigid, |
| his eye agonising in his flat skullneck and yelps over the mute world)_ |
| A son of a whore. Apocalypse. |
| |
| KITTY: And Mary Shortall that was in the lock with the pox she got from |
| Jimmy Pidgeon in the blue caps had a child off him that couldn't swallow |
| and was smothered with the convulsions in the mattress and we all |
| subscribed for the funeral. |
| |
| PHILIP DRUNK: _(Gravely) Qui vous a mis dans cette fichue position, |
| Philippe?_ |
| |
| PHILIP SOBER: _(Gaily) c'était le sacré pigeon, Philippe._ |
| |
| _(Kitty unpins her hat and sets it down calmly, patting her henna hair. |
| And a prettier, a daintier head of winsome curls was never seen on a |
| whore's shoulders. Lynch puts on her hat. She whips it off.)_ |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Laughs)_ And to such delights has Metchnikoff inoculated |
| anthropoid apes. |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Nods)_ Locomotor ataxy. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Gaily)_ O, my dictionary. |
| |
| LYNCH: Three wise virgins. |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Agueshaken, profuse yellow spawn foaming over his bony |
| epileptic lips)_ She sold lovephiltres, whitewax, orangeflower. Panther, |
| the Roman centurion, polluted her with his genitories. _(He sticks out |
| a flickering phosphorescent scorpion tongue, his hand on his fork)_ |
| Messiah! He burst her tympanum. _(With gibbering baboon's cries he jerks |
| his hips in the cynical spasm)_ Hik! Hek! Hak! Hok! Huk! Kok! Kuk! |
| |
| _(Ben Jumbo Dollard, Rubicund, musclebound, hairynostrilled, |
| hugebearded, cabbageeared, shaggychested, shockmaned, fat-papped, stands |
| forth, his loins and genitals tightened into a pair of black bathing |
| bagslops.)_ |
| |
| BEN DOLLARD: _(Nakkering castanet bones in his huge padded paws, yodels |
| jovially in base barreltone)_ When love absorbs my ardent soul. |
| |
| _(The virgins Nurse Callan and Nurse Quigley burst through the |
| ringkeepers and the ropes and mob him with open arms.)_ |
| |
| THE VIRGINS: _(Gushingly)_ Big Ben! Ben my Chree! |
| |
| A VOICE: Hold that fellow with the bad breeches. |
| |
| BEN DOLLARD: _(Smites his thigh in abundant laughter)_ Hold him now. |
| |
| HENRY: _(Caressing on his breast a severed female head, murmurs)_ Thine |
| heart, mine love. _(He plucks his lutestrings)_ When first I saw... |
| |
| VIRAG: _(Sloughing his skins, his multitudinous plumage moulting)_ Rats! |
| _(He yawns, showing a coalblack throat, and closes his jaws by an upward |
| push of his parchmentroll)_ After having said which I took my departure. |
| Farewell. Fare thee well. _Dreck!_ |
| |
| _(Henry Flower combs his moustache and beard rapidly with a pocketcomb |
| and gives a cow's lick to his hair. Steered by his rapier, he glides to |
| the door, his wild harp slung behind him. Virag reaches the door in two |
| ungainly stilthops, his tail cocked, and deftly claps sideways on the |
| wall a pusyellow flybill, butting it with his head.)_ |
| |
| THE FLYBILL: K. II. Post No Bills. Strictly confidential. Dr Hy Franks. |
| |
| HENRY: All is lost now. |
| |
| _(Virag unscrews his head in a trice and holds it under his arm.)_ |
| |
| VIRAG'S HEAD: Quack! |
| |
| _(Exeunt severally.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Over his shoulder to zoe)_ You would have preferred |
| the fighting parson who founded the protestant error. But beware |
| Antisthenes, the dog sage, and the last end of Arius Heresiarchus. The |
| agony in the closet. |
| |
| LYNCH: All one and the same God to her. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Devoutly)_ And sovereign Lord of all things. |
| |
| FLORRY: _(To Stephen)_ I'm sure you're a spoiled priest. Or a monk. |
| |
| LYNCH: He is. A cardinal's son. |
| |
| STEPHEN: Cardinal sin. Monks of the screw. |
| |
| _(His Eminence Simon Stephen Cardinal Dedalus, Primate of all Ireland, |
| appears in the doorway, dressed in red soutane, sandals and socks. Seven |
| dwarf simian acolytes, also in red, cardinal sins, uphold his train, |
| peeping under it. He wears a battered silk hat sideways on his head. His |
| thumbs are stuck in his armpits and his palms outspread. Round his |
| neck hangs a rosary of corks ending on his breast in a corkscrew cross. |
| Releasing his thumbs, he invokes grace from on high with large wave |
| gestures and proclaims with bloated pomp:)_ |
| |
| THE CARDINAL: |
| |
| Conservio lies captured |
| He lies in the lowest dungeon |
| With manacles and chains around his limbs |
| Weighing upwards of three tons. |
| |
| _(He looks at all for a moment, his right eye closed tight, his left |
| cheek puffed out. Then, unable to repress his merriment, he rocks to and |
| fro, arms akimbo, and sings with broad rollicking humour:)_ |
| |
| O, the poor little fellow |
| Hihihihihis legs they were yellow |
| He was plump, fat and heavy and brisk as a snake |
| But some bloody savage |
| To graize his white cabbage |
| He murdered Nell Flaherty's duckloving drake. |
| |
| _(A multitude of midges swarms white over his robe. He scratches himself |
| with crossed arms at his ribs, grimacing, and exclaims:)_ |
| |
| I'm suffering the agony of the damned. By the hoky fiddle, thanks be to |
| Jesus those funny little chaps are not unanimous. If they were they'd |
| walk me off the face of the bloody globe. |
| |
| _(His head aslant he blesses curtly with fore and middle fingers, |
| imparts the Easter kiss and doubleshuffles off comically, swaying |
| his hat from side to side, shrinking quickly to the size of his |
| trainbearers. The dwarf acolytes, giggling, peeping, nudging, ogling, |
| Easterkissing, zigzag behind him. His voice is heard mellow from afar, |
| merciful male, melodious:)_ |
| |
| Shall carry my heart to thee, |
| Shall carry my heart to thee, |
| And the breath of the balmy night |
| Shall carry my heart to thee! |
| _(The trick doorhandle turns.)_ |
| |
| |
| THE DOORHANDLE: Theeee! |
| |
| ZOE: The devil is in that door. |
| |
| _(A male form passes down the creaking staircase and is heard taking |
| the waterproof and hat from the rack. Bloom starts forward involuntarily |
| and, half closing the door as he passes, takes the chocolate from his |
| pocket and offers it nervously to Zoe.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: _(Sniffs his hair briskly)_ Hmmm! Thank your mother for the |
| rabbits. I'm very fond of what I like. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Hearing a male voice in talk with the whores on the doorstep, |
| pricks his ears)_ If it were he? After? Or because not? Or the double |
| event? |
| |
| ZOE: _(Tears open the silverfoil)_ Fingers was made before forks. _(She |
| breaks off and nibbles a piece gives a piece to Kitty Ricketts and then |
| turns kittenishly to Lynch)_ No objection to French lozenges? _(He nods. |
| She taunts him.)_ Have it now or wait till you get it? _(He opens his |
| mouth, his head cocked. She whirls the prize in left circle. His head |
| follows. She whirls it back in right circle. He eyes her.)_ Catch! |
| |
| _(She tosses a piece. With an adroit snap he catches it and bites it |
| through with a crack.)_ |
| |
| KITTY: _(Chewing)_ The engineer I was with at the bazaar does have |
| lovely ones. Full of the best liqueurs. And the viceroy was there with |
| his lady. The gas we had on the Toft's hobbyhorses. I'm giddy still. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In Svengali's fur overcoat, with folded arms and Napoleonic |
| forelock, frowns in ventriloquial exorcism with piercing eagle glance |
| towards the door. Then rigid with left foot advanced he makes a swift |
| pass with impelling fingers and gives the sign of past master, drawing |
| his right arm downwards from his left shoulder.)_ Go, go, go, I conjure |
| you, whoever you are! |
| |
| _(A male cough and tread are heard passing through the mist outside. |
| Bloom's features relax. He places a hand in his waistcoat, posing |
| calmly. Zoe offers him chocolate.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Solemnly)_ Thanks. |
| |
| ZOE: Do as you're bid. Here! |
| |
| _(A firm heelclacking tread is heard on the stairs.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Takes the chocolate)_ Aphrodisiac? Tansy and pennyroyal. But I |
| bought it. Vanilla calms or? Mnemo. Confused light confuses memory. Red |
| influences lupus. Colours affect women's characters, any they have. This |
| black makes me sad. Eat and be merry for tomorrow. _(He eats)_ Influence |
| taste too, mauve. But it is so long since I. Seems new. Aphro. That |
| priest. Must come. Better late than never. Try truffles at Andrews. |
| |
| _(The door opens. Bella Cohen, a massive whoremistress, enters. She |
| is dressed in a threequarter ivory gown, fringed round the hem with |
| tasselled selvedge, and cools herself flirting a black horn fan like |
| Minnie Hauck in_ Carmen. _On her left hand are wedding and keeper rings. |
| Her eyes are deeply carboned. She has a sprouting moustache. Her |
| olive face is heavy, slightly sweated and fullnosed with orangetainted |
| nostrils. She has large pendant beryl eardrops.)_ |
| |
| BELLA: My word! I'm all of a mucksweat. |
| |
| _(She glances round her at the couples. Then her eyes rest on Bloom with |
| hard insistence. Her large fan winnows wind towards her heated faceneck |
| and embonpoint. Her falcon eyes glitter.)_ |
| |
| THE FAN: _(Flirting quickly, then slowly)_ Married, I see. |
| |
| BLOOM: Yes. Partly, I have mislaid... |
| |
| THE FAN: _(Half opening, then closing)_ And the missus is master. |
| Petticoat government. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Looks down with a sheepish grin)_ That is so. |
| |
| THE FAN: _(Folding together, rests against her left eardrop)_ Have you |
| forgotten me? |
| |
| BLOOM: Yes. Yo. |
| |
| THE FAN: _(Folded akimbo against her waist)_ Is me her was you dreamed |
| before? Was then she him you us since knew? Am all them and the same now |
| we? |
| |
| _(Bella approaches, gently tapping with the fan.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Wincing)_ Powerful being. In my eyes read that slumber which |
| women love. |
| |
| THE FAN: _(Tapping)_ We have met. You are mine. It is fate. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Cowed)_ Exuberant female. Enormously I desiderate your |
| domination. I am exhausted, abandoned, no more young. I stand, so to |
| speak, with an unposted letter bearing the extra regulation fee before |
| the too late box of the general postoffice of human life. The door |
| and window open at a right angle cause a draught of thirtytwo feet per |
| second according to the law of falling bodies. I have felt this instant |
| a twinge of sciatica in my left glutear muscle. It runs in our family. |
| Poor dear papa, a widower, was a regular barometer from it. He believed |
| in animal heat. A skin of tabby lined his winter waistcoat. Near the |
| end, remembering king David and the Sunamite, he shared his bed with |
| Athos, faithful after death. A dog's spittle as you probably... _(He |
| winces)_ Ah! |
| |
| RICHIE GOULDING: _(Bagweighted, passes the door)_ Mocking is catch. Best |
| value in Dub. Fit for a prince's. Liver and kidney. |
| |
| THE FAN: _(Tapping)_ All things end. Be mine. Now. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Undecided)_ All now? I should not have parted with my talisman. |
| Rain, exposure at dewfall on the searocks, a peccadillo at my time of |
| life. Every phenomenon has a natural cause. |
| |
| THE FAN: _(Points downwards slowly)_ You may. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Looks downwards and perceives her unfastened bootlace)_ We are |
| observed. |
| |
| THE FAN: _(Points downwards quickly)_ You must. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(With desire, with reluctance)_ I can make a true black knot. |
| Learned when I served my time and worked the mail order line for |
| Kellett's. Experienced hand. Every knot says a lot. Let me. In courtesy. |
| I knelt once before today. Ah! |
| |
| _(Bella raises her gown slightly and, steadying her pose, lifts to the |
| edge of a chair a plump buskined hoof and a full pastern, silksocked. |
| Bloom, stifflegged, aging, bends over her hoof and with gentle fingers |
| draws out and in her laces.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Murmurs lovingly)_ To be a shoefitter in Manfield's was my |
| love's young dream, the darling joys of sweet buttonhooking, to lace |
| up crisscrossed to kneelength the dressy kid footwear satinlined, so |
| incredibly impossibly small, of Clyde Road ladies. Even their wax model |
| Raymonde I visited daily to admire her cobweb hose and stick of rhubarb |
| toe, as worn in Paris. |
| |
| THE HOOF: Smell my hot goathide. Feel my royal weight. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Crosslacing)_ Too tight? |
| |
| THE HOOF: If you bungle, Handy Andy, I'll kick your football for you. |
| |
| BLOOM: Not to lace the wrong eyelet as I did the night of the bazaar |
| dance. Bad luck. Hook in wrong tache of her... person you mentioned. |
| That night she met... Now! |
| |
| _(He knots the lace. Bella places her foot on the floor. Bloom raises |
| his head. Her heavy face, her eyes strike him in midbrow. His eyes grow |
| dull, darker and pouched, his nose thickens.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Mumbles)_ Awaiting your further orders we remain, gentlemen,... |
| |
| BELLO: _(With a hard basilisk stare, in a baritone voice)_ Hound of |
| dishonour! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Infatuated)_ Empress! |
| |
| BELLO: _(His heavy cheekchops sagging)_ Adorer of the adulterous rump! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Plaintively)_ Hugeness! |
| |
| BELLO: Dungdevourer! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(With sinews semiflexed)_ Magmagnificence! |
| |
| BELLO: Down! _(He taps her on the shoulder with his fan)_ Incline feet |
| forward! Slide left foot one pace back! You will fall. You are falling. |
| On the hands down! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Her eyes upturned in the sign of admiration, closing, yaps)_ |
| Truffles! |
| |
| _(With a piercing epileptic cry she sinks on all fours, grunting, |
| snuffling, rooting at his feet: then lies, shamming dead, with eyes shut |
| tight, trembling eyelids, bowed upon the ground in the attitude of most |
| excellent master.)_ |
| |
| BELLO: _(With bobbed hair, purple gills, fit moustache rings round his |
| shaven mouth, in mountaineer's puttees, green silverbuttoned coat, sport |
| skirt and alpine hat with moorcock's feather, his hands stuck deep in |
| his breeches pockets, places his heel on her neck and grinds it in)_ |
| Footstool! Feel my entire weight. Bow, bondslave, before the throne of |
| your despot's glorious heels so glistening in their proud erectness. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Enthralled, bleats)_ I promise never to disobey. |
| |
| BELLO: _(Laughs loudly)_ Holy smoke! You little know what's in store for |
| you. I'm the Tartar to settle your little lot and break you in! I'll bet |
| Kentucky cocktails all round I shame it out of you, old son. Cheek me, |
| I dare you. If you do tremble in anticipation of heel discipline to be |
| inflicted in gym costume. |
| |
| _(Bloom creeps under the sofa and peers out through the fringe.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: _(Widening her slip to screen her)_ She's not here. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Closing her eyes)_ She's not here. |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Hiding her with her gown)_ She didn't mean it, Mr Bello. |
| She'll be good, sir. |
| |
| KITTY: Don't be too hard on her, Mr Bello. Sure you won't, ma'amsir. |
| |
| BELLO: _(Coaxingly)_ Come, ducky dear, I want a word with you, darling, |
| just to administer correction. Just a little heart to heart talk, |
| sweety. _(Bloom puts out her timid head)_ There's a good girly now. |
| _(Bello grabs her hair violently and drags her forward)_ I only want |
| to correct you for your own good on a soft safe spot. How's that tender |
| behind? O, ever so gently, pet. Begin to get ready. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Fainting)_ Don't tear my... |
| |
| BELLO: _(Savagely)_ The nosering, the pliers, the bastinado, the hanging |
| hook, the knout I'll make you kiss while the flutes play like the Nubian |
| slave of old. You're in for it this time! I'll make you remember me for |
| the balance of your natural life. _(His forehead veins swollen, his face |
| congested)_ I shall sit on your ottoman saddleback every morning after |
| my thumping good breakfast of Matterson's fat hamrashers and a bottle |
| of Guinness's porter. _(He belches)_ And suck my thumping good Stock |
| Exchange cigar while I read the _Licensed Victualler's Gazette_. Very |
| possibly I shall have you slaughtered and skewered in my stables and |
| enjoy a slice of you with crisp crackling from the baking tin basted |
| and baked like sucking pig with rice and lemon or currant sauce. It will |
| hurt you. _(He twists her arm. Bloom squeals, turning turtle.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Don't be cruel, nurse! Don't! |
| |
| BELLO: _(Twisting)_ Another! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Screams)_ O, it's hell itself! Every nerve in my body aches |
| like mad! |
| |
| BELLO: _(Shouts)_ Good, by the rumping jumping general! That's the best |
| bit of news I heard these six weeks. Here, don't keep me waiting, damn |
| you! _(He slaps her face)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Whimpers)_ You're after hitting me. I'll tell... |
| |
| BELLO: Hold him down, girls, till I squat on him. |
| |
| ZOE: Yes. Walk on him! I will. |
| |
| FLORRY: I will. Don't be greedy. |
| |
| KITTY: No, me. Lend him to me. |
| |
| _(The brothel cook, mrs keogh, wrinkled, greybearded, in a greasy bib, |
| men's grey and green socks and brogues, floursmeared, a rollingpin stuck |
| with raw pastry in her bare red arm and hand, appears at the door.)_ |
| |
| MRS KEOGH: _(Ferociously)_ Can I help? _(They hold and pinion Bloom.)_ |
| |
| BELLO: _(Squats with a grunt on Bloom's upturned face, puffing |
| cigarsmoke, nursing a fat leg)_ I see Keating Clay is elected |
| vicechairman of the Richmond asylum and by the by Guinness's preference |
| shares are at sixteen three quaffers. Curse me for a fool that didn't |
| buy that lot Craig and Gardner told me about. Just my infernal luck, |
| curse it. And that Goddamned outsider _Throwaway_ at twenty to one. |
| _(He quenches his cigar angrily on Bloom's ear)_ Where's that Goddamned |
| cursed ashtray? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Goaded, buttocksmothered)_ O! O! Monsters! Cruel one! |
| |
| BELLO: Ask for that every ten minutes. Beg. Pray for it as you never |
| prayed before. _(He thrusts out a figged fist and foul cigar)_ Here, |
| kiss that. Both. Kiss. _(He throws a leg astride and, pressing with |
| horseman's knees, calls in a hard voice)_ Gee up! A cockhorse to Banbury |
| cross. I'll ride him for the Eclipse stakes. _(He bends sideways and |
| squeezes his mount's testicles roughly, shouting)_ Ho! Off we pop! I'll |
| nurse you in proper fashion. _(He horserides cockhorse, leaping in the |
| saddle)_ The lady goes a pace a pace and the coachman goes a trot a trot |
| and the gentleman goes a gallop a gallop a gallop a gallop. |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Pulls at Bello)_ Let me on him now. You had enough. I asked |
| before you. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Pulling at florry)_ Me. Me. Are you not finished with him yet, |
| suckeress? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Stifling)_ Can't. |
| |
| BELLO: Well, I'm not. Wait. _(He holds in his breath)_ Curse it. Here. |
| This bung's about burst. _(He uncorks himself behind: then, contorting |
| his features, farts loudly)_ Take that! _(He recorks himself)_ Yes, by |
| Jingo, sixteen three quarters. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(A sweat breaking out over him)_ Not man. _(He sniffs)_ Woman. |
| |
| BELLO: _(Stands up)_ No more blow hot and cold. What you longed for has |
| come to pass. Henceforth you are unmanned and mine in earnest, a thing |
| under the yoke. Now for your punishment frock. You will shed your male |
| garments, you understand, Ruby Cohen? and don the shot silk luxuriously |
| rustling over head and shoulders. And quickly too! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Shrinks)_ Silk, mistress said! O crinkly! scrapy! Must I |
| tiptouch it with my nails? |
| |
| BELLO: _(Points to his whores)_ As they are now so will you be, wigged, |
| singed, perfumesprayed, ricepowdered, with smoothshaven armpits. Tape |
| measurements will be taken next your skin. You will be laced with cruel |
| force into vicelike corsets of soft dove coutille with whalebone busk to |
| the diamondtrimmed pelvis, the absolute outside edge, while your figure, |
| plumper than when at large, will be restrained in nettight frocks, |
| pretty two ounce petticoats and fringes and things stamped, of course, |
| with my houseflag, creations of lovely lingerie for Alice and nice |
| scent for Alice. Alice will feel the pullpull. Martha and Mary will be |
| a little chilly at first in such delicate thighcasing but the frilly |
| flimsiness of lace round your bare knees will remind you... |
| |
| BLOOM: _(A charming soubrette with dauby cheeks, mustard hair and large |
| male hands and nose, leering mouth)_ I tried her things on only twice, |
| a small prank, in Holles street. When we were hard up I washed them to |
| save the laundry bill. My own shirts I turned. It was the purest thrift. |
| |
| BELLO: _(Jeers)_ Little jobs that make mother pleased, eh? And showed |
| off coquettishly in your domino at the mirror behind closedrawn blinds |
| your unskirted thighs and hegoat's udders in various poses of surrender, |
| eh? Ho! ho! I have to laugh! That secondhand black operatop shift and |
| short trunkleg naughties all split up the stitches at her last rape that |
| Mrs Miriam Dandrade sold you from the Shelbourne hotel, eh? |
| |
| BLOOM: Miriam. Black. Demimondaine. |
| |
| BELLO: _(Guffaws)_ Christ Almighty it's too tickling, this! You were |
| a nicelooking Miriam when you clipped off your backgate hairs and |
| lay swooning in the thing across the bed as Mrs Dandrade about to be |
| violated by lieutenant Smythe-Smythe, Mr Philip Augustus Blockwell M. |
| P., signor Laci Daremo, the robust tenor, blueeyed Bert, the liftboy, |
| Henri Fleury of Gordon Bennett fame, Sheridan, the quadroon Croesus, the |
| varsity wetbob eight from old Trinity, Ponto, her splendid Newfoundland |
| and Bobs, dowager duchess of Manorhamilton. _(He guffaws again)_ Christ, |
| wouldn't it make a Siamese cat laugh? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Her hands and features working)_ It was Gerald converted me to |
| be a true corsetlover when I was female impersonator in the High School |
| play _Vice Versa_. It was dear Gerald. He got that kink, fascinated by |
| sister's stays. Now dearest Gerald uses pinky greasepaint and gilds his |
| eyelids. Cult of the beautiful. |
| |
| BELLO: _(With wicked glee)_ Beautiful! Give us a breather! When you |
| took your seat with womanish care, lifting your billowy flounces, on the |
| smoothworn throne. |
| |
| BLOOM: Science. To compare the various joys we each enjoy. _(Earnestly)_ |
| And really it's better the position... because often I used to wet... |
| |
| BELLO: _(Sternly)_ No insubordination! The sawdust is there in the |
| corner for you. I gave you strict instructions, didn't I? Do it |
| standing, sir! I'll teach you to behave like a jinkleman! If I catch a |
| trace on your swaddles. Aha! By the ass of the Dorans you'll find I'm a |
| martinet. The sins of your past are rising against you. Many. Hundreds. |
| |
| THE SINS OF THE PAST: _(In a medley of voices)_ He went through a form |
| of clandestine marriage with at least one woman in the shadow of the |
| Black church. Unspeakable messages he telephoned mentally to Miss Dunn |
| at an address in D'Olier street while he presented himself indecently to |
| the instrument in the callbox. By word and deed he frankly encouraged |
| a nocturnal strumpet to deposit fecal and other matter in an unsanitary |
| outhouse attached to empty premises. In five public conveniences |
| he wrote pencilled messages offering his nuptial partner to all |
| strongmembered males. And by the offensively smelling vitriol works did |
| he not pass night after night by loving courting couples to see if and |
| what and how much he could see? Did he not lie in bed, the gross boar, |
| gloating over a nauseous fragment of wellused toilet paper presented to |
| him by a nasty harlot, stimulated by gingerbread and a postal order? |
| |
| BELLO: _(Whistles loudly)_ Say! What was the most revolting piece of |
| obscenity in all your career of crime? Go the whole hog. Puke it out! Be |
| candid for once. |
| |
| _(Mute inhuman faces throng forward, leering, vanishing, gibbering, |
| Booloohoom. Poldy Kock, Bootlaces a penny Cassidy's hag, blind |
| stripling, Larry Rhinoceros, the girl, the woman, the whore, the other, |
| the...)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Don't ask me! Our mutual faith. Pleasants street. I only thought |
| the half of the... I swear on my sacred oath... |
| |
| BELLO: _(Peremptorily)_ Answer. Repugnant wretch! I insist on knowing. |
| Tell me something to amuse me, smut or a bloody good ghoststory or a |
| line of poetry, quick, quick, quick! Where? How? What time? With how |
| many? I give you just three seconds. One! Two! Thr... |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Docile, gurgles)_ I rererepugnosed in rerererepugnant |
| |
| BELLO: _(Imperiously)_ O, get out, you skunk! Hold your tongue! Speak |
| when you're spoken to. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Bows)_ Master! Mistress! Mantamer! |
| |
| _(He lifts his arms. His bangle bracelets fill.)_ |
| |
| BELLO: _(Satirically)_ By day you will souse and bat our smelling |
| underclothes also when we ladies are unwell, and swab out our latrines |
| with dress pinned up and a dishclout tied to your tail. Won't that be |
| nice? _(He places a ruby ring on her finger)_ And there now! With this |
| ring I thee own. Say, thank you, mistress. |
| |
| BLOOM: Thank you, mistress. |
| |
| BELLO: You will make the beds, get my tub ready, empty the pisspots in |
| the different rooms, including old Mrs Keogh's the cook's, a sandy one. |
| Ay, and rinse the seven of them well, mind, or lap it up like champagne. |
| Drink me piping hot. Hop! You will dance attendance or I'll lecture you |
| on your misdeeds, Miss Ruby, and spank your bare bot right well, miss, |
| with the hairbrush. You'll be taught the error of your ways. At night |
| your wellcreamed braceletted hands will wear fortythreebutton gloves |
| newpowdered with talc and having delicately scented fingertips. For such |
| favours knights of old laid down their lives. _(He chuckles)_ My boys |
| will be no end charmed to see you so ladylike, the colonel, above |
| all, when they come here the night before the wedding to fondle my new |
| attraction in gilded heels. First I'll have a go at you myself. A man I |
| know on the turf named Charles Alberta Marsh (I was in bed with him just |
| now and another gentleman out of the Hanaper and Petty Bag office) is |
| on the lookout for a maid of all work at a short knock. Swell the bust. |
| Smile. Droop shoulders. What offers? _(He points)_ For that lot. Trained |
| by owner to fetch and carry, basket in mouth. _(He bares his arm and |
| plunges it elbowdeep in Bloom's vulva)_ There's fine depth for you! |
| What, boys? That give you a hardon? _(He shoves his arm in a bidder's |
| face)_ Here wet the deck and wipe it round! |
| |
| A BIDDER: A florin. |
| |
| _(Dillon's lacquey rings his handbell.)_ |
| |
| THE LACQUEY: Barang! |
| |
| A VOICE: One and eightpence too much. |
| |
| CHARLES ALBERTA MARSH: Must be virgin. Good breath. Clean. |
| |
| BELLO: _(Gives a rap with his gavel)_ Two bar. Rockbottom figure and |
| cheap at the price. Fourteen hands high. Touch and examine his points. |
| Handle him. This downy skin, these soft muscles, this tender flesh. If |
| I had only my gold piercer here! And quite easy to milk. Three newlaid |
| gallons a day. A pure stockgetter, due to lay within the hour. His |
| sire's milk record was a thousand gallons of whole milk in forty weeks. |
| Whoa my jewel! Beg up! Whoa! _(He brands his initial C on Bloom's |
| croup)_ So! Warranted Cohen! What advance on two bob, gentlemen? |
| |
| A DARKVISAGED MAN: _(In disguised accent)_ Hoondert punt sterlink. |
| |
| VOICES: _(Subdued)_ For the Caliph. Haroun Al Raschid. |
| |
| BELLO: _(Gaily)_ Right. Let them all come. The scanty, daringly short |
| skirt, riding up at the knee to show a peep of white pantalette, is a |
| potent weapon and transparent stockings, emeraldgartered, with the |
| long straight seam trailing up beyond the knee, appeal to the better |
| instincts of the _blasé_ man about town. Learn the smooth mincing walk |
| on four inch Louis Quinze heels, the Grecian bend with provoking croup, |
| the thighs fluescent, knees modestly kissing. Bring all your powers of |
| fascination to bear on them. Pander to their Gomorrahan vices. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Bends his blushing face into his armpit and simpers with |
| forefinger in mouth)_ O, I know what you're hinting at now! |
| |
| BELLO: What else are you good for, an impotent thing like you? _(He |
| stoops and, peering, pokes with his fan rudely under the fat suet folds |
| of Bloom's haunches)_ Up! Up! Manx cat! What have we here? Where's your |
| curly teapot gone to or who docked it on you, cockyolly? Sing, birdy, |
| sing. It's as limp as a boy of six's doing his pooly behind a cart. Buy |
| a bucket or sell your pump. _(Loudly)_ Can you do a man's job? |
| |
| BLOOM: Eccles street... |
| |
| BELLO: _(Sarcastically)_ I wouldn't hurt your feelings for the world but |
| there's a man of brawn in possession there. The tables are turned, my |
| gay young fellow! He is something like a fullgrown outdoor man. Well for |
| you, you muff, if you had that weapon with knobs and lumps and warts all |
| over it. He shot his bolt, I can tell you! Foot to foot, knee to knee, |
| belly to belly, bubs to breast! He's no eunuch. A shock of red hair he |
| has sticking out of him behind like a furzebush! Wait for nine months, |
| my lad! Holy ginger, it's kicking and coughing up and down in her guts |
| already! That makes you wild, don't it? Touches the spot? _(He spits in |
| contempt)_ Spittoon! |
| |
| BLOOM: I was indecently treated, I... Inform the police. Hundred |
| pounds. Unmentionable. I... |
| |
| BELLO: Would if you could, lame duck. A downpour we want not your |
| drizzle. |
| |
| BLOOM: To drive me mad! Moll! I forgot! Forgive! Moll... We... Still... |
| |
| BELLO: _(Ruthlessly)_ No, Leopold Bloom, all is changed by woman's will |
| since you slept horizontal in Sleepy Hollow your night of twenty years. |
| Return and see. |
| |
| _(Old Sleepy Hollow calls over the wold.)_ |
| |
| SLEEPY HOLLOW: Rip van Wink! Rip van Winkle! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In tattered mocassins with a rusty fowlingpiece, tiptoeing, |
| fingertipping, his haggard bony bearded face peering through the diamond |
| panes, cries out)_ I see her! It's she! The first night at Mat Dillon's! |
| But that dress, the green! And her hair is dyed gold and he... |
| |
| BELLO: _(Laughs mockingly)_ That's your daughter, you owl, with a |
| Mullingar student. |
| |
| _(Milly Bloom, fairhaired, greenvested, slimsandalled, her blue scarf |
| in the seawind simply swirling, breaks from the arms of her lover and |
| calls, her young eyes wonderwide.)_ |
| |
| MILLY: My! It's Papli! But, O Papli, how old you've grown! |
| |
| BELLO: Changed, eh? Our whatnot, our writingtable where we never wrote, |
| aunt Hegarty's armchair, our classic reprints of old masters. A man and |
| his menfriends are living there in clover. The _Cuckoos' Rest!_ Why not? |
| How many women had you, eh, following them up dark streets, flatfoot, |
| exciting them by your smothered grunts, what, you male prostitute? |
| Blameless dames with parcels of groceries. Turn about. Sauce for the |
| goose, my gander O. |
| |
| BLOOM: They... I... |
| |
| BELLO: _(Cuttingly)_ Their heelmarks will stamp the Brusselette carpet |
| you bought at Wren's auction. In their horseplay with Moll the romp to |
| find the buck flea in her breeches they will deface the little statue |
| you carried home in the rain for art for art' sake. They will violate |
| the secrets of your bottom drawer. Pages will be torn from your handbook |
| of astronomy to make them pipespills. And they will spit in your ten |
| shilling brass fender from Hampton Leedom's. |
| |
| BLOOM: Ten and six. The act of low scoundrels. Let me go. I will return. |
| I will prove... |
| |
| A VOICE: Swear! |
| |
| _(Bloom clenches his fists and crawls forward, a bowieknife between his |
| teeth.)_ |
| |
| BELLO: As a paying guest or a kept man? Too late. You have made your |
| secondbest bed and others must lie in it. Your epitaph is written. You |
| are down and out and don't you forget it, old bean. |
| |
| BLOOM: Justice! All Ireland versus one! Has nobody...? _(He bites his |
| thumb)_ |
| |
| BELLO: Die and be damned to you if you have any sense of decency |
| or grace about you. I can give you a rare old wine that'll send you |
| skipping to hell and back. Sign a will and leave us any coin you have! |
| If you have none see you damn well get it, steal it, rob it! We'll bury |
| you in our shrubbery jakes where you'll be dead and dirty with old Cuck |
| Cohen, my stepnephew I married, the bloody old gouty procurator and |
| sodomite with a crick in his neck, and my other ten or eleven husbands, |
| whatever the buggers' names were, suffocated in the one cesspool. _(He |
| explodes in a loud phlegmy laugh)_ We'll manure you, Mr Flower! _(He |
| pipes scoffingly)_ Byby, Poldy! Byby, Papli! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Clasps his head)_ My willpower! Memory! I have sinned! I have |
| suff... |
| |
| _(He weeps tearlessly)_ |
| |
| BELLO: _(Sneers)_ Crybabby! Crocodile tears! |
| |
| _(Bloom, broken, closely veiled for the sacrifice, sobs, his face to |
| the earth. The passing bell is heard. Darkshawled figures of the |
| circumcised, in sackcloth and ashes, stand by the wailing wall. M. |
| Shulomowitz, Joseph Goldwater, Moses Herzog, Harris Rosenberg, M. |
| Moisel, J. Citron, Minnie Watchman, P. Mastiansky, The Reverend Leopold |
| Abramovitz, Chazen. With swaying arms they wail in pneuma over the |
| recreant Bloom.)_ |
| |
| THE CIRCUMCISED: _(In dark guttural chant as they cast dead sea fruit |
| upon him, no flowers) Shema Israel Adonai Elohenu Adonai Echad._ |
| |
| VOICES: _(Sighing)_ So he's gone. Ah yes. Yes, indeed. Bloom? Never |
| heard of him. No? Queer kind of chap. There's the widow. That so? Ah, |
| yes. |
| |
| _(From the suttee pyre the flame of gum camphire ascends. The pall of |
| incense smoke screens and disperses. Out of her oakframe a nymph with |
| hair unbound, lightly clad in teabrown artcolours, descends from her |
| grotto and passing under interlacing yews stands over Bloom.)_ |
| |
| THE YEWS: _(Their leaves whispering)_ Sister. Our sister. Ssh! |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(Softly)_ Mortal! _(Kindly)_ Nay, dost not weepest! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Crawls jellily forward under the boughs, streaked by sunlight, |
| with dignity)_ This position. I felt it was expected of me. Force of |
| habit. |
| |
| THE NYMPH: Mortal! You found me in evil company, highkickers, coster |
| picnicmakers, pugilists, popular generals, immoral panto boys in |
| fleshtights and the nifty shimmy dancers, La Aurora and Karini, musical |
| act, the hit of the century. I was hidden in cheap pink paper that smelt |
| of rock oil. I was surrounded by the stale smut of clubmen, stories to |
| disturb callow youth, ads for transparencies, truedup dice and bustpads, |
| proprietary articles and why wear a truss with testimonial from ruptured |
| gentleman. Useful hints to the married. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Lifts a turtle head towards her lap)_ We have met before. On |
| another star. |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(Sadly)_ Rubber goods. Neverrip brand as supplied to the |
| aristocracy. Corsets for men. I cure fits or money refunded. Unsolicited |
| testimonials for Professor Waldmann's wonderful chest exuber. My bust |
| developed four inches in three weeks, reports Mrs Gus Rublin with photo. |
| |
| BLOOM: You mean _Photo Bits?_ |
| |
| THE NYMPH: I do. You bore me away, framed me in oak and tinsel, set me |
| above your marriage couch. Unseen, one summer eve, you kissed me in |
| four places. And with loving pencil you shaded my eyes, my bosom and my |
| shame. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Humbly kisses her long hair)_ Your classic curves, beautiful |
| immortal, I was glad to look on you, to praise you, a thing of beauty, |
| almost to pray. |
| |
| THE NYMPH: During dark nights I heard your praise. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Quickly)_ Yes, yes. You mean that I... Sleep reveals the worst |
| side of everyone, children perhaps excepted. I know I fell out of bed |
| or rather was pushed. Steel wine is said to cure snoring. For the rest |
| there is that English invention, pamphlet of which I received some days |
| ago, incorrectly addressed. It claims to afford a noiseless, inoffensive |
| vent. _(He sighs)_ 'Twas ever thus. Frailty, thy name is marriage. |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(Her fingers in her ears)_ And words. They are not in my |
| dictionary. |
| |
| BLOOM: You understood them? |
| |
| THE YEWS: Ssh! |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(Covers her face with her hands)_ What have I not seen in |
| that chamber? What must my eyes look down on? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Apologetically)_ I know. Soiled personal linen, wrong side up |
| with care. The quoits are loose. From Gibraltar by long sea long ago. |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(Bends her head)_ Worse, worse! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Reflects precautiously)_ That antiquated commode. It wasn't her |
| weight. She scaled just eleven stone nine. She put on nine pounds |
| after weaning. It was a crack and want of glue. Eh? And that absurd |
| orangekeyed utensil which has only one handle. |
| |
| _(The sound of a waterfall is heard in bright cascade.)_ |
| |
| THE WATERFALL: |
| |
| Poulaphouca Poulaphouca |
| Poulaphouca Poulaphouca. |
| |
| THE YEWS: _(Mingling their boughs)_ Listen. Whisper. She is right, our |
| sister. We grew by Poulaphouca waterfall. We gave shade on languorous |
| summer days. |
| |
| |
| JOHN WYSE NOLAN: _(In the background, in Irish National Forester's |
| uniform, doffs his plumed hat)_ Prosper! Give shade on languorous days, |
| trees of Ireland! |
| |
| THE YEWS: _(Murmuring)_ Who came to Poulaphouca with the High School |
| excursion? Who left his nutquesting classmates to seek our shade? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Scared)_ High School of Poula? Mnemo? Not in full possession of |
| faculties. Concussion. Run over by tram. |
| |
| THE ECHO: Sham! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Pigeonbreasted, bottleshouldered, padded, in nondescript |
| juvenile grey and black striped suit, too small for him, white tennis |
| shoes, bordered stockings with turnover tops and a red schoolcap with |
| badge)_ I was in my teens, a growing boy. A little then sufficed, a |
| jolting car, the mingling odours of the ladies' cloakroom and lavatory, |
| the throng penned tight on the old Royal stairs (for they love crushes, |
| instinct of the herd, and the dark sexsmelling theatre unbridles |
| vice), even a pricelist of their hosiery. And then the heat. There were |
| sunspots that summer. End of school. And tipsycake. Halcyon days. |
| |
| _(Halcyon days, high school boys in blue and white football jerseys and |
| shorts, Master Donald Turnbull, Master Abraham Chatterton, Master Owen |
| Goldberg, Master Jack Meredith, Master Percy Apjohn, stand in a clearing |
| of the trees and shout to Master Leopold Bloom.)_ |
| |
| THE HALCYON DAYS: Mackerel! Live us again. Hurray! _(They cheer)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Hobbledehoy, warmgloved, mammamufflered, starred with spent |
| snowballs, struggles to rise)_ Again! I feel sixteen! What a lark! Let's |
| ring all the bells in Montague street. _(He cheers feebly)_ Hurray for |
| the High School! |
| |
| THE ECHO: Fool! |
| |
| THE YEWS: _(Rustling)_ She is right, our sister. Whisper. _(Whispered |
| kisses are heard in all the wood. Faces of hamadryads peep out from |
| the boles and among the leaves and break, blossoming into bloom.)_ Who |
| profaned our silent shade? |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(Coyly, through parting fingers)_ There? In the open air? |
| |
| THE YEWS: _(Sweeping downward)_ Sister, yes. And on our virgin sward. |
| |
| THE WATERFALL: |
| |
| Poulaphouca Poulaphouca |
| Phoucaphouca Phoucaphouca. |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(With wide fingers)_ O, infamy! |
| |
| BLOOM: I was precocious. Youth. The fauna. I sacrificed to the god of |
| the forest. The flowers that bloom in the spring. It was pairing |
| time. Capillary attraction is a natural phenomenon. Lotty Clarke, |
| flaxenhaired, I saw at her night toilette through illclosed curtains |
| with poor papa's operaglasses: The wanton ate grass wildly. She rolled |
| downhill at Rialto bridge to tempt me with her flow of animal spirits. |
| She climbed their crooked tree and I... A saint couldn't resist it. The |
| demon possessed me. Besides, who saw? |
| |
| _(Staggering Bob, a whitepolled calf, thrusts a ruminating head with |
| humid nostrils through the foliage.)_ |
| |
| STAGGERING BOB: (LARGE TEARDROPS ROLLING FROM HIS PROMINENT EYES, |
| SNIVELS) Me. Me see. |
| |
| BLOOM: Simply satisfying a need I... _(With pathos)_ No girl would when |
| I went girling. Too ugly. They wouldn't play... |
| |
| _(High on Ben Howth through rhododendrons a nannygoat passes, |
| plumpuddered, buttytailed, dropping currants.)_ |
| |
| THE NANNYGOAT: _(Bleats)_ Megeggaggegg! Nannannanny! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Hatless, flushed, covered with burrs of thistledown and |
| gorsespine)_ Regularly engaged. Circumstances alter cases. _(He gazes |
| intently downwards on the water)_ Thirtytwo head over heels per second. |
| Press nightmare. Giddy Elijah. Fall from cliff. Sad end of government |
| printer's clerk. _(Through silversilent summer air the dummy of Bloom, |
| rolled in a mummy, rolls roteatingly from the Lion's Head cliff into the |
| purple waiting waters.)_ |
| |
| THE DUMMYMUMMY: Bbbbblllllblblblblobschbg! |
| |
| _(Far out in the bay between bailey and kish lights the_ Erin's King |
| _sails, sending a broadening plume of coalsmoke from her funnel towards |
| the land.)_ |
| |
| COUNCILLOR NANNETII: _(Alone on deck, in dark alpaca, yellowkitefaced, |
| his hand in his waistcoat opening, declaims)_ When my country takes her |
| place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, let my |
| epitaph be written. I have... |
| |
| BLOOM: Done. Prff! |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(Loftily)_ We immortals, as you saw today, have not such |
| a place and no hair there either. We are stonecold and pure. We eat |
| electric light. _(She arches her body in lascivious crispation, placing |
| her forefinger in her mouth)_ Spoke to me. Heard from behind. How then |
| could you...? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Pawing the heather abjectly)_ O, I have been a perfect pig. |
| Enemas too I have administered. One third of a pint of quassia to which |
| add a tablespoonful of rocksalt. Up the fundament. With Hamilton Long's |
| syringe, the ladies' friend. |
| |
| THE NYMPH: In my presence. The powderpuff. _(She blushes and makes a |
| knee)_ And the rest! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Dejected)_ Yes. _Peccavi!_ I have paid homage on that living |
| altar where the back changes name. _(With sudden fervour)_ For why |
| should the dainty scented jewelled hand, the hand that rules...? |
| |
| _(Figures wind serpenting in slow woodland pattern around the treestems, |
| cooeeing)_ |
| |
| THE VOICE OF KITTY: _(In the thicket)_ Show us one of them cushions. |
| |
| THE VOICE OF FLORRY: Here. |
| |
| _(A grouse wings clumsily through the underwood.)_ |
| |
| THE VOICE OF LYNCH: _(In the thicket)_ Whew! Piping hot! |
| |
| THE VOICE OF ZOE: _(From the thicket)_ Came from a hot place. |
| |
| THE VOICE OF VIRAG: _(A birdchief, bluestreaked and feathered in war |
| panoply with his assegai, striding through a crackling canebrake over |
| beechmast and acorns)_ Hot! Hot! Ware Sitting Bull! |
| |
| BLOOM: It overpowers me. The warm impress of her warm form. Even to sit |
| where a woman has sat, especially with divaricated thighs, as though to |
| grant the last favours, most especially with previously well uplifted |
| white sateen coatpans. So womanly, full. It fills me full. |
| |
| THE WATERFALL: |
| |
| _Phillaphulla Poulaphouca |
| Poulaphouca Poulaphouca._ |
| |
| THE YEWS: Ssh! Sister, speak! |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(Eyeless, in nun's white habit, coif and hugewinged wimple, |
| softly, with remote eyes)_ Tranquilla convent. Sister Agatha. Mount |
| Carmel. The apparitions of Knock and Lourdes. No more desire. _(She |
| reclines her head, sighing)_ Only the ethereal. Where dreamy creamy gull |
| waves o'er the waters dull. |
| |
| _(Bloom half rises. His back trouserbutton snaps.)_ |
| |
| THE BUTTON: Bip! |
| |
| _(Two sluts of the coombe dance rainily by, shawled, yelling flatly.)_ |
| |
| THE SLUTS: |
| |
| O, Leopold lost the pin of his drawers |
| He didn't know what to do, |
| To keep it up, |
| To keep it up. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Coldly)_ You have broken the spell. The last straw. If there |
| were only ethereal where would you all be, postulants and novices? Shy |
| but willing like an ass pissing. |
| |
| THE YEWS: _(Their silverfoil of leaves precipitating, their skinny arms |
| aging and swaying)_ Deciduously! |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(Her features hardening, gropes in the folds of her habit)_ |
| Sacrilege! To attempt my virtue! _(A large moist stain appears on her |
| robe)_ Sully my innocence! You are not fit to touch the garment of a |
| pure woman. _(She clutches again in her robe)_ Wait. Satan, you'll sing |
| no more lovesongs. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. _(She draws a poniard and, |
| clad in the sheathmail of an elected knight of nine, strikes at his |
| loins)_ Nekum! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Starts up, seizes her hand)_ Hoy! Nebrakada! Cat o' nine lives! |
| Fair play, madam. No pruningknife. The fox and the grapes, is it? What |
| do you lack with your barbed wire? Crucifix not thick enough? _(He |
| clutches her veil)_ A holy abbot you want or Brophy, the lame gardener, |
| or the spoutless statue of the watercarrier, or good mother Alphonsus, |
| eh Reynard? |
| |
| THE NYMPH: _(With a cry flees from him unveiled, her plaster cast |
| cracking, a cloud of stench escaping from the cracks)_ Poli...! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Calls after her)_ As if you didn't get it on the double |
| yourselves. No jerks and multiple mucosities all over you. I tried it. |
| Your strength our weakness. What's our studfee? What will you pay on |
| the nail? You fee mendancers on the Riviera, I read. _(The fleeing nymph |
| raises a keen)_ Eh? I have sixteen years of black slave labour behind |
| me. And would a jury give me five shillings alimony tomorrow, eh? Fool |
| someone else, not me. _(He sniffs)_ Rut. Onions. Stale. Sulphur. Grease. |
| |
| _(The figure of Bella Cohen stands before him.)_ |
| |
| BELLA: You'll know me the next time. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Composed, regards her) Passée._ Mutton dressed as lamb. Long |
| in the tooth and superfluous hair. A raw onion the last thing at night |
| would benefit your complexion. And take some double chin drill. Your |
| eyes are as vapid as the glasseyes of your stuffed fox. They have the |
| dimensions of your other features, that's all. I'm not a triple screw |
| propeller. |
| |
| BELLA: _(Contemptuously)_ You're not game, in fact. _(Her sowcunt |
| barks)_ Fbhracht! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Contemptuously)_ Clean your nailless middle finger first, your |
| bully's cold spunk is dripping from your cockscomb. Take a handful of |
| hay and wipe yourself. |
| |
| BELLA: I know you, canvasser! Dead cod! |
| |
| BLOOM: I saw him, kipkeeper! Pox and gleet vendor! |
| |
| BELLA: _(Turns to the piano)_ Which of you was playing the dead march |
| from _Saul?_ |
| |
| ZOE: Me. Mind your cornflowers. _(She darts to the piano and bangs |
| chords on it with crossed arms)_ The cat's ramble through the slag. |
| _(She glances back)_ Eh? Who's making love to my sweeties? _(She darts |
| back to the table)_ What's yours is mine and what's mine is my own. |
| |
| _(Kitty, disconcerted, coats her teeth with the silver paper. Bloom |
| approaches Zoe.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Gently)_ Give me back that potato, will you? |
| |
| ZOE: Forfeits, a fine thing and a superfine thing. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(With feeling)_ It is nothing, but still, a relic of poor mamma. |
| |
| ZOE: |
| |
| Give a thing and take it back |
| God'll ask you where is that |
| You'll say you don't know |
| God'll send you down below. |
| |
| BLOOM: There is a memory attached to it. I should like to have it. |
| |
| STEPHEN: To have or not to have that is the question. |
| |
| ZOE: Here. _(She hauls up a reef of her slip, revealing her bare thigh, |
| and unrolls the potato from the top of her stocking)_ Those that hides |
| knows where to find. |
| |
| BELLA: _(Frowns)_ Here. This isn't a musical peepshow. And don't you |
| smash that piano. Who's paying here? |
| |
| _(She goes to the pianola. Stephen fumbles in his pocket and, taking out |
| a banknote by its corner, hands it to her.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(With exaggerated politeness)_ This silken purse I made out |
| of the sow's ear of the public. Madam, excuse me. If you allow me. _(He |
| indicates vaguely Lynch and Bloom)_ We are all in the same sweepstake, |
| Kinch and Lynch. _Dans ce bordel ou tenons nostre état_. |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Calls from the hearth)_ Dedalus! Give her your blessing for me. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Hands Bella a coin)_ Gold. She has it. |
| |
| BELLA: _(Looks at the money, then at Stephen, then at Zoe, Florry and |
| Kitty)_ Do you want three girls? It's ten shillings here. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Delightedly)_ A hundred thousand apologies. _(He fumbles |
| again and takes out and hands her two crowns)_ Permit, _brevi manu_, my |
| sight is somewhat troubled. |
| |
| _(Bella goes to the table to count the money while Stephen talks to |
| himself in monosyllables. Zoe bends over the table. Kitty leans over |
| Zoe's neck. Lynch gets up, rights his cap and, clasping Kitty's waist, |
| adds his head to the group.)_ |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Strives heavily to rise)_ Ow! My foot's asleep. _(She limps |
| over to the table. Bloom approaches.)_ |
| |
| BELLA, ZOE, KITTY, LYNCH, BLOOM: _(Chattering and squabbling)_ The |
| gentleman... ten shillings... paying for the three... allow me a |
| moment... this gentleman pays separate... who's touching it?... ow! |
| ... mind who you're pinching... are you staying the night or a short |
| time?... who did?... you're a liar, excuse me... the gentleman paid |
| down like a gentleman... drink... it's long after eleven. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(At the pianola, making a gesture of abhorrence)_ No bottles! |
| What, eleven? A riddle! |
| |
| ZOE: _(Lifting up her pettigown and folding a half sovereign into the |
| top of her stocking)_ Hard earned on the flat of my back. |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Lifting Kitty from the table)_ Come! |
| |
| KITTY: Wait. _(She clutches the two crowns)_ |
| |
| FLORRY: And me? |
| |
| LYNCH: Hoopla! _(He lifts her, carries her and bumps her down on the |
| sofa.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: |
| |
| The fox crew, the cocks flew, |
| The bells in heaven |
| Were striking eleven. |
| 'Tis time for her poor soul |
| To get out of heaven. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Quietly lays a half sovereign on the table between bella and |
| florry)_ So. Allow me. _(He takes up the poundnote)_ Three times ten. |
| We're square. |
| |
| BELLA: _(Admiringly)_ You're such a slyboots, old cocky. I could kiss |
| you. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Points)_ Him? Deep as a drawwell. _(Lynch bends Kitty back over |
| the sofa and kisses her. Bloom goes with the poundnote to Stephen.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: This is yours. |
| |
| STEPHEN: How is that? _Les distrait_ or absentminded beggar. _(He |
| fumbles again in his pocket and draws out a handful of coins. An object |
| fills.)_ That fell. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Stooping, picks up and hands a box of matches)_ This. |
| |
| STEPHEN: Lucifer. Thanks. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Quietly)_ You had better hand over that cash to me to take care |
| of. Why pay more? |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Hands him all his coins)_ Be just before you are generous. |
| |
| BLOOM: I will but is it wise? _(He counts)_ One, seven, eleven, and |
| five. Six. Eleven. I don't answer for what you may have lost. |
| |
| STEPHEN: Why striking eleven? Proparoxyton. Moment before the next |
| Lessing says. Thirsty fox. _(He laughs loudly)_ Burying his grandmother. |
| Probably he killed her. |
| |
| BLOOM: That is one pound six and eleven. One pound seven, say. |
| |
| STEPHEN: Doesn't matter a rambling damn. |
| |
| BLOOM: No, but... |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Comes to the table)_ Cigarette, please. _(Lynch tosses a |
| cigarette from the sofa to the table)_ And so Georgina Johnson is dead |
| and married. _(A cigarette appears on the table. Stephen looks at it)_ |
| Wonder. Parlour magic. Married. Hm. _(He strikes a match and proceeds to |
| light the cigarette with enigmatic melancholy)_ |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Watching him)_ You would have a better chance of lighting it if |
| you held the match nearer. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Brings the match near his eye)_ Lynx eye. Must get glasses. |
| Broke them yesterday. Sixteen years ago. Distance. The eye sees all |
| flat. _(He draws the match away. It goes out.)_ Brain thinks. Near: |
| far. Ineluctable modality of the visible. _(He frowns mysteriously)_ Hm. |
| Sphinx. The beast that has twobacks at midnight. Married. |
| |
| ZOE: It was a commercial traveller married her and took her away with |
| him. |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Nods)_ Mr Lambe from London. |
| |
| STEPHEN: Lamb of London, who takest away the sins of our world. |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Embracing Kitty on the sofa, chants deeply) Dona nobis pacem._ |
| |
| _(The cigarette slips from Stephen 's fingers. Bloom picks it up and |
| throws it in the grate.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Don't smoke. You ought to eat. Cursed dog I met. _(To Zoe)_ You |
| have nothing? |
| |
| ZOE: Is he hungry? |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Extends his hand to her smiling and chants to the air of the |
| bloodoath in the_ Dusk of the Gods) |
| |
| Hangende Hunger, |
| Fragende Frau, |
| Macht uns alle kaputt. |
| |
| |
| ZOE: _(Tragically)_ Hamlet, I am thy father's gimlet! _(She takes |
| his hand)_ Blue eyes beauty I'll read your hand. _(She points to his |
| forehead)_ No wit, no wrinkles. _(She counts)_ Two, three, Mars, that's |
| courage. _(Stephen shakes his head)_ No kid. |
| |
| LYNCH: Sheet lightning courage. The youth who could not shiver and |
| shake. _(To Zoe)_ Who taught you palmistry? |
| |
| ZOE: _(Turns)_ Ask my ballocks that I haven't got. _(To Stephen)_ I see |
| it in your face. The eye, like that. _(She frowns with lowered head)_ |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Laughing, slaps Kitty behind twice)_ Like that. Pandybat. |
| |
| _(Twice loudly a pandybat cracks, the coffin of the pianola flies open, |
| the bald little round jack-in-the-box head of Father Dolan springs up.)_ |
| |
| FATHER DOLAN: Any boy want flogging? Broke his glasses? Lazy idle little |
| schemer. See it in your eye. |
| |
| _(Mild, benign, rectorial, reproving, the head of Don John Conmee rises |
| from the pianola coffin.)_ |
| |
| DON JOHN CONMEE: Now, Father Dolan! Now. I'm sure that Stephen is a very |
| good little boy! |
| |
| ZOE: _(Examining Stephen's palm)_ Woman's hand. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Murmurs)_ Continue. Lie. Hold me. Caress. I never could read |
| His handwriting except His criminal thumbprint on the haddock. |
| |
| ZOE: What day were you born? |
| |
| STEPHEN: Thursday. Today. |
| |
| ZOE: Thursday's child has far to go. _(She traces lines on his hand)_ |
| Line of fate. Influential friends. |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Pointing)_ Imagination. |
| |
| ZOE: Mount of the moon. You'll meet with a... _(She peers at his hands |
| abruptly)_ I won't tell you what's not good for you. Or do you want to |
| know? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Detaches her fingers and offers his palm)_ More harm than good. |
| Here. Read mine. |
| |
| BELLA: Show. _(She turns up bloom's hand)_ I thought so. Knobby knuckles |
| for the women. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Peering at bloom's palm)_ Gridiron. Travels beyond the sea and |
| marry money. |
| |
| BLOOM: Wrong. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Quickly)_ O, I see. Short little finger. Henpecked husband. That |
| wrong? |
| |
| _(Black Liz, a huge rooster hatching in a chalked circle, rises, |
| stretches her wings and clucks.)_ |
| |
| BLACK LIZ: Gara. Klook. Klook. Klook. |
| |
| _(She sidles from her newlaid egg and waddles off)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Points to his hand)_ That weal there is an accident. Fell and |
| cut it twentytwo years ago. I was sixteen. |
| |
| ZOE: I see, says the blind man. Tell us news. |
| |
| STEPHEN: See? Moves to one great goal. I am twentytwo. Sixteen years ago |
| he was twentytwo too. Sixteen years ago I twentytwo tumbled. Twentytwo |
| years ago he sixteen fell off his hobbyhorse. _(He winces)_ Hurt my hand |
| somewhere. Must see a dentist. Money? |
| |
| _(Zoe whispers to Florry. They giggle. Bloom releases his hand and |
| writes idly on the table in backhand, pencilling slow curves.)_ |
| |
| FLORRY: What? |
| |
| _(A hackneycar, number three hundred and twentyfour, with a |
| gallantbuttocked mare, driven by James Barton, Harmony Avenue, |
| Donnybrook, trots past. Blazes Boylan and Lenehan sprawl swaying on the |
| sideseats. The Ormond boots crouches behind on the axle. Sadly over the |
| crossblind Lydia Douce and Mina Kennedy gaze.)_ |
| |
| THE BOOTS: _(Jogging, mocks them with thumb and wriggling wormfingers)_ |
| Haw haw have you the horn? |
| |
| _(Bronze by gold they whisper.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: _(To Florry)_ Whisper. |
| |
| _(They whisper again)_ |
| |
| _(Over the well of the car Blazes Boylan leans, his boater straw set |
| sideways, a red flower in his mouth. Lenehan in yachtsman's cap and |
| white shoes officiously detaches a long hair from Blazes Boylan's coat |
| shoulder.)_ |
| |
| LENEHAN: Ho! What do I here behold? Were you brushing the cobwebs off a |
| few quims? |
| |
| BOYLAN: _(Seated, smiles)_ Plucking a turkey. |
| |
| LENEHAN: A good night's work. |
| |
| BOYLAN: _(Holding up four thick bluntungulated fingers, winks)_ Blazes |
| Kate! Up to sample or your money back. _(He holds out a forefinger)_ |
| Smell that. |
| |
| LENEHAN: _(Smells gleefully)_ Ah! Lobster and mayonnaise. Ah! |
| |
| ZOE AND FLORRY: _(Laugh together)_ Ha ha ha ha. |
| |
| BOYLAN: _(Jumps surely from the car and calls loudly for all to hear)_ |
| Hello, Bloom! Mrs Bloom dressed yet? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(In flunkey's prune plush coat and kneebreeches, buff stockings |
| and powdered wig)_ I'm afraid not, sir. The last articles... |
| |
| BOYLAN: _(Tosses him sixpence)_ Here, to buy yourself a gin and splash. |
| _(He hangs his hat smartly on a peg of Bloom's antlered head)_ Show me |
| in. I have a little private business with your wife, you understand? |
| |
| BLOOM: Thank you, sir. Yes, sir. Madam Tweedy is in her bath, sir. |
| |
| MARION: He ought to feel himself highly honoured. _(She plops splashing |
| out of the water)_ Raoul darling, come and dry me. I'm in my pelt. Only |
| my new hat and a carriage sponge. |
| |
| BOYLAN: _(A merry twinkle in his eye)_ Topping! |
| |
| BELLA: What? What is it? |
| |
| _(Zoe whispers to her.)_ |
| |
| MARION: Let him look, the pishogue! Pimp! And scourge himself! I'll |
| write to a powerful prostitute or Bartholomona, the bearded woman, to |
| raise weals out on him an inch thick and make him bring me back a signed |
| and stamped receipt. |
| |
| BOYLAN: (clasps himself) Here, I can't hold this little lot much longer. |
| (he strides off on stiff cavalry legs) |
| |
| BELLA: _(Laughing)_ Ho ho ho ho. |
| |
| BOYLAN: _(To Bloom, over his shoulder)_ You can apply your eye to the |
| keyhole and play with yourself while I just go through her a few times. |
| |
| BLOOM: Thank you, sir. I will, sir. May I bring two men chums to witness |
| the deed and take a snapshot? _(He holds out an ointment jar)_ Vaseline, |
| sir? Orangeflower...? Lukewarm water...? |
| |
| KITTY: _(From the sofa)_ Tell us, Florry. Tell us. What. |
| |
| _(Florry whispers to her. Whispering lovewords murmur, liplapping |
| loudly, poppysmic plopslop.)_ |
| |
| MINA KENNEDY: _(Her eyes upturned)_ O, it must be like the scent of |
| geraniums and lovely peaches! O, he simply idolises every bit of her! |
| Stuck together! Covered with kisses! |
| |
| LYDIA DOUCE: _(Her mouth opening)_ Yumyum. O, he's carrying her round |
| the room doing it! Ride a cockhorse. You could hear them in Paris and |
| New York. Like mouthfuls of strawberries and cream. |
| |
| KITTY: _(Laughing)_ Hee hee hee. |
| |
| BOYLAN'S VOICE: _(Sweetly, hoarsely, in the pit of his stomach)_ Ah! |
| Gooblazqruk brukarchkrasht! |
| |
| MARION'S VOICE: _(Hoarsely, sweetly, rising to her throat)_ O! |
| Weeshwashtkissinapooisthnapoohuck? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(His eyes wildly dilated, clasps himself)_ Show! Hide! Show! |
| Plough her! More! Shoot! |
| |
| BELLA, ZOE, FLORRY, KITTY: Ho ho! Ha ha! Hee hee! |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Points)_ The mirror up to nature. _(He laughs)_ Hu hu hu hu hu! |
| |
| _(Stephen and Bloom gaze in the mirror. The face of William Shakespeare, |
| beardless, appears there, rigid in facial paralysis, crowned by the |
| reflection of the reindeer antlered hatrack in the hall.)_ |
| |
| SHAKESPEARE: _(In dignified ventriloquy)_ 'Tis the loud laugh bespeaks |
| the vacant mind. _(To Bloom)_ Thou thoughtest as how thou wastest |
| invisible. Gaze. _(He crows with a black capon's laugh)_ Iagogo! How my |
| Oldfellow chokit his Thursdaymornun. Iagogogo! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Smiles yellowly at the three whores)_ When will I hear the |
| joke? |
| |
| ZOE: Before you're twice married and once a widower. |
| |
| BLOOM: Lapses are condoned. Even the great Napoleon when measurements |
| were taken next the skin after his death... |
| |
| _(Mrs Dignam, widow woman, her snubnose and cheeks flushed with |
| deathtalk, tears and Tunney's tawny sherry, hurries by in her weeds, |
| her bonnet awry, rouging and powdering her cheeks, lips and nose, a |
| pen chivvying her brood of cygnets. Beneath her skirt appear her late |
| husband's everyday trousers and turnedup boots, large eights. She holds |
| a Scottish widows' insurance policy and a large marquee umbrella under |
| which her brood run with her, Patsy hopping on one shod foot, his collar |
| loose, a hank of porksteaks dangling, freddy whimpering, Susy with a |
| crying cod's mouth, Alice struggling with the baby. She cuffs them on, |
| her streamers flaunting aloft.)_ |
| |
| FREDDY: Ah, ma, you're dragging me along! |
| |
| SUSY: Mamma, the beeftea is fizzing over! |
| |
| SHAKESPEARE: _(With paralytic rage)_ Weda seca whokilla farst. |
| |
| _(The face of Martin Cunningham, bearded, refeatures Shakespeare's |
| beardless face. The marquee umbrella sways drunkenly, the children run |
| aside. Under the umbrella appears Mrs Cunningham in Merry Widow hat and |
| kimono gown. She glides sidling and bowing, twirling japanesily.)_ |
| |
| MRS CUNNINGHAM: _(Sings)_ |
| |
| And they call me the jewel of Asia! |
| |
| MARTIN CUNNINGHAM: _(Gazes on her, impassive)_ Immense! Most bloody |
| awful demirep! |
| |
| STEPHEN: _Et exaltabuntur cornua iusti._ Queens lay with prize bulls. |
| Remember Pasiphae for whose lust my grandoldgrossfather made the first |
| confessionbox. Forget not Madam Grissel Steevens nor the suine scions |
| of the house of Lambert. And Noah was drunk with wine. And his ark was |
| open. |
| |
| BELLA: None of that here. Come to the wrong shop. |
| |
| LYNCH: Let him alone. He's back from Paris. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Runs to stephen and links him)_ O go on! Give us some parleyvoo. |
| |
| _(Stephen claps hat on head and leaps over to the fireplace where he |
| stands with shrugged shoulders, finny hands outspread, a painted smile |
| on his face.)_ |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Oommelling on the sofa)_ Rmm Rmm Rmm Rrrrrrmmmm. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Gabbles with marionette jerks)_ Thousand places of |
| entertainment to expense your evenings with lovely ladies saling gloves |
| and other things perhaps hers heart beerchops perfect fashionable |
| house very eccentric where lots cocottes beautiful dressed much about |
| princesses like are dancing cancan and walking there parisian clowneries |
| extra foolish for bachelors foreigns the same if talking a poor english |
| how much smart they are on things love and sensations voluptuous. |
| Misters very selects for is pleasure must to visit heaven and hell show |
| with mortuary candles and they tears silver which occur every night. |
| Perfectly shocking terrific of religion's things mockery seen in |
| universal world. All chic womans which arrive full of modesty then |
| disrobe and squeal loud to see vampire man debauch nun very fresh young |
| with _dessous troublants_. _(He clacks his tongue loudly)_ _Ho, la la! |
| Ce pif qu'il a!_ |
| |
| LYNCH: _Vive le vampire!_ |
| |
| THE WHORES: Bravo! Parleyvoo! |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Grimacing with head back, laughs loudly, clapping himself)_ |
| Great success of laughing. Angels much prostitutes like and holy |
| apostles big damn ruffians. _Demimondaines_ nicely handsome sparkling of |
| diamonds very amiable costumed. Or do you are fond better what belongs |
| they moderns pleasure turpitude of old mans? _(He points about him with |
| grotesque gestures which Lynch and the whores reply to)_ Caoutchouc |
| statue woman reversible or lifesize tompeeptom of virgins nudities very |
| lesbic the kiss five ten times. Enter, gentleman, to see in mirror every |
| positions trapezes all that machine there besides also if desire act |
| awfully bestial butcher's boy pollutes in warm veal liver or omlet on |
| the belly _pièce de Shakespeare._ |
| |
| BELLA: _(Clapping her belly sinks back on the sofa, with a shout of |
| laughter)_ An omelette on the... Ho! ho! ho! ho!... omelette on the... |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Mincingly)_ I love you, sir darling. Speak you englishman |
| tongue for _double entente cordiale._ O yes, _mon loup_. How much cost? |
| Waterloo. Watercloset. _(He ceases suddenly and holds up a forefinger)_ |
| |
| BELLA: _(Laughing)_ Omelette... |
| |
| THE WHORES: _(Laughing)_ Encore! Encore! |
| |
| STEPHEN: Mark me. I dreamt of a watermelon. |
| |
| ZOE: Go abroad and love a foreign lady. |
| |
| LYNCH: Across the world for a wife. |
| |
| FLORRY: Dreams goes by contraries. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Extends his arms)_ It was here. Street of harlots. In |
| Serpentine avenue Beelzebub showed me her, a fubsy widow. Where's the |
| red carpet spread? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Approaching Stephen)_ Look... |
| |
| STEPHEN: No, I flew. My foes beneath me. And ever shall be. World |
| without end. _(He cries) P_ater! Free! |
| |
| BLOOM: I say, look... |
| |
| STEPHEN: Break my spirit, will he? _O merde alors! (He cries, his |
| vulture talons sharpened)_ Hola! Hillyho! |
| |
| _(Simon Dedalus' voice hilloes in answer, somewhat sleepy but ready.)_ |
| |
| SIMON: That's all right. _(He swoops uncertainly through the air, |
| wheeling, uttering cries of heartening, on strong ponderous buzzard |
| wings)_ Ho, boy! Are you going to win? Hoop! Pschatt! Stable with those |
| halfcastes. Wouldn't let them within the bawl of an ass. Head up! Keep |
| our flag flying! An eagle gules volant in a field argent displayed. |
| Ulster king at arms! Haihoop! _(He makes the beagle's call, giving |
| tongue)_ Bulbul! Burblblburblbl! Hai, boy! |
| |
| _(The fronds and spaces of the wallpaper file rapidly across country. |
| A stout fox, drawn from covert, brush pointed, having buried his |
| grandmother, runs swift for the open, brighteyed, seeking badger earth, |
| under the leaves. The pack of staghounds follows, nose to the ground, |
| sniffing their quarry, beaglebaying, burblbrbling to be blooded. Ward |
| Union huntsmen and huntswomen live with them, hot for a kill. From Six |
| Mile Point, Flathouse, Nine Mile Stone follow the footpeople with knotty |
| sticks, hayforks, salmongaffs, lassos, flockmasters with stockwhips, |
| bearbaiters with tomtoms, toreadors with bullswords, greynegroes |
| waving torches. The crowd bawls of dicers, crown and anchor players, |
| thimbleriggers, broadsmen. Crows and touts, hoarse bookies in high |
| wizard hats clamour deafeningly.)_ |
| |
| THE CROWD: |
| |
| Card of the races. Racing card! |
| Ten to one the field! |
| Tommy on the clay here! Tommy on the clay! |
| Ten to one bar one! Ten to one bar one! |
| Try your luck on Spinning Jenny! |
| Ten to one bar one! |
| Sell the monkey, boys! Sell the monkey! |
| I'll give ten to one! |
| Ten to one bar one! |
| |
| _(A dark horse, riderless, bolts like a phantom past the winningpost, |
| his mane moonfoaming, his eyeballs stars. The field follows, a bunch of |
| bucking mounts. Skeleton horses, Sceptre, Maximum the Second, Zinfandel, |
| the Duke of Westminster's Shotover, Repulse, the Duke of Beaufort's |
| Ceylon, prix de Paris. Dwarfs ride them, rustyarmoured, leaping, leaping |
| in their, in their saddles. Last in a drizzle of rain on a brokenwinded |
| isabelle nag, Cock of the North, the favourite, honey cap, green jacket, |
| orange sleeves, Garrett Deasy up, gripping the reins, a hockeystick at |
| the ready. His nag on spavined whitegaitered feet jogs along the rocky |
| road.)_ |
| |
| THE ORANGE LODGES: _(Jeering)_ Get down and push, mister. Last lap! |
| You'll be home the night! |
| |
| GARRETT DEASY: _(Bolt upright, his nailscraped face plastered with |
| postagestamps, brandishes his hockeystick, his blue eyes flashing in the |
| prism of the chandelier as his mount lopes by at schooling gallop)_ |
| |
| _Per vias rectas!_ |
| |
| _(A yoke of buckets leopards all over him and his rearing nag a torrent |
| of mutton broth with dancing coins of carrots, barley, onions, turnips, |
| potatoes.)_ |
| |
| THE GREEN LODGES: Soft day, sir John! Soft day, your honour! |
| |
| _(Private Carr, Private Compton and Cissy Caffrey pass beneath the |
| windows, singing in discord.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: Hark! Our friend noise in the street. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Holds up her hand)_ Stop! |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR, PRIVATE COMPTON AND CISSY CAFFREY: |
| |
| Yet I've a sort a Yorkshire relish for... |
| |
| ZOE: That's me. _(She claps her hands)_ Dance! Dance! _(She runs to the |
| pianola)_ Who has twopence? |
| |
| BLOOM: Who'll...? |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Handing her coins)_ Here. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Cracking his fingers impatiently)_ Quick! Quick! Where's my |
| augur's rod? _(He runs to the piano and takes his ashplant, beating his |
| foot in tripudium)_ |
| |
| ZOE: _(Turns the drumhandle)_ There. |
| |
| _(She drops two pennies in the slot. Gold, pink and violet lights |
| start forth. The drum turns purring in low hesitation waltz. Professor |
| Goodwin, in a bowknotted periwig, in court dress, wearing a stained |
| inverness cape, bent in two from incredible age, totters across the |
| room, his hands fluttering. He sits tinily on the pianostool and lifts |
| and beats handless sticks of arms on the keyboard, nodding with damsel's |
| grace, his bowknot bobbing)_ |
| |
| ZOE: _(Twirls round herself, heeltapping)_ Dance. Anybody here for |
| there? Who'll dance? Clear the table. |
| |
| _(The pianola with changing lights plays in waltz time the prelude of_ |
| My Girl's a Yorkshire Girl. _Stephen throws his ashplant on the table |
| and seizes Zoe round the waist. Florry and Bella push the table towards |
| the fireplace. Stephen, arming Zoe with exaggerated grace, begins to |
| waltz her round the room. Bloom stands aside. Her sleeve filling from |
| gracing arms reveals a white fleshflower of vaccination. Between the |
| curtains Professor Maginni inserts a leg on the toepoint of which spins |
| a silk hat. With a deft kick he sends it spinning to his crown and |
| jauntyhatted skates in. He wears a slate frockcoat with claret silk |
| lapels, a gorget of cream tulle, a green lowcut waistcoat, stock collar |
| with white kerchief, tight lavender trousers, patent pumps and canary |
| gloves. In his buttonhole is an immense dahlia. He twirls in reversed |
| directions a clouded cane, then wedges it tight in his oxter. He places |
| a hand lightly on his breastbone, bows, and fondles his flower and |
| buttons.)_ |
| |
| MAGINNI: The poetry of motion, art of calisthenics. No connection |
| with Madam Legget Byrne's or Levenston's. Fancy dress balls arranged. |
| Deportment. The Katty Lanner step. So. Watch me! My terpsichorean |
| abilities. _(He minuets forward three paces on tripping bee's feet) Tout |
| le monde en avant! Révérence! Tout le monde en place!_ |
| |
| _(The prelude ceases. Professor Goodwin, beating vague arms shrivels, |
| sinks, his live cape filling about the stool. The air in firmer waltz |
| time sounds. Stephen and Zoe circle freely. The lights change, glow, |
| fide gold rosy violet.)_ |
| |
| THE PIANOLA: |
| |
| Two young fellows were talking about their girls, girls, girls, |
| Sweethearts they'd left behind... |
| |
| _(From a corner the morning hours run out, goldhaired, slimsandalled, |
| in girlish blue, waspwaisted, with innocent hands. Nimbly they dance, |
| twirling their skipping ropes. The hours of noon follow in amber gold. |
| Laughing, linked, high haircombs flashing, they catch the sun in mocking |
| mirrors, lifting their arms.)_ |
| |
| MAGINNI: _(Clipclaps glovesilent hands) Carré! Avant deux!_ Breathe |
| evenly! _Balance!_ |
| |
| _(The morning and noon hours waltz in their places, turning, advancing |
| to each other, shaping their curves, bowing visavis. Cavaliers behind |
| them arch and suspend their arms, with hands descending to, touching, |
| rising from their shoulders.)_ |
| |
| HOURS: You may touch my. |
| |
| CAVALIERS: May I touch your? |
| |
| HOURS: O, but lightly! |
| |
| CAVALIERS: O, so lightly! |
| |
| THE PIANOLA: |
| |
| My little shy little lass has a waist. |
| |
| _(Zoe and Stephen turn boldly with looser swing. The twilight hours |
| advance from long landshadows, dispersed, lagging, languideyed, their |
| cheeks delicate with cipria and false faint bloom. They are in grey |
| gauze with dark bat sleeves that flutter in the land breeze.)_ |
| |
| MAGINNI: _Avant huit! Traversé! Salut! Cours de mains! Croisé!_ |
| |
| _(The night hours, one by one, steal to the last place. Morning, noon |
| and twilight hours retreat before them. They are masked, with daggered |
| hair and bracelets of dull bells. Weary they curchycurchy under veils.)_ |
| |
| THE BRACELETS: Heigho! Heigho! |
| |
| ZOE: _(Twirling, her hand to her brow)_ O! |
| |
| MAGINNI: _Les tiroirs! Chaîne de dames! La corbeille! Dos à dos!_ |
| |
| _(Arabesquing wearily they weave a pattern on the floor, weaving, |
| unweaving, curtseying, twirling, simply swirling.)_ |
| |
| ZOE: I'm giddy! |
| |
| _(She frees herself, droops on a chair. Stephen seizes Florry and turns |
| with her.)_ |
| |
| MAGINNI: Boulangère! Les ronds! Les ponts! Chevaux de bois! Escargots! |
| |
| _(Twining, receding, with interchanging hands the night hours link each |
| each with arching arms in a mosaic of movements. Stephen and Florry turn |
| cumbrously.)_ |
| |
| MAGINNI: _Dansez avec vos dames! Changez de dames! Donnez le petit |
| bouquet à votre dame! Remerciez!_ |
| |
| THE PIANOLA: |
| |
| Best, best of all, |
| Baraabum! |
| |
| KITTY: (JUMPS UP) O, they played that on the hobbyhorses at the Mirus |
| bazaar! |
| |
| _(She runs to Stephen. He leaves florry brusquely and seizes Kitty. |
| A screaming bittern's harsh high whistle shrieks. Groangrousegurgling |
| Toft's cumbersome whirligig turns slowly the room right roundabout the |
| room.)_ |
| |
| THE PIANOLA: |
| |
| My girl's a Yorkshire girl. |
| |
| ZOE: |
| |
| Yorkshire through and through. |
| |
| Come on all! |
| |
| _(She seizes Florry and waltzes her.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: _Pas seul!_ |
| |
| _(He wheels Kitty into Lynch's arms, snatches up his ashplant from |
| the table and takes the floor. All wheel whirl waltz twirl. Bloombella |
| Kittylynch Florryzoe jujuby women. Stephen with hat ashplant frogsplits |
| in middle highkicks with skykicking mouth shut hand clasp part under |
| thigh. With clang tinkle boomhammer tallyho hornblower blue green yellow |
| flashes Toft's cumbersome turns with hobbyhorse riders from gilded |
| snakes dangled, bowels fandango leaping spurn soil foot and fall |
| again.)_ |
| |
| THE PIANOLA: |
| |
| Though she's a factory lass |
| And wears no fancy clothes. |
| |
| _(Closeclutched swift swifter with glareblareflare scudding they |
| scootlootshoot lumbering by. Baraabum!)_ |
| |
| TUTTI: Encore! Bis! Bravo! Encore! |
| |
| SIMON: Think of your mother's people! |
| |
| STEPHEN: Dance of death. |
| |
| _(Bang fresh barang bang of lacquey's bell, horse, nag, steer, piglings, |
| Conmee on Christass, lame crutch and leg sailor in cockboat armfolded |
| ropepulling hitching stamp hornpipe through and through. Baraabum! On |
| nags hogs bellhorses Gadarene swine Corny in coffin Steel shark stone |
| onehandled nelson two trickies Frauenzimmer plumstained from pram |
| filling bawling gum he's a champion. Fuseblue peer from barrel rev. |
| evensong Love on hackney jaunt Blazes blind coddoubled bicyclers Dilly |
| with snowcake no fancy clothes. Then in last switchback lumbering up |
| and down bump mashtub sort of viceroy and reine relish for tublumber |
| bumpshire rose. Baraabum!)_ |
| |
| _(The couples fall aside. Stephen whirls giddily. Room whirls back. Eyes |
| closed he totters. Red rails fly spacewards. Stars all around suns turn |
| roundabout. Bright midges dance on walls. He stops dead.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: Ho! |
| |
| _(Stephen's mother, emaciated, rises stark through the floor, in leper |
| grey with a wreath of faded orangeblossoms and a torn bridal veil, her |
| face worn and noseless, green with gravemould. Her hair is scant and |
| lank. She fixes her bluecircled hollow eyesockets on Stephen and opens |
| her toothless mouth uttering a silent word. A choir of virgins and |
| confessors sing voicelessly.)_ |
| |
| THE CHOIR: |
| |
| Liliata rutilantium te confessorum... |
| Iubilantium te virginum... |
| |
| _(from the top of a tower Buck Mulligan, in particoloured jester's dress |
| of puce and yellow and clown's cap with curling bell, stands gaping at |
| her, a smoking buttered split scone in his hand.)_ |
| |
| BUCK MULLIGAN: She's beastly dead. The pity of it! Mulligan meets the |
| afflicted mother. _(He upturns his eyes)_ Mercurial Malachi! |
| |
| THE MOTHER: _(With the subtle smile of death's madness)_ I was once the |
| beautiful May Goulding. I am dead. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Horrorstruck)_ Lemur, who are you? No. What bogeyman's trick |
| is this? |
| |
| BUCK MULLIGAN: _(Shakes his curling capbell)_ The mockery of it! Kinch |
| dogsbody killed her bitchbody. She kicked the bucket. _(Tears of molten |
| butter fall from his eyes on to the scone)_ Our great sweet mother! _Epi |
| oinopa ponton._ |
| |
| THE MOTHER: _(Comes nearer, breathing upon him softly her breath of |
| wetted ashes)_ All must go through it, Stephen. More women than men in |
| the world. You too. Time will come. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Choking with fright, remorse and horror)_ They say I killed |
| you, mother. He offended your memory. Cancer did it, not I. Destiny. |
| |
| THE MOTHER: _(A green rill of bile trickling from a side of her mouth)_ |
| You sang that song to me. _Love's bitter mystery._ |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Eagerly)_ Tell me the word, mother, if you know now. The word |
| known to all men. |
| |
| THE MOTHER: Who saved you the night you jumped into the train at |
| Dalkey with Paddy Lee? Who had pity for you when you were sad among the |
| strangers? Prayer is allpowerful. Prayer for the suffering souls in the |
| Ursuline manual and forty days' indulgence. Repent, Stephen. |
| |
| STEPHEN: The ghoul! Hyena! |
| |
| THE MOTHER: I pray for you in my other world. Get Dilly to make you that |
| boiled rice every night after your brainwork. Years and years I loved |
| you, O, my son, my firstborn, when you lay in my womb. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Fanning herself with the grate fan)_ I'm melting! |
| |
| FLORRY: _(Points to Stephen)_ Look! He's white. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Goes to the window to open it more)_ Giddy. |
| |
| THE MOTHER: _(With smouldering eyes)_ Repent! O, the fire of hell! |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Panting)_ His noncorrosive sublimate! The corpsechewer! Raw |
| head and bloody bones. |
| |
| THE MOTHER: _(Her face drawing near and nearer, sending out an ashen |
| breath)_ Beware! _(She raises her blackened withered right arm slowly |
| towards Stephen's breast with outstretched finger)_ Beware God's hand! |
| _(A green crab with malignant red eyes sticks deep its grinning claws in |
| Stephen's heart.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Strangled with rage)_ Shite! _(His features grow drawn grey |
| and old)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(At the window)_ What? |
| |
| STEPHEN: _Ah non, par exemple!_ The intellectual imagination! With me |
| all or not at all. _Non serviam!_ |
| |
| FLORRY: Give him some cold water. Wait. _(She rushes out)_ |
| |
| THE MOTHER: _(Wrings her hands slowly, moaning desperately)_ O Sacred |
| Heart of Jesus, have mercy on him! Save him from hell, O Divine Sacred |
| Heart! |
| |
| STEPHEN: No! No! No! Break my spirit, all of you, if you can! I'll bring |
| you all to heel! |
| |
| THE MOTHER: _(In the agony of her deathrattle)_ Have mercy on Stephen, |
| Lord, for my sake! Inexpressible was my anguish when expiring with love, |
| grief and agony on Mount Calvary. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _Nothung_! |
| |
| _(He lifts his ashplant high with both hands and smashes the chandelier. |
| Time's livid final flame leaps and, in the following darkness, ruin of |
| all space, shattered glass and toppling masonry.)_ |
| |
| THE GASJET: Pwfungg! |
| |
| BLOOM: Stop! |
| |
| LYNCH: _(Rushes forward and seizes Stephen's hand)_ Here! Hold on! Don't |
| run amok! |
| |
| BELLA: Police! |
| |
| _(Stephen, abandoning his ashplant, his head and arms thrown back stark, |
| beats the ground and flies from the room, past the whores at the door.)_ |
| |
| BELLA: _(Screams)_ After him! |
| |
| _(The two whores rush to the halldoor. Lynch and Kitty and Zoe stampede |
| from the room. They talk excitedly. Bloom follows, returns.)_ |
| |
| THE WHORES: _(Jammed in the doorway, pointing)_ Down there. |
| |
| ZOE: _(Pointing)_ There. There's something up. |
| |
| BELLA: Who pays for the lamp? _(She seizes Bloom's coattail)_ Here, you |
| were with him. The lamp's broken. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Rushes to the hall, rushes back)_ What lamp, woman? |
| |
| A WHORE: He tore his coat. |
| |
| BELLA: _(Her eyes hard with anger and cupidity, points)_ Who's to pay |
| for that? Ten shillings. You're a witness. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Snatches up Stephen's ashplant)_ Me? Ten shillings? Haven't you |
| lifted enough off him? Didn't he...? |
| |
| BELLA: _(Loudly)_ Here, none of your tall talk. This isn't a brothel. A |
| ten shilling house. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(His head under the lamp, pulls the chain. Puling, the gasjet |
| lights up a crushed mauve purple shade. He raises the ashplant.)_ Only |
| the chimney's broken. Here is all he... |
| |
| BELLA: _(Shrinks back and screams)_ Jesus! Don't! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Warding off a blow)_ To show you how he hit the paper. There's |
| not sixpenceworth of damage done. Ten shillings! |
| |
| FLORRY: _(With a glass of water, enters)_ Where is he? |
| |
| BELLA: Do you want me to call the police? |
| |
| BLOOM: O, I know. Bulldog on the premises. But he's a Trinity student. |
| Patrons of your establishment. Gentlemen that pay the rent. _(He makes |
| a masonic sign)_ Know what I mean? Nephew of the vice-chancellor. You |
| don't want a scandal. |
| |
| BELLA: _(Angrily)_ Trinity. Coming down here ragging after the boatraces |
| and paying nothing. Are you my commander here or? Where is he? I'll |
| charge him! Disgrace him, I will! (She Shouts) Zoe! Zoe! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Urgently)_ And if it were your own son in Oxford? _(Warningly)_ |
| I know. |
| |
| BELLA: _(Almost speechless)_ Who are. Incog! |
| |
| ZOE: _(In the doorway)_ There's a row on. |
| |
| BLOOM: What? Where? _(He throws a shilling on the table and starts)_ |
| That's for the chimney. Where? I need mountain air. |
| |
| _(He hurries out through the hall. The whores point. Florry follows, |
| spilling water from her tilted tumbler. On the doorstep all the whores |
| clustered talk volubly, pointing to the right where the fog has cleared |
| off. From the left arrives a jingling hackney car. It slows to in front |
| of the house. Bloom at the halldoor perceives Corny Kelleher who is |
| about to dismount from the car with two silent lechers. He averts |
| his face. Bella from within the hall urges on her whores. They blow |
| ickylickysticky yumyum kisses. Corny Kelleher replies with a ghastly |
| lewd smile. The silent lechers turn to pay the jarvey. Zoe and Kitty |
| still point right. Bloom, parting them swiftly, draws his caliph's hood |
| and poncho and hurries down the steps with sideways face. Incog Haroun |
| al Raschid he flits behind the silent lechers and hastens on by the |
| railings with fleet step of a pard strewing the drag behind him, torn |
| envelopes drenched in aniseed. The ashplant marks his stride. A pack |
| of bloodhounds, led by Hornblower of Trinity brandishing a dogwhip in |
| tallyho cap and an old pair of grey trousers, follow from fir, picking |
| up the scent, nearer, baying, panting, at fault, breaking away, throwing |
| their tongues, biting his heels, leaping at his tail. He walks, |
| runs, zigzags, gallops, lugs laid back. He is pelted with gravel, |
| cabbagestumps, biscuitboxes, eggs, potatoes, dead codfish, woman's |
| slipperslappers. After him freshfound the hue and cry zigzag gallops |
| in hot pursuit of follow my leader: 65 C, 66 C, night watch, John Henry |
| Menton, Wisdom Hely, V. B. Dillon, Councillor Nannetti, Alexander Keyes, |
| Larry O'rourke, Joe Cuffe Mrs O'dowd, Pisser Burke, The Nameless One, |
| Mrs Riordan, The Citizen, Garryowen, Whodoyoucallhim, Strangeface, |
| Fellowthatsolike, Sawhimbefore, Chapwithawen, Chris Callinan, Sir |
| Charles Cameron, Benjamin Dollard, Lenehan, Bartell d'Arcy, Joe Hynes, |
| red Murray, editor Brayden, T. M. Healy, Mr Justice Fitzgibbon, John |
| Howard Parnell, the reverend Tinned Salmon, Professor Joly, Mrs |
| Breen, Denis Breen, Theodore Purefoy, Mina Purefoy, the Westland |
| Row postmistress, C. P. M'Coy, friend of Lyons, Hoppy Holohan, |
| maninthestreet, othermaninthestreet, Footballboots, pugnosed driver, |
| rich protestant lady, Davy Byrne, Mrs Ellen M'Guinness, Mrs Joe |
| Gallaher, George Lidwell, Jimmy Henry on corns, Superintendent Laracy, |
| Father Cowley, Crofton out of the Collector-general's, Dan Dawson, |
| dental surgeon Bloom with tweezers, Mrs Bob Doran, Mrs Kennefick, Mrs |
| Wyse Nolan, John Wyse Nolan, handsomemarriedwomanrubbedagainstwide |
| behindinClonskeatram, the bookseller of_ Sweets of Sin, _Miss |
| Dubedatandshedidbedad, Mesdames Gerald and Stanislaus Moran of Roebuck, |
| the managing clerk of Drimmie's, Wetherup, colonel Hayes, Mastiansky, |
| Citron, Penrose, Aaron Figatner, Moses Herzog, Michael E Geraghty, |
| Inspector Troy, Mrs Galbraith, the constable off Eccles Street corner, |
| old doctor Brady with stethoscope, the mystery man on the beach, a |
| retriever, Mrs Miriam Dandrade and all her lovers.)_ |
| |
| THE HUE AND CRY: _(Helterskelterpelterwelter)_ He's Bloom! Stop Bloom! |
| Stopabloom! Stopperrobber! Hi! Hi! Stophim on the corner! |
| |
| _(At the corner of Beaver Street beneath the scaffolding Bloom panting |
| stops on the fringe of the noisy quarrelling knot, a lot not knowing a |
| jot what hi! hi! row and wrangle round the whowhat brawlaltogether.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(With elaborate gestures, breathing deeply and slowly)_ You |
| are my guests. Uninvited. By virtue of the fifth of George and seventh |
| of Edward. History to blame. Fabled by mothers of memory. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(To Cissy Caffrey)_ Was he insulting you? |
| |
| STEPHEN: Addressed her in vocative feminine. Probably neuter. |
| Ungenitive. |
| |
| VOICES: No, he didn't. I seen him. The girl there. He was in Mrs |
| Cohen's. What's up? Soldier and civilian. |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: I was in company with the soldiers and they left me to |
| do--you know, and the young man run up behind me. But I'm faithful to |
| the man that's treating me though I'm only a shilling whore. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Catches sight of Lynch's and Kitty's heads)_ Hail, Sisyphus. |
| _(He points to himself and the others)_ Poetic. Uropoetic. |
| |
| VOICES: Shes faithfultheman. |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: Yes, to go with him. And me with a soldier friend. |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: He doesn't half want a thick ear, the blighter. Biff |
| him one, Harry. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(To Cissy)_ Was he insulting you while me and him was |
| having a piss? |
| |
| LORD TENNYSON: _(Gentleman poet in Union Jack blazer and cricket |
| flannels, bareheaded, flowingbearded)_ Theirs not to reason why. |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: Biff him, Harry. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(To Private Compton)_ I don't know your name but you are quite |
| right. Doctor Swift says one man in armour will beat ten men in their |
| shirts. Shirt is synechdoche. Part for the whole. |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: _(To The Crowd)_ No, I was with the privates. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Amiably)_ Why not? The bold soldier boy. In my opinion every |
| lady for example... |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(His cap awry, advances to Stephen)_ Say, how would it |
| be, governor, if I was to bash in your jaw? |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Looks up to the sky)_ How? Very unpleasant. Noble art of |
| selfpretence. Personally, I detest action. _(He waves his hand)_ Hand |
| hurts me slightly. _Enfin ce sont vos oignons._ _(To Cissy Caffrey)_ |
| Some trouble is on here. What is it precisely? |
| |
| DOLLY GRAY: _(From her balcony waves her handkerchief, giving the sign |
| of the heroine of Jericho)_ Rahab. Cook's son, goodbye. Safe home to |
| Dolly. Dream of the girl you left behind and she will dream of you. |
| |
| _(The soldiers turn their swimming eyes.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Elbowing through the crowd, plucks Stephen's sleeve |
| vigorously)_ Come now, professor, that carman is waiting. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Turns)_ Eh? _(He disengages himself)_ Why should I not speak |
| to him or to any human being who walks upright upon this oblate orange? |
| _(He points his finger)_ I'm not afraid of what I can talk to if I see |
| his eye. Retaining the perpendicular. |
| |
| _(He staggers a pace back)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Propping him)_ Retain your own. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Laughs emptily)_ My centre of gravity is displaced. I have |
| forgotten the trick. Let us sit down somewhere and discuss. Struggle |
| for life is the law of existence but but human philirenists, notably the |
| tsar and the king of England, have invented arbitration. _(He taps his |
| brow)_ But in here it is I must kill the priest and the king. |
| |
| BIDDY THE CLAP: Did you hear what the professor said? He's a professor |
| out of the college. |
| |
| CUNTY KATE: I did. I heard that. |
| |
| BIDDY THE CLAP: He expresses himself with such marked refinement of |
| phraseology. |
| |
| CUNTY KATE: Indeed, yes. And at the same time with such apposite |
| trenchancy. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(Pulls himself free and comes forward)_ What's that |
| you're saying about my king? |
| |
| _(Edward the Seventh appears in an archway. He wars a white jersey on |
| which an image of the Sacred Heart is stitched with the insignia of |
| Garter and Thistle, Golden Fleece, Elephant of Denmark, Skinner's |
| and Probyn's horse, Lincoln's Inn bencher and ancient and honourable |
| artillery company of Massachusetts. He sucks a red jujube. He is robed |
| as a grand elect perfect and sublime mason with trowel and apron, |
| marked_ made in Germany. _In his left hand he holds a plasterer's bucket |
| on which is printed_ Défense d'uriner. _A roar of welcome greets him.)_ |
| |
| EDWARD THE SEVENTH: _(Slowly, solemnly but indistinctly)_ Peace, perfect |
| peace. For identification, bucket in my hand. Cheerio, boys. _(He turns |
| to his subjects)_ We have come here to witness a clean straight fight |
| and we heartily wish both men the best of good luck. Mahak makar a bak. |
| |
| _(He shakes hands with Private Carr, Private Compton, Stephen, Bloom and |
| Lynch. General applause. Edward the Seventh lifts his bucket graciously |
| in acknowledgment.)_ |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(To Stephen)_ Say it again. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Nervous, friendly, pulls himself up)_ I understand your point |
| of view though I have no king myself for the moment. This is the age of |
| patent medicines. A discussion is difficult down here. But this is the |
| point. You die for your country. Suppose. _(He places his arm on Private |
| Carr's sleeve)_ Not that I wish it for you. But I say: Let my country |
| die for me. Up to the present it has done so. I didn't want it to die. |
| Damn death. Long live life! |
| |
| EDWARD THE SEVENTH: _(Levitates over heaps of slain, in the garb and |
| with the halo of Joking Jesus, a white jujube in his phosphorescent |
| face)_ |
| |
| My methods are new and are causing surprise. To make the blind see I |
| throw dust in their eyes. |
| |
| STEPHEN: Kings and unicorns! _(He fills back a pace)_ Come somewhere and |
| we'll... What was that girl saying?... |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: Eh, Harry, give him a kick in the knackers. Stick one |
| into Jerry. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(To the privates, softly)_ He doesn't know what he's saying. |
| Taken a little more than is good for him. Absinthe. Greeneyed monster. I |
| know him. He's a gentleman, a poet. It's all right. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Nods, smiling and laughing)_ Gentleman, patriot, scholar and |
| judge of impostors. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: I don't give a bugger who he is. |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: We don't give a bugger who he is. |
| |
| STEPHEN: I seem to annoy them. Green rag to a bull. |
| |
| _(Kevin Egan of Paris in black Spanish tasselled shirt and peep-o'-day |
| boy's hat signs to Stephen.)_ |
| |
| KEVIN EGAN: H'lo! _Bonjour!_ The _vieille ogresse_ with the _dents |
| jaunes_. |
| |
| _(Patrice Egan peeps from behind, his rabbitface nibbling a quince |
| leaf.)_ |
| |
| PATRICE: _Socialiste!_ |
| |
| DON EMILE PATRIZIO FRANZ RUPERT POPE HENNESSY: _(In medieval hauberk, |
| two wild geese volant on his helm, with noble indignation points a |
| mailed hand against the privates)_ Werf those eykes to footboden, big |
| grand porcos of johnyellows todos covered of gravy! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(To Stephen)_ Come home. You'll get into trouble. |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Swaying)_ I don't avoid it. He provokes my intelligence. |
| |
| BIDDY THE CLAP: One immediately observes that he is of patrician |
| lineage. |
| |
| THE VIRAGO: Green above the red, says he. Wolfe Tone. |
| |
| THE BAWD: The red's as good as the green. And better. Up the soldiers! |
| Up King Edward! |
| |
| A ROUGH: _(Laughs)_ Ay! Hands up to De Wet. |
| |
| THE CITIZEN: _(With a huge emerald muffler and shillelagh, calls)_ |
| |
| May the God above |
| Send down a dove |
| With teeth as sharp as razors |
| To slit the throats |
| Of the English dogs |
| That hanged our Irish leaders. |
| |
| THE CROPPY BOY: _(The ropenoose round his neck, gripes in his issuing |
| bowels with both hands)_ |
| |
| I bear no hate to a living thing, But I love my country beyond the king. |
| |
| RUMBOLD, DEMON BARBER: _(Accompanied by two blackmasked assistants, |
| advances with gladstone bag which he opens)_ Ladies and gents, |
| cleaver purchased by Mrs Pearcy to slay Mogg. Knife with which Voisin |
| dismembered the wife of a compatriot and hid remains in a sheet in the |
| cellar, the unfortunate female's throat being cut from ear to ear. Phial |
| containing arsenic retrieved from body of Miss Barron which sent Seddon |
| to the gallows. |
| |
| _(He jerks the rope. The assistants leap at the victim's legs and drag |
| him downward, grunting the croppy boy's tongue protrudes violently.)_ |
| |
| THE CROPPY BOY: |
| |
| Horhot ho hray hor hother's hest. |
| |
| _(He gives up the ghost. A violent erection of the hanged sends gouts |
| of sperm spouting through his deathclothes on to the cobblestones. Mrs |
| Bellingham, Mrs Yelverton Barry and the Honourable Mrs Mervyn Talboys |
| rush forward with their handkerchiefs to sop it up.)_ |
| |
| RUMBOLD: I'm near it myself. _(He undoes the noose)_ Rope which hanged |
| the awful rebel. Ten shillings a time. As applied to Her Royal Highness. |
| _(He plunges his head into the gaping belly of the hanged and draws out |
| his head again clotted with coiled and smoking entrails)_ My painful |
| duty has now been done. God save the king! |
| |
| EDWARD THE SEVENTH: _(Dances slowly, solemnly, rattling his bucket, and |
| sings with soft contentment)_ |
| |
| On coronation day, on coronation day, O, won't we have a merry time, |
| Drinking whisky, beer and wine! |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: Here. What are you saying about my king? |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Throws up his hands)_ O, this is too monotonous! Nothing. |
| He wants my money and my life, though want must be his master, for |
| some brutish empire of his. Money I haven't. _(He searches his pockets |
| vaguely)_ GAVE IT TO SOMEONE. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: Who wants your bleeding money? |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Tries to move off)_ Will someone tell me where I am least |
| likely to meet these necessary evils? _Ça se voit aussi à paris._ Not |
| that I... But, by Saint Patrick...! |
| |
| _(The women's heads coalesce. Old Gummy Granny in sugarloaf hat appears |
| seated on a toadstool, the deathflower of the potato blight on her |
| breast.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: Aha! I know you, gammer! Hamlet, revenge! The old sow that eats |
| her farrow! |
| |
| OLD GUMMY GRANNY: _(Rocking to and fro)_ Ireland's sweetheart, the king |
| of Spain's daughter, alanna. Strangers in my house, bad manners to them! |
| _(She keens with banshee woe)_ Ochone! Ochone! Silk of the kine! _(She |
| wails)_ You met with poor old Ireland and how does she stand? |
| |
| STEPHEN: How do I stand you? The hat trick! Where's the third person of |
| the Blessed Trinity? Soggarth Aroon? The reverend Carrion Crow. |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: _(Shrill)_ Stop them from fighting! |
| |
| A ROUGH: Our men retreated. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(Tugging at his belt)_ I'll wring the neck of any fucker |
| says a word against my fucking king. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Terrified)_ He said nothing. Not a word. A pure |
| misunderstanding. |
| |
| THE CITIZEN: _Erin go bragh!_ |
| |
| _(Major Tweedy and the Citizen exhibit to each other medals, |
| decorations, trophies of war, wounds. Both salute with fierce |
| hostility.)_ |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: Go it, Harry. Do him one in the eye. He's a proboer. |
| |
| STEPHEN: Did I? When? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(To the redcoats)_ We fought for you in South Africa, Irish |
| missile troops. Isn't that history? Royal Dublin Fusiliers. Honoured by |
| our monarch. |
| |
| THE NAVVY: _(Staggering past)_ O, yes! O God, yes! O, make the kwawr a |
| krowawr! O! Bo! |
| |
| _(Casqued halberdiers in armour thrust forward a pentice of gutted |
| spearpoints. Major Tweedy, moustached like Turko the terrible, in |
| bearskin cap with hackleplume and accoutrements, with epaulettes, gilt |
| chevrons and sabretaches, his breast bright with medals, toes the line. |
| He gives the pilgrim warrior's sign of the knights templars.)_ |
| |
| MAJOR TWEEDY: _(Growls gruffly)_ Rorke's Drift! Up, guards, and at them! |
| Mahar shalal hashbaz. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: I'll do him in. |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: _(Waves the crowd back)_ Fair play, here. Make a |
| bleeding butcher's shop of the bugger. |
| |
| _(Massed bands blare_ Garryowen _and_ God save the King.) |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: They're going to fight. For me! |
| |
| CUNTY KATE: The brave and the fair. |
| |
| BIDDY THE CLAP: Methinks yon sable knight will joust it with the best. |
| |
| CUNTY KATE: _(Blushing deeply)_ Nay, madam. The gules doublet and merry |
| saint George for me! |
| |
| STEPHEN: |
| |
| The harlot's cry from street to street Shall weave Old Ireland's |
| windingsheet. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(Loosening his belt, shouts)_ I'll wring the neck of any |
| fucking bastard says a word against my bleeding fucking king. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Shakes Cissy Caffrey's shoulders)_ Speak, you! Are you struck |
| dumb? You are the link between nations and generations. Speak, woman, |
| sacred lifegiver! |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: _(Alarmed, seizes Private Carr's sleeve)_ Amn't I with |
| you? Amn't I your girl? Cissy's your girl. _(She cries)_ Police! |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Ecstatically, to Cissy Caffrey)_ |
| |
| White thy fambles, red thy gan |
| And thy quarrons dainty is. |
| |
| |
| VOICES: Police! |
| |
| DISTANT VOICES: Dublin's burning! Dublin's burning! On fire, on fire! |
| |
| _(Brimstone fires spring up. Dense clouds roll past. Heavy Gatling guns |
| boom. Pandemonium. Troops deploy. Gallop of hoofs. Artillery. Hoarse |
| commands. Bells clang. Backers shout. Drunkards bawl. Whores screech. |
| Foghorns hoot. Cries of valour. Shrieks of dying. Pikes clash on |
| cuirasses. Thieves rob the slain. Birds of prey, winging from the sea, |
| rising from marshlands, swooping from eyries, hover screaming, gannets, |
| cormorants, vultures, goshawks, climbing woodcocks, peregrines, merlins, |
| blackgrouse, sea eagles, gulls, albatrosses, barnacle geese. The |
| midnight sun is darkened. The earth trembles. The dead of Dublin |
| from Prospect and Mount Jerome in white sheepskin overcoats and black |
| goatfell cloaks arise and appear to many. A chasm opens with a noiseless |
| yawn. Tom Rochford, winner, in athlete's singlet and breeches, arrives |
| at the head of the national hurdle handicap and leaps into the void. |
| He is followed by a race of runners and leapers. In wild attitudes they |
| spring from the brink. Their bodies plunge. Factory lasses with fancy |
| clothes toss redhot Yorkshire baraabombs. Society ladies lift their |
| skirts above their heads to protect themselves. Laughing witches in red |
| cutty sarks ride through the air on broomsticks. Quakerlyster plasters |
| blisters. It rains dragons' teeth. Armed heroes spring up from furrows. |
| They exchange in amity the pass of knights of the red cross and fight |
| duels with cavalry sabres: Wolfe Tone against Henry Grattan, Smith |
| O'Brien against Daniel O'Connell, Michael Davitt against Isaac Butt, |
| Justin M'Carthy against Parnell, Arthur Griffith against John Redmond, |
| John O'Leary against Lear O'Johnny, Lord Edward Fitzgerald against Lord |
| Gerald Fitzedward, The O'Donoghue of the Glens against The Glens of The |
| O'Donoghue. On an eminence, the centre of the earth, rises the feldaltar |
| of Saint Barbara. Black candles rise from its gospel and epistle horns. |
| From the high barbacans of the tower two shafts of light fall on the |
| smokepalled altarstone. On the altarstone Mrs Mina Purefoy, goddess of |
| unreason, lies, naked, fettered, a chalice resting on her swollen belly. |
| Father Malachi O'Flynn in a lace petticoat and reversed chasuble, his |
| two left feet back to the front, celebrates camp mass. The Reverend Mr |
| Hugh C Haines Love M. A. in a plain cassock and mortarboard, his head |
| and collar back to the front, holds over the celebrant's head an open |
| umbrella.)_ |
| |
| FATHER MALACHI O'FLYNN: _Introibo ad altare diaboli._ |
| |
| THE REVEREND MR HAINES LOVE: To the devil which hath made glad my young |
| days. |
| |
| FATHER MALACHI O'FLYNN: _(Takes from the chalice and elevates a |
| blooddripping host) Corpus meum._ |
| |
| THE REVEREND MR HAINES LOVE: _(Raises high behind the celebrant's |
| petticoat, revealing his grey bare hairy buttocks between which a carrot |
| is stuck)_ My body. |
| |
| THE VOICE OF ALL THE DAMNED: Htengier Tnetopinmo Dog Drol eht rof, |
| Aiulella! |
| |
| _(From on high the voice of Adonai calls.)_ |
| |
| ADONAI: Dooooooooooog! |
| |
| THE VOICE OF ALL THE BLESSED: Alleluia, for the Lord God Omnipotent |
| reigneth! |
| |
| _(From on high the voice of Adonai calls.)_ |
| |
| ADONAI: Goooooooooood! |
| |
| _(In strident discord peasants and townsmen of Orange and Green factions |
| sing_ Kick the Pope _and_ Daily, daily sing to Mary.) |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(With ferocious articulation)_ I'll do him in, so help me |
| fucking Christ! I'll wring the bastard fucker's bleeding blasted fucking |
| windpipe! |
| |
| OLD GUMMY GRANNY: _(Thrusts a dagger towards Stephen's hand)_ Remove |
| him, acushla. At 8.35 a.m. you will be in heaven and Ireland will be |
| free. _(She prays)_ O good God, take him! |
| |
| (THE RETRIEVER, NOSING ON THE FRINGE OF THE CROWD, BARKS NOISILY.) |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Runs to lynch)_ Can't you get him away? |
| |
| LYNCH: He likes dialectic, the universal language. Kitty! _(To Bloom)_ |
| Get him away, you. He won't listen to me. |
| |
| _(He drags Kitty away.)_ |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Points) exit Judas. Et laqueo se suspendit._ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Runs to Stephen)_ Come along with me now before worse happens. |
| Here's your stick. |
| |
| STEPHEN: Stick, no. Reason. This feast of pure reason. |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: _(Pulling Private Carr)_ Come on, you're boosed. He |
| insulted me but I forgive him. _(Shouting in his ear)_ I forgive him for |
| insulting me. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Over Stephen's shoulder)_ Yes, go. You see he's incapable. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(Breaks loose)_ I'll insult him. |
| |
| _(He rushes towards Stephen, fist outstretched, and strikes him in the |
| face. Stephen totters, collapses, falls, stunned. He lies prone, his |
| face to the sky, his hat rolling to the wall. Bloom follows and picks it |
| up.)_ |
| |
| MAJOR TWEEDY: _(Loudly)_ Carbine in bucket! Cease fire! Salute! |
| |
| THE RETRIEVER: _(Barking furiously)_ Ute ute ute ute ute ute ute ute. |
| |
| THE CROWD: Let him up! Don't strike him when he's down! Air! Who? The |
| soldier hit him. He's a professor. Is he hurted? Don't manhandle him! |
| He's fainted! |
| |
| A HAG: What call had the redcoat to strike the gentleman and he under |
| the influence. Let them go and fight the Boers! |
| |
| THE BAWD: Listen to who's talking! Hasn't the soldier a right to go with |
| his girl? He gave him the coward's blow. |
| |
| _(They grab at each other's hair, claw at each other and spit)_ |
| |
| THE RETRIEVER: _(Barking)_ Wow wow wow. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Shoves them back, loudly)_ Get back, stand back! |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: _(Tugging his comrade)_ Here. Bugger off, Harry. Here's |
| the cops! _(Two raincaped watch, tall, stand in the group.)_ |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: What's wrong here? |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: We were with this lady. And he insulted us. And |
| assaulted my chum. _(The retriever barks)_ Who owns the bleeding tyke? |
| |
| CISSY CAFFREY: _(With expectation)_ Is he bleeding! |
| |
| A MAN: _(Rising from his knees)_ No. Gone off. He'll come to all right. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Glances sharply at the man)_ Leave him to me. I can easily... |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: Who are you? Do you know him? |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(Lurches towards the watch)_ He insulted my lady friend. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Angrily)_ You hit him without provocation. I'm a witness. |
| Constable, take his regimental number. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: I don't want your instructions in the discharge of my |
| duty. |
| |
| PRIVATE COMPTON: _(Pulling his comrade)_ Here, bugger off Harry. Or |
| Bennett'll shove you in the lockup. |
| |
| PRIVATE CARR: _(Staggering as he is pulled away)_ God fuck old Bennett. |
| He's a whitearsed bugger. I don't give a shit for him. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: _(Takes out his notebook)_ What's his name? |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Peering over the crowd)_ I just see a car there. If you give me |
| a hand a second, sergeant... |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: Name and address. |
| |
| _(Corny Kelleker, weepers round his hat, a death wreath in his hand, |
| appears among the bystanders.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Quickly)_ O, the very man! _(He whispers)_ Simon Dedalus' son. |
| A bit sprung. Get those policemen to move those loafers back. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: Night, Mr Kelleher. |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: _(To the watch, with drawling eye)_ That's all right. |
| I know him. Won a bit on the races. Gold cup. Throwaway. _(He laughs)_ |
| Twenty to one. Do you follow me? |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: _(Turns to the crowd)_ Here, what are you all gaping at? |
| Move on out of that. |
| |
| _(The crowd disperses slowly, muttering, down the lane.)_ |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: Leave it to me, sergeant. That'll be all right. _(He |
| laughs, shaking his head)_ We were often as bad ourselves, ay or worse. |
| What? Eh, what? |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: _(Laughs)_ I suppose so. |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: _(Nudges the second watch)_ Come and wipe your name off |
| the slate. _(He lilts, wagging his head)_ With my tooraloom tooraloom |
| tooraloom tooraloom. What, eh, do you follow me? |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: _(Genially)_ Ah, sure we were too. |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: _(Winking)_ Boys will be boys. I've a car round there. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: All right, Mr Kelleher. Good night. |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: I'll see to that. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Shakes hands with both of the watch in turn)_ Thank you very |
| much, gentlemen. Thank you. _(He mumbles confidentially)_ We don't want |
| any scandal, you understand. Father is a wellknown highly respected |
| citizen. Just a little wild oats, you understand. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: O. I understand, sir. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: That's all right, sir. |
| |
| FIRST WATCH: It was only in case of corporal injuries I'd have to report |
| it at the station. |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Nods rapidly)_ Naturally. Quite right. Only your bounden duty. |
| |
| SECOND WATCH: It's our duty. |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: Good night, men. |
| |
| THE WATCH: _(Saluting together)_ Night, gentlemen. _(They move off with |
| slow heavy tread)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Blows)_ Providential you came on the scene. You have a car?... |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: _(Laughs, pointing his thumb over his right shoulder to |
| the car brought up against the scaffolding)_ Two commercials that were |
| standing fizz in Jammet's. Like princes, faith. One of them lost two |
| quid on the race. Drowning his grief. And were on for a go with the |
| jolly girls. So I landed them up on Behan's car and down to nighttown. |
| |
| BLOOM: I was just going home by Gardiner street when I happened to... |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: _(Laughs)_ Sure they wanted me to join in with the mots. |
| No, by God, says I. Not for old stagers like myself and yourself. _(He |
| laughs again and leers with lacklustre eye)_ Thanks be to God we have it |
| in the house, what, eh, do you follow me? Hah, hah, hah! |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Tries to laugh)_ He, he, he! Yes. Matter of fact I was just |
| visiting an old friend of mine there, Virag, you don't know him (poor |
| fellow, he's laid up for the past week) and we had a liquor together and |
| I was just making my way home... |
| |
| _(The horse neighs.)_ |
| |
| THE HORSE: Hohohohohohoh! Hohohohome! |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: Sure it was Behan our jarvey there that told me after |
| we left the two commercials in Mrs Cohen's and I told him to pull up and |
| got off to see. _(He laughs)_ Sober hearsedrivers a speciality. Will I |
| give him a lift home? Where does he hang out? Somewhere in Cabra, what? |
| |
| BLOOM: No, in Sandycove, I believe, from what he let drop. |
| |
| _(Stephen, prone, breathes to the stars. Corny Kelleher, asquint, drawls |
| at the horse. Bloom, in gloom, looms down.)_ |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: _(Scratches his nape)_ Sandycove! _(He bends down and |
| calls to Stephen)_ Eh! _(He calls again)_ Eh! He's covered with shavings |
| anyhow. Take care they didn't lift anything off him. |
| |
| BLOOM: No, no, no. I have his money and his hat here and stick. |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: Ah, well, he'll get over it. No bones broken. Well, I'll |
| shove along. _(He laughs)_ I've a rendezvous in the morning. Burying the |
| dead. Safe home! |
| |
| THE HORSE: _(Neighs)_ Hohohohohome. |
| |
| BLOOM: Good night. I'll just wait and take him along in a few... |
| |
| _(Corny Kelleher returns to the outside car and mounts it. The horse |
| harness jingles.)_ |
| |
| CORNY KELLEHER: _(From the car, standing)_ Night. |
| |
| BLOOM: Night. |
| |
| _(The jarvey chucks the reins and raises his whip encouragingly. The |
| car and horse back slowly, awkwardly, and turn. Corny Kelleher on the |
| sideseat sways his head to and fro in sign of mirth at Bloom's plight. |
| The jarvey joins in the mute pantomimic merriment nodding from the |
| farther seat. Bloom shakes his head in mute mirthful reply. With thumb |
| and palm Corny Kelleher reassures that the two bobbies will allow the |
| sleep to continue for what else is to be done. With a slow nod Bloom |
| conveys his gratitude as that is exactly what Stephen needs. The car |
| jingles tooraloom round the corner of the tooraloom lane. Corny Kelleher |
| again reassuralooms with his hand. Bloom with his hand assuralooms Corny |
| Kelleher that he is reassuraloomtay. The tinkling hoofs and jingling |
| harness grow fainter with their tooralooloo looloo lay. Bloom, holding |
| in his hand Stephen's hat, festooned with shavings, and ashplant, stands |
| irresolute. Then he bends to him and shakes him by the shoulder.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Eh! Ho! _(There is no answer; he bends again)_ Mr Dedalus! |
| _(There is no answer)_ The name if you call. Somnambulist. _(He bends |
| again and hesitating, brings his mouth near the face of the prostrate |
| form)_ Stephen! _(There is no answer. He calls again.)_ Stephen! |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Groans)_ Who? Black panther. Vampire. _(He sighs and |
| stretches himself, then murmurs thickly with prolonged vowels)_ |
| |
| Who... drive... Fergus now |
| And pierce... wood's woven shade?... |
| |
| _(He turns on his left side, sighing, doubling himself together.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: Poetry. Well educated. Pity. _(He bends again and undoes |
| the buttons of Stephen's waistcoat)_ To breathe. _(He brushes the |
| woodshavings from Stephen's clothes with light hand and fingers)_ One |
| pound seven. Not hurt anyhow. _(He listens)_ What? |
| |
| STEPHEN: _(Murmurs)_ |
| |
| ... shadows... the woods |
| ... white breast... dim sea. |
| |
| _(He stretches out his arms, sighs again and curls his body. Bloom, |
| holding the hat and ashplant, stands erect. A dog barks in the distance. |
| Bloom tightens and loosens his grip on the ashplant. He looks down on |
| Stephen's face and form.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Communes with the night)_ Face reminds me of his poor mother. |
| In the shady wood. The deep white breast. Ferguson, I think I caught. A |
| girl. Some girl. Best thing could happen him. _(He murmurs)_... swear |
| that I will always hail, ever conceal, never reveal, any part or parts, |
| art or arts... _(He murmurs)_... in the rough sands of the sea... a |
| cabletow's length from the shore... where the tide ebbs... and flows |
| ... |
| |
| _(Silent, thoughtful, alert he stands on guard, his fingers at his lips |
| in the attitude of secret master. Against the dark wall a figure appears |
| slowly, a fairy boy of eleven, a changeling, kidnapped, dressed in an |
| eton suit with glass shoes and a little bronze helmet, holding a book |
| in his hand. He reads from right to left inaudibly, smiling, kissing the |
| page.)_ |
| |
| BLOOM: _(Wonderstruck, calls inaudibly)_ Rudy! |
| |
| RUDY: _(Gazes, unseeing, into Bloom's eyes and goes on reading, kissing, |
| smiling. He has a delicate mauve face. On his suit he has diamond and |
| ruby buttons. In his free left hand he holds a slim ivory cane with a |
| violet bowknot. A white lambkin peeps out of his waistcoat pocket.)_ |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| -- III -- |
| |
| Preparatory to anything else Mr Bloom brushed off the greater bulk of |
| the shavings and handed Stephen the hat and ashplant and bucked him up |
| generally in orthodox Samaritan fashion which he very badly needed. His |
| (Stephen's) mind was not exactly what you would call wandering but a bit |
| unsteady and on his expressed desire for some beverage to drink Mr |
| Bloom in view of the hour it was and there being no pump of Vartry water |
| available for their ablutions let alone drinking purposes hit upon an |
| expedient by suggesting, off the reel, the propriety of the cabman's |
| shelter, as it was called, hardly a stonesthrow away near Butt bridge |
| where they might hit upon some drinkables in the shape of a milk and |
| soda or a mineral. But how to get there was the rub. For the nonce he |
| was rather nonplussed but inasmuch as the duty plainly devolved upon him |
| to take some measures on the subject he pondered suitable ways and means |
| during which Stephen repeatedly yawned. So far as he could see he was |
| rather pale in the face so that it occurred to him as highly advisable |
| to get a conveyance of some description which would answer in their |
| then condition, both of them being e.d.ed, particularly Stephen, always |
| assuming that there was such a thing to be found. Accordingly after a |
| few such preliminaries as brushing, in spite of his having forgotten |
| to take up his rather soapsuddy handkerchief after it had done yeoman |
| service in the shaving line, they both walked together along Beaver |
| street or, more properly, lane as far as the farrier's and the |
| distinctly fetid atmosphere of the livery stables at the corner of |
| Montgomery street where they made tracks to the left from thence |
| debouching into Amiens street round by the corner of Dan Bergin's. But |
| as he confidently anticipated there was not a sign of a Jehu plying for |
| hire anywhere to be seen except a fourwheeler, probably engaged by some |
| fellows inside on the spree, outside the North Star hotel and there was |
| no symptom of its budging a quarter of an inch when Mr Bloom, who was |
| anything but a professional whistler, endeavoured to hail it by emitting |
| a kind of a whistle, holding his arms arched over his head, twice. |
| |
| This was a quandary but, bringing common sense to bear on it, evidently |
| there was nothing for it but put a good face on the matter and foot it |
| which they accordingly did. So, bevelling around by Mullett's and the |
| Signal House which they shortly reached, they proceeded perforce in the |
| direction of Amiens street railway terminus, Mr Bloom being handicapped |
| by the circumstance that one of the back buttons of his trousers had, |
| to vary the timehonoured adage, gone the way of all buttons though, |
| entering thoroughly into the spirit of the thing, he heroically made |
| light of the mischance. So as neither of them were particularly pressed |
| for time, as it happened, and the temperature refreshing since it |
| cleared up after the recent visitation of Jupiter Pluvius, they dandered |
| along past by where the empty vehicle was waiting without a fare or a |
| jarvey. As it so happened a Dublin United Tramways Company's sandstrewer |
| happened to be returning and the elder man recounted to his companion _Ã |
| propos_ of the incident his own truly miraculous escape of some little |
| while back. They passed the main entrance of the Great Northern railway |
| station, the starting point for Belfast, where of course all traffic was |
| suspended at that late hour and passing the backdoor of the morgue |
| (a not very enticing locality, not to say gruesome to a degree, more |
| especially at night) ultimately gained the Dock Tavern and in due course |
| turned into Store street, famous for its C division police station. |
| Between this point and the high at present unlit warehouses of Beresford |
| place Stephen thought to think of Ibsen, associated with Baird's the |
| stonecutter's in his mind somehow in Talbot place, first turning on the |
| right, while the other who was acting as his _fidus Achates_ inhaled |
| with internal satisfaction the smell of James Rourke's city bakery, |
| situated quite close to where they were, the very palatable odour indeed |
| of our daily bread, of all commodities of the public the primary and |
| most indispensable. Bread, the staff of life, earn your bread, O tell me |
| where is fancy bread, at Rourke's the baker's it is said. |
| |
| _En route_ to his taciturn and, not to put too fine a point on it, not |
| yet perfectly sober companion Mr Bloom who at all events was in complete |
| possession of his faculties, never more so, in fact disgustingly sober, |
| spoke a word of caution re the dangers of nighttown, women of ill fame |
| and swell mobsmen, which, barely permissible once in a while though not |
| as a habitual practice, was of the nature of a regular deathtrap for |
| young fellows of his age particularly if they had acquired drinking |
| habits under the influence of liquor unless you knew a little jiujitsu |
| for every contingency as even a fellow on the broad of his back could |
| administer a nasty kick if you didn't look out. Highly providential |
| was the appearance on the scene of Corny Kelleher when Stephen was |
| blissfully unconscious but for that man in the gap turning up at the |
| eleventh hour the finis might have been that he might have been a |
| candidate for the accident ward or, failing that, the bridewell and |
| an appearance in the court next day before Mr Tobias or, he being the |
| solicitor rather, old Wall, he meant to say, or Mahony which simply |
| spelt ruin for a chap when it got bruited about. The reason he mentioned |
| the fact was that a lot of those policemen, whom he cordially disliked, |
| were admittedly unscrupulous in the service of the Crown and, as Mr |
| Bloom put it, recalling a case or two in the A division in Clanbrassil |
| street, prepared to swear a hole through a ten gallon pot. Never on |
| the spot when wanted but in quiet parts of the city, Pembroke road for |
| example, the |
| |
| guardians of the law were well in evidence, the obvious reason being |
| they were paid to protect the upper classes. Another thing he commented |
| on was equipping soldiers with firearms or sidearms of any description |
| liable to go off at any time which was tantamount to inciting them |
| against civilians should by any chance they fall out over anything. You |
| frittered away your time, he very sensibly maintained, and health and |
| also character besides which, the squandermania of the thing, fast women |
| of the _demimonde_ ran away with a lot of l s. d. into the bargain and |
| the greatest danger of all was who you got drunk with though, touching |
| the much vexed question of stimulants, he relished a glass of choice old |
| wine in season as both |
| |
| nourishing and bloodmaking and possessing aperient virtues (notably a |
| good burgundy which he was a staunch believer in) still never beyond |
| a certain point where he invariably drew the line as it simply led to |
| trouble all round to say nothing of your being at the tender mercy of |
| others practically. Most of all he commented adversely on the desertion |
| of Stephen by all his pubhunting _confreres_ but one, a most glaring |
| piece of ratting on the part of his brother medicos under all the circs. |
| |
| --And that one was Judas, Stephen said, who up to then had said nothing |
| whatsoever of any kind. |
| |
| Discussing these and kindred topics they made a beeline across the back |
| of the Customhouse and passed under the Loop Line bridge where a brazier |
| of coke burning in front of a sentrybox or something like one attracted |
| their rather lagging footsteps. Stephen of his own accord stopped for |
| no special reason to look at the heap of barren cobblestones and by |
| the light emanating from the brazier he could just make out the darker |
| figure of the corporation watchman inside the gloom of the sentrybox. He |
| began to remember that this had happened or had been mentioned as having |
| happened before but it cost him no small effort before he remembered |
| that he recognised in the sentry a quondam friend of his father's, |
| Gumley. To avoid a meeting he drew nearer to the pillars of the railway |
| bridge. |
| |
| --Someone saluted you, Mr Bloom said. |
| |
| A figure of middle height on the prowl evidently under the arches |
| saluted again, calling: |
| |
| --_Night!_ |
| |
| Stephen of course started rather dizzily and stopped to return the |
| compliment. Mr Bloom actuated by motives of inherent delicacy inasmuch |
| as he always believed in minding his own business moved off but |
| nevertheless remained on the _qui vive_ with just a shade of anxiety |
| though not funkyish in the least. Though unusual in the Dublin area he |
| knew that it was not by any means unknown for desperadoes who had next |
| to nothing to live on to be abroad waylaying and generally terrorising |
| peaceable pedestrians by placing a pistol at their head in some |
| secluded spot outside the city proper, famished loiterers of the |
| Thames embankment category they might be hanging about there or simply |
| marauders ready to decamp with whatever boodle they could in one fell |
| swoop at a moment's notice, your money or your life, leaving you there |
| to point a moral, gagged and garrotted. |
| |
| Stephen, that is when the accosting figure came to close quarters, |
| though he was not in an over sober state himself recognised Corley's |
| breath redolent of rotten cornjuice. Lord John Corley some called him |
| and his genealogy came about in this wise. He was the eldest son of |
| inspector Corley of the G division, lately deceased, who had married |
| a certain Katherine Brophy, the daughter of a Louth farmer. His |
| grandfather Patrick Michael Corley of New Ross had married the widow |
| of a publican there whose maiden name had been Katherine (also) Talbot. |
| Rumour had it (though not proved) that she descended from the house of |
| the lords Talbot de Malahide in whose mansion, really an unquestionably |
| fine residence of its kind and well worth seeing, her mother or aunt or |
| some relative, a woman, as the tale went, of extreme beauty, had enjoyed |
| the distinction of being in service in the washkitchen. This therefore |
| was the reason why the still comparatively young though dissolute |
| man who now addressed Stephen was spoken of by some with facetious |
| proclivities as Lord John Corley. |
| |
| Taking Stephen on one side he had the customary doleful ditty to tell. |
| Not as much as a farthing to purchase a night's lodgings. His friends |
| had all deserted him. Furthermore he had a row with Lenehan and called |
| him to Stephen a mean bloody swab with a sprinkling of a number of other |
| uncalledfor expressions. He was out of a job and implored of Stephen to |
| tell him where on God's earth he could get something, anything at all, |
| to do. No, it was the daughter of the mother in the washkitchen that |
| was fostersister to the heir of the house or else they were connected |
| through the mother in some way, both occurrences happening at the same |
| time if the whole thing wasn't a complete fabrication from start to |
| finish. Anyhow he was all in. |
| |
| --I wouldn't ask you only, pursued he, on my solemn oath and God knows |
| I'm on the rocks. |
| |
| --There'll be a job tomorrow or next day, Stephen told him, in a boys' |
| school at Dalkey for a gentleman usher. Mr Garrett Deasy. Try it. You |
| may mention my name. |
| |
| --Ah, God, Corley replied, sure I couldn't teach in a school, man. I was |
| never one of your bright ones, he added with a half laugh. I got stuck |
| twice in the junior at the christian brothers. |
| |
| --I have no place to sleep myself, Stephen informed him. |
| |
| Corley at the first go-off was inclined to suspect it was something to |
| do with Stephen being fired out of his digs for bringing in a bloody |
| tart off the street. There was a dosshouse in Marlborough street, Mrs |
| Maloney's, but it was only a tanner touch and full of undesirables but |
| M'Conachie told him you got a decent enough do in the Brazen Head over |
| in Winetavern street (which was distantly suggestive to the person |
| addressed of friar Bacon) for a bob. He was starving too though he |
| hadn't said a word about it. |
| |
| Though this sort of thing went on every other night or very near it |
| still Stephen's feelings got the better of him in a sense though he knew |
| that Corley's brandnew rigmarole on a par with the others was hardly |
| deserving of much credence. However _haud ignarus malorum miseris |
| succurrere disco_ etcetera as the Latin poet remarks especially as luck |
| would have it he got paid his screw after every middle of the month on |
| the sixteenth which was the date of the month as a matter of fact though |
| a good bit of the wherewithal was demolished. But the cream of the joke |
| was nothing would get it out of Corley's head that he was living in |
| affluence and hadn't a thing to do but hand out the needful. Whereas. |
| He put his hand in a pocket anyhow not with the idea of finding any food |
| there but thinking he might lend him anything up to a bob or so in lieu |
| so that he might endeavour at all events and get sufficient to eat but |
| the result was in the negative for, to his chagrin, he found his cash |
| missing. A few broken biscuits were all the result of his investigation. |
| He tried his hardest to recollect for the moment whether he had lost |
| as well he might have or left because in that contingency it was not a |
| pleasant lookout, very much the reverse in fact. He was altogether too |
| fagged out to institute a thorough search though he tried to recollect. |
| About biscuits he dimly remembered. Who now exactly gave them he |
| wondered or where was or did he buy. However in another pocket he came |
| across what he surmised in the dark were pennies, erroneously however, |
| as it turned out. |
| |
| --Those are halfcrowns, man, Corley corrected him. |
| |
| And so in point of fact they turned out to be. Stephen anyhow lent him |
| one of them. |
| |
| --Thanks, Corley answered, you're a gentleman. I'll pay you back one |
| time. Who's that with you? I saw him a few times in the Bleeding Horse |
| in Camden street with Boylan, the billsticker. You might put in a good |
| word for us to get me taken on there. I'd carry a sandwichboard only |
| the girl in the office told me they're full up for the next three weeks, |
| man. God, you've to book ahead, man, you'd think it was for the Carl |
| Rosa. I don't give a shite anyway so long as I get a job, even as a |
| crossing sweeper. |
| |
| Subsequently being not quite so down in the mouth after the two and six |
| he got he informed Stephen about a fellow by the name of Bags Comisky |
| that he said Stephen knew well out of Fullam's, the shipchandler's, |
| bookkeeper there that used to be often round in Nagle's back with O'Mara |
| and a little chap with a stutter the name of Tighe. Anyhow he was lagged |
| the night before last and fined ten bob for a drunk and disorderly and |
| refusing to go with the constable. |
| |
| 210 |
| |
| Mr Bloom in the meanwhile kept dodging about in the vicinity of the |
| cobblestones near the brazier of coke in front of the corporation |
| watchman's sentrybox who evidently a glutton for work, it struck him, |
| was having a quiet forty winks for all intents and purposes on his own |
| private account while Dublin slept. He threw an odd eye at the same time |
| now and then at Stephen's anything but immaculately attired interlocutor |
| as if he had seen that nobleman somewhere or other though where he was |
| not in a position to truthfully state nor had he the remotest idea when. |
| Being a levelheaded individual who could give points to not a few in |
| point of shrewd observation he also remarked on his very dilapidated |
| hat and slouchy wearing apparel generally testifying to a chronic |
| impecuniosity. Palpably he was one of his hangerson but for the |
| matter of that it was merely a question of one preying on his nextdoor |
| neighbour all round, in every deep, so to put it, a deeper depth and for |
| the matter of that if the man in the street chanced to be in the dock |
| himself penal servitude with or without the option of a fine would be |
| a very rara avis altogether. In any case he had a consummate amount of |
| cool assurance intercepting people at that hour of the night or morning. |
| Pretty thick that was certainly. |
| |
| The pair parted company and Stephen rejoined Mr Bloom who, with his |
| practised eye, was not without perceiving that he had succumbed to the |
| blandiloquence of the other parasite. Alluding to the encounter he said, |
| laughingly, Stephen, that is: |
| |
| --He is down on his luck. He asked me to ask you to ask somebody named |
| Boylan, a billsticker, to give him a job as a sandwichman. |
| |
| At this intelligence, in which he seemingly evinced little interest, Mr |
| Bloom gazed abstractedly for the space of a half a second or so in the |
| direction of a bucketdredger, rejoicing in the farfamed name of Eblana, |
| moored alongside Customhouse quay and quite possibly out of repair, |
| whereupon he observed evasively: |
| |
| --Everybody gets their own ration of luck, they say. Now you mention it |
| his face was familiar to me. But, leaving that for the moment, how much |
| did you part with, he queried, if I am not too inquisitive? |
| |
| --Half a crown, Stephen responded. I daresay he needs it to sleep |
| somewhere. |
| |
| --Needs! Mr Bloom ejaculated, professing not the least surprise at |
| the intelligence, I can quite credit the assertion and I guarantee he |
| invariably does. Everyone according to his needs or everyone according |
| to his deeds. But, talking about things in general, where, added he with |
| a smile, will you sleep yourself? Walking to Sandycove is out of |
| the question. And even supposing you did you won't get in after what |
| occurred at Westland Row station. Simply fag out there for nothing. I |
| don't mean to presume to dictate to you in the slightest degree but why |
| did you leave your father's house? |
| |
| --To seek misfortune, was Stephen's answer. |
| |
| --I met your respected father on a recent occasion, Mr Bloom |
| diplomatically returned, today in fact, or to be strictly accurate, on |
| yesterday. Where does he live at present? I gathered in the course of |
| conversation that he had moved. |
| |
| --I believe he is in Dublin somewhere, Stephen answered unconcernedly. |
| Why? |
| |
| --A gifted man, Mr Bloom said of Mr Dedalus senior, in more respects |
| than one and a born _raconteur_ if ever there was one. He takes great |
| pride, quite legitimate, out of you. You could go back perhaps, he |
| hasarded, still thinking of the very unpleasant scene at Westland Row |
| terminus when it was perfectly evident that the other two, Mulligan, |
| that is, and that English tourist friend of his, who eventually euchred |
| their third companion, were patently trying as if the whole bally |
| station belonged to them to give Stephen the slip in the confusion, |
| which they did. |
| |
| There was no response forthcoming to the suggestion however, such as it |
| was, Stephen's mind's eye being too busily engaged in repicturing his |
| family hearth the last time he saw it with his sister Dilly sitting by |
| the ingle, her hair hanging down, waiting for some weak Trinidad shell |
| cocoa that was in the sootcoated kettle to be done so that she and he |
| could drink it with the oatmealwater for milk after the Friday herrings |
| they had eaten at two a penny with an egg apiece for Maggy, Boody and |
| Katey, the cat meanwhile under the mangle devouring a mess of eggshells |
| and charred fish heads and bones on a square of brown paper, in |
| accordance with the third precept of the church to fast and abstain |
| on the days commanded, it being quarter tense or if not, ember days or |
| something like that. |
| |
| --No, Mr Bloom repeated again, I wouldn't personally repose much trust |
| in that boon companion of yours who contributes the humorous element, Dr |
| Mulligan, as a guide, philosopher and friend if I were in your shoes. He |
| knows which side his bread is buttered on though in all probability he |
| never realised what it is to be without regular meals. Of course you |
| didn't notice as much as I did. But it wouldn't occasion me the least |
| surprise to learn that a pinch of tobacco or some narcotic was put in |
| your drink for some ulterior object. |
| |
| He understood however from all he heard that Dr Mulligan was a versatile |
| allround man, by no means confined to medicine only, who was rapidly |
| coming to the fore in his line and, if the report was verified, bade |
| fair to enjoy a flourishing practice in the not too distant future as |
| a tony medical practitioner drawing a handsome fee for his services |
| in addition to which professional status his rescue of that man from |
| certain drowning by artificial respiration and what they call first |
| aid at Skerries, or Malahide was it?, was, he was bound to admit, an |
| exceedingly plucky deed which he could not too highly praise, so that |
| frankly he was utterly at a loss to fathom what earthly reason could be |
| at the back of it except he put it down to sheer cussedness or jealousy, |
| pure and simple. |
| |
| --Except it simply amounts to one thing and he is what they call picking |
| your brains, he ventured to throw out. |
| |
| The guarded glance of half solicitude half curiosity augmented by |
| friendliness which he gave at Stephen's at present morose expression |
| of features did not throw a flood of light, none at all in fact on the |
| problem as to whether he had let himself be badly bamboozled to judge by |
| two or three lowspirited remarks he let drop or the other way about saw |
| through the affair and for some reason or other best known to himself |
| allowed matters to more or less. Grinding poverty did have that effect |
| and he more than conjectured that, high educational abilities though he |
| possessed, he experienced no little difficulty in making both ends meet. |
| |
| Adjacent to the men's public urinal they perceived an icecream car round |
| which a group of presumably Italians in heated altercation were getting |
| rid of voluble expressions in their vivacious language in a particularly |
| animated way, there being some little differences between the parties. |
| |
| --_Puttana madonna, che ci dia i quattrini! Ho ragione? Culo rotto!_ |
| |
| _--Intendiamoci. Mezzo sovrano piu..._ |
| |
| _--Dice lui, pero!_ |
| |
| _--Mezzo._ |
| |
| _--Farabutto! Mortacci sui!_ |
| |
| _--Ma ascolta! Cinque la testa piu..._ |
| |
| Mr Bloom and Stephen entered the cabman's shelter, an unpretentious |
| wooden structure, where, prior to then, he had rarely if ever been |
| before, the former having previously whispered to the latter a few |
| hints anent the keeper of it said to be the once famous Skin-the-Goat |
| Fitzharris, the invincible, though he could not vouch for the actual |
| facts which quite possibly there was not one vestige of truth in. A few |
| moments later saw our two noctambules safely seated in a discreet corner |
| only to be greeted by stares from the decidedly miscellaneous collection |
| of waifs and strays and other nondescript specimens of the genus _homo_ |
| already there engaged in eating and drinking diversified by conversation |
| for whom they seemingly formed an object of marked curiosity. |
| |
| --Now touching a cup of coffee, Mr Bloom ventured to plausibly suggest |
| to break the ice, it occurs to me you ought to sample something in the |
| shape of solid food, say, a roll of some description. |
| |
| Accordingly his first act was with characteristic _sangfroid_ to order |
| these commodities quietly. The _hoi polloi_ of jarvies or stevedores |
| or whatever they were after a cursory examination turned their eyes |
| apparently dissatisfied, away though one redbearded bibulous individual |
| portion of whose hair was greyish, a sailor probably, still stared for |
| some appreciable time before transferring his rapt attention to the |
| floor. Mr Bloom, availing himself of the right of free speech, he having |
| just a bowing acquaintance with the language in dispute, though, to be |
| sure, rather in a quandary over _voglio_, remarked to his _protégé_ in |
| an audible tone of voice _a propos_ of the battle royal in the street |
| which was still raging fast and furious: |
| |
| --A beautiful language. I mean for singing purposes. Why do you not |
| write your poetry in that language? _Bella Poetria_! It is so melodious |
| and full. _Belladonna. Voglio._ |
| |
| Stephen, who was trying his dead best to yawn if he could, suffering |
| from lassitude generally, replied: |
| |
| --To fill the ear of a cow elephant. They were haggling over money. |
| |
| --Is that so? Mr Bloom asked. Of course, he subjoined pensively, at the |
| inward reflection of there being more languages to start with than were |
| absolutely necessary, it may be only the southern glamour that surrounds |
| it. |
| |
| The keeper of the shelter in the middle of this _tête-â-tête_ put a |
| boiling swimming cup of a choice concoction labelled coffee on the table |
| and a rather antediluvian specimen of a bun, or so it seemed. After |
| which he beat a retreat to his counter, Mr Bloom determining to have |
| a good square look at him later on so as not to appear to. For which |
| reason he encouraged Stephen to proceed with his eyes while he did |
| the honours by surreptitiously pushing the cup of what was temporarily |
| supposed to be called coffee gradually nearer him. |
| |
| --Sounds are impostures, Stephen said after a pause of some little time, |
| like names. Cicero, Podmore. Napoleon, Mr Goodbody. Jesus, Mr Doyle. |
| Shakespeares were as common as Murphies. What's in a name? |
| |
| --Yes, to be sure, Mr Bloom unaffectedly concurred. Of course. Our name |
| was changed too, he added, pushing the socalled roll across. |
| |
| The redbearded sailor who had his weather eye on the newcomers boarded |
| Stephen, whom he had singled out for attention in particular, squarely |
| by asking: |
| |
| --And what might your name be? |
| |
| Just in the nick of time Mr Bloom touched his companion's boot but |
| Stephen, apparently disregarding the warm pressure from an unexpected |
| quarter, answered: |
| |
| --Dedalus. |
| |
| The sailor stared at him heavily from a pair of drowsy baggy eyes, |
| rather bunged up from excessive use of boose, preferably good old |
| Hollands and water. |
| |
| --You know Simon Dedalus? he asked at length. |
| |
| --I've heard of him, Stephen said. |
| |
| Mr Bloom was all at sea for a moment, seeing the others evidently |
| eavesdropping too. |
| |
| --He's Irish, the seaman bold affirmed, staring still in much the same |
| way and nodding. All Irish. |
| |
| --All too Irish, Stephen rejoined. |
| |
| As for Mr Bloom he could neither make head or tail of the whole business |
| and he was just asking himself what possible connection when the sailor |
| of his own accord turned to the other occupants of the shelter with the |
| remark: |
| |
| --I seen him shoot two eggs off two bottles at fifty yards over his |
| shoulder. The lefthand dead shot. |
| |
| Though he was slightly hampered by an occasional stammer and his |
| gestures being also clumsy as it was still he did his best to explain. |
| |
| --Bottles out there, say. Fifty yards measured. Eggs on the bottles. |
| Cocks his gun over his shoulder. Aims. |
| |
| He turned his body half round, shut up his right eye completely. Then he |
| screwed his features up someway sideways and glared out into the night |
| with an unprepossessing cast of countenance. |
| |
| --Pom! he then shouted once. |
| |
| The entire audience waited, anticipating an additional detonation, there |
| being still a further egg. |
| |
| --Pom! he shouted twice. |
| |
| Egg two evidently demolished, he nodded and winked, adding |
| bloodthirstily: |
| |
| _--Buffalo Bill shoots to kill, Never missed nor he never will._ |
| |
| A silence ensued till Mr Bloom for agreeableness' sake just felt like |
| asking him whether it was for a marksmanship competition like the |
| Bisley. |
| |
| --Beg pardon, the sailor said. |
| |
| --Long ago? Mr Bloom pursued without flinching a hairsbreadth. |
| |
| --Why, the sailor replied, relaxing to a certain extent under the magic |
| influence of diamond cut diamond, it might be a matter of ten years. He |
| toured the wide world with Hengler's Royal Circus. I seen him do that in |
| Stockholm. |
| |
| --Curious coincidence, Mr Bloom confided to Stephen unobtrusively. |
| |
| --Murphy's my name, the sailor continued. D. B. Murphy of Carrigaloe. |
| Know where that is? |
| |
| --Queenstown harbour, Stephen replied. |
| |
| --That's right, the sailor said. Fort Camden and Fort Carlisle. That's |
| where I hails from. I belongs there. That's where I hails from. My |
| little woman's down there. She's waiting for me, I know. _For England, |
| home and beauty_. She's my own true wife I haven't seen for seven years |
| now, sailing about. |
| |
| Mr Bloom could easily picture his advent on this scene, the homecoming |
| to the mariner's roadside shieling after having diddled Davy Jones, |
| a rainy night with a blind moon. Across the world for a wife. Quite a |
| number of stories there were on that particular Alice Ben Bolt topic, |
| Enoch Arden and Rip van Winkle and does anybody hereabouts remember Caoc |
| O'Leary, a favourite and most trying declamation piece by the way of |
| poor John Casey and a bit of perfect poetry in its own small way. |
| Never about the runaway wife coming back, however much devoted to the |
| absentee. The face at the window! Judge of his astonishment when he |
| finally did breast the tape and the awful truth dawned upon him anent |
| his better half, wrecked in his affections. You little expected me but |
| I've come to stay and make a fresh start. There she sits, a grasswidow, |
| at the selfsame fireside. Believes me dead, rocked in the cradle of the |
| deep. And there sits uncle Chubb or Tomkin, as the case might be, the |
| publican of the Crown and Anchor, in shirtsleeves, eating rumpsteak and |
| onions. No chair for father. Broo! The wind! Her brandnew arrival is on |
| her knee, _post mortem_ child. With a high ro! and a randy ro! and my |
| galloping tearing tandy, O! Bow to the inevitable. Grin and bear it. I |
| remain with much love your brokenhearted husband D B Murphy. |
| |
| The sailor, who scarcely seemed to be a Dublin resident, turned to one |
| of the jarvies with the request: |
| |
| --You don't happen to have such a thing as a spare chaw about you? |
| |
| The jarvey addressed as it happened had not but the keeper took a die of |
| plug from his good jacket hanging on a nail and the desired object was |
| passed from hand to hand. |
| |
| --Thank you, the sailor said. |
| |
| He deposited the quid in his gob and, chewing and with some slow |
| stammers, proceeded: |
| |
| --We come up this morning eleven o'clock. The threemaster _Rosevean_ |
| from Bridgwater with bricks. I shipped to get over. Paid off this |
| afternoon. There's my discharge. See? D. B. Murphy. A. B. S. |
| |
| In confirmation of which statement he extricated from an inside pocket |
| and handed to his neighbour a not very cleanlooking folded document. |
| |
| --You must have seen a fair share of the world, the keeper remarked, |
| leaning on the counter. |
| |
| --Why, the sailor answered upon reflection upon it, I've circumnavigated |
| a bit since I first joined on. I was in the Red Sea. I was in China and |
| North America and South America. We was chased by pirates one voyage. |
| I seen icebergs plenty, growlers. I was in Stockholm and the Black Sea, |
| the Dardanelles under Captain Dalton, the best bloody man that ever |
| scuttled a ship. I seen Russia. _Gospodi pomilyou_. That's how the |
| Russians prays. |
| |
| --You seen queer sights, don't be talking, put in a jarvey. |
| |
| --Why, the sailor said, shifting his partially chewed plug. I seen |
| queer things too, ups and downs. I seen a crocodile bite the fluke of an |
| anchor same as I chew that quid. |
| |
| He took out of his mouth the pulpy quid and, lodging it between his |
| teeth, bit ferociously: |
| |
| --Khaan! Like that. And I seen maneaters in Peru that eats corpses and |
| the livers of horses. Look here. Here they are. A friend of mine sent |
| me. |
| |
| He fumbled out a picture postcard from his inside pocket which seemed to |
| be in its way a species of repository and pushed it along the table. The |
| printed matter on it stated: _Choza de Indios. Beni, Bolivia._ |
| |
| All focussed their attention at the scene exhibited, a group of savage |
| women in striped loincloths, squatted, blinking, suckling, frowning, |
| sleeping amid a swarm of infants (there must have been quite a score of |
| them) outside some primitive shanties of osier. |
| |
| --Chews coca all day, the communicative tarpaulin added. Stomachs |
| like breadgraters. Cuts off their diddies when they can't bear no more |
| children. |
| |
| See them sitting there stark ballocknaked eating a dead horse's liver |
| raw. |
| |
| His postcard proved a centre of attraction for Messrs the greenhorns for |
| several minutes if not more. |
| |
| --Know how to keep them off? he inquired generally. |
| |
| Nobody volunteering a statement he winked, saying: |
| |
| --Glass. That boggles 'em. Glass. |
| |
| Mr Bloom, without evincing surprise, unostentatiously turned over the |
| card to peruse the partially obliterated address and postmark. It ran |
| as follows: _Tarjeta Postal, Señor A Boudin, Galeria Becche, Santiago, |
| Chile._ There was no message evidently, as he took particular notice. |
| Though not an implicit believer in the lurid story narrated (or the |
| eggsniping transaction for that matter despite William Tell and the |
| Lazarillo-Don Cesar de Bazan incident depicted in _Maritana_ on which |
| occasion the former's ball passed through the latter's hat) having |
| detected a discrepancy between his name (assuming he was the person |
| he represented himself to be and not sailing under false colours |
| after having boxed the compass on the strict q.t. somewhere) and |
| the fictitious addressee of the missive which made him nourish some |
| suspicions of our friend's _bona fides_ nevertheless it reminded him in |
| a way of a longcherished plan he meant to one day realise some Wednesday |
| or Saturday of travelling to London via long sea not to say that he had |
| ever travelled extensively to any great extent but he was at heart a |
| born adventurer though by a trick of fate he had consistently remained |
| a landlubber except you call going to Holyhead which was his longest. |
| Martin Cunningham frequently said he would work a pass through Egan but |
| some deuced hitch or other eternally cropped up with the net result that |
| the scheme fell through. But even suppose it did come to planking |
| down the needful and breaking Boyd's heart it was not so dear, purse |
| permitting, a few guineas at the outside considering the fare to |
| Mullingar where he figured on going was five and six, there and back. |
| The trip would benefit health on account of the bracing ozone and be in |
| every way thoroughly pleasurable, especially for a chap whose liver was |
| out of order, seeing the different places along the route, Plymouth, |
| Falmouth, Southampton and so on culminating in an instructive tour of |
| the sights of the great metropolis, the spectacle of our modern Babylon |
| where doubtless he would see the greatest improvement, tower, abbey, |
| wealth of Park lane to renew acquaintance with. Another thing just |
| struck him as a by no means bad notion was he might have a gaze around |
| on the spot to see about trying to make arrangements about a concert |
| tour of summer music embracing the most prominent pleasure resorts, |
| Margate with mixed bathing and firstrate hydros and spas, Eastbourne, |
| Scarborough, Margate and so on, beautiful Bournemouth, the Channel |
| islands and similar bijou spots, which might prove highly remunerative. |
| Not, of course, with a hole and corner scratch company or local ladies |
| on the job, witness Mrs C P M'Coy type lend me your valise and I'll post |
| you the ticket. No, something top notch, an all star Irish caste, the |
| Tweedy-Flower grand opera company with his own legal consort as leading |
| lady as a sort of counterblast to the Elster Grimes and Moody-Manners, |
| perfectly simple matter and he was quite sanguine of success, providing |
| puffs in the local papers could be managed by some fellow with a bit of |
| bounce who could pull the indispensable wires and thus combine business |
| with pleasure. But who? That was the rub. Also, without being actually |
| positive, it struck him a great field was to be opened up in the line |
| of opening up new routes to keep pace with the times _apropos_ of the |
| Fishguard-Rosslare route which, it was mooted, was once more on the |
| _tapis_ in the circumlocution departments with the usual quantity of red |
| tape and dillydallying of effete fogeydom and dunderheads generally. A |
| great opportunity there certainly was for push and enterprise to meet |
| the travelling needs of the public at large, the average man, i.e. |
| Brown, Robinson and Co. |
| |
| It was a subject of regret and absurd as well on the face of it and no |
| small blame to our vaunted society that the man in the street, when the |
| system really needed toning up, for the matter of a couple of paltry |
| pounds was debarred from seeing more of the world they lived in instead |
| of being always and ever cooped up since my old stick-in-the-mud took me |
| for a wife. After all, hang it, they had their eleven and more humdrum |
| months of it and merited a radical change of _venue_ after the grind |
| of city life in the summertime for choice when dame Nature is at her |
| spectacular best constituting nothing short of a new lease of life. |
| There were equally excellent opportunities for vacationists in the home |
| island, delightful sylvan spots for rejuvenation, offering a plethora |
| of attractions as well as a bracing tonic for the system in and around |
| Dublin and its picturesque environs even, Poulaphouca to which there was |
| a steamtram, but also farther away from the madding crowd in Wicklow, |
| rightly termed the garden of Ireland, an ideal neighbourhood for elderly |
| wheelmen so long as it didn't come down, and in the wilds of Donegal |
| where if report spoke true the _coup d'oeil_ was exceedingly grand |
| though the lastnamed locality was not easily getatable so that the |
| influx of visitors was not as yet all that it might be considering the |
| signal benefits to be derived from it while Howth with its historic |
| associations and otherwise, Silken Thomas, Grace O'Malley, George IV, |
| rhododendrons several hundred feet above sealevel was a favourite haunt |
| with all sorts and conditions of men especially in the spring when young |
| men's fancy, though it had its own toll of deaths by falling off the |
| cliffs by design or accidentally, usually, by the way, on their left |
| leg, it being only about three quarters of an hour's run from the |
| pillar. Because of course uptodate tourist travelling was as yet merely |
| in its infancy, so to speak, and the accommodation left much to be |
| desired. Interesting to fathom it seemed to him from a motive of |
| curiosity, pure and simple, was whether it was the traffic that created |
| the route or viceversa or the two sides in fact. He turned back the |
| other side of the card, picture, and passed it along to Stephen. |
| |
| --I seen a Chinese one time, related the doughty narrator, that had |
| little pills like putty and he put them in the water and they opened and |
| every pill was something different. One was a ship, another was a house, |
| another was a flower. Cooks rats in your soup, he appetisingly added, |
| the chinks does. |
| |
| Possibly perceiving an expression of dubiosity on their faces the |
| globetrotter went on, adhering to his adventures. |
| |
| --And I seen a man killed in Trieste by an Italian chap. Knife in his |
| back. Knife like that. |
| |
| Whilst speaking he produced a dangerouslooking claspknife quite in |
| keeping with his character and held it in the striking position. |
| |
| --In a knockingshop it was count of a tryon between two smugglers. |
| Fellow hid behind a door, come up behind him. Like that. _Prepare to |
| meet your God_, says he. Chuk! It went into his back up to the butt. |
| |
| His heavy glance drowsily roaming about kind of defied their further |
| questions even should they by any chance want to. |
| |
| --That's a good bit of steel, repeated he, examining his formidable |
| _stiletto_. |
| |
| After which harrowing _denouement_ sufficient to appal the stoutest he |
| snapped the blade to and stowed the weapon in question away as before in |
| his chamber of horrors, otherwise pocket. |
| |
| --They're great for the cold steel, somebody who was evidently quite in |
| the dark said for the benefit of them all. That was why they thought |
| the park murders of the invincibles was done by foreigners on account of |
| them using knives. |
| |
| At this remark passed obviously in the spirit of _where ignorance |
| is bliss_ Mr B. and Stephen, each in his own particular way, both |
| instinctively exchanged meaning glances, in a religious silence of the |
| strictly _entre nous_ variety however, towards where Skin-the-Goat, |
| _alias_ the keeper, not turning a hair, was drawing spurts of liquid |
| from his boiler affair. His inscrutable face which was really a work |
| of art, a perfect study in itself, beggaring description, conveyed |
| the impression that he didn't understand one jot of what was going on. |
| Funny, very! |
| |
| There ensued a somewhat lengthy pause. One man was reading in fits and |
| starts a stained by coffee evening journal, another the card with the |
| natives _choza de_, another the seaman's discharge. Mr Bloom, so far |
| as he was personally concerned, was just pondering in pensive mood. He |
| vividly recollected when the occurrence alluded to took place as well |
| as yesterday, roughly some score of years previously in the days of the |
| land troubles, when it took the civilised world by storm, figuratively |
| speaking, early in the eighties, eightyone to be correct, when he was |
| just turned fifteen. |
| |
| --Ay, boss, the sailor broke in. Give us back them papers. |
| |
| The request being complied with he clawed them up with a scrape. |
| |
| --Have you seen the rock of Gibraltar? Mr Bloom inquired. |
| |
| The sailor grimaced, chewing, in a way that might be read as yes, ay or |
| no. |
| |
| --Ah, you've touched there too, Mr Bloom said, Europa point, thinking he |
| had, in the hope that the rover might possibly by some reminiscences but |
| he failed to do so, simply letting spirt a jet of spew into the sawdust, |
| and shook his head with a sort of lazy scorn. |
| |
| --What year would that be about? Mr B interrogated. Can you recall the |
| boats? |
| |
| Our _soi-disant_ sailor munched heavily awhile hungrily before |
| answering: |
| |
| --I'm tired of all them rocks in the sea, he said, and boats and ships. |
| Salt junk all the time. |
| |
| Tired seemingly, he ceased. His questioner perceiving that he was not |
| likely to get a great deal of change out of such a wily old customer, |
| fell to woolgathering on the enormous dimensions of the water about the |
| globe, suffice it to say that, as a casual glance at the map revealed, |
| it covered fully three fourths of it and he fully realised accordingly |
| what it meant to rule the waves. On more than one occasion, a dozen |
| at the lowest, near the North Bull at Dollymount he had remarked a |
| superannuated old salt, evidently derelict, seated habitually near the |
| not particularly redolent sea on the wall, staring quite obliviously at |
| it and it at him, dreaming of fresh woods and pastures new as someone |
| somewhere sings. And it left him wondering why. Possibly he had tried to |
| find out the secret for himself, floundering up and down the antipodes |
| and all that sort of thing and over and under, well, not exactly under, |
| tempting the fates. And the odds were twenty to nil there was really no |
| secret about it at all. Nevertheless, without going into the _minutiae_ |
| of the business, the eloquent fact remained that the sea was there in |
| all its glory and in the natural course of things somebody or other had |
| to sail on it and fly in the face of providence though it merely went |
| to show how people usually contrived to load that sort of onus on to the |
| other fellow like the hell idea and the lottery and insurance which were |
| run on identically the same lines so that for that very reason if no |
| other lifeboat Sunday was a highly laudable institution to which the |
| public at large, no matter where living inland or seaside, as the case |
| might be, having it brought home to them like that should extend its |
| gratitude also to the harbourmasters and coastguard service who had |
| to man the rigging and push off and out amid the elements whatever the |
| season when duty called _Ireland expects that every man_ and so on and |
| sometimes had a terrible time of it in the wintertime not forgetting the |
| Irish lights, Kish and others, liable to capsize at any moment, rounding |
| which he once with his daughter had experienced some remarkably choppy, |
| not to say stormy, weather. |
| |
| --There was a fellow sailed with me in the Rover, the old seadog, |
| himself a rover, proceeded, went ashore and took up a soft job as |
| gentleman's valet at six quid a month. Them are his trousers I've on |
| me and he gave me an oilskin and that jackknife. I'm game for that job, |
| shaving and brushup. I hate roaming about. There's my son now, Danny, |
| run off to sea and his mother got him took in a draper's in Cork where |
| he could be drawing easy money. |
| |
| --What age is he? queried one hearer who, by the way, seen from the |
| side, bore a distant resemblance to Henry Campbell, the townclerk, away |
| from the carking cares of office, unwashed of course and in a seedy |
| getup and a strong suspicion of nosepaint about the nasal appendage. |
| |
| --Why, the sailor answered with a slow puzzled utterance, my son, Danny? |
| He'd be about eighteen now, way I figure it. |
| |
| The Skibbereen father hereupon tore open his grey or unclean anyhow |
| shirt with his two hands and scratched away at his chest on which was to |
| be seen an image tattooed in blue Chinese ink intended to represent an |
| anchor. |
| |
| --There was lice in that bunk in Bridgwater, he remarked, sure as nuts. |
| I must get a wash tomorrow or next day. It's them black lads I objects |
| to. I hate those buggers. Suck your blood dry, they does. |
| |
| Seeing they were all looking at his chest he accommodatingly dragged |
| his shirt more open so that on top of the timehonoured symbol of the |
| mariner's hope and rest they had a full view of the figure 16 and a |
| young man's sideface looking frowningly rather. |
| |
| --Tattoo, the exhibitor explained. That was done when we were Iying |
| becalmed off Odessa in the Black Sea under Captain Dalton. Fellow, the |
| name of Antonio, done that. There he is himself, a Greek. |
| |
| --Did it hurt much doing it? one asked the sailor. |
| |
| That worthy, however, was busily engaged in collecting round the. |
| Someway in his. Squeezing or. |
| |
| --See here, he said, showing Antonio. There he is cursing the mate. And |
| there he is now, he added, the same fellow, pulling the skin with his |
| fingers, some special knack evidently, and he laughing at a yarn. |
| |
| And in point of fact the young man named Antonio's livid face did |
| actually look like forced smiling and the curious effect excited the |
| unreserved admiration of everybody including Skin-the-Goat, who this |
| time stretched over. |
| |
| --Ay, ay, sighed the sailor, looking down on his manly chest. He's gone |
| too. Ate by sharks after. Ay, ay. |
| |
| He let go of the skin so that the profile resumed the normal expression |
| of before. |
| |
| --Neat bit of work, one longshoreman said. |
| |
| --And what's the number for? loafer number two queried. |
| |
| --Eaten alive? a third asked the sailor. |
| |
| --Ay, ay, sighed again the latter personage, more cheerily this |
| time with some sort of a half smile for a brief duration only in the |
| direction of the questioner about the number. Ate. A Greek he was. |
| |
| And then he added with rather gallowsbird humour considering his alleged |
| end: |
| |
| _--As bad as old Antonio, For he left me on my ownio._ |
| |
| The face of a streetwalker glazed and haggard under a black straw hat |
| peered askew round the door of the shelter palpably reconnoitring on |
| her own with the object of bringing more grist to her mill. Mr |
| Bloom, scarcely knowing which way to look, turned away on the moment |
| flusterfied but outwardly calm, and, picking up from the table the pink |
| sheet of the Abbey street organ which the jarvey, if such he was, had |
| laid aside, he picked it up and looked at the pink of the paper though |
| why pink. His reason for so doing was he recognised on the moment |
| round the door the same face he had caught a fleeting glimpse of that |
| afternoon on Ormond quay, the partially idiotic female, namely, of the |
| lane who knew the lady in the brown costume does be with you (Mrs B.) |
| and begged the chance of his washing. Also why washing which seemed |
| rather vague than not, your washing. Still candour compelled him to |
| admit he had washed his wife's undergarments when soiled in Holles |
| street and women would and did too a man's similar garments initialled |
| with Bewley and Draper's marking ink (hers were, that is) if they really |
| loved him, that is to say, love me, love my dirty shirt. Still just |
| then, being on tenterhooks, he desired the female's room more than her |
| company so it came as a genuine relief when the keeper made her a rude |
| sign to take herself off. Round the side of the Evening Telegraph he |
| just caught a fleeting glimpse of her face round the side of the door |
| with a kind of demented glassy grin showing that she was not exactly all |
| there, viewing with evident amusement the group of gazers round skipper |
| Murphy's nautical chest and then there was no more of her. |
| |
| --The gunboat, the keeper said. |
| |
| --It beats me, Mr Bloom confided to Stephen, medically I am speaking, |
| how a wretched creature like that from the Lock hospital reeking with |
| disease can be barefaced enough to solicit or how any man in his sober |
| senses, if he values his health in the least. Unfortunate creature! Of |
| course I suppose some man is ultimately responsible for her condition. |
| Still no matter what the cause is from... |
| |
| Stephen had not noticed her and shrugged his shoulders, merely |
| remarking: |
| |
| --In this country people sell much more than she ever had and do a |
| roaring trade. Fear not them that sell the body but have not power to |
| buy the soul. She is a bad merchant. She buys dear and sells cheap. |
| |
| The elder man, though not by any manner of means an old maid or a prude, |
| said it was nothing short of a crying scandal that ought to be put a |
| stop to _instanter_ to say that women of that stamp (quite apart from |
| any oldmaidish squeamishness on the subject), a necessary evil, w ere |
| not licensed and medically inspected by the proper authorities, a thing, |
| he could truthfully state, he, as a _paterfamilias_, was a stalwart |
| advocate of from the very first start. Whoever embarked on a policy of |
| the sort, he said, and ventilated the matter thoroughly would confer a |
| lasting boon on everybody concerned. |
| |
| --You as a good catholic, he observed, talking of body and soul, believe |
| in the soul. Or do you mean the intelligence, the brainpower as such, |
| as distinct from any outside object, the table, let us say, that cup. I |
| believe in that myself because it has been explained by competent men as |
| the convolutions of the grey matter. Otherwise we would never have such |
| inventions as X rays, for instance. Do you? |
| |
| Thus cornered, Stephen had to make a superhuman effort of memory to try |
| and concentrate and remember before he could say: |
| |
| --They tell me on the best authority it is a simple substance and |
| therefore incorruptible. It would be immortal, I understand, but for the |
| possibility of its annihilation by its First Cause Who, from all I |
| can hear, is quite capable of adding that to the number of His other |
| practical jokes, _corruptio per se_ and _corruptio per accidens_ both |
| being excluded by court etiquette. |
| |
| Mr Bloom thoroughly acquiesced in the general gist of this though the |
| mystical finesse involved was a bit out of his sublunary depth still |
| he felt bound to enter a demurrer on the head of simple, promptly |
| rejoining: |
| |
| --Simple? I shouldn't think that is the proper word. Of course, I grant |
| you, to concede a point, you do knock across a simple soul once in a |
| blue moon. But what I am anxious to arrive at is it is one thing for |
| instance to invent those rays Rontgen did or the telescope like Edison, |
| though I believe it was before his time Galileo was the man, I mean, |
| and the same applies to the laws, for example, of a farreaching natural |
| phenomenon such as electricity but it's a horse of quite another colour |
| to say you believe in the existence of a supernatural God. |
| |
| --O that, Stephen expostulated, has been proved conclusively by several |
| of the bestknown passages in Holy Writ, apart from circumstantial |
| evidence. |
| |
| On this knotty point however the views of the pair, poles apart as they |
| were both in schooling and everything else with the marked difference in |
| their respective ages, clashed. |
| |
| --Has been? the more experienced of the two objected, sticking to his |
| original point with a smile of unbelief. I'm not so sure about that. |
| That's a matter for everyman's opinion and, without dragging in the |
| sectarian side of the business, I beg to differ with you _in toto_ |
| there. My belief is, to tell you the candid truth, that those bits were |
| genuine forgeries all of them put in by monks most probably or it's the |
| big question of our national poet over again, who precisely wrote them |
| like _Hamlet_ and Bacon, as, you who know your Shakespeare infinitely |
| better than I, of course I needn't tell you. Can't you drink that |
| coffee, by the way? Let me stir it. And take a piece of that bun. It's |
| like one of our skipper's bricks disguised. Still no-one can give what |
| he hasn't got. Try a bit. |
| |
| --Couldn't, Stephen contrived to get out, his mental organs for the |
| moment refusing to dictate further. |
| |
| Faultfinding being a proverbially bad hat Mr Bloom thought well to stir |
| or try to the clotted sugar from the bottom and reflected with something |
| approaching acrimony on the Coffee Palace and its temperance (and |
| lucrative) work. To be sure it was a legitimate object and beyond yea or |
| nay did a world of good, shelters such as the present one they were in |
| run on teetotal lines for vagrants at night, concerts, dramatic evenings |
| and useful lectures (admittance free) by qualified men for the lower |
| orders. On the other hand he had a distinct and painful recollection |
| they paid his wife, Madam Marion Tweedy who had been prominently |
| associated with it at one time, a very modest remuneration indeed for |
| her pianoplaying. The idea, he was strongly inclined to believe, was |
| to do good and net a profit, there being no competition to speak |
| of. Sulphate of copper poison SO4 or something in some dried peas he |
| remembered reading of in a cheap eatinghouse somewhere but he couldn't |
| remember when it was or where. Anyhow inspection, medical inspection, |
| of all eatables seemed to him more than ever necessary which possibly |
| accounted for the vogue of Dr Tibble's Vi-Cocoa on account of the |
| medical analysis involved. |
| |
| --Have a shot at it now, he ventured to say of the coffee after being |
| stirred. |
| |
| Thus prevailed on to at any rate taste it Stephen lifted the heavy mug |
| from the brown puddle it clopped out of when taken up by the handle and |
| took a sip of the offending beverage. |
| |
| --Still it's solid food, his good genius urged, I'm a stickler for solid |
| food, his one and only reason being not gormandising in the least but |
| regular meals as the _sine qua non_ for any kind of proper work, mental |
| or manual. You ought to eat more solid food. You would feel a different |
| man. |
| |
| --Liquids I can eat, Stephen said. But O, oblige me by taking away that |
| knife. I can't look at the point of it. It reminds me of Roman history. |
| |
| Mr Bloom promptly did as suggested and removed the incriminated article, |
| a blunt hornhandled ordinary knife with nothing particularly Roman or |
| antique about it to the lay eye, observing that the point was the least |
| conspicuous point about it. |
| |
| --Our mutual friend's stories are like himself, Mr Bloom _apropos_ of |
| knives remarked to his _confidante sotto voce_. Do you think they are |
| genuine? He could spin those yarns for hours on end all night long and |
| lie like old boots. Look at him. |
| |
| Yet still though his eyes were thick with sleep and sea air life was |
| full of a host of things and coincidences of a terrible nature and it |
| was quite within the bounds of possibility that it was not an |
| entire fabrication though at first blush there was not much inherent |
| probability in all the spoof he got off his chest being strictly |
| accurate gospel. |
| |
| He had been meantime taking stock of the individual in front of him and |
| Sherlockholmesing him up ever since he clapped eyes on him. Though a |
| wellpreserved man of no little stamina, if a trifle prone to baldness, |
| there was something spurious in the cut of his jib that suggested a jail |
| delivery and it required no violent stretch of imagination to associate |
| such a weirdlooking specimen with the oakum and treadmill fraternity. He |
| might even have done for his man supposing it was his own case he told, |
| as people often did about others, namely, that he killed him himself |
| and had served his four or five goodlooking years in durance vile to say |
| nothing of the Antonio personage (no relation to the dramatic personage |
| of identical name who sprang from the pen of our national poet) who |
| expiated his crimes in the melodramatic manner above described. On the |
| other hand he might be only bluffing, a pardonable weakness because |
| meeting unmistakable mugs, Dublin residents, like those jarvies waiting |
| news from abroad would tempt any ancient mariner who sailed the ocean |
| seas to draw the long bow about the schooner _Hesperus_ and etcetera. |
| And when all was said and done the lies a fellow told about himself |
| couldn't probably hold a proverbial candle to the wholesale whoppers |
| other fellows coined about him. |
| |
| --Mind you, I'm not saying that it's all a pure invention, he resumed. |
| Analogous scenes are occasionally, if not often, met with. Giants, |
| though that is rather a far cry, you see once in a way, Marcella the |
| midget queen. In those waxworks in Henry street I myself saw some |
| Aztecs, as they are called, sitting bowlegged, they couldn't straighten |
| their legs if you paid them because the muscles here, you see, he |
| proceeded, indicating on his companion the brief outline of the sinews |
| or whatever you like to call them behind the right knee, were utterly |
| powerless from sitting that way so long cramped up, being adored as |
| gods. There's an example again of simple souls. |
| |
| However reverting to friend Sinbad and his horrifying adventures (who |
| reminded him a bit of Ludwig, _alias_ Ledwidge, when he occupied |
| the boards of the Gaiety when Michael Gunn was identified with the |
| management in the _Flying Dutchman_, a stupendous success, and his host |
| of admirers came in large numbers, everyone simply flocking to hear him |
| though ships of any sort, phantom or the reverse, on the stage usually |
| fell a bit flat as also did trains) there was nothing intrinsically |
| incompatible about it, he conceded. On the contrary that stab in the |
| back touch was quite in keeping with those italianos though candidly he |
| was none the less free to admit those icecreamers and friers in the fish |
| way not to mention the chip potato variety and so forth over in little |
| Italy there near the Coombe were sober thrifty hardworking fellows |
| except perhaps a bit too given to pothunting the harmless necessary |
| animal of the feline persuasion of others at night so as to have a good |
| old succulent tuckin with garlic _de rigueur_ off him or her next day on |
| the quiet and, he added, on the cheap. |
| |
| --Spaniards, for instance, he continued, passionate temperaments like |
| that, impetuous as Old Nick, are given to taking the law into their own |
| hands and give you your quietus doublequick with those poignards they |
| carry in the abdomen. It comes from the great heat, climate generally. |
| My wife is, so to speak, Spanish, half that is. Point of fact she could |
| actually claim Spanish nationality if she wanted, having been born in |
| (technically) Spain, i.e. Gibraltar. She has the Spanish type. Quite |
| dark, regular brunette, black. I for one certainly believe climate |
| accounts for character. That's why I asked you if you wrote your poetry |
| in Italian. |
| |
| --The temperaments at the door, Stephen interposed with, were very |
| passionate about ten shillings. _Roberto ruba roba sua_. |
| |
| --Quite so, Mr Bloom dittoed. |
| |
| --Then, Stephen said staring and rambling on to himself or some unknown |
| listener somewhere, we have the impetuosity of Dante and the isosceles |
| triangle miss Portinari he fell in love with and Leonardo and san |
| Tommaso Mastino. |
| |
| --It's in the blood, Mr Bloom acceded at once. All are washed in the |
| blood of the sun. Coincidence I just happened to be in the Kildare |
| street museum 890 today, shortly prior to our meeting if I can so call |
| it, and I was just looking at those antique statues there. The splendid |
| proportions of hips, bosom. You simply don't knock against those kind of |
| women here. An exception here and there. Handsome yes, pretty in a way |
| you find but what I'm talking about is the female form. Besides they |
| have so little taste in dress, most of them, which greatly enhances a |
| woman's natural beauty, no matter what you say. Rumpled stockings, it |
| may be, possibly is, a foible of mine but still it's a thing I simply |
| hate to see. |
| |
| Interest, however, was starting to flag somewhat all round and then the |
| others got on to talking about accidents at sea, ships lost in a fog, |
| goo collisions with icebergs, all that sort of thing. Shipahoy of course |
| had his own say to say. He had doubled the cape a few odd times and |
| weathered a monsoon, a kind of wind, in the China seas and through all |
| those perils of the deep there was one thing, he declared, stood to him |
| or words to that effect, a pious medal he had that saved him. |
| |
| So then after that they drifted on to the wreck off Daunt's rock, wreck |
| of that illfated Norwegian barque nobody could think of her name for |
| the moment till the jarvey who had really quite a look of Henry Campbell |
| remembered it _Palme_ on Booterstown strand. That was the talk of the |
| town that year (Albert William Quill wrote a fine piece of original |
| verse of 910 distinctive merit on the topic for the Irish _Times_), |
| breakers running over her and crowds and crowds on the shore in |
| commotion petrified with horror. Then someone said something about the |
| case of the s. s. _Lady Cairns_ of Swansea run into by the _Mona_ which |
| was on an opposite tack in rather muggyish weather and lost with all |
| hands on deck. No aid was given. Her master, the _Mona's_, said he |
| was afraid his collision bulkhead would give way. She had no water, it |
| appears, in her hold. |
| |
| At this stage an incident happened. It having become necessary for him |
| to unfurl a reef the sailor vacated his seat. |
| |
| --Let me cross your bows mate, he said to his neighbour who was just |
| gently dropping off into a peaceful doze. |
| |
| He made tracks heavily, slowly with a dumpy sort of a gait to the door, |
| stepped heavily down the one step there was out of the shelter and bore |
| due left. While he was in the act of getting his bearings Mr Bloom who |
| noticed when he stood up that he had two flasks of presumably ship's |
| rum sticking one out of each pocket for the private consumption of his |
| burning interior, saw him produce a bottle and uncork it or unscrew and, |
| applying its nozz1e to his lips, take a good old delectable swig out of |
| it with a gurgling noise. The irrepressible Bloom, who also had a |
| shrewd suspicion that the old stager went out on a manoeuvre after the |
| counterattraction in the shape of a female who however had disappeared |
| to all intents and purposes, could by straining just perceive him, when |
| duly refreshed by his rum puncheon exploit, gaping up at the piers and |
| girders of the Loop line rather out of his depth as of course it was all |
| radically altered since his last visit and greatly improved. Some person |
| or persons invisible directed him to the male urinal erected by the |
| cleansing committee all over the place for the purpose but after a brief |
| space of time during which silence reigned supreme the sailor, evidently |
| giving it a wide berth, eased himself closer at hand, the noise of his |
| bilgewater some little time subsequently splashing on the ground where |
| it apparently awoke a horse of the cabrank. A hoof scooped anyway for |
| new foothold after sleep and harness jingled. Slightly disturbed in his |
| sentrybox by the brazier of live coke the watcher of the corporation |
| stones who, though now broken down and fast breaking up, was none other |
| in stern reality than the Gumley aforesaid, now practically on the |
| parish rates, given the temporary job by Pat Tobin in all human |
| probability from dictates of humanity knowing him before shifted about |
| and shuffled in his box before composing his limbs again in to the arms |
| of Morpheus, a truly amazing piece of hard lines in its most virulent |
| form on a fellow most respectably connected and familiarised with decent |
| home comforts all his life who came in for a cool 100 pounds a year |
| at one time which of course the doublebarrelled ass proceeded to make |
| general ducks and drakes of. And there he was at the end of his tether |
| after having often painted the town tolerably pink without a beggarly |
| stiver. He drank needless to be told and it pointed only once more a |
| moral when he might quite easily be in a large way of business if--a |
| big if, however--he had contrived to cure himself of his particular |
| partiality. |
| |
| All meantime were loudly lamenting the falling off in Irish shipping, |
| coastwise and foreign as well, which was all part and parcel of the same |
| thing. A Palgrave Murphy boat was put off the ways at Alexandra basin, |
| the only launch that year. Right enough the harbours were there only no |
| ships ever called. |
| |
| There were wrecks and wreckers, the keeper said, who was evidently _au |
| fait_. |
| |
| What he wanted to ascertain was why that ship ran bang against the only |
| rock in Galway bay when the Galway harbour scheme was mooted by a Mr |
| Worthington or some name like that, eh? Ask the then captain, he advised |
| them, how much palmoil the British government gave him for that day's |
| work, Captain John Lever of the Lever Line. |
| |
| --Am I right, skipper? he queried of the sailor, now returning after his |
| private potation and the rest of his exertions. |
| |
| That worthy picking up the scent of the fagend of the song or words |
| growled in wouldbe music but with great vim some kind of chanty or other |
| in seconds or thirds. Mr Bloom's sharp ears heard him then expectorate |
| the plug probably (which it was), so that he must have lodged it for the |
| time being in his fist while he did the drinking and making water jobs |
| and found it a bit sour after the liquid fire in question. Anyhow in |
| he rolled after his successful libation-_cum_-potation, introducing an |
| atmosphere of drink into the _soirée_, boisterously trolling, like a |
| veritable son of a seacook: |
| |
| _--The biscuits was as hard as brass |
| And the beef as salt as Lot's wife's arse. |
| O, Johnny Lever! |
| Johnny Lever, O!_ |
| |
| After which effusion the redoubtable specimen duly arrived on the scene |
| and regaining his seat he sank rather than sat heavily on the form |
| provided. Skin-the-Goat, assuming he was he, evidently with an axe to |
| grind, was airing his grievances in a forcible-feeble philippic anent |
| the natural resources of Ireland or something of that sort which he |
| described in his lengthy dissertation as the richest country bar none on |
| the face of God's earth, far and away superior to England, with coal in |
| large quantities, six million pounds worth of pork exported every year, |
| ten millions between butter and eggs and all the riches drained out of |
| it by England levying taxes on the poor people that paid through the |
| nose always and gobbling up the best meat in the market and a lot more |
| surplus steam in the same vein. Their conversation accordingly became |
| general and all agreed that that was a fact. You could grow any mortal |
| thing in Irish soil, he stated, and there was that colonel Everard down |
| there in Navan growing tobacco. Where would you find anywhere the like |
| of Irish bacon? But a day of reckoning, he stated _crescendo_ with no |
| uncertain voice, thoroughly monopolising all the conversation, was in |
| store for mighty England, despite her power of pelf on account of her |
| crimes. There would be a fall and the greatest fall in history. |
| The Germans and the Japs were going to have their little lookin, he |
| affirmed. The Boers were the beginning of the end. Brummagem England was |
| toppling already and her downfall would be Ireland, her Achilles heel, |
| which he explained to them about the vulnerable point of Achilles, the |
| Greek hero, a point his auditors at once seized as he completely gripped |
| their attention by showing the tendon referred to on his boot. His |
| advice to every Irishman was: stay in the land of your birth and work |
| for Ireland and live for Ireland. Ireland, Parnell said, could not spare |
| a single one of her sons. |
| |
| Silence all round marked the termination of his _finale_. The impervious |
| navigator heard these lurid tidings, undismayed. |
| |
| --Take a bit of doing, boss, retaliated that rough diamond palpably a |
| bit peeved in response to the foregoing truism. |
| |
| To which cold douche referring to downfall and so on the keeper |
| concurred but nevertheless held to his main view. |
| |
| --Who's the best troops in the army? the grizzled old veteran irately |
| interrogated. And the best jumpers and racers? And the best admirals and |
| generals we've got? Tell me that. |
| |
| --The Irish, for choice, retorted the cabby like Campbell, facial |
| blemishes apart. |
| |
| --That's right, the old tarpaulin corroborated. The Irish catholic |
| peasant. He's the backbone of our empire. You know Jem Mullins? |
| |
| While allowing him his individual opinions as everyman the keeper added |
| he cared nothing for any empire, ours or his, and considered no Irishman |
| worthy of his salt that served it. Then they began to have a few |
| irascible words when it waxed hotter, both, needless to say, appealing |
| to the listeners who followed the passage of arms with interest so long |
| as they didn't indulge in recriminations and come to blows. |
| |
| From inside information extending over a series of years Mr Bloom was |
| rather inclined to poohpooh the suggestion as egregious balderdash for, |
| pending that consummation devoutly to be or not to be wished for, he was |
| fully cognisant of the fact that their neighbours across the channel, |
| unless they were much bigger fools than he took them for, rather |
| concealed their strength than the opposite. It was quite on a par with |
| the quixotic idea in certain quarters that in a hundred million years |
| the coal seam of the sister island would be played out and if, as |
| time went on, that turned out to be how the cat jumped all he could |
| personally say on the matter was that as a host of contingencies, |
| equally relevant to the issue, might occur ere then it was highly |
| advisable in the interim to try to make the most of both countries even |
| though poles apart. Another little interesting point, the amours of |
| whores and chummies, to put it in common parlance, reminded him Irish |
| soldiers had as often fought for England as against her, more so, in |
| fact. And now, why? So the scene between the pair of them, the licensee |
| of the place rumoured to be or have been Fitzharris, the famous |
| invincible, and the other, obviously bogus, reminded him forcibly as |
| being on all fours with the confidence trick, supposing, that is, it was |
| prearranged as the lookeron, a student of the human soul if anything, |
| the others seeing least of the game. And as for the lessee or keeper, |
| who probably wasn't the other person at all, he (B.) couldn't help |
| feeling and most properly it was better to give people like that the |
| goby unless you were a blithering idiot altogether and refuse to have |
| anything to do with them as a golden rule in private life and their |
| felonsetting, there always being the offchance of a Dannyman coming |
| forward and turning queen's evidence or king's now like Denis or Peter |
| Carey, an idea he utterly repudiated. Quite apart from that he disliked |
| those careers of wrongdoing and crime on principle. Yet, though such |
| criminal propensities had never been an inmate of his bosom in any |
| shape or form, he certainly did feel and no denying it (while inwardly |
| remaining what he was) a certain kind of admiration for a man who |
| had actually brandished a knife, cold steel, with the courage of his |
| political convictions (though, personally, he would never be a party to |
| any such thing), off the same bat as those love vendettas of the south, |
| have her or swing for her, when the husband frequently, after some words |
| passed between the two concerning her relations with the other lucky |
| mortal (he having had the pair watched), inflicted fatal injuries on |
| his adored one as a result of an alternative postnuptial _liaison_ |
| by plunging his knife into her, until it just struck him that |
| Fitz, nicknamed Skin-the-Goat, merely drove the car for the actual |
| perpetrators of the outrage and so was not, if he was reliably informed, |
| actually party to the ambush which, in point of fact, was the plea some |
| legal luminary saved his skin on. In any case that was very ancient |
| history by now and as for our friend, the pseudo Skin-the-etcetera, he |
| had transparently outlived his welcome. He ought to have either died |
| naturally or on the scaffold high. Like actresses, always farewell |
| positively last performance then come up smiling again. Generous to a |
| fault of course, temperamental, no economising or any idea of the sort, |
| always snapping at the bone for the shadow. So similarly he had a very |
| shrewd suspicion that Mr Johnny Lever got rid of some l s d. in the |
| course of his perambulations round the docks in the congenial atmosphere |
| of the _Old Ireland_ tavern, come back to Erin and so on. Then as for |
| the other he had heard not so long before the same identical lingo as he |
| told Stephen how he simply but effectually silenced the offender. |
| |
| --He took umbrage at something or other, that muchinjured but on the |
| whole eventempered person declared, I let slip. He called me a jew and |
| in a heated fashion offensively. So I without deviating from plain facts |
| in the least told him his God, I mean Christ, was a jew too and all his |
| family like me though in reality I'm not. That was one for him. A soft |
| answer turns away wrath. He hadn't a word to say for himself as everyone |
| saw. Am I not right? |
| |
| He turned a long you are wrong gaze on Stephen of timorous dark pride |
| at the soft impeachment with a glance also of entreaty for he seemed to |
| glean in a kind of a way that it wasn't all exactly. |
| |
| --_Ex quibus_, Stephen mumbled in a noncommittal accent, their two or |
| four eyes conversing, _Christus_ or Bloom his name is or after all any |
| other, _secundum carnem_. |
| |
| --Of course, Mr B. proceeded to stipulate, you must look at both sides |
| of the question. It is hard to lay down any hard and fast rules as to |
| right and wrong but room for improvement all round there certainly is |
| though every country, they say, our own distressful included, has the |
| government it deserves. But with a little goodwill all round. It's all |
| very fine to boast of mutual superiority but what about mutual equality. |
| I resent violence and intolerance in any shape or form. It never |
| reaches anything or stops anything. A revolution must come on the due |
| instalments plan. It's a patent absurdity on the face of it to hate |
| people because they live round the corner and speak another vernacular, |
| in the next house so to speak. |
| |
| --Memorable bloody bridge battle and seven minutes' war, Stephen |
| assented, between Skinner's alley and Ormond market. |
| |
| Yes, Mr Bloom thoroughly agreed, entirely endorsing the remark, that |
| was overwhelmingly right. And the whole world was full of that sort of |
| thing. |
| |
| --You just took the words out of my mouth, he said. A hocuspocus of |
| conflicting evidence that candidly you couldn't remotely... |
| |
| All those wretched quarrels, in his humble opinion, stirring up |
| bad blood, from some bump of combativeness or gland of some kind, |
| erroneously supposed to be about a punctilio of honour and a flag, were |
| very largely a question of the money question which was at the back of |
| everything greed and jealousy, people never knowing when to stop. |
| |
| --They accuse, remarked he audibly. |
| |
| He turned away from the others who probably and spoke nearer to, so as |
| the others in case they. |
| |
| --Jews, he softly imparted in an aside in Stephen's ear, are accused of |
| ruining. Not a vestige of truth in it, I can safely say. History, would |
| you be surprised to learn, proves up to the hilt Spain decayed when the |
| inquisition hounded the jews out and England prospered when Cromwell, |
| an uncommonly able ruffian who in other respects has much to answer for, |
| imported them. Why? Because they are imbued with the proper spirit. They |
| are practical and are proved to be so. I don't want to indulge in any |
| because you know the standard works on the subject and then orthodox as |
| you are. But in the economic, not touching religion, domain the priest |
| spells poverty. Spain again, you saw in the war, compared with goahead |
| America. Turks. It's in the dogma. Because if they didn't believe they'd |
| go straight to heaven when they die they'd try to live better, at least |
| so I think. That's the juggle on which the p.p's raise the wind on false |
| pretences. I'm, he resumed with dramatic force, as good an Irishman |
| as that rude person I told you about at the outset and I want to see |
| everyone, concluded he, all creeds and classes _pro rata_ having a |
| comfortable tidysized income, in no niggard fashion either, something |
| in the neighbourhood of 300 pounds per annum. That's the vital issue |
| at stake and it's feasible and would be provocative of friendlier |
| intercourse between man and man. At least that's my idea for what it's |
| worth. I call that patriotism. _Ubi patria_, as we learned a smattering |
| of in our classical days in _Alma Mater, vita bene_. Where you can live |
| well, the sense is, if you work. |
| |
| Over his untastable apology for a cup of coffee, listening to this |
| synopsis of things in general, Stephen stared at nothing in particular. |
| He could hear, of course, all kinds of words changing colour like those |
| crabs about Ringsend in the morning burrowing quickly into all colours |
| of different sorts of the same sand where they had a home somewhere |
| beneath or seemed to. Then he looked up and saw the eyes that said or |
| didn't say the words the voice he heard said, if you work. |
| |
| --Count me out, he managed to remark, meaning work. |
| |
| The eyes were surprised at this observation because as he, the person |
| who owned them pro tem. observed or rather his voice speaking did, all |
| must work, have to, together. |
| |
| --I mean, of course, the other hastened to affirm, work in the widest |
| possible sense. Also literary labour not merely for the kudos of |
| the thing. Writing for the newspapers which is the readiest channel |
| nowadays. That's work too. Important work. After all, from the little |
| I know of you, after all the money expended on your education you are |
| entitled to recoup yourself and command your price. You have every bit |
| as much right to live by your pen in pursuit of your philosophy as the |
| peasant has. What? You both belong to Ireland, the brain and the brawn. |
| Each is equally important. |
| |
| --You suspect, Stephen retorted with a sort of a half laugh, that I may |
| be important because I belong to the _faubourg Saint Patrice_ called |
| Ireland for short. |
| |
| --I would go a step farther, Mr Bloom insinuated. |
| |
| --But I suspect, Stephen interrupted, that Ireland must be important |
| because it belongs to me. |
| |
| --What belongs, queried Mr Bloom bending, fancying he was perhaps under |
| some misapprehension. Excuse me. Unfortunately, I didn't catch the |
| latter portion. What was it you...? |
| |
| Stephen, patently crosstempered, repeated and shoved aside his mug of |
| coffee or whatever you like to call it none too politely, adding: 1170 |
| |
| --We can't change the country. Let us change the subject. |
| |
| At this pertinent suggestion Mr Bloom, to change the subject, looked |
| down but in a quandary, as he couldn't tell exactly what construction |
| to put on belongs to which sounded rather a far cry. The rebuke of some |
| kind was clearer than the other part. Needless to say the fumes of |
| his recent orgy spoke then with some asperity in a curious bitter way |
| foreign to his sober state. Probably the homelife to which Mr B attached |
| the utmost importance had not been all that was needful or he hadn't |
| been familiarised with the right sort of people. With a touch of fear |
| for the young man beside him whom he furtively scrutinised with an air |
| of some consternation remembering he had just come back from Paris, |
| the eyes more especially reminding him forcibly of father and sister, |
| failing to throw much light on the subject, however, he brought to mind |
| instances of cultured fellows that promised so brilliantly nipped in the |
| bud of premature decay and nobody to blame but themselves. For instance |
| there was the case of O'Callaghan, for one, the halfcrazy faddist, |
| respectably connected though of inadequate means, with his mad vagaries |
| among whose other gay doings when rotto and making himself a nuisance |
| to everybody all round he was in the habit of ostentatiously sporting in |
| public a suit of brown paper (a fact). And then the usual _denouement_ |
| after the fun had gone on fast and furious he got 1190 landed into hot |
| water and had to be spirited away by a few friends, after a strong hint |
| to a blind horse from John Mallon of Lower Castle Yard, so as not to |
| be made amenable under section two of the criminal law amendment act, |
| certain names of those subpoenaed being handed in but not divulged |
| for reasons which will occur to anyone with a pick of brains. Briefly, |
| putting two and two together, six sixteen which he pointedly turned a |
| deaf ear to, Antonio and so forth, jockeys and esthetes and the tattoo |
| which was all the go in the seventies or thereabouts even in the house |
| of lords because early in life the occupant of the throne, then heir |
| apparent, the other members of the upper ten and other high personages |
| simply following in the footsteps of the head of the state, he reflected |
| about the errors of notorieties and crowned heads running counter to |
| morality such as the Cornwall case a number of years before under their |
| veneer in a way scarcely intended by nature, a thing good Mrs Grundy, |
| as the law stands, was terribly down on though not for the reason they |
| thought they were probably whatever it was except women chiefly who were |
| always fiddling more or less at one another it being largely a matter of |
| dress and all the rest of it. Ladies who like distinctive underclothing |
| should, and every welltailored man must, trying to make the gap wider |
| between them by innuendo and give more of a genuine filip to acts of |
| impropriety between the two, she unbuttoned his and then he untied her, |
| mind the pin, whereas savages in the cannibal islands, say, at ninety |
| degrees in the shade not caring a continental. However, reverting to the |
| original, there were on the other hand others who had forced their way |
| to the top from the lowest rung by the aid of their bootstraps. Sheer |
| force of natural genius, that. With brains, sir. |
| |
| For which and further reasons he felt it was his interest and duty even |
| to wait on and profit by the unlookedfor occasion though why he could |
| not exactly tell being as it was already several shillings to the |
| bad having in fact let himself in for it. Still to cultivate the |
| acquaintance of someone of no uncommon calibre who could provide food |
| for reflection would amply repay any small. Intellectual stimulation, |
| as such, was, he felt, from time to time a firstrate tonic for the mind. |
| Added to which was the coincidence of meeting, discussion, dance, row, |
| old salt of the here today and gone tomorrow type, night loafers, the |
| whole galaxy of events, all went to make up a miniature cameo of the |
| world we live in especially as the lives of the submerged tenth, viz. |
| coalminers, divers, scavengers etc., were very much under the microscope |
| lately. To improve the shining hour he wondered whether he might meet |
| with anything approaching the same luck as Mr Philip Beaufoy if taken |
| down in writing suppose he were to pen something out of the common |
| groove (as he fully intended doing) at the rate of one guinea per |
| column. _My Experiences_, let us say, _in a Cabman's Shelter_. |
| |
| The pink edition extra sporting of the _Telegraph_ tell a graphic lie |
| lay, as luck would have it, beside his elbow and as he was just puzzling |
| again, far from satisfied, over a country belonging to him and the |
| preceding rebus the vessel came from Bridgwater and the postcard was |
| addressed A. Boudin find the captain's age, his eyes went aimlessly |
| over the respective captions which came under his special province the |
| allembracing give us this day our daily press. First he got a bit of a |
| start but it turned out to be only something about somebody named H. |
| du Boyes, agent for typewriters or something like that. Great battle, |
| Tokio. Lovemaking in Irish, 200 pounds damages. Gordon Bennett. |
| Emigration Swindle. Letter from His Grace. William. Ascot meeting, |
| the Gold Cup. Victory of outsider _Throwaway_ recalls Derby of '92 when |
| Capt. Marshall's dark horse _Sir Hugo_ captured the blue ribband at long |
| odds. New York disaster. Thousand lives lost. Foot and Mouth. Funeral of |
| the late Mr Patrick Dignam. |
| |
| So to change the subject he read about Dignam R. I. P. which, he |
| reflected, was anything but a gay sendoff. Or a change of address |
| anyway. |
| |
| --_This morning_ (Hynes put it in of course) _the remains of the late Mr |
| Patrick Dignam were removed from his residence, no 9 Newbridge Avenue, |
| Sandymount, for interment in Glasnevin. The deceased gentleman was a |
| most popular and genial personality in city life and his demise after a |
| brief illness came as a great shock to citizens of all classes by whom |
| he is deeply regretted. The obsequies, at which many friends of the |
| deceased were present, were carried out_ (certainly Hynes wrote it with |
| a nudge from Corny) _by Messrs H. J. O'Neill and Son, 164 North Strand |
| Road. The mourners included: Patk. Dignam (son), Bernard Corrigan |
| (brother-in-law), Jno. Henry Menton, solr, Martin Cunningham, John |
| Power, eatondph 1/8 ador dorador douradora_ (must be where he called |
| Monks the dayfather about Keyes's ad) _Thomas Kernan, Simon Dedalus, |
| Stephen Dedalus B.,4., Edw. J. Lambert, Cornelius T. Kelleher, Joseph |
| M'C Hynes, L. Boom, CP M'Coy,--M'lntosh and several others_. |
| |
| Nettled not a little by L. _Boom_ (as it incorrectly stated) and the |
| line of bitched type but tickled to death simultaneously by C. P. M'Coy |
| and Stephen Dedalus B. A. who were conspicuous, needless to say, by |
| their total absence (to say nothing of M'Intosh) L. Boom pointed it |
| out to his companion B. A. engaged in stifling another yawn, half |
| nervousness, not forgetting the usual crop of nonsensical howlers of |
| misprints. |
| |
| --Is that first epistle to the Hebrews, he asked as soon as his bottom |
| jaw would let him, in? Text: open thy mouth and put thy foot in it. |
| |
| --It is. Really, Mr Bloom said (though first he fancied he alluded to |
| the archbishop till he added about foot and mouth with which there could |
| be no possible connection) overjoyed to set his mind at rest and a bit |
| flabbergasted at Myles Crawford's after all managing to. There. |
| |
| While the other was reading it on page two Boom (to give him for the |
| nonce his new misnomer) whiled away a few odd leisure moments in fits |
| and starts with the account of the third event at Ascot on page three, |
| his side. Value 1000 sovs with 3000 sovs in specie added. For entire |
| colts and fillies. Mr F. Alexander's _Throwaway_, b. h. by _Rightaway_, |
| 5 yrs, 9 st 4 lbs (W. Lane) 1, lord Howard de Walden's _Zinfandel_ (M. |
| Cannon) z, Mr W. Bass's _Sceptre_ 3. Betting 5 to 4 on _Zinfandel_, |
| 20 to 1 _Throwaway_ (off). _Sceptre_ a shade heavier, 5 to 4 on |
| _Zinfandel_, 20 to 1 _Throwaway_ (off). _Throwaway_ and _Zinfandel_ |
| stood close order. It was anybody's race then the rank outsider drew to |
| the fore, got long lead, beating lord Howard de Walden's chestnut |
| colt and Mr W. Bass's bay filly Sceptre on a 2 1/2 mile course. Winner |
| trained by Braime so that Lenehan's version of the business was all pure |
| buncombe. Secured the verdict cleverly by a length. 1000 sovs with |
| 3000 in specie. Also ran: J de Bremond's (French horse Bantam Lyons was |
| anxiously inquiring after not in yet but expected any minute) _Maximum |
| II_. Different ways of bringing off a coup. Lovemaking damages. Though |
| that halfbaked Lyons ran off at a tangent in his impetuosity to get |
| left. Of course gambling eminently lent itself to that sort of thing |
| though as the event turned out the poor fool hadn't much reason to |
| congratulate himself on his pick, the forlorn hope. Guesswork it reduced |
| itself to eventually. |
| |
| --There was every indication they would arrive at that, he, Bloom, said. |
| |
| --Who? the other, whose hand by the way was hurt, said. |
| |
| One morning you would open the paper, the cabman affirmed, and read: |
| _Return of Parnell_. He bet them what they liked. A Dublin fusilier was |
| in that shelter one night and said he saw him in South Africa. Pride it |
| was killed him. He ought to have done away with himself or lain low for |
| a time after committee room no 15 until he was his old self again with |
| no-one to point a finger at him. Then they would all to a man have gone |
| down on their marrowbones to him to come back when he had recovered |
| his senses. Dead he wasn't. Simply absconded somewhere. The coffin they |
| brought over was full of stones. He changed his name to De Wet, the Boer |
| general. He made a mistake to fight the priests. And so forth and so on. |
| |
| All the same Bloom (properly so dubbed) was rather surprised at their |
| memories for in nine cases out of ten it was a case of tarbarrels and |
| not singly but in their thousands and then complete oblivion because it |
| was twenty odd years. Highly unlikely of course there was even a shadow |
| of truth in the stones and, even supposing, he thought a return highly |
| inadvisable, all things considered. Something evidently riled them in |
| his death. Either he petered out too tamely of acute pneumonia just when |
| his various different political arrangements were nearing completion |
| or whether it transpired he owed his death to his having neglected to |
| change his boots and clothes-after a wetting when a cold resulted and |
| failing to consult a specialist he being confined to his room till he |
| eventually died of it amid widespread regret before a fortnight was at |
| an end or quite possibly they were distressed to find the job was taken |
| out of their hands. Of course nobody being acquainted with his movements |
| even before there was absolutely no clue as to his whereabouts which |
| were decidedly of the _Alice, where art thou_ order even prior to his |
| starting to go under several aliases such as Fox and Stewart so the |
| remark which emanated from friend cabby might be within the bounds of |
| possibility. Naturally then it would prey on his mind as a born leader |
| of men which undoubtedly he was and a commanding figure, a sixfooter |
| or at any rate five feet ten or eleven in his stockinged feet, whereas |
| Messrs So and So who, though they weren't even a patch on the former |
| man, ruled the roost after their redeeming features were very few and |
| far between. It certainly pointed a moral, the idol with feet of clay, |
| and then seventytwo of his trusty henchmen rounding on him with mutual |
| mudslinging. And the identical same with murderers. You had to come |
| back. That haunting sense kind of drew you. To show the understudy in |
| the title _rôle_ how to. He saw him once on the auspicious occasion |
| when they broke up the type in the _Insuppressible_ or was it _United |
| Ireland_, a privilege he keenly appreciated, and, in point of fact, |
| handed him his silk hat when it was knocked off and he said _Thank you_, |
| excited as he undoubtedly was under his frigid exterior notwithstanding |
| the little misadventure mentioned between the cup and the lip: what's |
| bred in the bone. Still as regards return. You were a lucky dog if |
| they didn't set the terrier at you directly you got back. Then a lot of |
| shillyshally usually followed, Tom for and Dick and Harry against. And |
| then, number one, you came up against the man in possession and had to |
| produce your credentials like the claimant in the Tichborne case, |
| Roger Charles Tichborne, _Bella_ was the boat's name to the best of his |
| recollection he, the heir, went down in as the evidence went to show |
| and there was a tattoo mark too in Indian ink, lord Bellew was it, as he |
| might very easily have picked up the details from some pal on board ship |
| and then, when got up to tally with the description given, introduce |
| himself with: _Excuse me, my name is So and So_ or some such commonplace |
| remark. A more prudent course, as Bloom said to the not over effusive, |
| in fact like the distinguished personage under discussion beside him, |
| would have been to sound the lie of the land first. |
| |
| --That bitch, that English whore, did for him, the shebeen proprietor |
| commented. She put the first nail in his coffin. |
| |
| --Fine lump of a woman all the same, the _soi-disant_ townclerk Henry |
| Campbell remarked, and plenty of her. She loosened many a man's thighs. |
| I seen her picture in a barber's. The husband was a captain or an |
| officer. |
| |
| --Ay, Skin-the-Goat amusingly added, he was and a cottonball one. |
| |
| This gratuitous contribution of a humorous character occasioned a fair |
| amount of laughter among his _entourage_. As regards Bloom he, without |
| the faintest suspicion of a smile, merely gazed in the direction of |
| the door and reflected upon the historic story which had aroused |
| extraordinary interest at the time when the facts, to make matters |
| worse, were made public with the usual affectionate letters that passed |
| between them full of sweet nothings. First it was strictly Platonic till |
| nature intervened and an attachment sprang up between them till bit by |
| bit matters came to a climax and the matter became the talk of the town |
| till the staggering blow came as a welcome intelligence to not a few |
| evildisposed, however, who were resolved upon encompassing his downfall |
| though the thing was public property all along though not to anything |
| like the sensational extent that it subsequently blossomed into. Since |
| their names were coupled, though, since he was her declared favourite, |
| where was the particular necessity to proclaim it to the rank and file |
| from the housetops, the fact, namely, that he had shared her bedroom |
| which came out in the witnessbox on oath when a thrill went through the |
| packed court literally electrifying everybody in the shape of witnesses |
| swearing to having witnessed him on such and such a particular date in |
| the act of scrambling out of an upstairs apartment with the assistance |
| of a ladder in night apparel, having gained admittance in the same |
| fashion, a fact the weeklies, addicted to the lubric a little, simply |
| coined shoals of money out of. Whereas the simple fact of the case was |
| it was simply a case of the husband not being up to the scratch, with |
| nothing in common between them beyond the name, and then a real man |
| arriving on the scene, strong to the verge of weakness, falling a victim |
| to her siren charms and forgetting home ties, the usual sequel, to bask |
| in the loved one's smiles. The eternal question of the life connubial, |
| needless to say, cropped up. Can real love, supposing there happens to |
| be another chap in the case, exist between married folk? Poser. |
| Though it was no concern of theirs absolutely if he regarded her with |
| affection, carried away by a wave of folly. A magnificent specimen of |
| manhood he was truly augmented obviously by gifts of a high order, as |
| compared with the other military supernumerary that is (who was just the |
| usual everyday _farewell, my gallant captain_ kind of an individual in |
| the light dragoons, the 18th hussars to be accurate) and inflammable |
| doubtless (the fallen leader, that is, not the other) in his own |
| peculiar way which she of course, woman, quickly perceived as highly |
| likely to carve his way to fame which he almost bid fair to do till the |
| priests and ministers of the gospel as a whole, his erstwhile staunch |
| adherents, and his beloved evicted tenants for whom he had done yeoman |
| service in the rural parts of the country by taking up the cudgels on |
| their behalf in a way that exceeded their most sanguine expectations, |
| very effectually cooked his matrimonial goose, thereby heaping coals of |
| fire on his head much in the same way as the fabled ass's kick. Looking |
| back now in a retrospective kind of arrangement all seemed a kind of |
| dream. And then coming back was the worst thing you ever did because it |
| went without saying you would feel out of place as things always moved |
| with the times. Why, as he reflected, Irishtown strand, a locality he |
| had not been in for quite a number of years looked different somehow |
| since, as it happened, he went to reside on the north side. North or |
| south, however, it was just the wellknown case of hot passion, pure and |
| simple, upsetting the applecart with a vengeance and just bore out the |
| very thing he was saying as she also was Spanish or half so, types that |
| wouldn't do things by halves, passionate abandon of the south, casting |
| every shred of decency to the winds. |
| |
| --Just bears out what I was saying, he, with glowing bosom said to |
| Stephen, about blood and the sun. And, if I don't greatly mistake she |
| was Spanish too. |
| |
| --The king of Spain's daughter, Stephen answered, adding something or |
| other rather muddled about farewell and adieu to you Spanish onions and |
| the first land called the Deadman and from Ramhead to Scilly was so and |
| so many. |
| |
| --Was she? Bloom ejaculated, surprised though not astonished by any |
| means, I never heard that rumour before. Possible, especially there, it |
| was as she lived there. So, Spain. |
| |
| Carefully avoiding a book in his pocket _Sweets of_, which reminded him |
| by the by of that Cap l street library book out of date, he took out his |
| pocketbook and, turning over the various contents it contained rapidly |
| finally he. |
| |
| --Do you consider, by the by, he said, thoughtfully selecting a faded |
| photo which he laid on the table, that a Spanish type? |
| |
| Stephen, obviously addressed, looked down on the photo showing a large |
| sized lady with her fleshy charms on evidence in an open fashion as she |
| was in the full bloom of womanhood in evening dress cut ostentatiously |
| low for the occasion to give a liberal display of bosom, with more than |
| vision of breasts, her full lips parted and some perfect teeth, standing |
| near, ostensibly with gravity, a piano on the rest of which was _In Old |
| Madrid_, a ballad, pretty in its way, which was then all the vogue. Her |
| (the lady's) eyes, dark, large, looked at Stephen, about to smile about |
| something to be admired, Lafayette of Westmoreland street, Dublin's |
| premier photographic artist, being responsible for the esthetic |
| execution. |
| |
| --Mrs Bloom, my wife the _prima donna_ Madam Marion Tweedy, Bloom |
| indicated. Taken a few years since. In or about ninety six. Very like |
| her then. |
| |
| Beside the young man he looked also at the photo of the lady now his |
| 1440 legal wife who, he intimated, was the accomplished daughter of |
| Major Brian Tweedy and displayed at an early age remarkable proficiency |
| as a singer having even made her bow to the public when her years |
| numbered barely sweet sixteen. As for the face it was a speaking |
| likeness in expression but it did not do justice to her figure which |
| came in for a lot of notice usually and which did not come out to the |
| best advantage in that getup. She could without difficulty, he said, |
| have posed for the ensemble, not to dwell on certain opulent curves of |
| the. He dwelt, being a bit of an artist in his spare time, on the female |
| form in general developmentally because, as it so happened, no later |
| than that afternoon he had seen those Grecian statues, 1450 perfectly |
| developed as works of art, in the National Museum. Marble could give |
| the original, shoulders, back, all the symmetry, all the rest. Yes, |
| puritanisme, it does though Saint Joseph's sovereign thievery alors |
| (Bandez!) Figne toi trop. Whereas no photo could because it simply |
| wasn't art in a word. |
| |
| The spirit moving him he would much have liked to follow Jack Tar's good |
| example and leave the likeness there for a very few minutes to speak for |
| itself on the plea he so that the other could drink in the beauty for |
| himself, her stage presence being, frankly, a treat in itself which the |
| camera could not at all do justice to. But it was scarcely professional |
| etiquette so. Though it was a warm pleasant sort of a night now yet |
| wonderfully cool for the season considering, for sunshine after storm. |
| And he did feel a kind of need there and then to follow suit like a |
| kind of inward voice and satisfy a possible need by moving a motion. |
| Nevertheless he sat tight just viewing the slightly soiled photo creased |
| by opulent curves, none the worse for wear however, and looked away |
| thoughtfully with the intention of not further increasing the |
| other's possible embarrassment while gauging her symmetry of heaving |
| _embonpoint_. In fact the slight soiling was only an added charm like |
| the case of linen slightly soiled, good as new, much better in fact |
| with the starch out. Suppose she was gone when he? I looked for the lamp |
| which she told me came into his mind but merely as a passing fancy of |
| his because he then recollected the morning littered bed etcetera and |
| the book about Ruby with met him pike hoses (_sic_) in it which must |
| have fell down sufficiently appropriately beside the domestic chamberpot |
| with apologies to Lindley Murray. |
| |
| The vicinity of the young man he certainly relished, educated, |
| _distingué_ and impulsive into the bargain, far and away the pick of the |
| bunch though you wouldn't think he had it in him yet you would. Besides |
| he said the picture was handsome which, say what you like, it was though |
| at the moment she was distinctly stouter. And why not? An awful lot of |
| makebelieve went on about that sort of thing involving a lifelong slur |
| with the usual splash page of gutterpress about the same old matrimonial |
| tangle alleging misconduct with professional golfer or the newest |
| stage favourite instead of being honest and aboveboard about the whole |
| business. How they were fated to meet and an attachment sprang up |
| between the two so that their names were coupled in the public eye |
| was told in court with letters containing the habitual mushy and |
| compromising expressions leaving no loophole to show that they openly |
| cohabited two or three times a week at some wellknown seaside hotel and |
| relations, when the thing ran its normal course, became in due course |
| intimate. Then the decree _nisi_ and the King's proctor tries to show |
| cause why and, he failing to quash it, _nisi_ was made absolute. But as |
| for that the two misdemeanants, wrapped up as they largely were in one |
| another, could safely afford to ignore it as they very largely did till |
| the matter was put in the hands of a solicitor who filed a petition for |
| the party wronged in due course. He, B, enjoyed the distinction of being |
| close to Erin's uncrowned king in the flesh when the thing occurred on |
| the historic _fracas_ when the fallen leader's, who notoriously stuck to |
| his guns to the last drop even when clothed in the mantle of adultery, |
| (leader's) trusty henchmen to the number of ten or a dozen or |
| possibly even more than that penetrated into the printing works of the |
| _Insuppressible_ or no it was _United Ireland_ (a by no means by the |
| by appropriate appellative) and broke up the typecases with hammers or |
| something like that all on account of some scurrilous effusions from |
| the facile pens of the O'Brienite scribes at the usual mudslinging |
| occupation reflecting on the erstwhile tribune's private morals. Though |
| palpably a radically altered man he was still a commanding figure though |
| carelessly garbed as usual with that look of settled purpose which went |
| a long way with the shillyshallyers till they discovered to their vast |
| discomfiture that their idol had feet of clay after placing him upon a |
| pedestal which she, however, was the first to perceive. As those were |
| particularly hot times in the general hullaballoo Bloom sustained a |
| minor injury from a nasty prod of some chap's elbow in the crowd that |
| of course congregated lodging some place about the pit of the stomach, |
| fortunately not of a grave character. His hat (Parnell's) a silk one was |
| inadvertently knocked off and, as a matter of strict history, Bloom was |
| the man who picked it up in the crush after witnessing the occurrence |
| meaning to return it to him (and return it to him he did with the utmost |
| celerity) who panting and hatless and whose thoughts were miles away |
| from his hat at the time all the same being a gentleman born with a |
| stake in the country he, as a matter of fact, having gone into it more |
| for the kudos of the thing than anything else, what's bred in the bone |
| instilled into him in infancy at his mother's knee in the shape of |
| knowing what good form was came out at once because he turned round to |
| the donor and thanked him with perfect _aplomb_, saying: _Thank you, |
| sir_, though in a very different tone of voice from the ornament of the |
| legal profession whose headgear Bloom also set to rights earlier in the |
| course of the day, history repeating itself with a difference, after |
| the burial of a mutual friend when they had left him alone in his glory |
| after the grim task of having committed his remains to the grave. |
| |
| On the other hand what incensed him more inwardly was the blatant jokes |
| of the cabman and so on who passed it all off as a jest, laughing 1530 |
| immoderately, pretending to understand everything, the why and the |
| wherefore, and in reality not knowing their own minds, it being a case |
| for the two parties themselves unless it ensued that the legitimate |
| husband happened to be a party to it owing to some anonymous letter from |
| the usual boy Jones, who happened to come across them at the crucial |
| moment in a loving position locked in one another's arms, drawing |
| attention to their illicit proceedings and leading up to a domestic |
| rumpus and the erring fair one begging forgiveness of her lord and |
| master upon her knees and promising to sever the connection and not |
| receive his visits any more if only the aggrieved husband would overlook |
| the matter and let bygones be bygones with tears in her eyes though |
| possibly with her tongue in her fair cheek at the same time as quite |
| possibly there were several others. He personally, being of a sceptical |
| bias, believed and didn't make the smallest bones about saying so either |
| that man or men in the plural were always hanging around on the waiting |
| list about a lady, even supposing she was the best wife in the world |
| and they got on fairly well together for the sake of argument, when, |
| neglecting her duties, she chose to be tired of wedded life and was on |
| for a little flutter in polite debauchery to press their attentions on |
| her with improper intent, the upshot being that her affections centred |
| on another, the cause of many _liaisons_ between still attractive |
| married women getting on for fair and forty and younger men, no doubt as |
| several famous cases of feminine infatuation proved up to the hilt. |
| |
| It was a thousand pities a young fellow, blessed with an allowance of |
| brains as his neighbour obviously was, should waste his valuable time |
| with profligate women who might present him with a nice dose to last him |
| his lifetime. In the nature of single blessedness he would one day take |
| unto himself a wife when Miss Right came on the scene but in the interim |
| ladies' society was a _conditio sine qua non_ though he had the gravest |
| possible doubts, not that he wanted in the smallest to pump Stephen |
| about Miss Ferguson (who was very possibly the particular lodestar who |
| brought him down to Irishtown so early in the morning), as to whether he |
| would find much satisfaction basking in the boy and girl courtship idea |
| and the company of smirking misses without a penny to their names bi or |
| triweekly with the orthodox preliminary canter of complimentplaying and |
| walking out leading up to fond lovers' ways and flowers and chocs. To |
| think of him house and homeless, rooked by some landlady worse than any |
| stepmother, was really too bad at his age. The queer suddenly things |
| he popped out with attracted the elder man who was several years the |
| other's senior or like his father but something substantial he certainly |
| ought to eat even were it only an eggflip made on unadulterated maternal |
| nutriment or, failing that, the homely Humpty Dumpty boiled. |
| |
| --At what o'clock did you dine? he questioned of the slim form and tired |
| though unwrinkled face. |
| |
| --Some time yesterday, Stephen said. |
| |
| --Yesterday! exclaimed Bloom till he remembered it was already tomorrow |
| Friday. Ah, you mean it's after twelve! |
| |
| --The day before yesterday, Stephen said, improving on himself. |
| |
| Literally astounded at this piece of intelligence Bloom reflected. |
| Though they didn't see eye to eye in everything a certain analogy there |
| somehow was as if both their minds were travelling, so to speak, in the |
| one train of thought. At his age when dabbling in politics roughly |
| some score of years previously when he had been a _quasi_ aspirant to |
| parliamentary honours in the Buckshot Foster days he too recollected in |
| retrospect (which was a source of keen satisfaction in itself) he had |
| a sneaking regard for those same ultra ideas. For instance when the |
| evicted tenants question, then at its first inception, bulked largely in |
| people's mind though, it goes without saying, not contributing a copper |
| or pinning his faith absolutely to its dictums, some of which wouldn't |
| exactly hold water, he at the outset in principle at all events was in |
| thorough sympathy with peasant possession as voicing the trend of modern |
| opinion (a partiality, however, which, realising his mistake, he was |
| subsequently partially cured of) and even was twitted with going a |
| step farther than Michael Davitt in the striking views he at one time |
| inculcated as a backtothelander, which was one reason he strongly |
| resented the innuendo put upon him in so barefaced a fashion by our |
| friend at the gathering of the clans in Barney Kiernan's so that he, |
| though often considerably misunderstood and the least pugnacious of |
| mortals, be it repeated, departed from his customary habit to give |
| him (metaphorically) one in the gizzard though, so far as politics |
| themselves were concerned, he was only too conscious of the casualties |
| invariably resulting from propaganda and displays of mutual animosity |
| and the misery and suffering it entailed as a foregone conclusion on |
| fine young fellows, chiefly, destruction of the fittest, in a word. |
| |
| Anyhow upon weighing up the pros and cons, getting on for one, as it |
| was, it was high time to be retiring for the night. The crux was it |
| was a bit risky to bring him home as eventualities might possibly ensue |
| (somebody having a temper of her own sometimes) and spoil the hash |
| altogether as on the night he misguidedly brought home a dog (breed |
| unknown) with a lame paw (not that the cases were either identical or |
| the reverse though he had hurt his hand too) to Ontario Terrace as he |
| very distinctly remembered, having been there, so to speak. On the |
| other hand it was altogether far and away too late for the Sandymount |
| or Sandycove suggestion so that he was in some perplexity as to which of |
| the two alternatives. Everything pointed to the fact that it behoved him |
| to avail himself to the full of the opportunity, all things considered. |
| His initial impression was he was a shade standoffish or not over |
| effusive but it grew on him someway. For one thing he mightn't what you |
| call jump at the idea, if approached, and what mostly worried him was |
| he didn't know how to lead up to it or word it exactly, supposing he |
| did entertain the proposal, as it would afford him very great personal |
| pleasure if he would allow him to help to put coin in his way or some |
| wardrobe, if found suitable. At all events he wound up by concluding, |
| eschewing for the nonce hidebound precedent, a cup of Epps's cocoa and |
| a shakedown for the night plus the use of a rug or two and overcoat |
| doubled into a pillow at least he would be in safe hands and as warm as |
| a toast on a trivet he failed to perceive any very vast amount of harm |
| in that always with the proviso no rumpus of any sort was kicked up. |
| A move had to be made because that merry old soul, the grasswidower |
| in question who appeared to be glued to the spot, didn't appear in any |
| particular hurry to wend his way home to his dearly beloved Queenstown |
| and it was highly likely some sponger's bawdyhouse of retired beauties |
| where age was no bar off Sheriff street lower would be the best clue |
| to that equivocal character's whereabouts for a few days to come, |
| alternately racking their feelings (the mermaids') with sixchamber |
| revolver anecdotes verging on the tropical calculated to freeze |
| the marrow of anybody's bones and mauling their largesized charms |
| betweenwhiles with rough and tumble gusto to the accompaniment of large |
| potations of potheen and the usual blarney about himself for as to who |
| he in reality was let x equal my right name and address, as Mr Algebra |
| remarks _passim_. At the same time he inwardly chuckled over his gentle |
| repartee to the blood and ouns champion about his god being a jew. |
| People could put up with being bitten by a wolf but what properly riled |
| them was a bite from a sheep. The most vulnerable point too of tender |
| Achilles. Your god was a jew. Because mostly they appeared to imagine he |
| came from Carrick-on-Shannon or somewhereabouts in the county Sligo. |
| |
| --I propose, our hero eventually suggested after mature reflection while |
| prudently pocketing her photo, as it's rather stuffy here you just come |
| home with me and talk things over. My diggings are quite close in the |
| vicinity. You can't drink that stuff. Do you like cocoa? Wait. I'll just |
| pay this lot. |
| |
| The best plan clearly being to clear out, the remainder being plain |
| sailing, he beckoned, while prudently pocketing the photo, to the keeper |
| of the shanty who didn't seem to. |
| |
| --Yes, that's the best, he assured Stephen to whom for the matter of |
| that Brazen Head or him or anywhere else was all more or less. |
| |
| All kinds of Utopian plans were flashing through his (B's) busy brain, |
| education (the genuine article), literature, journalism, prize titbits, |
| up to date billing, concert tours in English watering resorts packed |
| with hydros and seaside theatres, turning money away, duets in Italian |
| with the accent perfectly true to nature and a quantity of other |
| things, no necessity, of course, to tell the world and his wife from the |
| housetops about it, and a slice of luck. An opening was all was wanted. |
| Because he more than suspected he had his father's voice to bank his |
| hopes on which it was quite on the cards he had so it would be just as |
| well, by the way no harm, to trail the conversation in the direction of |
| that particular red herring just to. |
| |
| The cabby read out of the paper he had got hold of that the former |
| viceroy, earl Cadogan, had presided at the cabdrivers' association |
| dinner in London somewhere. Silence with a yawn or two accompanied this |
| thrilling announcement. Then the old specimen in the corner who appeared |
| to have some spark of vitality left read out that sir Anthony MacDonnell |
| had left Euston for the chief secretary's lodge or words to that effect. |
| To which absorbing piece of intelligence echo answered why. |
| |
| --Give us a squint at that literature, grandfather, the ancient mariner |
| put in, manifesting some natural impatience. |
| |
| --And welcome, answered the elderly party thus addressed. |
| |
| The sailor lugged out from a case he had a pair of greenish goggles |
| which he very slowly hooked over his nose and both ears. |
| |
| --Are you bad in the eyes? the sympathetic personage like the townclerk |
| queried. |
| |
| --Why, answered the seafarer with the tartan beard, who seemingly was |
| a bit of a literary cove in his own small way, staring out of seagreen |
| portholes as you might well describe them as, I uses goggles reading. |
| Sand in the Red Sea done that. One time I could read a book in the dark, |
| manner of speaking. _The Arabian Nights Entertainment_ was my favourite |
| and _Red as a Rose is She._ |
| |
| Hereupon he pawed the journal open and pored upon Lord only knows what, |
| found drowned or the exploits of King Willow, Iremonger having made a |
| hundred and something second wicket not out for Notts, during which |
| time (completely regardless of Ire) the keeper was intensely occupied |
| loosening an apparently new or secondhand boot which manifestly pinched |
| him as he muttered against whoever it was sold it, all of them who were |
| sufficiently awake enough to be picked out by their facial expressions, |
| that is to say, either simply looking on glumly or passing a trivial |
| remark. |
| |
| To cut a long story short Bloom, grasping the situation, was the first |
| to rise from his seat so as not to outstay their welcome having first |
| and foremost, being as good as his word that he would foot the bill for |
| the occasion, taken the wise precaution to unobtrusively motion to mine |
| host as a parting shot a scarcely perceptible sign when the others were |
| not looking to the effect that the amount due was forthcoming, making a |
| grand total of fourpence (the amount he deposited unobtrusively in |
| four coppers, literally the last of the Mohicans), he having previously |
| spotted on the printed pricelist for all who ran to read opposite him |
| in unmistakable figures, coffee 2d, confectionery do, and honestly well |
| worth twice the money once in a way, as Wetherup used to remark. |
| |
| --Come, he counselled to close the _séance_. |
| |
| Seeing that the ruse worked and the coast was clear they left the |
| shelter or shanty together and the _élite_ society of oilskin and |
| company whom nothing short of an earthquake would move out of their |
| _dolce far niente_. Stephen, who confessed to still feeling poorly and |
| fagged out, paused at the, for a moment, the door. |
| |
| --One thing I never understood, he said to be original on the spur of |
| the moment. Why they put tables upside down at night, I mean chairs |
| upside down, on the tables in cafes. To which impromptu the neverfailing |
| Bloom replied without a moment's hesitation, saying straight off: |
| |
| --To sweep the floor in the morning. |
| |
| So saying he skipped around, nimbly considering, frankly at the same |
| time apologetic to get on his companion's right, a habit of his, by the |
| bye, his right side being, in classical idiom, his tender Achilles. The |
| night air was certainly now a treat to breathe though Stephen was a bit |
| weak on his pins. |
| |
| --It will (the air) do you good, Bloom said, meaning also the walk, in |
| a moment. The only thing is to walk then you'll feel a different man. |
| Come. It's not far. Lean on me. |
| |
| Accordingly he passed his left arm in Stephen's right and led him on |
| accordingly. |
| |
| --Yes, Stephen said uncertainly because he thought he felt a strange |
| kind of flesh of a different man approach him, sinewless and wobbly and |
| all that. |
| |
| Anyhow they passed the sentrybox with stones, brazier etc. where |
| the municipal supernumerary, ex Gumley, was still to all intents and |
| purposes wrapped in the arms of Murphy, as the adage has it, dreaming |
| of fresh fields and pastures new. And _apropos_ of coffin of stones the |
| analogy was not at all bad as it was in fact a stoning to death on the |
| part of seventytwo out of eighty odd constituencies that ratted at the |
| time of the split and chiefly the belauded peasant class, probably the |
| selfsame evicted tenants he had put in their holdings. |
| |
| So they turned on to chatting about music, a form of art for which |
| Bloom, as a pure amateur, possessed the greatest love, as they made |
| tracks arm in arm across Beresford place. Wagnerian music, though |
| confessedly grand in its way, was a bit too heavy for Bloom and hard to |
| follow at the first go-off but the music of Mercadante's _Huguenots_, |
| Meyerbeer's _Seven Last Words on the Cross_ and Mozart's _Twelfth Mass_ |
| he simply revelled in, the _Gloria_ in that being, to his mind, the acme |
| of first class music as such, literally knocking everything else into |
| a cocked hat. He infinitely preferred the sacred music of the catholic |
| church to anything the opposite shop could offer in that line such as |
| those Moody and Sankey hymns or _Bid me to live and i will live |
| thy protestant to be_. He also yielded to none in his admiration of |
| Rossini's _Stabat Mater_, a work simply abounding in immortal numbers, |
| in which his wife, Madam Marion Tweedy, made a hit, a veritable |
| sensation, he might safely say, greatly adding to her other laureis and |
| putting the others totally in the shade, in the jesuit fathers' church |
| in upper Gardiner street, the sacred edifice being thronged to the |
| doors to hear her with virtuosos, or _virtuosi_ rather. There was the |
| unanimous opinion that there was none to come up to her and suffice it |
| to say in a place of worship for music of a sacred character there was |
| a generally voiced desire for an encore. On the whole though favouring |
| preferably light opera of the _Don Giovanni_ description and _Martha_, |
| a gem in its line, he had a _penchant_, though with only a surface |
| knowledge, for the severe classical school such as Mendelssohn. And |
| talking of that, taking it for granted he knew all about the old |
| favourites, he mentioned _par excellence_ Lionel's air in _Martha, |
| M'appari_, which, curiously enough, he had heard or overheard, to be |
| more accurate, on yesterday, a privilege he keenly appreciated, from the |
| lips of Stephen's respected father, sung to perfection, a study of the |
| number, in fact, which made all the others take a back seat. Stephen, in |
| reply to a politely put query, said he didn't sing it but launched |
| out into praises of Shakespeare's songs, at least of in or about that |
| period, the lutenist Dowland who lived in Fetter lane near Gerard the |
| herbalist, who _anno ludendo hausi, Doulandus_, an instrument he was |
| contemplating purchasing from Mr Arnold Dolmetsch, whom B. did not quite |
| recall though the name certainly sounded familiar, for sixtyfive guineas |
| and Farnaby and son with their _dux_ and _comes_ conceits and Byrd |
| (William) who played the virginals, he said, in the Queen's chapel or |
| anywhere else he found them and one Tomkins who made toys or airs and |
| John Bull. |
| |
| On the roadway which they were approaching whilst still speaking beyond |
| the swingchains a horse, dragging a sweeper, paced on the paven ground, |
| brushing a long swathe of mire up so that with the noise Bloom was not |
| perfectly certain whether he had caught aright the allusion to sixtyfive |
| guineas and John Bull. He inquired if it was John Bull the political |
| celebrity of that ilk, as it struck him, the two identical names, as a |
| striking coincidence. |
| |
| By the chains the horse slowly swerved to turn, which perceiving, Bloom, |
| who was keeping a sharp lookout as usual, plucked the other's sleeve |
| gently, jocosely remarking: |
| |
| --Our lives are in peril tonight. Beware of the steamroller. |
| |
| They thereupon stopped. Bloom looked at the head of a horse not worth |
| anything like sixtyfive guineas, suddenly in evidence in the dark quite |
| near so that it seemed new, a different grouping of bones and even flesh |
| because palpably it was a fourwalker, a hipshaker, a blackbuttocker, a |
| taildangler, a headhanger putting his hind foot foremost the while the |
| lord of his creation sat on the perch, busy with his thoughts. But such |
| a good poor brute he was sorry he hadn't a lump of sugar but, as he |
| wisely reflected, you could scarcely be prepared for every emergency |
| that might crop up. He was just a big nervous foolish noodly kind of a |
| horse, without a second care in the world. But even a dog, he reflected, |
| take that mongrel in Barney Kiernan's, of the same size, would be a holy |
| horror to face. But it was no animal's fault in particular if he was |
| built that way like the camel, ship of the desert, distilling grapes |
| into potheen in his hump. Nine tenths of them all could be caged or |
| trained, nothing beyond the art of man barring the bees. Whale with a |
| harpoon hairpin, alligator tickle the small of his back and he sees the |
| joke, chalk a circle for a rooster, tiger my eagle eye. These timely |
| reflections anent the brutes of the field occupied his mind somewhat |
| distracted from Stephen's words while the ship of the street was |
| manoeuvring and Stephen went on about the highly interesting old. |
| |
| --What's this I was saying? Ah, yes! My wife, he intimated, plunging |
| _in medias res_, would have the greatest of pleasure in making your |
| acquaintance as she is passionately attached to music of any kind. |
| |
| He looked sideways in a friendly fashion at the sideface of Stephen, |
| image of his mother, which was not quite the same as the usual handsome |
| blackguard type they unquestionably had an insatiable hankering after as |
| he was perhaps not that way built. |
| |
| Still, supposing he had his father's gift as he more than suspected, |
| it opened up new vistas in his mind such as Lady Fingall's Irish |
| industries, concert on the preceding Monday, and aristocracy in general. |
| |
| Exquisite variations he was now describing on an air _Youth here has |
| End_ by Jans Pieter Sweelinck, a Dutchman of Amsterdam where the frows |
| come from. Even more he liked an old German song of _Johannes Jeep_ |
| about the clear sea and the voices of sirens, sweet murderers of men, |
| which boggled Bloom a bit: |
| |
| _Von der Sirenen Listigkeit |
| Tun die Poeten dichten._ |
| |
| These opening bars he sang and translated _extempore_. Bloom, nodding, |
| said he perfectly understood and begged him to go on by all means which |
| he did. |
| |
| A phenomenally beautiful tenor voice like that, the rarest of boons, |
| which Bloom appreciated at the very first note he got out, could easily, |
| if properly handled by some recognised authority on voice production |
| such as Barraclough and being able to read music into the bargain, |
| command its own price where baritones were ten a penny and procure for |
| its fortunate possessor in the near future an _entrée_ into fashionable |
| houses in the best residential quarters of financial magnates in a large |
| way of business and titled people where with his university degree of |
| B. A. (a huge ad in its way) and gentlemanly bearing to all the more |
| influence the good impression he would infallibly score a distinct |
| success, being blessed with brains which also could be utilised for the |
| purpose and other requisites, if his clothes were properly attended |
| to so as to the better worm his way into their good graces as he, a |
| youthful tyro in--society's sartorial niceties, hardly understood how a |
| little thing like that could militate against you. It was in fact only a |
| matter of months and he could easily foresee him participating in their |
| musical and artistic _conversaziones_ during the festivities of the |
| Christmas season, for choice, causing a slight flutter in the dovecotes |
| of the fair sex and being made a lot of by ladies out for sensation, |
| cases of which, as he happened to know, were on record--in fact, without |
| giving the show away, he himself once upon a time, if he cared to, could |
| easily have. Added to which of course would be the pecuniary emolument |
| by no means to be sneezed at, going hand in hand with his tuition |
| fees. Not, he parenthesised, that for the sake of filthy lucre he need |
| necessarily embrace the lyric platform as a walk in life for any lengthy |
| space of time. But a step in the required direction it was beyond yea or |
| nay and both monetarily and mentally it contained no reflection on his |
| dignity in the smallest and it often turned in uncommonly handy to |
| be handed a cheque at a muchneeded moment when every little helped. |
| Besides, though taste latterly had deteriorated to a degree, original |
| music like that, different from the conventional rut, would rapidly |
| have a great vogue as it would be a decided novelty for Dublin's musical |
| world after the usual hackneyed run of catchy tenor solos foisted on a |
| confiding public by Ivan St Austell and Hilton St Just and their _genus |
| omne_. Yes, beyond a shadow of a doubt he could with all the cards in |
| his hand and he had a capital opening to make a name for himself and win |
| a high place in the city's esteem where he could command a stiff figure |
| and, booking ahead, give a grand concert for the patrons of the King |
| street house, given a backerup, if one were forthcoming to kick him |
| upstairs, so to speak, a big _if_, however, with some impetus of the |
| goahead sort to obviate the inevitable procrastination which often |
| tripped-up a too much fêted prince of good fellows. And it need not |
| detract from the other by one iota as, being his own master, he would |
| have heaps of time to practise literature in his spare moments when |
| desirous of so doing without its clashing with his vocal career or |
| containing anything derogatory whatsoever as it was a matter for himself |
| alone. In fact, he had the ball at his feet and that was the very reason |
| why the other, possessed of a remarkably sharp nose for smelling a rat |
| of any sort, hung on to him at all. |
| |
| The horse was just then. And later on at a propitious opportunity he |
| purposed (Bloom did), without anyway prying into his private affairs on |
| the _fools step in where angels_ principle, advising him to sever his |
| connection with a certain budding practitioner who, he noticed, was |
| prone to disparage and even to a slight extent with some hilarious |
| pretext when not present, deprecate him, or whatever you like to call it |
| which in Bloom's humble opinion threw a nasty sidelight on that side of |
| a person's character, no pun intended. |
| |
| The horse having reached the end of his tether, so to speak, halted and, |
| rearing high a proud feathering tail, added his quota by letting fall on |
| the floor which the brush would soon brush up and polish, three smoking |
| globes of turds. Slowly three times, one after another, from a full |
| crupper he mired. And humanely his driver waited till he (or she) had |
| ended, patient in his scythed car. |
| |
| Side by side Bloom, profiting by the _contretemps_, with Stephen passed |
| through the gap of the chains, divided by the upright, and, stepping |
| over a strand of mire, went across towards Gardiner street lower, |
| Stephen singing more boldly, but not loudly, the end of the ballad. |
| |
| _Und alle Schiffe brücken._ |
| |
| The driver never said a word, good, bad or indifferent, but merely |
| watched the two figures, as he sat on his lowbacked car, both black, |
| one full, one lean, walk towards the railway bridge, _to be married by |
| Father Maher_. As they walked they at times stopped and walked again |
| continuing their _tête-à -tête_ (which, of course, he was utterly out |
| of) about sirens enemies of man's reason, mingled with a number of other |
| topics of the same category, usurpers, historical cases of the kind |
| while the man in the sweeper car or you might as well call it in the |
| sleeper car who in any case couldn't possibly hear because they were too |
| far simply sat in his seat near the end of lower Gardiner street _and |
| looked after their lowbacked car_. |
| |
| |
| |
| What parallel courses did Bloom and Stephen follow returning? |
| |
| Starting united both at normal walking pace from Beresford place they |
| followed in the order named Lower and Middle Gardiner streets and |
| Mountjoy square, west: then, at reduced pace, each bearing left, |
| Gardiner's place by an inadvertence as far as the farther corner of |
| Temple street: then, at reduced pace with interruptions of halt, bearing |
| right, Temple street, north, as far as Hardwicke place. Approaching, |
| disparate, at relaxed walking pace they crossed both the circus before |
| George's church diametrically, the chord in any circle being less than |
| the arc which it subtends. |
| |
| |
| Of what did the duumvirate deliberate during their itinerary? |
| |
| Music, literature, Ireland, Dublin, Paris, friendship, woman, |
| prostitution, diet, the influence of gaslight or the light of arc and |
| glowlamps on the growth of adjoining paraheliotropic trees, exposed |
| corporation emergency dustbuckets, the Roman catholic church, |
| ecclesiastical celibacy, the Irish nation, jesuit education, careers, |
| the study of medicine, the past day, the maleficent influence of the |
| presabbath, Stephen's collapse. |
| |
| Did Bloom discover common factors of similarity between their respective |
| like and unlike reactions to experience? |
| |
| Both were sensitive to artistic impressions, musical in preference to |
| plastic or pictorial. Both preferred a continental to an insular manner |
| of life, a cisatlantic to a transatlantic place of residence. Both |
| indurated by early domestic training and an inherited tenacity of |
| heterodox resistance professed their disbelief in many orthodox |
| religious, national, social and ethical doctrines. Both admitted |
| the alternately stimulating and obtunding influence of heterosexual |
| magnetism. |
| |
| |
| Were their views on some points divergent? |
| |
| Stephen dissented openly from Bloom's views on the importance of dietary |
| and civic selfhelp while Bloom dissented tacitly from Stephen's views |
| on the eternal affirmation of the spirit of man in literature. Bloom |
| assented covertly to Stephen's rectification of the anachronism |
| involved in assigning the date of the conversion of the Irish nation to |
| christianity from druidism by Patrick son of Calpornus, son of Potitus, |
| son of Odyssus, sent by pope Celestine I in the year 432 in the reign of |
| Leary to the year 260 or thereabouts in the reign of Cormac MacArt (died |
| 266 A.D.), suffocated by imperfect deglutition of aliment at Sletty |
| and interred at Rossnaree. The collapse which Bloom ascribed to |
| gastric inanition and certain chemical compounds of varying degrees of |
| adulteration and alcoholic strength, accelerated by mental exertion and |
| the velocity of rapid circular motion in a relaxing atmosphere, Stephen |
| attributed to the reapparition of a matutinal cloud (perceived by both |
| from two different points of observation Sandycove and Dublin) at first |
| no bigger than a woman's hand. |
| |
| |
| Was there one point on which their views were equal and negative? |
| |
| The influence of gaslight or electric light on the growth of adjoining |
| paraheliotropic trees. |
| |
| |
| Had Bloom discussed similar subjects during nocturnal perambulations in |
| the past? |
| |
| In 1884 with Owen Goldberg and Cecil Turnbull at night on public |
| thoroughfares between Longwood avenue and Leonard's corner and Leonard's |
| corner and Synge street and Synge street and Bloomfield avenue. |
| |
| In 1885 with Percy Apjohn in the evenings, reclined against the wall |
| between Gibraltar villa and Bloomfield house in Crumlin, barony |
| of Uppercross. In 1886 occasionally with casual acquaintances and |
| prospective purchasers on doorsteps, in front parlours, in third class |
| railway carriages of suburban lines. In 1888 frequently with major Brian |
| Tweedy and his daughter Miss Marion Tweedy, together and separately on |
| the lounge in Matthew Dillon's house in Roundtown. Once in 1892 and once |
| in 1893 with Julius (Juda) Mastiansky, on both occasions in the parlour |
| of his (Bloom's) house in Lombard street, west. |
| |
| |
| What reflection concerning the irregular sequence of dates 1884, 1885, |
| 1886, 1888, 1892, 1893, 1904 did Bloom make before their arrival at |
| their destination? |
| |
| He reflected that the progressive extension of the field of individual |
| development and experience was regressively accompanied by a restriction |
| of the converse domain of interindividual relations. |
| |
| |
| As in what ways? |
| |
| From inexistence to existence he came to many and was as one received: |
| existence with existence he was with any as any with any: from existence |
| to nonexistence gone he would be by all as none perceived. |
| |
| What act did Bloom make on their arrival at their destination? |
| |
| At the housesteps of the 4th Of the equidifferent uneven numbers, number |
| 7 Eccles street, he inserted his hand mechanically into the back pocket |
| of his trousers to obtain his latchkey. |
| |
| |
| Was it there? |
| |
| It was in the corresponding pocket of the trousers which he had worn on |
| the day but one preceding. |
| |
| |
| Why was he doubly irritated? |
| |
| Because he had forgotten and because he remembered that he had reminded |
| himself twice not to forget. |
| |
| |
| What were then the alternatives before the, premeditatedly |
| (respectively) and inadvertently, keyless couple? |
| |
| To enter or not to enter. To knock or not to knock. |
| |
| |
| Bloom's decision? |
| |
| A stratagem. Resting his feet on the dwarf wall, he climbed over the |
| area railings, compressed his hat on his head, grasped two points at |
| the lower union of rails and stiles, lowered his body gradually by its |
| length of five feet nine inches and a half to within two feet ten inches |
| of the area pavement and allowed his body to move freely in space by |
| separating himself from the railings and crouching in preparation for |
| the impact of the fall. |
| |
| |
| Did he fall? |
| |
| By his body's known weight of eleven stone and four pounds in |
| avoirdupois measure, as certified by the graduated machine for |
| periodical selfweighing in the premises of Francis Froedman, |
| pharmaceutical chemist of 19 Frederick street, north, on the last feast |
| of the Ascension, to wit, the twelfth day of May of the bissextile year |
| one thousand nine hundred and four of the christian era (jewish era five |
| thousand six hundred and sixtyfour, mohammadan era one thousand three |
| hundred and twentytwo), golden number 5, epact 13, solar cycle 9, |
| dominical letters C B, Roman indiction 2, Julian period 6617, MCMIV. |
| |
| |
| Did he rise uninjured by concussion? |
| |
| Regaining new stable equilibrium he rose uninjured though concussed by |
| the impact, raised the latch of the area door by the exertion of force |
| at its freely moving flange and by leverage of the first kind applied |
| at its fulcrum, gained retarded access to the kitchen through the |
| subadjacent scullery, ignited a lucifer match by friction, set free |
| inflammable coal gas by turningon the ventcock, lit a high flame which, |
| by regulating, he reduced to quiescent candescence and lit finally a |
| portable candle. |
| |
| |
| What discrete succession of images did Stephen meanwhile perceive? |
| |
| Reclined against the area railings he perceived through the transparent |
| kitchen panes a man regulating a gasflame of 14 CP, a man lighting a |
| candle of 1 CP, a man removing in turn each of his two boots, a man |
| leaving the kitchen holding a candle. |
| |
| |
| Did the man reappear elsewhere? |
| |
| After a lapse of four minutes the glimmer of his candle was discernible |
| through the semitransparent semicircular glass fanlight over the |
| halldoor. The halldoor turned gradually on its hinges. In the open space |
| of the doorway the man reappeared without his hat, with his candle. |
| |
| |
| Did Stephen obey his sign? |
| |
| Yes, entering softly, he helped to close and chain the door and followed |
| softly along the hallway the man's back and listed feet and lighted |
| candle past a lighted crevice of doorway on the left and carefully down |
| a turning staircase of more than five steps into the kitchen of Bloom's |
| house. |
| |
| |
| What did Bloom do? |
| |
| He extinguished the candle by a sharp expiration of breath upon its |
| flame, drew two spoonseat deal chairs to the hearthstone, one for |
| Stephen with its back to the area window, the other for himself when |
| necessary, knelt on one knee, composed in the grate a pyre of crosslaid |
| resintipped sticks and various coloured papers and irregular polygons |
| of best Abram coal at twentyone shillings a ton from the yard of Messrs |
| Flower and M'Donald of 14 D'Olier street, kindled it at three projecting |
| points of paper with one ignited lucifer match, thereby releasing |
| the potential energy contained in the fuel by allowing its carbon and |
| hydrogen elements to enter into free union with the oxygen of the air. |
| |
| |
| Of what similar apparitions did Stephen think? |
| |
| Of others elsewhere in other times who, kneeling on one knee or on two, |
| had kindled fires for him, of Brother Michael in the infirmary of the |
| college of the Society of Jesus at Clongowes Wood, Sallins, in the |
| county of Kildare: of his father, Simon Dedalus, in an unfurnished room |
| of his first residence in Dublin, number thirteen Fitzgibbon street: |
| of his godmother Miss Kate Morkan in the house of her dying sister Miss |
| Julia Morkan at 15 Usher's Island: of his aunt Sara, wife of Richie |
| (Richard) Goulding, in the kitchen of their lodgings at 62 Clanbrassil |
| street: of his mother Mary, wife of Simon Dedalus, in the kitchen of |
| number twelve North Richmond street on the morning of the feast of |
| Saint Francis Xavier 1898: of the dean of studies, Father Butt, in the |
| physics' theatre of university College, 16 Stephen's Green, north: of |
| his sister Dilly (Delia) in his father's house in Cabra. |
| |
| |
| What did Stephen see on raising his gaze to the height of a yard from |
| the fire towards the opposite wall? |
| |
| Under a row of five coiled spring housebells a curvilinear rope, |
| stretched between two holdfasts athwart across the recess beside the |
| chimney pier, from which hung four smallsized square handkerchiefs |
| folded unattached consecutively in adjacent rectangles and one pair of |
| ladies' grey hose with Lisle suspender tops and feet in their habitual |
| position clamped by three erect wooden pegs two at their outer |
| extremities and the third at their point of junction. |
| |
| |
| What did Bloom see on the range? |
| |
| On the right (smaller) hob a blue enamelled saucepan: on the left |
| (larger) hob a black iron kettle. |
| |
| |
| What did Bloom do at the range? |
| |
| He removed the saucepan to the left hob, rose and carried the iron |
| kettle to the sink in order to tap the current by turning the faucet to |
| let it flow. |
| |
| |
| Did it flow? |
| |
| Yes. From Roundwood reservoir in county Wicklow of a cubic capacity of |
| 2400 million gallons, percolating through a subterranean aqueduct of |
| filter mains of single and double pipeage constructed at an initial |
| plant cost of 5 pounds per linear yard by way of the Dargle, Rathdown, |
| Glen of the Downs and Callowhill to the 26 acre reservoir at Stillorgan, |
| a distance of 22 statute miles, and thence, through a system of |
| relieving tanks, by a gradient of 250 feet to the city boundary at |
| Eustace bridge, upper Leeson street, though from prolonged summer drouth |
| and daily supply of 12 1/2 million gallons the water had fallen below |
| the sill of the overflow weir for which reason the borough surveyor and |
| waterworks engineer, Mr Spencer Harty, C. E., on the instructions of |
| the waterworks committee had prohibited the use of municipal water for |
| purposes other than those of consumption (envisaging the possibility of |
| recourse being had to the impotable water of the Grand and Royal canals |
| as in 1893) particularly as the South Dublin Guardians, notwithstanding |
| their ration of 15 gallons per day per pauper supplied through a 6 inch |
| meter, had been convicted of a wastage of 20,000 gallons per night by |
| a reading of their meter on the affirmation of the law agent of |
| the corporation, Mr Ignatius Rice, solicitor, thereby acting to the |
| detriment of another section of the public, selfsupporting taxpayers, |
| solvent, sound. |
| |
| What in water did Bloom, waterlover, drawer of water, watercarrier, |
| returning to the range, admire? |
| |
| Its universality: its democratic equality and constancy to its nature |
| in seeking its own level: its vastness in the ocean of Mercator's |
| projection: its unplumbed profundity in the Sundam trench of the Pacific |
| exceeding 8000 fathoms: the restlessness of its waves and surface |
| particles visiting in turn all points of its seaboard: the independence |
| of its units: the variability of states of sea: its hydrostatic |
| quiescence in calm: its hydrokinetic turgidity in neap and spring tides: |
| its subsidence after devastation: its sterility in the circumpolar |
| icecaps, arctic and antarctic: its climatic and commercial significance: |
| its preponderance of 3 to 1 over the dry land of the globe: its |
| indisputable hegemony extending in square leagues over all the region |
| below the subequatorial tropic of Capricorn: the multisecular stability |
| of its primeval basin: its luteofulvous bed: its capacity to dissolve |
| and hold in solution all soluble substances including millions of |
| tons of the most precious metals: its slow erosions of peninsulas and |
| islands, its persistent formation of homothetic islands, peninsulas |
| and downwardtending promontories: its alluvial deposits: its weight and |
| volume and density: its imperturbability in lagoons and highland tarns: |
| its gradation of colours in the torrid and temperate and frigid zones: |
| its vehicular ramifications in continental lakecontained streams and |
| confluent oceanflowing rivers with their tributaries and transoceanic |
| currents, gulfstream, north and south equatorial courses: its violence |
| in seaquakes, waterspouts, Artesian wells, eruptions, torrents, eddies, |
| freshets, spates, groundswells, watersheds, waterpartings, geysers, |
| cataracts, whirlpools, maelstroms, inundations, deluges, cloudbursts: |
| its vast circumterrestrial ahorizontal curve: its secrecy in springs and |
| latent humidity, revealed by rhabdomantic or hygrometric instruments |
| and exemplified by the well by the hole in the wall at Ashtown |
| gate, saturation of air, distillation of dew: the simplicity of its |
| composition, two constituent parts of hydrogen with one constituent part |
| of oxygen: its healing virtues: its buoyancy in the waters of the Dead |
| Sea: its persevering penetrativeness in runnels, gullies, inadequate |
| dams, leaks on shipboard: its properties for cleansing, quenching thirst |
| and fire, nourishing vegetation: its infallibility as paradigm and |
| paragon: its metamorphoses as vapour, mist, cloud, rain, sleet, snow, |
| hail: its strength in rigid hydrants: its variety of forms in loughs |
| and bays and gulfs and bights and guts and lagoons and atolls and |
| archipelagos and sounds and fjords and minches and tidal estuaries and |
| arms of sea: its solidity in glaciers, icebergs, icefloes: its docility |
| in working hydraulic millwheels, turbines, dynamos, electric power |
| stations, bleachworks, tanneries, scutchmills: its utility in canals, |
| rivers, if navigable, floating and graving docks: its potentiality |
| derivable from harnessed tides or watercourses falling from level |
| to level: its submarine fauna and flora (anacoustic, photophobe), |
| numerically, if not literally, the inhabitants of the globe: its |
| ubiquity as constituting 90 percent of the human body: the noxiousness |
| of its effluvia in lacustrine marshes, pestilential fens, faded |
| flowerwater, stagnant pools in the waning moon. |
| |
| |
| Having set the halffilled kettle on the now burning coals, why did he |
| return to the stillflowing tap? |
| |
| To wash his soiled hands with a partially consumed tablet of |
| Barrington's lemonflavoured soap, to which paper still adhered, (bought |
| thirteen hours previously for fourpence and still unpaid for), in fresh |
| cold neverchanging everchanging water and dry them, face and hands, in a |
| long redbordered holland cloth passed over a wooden revolving roller. |
| |
| |
| What reason did Stephen give for declining Bloom's offer? |
| |
| That he was hydrophobe, hating partial contact by immersion or total by |
| submersion in cold water, (his last bath having taken place in the month |
| of October of the preceding year), disliking the aqueous substances of |
| glass and crystal, distrusting aquacities of thought and language. |
| |
| |
| What impeded Bloom from giving Stephen counsels of hygiene and |
| prophylactic to which should be added suggestions concerning a |
| preliminary wetting of the head and contraction of the muscles with |
| rapid splashing of the face and neck and thoracic and epigastric region |
| in case of sea or river bathing, the parts of the human anatomy most |
| sensitive to cold being the nape, stomach and thenar or sole of foot? |
| |
| The incompatibility of aquacity with the erratic originality of genius. |
| |
| |
| What additional didactic counsels did he similarly repress? |
| |
| Dietary: concerning the respective percentage of protein and caloric |
| energy in bacon, salt ling and butter, the absence of the former in the |
| lastnamed and the abundance of the latter in the firstnamed. |
| |
| |
| Which seemed to the host to be the predominant qualities of his guest? |
| |
| Confidence in himself, an equal and opposite power of abandonment and |
| recuperation. |
| |
| |
| What concomitant phenomenon took place in the vessel of liquid by the |
| agency of fire? |
| |
| The phenomenon of ebullition. Fanned by a constant updraught of |
| ventilation between the kitchen and the chimneyflue, ignition was |
| communicated from the faggots of precombustible fuel to polyhedral |
| masses of bituminous coal, containing in compressed mineral form the |
| foliated fossilised decidua of primeval forests which had in turn |
| derived their vegetative existence from the sun, primal source of heat |
| (radiant), transmitted through omnipresent luminiferous diathermanous |
| ether. Heat (convected), a mode of motion developed by such |
| combustion, was constantly and increasingly conveyed from the source |
| of calorification to the liquid contained in the vessel, being radiated |
| through the uneven unpolished dark surface of the metal iron, in part |
| reflected, in part absorbed, in part transmitted, gradually raising |
| the temperature of the water from normal to boiling point, a rise in |
| temperature expressible as the result of an expenditure of 72 thermal |
| units needed to raise 1 pound of water from 50 degrees to 212 degrees |
| Fahrenheit. |
| |
| |
| What announced the accomplishment of this rise in temperature? |
| |
| A double falciform ejection of water vapour from under the kettlelid at |
| both sides simultaneously. |
| |
| |
| For what personal purpose could Bloom have applied the water so boiled? |
| |
| To shave himself. |
| |
| |
| What advantages attended shaving by night? |
| |
| A softer beard: a softer brush if intentionally allowed to remain from |
| shave to shave in its agglutinated lather: a softer skin if unexpectedly |
| encountering female acquaintances in remote places at incustomary hours: |
| quiet reflections upon the course of the day: a cleaner sensation when |
| awaking after a fresher sleep since matutinal noises, premonitions and |
| perturbations, a clattered milkcan, a postman's double knock, a paper |
| read, reread while lathering, relathering the same spot, a shock, a |
| shoot, with thought of aught he sought though fraught with nought might |
| cause a faster rate of shaving and a nick on which incision plaster with |
| precision cut and humected and applied adhered: which was to be done. |
| |
| |
| Why did absence of light disturb him less than presence of noise? |
| |
| Because of the surety of the sense of touch in his firm full masculine |
| feminine passive active hand. |
| |
| |
| What quality did it (his hand) possess but with what counteracting |
| influence? |
| |
| The operative surgical quality but that he was reluctant to shed human |
| blood even when the end justified the means, preferring, in their |
| natural order, heliotherapy, psychophysicotherapeutics, osteopathic |
| surgery. |
| |
| |
| What lay under exposure on the lower, middle and upper shelves of the |
| kitchen dresser, opened by Bloom? |
| |
| On the lower shelf five vertical breakfast plates, six horizontal |
| breakfast saucers on which rested inverted breakfast cups, a |
| moustachecup, uninverted, and saucer of Crown Derby, four white |
| goldrimmed eggcups, an open shammy purse displaying coins, mostly |
| copper, and a phial of aromatic (violet) comfits. On the middle shelf |
| a chipped eggcup containing pepper, a drum of table salt, four |
| conglomerated black olives in oleaginous paper, an empty pot of |
| Plumtree's potted meat, an oval wicker basket bedded with fibre and |
| containing one Jersey pear, a halfempty bottle of William Gilbey and |
| Co's white invalid port, half disrobed of its swathe of coralpink tissue |
| paper, a packet of Epps's soluble cocoa, five ounces of Anne Lynch's |
| choice tea at 2/- per lb in a crinkled leadpaper bag, a cylindrical |
| canister containing the best crystallised lump sugar, two onions, one, |
| the larger, Spanish, entire, the other, smaller, Irish, bisected with |
| augmented surface and more redolent, a jar of Irish Model Dairy's cream, |
| a jug of brown crockery containing a naggin and a quarter of soured |
| adulterated milk, converted by heat into water, acidulous serum and |
| semisolidified curds, which added to the quantity subtracted for Mr |
| Bloom's and Mrs Fleming's breakfasts, made one imperial pint, the total |
| quantity originally delivered, two cloves, a halfpenny and a small dish |
| containing a slice of fresh ribsteak. On the upper shelf a battery of |
| jamjars (empty) of various sizes and proveniences. |
| |
| |
| What attracted his attention lying on the apron of the dresser? |
| |
| Four polygonal fragments of two lacerated scarlet betting tickets, |
| numbered 8 87, 88 6. |
| |
| |
| What reminiscences temporarily corrugated his brow? |
| |
| Reminiscences of coincidences, truth stranger than fiction, |
| preindicative of the result of the Gold Cup flat handicap, the official |
| and definitive result of which he had read in the _Evening Telegraph_, |
| late pink edition, in the cabman's shelter, at Butt bridge. |
| |
| |
| Where had previous intimations of the result, effected or projected, |
| been received by him? |
| |
| In Bernard Kiernan's licensed premises 8, 9 and 10 little Britain |
| street: in David Byrne's licensed premises, 14 Duke street: in O'Connell |
| street lower, outside Graham Lemon's when a dark man had placed in |
| his hand a throwaway (subsequently thrown away), advertising Elijah, |
| restorer of the church in Zion: in Lincoln place outside the premises of |
| F. W. Sweny and Co (Limited), dispensing chemists, when, when Frederick |
| M. (Bantam) Lyons had rapidly and successively requested, perused and |
| restituted the copy of the current issue of the _Freeman's Journal and |
| National Press_ which he had been about to throw away (subsequently |
| thrown away), he had proceeded towards the oriental edifice of |
| the Turkish and Warm Baths, 11 Leinster street, with the light of |
| inspiration shining in his countenance and bearing in his arms the |
| secret of the race, graven in the language of prediction. |
| |
| What qualifying considerations allayed his perturbations? |
| |
| The difficulties of interpretation since the significance of any event |
| followed its occurrence as variably as the acoustic report followed the |
| electrical discharge and of counterestimating against an actual loss |
| by failure to interpret the total sum of possible losses proceeding |
| originally from a successful interpretation. |
| |
| |
| His mood? |
| |
| He had not risked, he did not expect, he had not been disappointed, he |
| was satisfied. |
| |
| |
| What satisfied him? |
| |
| To have sustained no positive loss. To have brought a positive gain to |
| others. Light to the gentiles. |
| |
| |
| How did Bloom prepare a collation for a gentile? |
| |
| He poured into two teacups two level spoonfuls, four in all, of Epps's |
| soluble cocoa and proceeded according to the directions for use printed |
| on the label, to each adding after sufficient time for infusion the |
| prescribed ingredients for diffusion in the manner and in the quantity |
| prescribed. |
| |
| |
| What supererogatory marks of special hospitality did the host show his |
| guest? |
| |
| Relinquishing his symposiarchal right to the moustache cup of imitation |
| Crown Derby presented to him by his only daughter, Millicent (Milly), |
| he substituted a cup identical with that of his guest and served |
| extraordinarily to his guest and, in reduced measure, to himself the |
| viscous cream ordinarily reserved for the breakfast of his wife Marion |
| (Molly). |
| |
| |
| Was the guest conscious of and did he acknowledge these marks of |
| hospitality? |
| |
| His attention was directed to them by his host jocosely, and he accepted |
| them seriously as they drank in jocoserious silence Epps's massproduct, |
| the creature cocoa. |
| |
| |
| Were there marks of hospitality which he contemplated but suppressed, |
| reserving them for another and for himself on future occasions to |
| complete the act begun? |
| |
| The reparation of a fissure of the length of 1 1/2 inches in the right |
| side of his guest's jacket. A gift to his guest of one of the four |
| lady's handkerchiefs, if and when ascertained to be in a presentable |
| condition. |
| |
| |
| Who drank more quickly? |
| |
| Bloom, having the advantage of ten seconds at the initiation and taking, |
| from the concave surface of a spoon along the handle of which a steady |
| flow of heat was conducted, three sips to his opponent's one, six to |
| two, nine to three. |
| |
| |
| What cerebration accompanied his frequentative act? |
| |
| Concluding by inspection but erroneously that his silent companion was |
| engaged in mental composition he reflected on the pleasures derived from |
| literature of instruction rather than of amusement as he himself had |
| applied to the works of William Shakespeare more than once for the |
| solution of difficult problems in imaginary or real life. |
| |
| |
| Had he found their solution? |
| |
| In spite of careful and repeated reading of certain classical passages, |
| aided by a glossary, he had derived imperfect conviction from the text, |
| the answers not bearing in all points. |
| |
| |
| What lines concluded his first piece of original verse written by him, |
| potential poet, at the age of 11 in 1877 on the occasion of the offering |
| of three prizes of 10/-, 5/- and 2/6 respectively for competition by the |
| _Shamrock_, a weekly newspaper? |
| |
| _An ambition to squint |
| At my verses in print |
| Makes me hope that for these you'll find room?. |
| If you so condescend |
| Then please place at the end |
| The name of yours truly, L. Bloom._ |
| |
| Did he find four separating forces between his temporary guest and him? |
| |
| Name, age, race, creed. |
| |
| |
| What anagrams had he made on his name in youth? |
| |
| Leopold Bloom |
| Ellpodbomool |
| Molldopeloob |
| Bollopedoom |
| Old Ollebo, M. P. |
| |
| |
| What acrostic upon the abbreviation of his first name had he (kinetic |
| poet) sent to Miss Marion (Molly) Tweedy on the 14 February 1888? |
| |
| _Poets oft have sung in rhyme |
| Of music sweet their praise divine. |
| Let them hymn it nine times nine. |
| Dearer far than song or wine. |
| You are mine. The world is mine._ |
| |
| |
| What had prevented him from completing a topical song (music by R. G. |
| Johnston) on the events of the past, or fixtures for the actual, years, |
| entitled _If Brian Boru could but come back and see old Dublin now_, |
| commissioned by Michael Gunn, lessee of the Gaiety Theatre, 46, 47, 48, |
| 49 South King street, and to be introduced into the sixth scene, the |
| valley of diamonds, of the second edition (30 January 1893) of the grand |
| annual Christmas pantomime _Sinbad the Sailor_ (produced by R Shelton |
| 26 December 1892, written by Greenleaf Whittier, scenery by George |
| A. Jackson and Cecil Hicks, costumes by Mrs and Miss Whelan under |
| the personal supervision of Mrs Michael Gunn, ballets by Jessie Noir, |
| harlequinade by Thomas Otto) and sung by Nelly Bouverist, principal |
| girl? |
| |
| Firstly, oscillation between events of imperial and of local interest, |
| the anticipated diamond jubilee of Queen Victoria (born 1820, acceded |
| 1837) and the posticipated opening of the new municipal fish market: |
| secondly, apprehension of opposition from extreme circles on the |
| questions of the respective visits of Their Royal Highnesses the |
| duke and duchess of York (real) and of His Majesty King Brian Boru |
| (imaginary): thirdly, a conflict between professional etiquette and |
| professional emulation concerning the recent erections of the Grand |
| Lyric Hall on Burgh Quay and the Theatre Royal in Hawkins street: |
| fourthly, distraction resultant from compassion for Nelly Bouverist's |
| non-intellectual, non-political, non-topical expression of countenance |
| and concupiscence caused by Nelly Bouverist's revelations of white |
| articles of non-intellectual, non-political, non-topical underclothing |
| while she (Nelly Bouverist) was in the articles: fifthly, the |
| difficulties of the selection of appropriate music and humorous |
| allusions from _Everybody's Book of Jokes_ (1000 pages and a laugh in |
| every one): sixthly, the rhymes, homophonous and cacophonous, associated |
| with the names of the new lord mayor, Daniel Tallon, the new high |
| sheriff, Thomas Pile and the new solicitorgeneral, Dunbar Plunket |
| Barton. |
| |
| |
| What relation existed between their ages? |
| |
| 16 years before in 1888 when Bloom was of Stephen's present age Stephen |
| was 6. 16 years after in 1920 when Stephen would be of Bloom's present |
| age Bloom would be 54. In 1936 when Bloom would be 70 and Stephen 54 |
| their ages initially in the ratio of 16 to 0 would be as 17 1/2 to 13 |
| 1/2, the proportion increasing and the disparity diminishing according |
| as arbitrary future years were added, for if the proportion existing in |
| 1883 had continued immutable, conceiving that to be possible, till then |
| 1904 when Stephen was 22 Bloom would be 374 and in 1920 when Stephen |
| would be 38, as Bloom then was, Bloom would be 646 while in 1952 when |
| Stephen would have attained the maximum postdiluvian age of 70 Bloom, |
| being 1190 years alive having been born in the year 714, would have |
| surpassed by 221 years the maximum antediluvian age, that of Methusalah, |
| 969 years, while, if Stephen would continue to live until he would |
| attain that age in the year 3072 A.D., Bloom would have been obliged to |
| have been alive 83,300 years, having been obliged to have been born in |
| the year 81,396 B.C. |
| |
| |
| What events might nullify these calculations? |
| |
| The cessation of existence of both or either, the inauguration of a |
| new era or calendar, the annihilation of the world and consequent |
| extermination of the human species, inevitable but impredictable. |
| |
| |
| How many previous encounters proved their preexisting acquaintance? |
| |
| Two. The first in the lilacgarden of Matthew Dillon's house, Medina |
| Villa, Kimmage road, Roundtown, in 1887, in the company of Stephen's |
| mother, Stephen being then of the age of 5 and reluctant to give his |
| hand in salutation. The second in the coffeeroom of Breslin's hotel on a |
| rainy Sunday in the January of 1892, in the company of Stephen's father |
| and Stephen's granduncle, Stephen being then 5 years older. |
| |
| |
| Did Bloom accept the invitation to dinner given then by the son and |
| afterwards seconded by the father? |
| |
| Very gratefully, with grateful appreciation, with sincere appreciative |
| gratitude, in appreciatively grateful sincerity of regret, he declined. |
| |
| |
| Did their conversation on the subject of these reminiscences reveal a |
| third connecting link between them? |
| |
| Mrs Riordan (Dante), a widow of independent means, had resided in the |
| house of Stephen's parents from 1 September 1888 to 29 December 1891 and |
| had also resided during the years 1892, 1893 and 1894 in the City Arms |
| Hotel owned by Elizabeth O'Dowd of 54 Prussia street where, during parts |
| of the years 1893 and 1894, she had been a constant informant of Bloom |
| who resided also in the same hotel, being at that time a clerk in the |
| employment of Joseph Cuffe of 5 Smithfield for the superintendence of |
| sales in the adjacent Dublin Cattle market on the North Circular road. |
| |
| |
| Had he performed any special corporal work of mercy for her? |
| |
| He had sometimes propelled her on warm summer evenings, an infirm widow |
| of independent, if limited, means, in her convalescent bathchair |
| with slow revolutions of its wheels as far as the corner of the North |
| Circular road opposite Mr Gavin Low's place of business where she had |
| remained for a certain time scanning through his onelensed binocular |
| fieldglasses unrecognisable citizens on tramcars, roadster bicycles |
| equipped with inflated pneumatic tyres, hackney carriages, tandems, |
| private and hired landaus, dogcarts, ponytraps and brakes passing from |
| the city to the Phoenix Park and vice versa. |
| |
| |
| Why could he then support that his vigil with the greater equanimity? |
| |
| Because in middle youth he had often sat observing through a rondel |
| of bossed glass of a multicoloured pane the spectacle offered with |
| continual changes of the thoroughfare without, pedestrians, quadrupeds, |
| velocipedes, vehicles, passing slowly, quickly, evenly, round and round |
| and round the rim of a round and round precipitous globe. |
| |
| |
| What distinct different memories had each of her now eight years |
| deceased? |
| |
| The older, her bezique cards and counters, her Skye terrier, her |
| suppositious wealth, her lapses of responsiveness and incipient |
| catarrhal deafness: the younger, her lamp of colza oil before the statue |
| of the Immaculate Conception, her green and maroon brushes for Charles |
| Stewart Parnell and for Michael Davitt, her tissue papers. |
| |
| |
| Were there no means still remaining to him to achieve the rejuvenation |
| which these reminiscences divulged to a younger companion rendered the |
| more desirable? |
| |
| The indoor exercises, formerly intermittently practised, subsequently |
| abandoned, prescribed in Eugen Sandow's _Physical Strength and How to |
| Obtain It_ which, designed particularly for commercial men engaged in |
| sedentary occupations, were to be made with mental concentration in |
| front of a mirror so as to bring into play the various families of |
| muscles and produce successively a pleasant rigidity, a more pleasant |
| relaxation and the most pleasant repristination of juvenile agility. |
| |
| |
| Had any special agility been his in earlier youth? |
| |
| Though ringweight lifting had been beyond his strength and the full |
| circle gyration beyond his courage yet as a High school scholar he |
| had excelled in his stable and protracted execution of the half lever |
| movement on the parallel bars in consequence of his abnormally developed |
| abdominal muscles. |
| |
| |
| Did either openly allude to their racial difference? |
| |
| Neither. |
| |
| |
| What, reduced to their simplest reciprocal form, were Bloom's thoughts |
| about Stephen's thoughts about Bloom and about Stephen's thoughts about |
| Bloom's thoughts about Stephen? |
| |
| He thought that he thought that he was a jew whereas he knew that he |
| knew that he knew that he was not. |
| |
| |
| What, the enclosures of reticence removed, were their respective |
| parentages? |
| |
| Bloom, only born male transubstantial heir of Rudolf Virag (subsequently |
| Rudolph Bloom) of Szombathely, Vienna, Budapest, Milan, London and |
| Dublin and of Ellen Higgins, second daughter of Julius Higgins (born |
| Karoly) and Fanny Higgins (born Hegarty). Stephen, eldest surviving male |
| consubstantial heir of Simon Dedalus of Cork and Dublin and of Mary, |
| daughter of Richard and Christina Goulding (born Grier). |
| |
| |
| Had Bloom and Stephen been baptised, and where and by whom, cleric or |
| layman? |
| |
| Bloom (three times), by the reverend Mr Gilmer Johnston M. A., alone, |
| in the protestant church of Saint Nicholas Without, Coombe, by James |
| O'Connor, Philip Gilligan and James Fitzpatrick, together, under a pump |
| in the village of Swords, and by the reverend Charles Malone C. C., in |
| the church of the Three Patrons, Rathgar. Stephen (once) by the reverend |
| Charles Malone C. C., alone, in the church of the Three Patrons, |
| Rathgar. |
| |
| |
| Did they find their educational careers similar? |
| |
| Substituting Stephen for Bloom Stoom would have passed successively |
| through a dame's school and the high school. Substituting Bloom for |
| Stephen Blephen would have passed successively through the preparatory, |
| junior, middle and senior grades of the intermediate and through the |
| matriculation, first arts, second arts and arts degree courses of the |
| royal university. |
| |
| |
| Why did Bloom refrain from stating that he had frequented the university |
| of life? |
| |
| Because of his fluctuating incertitude as to whether this observation |
| had or had not been already made by him to Stephen or by Stephen to him. |
| |
| |
| What two temperaments did they individually represent? |
| |
| The scientific. The artistic. |
| |
| |
| What proofs did Bloom adduce to prove that his tendency was towards |
| applied, rather than towards pure, science? |
| |
| Certain possible inventions of which he had cogitated when reclining |
| in a state of supine repletion to aid digestion, stimulated by his |
| appreciation of the importance of inventions now common but once |
| revolutionary, for example, the aeronautic parachute, the reflecting |
| telescope, the spiral corkscrew, the safety pin, the mineral water |
| siphon, the canal lock with winch and sluice, the suction pump. |
| |
| |
| Were these inventions principally intended for an improved scheme of |
| kindergarten? |
| |
| Yes, rendering obsolete popguns, elastic airbladders, games of hazard, |
| catapults. They comprised astronomical kaleidoscopes exhibiting the |
| twelve constellations of the zodiac from Aries to Pisces, miniature |
| mechanical orreries, arithmetical gelatine lozenges, geometrical |
| to correspond with zoological biscuits, globemap playing balls, |
| historically costumed dolls. |
| |
| |
| What also stimulated him in his cogitations? |
| |
| The financial success achieved by Ephraim Marks and Charles A. James, |
| the former by his 1d bazaar at 42 George's street, south, the latter |
| at his 6 1/2d shop and world's fancy fair and waxwork exhibition at 30 |
| Henry street, admission 2d, children 1d: and the infinite possibilities |
| hitherto unexploited of the modern art of advertisement if condensed |
| in triliteral monoideal symbols, vertically of maximum visibility |
| (divined), horizontally of maximum legibility (deciphered) and of |
| magnetising efficacy to arrest involuntary attention, to interest, to |
| convince, to decide. |
| |
| |
| Such as? |
| |
| K. II. Kino's 11/- Trousers. House of Keys. Alexander J. Keyes. |
| |
| |
| Such as not? |
| |
| Look at this long candle. Calculate when it burns out and you receive |
| gratis 1 pair of our special non-compo boots, guaranteed 1 candle power. |
| Address: Barclay and Cook, 18 Talbot street. |
| |
| Bacilikil (Insect Powder). Veribest (Boot Blacking). Uwantit (Combined |
| pocket twoblade penknife with corkscrew, nailfile and pipecleaner). |
| |
| |
| Such as never? |
| |
| What is home without Plumtree's Potted Meat? |
| |
| Incomplete. |
| |
| With it an abode of bliss. |
| |
| Manufactured by George Plumtree, 23 Merchants' quay, Dublin, put up in |
| 4 oz pots, and inserted by Councillor Joseph P. Nannetti, M. P., Rotunda |
| Ward, 19 Hardwicke street, under the obituary notices and anniversaries |
| of deceases. The name on the label is Plumtree. A plumtree in a meatpot, |
| registered trade mark. Beware of imitations. Peatmot. Trumplee. Moutpat. |
| Plamtroo. |
| |
| |
| Which example did he adduce to induce Stephen to deduce that |
| originality, though producing its own reward, does not invariably |
| conduce to success? |
| |
| His own ideated and rejected project of an illuminated showcart, drawn |
| by a beast of burden, in which two smartly dressed girls were to be |
| seated engaged in writing. |
| |
| |
| What suggested scene was then constructed by Stephen? |
| |
| Solitary hotel in mountain pass. Autumn. Twilight. Fire lit. In dark |
| corner young man seated. Young woman enters. Restless. Solitary. She |
| sits. She goes to window. She stands. She sits. Twilight. She thinks. |
| On solitary hotel paper she writes. She thinks. She writes. She sighs. |
| Wheels and hoofs. She hurries out. He comes from his dark corner. He |
| seizes solitary paper. He holds it towards fire. Twilight. He reads. |
| Solitary. |
| |
| |
| What? |
| |
| In sloping, upright and backhands: Queen's Hotel, Queen's Hotel, Queen's |
| Hotel. Queen's Ho... |
| |
| |
| What suggested scene was then reconstructed by Bloom? |
| |
| The Queen's Hotel, Ennis, county Clare, where Rudolph Bloom (Rudolf |
| Virag) died on the evening of the 27 June 1886, at some hour unstated, |
| in consequence of an overdose of monkshood (aconite) selfadministered in |
| the form of a neuralgic liniment composed of 2 parts of aconite liniment |
| to I of chloroform liniment (purchased by him at 10.20 a.m. on the |
| morning of 27 June 1886 at the medical hall of Francis Dennehy, 17 |
| Church street, Ennis) after having, though not in consequence of having, |
| purchased at 3.15 p.m. on the afternoon of 27 June 1886 a new boater |
| straw hat, extra smart (after having, though not in consequence of |
| having, purchased at the hour and in the place aforesaid, the toxin |
| aforesaid), at the general drapery store of James Cullen, 4 Main street, |
| Ennis. |
| |
| |
| Did he attribute this homonymity to information or coincidence or |
| intuition? |
| |
| Coincidence. |
| |
| |
| Did he depict the scene verbally for his guest to see? |
| |
| He preferred himself to see another's face and listen to another's |
| words by which potential narration was realised and kinetic temperament |
| relieved. |
| |
| |
| Did he see only a second coincidence in the second scene narrated to |
| him, described by the narrator as _A Pisgah Sight of Palestine or The |
| Parable of the Plums_? |
| |
| It, with the preceding scene and with others unnarrated but existent by |
| implication, to which add essays on various subjects or moral apothegms |
| (e.g. _My Favourite Hero or Procrastination is the Thief of Time_) |
| composed during schoolyears, seemed to him to contain in itself and |
| in conjunction with the personal equation certain possibilities of |
| financial, social, personal and sexual success, whether specially |
| collected and selected as model pedagogic themes (of cent per cent |
| merit) for the use of preparatory and junior grade students or |
| contributed in printed form, following the precedent of Philip Beaufoy |
| or Doctor Dick or Heblon's _Studies in Blue_, to a publication of |
| certified circulation and solvency or employed verbally as intellectual |
| stimulation for sympathetic auditors, tacitly appreciative of successful |
| narrative and confidently augurative of successful achievement, during |
| the increasingly longer nights gradually following the summer solstice |
| on the day but three following, videlicet, Tuesday, 21 June (S. Aloysius |
| Gonzaga), sunrise 3.33 a.m., sunset 8.29 p.m. |
| |
| |
| Which domestic problem as much as, if not more than, any other |
| frequently engaged his mind? |
| |
| What to do with our wives. |
| |
| |
| What had been his hypothetical singular solutions? |
| |
| Parlour games (dominos, halma, tiddledywinks, spilikins, cup and ball, |
| nap, spoil five, bezique, twentyfive, beggar my neighbour, draughts, |
| chess or backgammon): embroidery, darning or knitting for the |
| policeaided clothing society: musical duets, mandoline and guitar, piano |
| and flute, guitar and piano: legal scrivenery or envelope addressing: |
| biweekly visits to variety entertainments: commercial activity as |
| pleasantly commanding and pleasingly obeyed mistress proprietress in |
| a cool dairy shop or warm cigar divan: the clandestine satisfaction of |
| erotic irritation in masculine brothels, state inspected and medically |
| controlled: social visits, at regular infrequent prevented intervals |
| and with regular frequent preventive superintendence, to and from female |
| acquaintances of recognised respectability in the vicinity: courses of |
| evening instruction specially designed to render liberal instruction |
| agreeable. |
| |
| |
| What instances of deficient mental development in his wife inclined him |
| in favour of the lastmentioned (ninth) solution? |
| |
| In disoccupied moments she had more than once covered a sheet of paper |
| with signs and hieroglyphics which she stated were Greek and Irish and |
| Hebrew characters. She had interrogated constantly at varying intervals |
| as to the correct method of writing the capital initial of the name of |
| a city in Canada, Quebec. She understood little of political |
| complications, internal, or balance of power, external. In calculating |
| the addenda of bills she frequently had recourse to digital aid. |
| After completion of laconic epistolary compositions she abandoned |
| the implement of calligraphy in the encaustic pigment, exposed to |
| the corrosive action of copperas, green vitriol and nutgall. Unusual |
| polysyllables of foreign origin she interpreted phonetically or by false |
| analogy or by both: metempsychosis (met him pike hoses), _alias_ (a |
| mendacious person mentioned in sacred scripture). |
| |
| |
| What compensated in the false balance of her intelligence for these and |
| such deficiencies of judgment regarding persons, places and things? |
| |
| The false apparent parallelism of all perpendicular arms of all |
| balances, proved true by construction. The counterbalance of her |
| proficiency of judgment regarding one person, proved true by experiment. |
| |
| |
| How had he attempted to remedy this state of comparative ignorance? |
| |
| Variously. By leaving in a conspicuous place a certain book open at a |
| certain page: by assuming in her, when alluding explanatorily, latent |
| knowledge: by open ridicule in her presence of some absent other's |
| ignorant lapse. |
| |
| |
| With what success had he attempted direct instruction? |
| |
| She followed not all, a part of the whole, gave attention with interest |
| comprehended with surprise, with care repeated, with greater difficulty |
| remembered, forgot with ease, with misgiving reremembered, rerepeated |
| with error. |
| |
| |
| What system had proved more effective? |
| |
| Indirect suggestion implicating selfinterest. |
| |
| |
| Example? |
| |
| She disliked umbrella with rain, he liked woman with umbrella, she |
| disliked new hat with rain, he liked woman with new hat, he bought new |
| hat with rain, she carried umbrella with new hat. |
| |
| |
| Accepting the analogy implied in his guest's parable which examples of |
| postexilic eminence did he adduce? |
| |
| Three seekers of the pure truth, Moses of Egypt, Moses Maimonides, |
| author of _More Nebukim_ (Guide of the Perplexed) and Moses Mendelssohn |
| of such eminence that from Moses (of Egypt) to Moses (Mendelssohn) there |
| arose none like Moses (Maimonides). |
| |
| |
| What statement was made, under correction, by Bloom concerning a fourth |
| seeker of pure truth, by name Aristotle, mentioned, with permission, by |
| Stephen? |
| |
| That the seeker mentioned had been a pupil of a rabbinical philosopher, |
| name uncertain. |
| |
| |
| Were other anapocryphal illustrious sons of the law and children of a |
| selected or rejected race mentioned? |
| |
| Felix Bartholdy Mendelssohn (composer), Baruch Spinoza (philosopher), |
| Mendoza (pugilist), Ferdinand Lassalle (reformer, duellist). |
| |
| |
| What fragments of verse from the ancient Hebrew and ancient Irish |
| languages were cited with modulations of voice and translation of texts |
| by guest to host and by host to guest? |
| |
| By Stephen: _suil, suil, suil arun, suil go siocair agus suil go cuin_ |
| (walk, walk, walk your way, walk in safety, walk with care). |
| |
| |
| By Bloom: _Kkifeloch, harimon rakatejch m'baad l'zamatejch_ (thy temple |
| amid thy hair is as a slice of pomegranate). |
| |
| |
| How was a glyphic comparison of the phonic symbols of both languages |
| made in substantiation of the oral comparison? |
| |
| By juxtaposition. On the penultimate blank page of a book of inferior |
| literary style, entituled _Sweets of Sin_ (produced by Bloom and so |
| manipulated that its front cover came in contact with the surface of |
| the table) with a pencil (supplied by Stephen) Stephen wrote the Irish |
| characters for gee, eh, dee, em, simple and modified, and Bloom in turn |
| wrote the Hebrew characters ghimel, aleph, daleth and (in the absence of |
| mem) a substituted qoph, explaining their arithmetical values as ordinal |
| and cardinal numbers, videlicet 3, 1, 4, and 100. |
| |
| |
| Was the knowledge possessed by both of each of these languages, the |
| extinct and the revived, theoretical or practical? |
| |
| Theoretical, being confined to certain grammatical rules of accidence |
| and syntax and practically excluding vocabulary. |
| |
| |
| What points of contact existed between these languages and between the |
| peoples who spoke them? |
| |
| The presence of guttural sounds, diacritic aspirations, epenthetic and |
| servile letters in both languages: their antiquity, both having been |
| taught on the plain of Shinar 242 years after the deluge in the seminary |
| instituted by Fenius Farsaigh, descendant of Noah, progenitor of Israel, |
| and ascendant of Heber and Heremon, progenitors of Ireland: their |
| archaeological, genealogical, hagiographical, exegetical, homiletic, |
| toponomastic, historical and religious literatures comprising the works |
| of rabbis and culdees, Torah, Talmud (Mischna and Ghemara), Massor, |
| Pentateuch, Book of the Dun Cow, Book of Ballymote, Garland of Howth, |
| Book of Kells: their dispersal, persecution, survival and revival: the |
| isolation of their synagogical and ecclesiastical rites in ghetto (S. |
| Mary's Abbey) and masshouse (Adam and Eve's tavern): the proscription |
| of their national costumes in penal laws and jewish dress acts: the |
| restoration in Chanah David of Zion and the possibility of Irish |
| political autonomy or devolution. |
| |
| |
| What anthem did Bloom chant partially in anticipation of that multiple, |
| ethnically irreducible consummation? |
| |
| _Kolod balejwaw pnimah |
| Nefesch, jehudi, homijah._ |
| |
| |
| Why was the chant arrested at the conclusion of this first distich? |
| |
| In consequence of defective mnemotechnic. |
| |
| |
| How did the chanter compensate for this deficiency? |
| |
| By a periphrastic version of the general text. |
| |
| |
| In what common study did their mutual reflections merge? |
| |
| The increasing simplification traceable from the Egyptian epigraphic |
| hieroglyphs to the Greek and Roman alphabets and the anticipation of |
| modern stenography and telegraphic code in the cuneiform inscriptions |
| (Semitic) and the virgular quinquecostate ogham writing (Celtic). Did |
| the guest comply with his host's request? |
| |
| Doubly, by appending his signature in Irish and Roman characters. |
| |
| What was Stephen's auditive sensation? |
| |
| He heard in a profound ancient male unfamiliar melody the accumulation |
| of the past. |
| |
| |
| What was Bloom's visual sensation? |
| |
| He saw in a quick young male familiar form the predestination of a |
| future. |
| |
| |
| What were Stephen's and Bloom's quasisimultaneous volitional |
| quasisensations of concealed identities? |
| |
| Visually, Stephen's: The traditional figure of hypostasis, depicted |
| by Johannes Damascenus, Lentulus Romanus and Epiphanius Monachus as |
| leucodermic, sesquipedalian with winedark hair. Auditively, Bloom's: The |
| traditional accent of the ecstasy of catastrophe. |
| |
| |
| What future careers had been possible for Bloom in the past and with |
| what exemplars? |
| |
| In the church, Roman, Anglican or Nonconformist: exemplars, the very |
| reverend John Conmee S. J., the reverend T. Salmon, D. D., provost of |
| Trinity college, Dr Alexander J. Dowie. At the bar, English or Irish: |
| exemplars, Seymour Bushe, K. C., Rufus Isaacs, K. C. On the stage modern |
| or Shakespearean: exemplars, Charles Wyndham, high comedian Osmond |
| Tearle (died 1901), exponent of Shakespeare. |
| |
| |
| Did the host encourage his guest to chant in a modulated voice a strange |
| legend on an allied theme? |
| |
| Reassuringly, their place, where none could hear them talk, being |
| secluded, reassured, the decocted beverages, allowing for subsolid |
| residual sediment of a mechanical mixture, water plus sugar plus cream |
| plus cocoa, having been consumed. |
| |
| |
| Recite the first (major) part of this chanted legend. |
| |
| _Little Harry Hughes and his schoolfellows all |
| Went out for to play ball. |
| And the very first ball little Harry Hughes played |
| He drove it o'er the jew's garden wall. |
| And the very second ball little Harry Hughes played |
| He broke the jew's windows all._ |
| |
| |
| |
| How did the son of Rudolph receive this first part? |
| |
| |
| With unmixed feeling. Smiling, a jew he heard with pleasure and saw the |
| unbroken kitchen window. |
| |
| |
| Recite the second part (minor) of the legend. |
| |
| _Then out there came the jew's daughter |
| And she all dressed in green. |
| "Come back, come back, you pretty little boy, |
| And play your ball again." |
| |
| "I can't come back and I won't come back |
| Without my schoolfellows all. |
| For if my master he did hear |
| He'd make it a sorry ball." |
| |
| She took him by the lilywhite hand |
| And led him along the hall |
| Until she led him to a room |
| Where none could hear him call. |
| |
| She took a penknife out of her pocket |
| And cut off his little head. |
| And now he'll play his ball no more |
| For he lies among the dead._ |
| |
| |
| How did the father of Millicent receive this second part? |
| |
| With mixed feelings. Unsmiling, he heard and saw with wonder a jew's |
| daughter, all dressed in green. |
| |
| |
| Condense Stephen's commentary. |
| |
| One of all, the least of all, is the victim predestined. Once by |
| inadvertence twice by design he challenges his destiny. It comes when he |
| is abandoned and challenges him reluctant and, as an apparition of hope |
| and youth, holds him unresisting. It leads him to a strange habitation, |
| to a secret infidel apartment, and there, implacable, immolates him, |
| consenting. |
| |
| |
| Why was the host (victim predestined) sad? |
| |
| He wished that a tale of a deed should be told of a deed not by him |
| should by him not be told. |
| |
| |
| Why was the host (reluctant, unresisting) still? |
| |
| In accordance with the law of the conservation of energy. |
| |
| |
| Why was the host (secret infidel) silent? |
| |
| He weighed the possible evidences for and against ritual murder: the |
| incitations of the hierarchy, the superstition of the populace, the |
| propagation of rumour in continued fraction of veridicity, the envy of |
| opulence, the influence of retaliation, the sporadic reappearance of |
| atavistic delinquency, the mitigating circumstances of fanaticism, |
| hypnotic suggestion and somnambulism. |
| |
| |
| From which (if any) of these mental or physical disorders was he not |
| totally immune? |
| |
| From hypnotic suggestion: once, waking, he had not recognised his |
| sleeping apartment: more than once, waking, he had been for an |
| indefinite time incapable of moving or uttering sounds. From |
| somnambulism: once, sleeping, his body had risen, crouched and |
| crawled in the direction of a heatless fire and, having attained |
| its destination, there, curled, unheated, in night attire had lain, |
| sleeping. |
| |
| |
| Had this latter or any cognate phenomenon declared itself in any member |
| of his family? |
| |
| Twice, in Holles street and in Ontario terrace, his daughter Millicent |
| (Milly) at the ages of 6 and 8 years had uttered in sleep an exclamation |
| of terror and had replied to the interrogations of two figures in night |
| attire with a vacant mute expression. |
| |
| |
| What other infantile memories had he of her? |
| |
| 15 June 1889. A querulous newborn female infant crying to cause and |
| lessen congestion. A child renamed Padney Socks she shook with shocks |
| her moneybox: counted his three free moneypenny buttons, one, tloo, |
| tlee: a doll, a boy, a sailor she cast away: blond, born of two dark, |
| she had blond ancestry, remote, a violation, Herr Hauptmann Hainau, |
| Austrian army, proximate, a hallucination, lieutenant Mulvey, British |
| navy. |
| |
| |
| What endemic characteristics were present? |
| |
| Conversely the nasal and frontal formation was derived in a direct |
| line of lineage which, though interrupted, would continue at distant |
| intervals to more distant intervals to its most distant intervals. |
| |
| |
| What memories had he of her adolescence? |
| |
| She relegated her hoop and skippingrope to a recess. On the duke's lawn, |
| entreated by an English visitor, she declined to permit him to make and |
| take away her photographic image (objection not stated). On the South |
| Circular road in the company of Elsa Potter, followed by an individual |
| of sinister aspect, she went half way down Stamer street and turned |
| abruptly back (reason of change not stated). On the vigil of the 15th |
| anniversary of her birth she wrote a letter from Mullingar, county |
| Westmeath, making a brief allusion to a local student (faculty and year |
| not stated). |
| |
| |
| Did that first division, portending a second division, afflict him? |
| |
| Less than he had imagined, more than he had hoped. |
| |
| |
| What second departure was contemporaneously perceived by him similarly, |
| if differently? |
| |
| A temporary departure of his cat. |
| |
| |
| Why similarly, why differently? |
| |
| Similarly, because actuated by a secret purpose the quest of a new male |
| |
| (Mullingar student) or of a healing herb (valerian). Differently, |
| because of different possible returns to the inhabitants or to the |
| habitation. |
| |
| |
| In other respects were their differences similar? |
| |
| In passivity, in economy, in the instinct of tradition, in |
| unexpectedness. |
| |
| |
| As? |
| |
| Inasmuch as leaning she sustained her blond hair for him to ribbon it |
| for her (cf neckarching cat). Moreover, on the free surface of the lake |
| in Stephen's green amid inverted reflections of trees her uncommented |
| spit, describing concentric circles of waterrings, indicated by the |
| constancy of its permanence the locus of a somnolent prostrate fish (cf |
| mousewatching cat). |
| |
| Again, in order to remember the date, combatants, issue and consequences |
| of a famous military engagement she pulled a plait of her hair (cf |
| earwashing cat). Furthermore, silly Milly, she dreamed of having had |
| an unspoken unremembered conversation with a horse whose name had been |
| Joseph to whom (which) she had offered a tumblerful of lemonade which |
| it (he) had appeared to have accepted (cf hearthdreaming cat). Hence, in |
| passivity, in economy, in the instinct of tradition, in unexpectedness, |
| their differences were similar. |
| |
| |
| In what way had he utilised gifts (1) an owl, (2) a clock, given as |
| matrimonial auguries, to interest and to instruct her? |
| |
| As object lessons to explain: 1) the nature and habits of oviparous |
| animals, the possibility of aerial flight, certain abnormalities of |
| vision, the secular process of imbalsamation: 2) the principle of the |
| pendulum, exemplified in bob, wheelgear and regulator, the translation |
| in terms of human or social regulation of the various positions of |
| clockwise moveable indicators on an unmoving dial, the exactitude of the |
| recurrence per hour of an instant in each hour when the longer and the |
| shorter indicator were at the same angle of inclination, _videlicet_, 5 |
| 5/11 minutes past each hour per hour in arithmetical progression. |
| |
| |
| In what manners did she reciprocate? |
| |
| She remembered: on the 27th anniversary of his birth she presented to |
| him a breakfast moustachecup of imitation Crown Derby porcelain ware. |
| She provided: at quarter day or thereabouts if or when purchases |
| had been made by him not for her she showed herself attentive to his |
| necessities, anticipating his desires. She admired: a natural phenomenon |
| having been explained by him to her she expressed the immediate desire |
| to possess without gradual acquisition a fraction of his science, the |
| moiety, the quarter, a thousandth part. |
| |
| |
| What proposal did Bloom, diambulist, father of Milly, somnambulist, make |
| to Stephen, noctambulist? |
| |
| To pass in repose the hours intervening between Thursday (proper) and |
| Friday (normal) on an extemporised cubicle in the apartment immediately |
| above the kitchen and immediately adjacent to the sleeping apartment of |
| his host and hostess. |
| |
| |
| What various advantages would or might have resulted from a prolongation |
| of such an extemporisation? |
| |
| For the guest: security of domicile and seclusion of study. For the |
| host: rejuvenation of intelligence, vicarious satisfaction. For the |
| hostess: disintegration of obsession, acquisition of correct Italian |
| pronunciation. |
| |
| |
| Why might these several provisional contingencies between a guest and |
| a hostess not necessarily preclude or be precluded by a permanent |
| eventuality of reconciliatory union between a schoolfellow and a jew's |
| daughter? |
| |
| Because the way to daughter led through mother, the way to mother |
| through daughter. |
| |
| |
| To what inconsequent polysyllabic question of his host did the guest |
| return a monosyllabic negative answer? |
| |
| If he had known the late Mrs Emily Sinico, accidentally killed at Sydney |
| Parade railway station, 14 October 1903. |
| |
| |
| What inchoate corollary statement was consequently suppressed by the |
| host? |
| |
| A statement explanatory of his absence on the occasion of the interment |
| of Mrs Mary Dedalus (born Goulding), 26 June 1903, vigil of the |
| anniversary of the decease of Rudolph Bloom (born Virag). |
| |
| |
| Was the proposal of asylum accepted? |
| |
| Promptly, inexplicably, with amicability, gratefully it was declined. |
| What exchange of money took place between host and guest? |
| |
| The former returned to the latter, without interest, a sum of money |
| (1-7-0), one pound seven shillings sterling, advanced by the latter to |
| the former. |
| |
| |
| What counterproposals were alternately advanced, accepted, modified, |
| declined, restated in other terms, reaccepted, ratified, reconfirmed? |
| |
| To inaugurate a prearranged course of Italian instruction, place |
| the residence of the instructed. To inaugurate a course of vocal |
| instruction, place the residence of the instructress. To inaugurate |
| a series of static semistatic and peripatetic intellectual dialogues, |
| places the residence of both speakers (if both speakers were resident in |
| the same place), the Ship hotel and tavern, 6 Lower Abbey street (W. and |
| E. Connery, proprietors), the National Library of Ireland, 10 Kildare |
| street, the National Maternity Hospital, 29, 30 and 31 Holles street, a |
| public garden, the vicinity of a place of worship, a conjunction of two |
| or more public thoroughfares, the point of bisection of a right line |
| drawn between their residences (if both speakers were resident in |
| different places). |
| |
| |
| What rendered problematic for Bloom the realisation of these mutually |
| selfexcluding propositions? |
| |
| The irreparability of the past: once at a performance of Albert |
| Hengler's circus in the Rotunda, Rutland square, Dublin, an intuitive |
| particoloured clown in quest of paternity had penetrated from the ring |
| to a place in the auditorium where Bloom, solitary, was seated and had |
| publicly declared to an exhilarated audience that he (Bloom) was his |
| (the clown's) papa. The imprevidibility of the future: once in the |
| summer of 1898 he (Bloom) had marked a florin (2/-) with three notches |
| on the milled edge and tendered it m payment of an account due to and |
| received by J. and T. Davy, family grocers, 1 Charlemont Mall, Grand |
| Canal, for circulation on the waters of civic finance, for possible, |
| circuitous or direct, return. |
| |
| |
| Was the clown Bloom's son? |
| |
| No. |
| |
| |
| Had Bloom's coin returned? |
| |
| Never. |
| |
| |
| Why would a recurrent frustration the more depress him? |
| |
| Because at the critical turningpoint of human existence he desired to |
| amend many social conditions, the product of inequality and avarice and |
| international animosity. He believed then that human life was infinitely |
| perfectible, eliminating these conditions? |
| |
| There remained the generic conditions imposed by natural, as distinct |
| from human law, as integral parts of the human whole: the necessity of |
| destruction to procure alimentary sustenance: the painful character of |
| the ultimate functions of separate existence, the agonies of birth and |
| death: the monotonous menstruation of simian and (particularly) human |
| females extending from the age of puberty to the menopause: inevitable |
| accidents at sea, in mines and factories: certain very painful maladies |
| and their resultant surgical operations, innate lunacy and congenital |
| criminality, decimating epidemics: catastrophic cataclysms which make |
| terror the basis of human mentality: seismic upheavals the epicentres |
| of which are located in densely populated regions: the fact of vital |
| growth, through convulsions of metamorphosis, from infancy through |
| maturity to decay. |
| |
| |
| Why did he desist from speculation? |
| |
| Because it was a task for a superior intelligence to substitute other |
| more acceptable phenomena in the place of the less acceptable phenomena |
| to be removed. |
| |
| |
| Did Stephen participate in his dejection? |
| |
| He affirmed his significance as a conscious rational animal proceeding |
| syllogistically from the known to the unknown and a conscious rational |
| reagent between a micro and a macrocosm ineluctably constructed upon the |
| incertitude of the void. |
| |
| |
| Was this affirmation apprehended by Bloom? |
| |
| Not verbally. Substantially. |
| |
| |
| What comforted his misapprehension? |
| |
| That as a competent keyless citizen he had proceeded energetically from |
| the unknown to the known through the incertitude of the void. |
| |
| |
| In what order of precedence, with what attendant ceremony was the exodus |
| from the house of bondage to the wilderness of inhabitation effected? |
| |
| Lighted Candle in Stick borne by |
| |
| BLOOM |
| |
| Diaconal Hat on Ashplant borne by |
| |
| STEPHEN: |
| |
| |
| With what intonation secreto of what commemorative psalm? |
| |
| The 113th, _modus peregrinus: In exitu Israel de Egypto: domus Jacob de |
| populo barbaro_. |
| |
| |
| What did each do at the door of egress? |
| |
| Bloom set the candlestick on the floor. Stephen put the hat on his head. |
| |
| |
| For what creature was the door of egress a door of ingress? |
| |
| For a cat. |
| |
| |
| What spectacle confronted them when they, first the host, then the |
| guest, emerged silently, doubly dark, from obscurity by a passage from |
| the rere of the house into the penumbra of the garden? |
| |
| The heaventree of stars hung with humid nightblue fruit. |
| |
| |
| With what meditations did Bloom accompany his demonstration to his |
| companion of various constellations? |
| |
| Meditations of evolution increasingly vaster: of the moon invisible in |
| incipient lunation, approaching perigee: of the infinite lattiginous |
| scintillating uncondensed milky way, discernible by daylight by an |
| observer placed at the lower end of a cylindrical vertical shaft 5000 |
| ft deep sunk from the surface towards the centre of the earth: of Sirius |
| (alpha in Canis Maior) 10 lightyears (57,000,000,000,000 miles) distant |
| and in volume 900 times the dimension of our planet: of Arcturus: of the |
| precession of equinoxes: of Orion with belt and sextuple sun theta and |
| nebula in which 100 of our solar systems could be contained: of moribund |
| and of nascent new stars such as Nova in 1901: of our system plunging |
| towards the constellation of Hercules: of the parallax or parallactic |
| drift of socalled fixed stars, in reality evermoving wanderers from |
| immeasurably remote eons to infinitely remote futures in comparison with |
| which the years, threescore and ten, of allotted human life formed a |
| parenthesis of infinitesimal brevity. |
| |
| |
| Were there obverse meditations of involution increasingly less vast? |
| |
| Of the eons of geological periods recorded in the stratifications of the |
| earth: of the myriad minute entomological organic existences concealed |
| in cavities of the earth, beneath removable stones, in hives and mounds, |
| of microbes, germs, bacteria, bacilli, spermatozoa: of the incalculable |
| trillions of billions of millions of imperceptible molecules contained |
| by cohesion of molecular affinity in a single pinhead: of the universe |
| of human serum constellated with red and white bodies, themselves |
| universes of void space constellated with other bodies, each, in |
| continuity, its universe of divisible component bodies of which each was |
| again divisible in divisions of redivisible component bodies, dividends |
| and divisors ever diminishing without actual division till, if the |
| progress were carried far enough, nought nowhere was never reached. |
| |
| |
| Why did he not elaborate these calculations to a more precise result? |
| |
| Because some years previously in 1886 when occupied with the problem |
| of the quadrature of the circle he had learned of the existence of a |
| number computed to a relative degree of accuracy to be of such magnitude |
| and of so many places, e.g., the 9th power of the 9th power of 9, that, |
| the result having been obtained, 33 closely printed volumes of 1000 |
| pages each of innumerable quires and reams of India paper would have to |
| be requisitioned in order to contain the complete tale of its printed |
| integers of units, tens, hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, |
| hundreds of thousands, millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions, |
| billions, the nucleus of the nebula of every digit of every series |
| containing succinctly the potentiality of being raised to the utmost |
| kinetic elaboration of any power of any of its powers. |
| |
| |
| Did he find the problems of the inhabitability of the planets and their |
| satellites by a race, given in species, and of the possible social and |
| moral redemption of said race by a redeemer, easier of solution? |
| |
| Of a different order of difficulty. Conscious that the human organism, |
| normally capable of sustaining an atmospheric pressure of 19 tons, |
| when elevated to a considerable altitude in the terrestrial atmosphere |
| suffered with arithmetical progression of intensity, according as |
| the line of demarcation between troposphere and stratosphere was |
| approximated from nasal hemorrhage, impeded respiration and vertigo, |
| when proposing this problem for solution, he had conjectured as a |
| working hypothesis which could not be proved impossible that a more |
| adaptable and differently anatomically constructed race of beings might |
| subsist otherwise under Martian, Mercurial, Veneral, Jovian, Saturnian, |
| Neptunian or Uranian sufficient and equivalent conditions, though |
| an apogean humanity of beings created in varying forms with finite |
| differences resulting similar to the whole and to one another would |
| probably there as here remain inalterably and inalienably attached to |
| vanities, to vanities of vanities and to all that is vanity. |
| |
| And the problem of possible redemption? |
| The minor was proved by the major. |
| |
| |
| Which various features of the constellations were in turn considered? |
| |
| The various colours significant of various degrees of vitality (white, |
| yellow, crimson, vermilion, cinnabar): their degrees of brilliancy: |
| their magnitudes revealed up to and including the 7th: their positions: |
| the waggoner's star: Walsingham way: the chariot of David: the annular |
| cinctures of Saturn: the condensation of spiral nebulae into suns: the |
| interdependent gyrations of double suns: the independent synchronous |
| discoveries of Galileo, Simon Marius, Piazzi, Le Verrier, Herschel, |
| Galle: the systematisations attempted by Bode and Kepler of cubes |
| of distances and squares of times of revolution: the almost infinite |
| compressibility of hirsute comets and their vast elliptical egressive |
| and reentrant orbits from perihelion to aphelion: the sidereal origin of |
| meteoric stones: the Libyan floods on Mars about the period of the birth |
| of the younger astroscopist: the annual recurrence of meteoric showers |
| about the period of the feast of S. Lawrence (martyr, lo August): the |
| monthly recurrence known as the new moon with the old moon in her arms: |
| the posited influence of celestial on human bodies: the appearance of a |
| star (1st magnitude) of exceeding brilliancy dominating by night and |
| day (a new luminous sun generated by the collision and amalgamation in |
| incandescence of two nonluminous exsuns) about the period of the |
| birth of William Shakespeare over delta in the recumbent neversetting |
| constellation of Cassiopeia and of a star (2nd magnitude) of similar |
| origin but of lesser brilliancy which had appeared in and disappeared |
| from the constellation of the Corona Septentrionalis about the period |
| of the birth of Leopold Bloom and of other stars of (presumably) similar |
| origin which had (effectively or presumably) appeared in and disappeared |
| from the constellation of Andromeda about the period of the birth of |
| Stephen Dedalus, and in and from the constellation of Auriga some years |
| after the birth and death of Rudolph Bloom, junior, and in and from |
| other constellations some years before or after the birth or death of |
| other persons: the attendant phenomena of eclipses, solar and lunar, |
| from immersion to emersion, abatement of wind, transit of shadow, |
| taciturnity of winged creatures, emergence of nocturnal or crepuscular |
| animals, persistence of infernal light, obscurity of terrestrial waters, |
| pallor of human beings. |
| |
| |
| His (Bloom's) logical conclusion, having weighed the matter and allowing |
| for possible error? |
| |
| That it was not a heaventree, not a heavengrot, not a heavenbeast, not |
| a heavenman. That it was a Utopia, there being no known method from |
| the known to the unknown: an infinity renderable equally finite by the |
| suppositious apposition of one or more bodies equally of the same and of |
| different magnitudes: a mobility of illusory forms immobilised in space, |
| remobilised in air: a past which possibly had ceased to exist as a |
| present before its probable spectators had entered actual present |
| existence. |
| |
| |
| Was he more convinced of the esthetic value of the spectacle? |
| |
| Indubitably in consequence of the reiterated examples of poets in the |
| delirium of the frenzy of attachment or in the abasement of rejection |
| invoking ardent sympathetic constellations or the frigidity of the |
| satellite of their planet. |
| |
| |
| Did he then accept as an article of belief the theory of astrological |
| influences upon sublunary disasters? |
| |
| It seemed to him as possible of proof as of confutation and the |
| nomenclature employed in its selenographical charts as attributable to |
| verifiable intuition as to fallacious analogy: the lake of dreams, the |
| sea of rains, the gulf of dews, the ocean of fecundity. |
| |
| |
| What special affinities appeared to him to exist between the moon and |
| woman? |
| |
| Her antiquity in preceding and surviving successive tellurian |
| generations: her nocturnal predominance: her satellitic dependence: |
| her luminary reflection: her constancy under all her phases, rising |
| and setting by her appointed times, waxing and waning: the forced |
| invariability of her aspect: her indeterminate response to inaffirmative |
| interrogation: her potency over effluent and refluent waters: her power |
| to enamour, to mortify, to invest with beauty, to render insane, to |
| incite to and aid delinquency: the tranquil inscrutability of her |
| visage: the terribility of her isolated dominant implacable resplendent |
| propinquity: her omens of tempest and of calm: the stimulation of her |
| light, her motion and her presence: the admonition of her craters, her |
| arid seas, her silence: her splendour, when visible: her attraction, |
| when invisible. |
| |
| |
| What visible luminous sign attracted Bloom's, who attracted Stephen's, |
| gaze? |
| |
| In the second storey (rere) of his (Bloom's) house the light of a |
| paraffin oil lamp with oblique shade projected on a screen of roller |
| blind supplied by Frank O'Hara, window blind, curtain pole and revolving |
| shutter manufacturer, 16 Aungier street. |
| |
| |
| How did he elucidate the mystery of an invisible attractive person, his |
| wife Marion (Molly) Bloom, denoted by a visible splendid sign, a lamp? |
| |
| With indirect and direct verbal allusions or affirmations: with subdued |
| affection and admiration: with description: with impediment: with |
| suggestion. |
| |
| |
| Both then were silent? |
| |
| Silent, each contemplating the other in both mirrors of the reciprocal |
| flesh of theirhisnothis fellowfaces. |
| |
| |
| Were they indefinitely inactive? |
| |
| At Stephen's suggestion, at Bloom's instigation both, first Stephen, |
| then Bloom, in penumbra urinated, their sides contiguous, their organs |
| of micturition reciprocally rendered invisible by manual circumposition, |
| their gazes, first Bloom's, then Stephen's, elevated to the projected |
| luminous and semiluminous shadow. |
| |
| |
| Similarly? |
| |
| The trajectories of their, first sequent, then simultaneous, urinations |
| were dissimilar: Bloom's longer, less irruent, in the incomplete form of |
| the bifurcated penultimate alphabetical letter, who in his ultimate |
| year at High School (1880) had been capable of attaining the point |
| of greatest altitude against the whole concurrent strength of the |
| institution, 210 scholars: Stephen's higher, more sibilant, who in the |
| ultimate hours of the previous day had augmented by diuretic consumption |
| an insistent vesical pressure. |
| |
| |
| What different problems presented themselves to each concerning the |
| invisible audible collateral organ of the other? |
| |
| To Bloom: the problems of irritability, tumescence, rigidity, |
| reactivity, dimension, sanitariness, pilosity. |
| |
| To Stephen: the problem of the sacerdotal integrity of Jesus circumcised |
| (I January, holiday of obligation to hear mass and abstain from |
| unnecessary servile work) and the problem as to whether the divine |
| prepuce, the carnal bridal ring of the holy Roman catholic apostolic |
| church, conserved in Calcata, were deserving of simple hyperduly or of |
| the fourth degree of latria accorded to the abscission of such divine |
| excrescences as hair and toenails. |
| |
| |
| What celestial sign was by both simultaneously observed? |
| |
| A star precipitated with great apparent velocity across the firmament |
| from Vega in the Lyre above the zenith beyond the stargroup of the Tress |
| of Berenice towards the zodiacal sign of Leo. |
| |
| |
| How did the centripetal remainer afford egress to the centrifugal |
| departer? |
| |
| By inserting the barrel of an arruginated male key in the hole of an |
| unstable female lock, obtaining a purchase on the bow of the key and |
| turning its wards from right to left, withdrawing a bolt from its |
| staple, pulling inward spasmodically an obsolescent unhinged door and |
| revealing an aperture for free egress and free ingress. |
| |
| |
| How did they take leave, one of the other, in separation? |
| |
| Standing perpendicular at the same door and on different sides of its |
| base, the lines of their valedictory arms, meeting at any point and |
| forming any angle less than the sum of two right angles. |
| |
| |
| What sound accompanied the union of their tangent, the disunion of their |
| (respectively) centrifugal and centripetal hands? |
| |
| The sound of the peal of the hour of the night by the chime of the bells |
| in the church of Saint George. |
| |
| |
| What echoes of that sound were by both and each heard? |
| |
| By Stephen: |
| |
| _Liliata rutilantium. Turma circumdet. Iubilantium te virginum. Chorus |
| excipiat._ |
| |
| By Bloom: |
| |
| _Heigho, heigho, |
| Heigho, heigho._ |
| |
| |
| Where were the several members of the company which with Bloom that day |
| at the bidding of that peal had travelled from Sandymount in the south |
| to Glasnevin in the north? |
| |
| Martin Cunningham (in bed), Jack Power (in bed), Simon Dedalus (in bed), |
| Ned Lambert (in bed), Tom Kernan (in bed), Joe Hynes (in bed), John |
| Henry Menton (in bed), Bernard Corrigan (in bed), Patsy Dignam (in bed), |
| Paddy Dignam (in the grave). |
| |
| |
| Alone, what did Bloom hear? |
| |
| The double reverberation of retreating feet on the heavenborn earth, the |
| double vibration of a jew's harp in the resonant lane. |
| |
| |
| Alone, what did Bloom feel? |
| |
| The cold of interstellar space, thousands of degrees below freezing |
| point or the absolute zero of Fahrenheit, Centigrade or Reaumur: the |
| incipient intimations of proximate dawn. |
| |
| |
| Of what did bellchime and handtouch and footstep and lonechill remind |
| him? |
| |
| Of companions now in various manners in different places defunct: Percy |
| Apjohn (killed in action, Modder River), Philip Gilligan (phthisis, |
| Jervis Street hospital), Matthew F. Kane (accidental drowning, Dublin |
| Bay), Philip Moisel (pyemia, Heytesbury street), Michael Hart (phthisis, |
| Mater Misericordiae hospital), Patrick Dignam (apoplexy, Sandymount). |
| |
| |
| What prospect of what phenomena inclined him to remain? |
| |
| The disparition of three final stars, the diffusion of daybreak, the |
| apparition of a new solar disk. |
| |
| |
| Had he ever been a spectator of those phenomena? |
| |
| Once, in 1887, after a protracted performance of charades in the house |
| of Luke Doyle, Kimmage, he had awaited with patience the apparition |
| of the diurnal phenomenon, seated on a wall, his gaze turned in the |
| direction of Mizrach, the east. |
| |
| |
| He remembered the initial paraphenomena? |
| |
| More active air, a matutinal distant cock, ecclesiastical clocks at |
| various points, avine music, the isolated tread of an early wayfarer, |
| the visible diffusion of the light of an invisible luminous body, the |
| first golden limb of the resurgent sun perceptible low on the horizon. |
| |
| |
| Did he remain? |
| |
| With deep inspiration he returned, retraversing the garden, reentering |
| the passage, reclosing the door. With brief suspiration he reassumed the |
| candle, reascended the stairs, reapproached the door of the front room, |
| hallfloor, and reentered. |
| |
| |
| What suddenly arrested his ingress? |
| |
| The right temporal lobe of the hollow sphere of his cranium came into |
| contact with a solid timber angle where, an infinitesimal but sensible |
| fraction of a second later, a painful sensation was located in |
| consequence of antecedent sensations transmitted and registered. |
| |
| |
| Describe the alterations effected in the disposition of the articles of |
| furniture. |
| |
| A sofa upholstered in prune plush had been translocated from opposite |
| the door to the ingleside near the compactly furled Union Jack (an |
| alteration which he had frequently intended to execute): the blue and |
| white checker inlaid majolicatopped table had been placed opposite the |
| door in the place vacated by the prune plush sofa: the walnut sideboard |
| (a projecting angle of which had momentarily arrested his ingress) had |
| been moved from its position beside the door to a more advantageous but |
| more perilous position in front of the door: two chairs had been moved |
| from right and left of the ingleside to the position originally occupied |
| by the blue and white checker inlaid majolicatopped table. |
| |
| |
| Describe them. |
| |
| One: a squat stuffed easychair, with stout arms extended and back |
| slanted to the rere, which, repelled in recoil, had then upturned an |
| irregular fringe of a rectangular rug and now displayed on its amply |
| upholstered seat a centralised diffusing and diminishing discolouration. |
| The other: a slender splayfoot chair of glossy cane curves, placed |
| directly opposite the former, its frame from top to seat and from seat |
| to base being varnished dark brown, its seat being a bright circle of |
| white plaited rush. |
| |
| |
| What significances attached to these two chairs? |
| |
| Significances of similitude, of posture, of symbolism, of circumstantial |
| evidence, of testimonial supermanence. |
| |
| |
| What occupied the position originally occupied by the sideboard? |
| |
| A vertical piano (Cadby) with exposed keyboard, its closed coffin |
| supporting a pair of long yellow ladies' gloves and an emerald ashtray |
| containing four consumed matches, a partly consumed cigarette and two |
| discoloured ends of cigarettes, its musicrest supporting the music in |
| the key of G natural for voice and piano of _Love's Old Sweet Song_ |
| (words by G. Clifton Bingham, composed by J. L. Molloy, sung by Madam |
| Antoinette Sterling) open at the last page with the final indications |
| _ad libitum, forte_, pedal, _animato_, sustained pedal, _ritirando_, |
| close. |
| |
| |
| With what sensations did Bloom contemplate in rotation these objects? |
| |
| With strain, elevating a candlestick: with pain, feeling on his right |
| temple a contused tumescence: with attention, focussing his gaze on |
| a large dull passive and a slender bright active: with solicitation, |
| bending and downturning the upturned rugfringe: with amusement, |
| remembering Dr Malachi Mulligan's scheme of colour containing the |
| gradation of green: with pleasure, repeating the words and antecedent |
| act and perceiving through various channels of internal sensibility |
| the consequent and concomitant tepid pleasant diffusion of gradual |
| discolouration. |
| |
| |
| His next proceeding? |
| |
| From an open box on the majolicatopped table he extracted a black |
| diminutive cone, one inch in height, placed it on its circular base on |
| a small tin plate, placed his candlestick on the right corner of the |
| mantelpiece, produced from his waistcoat a folded page of prospectus |
| (illustrated) entitled Agendath Netaim, unfolded the same, examined |
| it superficially, rolled it into a thin cylinder, ignited it in the |
| candleflame, applied it when ignited to the apex of the cone till the |
| latter reached the stage of rutilance, placed the cylinder in the basin |
| of the candlestick disposing its unconsumed part in such a manner as to |
| facilitate total combustion. |
| |
| |
| What followed this operation? |
| |
| The truncated conical crater summit of the diminutive volcano emitted a |
| vertical and serpentine fume redolent of aromatic oriental incense. |
| |
| |
| What homothetic objects, other than the candlestick, stood on the |
| mantelpiece? |
| |
| A timepiece of striated Connemara marble, stopped at the hour of 4.46 |
| a.m. on the 21 March 1896, matrimonial gift of Matthew Dillon: a dwarf |
| tree of glacial arborescence under a transparent bellshade, matrimonial |
| gift of Luke and Caroline Doyle: an embalmed owl, matrimonial gift of |
| Alderman John Hooper. |
| |
| |
| What interchanges of looks took place between these three objects and |
| Bloom? |
| |
| In the mirror of the giltbordered pierglass the undecorated back of the |
| dwarf tree regarded the upright back of the embalmed owl. Before |
| the mirror the matrimonial gift of Alderman John Hooper with a clear |
| melancholy wise bright motionless compassionate gaze regarded Bloom |
| while Bloom with obscure tranquil profound motionless compassionated |
| gaze regarded the matrimonial gift of Luke and Caroline Doyle. |
| |
| |
| What composite asymmetrical image in the mirror then attracted his |
| attention? |
| |
| The image of a solitary (ipsorelative) mutable (aliorelative) man. |
| |
| |
| Why solitary (ipsorelative)? |
| |
| _Brothers and sisters had he none. Yet that man's father was his |
| grandfather's son._ |
| |
| |
| Why mutable (aliorelative)? |
| |
| From infancy to maturity he had resembled his maternal procreatrix. |
| From maturity to senility he would increasingly resemble his paternal |
| procreator. |
| |
| |
| What final visual impression was communicated to him by the mirror? |
| |
| The optical reflection of several inverted volumes improperly arranged |
| and not in the order of their common letters with scintillating titles |
| on the two bookshelves opposite. |
| |
| |
| Catalogue these books. |
| |
| _Thom's Dublin Post Office Directory, 1886_. Denis Florence M'Carthy's |
| _Poetical Works_ (copper beechleaf bookmark at p. 5). Shakespeare's |
| _Works_ (dark crimson morocco, goldtooled). |
| |
| _The Useful Ready Reckoner_ (brown cloth). |
| |
| _The Secret History of the Court of Charles II_ (red cloth, tooled |
| binding). _The Child's Guide_ (blue cloth). |
| |
| _The Beauties of Killarney_ (wrappers). |
| |
| _When We Were Boys_ by William O'Brien M. P. (green cloth, slightly |
| faded, envelope bookmark at p. 217). |
| |
| _Thoughts from Spinoza_ (maroon leather). |
| |
| _The Story of the Heavens_ by Sir Robert Ball (blue cloth). Ellis's |
| _Three Trips to Madagascar_ (brown cloth, title obliterated). |
| |
| _The Stark-Munro Letters_ by A. Conan Doyle, property of the City of |
| Dublin Public Library, 106 Capel street, lent 21 May (Whitsun Eve) 1904, |
| due 4 June 1904, 13 days overdue (black cloth binding, bearing white |
| letternumber ticket). |
| |
| _Voyages in China_ by "Viator" (recovered with brown paper, red ink |
| title). |
| |
| _Philosophy of the Talmud_ (sewn pamphlet). Lockhart's _Life of |
| Napoleon_ (cover wanting, marginal annotations, minimising victories, |
| aggrandising defeats of the protagonist). |
| |
| _Soll und Haben_ by Gustav Freytag (black boards, Gothic characters, |
| cigarette coupon bookmark at p. 24). Hozier's _History of the |
| Russo-Turkish War_ (brown cloth, a volumes, with gummed label, Garrison |
| Library, Governor's Parade, Gibraltar, on verso of cover). |
| |
| _Laurence Bloomfield in Ireland_ by William Allingham (second edition, |
| green cloth, gilt trefoil design, previous owner's name on recto of |
| flyleaf erased). |
| |
| _A Handbook of Astronomy_ (cover, brown leather, detached, S plates, |
| antique letterpress long primer, author's footnotes nonpareil, marginal |
| clues brevier, captions small pica). |
| |
| _The Hidden Life of Christ_ (black boards). |
| |
| _In the Track of the Sun_ (yellow cloth, titlepage missing, recurrent |
| title intestation). |
| |
| _Physical Strength and How to Obtain It_ by Eugen Sandow (red cloth). |
| |
| _Short but yet Plain Elements of Geometry_ written in French by F. |
| Ignat. Pardies and rendered into English by John Harris D. D. London, |
| printed for R. Knaplock at the Bifhop's Head, MDCCXI, with dedicatory |
| epiftle to his worthy friend Charles Cox, efquire, Member of Parliament |
| for the burgh of Southwark and having ink calligraphed statement on the |
| flyleaf certifying that the book was the property of Michael Gallagher, |
| dated this 10th day of May 1822 and requefting the perfon who should |
| find it, if the book should be loft or go aftray, to reftore it to |
| Michael Gallagher, carpenter, Dufery Gate, Ennifcorthy, county Wicklow, |
| the fineft place in the world. |
| |
| |
| What reflections occupied his mind during the process of reversion of |
| the inverted volumes? |
| |
| The necessity of order, a place for everything and everything in its |
| place: the deficient appreciation of literature possessed by females: |
| the incongruity of an apple incuneated in a tumbler and of an umbrella |
| inclined in a closestool: the insecurity of hiding any secret document |
| behind, beneath or between the pages of a book. |
| |
| |
| Which volume was the largest in bulk? |
| |
| Hozier's _History of the Russo-Turkish war._ |
| |
| |
| What among other data did the second volume of the work in question |
| contain? |
| |
| The name of a decisive battle (forgotten), frequently remembered by a |
| decisive officer, major Brian Cooper Tweedy (remembered). |
| |
| |
| Why, firstly and secondly, did he not consult the work in question? |
| |
| Firstly, in order to exercise mnemotechnic: secondly, because after an |
| interval of amnesia, when, seated at the central table, about to consult |
| the work in question, he remembered by mnemotechnic the name of the |
| military engagement, Plevna. |
| |
| |
| What caused him consolation in his sitting posture? |
| |
| The candour, nudity, pose, tranquility, youth, grace, sex, counsel of a |
| statue erect in the centre of the table, an image of Narcissus purchased |
| by auction from P. A. Wren, 9 Bachelor's Walk. |
| |
| |
| What caused him irritation in his sitting posture? Inhibitory pressure |
| of collar (size 17) and waistcoat (5 buttons), two articles of clothing |
| superfluous in the costume of mature males and inelastic to alterations |
| of mass by expansion. |
| |
| |
| How was the irritation allayed? |
| |
| He removed his collar, with contained black necktie and collapsible |
| stud, from his neck to a position on the left of the table. He |
| unbuttoned successively in reversed direction waistcoat, trousers, shirt |
| and vest along the medial line of irregular incrispated black hairs |
| extending in triangular convergence from the pelvic basin over the |
| circumference of the abdomen and umbilicular fossicle along the medial |
| line of nodes to the intersection of the sixth pectoral vertebrae, |
| thence produced both ways at right angles and terminating in circles |
| described about two equidistant points, right and left, on the summits |
| of the mammary prominences. He unbraced successively each of six minus |
| one braced trouser buttons, arranged in pairs, of which one incomplete. |
| |
| |
| What involuntary actions followed? |
| |
| He compressed between 2 fingers the flesh circumjacent to a cicatrice in |
| the left infracostal region below the diaphragm resulting from a sting |
| inflicted 2 weeks and 3 days previously (23 May 1904) by a bee. |
| He scratched imprecisely with his right hand, though insensible of |
| prurition, various points and surfaces of his partly exposed, wholly |
| abluted skin. He inserted his left hand into the left lower pocket of |
| his waistcoat and extracted and replaced a silver coin (I shilling), |
| placed there (presumably) on the occasion (17 October 1903) of the |
| interment of Mrs Emily Sinico, Sydney Parade. |
| |
| |
| Compile the budget for 16 June 1904. DEBIT |
| |
| 1 Pork Kidney |
| 1 Copy FREEMAN'S JOURNAL |
| 1 Bath And Gratification |
| Tramfare |
| 1 In Memoriam Patrick Dignam |
| 2 Banbury cakes |
| 1 Lunch |
| 1 Renewal fee for book |
| 1 Packet Notepaper and Envelopes |
| 1 Dinner and Gratification |
| 1 Postal Order and Stamp |
| Tramfare |
| 1 Pig's Foot |
| 1 Sheep's Trotter |
| 1 Cake Fry's Plain Chocolate |
| 1 Square Soda Bread |
| 1 Coffee and Bun |
| Loan (Stephen Dedalus) refunded |
| BALANCE |
| |
| |
| L. s. d. |
| 0--0--3 |
| 0--0--1 |
| 0--1--6 |
| 0--0--1 |
| 0--5--0 |
| 0--0--1 |
| 0--0--7 |
| 0--1--0 |
| 0--0--2 |
| 0--2--0 |
| 0--2--8 |
| 0--0--1 |
| 0--0--4 |
| 0--0--3 |
| 0--0--1 |
| 0--0--4 |
| 0--0--4 |
| 1--7--0 |
| 0-17--5 |
| 2-19--3 |
| CREDIT |
| |
| Cash in hand |
| Commission recd. _Freeman's Journal_ |
| Loan (Stephen Dedalus) |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| L. s. d. |
| 0--4--9 |
| 1--7--6 |
| 1--7--0 |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| 2-19--3 |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| Did the process of divestiture continue? |
| |
| Sensible of a benignant persistent ache in his footsoles he extended |
| his foot to one side and observed the creases, protuberances and salient |
| points caused by foot pressure in the course of walking repeatedly in |
| several different directions, then, inclined, he disnoded the laceknots, |
| unhooked and loosened the laces, took off each of his two boots for the |
| second time, detached the partially moistened right sock through the |
| fore part of which the nail of his great toe had again effracted, raised |
| his right foot and, having unhooked a purple elastic sock suspender, |
| took off his right sock, placed his unclothed right foot on the margin |
| of the seat of his chair, picked at and gently lacerated the protruding |
| part of the great toenail, raised the part lacerated to his nostrils and |
| inhaled the odour of the quick, then, with satisfaction, threw away the |
| lacerated ungual fragment. |
| |
| |
| Why with satisfaction? |
| |
| Because the odour inhaled corresponded to other odours inhaled of other |
| ungual fragments, picked and lacerated by Master Bloom, pupil of Mrs |
| Ellis's juvenile school, patiently each night in the act of brief |
| genuflection and nocturnal prayer and ambitious meditation. |
| |
| |
| In what ultimate ambition had all concurrent and consecutive ambitions |
| now coalesced? |
| |
| Not to inherit by right of primogeniture, gavelkind or borough English, |
| or possess in perpetuity an extensive demesne of a sufficient number of |
| acres, roods and perches, statute land measure (valuation 42 pounds), of |
| grazing turbary surrounding a baronial hall with gatelodge and carriage |
| drive nor, on the other hand, a terracehouse or semidetached villa, |
| described as _Rus in Urbe_ or _Qui si sana_, but to purchase by private |
| treaty in fee simple a thatched bungalowshaped 2 storey dwellinghouse of |
| southerly aspect, surmounted by vane and lightning conductor, connected |
| with the earth, with porch covered by parasitic plants (ivy or Virginia |
| creeper), halldoor, olive green, with smart carriage finish and neat |
| doorbrasses, stucco front with gilt tracery at eaves and gable, rising, |
| if possible, upon a gentle eminence with agreeable prospect from balcony |
| with stone pillar parapet over unoccupied and unoccupyable interjacent |
| pastures and standing in 5 or 6 acres of its own ground, at such |
| a distance from the nearest public thoroughfare as to render its |
| houselights visible at night above and through a quickset hornbeam hedge |
| of topiary cutting, situate at a given point not less than 1 statute |
| mile from the periphery of the metropolis, within a time limit of not |
| more than 15 minutes from tram or train line (e.g., Dundrum, south, or |
| Sutton, north, both localities equally reported by trial to resemble the |
| terrestrial poles in being favourable climates for phthisical subjects), |
| the premises to be held under feefarm grant, lease 999 years, the |
| messuage to consist of 1 drawingroom with baywindow (2 lancets), |
| thermometer affixed, 1 sittingroom, 4 bedrooms, 2 servants' rooms, tiled |
| kitchen with close range and scullery, lounge hall fitted with linen |
| wallpresses, fumed oak sectional bookcase containing the Encyclopaedia |
| Britannica and New Century Dictionary, transverse obsolete medieval and |
| oriental weapons, dinner gong, alabaster lamp, bowl pendant, vulcanite |
| automatic telephone receiver with adjacent directory, handtufted |
| Axminster carpet with cream ground and trellis border, loo table with |
| pillar and claw legs, hearth with massive firebrasses and ormolu mantel |
| chronometer clock, guaranteed timekeeper with cathedral chime, barometer |
| with hygrographic chart, comfortable lounge settees and corner fitments, |
| upholstered in ruby plush with good springing and sunk centre, three |
| banner Japanese screen and cuspidors (club style, rich winecoloured |
| leather, gloss renewable with a minimum of labour by use of linseed |
| oil and vinegar) and pyramidically prismatic central chandelier lustre, |
| bentwood perch with fingertame parrot (expurgated language), embossed |
| mural paper at 10/- per dozen with transverse swags of carmine floral |
| design and top crown frieze, staircase, three continuous flights at |
| successive right angles, of varnished cleargrained oak, treads and |
| risers, newel, balusters and handrail, with steppedup panel dado, |
| dressed with camphorated wax: bathroom, hot and cold supply, reclining |
| and shower: water closet on mezzanine provided with opaque singlepane |
| oblong window, tipup seat, bracket lamp, brass tierod and brace, |
| armrests, footstool and artistic oleograph on inner face of door: |
| ditto, plain: servants' apartments with separate sanitary and hygienic |
| necessaries for cook, general and betweenmaid (salary, rising by |
| biennial unearned increments of 2 pounds, with comprehensive fidelity |
| insurance, annual bonus (1 pound) and retiring allowance (based on |
| the 65 system) after 30 years' service), pantry, buttery, larder, |
| refrigerator, outoffices, coal and wood cellarage with winebin (still |
| and sparkling vintages) for distinguished guests, if entertained to |
| dinner (evening dress), carbon monoxide gas supply throughout. |
| |
| |
| What additional attractions might the grounds contain? |
| |
| As addenda, a tennis and fives court, a shrubbery, a glass summerhouse |
| with tropical palms, equipped in the best botanical manner, a rockery |
| with waterspray, a beehive arranged on humane principles, oval |
| flowerbeds in rectangular grassplots set with eccentric ellipses of |
| scarlet and chrome tulips, blue scillas, crocuses, polyanthus, sweet |
| William, sweet pea, lily of the valley (bulbs obtainable from sir James |
| W. Mackey (Limited) wholesale and retail seed and bulb merchants and |
| nurserymen, agents for chemical manures, 23 Sackville street, upper), an |
| orchard, kitchen garden and vinery protected against illegal trespassers |
| by glasstopped mural enclosures, a lumbershed with padlock for various |
| inventoried implements. |
| |
| |
| As? |
| |
| Eeltraps, lobsterpots, fishingrods, hatchet, steelyard, grindstone, |
| clodcrusher, swatheturner, carriagesack, telescope ladder, 10 tooth |
| rake, washing clogs, haytedder, tumbling rake, billhook, paintpot, |
| brush, hoe and so on. |
| |
| What improvements might be subsequently introduced? |
| |
| A rabbitry and fowlrun, a dovecote, a botanical conservatory, 2 hammocks |
| (lady's and gentleman's), a sundial shaded and sheltered by laburnum |
| or lilac trees, an exotically harmonically accorded Japanese tinkle |
| gatebell affixed to left lateral gatepost, a capacious waterbutt, |
| a lawnmower with side delivery and grassbox, a lawnsprinkler with |
| hydraulic hose. |
| |
| |
| What facilities of transit were desirable? |
| |
| When citybound frequent connection by train or tram from their |
| respective intermediate station or terminal. When countrybound |
| velocipedes, a chainless freewheel roadster cycle with side basketcar |
| attached, or draught conveyance, a donkey with wicker trap or smart |
| phaeton with good working solidungular cob (roan gelding, 14 h). |
| |
| |
| What might be the name of this erigible or erected residence? |
| |
| Bloom Cottage. Saint Leopold's. Flowerville. |
| |
| |
| Could Bloom of 7 Eccles street foresee Bloom of Flowerville? |
| |
| In loose allwool garments with Harris tweed cap, price 8/6, and useful |
| garden boots with elastic gussets and wateringcan, planting aligned |
| young firtrees, syringing, pruning, staking, sowing hayseed, trundling a |
| weedladen wheelbarrow without excessive fatigue at sunset amid the scent |
| of newmown hay, ameliorating the soil, multiplying wisdom, achieving |
| longevity. |
| |
| |
| What syllabus of intellectual pursuits was simultaneously possible? |
| |
| Snapshot photography, comparative study of religions, folklore relative |
| to various amatory and superstitious practices, contemplation of the |
| celestial constellations. |
| |
| |
| What lighter recreations? |
| |
| Outdoor: garden and fieldwork, cycling on level macadamised causeways |
| ascents of moderately high hills, natation in secluded fresh water and |
| unmolested river boating in secure wherry or light curricle with kedge |
| anchor on reaches free from weirs and rapids (period of estivation), |
| vespertinal perambulation or equestrian circumprocession with inspection |
| of sterile landscape and contrastingly agreeable cottagers' fires of |
| smoking peat turves (period of hibernation). Indoor: discussion in |
| tepid security of unsolved historical and criminal problems: lecture of |
| unexpurgated exotic erotic masterpieces: house carpentry with toolbox |
| containing hammer, awl nails, screws, tintacks, gimlet, tweezers, |
| bullnose plane and turnscrew. Might he become a gentleman farmer of |
| field produce and live stock? |
| |
| Not impossibly, with 1 or 2 stripper cows, 1 pike of upland hay and |
| requisite farming implements, e.g., an end-to-end churn, a turnip pulper |
| etc. |
| |
| |
| What would be his civic functions and social status among the county |
| families and landed gentry? |
| |
| Arranged successively in ascending powers of hierarchical order, that |
| of gardener, groundsman, cultivator, breeder, and at the zenith of his |
| career, resident magistrate or justice of the peace with a family crest |
| and coat of arms and appropriate classical motto _(Semper paratus_), |
| duly recorded in the court directory (Bloom, Leopold P., M. P., P. C., |
| K. P., L. L. D. (_honoris causa_), Bloomville, Dundrum) and mentioned in |
| court and fashionable intelligence (Mr and Mrs Leopold Bloom have left |
| Kingstown for England). |
| |
| |
| What course of action did he outline for himself in such capacity? |
| |
| A course that lay between undue clemency and excessive rigour: |
| the dispensation in a heterogeneous society of arbitrary classes, |
| incessantly rearranged in terms of greater and lesser social inequality, |
| of unbiassed homogeneous indisputable justice, tempered with mitigants |
| of the widest possible latitude but exactable to the uttermost farthing |
| with confiscation of estate, real and personal, to the crown. Loyal to |
| the highest constituted power in the land, actuated by an innate love of |
| rectitude his aims would be the strict maintenance of public order, |
| the repression of many abuses though not of all simultaneously (every |
| measure of reform or retrenchment being a preliminary solution to be |
| contained by fluxion in the final solution), the upholding of the letter |
| of the law (common, statute and law merchant) against all traversers in |
| covin and trespassers acting in contravention of bylaws and regulations, |
| all resuscitators (by trespass and petty larceny of kindlings) of |
| venville rights, obsolete by desuetude, all orotund instigators |
| of international persecution, all perpetuators of international |
| animosities, all menial molestors of domestic conviviality, all |
| recalcitrant violators of domestic connubiality. |
| |
| |
| Prove that he had loved rectitude from his earliest youth. |
| |
| To Master Percy Apjohn at High School in 1880 he had divulged his |
| disbelief in the tenets of the Irish (protestant) church (to which his |
| father Rudolf Virag (later Rudolph Bloom) had been converted from the |
| Israelitic faith and communion in 1865 by the Society for promoting |
| Christianity among the jews) subsequently abjured by him in favour of |
| Roman catholicism at the epoch of and with a view to his matrimony |
| in 1888. To Daniel Magrane and Francis Wade in 1882 during a juvenile |
| friendship (terminated by the premature emigration of the former) he |
| had advocated during nocturnal perambulations the political theory of |
| colonial (e.g. Canadian) expansion and the evolutionary theories of |
| Charles Darwin, expounded in _The Descent of Man_ and _The Origin |
| of Species_. In 1885 he had publicly expressed his adherence to the |
| collective and national economic programme advocated by James Fintan |
| Lalor, John Fisher Murray, John Mitchel, J. F. X. O'Brien and others, |
| the agrarian policy of Michael Davitt, the constitutional agitation of |
| Charles Stewart Parnell (M. P. for Cork City), the programme of |
| peace, retrenchment and reform of William Ewart Gladstone (M. P. for |
| Midlothian, N. B.) and, in support of his political convictions, had |
| climbed up into a secure position amid the ramifications of a tree |
| on Northumberland road to see the entrance (2 February 1888) into the |
| capital of a demonstrative torchlight procession of 20,000 torchbearers, |
| divided into 120 trade corporations, bearing 2000 torches in escort of |
| the marquess of Ripon and (honest) John Morley. |
| |
| |
| How much and how did he propose to pay for this country residence? |
| |
| As per prospectus of the Industrious Foreign Acclimatised Nationalised |
| Friendly Stateaided Building Society (incorporated 1874), a maximum |
| of 60 pounds per annum, being 1/6 of an assured income, derived from |
| giltedged securities, representing at 5 % simple interest on capital of |
| 1200 pounds (estimate of price at 20 years' purchase), of which to be |
| paid on acquisition and the balance in the form of annual rent, viz. 800 |
| pounds plus 2 1/2 % interest on the same, repayable quarterly in equal |
| annual instalments until extinction by amortisation of loan advanced for |
| purchase within a period of 20 years, amounting to an annual rental of |
| 64 pounds, headrent included, the titledeeds to remain in possession |
| of the lender or lenders with a saving clause envisaging forced sale, |
| foreclosure and mutual compensation in the event of protracted failure |
| to pay the terms assigned, otherwise the messuage to become the absolute |
| property of the tenant occupier upon expiry of the period of years |
| stipulated. |
| |
| |
| What rapid but insecure means to opulence might facilitate immediate |
| purchase? |
| |
| A private wireless telegraph which would transmit by dot and dash system |
| the result of a national equine handicap (flat or steeplechase) of I or |
| more miles and furlongs won by an outsider at odds of 50 to 1 at 3 hr |
| 8 m p.m. at Ascot (Greenwich time), the message being received and |
| available for betting purposes in Dublin at 2.59 p.m. (Dunsink time). |
| The unexpected discovery of an object of great monetary value (precious |
| stone, valuable adhesive or impressed postage stamps (7 schilling, |
| mauve, imperforate, Hamburg, 1866: 4 pence, rose, blue paper, perforate, |
| Great Britain, 1855: 1 franc, stone, official, rouletted, diagonal |
| surcharge, Luxemburg, 1878), antique dynastical ring, unique relic) in |
| unusual repositories or by unusual means: from the air (dropped by an |
| eagle in flight), by fire (amid the carbonised remains of an incendiated |
| edifice), in the sea (amid flotsam, jetsam, lagan and derelict), on |
| earth (in the gizzard of a comestible fowl). A Spanish prisoner's |
| donation of a distant treasure of valuables or specie or bullion lodged |
| with a solvent banking corporation loo years previously at 5% compound |
| interest of the collective worth of 5,000,000 pounds stg (five million |
| pounds sterling). A contract with an inconsiderate contractee for the |
| delivery of 32 consignments of some given commodity in consideration of |
| cash payment on delivery per delivery at the initial rate of 1/4d to be |
| increased constantly in the geometrical progression of 2 (1/4d, 1/2d, |
| 1d, 2d, 4d, 8d, 1s 4d, 2s 8d to 32 terms). A prepared scheme |
| based on a study of the laws of probability to break the bank at Monte |
| Carlo. A solution of the secular problem of the quadrature of the |
| circle, government premium 1,000,000 pounds sterling. |
| |
| |
| Was vast wealth acquirable through industrial channels? |
| |
| The reclamation of dunams of waste arenary soil, proposed in the |
| prospectus of Agendath Netaim, Bleibtreustrasse, Berlin, W. 15, by the |
| cultivation of orange plantations and melonfields and reafforestation. |
| The utilisation of waste paper, fells of sewer rodents, human excrement |
| possessing chemical properties, in view of the vast production of the |
| first, vast number of the second and immense quantity of the third, |
| every normal human being of average vitality and appetite producing |
| annually, cancelling byproducts of water, a sum total of 80 lbs. (mixed |
| animal and vegetable diet), to be multiplied by 4,386,035, the total |
| population of Ireland according to census returns of 1901. |
| |
| |
| Were there schemes of wider scope? |
| |
| A scheme to be formulated and submitted for approval to the harbour |
| commissioners for the exploitation of white coal (hydraulic power), |
| obtained by hydroelectric plant at peak of tide at Dublin bar or at |
| head of water at Poulaphouca or Powerscourt or catchment basins of main |
| streams for the economic production of 500,000 W. H. P. of electricity. |
| A scheme to enclose the peninsular delta of the North Bull at Dollymount |
| and erect on the space of the foreland, used for golf links and rifle |
| ranges, an asphalted esplanade with casinos, booths, shooting galleries, |
| hotels, boardinghouses, readingrooms, establishments for mixed bathing. |
| A scheme for the use of dogvans and goatvans for the delivery of early |
| morning milk. A scheme for the development of Irish tourist traffic in |
| and around Dublin by means of petrolpropelled riverboats, plying in the |
| fluvial fairway between Island bridge and Ringsend, charabancs, narrow |
| gauge local railways, and pleasure steamers for coastwise navigation |
| (10/- per person per day, guide (trilingual) included). A scheme for |
| the repristination of passenger and goods traffics over Irish waterways, |
| when freed from weedbeds. A scheme to connect by tramline the Cattle |
| Market (North Circular road and Prussia street) with the quays (Sheriff |
| street, lower, and East Wall), parallel with the Link line railway |
| laid (in conjunction with the Great Southern and Western railway line) |
| between the cattle park, Liffey junction, and terminus of Midland Great |
| Western Railway 43 to 45 North |
| |
| Wall, in proximity to the terminal stations or Dublin branches of Great |
| Central Railway, Midland Railway of England, City of Dublin Steam Packet |
| Company, Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company, Dublin and Glasgow |
| Steam Packet Company, Glasgow, Dublin and Londonderry Steam Packet |
| Company (Laird line), British and Irish Steam Packet Company, Dublin |
| and Morecambe Steamers, London and North Western Railway Company, Dublin |
| Port and Docks Board Landing Sheds and transit sheds of Palgrave, Murphy |
| and Company, steamship owners, agents for steamers from Mediterranean, |
| Spain, Portugal, France, Belgium and Holland and for Liverpool |
| Underwriters' Association, the cost of acquired rolling stock for |
| animal transport and of additional mileage operated by the Dublin United |
| Tramways Company, limited, to be covered by graziers' fees. |
| |
| |
| Positing what protasis would the contraction for such several schemes |
| become a natural and necessary apodosis? |
| |
| Given a guarantee equal to the sum sought, the support, by deed of |
| gift and transfer vouchers during donor's lifetime or by bequest |
| after donor's painless extinction, of eminent financiers (Blum Pasha, |
| Rothschild Guggenheim, Hirsch, Montefiore, Morgan, Rockefeller) |
| possessing fortunes in 6 figures, amassed during a successful life, and |
| joining capital with opportunity the thing required was done. |
| |
| |
| What eventuality would render him independent of such wealth? |
| |
| The independent discovery of a goldseam of inexhaustible ore. |
| |
| |
| For what reason did he meditate on schemes so difficult of realisation? |
| |
| It was one of his axioms that similar meditations or the automatic |
| relation to himself of a narrative concerning himself or tranquil |
| recollection of the past when practised habitually before retiring for |
| the night alleviated fatigue and produced as a result sound repose and |
| renovated vitality. |
| |
| |
| His justifications? |
| |
| As a physicist he had learned that of the 70 years of complete human |
| life at least 2/7, viz. 20 years are passed in sleep. As a philosopher |
| he knew that at the termination of any allotted life only an |
| infinitesimal part of any person's desires has been realised. As a |
| physiologist he believed in the artificial placation of malignant |
| agencies chiefly operative during somnolence. |
| |
| |
| What did he fear? |
| |
| The committal of homicide or suicide during sleep by an aberration |
| of the light of reason, the incommensurable categorical intelligence |
| situated in the cerebral convolutions. |
| |
| |
| What were habitually his final meditations? |
| |
| Of some one sole unique advertisement to cause passers to stop in |
| wonder, a poster novelty, with all extraneous accretions excluded, |
| reduced to its simplest and most efficient terms not exceeding the span |
| of casual vision and congruous with the velocity of modern life. |
| |
| |
| What did the first drawer unlocked contain? |
| |
| A Vere Foster's handwriting copybook, property of Milly (Millicent) |
| Bloom, certain pages of which bore diagram drawings, marked _Papli_, |
| which showed a large globular head with 5 hairs erect, 2 eyes in |
| profile, the trunk full front with 3 large buttons, 1 triangular foot: 2 |
| fading photographs of queen Alexandra of England and of Maud Branscombe, |
| actress and professional beauty: a Yuletide card, bearing on it a |
| pictorial representation of a parasitic plant, the legend _Mizpah_, the |
| date Xmas 1892, the name of the senders: from Mr + Mrs M. Comerford, the |
| versicle: _May this Yuletide bring to thee, Joy and peace and welcome |
| glee_: a butt of red partly liquefied sealing wax, obtained from the |
| stores department of Messrs Hely's, Ltd., 89, 90, and 91 Dame street: |
| a box containing the remainder of a gross of gilt "J" pennibs, obtained |
| from same department of same firm: an old sandglass which rolled |
| containing sand which rolled: a sealed prophecy (never unsealed) written |
| by Leopold Bloom in 1886 concerning the consequences of the passing into |
| law of William Ewart Gladstone's Home Rule bill of 1886 (never passed |
| into law): a bazaar ticket, no 2004, of S. Kevin's Charity Fair, price |
| 6d, 100 prizes: an infantile epistle, dated, small em monday, reading: |
| capital pee Papli comma capital aitch How are you note of interrogation |
| capital eye I am very well full stop new paragraph signature with |
| flourishes capital em Milly no stop: a cameo brooch, property of Ellen |
| Bloom (born Higgins), deceased: a cameo scarfpin, property of Rudolph |
| Bloom (born Virag), deceased: 3 typewritten letters, addressee, Henry |
| Flower, c/o. P. O. Westland Row, addresser, Martha Clifford, c/o. P. O. |
| Dolphin's Barn: the transliterated name and address of the addresser |
| of the 3 letters in reversed alphabetic boustrophedonic punctated |
| quadrilinear cryptogram (vowels suppressed) N. IGS./WI. UU. OX/W. OKS. |
| MH/Y. IM: a press cutting from an English weekly periodical _Modern |
| Society_, subject corporal chastisement in girls' schools: a pink ribbon |
| which had festooned an Easter egg in the year 1899: two partly uncoiled |
| rubber preservatives with reserve pockets, purchased by post from Box |
| 32, P. O., Charing Cross, London, W. C.: 1 pack of 1 dozen creamlaid |
| envelopes and feintruled notepaper, watermarked, now reduced by 3: some |
| assorted Austrian-Hungarian coins: 2 coupons of the Royal and Privileged |
| Hungarian Lottery: a lowpower magnifying glass: 2 erotic photocards |
| showing a) buccal coition between nude senorita (rere presentation, |
| superior position) and nude torero (fore presentation, inferior |
| position) b) anal violation by male religious (fully clothed, eyes |
| abject) of female religious (partly clothed, eyes direct), purchased by |
| post from Box 32, P. O., Charing Cross, London, W. C.: a press cutting |
| of recipe for renovation of old tan boots: a Id adhesive stamp, |
| lavender, of the reign of Queen Victoria: a chart of the measurements |
| of Leopold Bloom compiled before, during and after 2 months' consecutive |
| use of Sandow-Whiteley's pulley exerciser (men's 15/-, athlete's 20/-) |
| viz. chest 28 in and 29 1/2 in, biceps 9 in and 10 in, forearm 8 1/2 in |
| and 9 in, thigh 10 in and 12 in, calf 11 in and 12 in: 1 prospectus of |
| The Wonderworker, the world's greatest remedy for rectal complaints, |
| direct from Wonderworker, Coventry House, South Place, London E C, |
| addressed (erroneously) to Mrs L. Bloom with brief accompanying note |
| commencing (erroneously): Dear Madam. |
| |
| |
| Quote the textual terms in which the prospectus claimed advantages for |
| this thaumaturgic remedy. |
| |
| It heals and soothes while you sleep, in case of trouble in breaking |
| wind, assists nature in the most formidable way, insuring instant relief |
| in discharge of gases, keeping parts clean and free natural action, an |
| initial outlay of 7/6 making a new man of you and life worth living. |
| Ladies find Wonderworker especially useful, a pleasant surprise when |
| they note delightful result like a cool drink of fresh spring water on |
| a sultry summer's day. Recommend it to your lady and gentlemen friends, |
| lasts a lifetime. Insert long round end. Wonderworker. |
| |
| |
| Were there testimonials? |
| |
| Numerous. From clergyman, British naval officer, wellknown author, city |
| man, hospital nurse, lady, mother of five, absentminded beggar. |
| |
| |
| How did absentminded beggar's concluding testimonial conclude? |
| |
| What a pity the government did not supply our men with wonderworkers |
| during the South African campaign! What a relief it would have been! |
| |
| |
| What object did Bloom add to this collection of objects? |
| |
| A 4th typewritten letter received by Henry Flower (let H. F. be L. B.) |
| from Martha Clifford (find M. C.). |
| |
| |
| What pleasant reflection accompanied this action? |
| |
| The reflection that, apart from the letter in question, his magnetic |
| face, form and address had been favourably received during the course of |
| the preceding day by a wife (Mrs Josephine Breen, born Josie Powell), |
| a nurse, Miss Callan (Christian name unknown), a maid, Gertrude (Gerty, |
| family name unknown). |
| |
| |
| What possibility suggested itself? |
| |
| The possibility of exercising virile power of fascination in the not |
| immediate future after an expensive repast in a private apartment in |
| the company of an elegant courtesan, of corporal beauty, moderately |
| mercenary, variously instructed, a lady by origin. |
| |
| |
| What did the 2nd drawer contain? |
| |
| Documents: the birth certificate of Leopold Paula Bloom: an endowment |
| assurance policy of 500 pounds in the Scottish Widows' Assurance |
| Society, intestated Millicent (Milly) Bloom, coming into force at 25 |
| years as with profit policy of 430 pounds, 462/10/0 and 500 pounds at |
| 60 years or death, 65 years or death and death, respectively, or |
| with profit policy (paidup) of 299/10/0 together with cash payment of |
| 133/10/0, at option: a bank passbook issued by the Ulster Bank, College |
| Green branch showing statement of a/c for halfyear ending 31 December |
| 1903, balance in depositor's favour: 18/14/6 (eighteen pounds, fourteen |
| shillings and sixpence, sterling), net personalty: certificate of |
| possession of 900 pounds, Canadian 4 percent (inscribed) government |
| stock (free of stamp duty): dockets of the Catholic Cemeteries' |
| (Glasnevin) Committee, relative to a graveplot purchased: a local press |
| cutting concerning change of name by deedpoll. |
| |
| |
| Quote the textual terms of this notice. |
| |
| I, Rudolph Virag, now resident at no 52 Clanbrassil street, Dublin, |
| formerly of Szombathely in the kingdom of Hungary, hereby give notice |
| that I have assumed and intend henceforth upon all occasions and at all |
| times to be known by the name of Rudolph Bloom. |
| |
| |
| What other objects relative to Rudolph Bloom (born Virag) were in the |
| 2nd drawer? |
| |
| An indistinct daguerreotype of Rudolf Virag and his father Leopold |
| Virag executed in the year 1852 in the portrait atelier of their |
| (respectively) 1st and 2nd cousin, Stefan Virag of Szesfehervar, |
| Hungary. An ancient haggadah book in which a pair of hornrimmed convex |
| spectacles inserted marked the passage of thanksgiving in the ritual |
| prayers for Pessach (Passover): a photocard of the Queen's Hotel, |
| Ennis, proprietor, Rudolph Bloom: an envelope addressed: _To My Dear Son |
| Leopold_. |
| |
| |
| What fractions of phrases did the lecture of those five whole words |
| evoke? |
| |
| Tomorrow will be a week that I received... it is no use Leopold to be |
| ... with your dear mother... that is not more to stand... to her... |
| all for me is out... be kind to Athos, Leopold... my dear son... |
| always... of me... _das Herz... Gott... dein_... |
| |
| |
| What reminiscences of a human subject suffering from progressive |
| melancholia did these objects evoke in Bloom? |
| |
| An old man, widower, unkempt of hair, in bed, with head covered, |
| sighing: an infirm dog, Athos: aconite, resorted to by increasing doses |
| of grains and scruples as a palliative of recrudescent neuralgia: the |
| face in death of a septuagenarian, suicide by poison. |
| |
| |
| Why did Bloom experience a sentiment of remorse? |
| |
| Because in immature impatience he had treated with disrespect certain |
| beliefs and practices. |
| |
| |
| As? |
| |
| The prohibition of the use of fleshmeat and milk at one meal: the |
| hebdomadary symposium of incoordinately abstract, perfervidly concrete |
| mercantile coexreligionist excompatriots: the circumcision of |
| male infants: the supernatural character of Judaic scripture: the |
| ineffability of the tetragrammaton: the sanctity of the sabbath. |
| |
| |
| How did these beliefs and practices now appear to him? |
| |
| Not more rational than they had then appeared, not less rational than |
| other beliefs and practices now appeared. |
| |
| |
| What first reminiscence had he of Rudolph Bloom (deceased)? |
| |
| Rudolph Bloom (deceased) narrated to his son Leopold Bloom (aged 6) a |
| retrospective arrangement of migrations and settlements in and between |
| Dublin, London, Florence, Milan, Vienna, Budapest, Szombathely with |
| statements of satisfaction (his grandfather having seen Maria Theresia, |
| empress of Austria, queen of Hungary), with commercial advice (having |
| taken care of pence, the pounds having taken care of themselves). |
| Leopold Bloom (aged 6) had accompanied these narrations by constant |
| consultation of a geographical map of Europe (political) and by |
| suggestions for the establishment of affiliated business premises in the |
| various centres mentioned. |
| |
| |
| Had time equally but differently obliterated the memory of these |
| migrations in narrator and listener? |
| |
| In narrator by the access of years and in consequence of the use of |
| narcotic toxin: in listener by the access of years and in consequence of |
| the action of distraction upon vicarious experiences. |
| |
| |
| What idiosyncracies of the narrator were concomitant products of |
| amnesia? |
| |
| Occasionally he ate without having previously removed his hat. |
| Occasionally he drank voraciously the juice of gooseberry fool from an |
| inclined plate. Occasionally he removed from his lips the traces of food |
| by means of a lacerated envelope or other accessible fragment of paper. |
| |
| |
| What two phenomena of senescence were more frequent? |
| |
| The myopic digital calculation of coins, eructation consequent upon |
| repletion. |
| |
| |
| What object offered partial consolation for these reminiscences? |
| |
| The endowment policy, the bank passbook, the certificate of the |
| possession of scrip. |
| |
| |
| Reduce Bloom by cross multiplication of reverses of fortune, from which |
| these supports protected him, and by elimination of all positive values |
| to a negligible negative irrational unreal quantity. |
| |
| Successively, in descending helotic order: Poverty: that of the outdoor |
| hawker of imitation jewellery, the dun for the recovery of bad and |
| doubtful debts, the poor rate and deputy cess collector. Mendicancy: |
| that of the fraudulent bankrupt with negligible assets paying 1s. 4d. |
| in the pound, sandwichman, distributor of throwaways, nocturnal vagrant, |
| insinuating sycophant, maimed sailor, blind stripling, superannuated |
| bailiffs man, marfeast, lickplate, spoilsport, pickthank, eccentric |
| public laughingstock seated on bench of public park under discarded |
| perforated umbrella. Destitution: the inmate of Old Man's House (Royal |
| Hospital) Kilmainham, the inmate of Simpson's Hospital for reduced but |
| respectable men permanently disabled by gout or want of sight. Nadir of |
| misery: the aged impotent disfranchised ratesupported moribund lunatic |
| pauper. |
| |
| |
| With which attendant indignities? |
| |
| The unsympathetic indifference of previously amiable females, the |
| contempt of muscular males, the acceptance of fragments of bread, |
| the simulated ignorance of casual acquaintances, the latration of |
| illegitimate unlicensed vagabond dogs, the infantile discharge of |
| decomposed vegetable missiles, worth little or nothing, nothing or less |
| than nothing. |
| |
| |
| By what could such a situation be precluded? |
| |
| By decease (change of state): by departure (change of place). |
| |
| |
| Which preferably? |
| |
| The latter, by the line of least resistance. |
| |
| |
| What considerations rendered departure not entirely undesirable? |
| |
| Constant cohabitation impeding mutual toleration of personal defects. |
| The habit of independent purchase increasingly cultivated. The necessity |
| to counteract by impermanent sojourn the permanence of arrest. |
| |
| |
| What considerations rendered departure not irrational? |
| |
| The parties concerned, uniting, had increased and multiplied, which |
| being done, offspring produced and educed to maturity, the parties, if |
| not disunited were obliged to reunite for increase and multiplication, |
| which was absurd, to form by reunion the original couple of uniting |
| parties, which was impossible. |
| |
| |
| What considerations rendered departure desirable? |
| |
| The attractive character of certain localities in Ireland and abroad, |
| as represented in general geographical maps of polychrome design or |
| in special ordnance survey charts by employment of scale numerals and |
| hachures. |
| |
| |
| In Ireland? |
| |
| The cliffs of Moher, the windy wilds of Connemara, lough Neagh with |
| submerged petrified city, the Giant's Causeway, Fort Camden and Fort |
| Carlisle, the Golden Vale of Tipperary, the islands of Aran, the |
| pastures of royal Meath, Brigid's elm in Kildare, the Queen's Island |
| shipyard in Belfast, the Salmon Leap, the lakes of Killarney. |
| |
| |
| Abroad? |
| |
| Ceylon (with spicegardens supplying tea to Thomas Kernan, agent for |
| Pulbrook, Robertson and Co, 2 Mincing Lane, London, E. C., 5 Dame |
| street, Dublin), Jerusalem, the holy city (with mosque of Omar and gate |
| of Damascus, goal of aspiration), the straits of Gibraltar (the unique |
| birthplace of Marion Tweedy), the Parthenon (containing statues of nude |
| Grecian divinities), the Wall street money market (which controlled |
| international finance), the Plaza de Toros at La Linea, Spain (where |
| O'Hara of the Camerons had slain the bull), Niagara (over which no human |
| being had passed with impunity), the land of the Eskimos (eaters |
| of soap), the forbidden country of Thibet (from which no traveller |
| returns), the bay of Naples (to see which was to die), the Dead Sea. |
| |
| |
| Under what guidance, following what signs? |
| |
| At sea, septentrional, by night the polestar, located at the point of |
| intersection of the right line from beta to alpha in Ursa Maior produced |
| and divided externally at omega and the hypotenuse of the rightangled |
| triangle formed by the line alpha omega so produced and the line alpha |
| delta of Ursa Maior. On land, meridional, a bispherical moon, revealed |
| in imperfect varying phases of lunation through the posterior interstice |
| of the imperfectly occluded skirt of a carnose negligent perambulating |
| female, a pillar of the cloud by day. |
| |
| |
| What public advertisement would divulge the occultation of the departed? |
| |
| 5 pounds reward, lost, stolen or strayed from his residence 7 Eccles |
| street, missing gent about 40, answering to the name of Bloom, Leopold |
| (Poldy), height 5 ft 9 1/2 inches, full build, olive complexion, may |
| have since grown a beard, when last seen was wearing a black suit. Above |
| sum will be paid for information leading to his discovery. |
| |
| |
| What universal binomial denominations would be his as entity and |
| nonentity? |
| |
| Assumed by any or known to none. Everyman or Noman. |
| |
| |
| What tributes his? |
| |
| Honour and gifts of strangers, the friends of Everyman. A nymph |
| immortal, beauty, the bride of Noman. |
| |
| |
| Would the departed never nowhere nohow reappear? |
| |
| Ever he would wander, selfcompelled, to the extreme limit of his |
| cometary orbit, beyond the fixed stars and variable suns and telescopic |
| planets, astronomical waifs and strays, to the extreme boundary of |
| space, passing from land to land, among peoples, amid events. Somewhere |
| imperceptibly he would hear and somehow reluctantly, suncompelled, obey |
| the summons of recall. Whence, disappearing from the constellation of |
| the Northern Crown he would somehow reappear reborn above delta in the |
| constellation of Cassiopeia and after incalculable eons of peregrination |
| return an estranged avenger, a wreaker of justice on malefactors, a dark |
| crusader, a sleeper awakened, with financial resources (by supposition) |
| surpassing those of Rothschild or the silver king. |
| |
| |
| What would render such return irrational? |
| |
| An unsatisfactory equation between an exodus and return in time through |
| reversible space and an exodus and return in space through irreversible |
| time. |
| |
| |
| What play of forces, inducing inertia, rendered departure undesirable? |
| |
| The lateness of the hour, rendering procrastinatory: the obscurity |
| of the night, rendering invisible: the uncertainty of thoroughfares, |
| rendering perilous: the necessity for repose, obviating movement: the |
| proximity of an occupied bed, obviating research: the anticipation of |
| warmth (human) tempered with coolness (linen), obviating desire and |
| rendering desirable: the statue of Narcissus, sound without echo, |
| desired desire. |
| |
| |
| What advantages were possessed by an occupied, as distinct from an |
| unoccupied bed? |
| |
| The removal of nocturnal solitude, the superior quality of human |
| (mature female) to inhuman (hotwaterjar) calefaction, the stimulation of |
| matutinal contact, the economy of mangling done on the premises in the |
| case of trousers accurately folded and placed lengthwise between the |
| spring mattress (striped) and the woollen mattress (biscuit section). |
| |
| |
| What past consecutive causes, before rising preapprehended, of |
| accumulated fatigue did Bloom, before rising, silently recapitulate? |
| |
| The preparation of breakfast (burnt offering): intestinal congestion and |
| premeditative defecation (holy of holies): the bath (rite of John): the |
| funeral (rite of Samuel): the advertisement of Alexander Keyes (Urim and |
| Thummim): the unsubstantial lunch (rite of Melchisedek): the visit to |
| museum and national library (holy place): the bookhunt along Bedford |
| row, Merchants' Arch, Wellington Quay (Simchath Torah): the music in the |
| Ormond Hotel (Shira Shirim): the altercation with a truculent troglodyte |
| in Bernard Kiernan's premises (holocaust): a blank period of time |
| including a cardrive, a visit to a house of mourning, a leavetaking |
| (wilderness): the eroticism produced by feminine exhibitionism (rite of |
| Onan): the prolonged delivery of Mrs Mina Purefoy (heave offering): |
| the visit to the disorderly house of Mrs Bella Cohen, 82 Tyrone |
| street, lower and subsequent brawl and chance medley in Beaver street |
| (Armageddon)--nocturnal perambulation to and from the cabman's shelter, |
| Butt Bridge (atonement). |
| |
| |
| What selfimposed enigma did Bloom about to rise in order to go so as to |
| conclude lest he should not conclude involuntarily apprehend? |
| |
| The cause of a brief sharp unforeseen heard loud lone crack emitted by |
| the insentient material of a strainveined timber table. |
| |
| |
| What selfinvolved enigma did Bloom risen, going, gathering multicoloured |
| multiform multitudinous garments, voluntarily apprehending, not |
| comprehend? |
| |
| Who was M'Intosh? |
| |
| |
| What selfevident enigma pondered with desultory constancy during 30 |
| years did Bloom now, having effected natural obscurity by the extinction |
| of artificial light, silently suddenly comprehend? |
| |
| Where was Moses when the candle went out? |
| |
| |
| What imperfections in a perfect day did Bloom, walking, charged with |
| collected articles of recently disvested male wearing apparel, silently, |
| successively, enumerate? |
| |
| A provisional failure to obtain renewal of an advertisement: to obtain |
| a certain quantity of tea from Thomas Kernan (agent for Pulbrook, |
| Robertson and Co, 5 Dame Street, Dublin, and 2 Mincing Lane, London E. |
| C.): to certify the presence or absence of posterior rectal orifice in |
| the case of Hellenic female divinities: to obtain admission (gratuitous |
| or paid) to the performance of Leah by Mrs Bandmann Palmer at the Gaiety |
| Theatre, 46, 47, 48, 49 South King street. |
| |
| |
| What impression of an absent face did Bloom, arrested, silently recall? |
| |
| The face of her father, the late Major Brian Cooper Tweedy, Royal Dublin |
| Fusiliers, of Gibraltar and Rehoboth, Dolphin's Barn. |
| |
| |
| What recurrent impressions of the same were possible by hypothesis? |
| |
| Retreating, at the terminus of the Great Northern Railway, Amiens |
| street, with constant uniform acceleration, along parallel lines |
| meeting at infinity, if produced: along parallel lines, reproduced from |
| infinity, with constant uniform retardation, at the terminus of the |
| Great Northern Railway, Amiens street, returning. |
| |
| |
| What miscellaneous effects of female personal wearing apparel were |
| perceived by him? |
| |
| A pair of new inodorous halfsilk black ladies' hose, a pair of new |
| violet garters, a pair of outsize ladies' drawers of India mull, cut on |
| generous lines, redolent of opoponax, jessamine and Muratti's Turkish |
| cigarettes and containing a long bright steel safety pin, folded |
| curvilinear, a camisole of batiste with thin lace border, an accordion |
| underskirt of blue silk moirette, all these objects being disposed |
| irregularly on the top of a rectangular trunk, quadruple battened, |
| having capped corners, with multicoloured labels, initialled on its fore |
| side in white lettering B. C. T. (Brian Cooper Tweedy). |
| |
| |
| What impersonal objects were perceived? |
| |
| A commode, one leg fractured, totally covered by square cretonne |
| cutting, apple design, on which rested a lady's black straw hat. |
| Orangekeyed ware, bought of Henry Price, basket, fancy goods, chinaware |
| and ironmongery manufacturer, 21, 22, 23 Moore street, disposed |
| irregularly on the washstand and floor and consisting of basin, soapdish |
| and brushtray (on the washstand, together), pitcher and night article |
| (on the floor, separate). |
| |
| |
| Bloom's acts? |
| |
| He deposited the articles of clothing on a chair, removed his remaining |
| articles of clothing, took from beneath the bolster at the head of the |
| bed a folded long white nightshirt, inserted his head and arms into the |
| proper apertures of the nightshirt, removed a pillow from the head to |
| the foot of the bed, prepared the bedlinen accordingly and entered the |
| bed. |
| |
| |
| How? |
| |
| With circumspection, as invariably when entering an abode (his own or |
| not his own): with solicitude, the snakespiral springs of the mattress |
| being old, the brass quoits and pendent viper radii loose and tremulous |
| under stress and strain: prudently, as entering a lair or ambush of |
| lust or adders: lightly, the less to disturb: reverently, the bed of |
| conception and of birth, of consummation of marriage and of breach of |
| marriage, of sleep and of death. |
| |
| |
| What did his limbs, when gradually extended, encounter? |
| |
| New clean bedlinen, additional odours, the presence of a human form, |
| female, hers, the imprint of a human form, male, not his, some crumbs, |
| some flakes of potted meat, recooked, which he removed. |
| |
| |
| If he had smiled why would he have smiled? |
| |
| To reflect that each one who enters imagines himself to be the first to |
| enter whereas he is always the last term of a preceding series even if |
| the first term of a succeeding one, each imagining himself to be first, |
| last, only and alone whereas he is neither first nor last nor only nor |
| alone in a series originating in and repeated to infinity. |
| |
| |
| What preceding series? |
| |
| Assuming Mulvey to be the first term of his series, Penrose, Bartell |
| d'Arcy, professor Goodwin, Julius Mastiansky, John Henry Menton, Father |
| Bernard Corrigan, a farmer at the Royal Dublin Society's Horse Show, |
| Maggot O'Reilly, Matthew Dillon, Valentine Blake Dillon (Lord Mayor |
| of Dublin), Christopher Callinan, Lenehan, an Italian organgrinder, |
| an unknown gentleman in the Gaiety Theatre, Benjamin Dollard, Simon |
| Dedalus, Andrew (Pisser) Burke, Joseph Cuffe, Wisdom Hely, Alderman John |
| Hooper, Dr Francis Brady, Father Sebastian of Mount Argus, a bootblack |
| at the General Post Office, Hugh E. (Blazes) Boylan and so each and so |
| on to no last term. |
| |
| |
| What were his reflections concerning the last member of this series and |
| late occupant of the bed? |
| |
| Reflections on his vigour (a bounder), corporal proportion (a |
| billsticker), commercial ability (a bester), impressionability (a |
| boaster). |
| |
| |
| Why for the observer impressionability in addition to vigour, corporal |
| proportion and commercial ability? |
| |
| Because he had observed with augmenting frequency in the preceding |
| members of the same series the same concupiscence, inflammably |
| transmitted, first with alarm, then with understanding, then with |
| desire, finally with fatigue, with alternating symptoms of epicene |
| comprehension and apprehension. |
| |
| |
| With what antagonistic sentiments were his subsequent reflections |
| affected? |
| |
| Envy, jealousy, abnegation, equanimity. |
| |
| |
| Envy? |
| |
| Of a bodily and mental male organism specially adapted for the |
| superincumbent posture of energetic human copulation and energetic |
| piston and cylinder movement necessary for the complete satisfaction of |
| a constant but not acute concupiscence resident in a bodily and mental |
| female organism, passive but not obtuse. |
| |
| |
| Jealousy? |
| |
| Because a nature full and volatile in its free state, was alternately |
| the agent and reagent of attraction. Because attraction between agent(s) |
| and reagent(s) at all instants varied, with inverse proportion of |
| increase and decrease, with incessant circular extension and radial |
| reentrance. Because the controlled contemplation of the fluctuation of |
| attraction produced, if desired, a fluctuation of pleasure. |
| |
| |
| Abnegation? |
| |
| In virtue of a) acquaintance initiated in September 1903 in the |
| establishment of George Mesias, merchant tailor and outfitter, 5 Eden |
| Quay, b) hospitality extended and received in kind, reciprocated and |
| reappropriated in person, c) comparative youth subject to impulses of |
| ambition and magnanimity, colleagual altruism and amorous egoism, d) |
| extraracial attraction, intraracial inhibition, supraracial prerogative, |
| e) an imminent provincial musical tour, common current expenses, net |
| proceeds divided. |
| |
| |
| Equanimity? |
| |
| As as natural as any and every natural act of a nature expressed or |
| understood executed in natured nature by natural creatures in accordance |
| with his, her and their natured natures, of dissimilar similarity. |
| As not so calamitous as a cataclysmic annihilation of the planet in |
| consequence of a collision with a dark sun. As less reprehensible than |
| theft, highway robbery, cruelty to children and animals, obtaining money |
| under false pretences, forgery, embezzlement, misappropriation of public |
| money, betrayal of public trust, malingering, mayhem, corruption of |
| minors, criminal libel, blackmail, contempt of court, arson, treason, |
| felony, mutiny on the high seas, trespass, burglary, jailbreaking, |
| practice of unnatural vice, desertion from armed forces in the field, |
| perjury, poaching, usury, intelligence with the king's enemies, |
| impersonation, criminal assault, manslaughter, wilful and premeditated |
| murder. As not more abnormal than all other parallel processes of |
| adaptation to altered conditions of existence, resulting in a reciprocal |
| equilibrium between the bodily organism and its attendant circumstances, |
| foods, beverages, acquired habits, indulged inclinations, significant |
| disease. As more than inevitable, irreparable. |
| |
| |
| Why more abnegation than jealousy, less envy than equanimity? |
| |
| From outrage (matrimony) to outrage (adultery) there arose nought but |
| outrage (copulation) yet the matrimonial violator of the matrimonially |
| violated had not been outraged by the adulterous violator of the |
| adulterously violated. |
| |
| |
| What retribution, if any? |
| |
| Assassination, never, as two wrongs did not make one right. Duel by |
| combat, no. Divorce, not now. Exposure by mechanical artifice (automatic |
| bed) or individual testimony (concealed ocular witnesses), not yet. Suit |
| for damages by legal influence or simulation of assault with evidence of |
| injuries sustained (selfinflicted), not impossibly. Hushmoney by moral |
| influence possibly. If any, positively, connivance, introduction of |
| emulation (material, a prosperous rival agency of publicity: moral, |
| a successful rival agent of intimacy), depreciation, alienation, |
| humiliation, separation protecting the one separated from the other, |
| protecting the separator from both. |
| |
| |
| By what reflections did he, a conscious reactor against the void of |
| incertitude, justify to himself his sentiments? |
| |
| The preordained frangibility of the hymen: the presupposed intangibility |
| of the thing in itself: the incongruity and disproportion between |
| the selfprolonging tension of the thing proposed to be done and the |
| selfabbreviating relaxation of the thing done; the fallaciously inferred |
| debility of the female: the muscularity of the male: the variations of |
| ethical codes: the natural grammatical transition by inversion involving |
| no alteration of sense of an aorist preterite proposition (parsed as |
| masculine subject, monosyllabic onomatopoeic transitive verb with direct |
| feminine object) from the active voice into its correlative aorist |
| preterite proposition (parsed as feminine subject, auxiliary verb |
| and quasimonosyllabic onomatopoeic past participle with complementary |
| masculine agent) in the passive voice: the continued product of |
| seminators by generation: the continual production of semen by |
| distillation: the futility of triumph or protest or vindication: the |
| inanity of extolled virtue: the lethargy of nescient matter: the apathy |
| of the stars. |
| |
| |
| In what final satisfaction did these antagonistic sentiments and |
| reflections, reduced to their simplest forms, converge? |
| |
| Satisfaction at the ubiquity in eastern and western terrestrial |
| hemispheres, in all habitable lands and islands explored or unexplored |
| (the land of the midnight sun, the islands of the blessed, the isles of |
| Greece, the land of promise), of adipose anterior and posterior female |
| hemispheres, redolent of milk and honey and of excretory sanguine and |
| seminal warmth, reminiscent of secular families of curves of amplitude, |
| insusceptible of moods of impression or of contrarieties of expression, |
| expressive of mute immutable mature animality. |
| |
| |
| The visible signs of antesatisfaction? |
| |
| An approximate erection: a solicitous adversion: a gradual elevation: a |
| tentative revelation: a silent contemplation. |
| |
| |
| Then? |
| |
| He kissed the plump mellow yellow smellow melons of her rump, on each |
| plump melonous hemisphere, in their mellow yellow furrow, with obscure |
| prolonged provocative melonsmellonous osculation. |
| |
| |
| The visible signs of postsatisfaction? |
| |
| A silent contemplation: a tentative velation: a gradual abasement: a |
| solicitous aversion: a proximate erection. |
| |
| |
| What followed this silent action? |
| |
| Somnolent invocation, less somnolent recognition, incipient excitation, |
| catechetical interrogation. |
| |
| |
| With what modifications did the narrator reply to this interrogation? |
| |
| Negative: he omitted to mention the clandestine correspondence between |
| Martha Clifford and Henry Flower, the public altercation at, in and |
| in the vicinity of the licensed premises of Bernard Kiernan and Co, |
| Limited, 8, 9 and 10 Little Britain street, the erotic provocation |
| and response thereto caused by the exhibitionism of Gertrude (Gerty), |
| surname unknown. Positive: he included mention of a performance by Mrs |
| Bandmann Palmer of LEAH at the Gaiety Theatre, 46, 47, 48, 49 South King |
| street, an invitation to supper at Wynn's (Murphy's) Hotel, 35, 36 and |
| 37 Lower Abbey street, a volume of peccaminous pornographical tendency |
| entituled SWEETS OF SIN, anonymous author a gentleman of fashion, a |
| temporary concussion caused by a falsely calculated movement in the |
| course of a postcenal gymnastic display, the victim (since completely |
| recovered) being Stephen Dedalus, professor and author, eldest surviving |
| son of Simon Dedalus, of no fixed occupation, an aeronautical feat |
| executed by him (narrator) in the presence of a witness, the professor |
| and author aforesaid, with promptitude of decision and gymnastic |
| flexibility. |
| |
| |
| Was the narration otherwise unaltered by modifications? |
| |
| Absolutely. |
| |
| |
| Which event or person emerged as the salient point of his narration? |
| |
| Stephen Dedalus, professor and author. |
| |
| |
| What limitations of activity and inhibitions of conjugal rights were |
| perceived by listener and narrator concerning themselves during the |
| course of this intermittent and increasingly more laconic narration? |
| |
| By the listener a limitation of fertility inasmuch as marriage had been |
| celebrated 1 calendar month after the 18th anniversary of her birth (8 |
| September 1870), viz. 8 October, and consummated on the same date with |
| female issue born 15 June 1889, having been anticipatorily consummated |
| on the lo September of the same year and complete carnal intercourse, |
| with ejaculation of semen within the natural female organ, having last |
| taken place 5 weeks previous, viz. 27 November 1893, to the birth on 29 |
| December 1893 of second (and only male) issue, deceased 9 January 1894, |
| aged 11 days, there remained a period of 10 years, 5 months and 18 days |
| during which carnal intercourse had been incomplete, without ejaculation |
| of semen within the natural female organ. By the narrator a limitation |
| of activity, mental and corporal, inasmuch as complete mental |
| intercourse between himself and the listener had not taken place since |
| the consummation of puberty, indicated by catamenic hemorrhage, of the |
| female issue of narrator and listener, 15 September 1903, there remained |
| a period of 9 months and 1 day during which, in consequence of a |
| preestablished natural comprehension in incomprehension between the |
| consummated females (listener and issue), complete corporal liberty of |
| action had been circumscribed. |
| |
| |
| How? |
| |
| By various reiterated feminine interrogation concerning the masculine |
| destination whither, the place where, the time at which, the duration |
| for which, the object with which in the case of temporary absences, |
| projected or effected. |
| |
| |
| What moved visibly above the listener's and the narrator's invisible |
| thoughts? |
| |
| The upcast reflection of a lamp and shade, an inconstant series of |
| concentric circles of varying gradations of light and shadow. |
| |
| |
| In what directions did listener and narrator lie? |
| |
| Listener, S. E. by E.: Narrator, N. W. by W.: on the 53rd parallel |
| of latitude, N., and 6th meridian of longitude, W.: at an angle of 45 |
| degrees to the terrestrial equator. |
| |
| |
| In what state of rest or motion? |
| |
| At rest relatively to themselves and to each other. In motion being each |
| and both carried westward, forward and rereward respectively, by the |
| proper perpetual motion of the earth through everchanging tracks of |
| neverchanging space. |
| |
| |
| In what posture? |
| |
| Listener: reclined semilaterally, left, left hand under head, right |
| leg extended in a straight line and resting on left leg, flexed, in the |
| attitude of Gea-Tellus, fulfilled, recumbent, big with seed. Narrator: |
| reclined laterally, left, with right and left legs flexed, the index |
| finger and thumb of the right hand resting on the bridge of the nose, in |
| the attitude depicted in a snapshot photograph made by Percy Apjohn, the |
| childman weary, the manchild in the womb. |
| |
| |
| Womb? Weary? |
| |
| He rests. He has travelled. |
| |
| |
| With? |
| |
| Sinbad the Sailor and Tinbad the Tailor and Jinbad the Jailer and |
| Whinbad the Whaler and Ninbad the Nailer and Finbad the Failer and |
| Binbad the Bailer and Pinbad the Pailer and Minbad the Mailer and Hinbad |
| the Hailer and Rinbad the Railer and Dinbad the Kailer and Vinbad the |
| Quailer and Linbad the Yailer and Xinbad the Phthailer. |
| |
| |
| When? |
| |
| Going to dark bed there was a square round Sinbad the Sailor roc's auk's |
| egg in the night of the bed of all the auks of the rocs of Darkinbad the |
| Brightdayler. |
| |
| |
| Where? |
| |
| |
| |
| Yes because he never did a thing like that before as ask to get his |
| breakfast in bed with a couple of eggs since the _City Arms_ hotel |
| when he used to be pretending to be laid up with a sick voice doing his |
| highness to make himself interesting for that old faggot Mrs Riordan |
| that he thought he had a great leg of and she never left us a farthing |
| all for masses for herself and her soul greatest miser ever was actually |
| afraid to lay out 4d for her methylated spirit telling me all her |
| ailments she had too much old chat in her about politics and earthquakes |
| and the end of the world let us have a bit of fun first God help the |
| world if all the women were her sort down on bathingsuits and lownecks |
| of course nobody wanted her to wear them I suppose she was pious because |
| no man would look at her twice I hope Ill never be like her a wonder |
| she didnt want us to cover our faces but she was a welleducated woman |
| certainly and her gabby talk about Mr Riordan here and Mr Riordan there |
| I suppose he was glad to get shut of her and her dog smelling my fur and |
| always edging to get up under my petticoats especially then still I like |
| that in him polite to old women like that and waiters and beggars too |
| hes not proud out of nothing but not always if ever he got anything |
| really serious the matter with him its much better for them to go into |
| a hospital where everything is clean but I suppose Id have to dring it |
| into him for a month yes and then wed have a hospital nurse next thing |
| on the carpet have him staying there till they throw him out or a nun |
| maybe like the smutty photo he has shes as much a nun as Im not yes |
| because theyre so weak and puling when theyre sick they want a woman |
| to get well if his nose bleeds youd think it was O tragic and that |
| dyinglooking one off the south circular when he sprained his foot at |
| the choir party at the sugarloaf Mountain the day I wore that dress |
| Miss Stack bringing him flowers the worst old ones she could find at the |
| bottom of the basket anything at all to get into a mans bedroom with |
| her old maids voice trying to imagine he was dying on account of her to |
| never see thy face again though he looked more like a man with his beard |
| a bit grown in the bed father was the same besides I hate bandaging and |
| dosing when he cut his toe with the razor paring his corns afraid hed |
| get bloodpoisoning but if it was a thing I was sick then wed see what |
| attention only of course the woman hides it not to give all the trouble |
| they do yes he came somewhere Im sure by his appetite anyway love its |
| not or hed be off his feed thinking of her so either it was one of those |
| night women if it was down there he was really and the hotel story he |
| made up a pack of lies to hide it planning it Hynes kept me who did I |
| meet ah yes I met do you remember Menton and who else who let me see |
| that big babbyface I saw him and he not long married flirting with a |
| young girl at Pooles Myriorama and turned my back on him when he slinked |
| out looking quite conscious what harm but he had the impudence to make |
| up to me one time well done to him mouth almighty and his boiled eyes of |
| all the big stupoes I ever met and thats called a solicitor only for |
| I hate having a long wrangle in bed or else if its not that its some |
| little bitch or other he got in with somewhere or picked up on the |
| sly if they only knew him as well as I do yes because the day before |
| yesterday he was scribbling something a letter when I came into the |
| front room to show him Dignams death in the paper as if something told |
| me and he covered it up with the blottingpaper pretending to be thinking |
| about business so very probably that was it to somebody who thinks |
| she has a softy in him because all men get a bit like that at his age |
| especially getting on to forty he is now so as to wheedle any money she |
| can out of him no fool like an old fool and then the usual kissing my |
| bottom was to hide it not that I care two straws now who he does it with |
| or knew before that way though Id like to find out so long as I dont |
| have the two of them under my nose all the time like that slut that Mary |
| we had in Ontario terrace padding out her false bottom to excite him bad |
| enough to get the smell of those painted women off him once or twice |
| I had a suspicion by getting him to come near me when I found the |
| long hair on his coat without that one when I went into the kitchen |
| pretending he was drinking water 1 woman is not enough for them it was |
| all his fault of course ruining servants then proposing that she could |
| eat at our table on Christmas day if you please O no thank you not in my |
| house stealing my potatoes and the oysters 2/6 per doz going out to see |
| her aunt if you please common robbery so it was but I was sure he had |
| something on with that one it takes me to find out a thing like that he |
| said you have no proof it was her proof O yes her aunt was very fond of |
| oysters but I told her what I thought of her suggesting me to go out to |
| be alone with her I wouldnt lower myself to spy on them the garters I |
| found in her room the Friday she was out that was enough for me a little |
| bit too much her face swelled up on her with temper when I gave her her |
| weeks notice I saw to that better do without them altogether do out the |
| rooms myself quicker only for the damn cooking and throwing out the dirt |
| I gave it to him anyhow either she or me leaves the house I couldnt even |
| touch him if I thought he was with a dirty barefaced liar and sloven |
| like that one denying it up to my face and singing about the place in |
| the W C too because she knew she was too well off yes because he couldnt |
| possibly do without it that long so he must do it somewhere and the last |
| time he came on my bottom when was it the night Boylan gave my hand a |
| great squeeze going along by the Tolka in my hand there steals another |
| I just pressed the back of his like that with my thumb to squeeze back |
| singing the young May moon shes beaming love because he has an idea |
| about him and me hes not such a fool he said Im dining out and going to |
| the Gaiety though Im not going to give him the satisfaction in any case |
| God knows hes a change in a way not to be always and ever wearing the |
| same old hat unless I paid some nicelooking boy to do it since I cant do |
| it myself a young boy would like me Id confuse him a little alone with |
| him if we were Id let him see my garters the new ones and make him turn |
| red looking at him seduce him I know what boys feel with that down |
| on their cheek doing that frigging drawing out the thing by the hour |
| question and answer would you do this that and the other with the |
| coalman yes with a bishop yes I would because I told him about some dean |
| or bishop was sitting beside me in the jews temples gardens when I was |
| knitting that woollen thing a stranger to Dublin what place was it and |
| so on about the monuments and he tired me out with statues encouraging |
| him making him worse than he is who is in your mind now tell me who are |
| you thinking of who is it tell me his name who tell me who the german |
| Emperor is it yes imagine Im him think of him can you feel him trying to |
| make a whore of me what he never will he ought to give it up now at this |
| age of his life simply ruination for any woman and no satisfaction in it |
| pretending to like it till he comes and then finish it off myself anyway |
| and it makes your lips pale anyhow its done now once and for all with |
| all the talk of the world about it people make its only the first time |
| after that its just the ordinary do it and think no more about it why |
| cant you kiss a man without going and marrying him first you sometimes |
| love to wildly when you feel that way so nice all over you you cant help |
| yourself I wish some man or other would take me sometime when hes there |
| and kiss me in his arms theres nothing like a kiss long and hot down to |
| your soul almost paralyses you then I hate that confession when I used |
| to go to Father Corrigan he touched me father and what harm if he did |
| where and I said on the canal bank like a fool but whereabouts on your |
| person my child on the leg behind high up was it yes rather high up was |
| it where you sit down yes O Lord couldnt he say bottom right out and |
| have done with it what has that got to do with it and did you whatever |
| way he put it I forget no father and I always think of the real father |
| what did he want to know for when I already confessed it to God he had |
| a nice fat hand the palm moist always I wouldnt mind feeling it neither |
| would he Id say by the bullneck in his horsecollar I wonder did he know |
| me in the box I could see his face he couldnt see mine of course hed |
| never turn or let on still his eyes were red when his father died theyre |
| lost for a woman of course must be terrible when a man cries let alone |
| them Id like to be embraced by one in his vestments and the smell of |
| incense off him like the pope besides theres no danger with a priest if |
| youre married hes too careful about himself then give something to H |
| H the pope for a penance I wonder was he satisfied with me one thing I |
| didnt like his slapping me behind going away so familiarly in the hall |
| though I laughed Im not a horse or an ass am I I suppose he was thinking |
| of his fathers I wonder is he awake thinking of me or dreaming am I in |
| it who gave him that flower he said he bought he smelt of some kind of |
| drink not whisky or stout or perhaps the sweety kind of paste they stick |
| their bills up with some liqueur Id like to sip those richlooking green |
| and yellow expensive drinks those stagedoor johnnies drink with the |
| opera hats I tasted once with my finger dipped out of that American that |
| had the squirrel talking stamps with father he had all he could do to |
| keep himself from falling asleep after the last time after we took the |
| port and potted meat it had a fine salty taste yes because I felt lovely |
| and tired myself and fell asleep as sound as a top the moment I popped |
| straight into bed till that thunder woke me up God be merciful to us |
| I thought the heavens were coming down about us to punish us when I |
| blessed myself and said a Hail Mary like those awful thunderbolts in |
| Gibraltar as if the world was coming to an end and then they come and |
| tell you theres no God what could you do if it was running and rushing |
| about nothing only make an act of contrition the candle I lit that |
| evening in Whitefriars street chapel for the month of May see it brought |
| its luck though hed scoff if he heard because he never goes to church |
| mass or meeting he says your soul you have no soul inside only grey |
| matter because he doesnt know what it is to have one yes when I lit the |
| lamp because he must have come 3 or 4 times with that tremendous big red |
| brute of a thing he has I thought the vein or whatever the dickens they |
| call it was going to burst though his nose is not so big after I took |
| off all my things with the blinds down after my hours dressing and |
| perfuming and combing it like iron or some kind of a thick crowbar |
| standing all the time he must have eaten oysters I think a few dozen he |
| was in great singing voice no I never in all my life felt anyone had |
| one the size of that to make you feel full up he must have eaten a whole |
| sheep after whats the idea making us like that with a big hole in the |
| middle of us or like a Stallion driving it up into you because thats all |
| they want out of you with that determined vicious look in his eye I had |
| to halfshut my eyes still he hasnt such a tremendous amount of spunk in |
| him when I made him pull out and do it on me considering how big it is |
| so much the better in case any of it wasnt washed out properly the last |
| time I let him finish it in me nice invention they made for women for |
| him to get all the pleasure but if someone gave them a touch of it |
| themselves theyd know what I went through with Milly nobody would |
| believe cutting her teeth too and Mina Purefoys husband give us a swing |
| out of your whiskers filling her up with a child or twins once a year |
| as regular as the clock always with a smell of children off her the one |
| they called budgers or something like a nigger with a shock of hair on |
| it Jesusjack the child is a black the last time I was there a squad of |
| them falling over one another and bawling you couldnt hear your ears |
| supposed to be healthy not satisfied till they have us swollen out like |
| elephants or I dont know what supposing I risked having another not off |
| him though still if he was married Im sure hed have a fine strong child |
| but I dont know Poldy has more spunk in him yes thatd be awfully jolly |
| I suppose it was meeting Josie Powell and the funeral and thinking about |
| me and Boylan set him off well he can think what he likes now if thatll |
| do him any good I know they were spooning a bit when I came on the scene |
| he was dancing and sitting out with her the night of Georgina Simpsons |
| housewarming and then he wanted to ram it down my neck it was on account |
| of not liking to see her a wallflower that was why we had the standup |
| row over politics he began it not me when he said about Our Lord being a |
| carpenter at last he made me cry of course a woman is so sensitive about |
| everything I was fuming with myself after for giving in only for I knew |
| he was gone on me and the first socialist he said He was he annoyed me |
| so much I couldnt put him into a temper still he knows a lot of mixedup |
| things especially about the body and the inside I often wanted to study |
| up that myself what we have inside us in that family physician I could |
| always hear his voice talking when the room was crowded and watch him |
| after that I pretended I had a coolness on with her over him because he |
| used to be a bit on the jealous side whenever he asked who are you going |
| to and I said over to Floey and he made me the present of Byron's poems |
| and the three pairs of gloves so that finished that I could quite easily |
| get him to make it up any time I know how Id even supposing he got in |
| with her again and was going out to see her somewhere Id know if he |
| refused to eat the onions I know plenty of ways ask him to tuck down the |
| collar of my blouse or touch him with my veil and gloves on going out I |
| kiss then would send them all spinning however alright well see then let |
| him go to her she of course would only be too delighted to pretend shes |
| mad in love with him that I wouldnt so much mind Id just go to her and |
| ask her do you love him and look her square in the eyes she couldnt fool |
| me but he might imagine he was and make a declaration to her with his |
| plabbery kind of a manner like he did to me though I had the devils own |
| job to get it out of him though I liked him for that it showed he could |
| hold in and wasnt to be got for the asking he was on the pop of asking |
| me too the night in the kitchen I was rolling the potato cake theres |
| something I want to say to you only for I put him off letting on I was |
| in a temper with my hands and arms full of pasty flour in any case I let |
| out too much the night before talking of dreams so I didnt want to let |
| him know more than was good for him she used to be always embracing me |
| Josie whenever he was there meaning him of course glauming me over and |
| when I said I washed up and down as far as possible asking me and did |
| you wash possible the women are always egging on to that putting it on |
| thick when hes there they know by his sly eye blinking a bit putting on |
| the indifferent when they come out with something the kind he is what |
| spoils him I dont wonder in the least because he was very handsome at |
| that time trying to look like Lord Byron I said I liked though he |
| was too beautiful for a man and he was a little before we got engaged |
| afterwards though she didnt like it so much the day I was in fits of |
| laughing with the giggles I couldnt stop about all my hairpins falling |
| out one after another with the mass of hair I had youre always in great |
| humour she said yes because it grigged her because she knew what it |
| meant because I used to tell her a good bit of what went on between us |
| not all but just enough to make her mouth water but that wasnt my fault |
| she didnt darken the door much after we were married I wonder what shes |
| got like now after living with that dotty husband of hers she had her |
| face beginning to look drawn and run down the last time I saw her she |
| must have been just after a row with him because I saw on the moment she |
| was edging to draw down a conversation about husbands and talk about him |
| to run him down what was it she told me O yes that sometimes he used to |
| go to bed with his muddy boots on when the maggot takes him just imagine |
| having to get into bed with a thing like that that might murder you |
| any moment what a man well its not the one way everyone goes mad Poldy |
| anyhow whatever he does always wipes his feet on the mat when he comes |
| in wet or shine and always blacks his own boots too and he always takes |
| off his hat when he comes up in the street like then and now hes going |
| about in his slippers to look for 10000 pounds for a postcard U p up |
| O sweetheart May wouldnt a thing like that simply bore you stiff to |
| extinction actually too stupid even to take his boots off now what |
| could you make of a man like that Id rather die 20 times over than marry |
| another of their sex of course hed never find another woman like me to |
| put up with him the way I do know me come sleep with me yes and he knows |
| that too at the bottom of his heart take that Mrs Maybrick that poisoned |
| her husband for what I wonder in love with some other man yes it was |
| found out on her wasnt she the downright villain to go and do a thing |
| like that of course some men can be dreadfully aggravating drive you mad |
| and always the worst word in the world what do they ask us to marry them |
| for if were so bad as all that comes to yes because they cant get on |
| without us white Arsenic she put in his tea off flypaper wasnt it I |
| wonder why they call it that if I asked him hed say its from the Greek |
| leave us as wise as we were before she must have been madly in love with |
| the other fellow to run the chance of being hanged O she didnt care if |
| that was her nature what could she do besides theyre not brutes enough |
| to go and hang a woman surely are they |
| |
| theyre all so different Boylan talking about the shape of my foot he |
| noticed at once even before he was introduced when I was in the D B C |
| with Poldy laughing and trying to listen I was waggling my foot we both |
| ordered 2 teas and plain bread and butter I saw him looking with his |
| two old maids of sisters when I stood up and asked the girl where it was |
| what do I care with it dropping out of me and that black closed breeches |
| he made me buy takes you half an hour to let them down wetting all |
| myself always with some brandnew fad every other week such a long one I |
| did I forgot my suede gloves on the seat behind that I never got after |
| some robber of a woman and he wanted me to put it in the Irish times |
| lost in the ladies lavatory D B C Dame street finder return to Mrs |
| Marion Bloom and I saw his eyes on my feet going out through the turning |
| door he was looking when I looked back and I went there for tea 2 days |
| after in the hope but he wasnt now how did that excite him because I was |
| crossing them when we were in the other room first he meant the shoes |
| that are too tight to walk in my hand is nice like that if I only had a |
| ring with the stone for my month a nice aquamarine Ill stick him for one |
| and a gold bracelet I dont like my foot so much still I made him spend |
| once with my foot the night after Goodwins botchup of a concert so cold |
| and windy it was well we had that rum in the house to mull and the fire |
| wasnt black out when he asked to take off my stockings lying on the |
| hearthrug in Lombard street west and another time it was my muddy boots |
| hed like me to walk in all the horses dung I could find but of course |
| hes not natural like the rest of the world that I what did he say I |
| could give 9 points in 10 to Katty Lanner and beat her what does that |
| mean I asked him I forget what he said because the stoppress edition |
| just passed and the man with the curly hair in the Lucan dairy thats so |
| polite I think I saw his face before somewhere I noticed him when I was |
| tasting the butter so I took my time Bartell dArcy too that he used to |
| make fun of when he commenced kissing me on the choir stairs after I |
| sang Gounods _Ave Maria_ what are we waiting for O my heart kiss me |
| straight on the brow and part which is my brown part he was pretty hot |
| for all his tinny voice too my low notes he was always raving about if |
| you can believe him I liked the way he used his mouth singing then he |
| said wasnt it terrible to do that there in a place like that I dont see |
| anything so terrible about it Ill tell him about that some day not now |
| and surprise him ay and Ill take him there and show him the very place |
| too we did it so now there you are like it or lump it he thinks nothing |
| can happen without him knowing he hadnt an idea about my mother till we |
| were engaged otherwise hed never have got me so cheap as he did he was |
| lo times worse himself anyhow begging me to give him a tiny bit cut off |
| my drawers that was the evening coming along Kenilworth square he kissed |
| me in the eye of my glove and I had to take it off asking me questions |
| is it permitted to enquire the shape of my bedroom so I let him keep it |
| as if I forgot it to think of me when I saw him slip it into his pocket |
| of course hes mad on the subject of drawers thats plain to be seen |
| always skeezing at those brazenfaced things on the bicycles with their |
| skirts blowing up to their navels even when Milly and I were out with |
| him at the open air fete that one in the cream muslin standing right |
| against the sun so he could see every atom she had on when he saw me |
| from behind following in the rain I saw him before he saw me however |
| standing at the corner of the Harolds cross road with a new raincoat on |
| him with the muffler in the Zingari colours to show off his complexion |
| and the brown hat looking slyboots as usual what was he doing there |
| where hed no business they can go and get whatever they like from |
| anything at all with a skirt on it and were not to ask any questions but |
| they want to know where were you where are you going I could feel him |
| coming along skulking after me his eyes on my neck he had been keeping |
| away from the house he felt it was getting too warm for him so I |
| halfturned and stopped then he pestered me to say yes till I took off my |
| glove slowly watching him he said my openwork sleeves were too cold for |
| the rain anything for an excuse to put his hand anear me drawers drawers |
| the whole blessed time till I promised to give him the pair off my doll |
| to carry about in his waistcoat pocket _O Maria Santisima_ he did look |
| a big fool dreeping in the rain splendid set of teeth he had made me |
| hungry to look at them and beseeched of me to lift the orange petticoat |
| I had on with the sunray pleats that there was nobody he said hed kneel |
| down in the wet if I didnt so persevering he would too and ruin his new |
| raincoat you never know what freak theyd take alone with you theyre so |
| savage for it if anyone was passing so I lifted them a bit and touched |
| his trousers outside the way I used to Gardner after with my ring hand |
| to keep him from doing worse where it was too public I was dying to find |
| out was he circumcised he was shaking like a jelly all over they want |
| to do everything too quick take all the pleasure out of it and father |
| waiting all the time for his dinner he told me to say I left my purse in |
| the butchers and had to go back for it what a Deceiver then he wrote me |
| that letter with all those words in it how could he have the face to any |
| woman after his company manners making it so awkward after when we met |
| asking me have I offended you with my eyelids down of course he saw I |
| wasnt he had a few brains not like that other fool Henny Doyle he was |
| always breaking or tearing something in the charades I hate an unlucky |
| man and if I knew what it meant of course I had to say no for form sake |
| dont understand you I said and wasnt it natural so it is of course |
| it used to be written up with a picture of a womans on that wall in |
| Gibraltar with that word I couldnt find anywhere only for children |
| seeing it too young then writing every morning a letter sometimes twice |
| a day I liked the way he made love then he knew the way to take a woman |
| when he sent me the 8 big poppies because mine was the 8th then I wrote |
| the night he kissed my heart at Dolphins barn I couldnt describe it |
| simply it makes you feel like nothing on earth but he never knew how to |
| embrace well like Gardner I hope hell come on Monday as he said at the |
| same time four I hate people who come at all hours answer the door you |
| think its the vegetables then its somebody and you all undressed or |
| the door of the filthy sloppy kitchen blows open the day old frostyface |
| Goodwin called about the concert in Lombard street and I just after |
| dinner all flushed and tossed with boiling old stew dont look at me |
| professor I had to say Im a fright yes but he was a real old gent in his |
| way it was impossible to be more respectful nobody to say youre out you |
| have to peep out through the blind like the messengerboy today I thought |
| it was a putoff first him sending the port and the peaches first and I |
| was just beginning to yawn with nerves thinking he was trying to make a |
| fool of me when I knew his tattarrattat at the door he must have been |
| a bit late because it was l/4 after 3 when I saw the 2 Dedalus girls |
| coming from school I never know the time even that watch he gave me |
| never seems to go properly Id want to get it looked after when I threw |
| the penny to that lame sailor for England home and beauty when I was |
| whistling there is a charming girl I love and I hadnt even put on my |
| clean shift or powdered myself or a thing then this day week were to go |
| to Belfast just as well he has to go to Ennis his fathers anniversary |
| the 27th it wouldnt be pleasant if he did suppose our rooms at the hotel |
| were beside each other and any fooling went on in the new bed I couldnt |
| tell him to stop and not bother me with him in the next room or perhaps |
| some protestant clergyman with a cough knocking on the wall then hed |
| never believe the next day we didnt do something its all very well a |
| husband but you cant fool a lover after me telling him we never did |
| anything of course he didnt believe me no its better hes going where |
| he is besides something always happens with him the time going to the |
| Mallow concert at Maryborough ordering boiling soup for the two of |
| us then the bell rang out he walks down the platform with the soup |
| splashing about taking spoonfuls of it hadnt he the nerve and the waiter |
| after him making a holy show of us screeching and confusion for the |
| engine to start but he wouldnt pay till he finished it the two gentlemen |
| in the 3rd class carriage said he was quite right so he was too hes so |
| pigheaded sometimes when he gets a thing into his head a good job he was |
| able to open the carriage door with his knife or theyd have taken us on |
| to Cork I suppose that was done out of revenge on him O I love jaunting |
| in a train or a car with lovely soft cushions I wonder will he take |
| a 1st class for me he might want to do it in the train by tipping the |
| guard well O I suppose therell be the usual idiots of men gaping at |
| us with their eyes as stupid as ever they can possibly be that was an |
| exceptional man that common workman that left us alone in the carriage |
| that day going to Howth Id like to find out something about him l or 2 |
| tunnels perhaps then you have to look out of the window all the nicer |
| then coming back suppose I never came back what would they say eloped |
| with him that gets you on on the stage the last concert I sang at where |
| its over a year ago when was it St Teresas hall Clarendon St little |
| chits of missies they have now singing Kathleen Kearney and her like |
| on account of father being in the army and my singing the absentminded |
| beggar and wearing a brooch for Lord Roberts when I had the map of it |
| all and Poldy not Irish enough was it him managed it this time I wouldnt |
| put it past him like he got me on to sing in the _Stabat Mater_ by going |
| around saying he was putting Lead Kindly Light to music I put him up to |
| that till the jesuits found out he was a freemason thumping the piano |
| lead Thou me on copied from some old opera yes and he was going about |
| with some of them Sinner Fein lately or whatever they call themselves |
| talking his usual trash and nonsense he says that little man he showed |
| me without the neck is very intelligent the coming man Griffiths is he |
| well he doesnt look it thats all I can say still it must have been him |
| he knew there was a boycott I hate the mention of their politics after |
| the war that Pretoria and Ladysmith and Bloemfontein where Gardner lieut |
| Stanley G 8th Bn 2nd East Lancs Rgt of enteric fever he was a lovely |
| fellow in khaki and just the right height over me Im sure he was brave |
| too he said I was lovely the evening we kissed goodbye at the canal lock |
| my Irish beauty he was pale with excitement about going away or wed be |
| seen from the road he couldnt stand properly and I so hot as I never |
| felt they could have made their peace in the beginning or old oom Paul |
| and the rest of the other old Krugers go and fight it out between them |
| instead of dragging on for years killing any finelooking men there were |
| with their fever if he was even decently shot it wouldnt have been so |
| bad I love to see a regiment pass in review the first time I saw the |
| Spanish cavalry at La Roque it was lovely after looking across the bay |
| from Algeciras all the lights of the rock like fireflies or those sham |
| battles on the 15 acres the Black Watch with their kilts in time at the |
| march past the 10th hussars the prince of Wales own or the lancers O the |
| lancers theyre grand or the Dublins that won Tugela his father made his |
| money over selling the horses for the cavalry well he could buy me a |
| nice present up in Belfast after what I gave him theyve lovely linen up |
| there or one of those nice kimono things I must buy a mothball like I |
| had before to keep in the drawer with them it would be exciting going |
| round with him shopping buying those things in a new city better leave |
| this ring behind want to keep turning and turning to get it over the |
| knuckle there or they might bell it round the town in their papers or |
| tell the police on me but theyd think were married O let them all go and |
| smother themselves for the fat lot I care he has plenty of money and hes |
| not a marrying man so somebody better get it out of him if I could find |
| out whether he likes me I looked a bit washy of course when I looked |
| close in the handglass powdering a mirror never gives you the expression |
| besides scrooching down on me like that all the time with his big |
| hipbones hes heavy too with his hairy chest for this heat always having |
| to lie down for them better for him put it into me from behind the way |
| Mrs Mastiansky told me her husband made her like the dogs do it and |
| stick out her tongue as far as ever she could and he so quiet and mild |
| with his tingating cither can you ever be up to men the way it takes |
| them lovely stuff in that blue suit he had on and stylish tie and socks |
| with the skyblue silk things on them hes certainly well off I know by |
| the cut his clothes have and his heavy watch but he was like a perfect |
| devil for a few minutes after he came back with the stoppress tearing up |
| the tickets and swearing blazes because he lost 20 quid he said he lost |
| over that outsider that won and half he put on for me on account of |
| Lenehans tip cursing him to the lowest pits that sponger he was making |
| free with me after the Glencree dinner coming back that long joult over |
| the featherbed mountain after the lord Mayor looking at me with his |
| dirty eyes Val Dillon that big heathen I first noticed him at dessert |
| when I was cracking the nuts with my teeth I wished I could have picked |
| every morsel of that chicken out of my fingers it was so tasty |
| and browned and as tender as anything only for I didnt want to eat |
| everything on my plate those forks and fishslicers were hallmarked |
| silver too I wish I had some I could easily have slipped a couple into |
| my muff when I was playing with them then always hanging out of them for |
| money in a restaurant for the bit you put down your throat we have to |
| be thankful for our mangy cup of tea itself as a great compliment to be |
| noticed the way the world is divided in any case if its going to go on I |
| want at least two other good chemises for one thing and but I dont know |
| what kind of drawers he likes none at all I think didnt he say yes and |
| half the girls in Gibraltar never wore them either naked as God made |
| them that Andalusian singing her Manola she didnt make much secret of |
| what she hadnt yes and the second pair of silkette stockings is laddered |
| after one days wear I could have brought them back to Lewers this |
| morning and kicked up a row and made that one change them only not to |
| upset myself and run the risk of walking into him and ruining the whole |
| thing and one of those kidfitting corsets Id want advertised cheap in |
| the Gentlewoman with elastic gores on the hips he saved the one I have |
| but thats no good what did they say they give a delightful figure line |
| 11/6 obviating that unsightly broad appearance across the lower back to |
| reduce flesh my belly is a bit too big Ill have to knock off the |
| stout at dinner or am I getting too fond of it the last they sent from |
| ORourkes was as flat as a pancake he makes his money easy Larry they |
| call him the old mangy parcel he sent at Xmas a cottage cake and a |
| bottle of hogwash he tried to palm off as claret that he couldnt get |
| anyone to drink God spare his spit for fear hed die of the drouth or |
| I must do a few breathing exercises I wonder is that antifat any good |
| might overdo it the thin ones are not so much the fashion now garters |
| that much I have the violet pair I wore today thats all he bought me |
| out of the cheque he got on the first O no there was the face lotion |
| I finished the last of yesterday that made my skin like new I told him |
| over and over again get that made up in the same place and dont forget |
| it God only knows whether he did after all I said to him 111 know by |
| the bottle anyway if not I suppose 111 only have to wash in my piss like |
| beeftea or chickensoup with some of that opoponax and violet I thought |
| it was beginning to look coarse or old a bit the skin underneath is much |
| finer where it peeled off there on my finger after the burn its a pity |
| it isnt all like that and the four paltry handkerchiefs about 6/- in all |
| sure you cant get on in this world without style all going in food and |
| rent when I get it Ill lash it around I tell you in fine style I always |
| want to throw a handful of tea into the pot measuring and mincing if |
| I buy a pair of old brogues itself do you like those new shoes yes how |
| much were they Ive no clothes at all the brown costume and the skirt and |
| jacket and the one at the cleaners 3 whats that for any woman cutting |
| up this old hat and patching up the other the men wont look at you and |
| women try to walk on you because they know youve no man then with all |
| the things getting dearer every day for the 4 years more I have of life |
| up to 35 no Im what am I at all 111 be 33 in September will I what O |
| well look at that Mrs Galbraith shes much older than me I saw her when |
| I was out last week her beautys on the wane she was a lovely woman |
| magnificent head of hair on her down to her waist tossing it back like |
| that like Kitty OShea in Grantham street 1st thing I did every morning |
| to look across see her combing it as if she loved it and was full of it |
| pity I only got to know her the day before we left and that Mrs Langtry |
| the jersey lily the prince of Wales was in love with I suppose hes like |
| the first man going the roads only for the name of a king theyre all |
| made the one way only a black mans Id like to try a beauty up to what |
| was she 45 there was some funny story about the jealous old husband what |
| was it at all and an oyster knife he went no he made her wear a kind |
| of a tin thing round her and the prince of Wales yes he had the oyster |
| knife cant be true a thing like that like some of those books he brings |
| me the works of Master Francois Somebody supposed to be a priest about |
| a child born out of her ear because her bumgut fell out a nice word for |
| any priest to write and her a--e as if any fool wouldnt know what that |
| meant I hate that pretending of all things with that old blackguards |
| face on him anybody can see its not true and that Ruby and Fair Tyrants |
| he brought me that twice I remember when I came to page 5 o the part |
| about where she hangs him up out of a hook with a cord flagellate |
| sure theres nothing for a woman in that all invention made up about he |
| drinking the champagne out of her slipper after the ball was over like |
| the infant Jesus in the crib at Inchicore in the Blessed Virgins arms |
| sure no woman could have a child that big taken out of her and I thought |
| first it came out of her side because how could she go to the chamber |
| when she wanted to and she a rich lady of course she felt honoured H R H |
| he was in Gibraltar the year I was born I bet he found lilies there too |
| where he planted the tree he planted more than that in his time he might |
| have planted me too if hed come a bit sooner then I wouldnt be here as |
| I am he ought to chuck that Freeman with the paltry few shillings |
| he knocks out of it and go into an office or something where hed get |
| regular pay or a bank where they could put him up on a throne to count |
| the money all the day of course he prefers plottering about the house |
| so you cant stir with him any side whats your programme today I wish hed |
| even smoke a pipe like father to get the smell of a man or pretending |
| to be mooching about for advertisements when he could have been in Mr |
| Cuffes still only for what he did then sending me to try and patch it up |
| I could have got him promoted there to be the manager he gave me a great |
| mirada once or twice first he was as stiff as the mischief really and |
| truly Mrs Bloom only I felt rotten simply with the old rubbishy dress |
| that I lost the leads out of the tails with no cut in it but theyre |
| coming into fashion again I bought it simply to please him I knew it was |
| no good by the finish pity I changed my mind of going to Todd and Bums |
| as I said and not Lees it was just like the shop itself rummage sale a |
| lot of trash I hate those rich shops get on your nerves nothing kills me |
| altogether only he thinks he knows a great lot about a womans dress and |
| cooking mathering everything he can scour off the shelves into it if |
| I went by his advices every blessed hat I put on does that suit me yes |
| take that thats alright the one like a weddingcake standing up miles |
| off my head he said suited me or the dishcover one coming down on my |
| backside on pins and needles about the shopgirl in that place in Grafton |
| street I had the misfortune to bring him into and she as insolent as |
| ever she could be with her smirk saying Im afraid were giving you too |
| much trouble what shes there for but I stared it out of her yes he was |
| awfully stiff and no wonder but he changed the second time he looked |
| Poldy pigheaded as usual like the soup but I could see him looking very |
| hard at my chest when he stood up to open the door for me it was nice of |
| him to show me out in any case Im extremely sorry Mrs Bloom believe me |
| without making it too marked the first time after him being insulted and |
| me being supposed to be his wife I just half smiled I know my chest was |
| out that way at the door when he said Im extremely sorry and Im sure you |
| were |
| |
| yes I think he made them a bit firmer sucking them like that so long he |
| made me thirsty titties he calls them I had to laugh yes this one anyhow |
| stiff the nipple gets for the least thing Ill get him to keep that up |
| and Ill take those eggs beaten up with marsala fatten them out for him |
| what are all those veins and things curious the way its made 2 the same |
| in case of twins theyre supposed to represent beauty placed up there |
| like those statues in the museum one of them pretending to hide it with |
| her hand are they so beautiful of course compared with what a man looks |
| like with his two bags full and his other thing hanging down out of |
| him or sticking up at you like a hatrack no wonder they hide it with a |
| cabbageleaf that disgusting Cameron highlander behind the meat market or |
| that other wretch with the red head behind the tree where the statue |
| of the fish used to be when I was passing pretending he was pissing |
| standing out for me to see it with his babyclothes up to one side the |
| Queens own they were a nice lot its well the Surreys relieved them |
| theyre always trying to show it to you every time nearly I passed |
| outside the mens greenhouse near the Harcourt street station just to |
| try some fellow or other trying to catch my eye as if it was I of the |
| 7 wonders of the world O and the stink of those rotten places the night |
| coming home with Poldy after the Comerfords party oranges and lemonade |
| to make you feel nice and watery I went into r of them it was so biting |
| cold I couldnt keep it when was that 93 the canal was frozen yes it was |
| a few months after a pity a couple of the Camerons werent there to see |
| me squatting in the mens place meadero I tried to draw a picture of |
| it before I tore it up like a sausage or something I wonder theyre not |
| afraid going about of getting a kick or a bang of something there the |
| woman is beauty of course thats admitted when he said I could pose for a |
| picture naked to some rich fellow in Holles street when he lost the |
| job in Helys and I was selling the clothes and strumming in the coffee |
| palace would I be like that bath of the nymph with my hair down yes only |
| shes younger or Im a little like that dirty bitch in that Spanish photo |
| he has nymphs used they go about like that I asked him about her and |
| that word met something with hoses in it and he came out with some |
| jawbreakers about the incarnation he never can explain a thing simply |
| the way a body can understand then he goes and burns the bottom out of |
| the pan all for his Kidney this one not so much theres the mark of his |
| teeth still where he tried to bite the nipple I had to scream out arent |
| they fearful trying to hurt you I had a great breast of milk with Milly |
| enough for two what was the reason of that he said I could have got a |
| pound a week as a wet nurse all swelled out the morning that delicate |
| looking student that stopped in no 28 with the Citrons Penrose nearly |
| caught me washing through the window only for I snapped up the towel to |
| my face that was his studenting hurt me they used to weaning her till he |
| got doctor Brady to give me the belladonna prescription I had to get him |
| to suck them they were so hard he said it was sweeter and thicker than |
| cows then he wanted to milk me into the tea well hes beyond everything I |
| declare somebody ought to put him in the budget if I only could remember |
| the I half of the things and write a book out of it the works of Master |
| Poldy yes and its so much smoother the skin much an hour he was at them |
| Im sure by the clock like some kind of a big infant I had at me they |
| want everything in their mouth all the pleasure those men get out of a |
| woman I can feel his mouth O Lord I must stretch myself I wished he was |
| here or somebody to let myself go with and come again like that I feel |
| all fire inside me or if I could dream it when he made me spend the 2nd |
| time tickling me behind with his finger I was coming for about 5 minutes |
| with my legs round him I had to hug him after O Lord I wanted to shout |
| out all sorts of things fuck or shit or anything at all only not to look |
| ugly or those lines from the strain who knows the way hed take it you |
| want to feel your way with a man theyre not all like him thank God some |
| of them want you to be so nice about it I noticed the contrast he does |
| it and doesnt talk I gave my eyes that look with my hair a bit loose |
| from the tumbling and my tongue between my lips up to him the savage |
| brute Thursday Friday one Saturday two Sunday three O Lord I cant wait |
| till Monday |
| |
| frseeeeeeeefronnnng train somewhere whistling the strength those engines |
| have in them like big giants and the water rolling all over and out of |
| them all sides like the end of Loves old sweeeetsonnnng the poor men |
| that have to be out all the night from their wives and families in those |
| roasting engines stifling it was today Im glad I burned the half of |
| those old Freemans and Photo Bits leaving things like that lying about |
| hes getting very careless and threw the rest of them up in the W C 111 |
| get him to cut them tomorrow for me instead of having them there for |
| the next year to get a few pence for them have him asking wheres last |
| Januarys paper and all those old overcoats I bundled out of the hall |
| making the place hotter than it is that rain was lovely and refreshing |
| just after my beauty sleep I thought it was going to get like Gibraltar |
| my goodness the heat there before the levanter came on black as night |
| and the glare of the rock standing up in it like a big giant compared |
| with their 3 Rock mountain they think is so great with the red sentries |
| here and there the poplars and they all whitehot and the smell of the |
| rainwater in those tanks watching the sun all the time weltering down on |
| you faded all that lovely frock fathers friend Mrs Stanhope sent me from |
| the B Marche paris what a shame my dearest Doggerina she wrote on it |
| she was very nice whats this her other name was just a p c to tell you I |
| sent the little present have just had a jolly warm bath and feel a very |
| clean dog now enjoyed it wogger she called him wogger wd give anything |
| to be back in Gib and hear you sing Waiting and in old Madrid Concone |
| is the name of those exercises he bought me one of those new some word |
| I couldnt make out shawls amusing things but tear for the least thing |
| still there lovely I think dont you will always think of the lovely teas |
| we had together scrumptious currant scones and raspberry wafers I adore |
| well now dearest Doggerina be sure and write soon kind she left out |
| regards to your father also captain Grove with love yrs affly Hester x |
| x x x x she didnt look a bit married just like a girl he was years older |
| than her wogger he was awfully fond of me when he held down the wire |
| with his foot for me to step over at the bullfight at La Linea when |
| that matador Gomez was given the bulls ear these clothes we have to wear |
| whoever invented them expecting you to walk up Killiney hill then for |
| example at that picnic all staysed up you cant do a blessed thing in |
| them in a crowd run or jump out of the way thats why I was afraid when |
| that other ferocious old Bull began to charge the banderilleros with |
| the sashes and the 2 things in their hats and the brutes of men shouting |
| bravo toro sure the women were as bad in their nice white mantillas |
| ripping all the whole insides out of those poor horses I never heard of |
| such a thing in all my life yes he used to break his heart at me taking |
| off the dog barking in bell lane poor brute and it sick what became |
| of them ever I suppose theyre dead long ago the 2 of them its like all |
| through a mist makes you feel so old I made the scones of course I had |
| everything all to myself then a girl Hester we used to compare our hair |
| mine was thicker than hers she showed me how to settle it at the back |
| when I put it up and whats this else how to make a knot on a thread with |
| the one hand we were like cousins what age was I then the night of the |
| storm I slept in her bed she had her arms round me then we were fighting |
| in the morning with the pillow what fun he was watching me whenever he |
| got an opportunity at the band on the Alameda esplanade when I was with |
| father and captain Grove I looked up at the church first and then at the |
| windows then down and our eyes met I felt something go through me like |
| all needles my eyes were dancing I remember after when I looked |
| at myself in the glass hardly recognised myself the change he was |
| attractive to a girl in spite of his being a little bald intelligent |
| looking disappointed and gay at the same time he was like Thomas in |
| the shadow of Ashlydyat I had a splendid skin from the sun and the |
| excitement like a rose I didnt get a wink of sleep it wouldnt have been |
| nice on account of her but I could have stopped it in time she gave me |
| the Moonstone to read that was the first I read of Wilkie Collins East |
| Lynne I read and the shadow of Ashlydyat Mrs Henry Wood Henry Dunbar by |
| that other woman I lent him afterwards with Mulveys photo in it so as he |
| see I wasnt without and Lord Lytton Eugene Aram Molly bawn she gave me |
| by Mrs Hungerford on account of the name I dont like books with a Molly |
| in them like that one he brought me about the one from Flanders a whore |
| always shoplifting anything she could cloth and stuff and yards of it |
| O this blanket is too heavy on me thats better I havent even one decent |
| nightdress this thing gets all rolled under me besides him and his |
| fooling thats better I used to be weltering then in the heat my shift |
| drenched with the sweat stuck in the cheeks of my bottom on the chair |
| when I stood up they were so fattish and firm when I got up on the sofa |
| cushions to see with my clothes up and the bugs tons of them at night |
| and the mosquito nets I couldnt read a line Lord how long ago it seems |
| centuries of course they never came back and she didnt put her address |
| right on it either she may have noticed her wogger people were always |
| going away and we never I remember that day with the waves and the |
| boats with their high heads rocking and the smell of ship those Officers |
| uniforms on shore leave made me seasick he didnt say anything he was |
| very serious I had the high buttoned boots on and my skirt was blowing |
| she kissed me six or seven times didnt I cry yes I believe I did or near |
| it my lips were taittering when I said goodbye she had a Gorgeous wrap |
| of some special kind of blue colour on her for the voyage made very |
| peculiarly to one side like and it was extremely pretty it got as dull |
| as the devil after they went I was almost planning to run away mad out |
| of it somewhere were never easy where we are father or aunt or marriage |
| waiting always waiting to guiiiide him toooo me waiting nor speeeed |
| his flying feet their damn guns bursting and booming all over the shop |
| especially the Queens birthday and throwing everything down in all |
| directions if you didnt open the windows when general Ulysses Grant |
| whoever he was or did supposed to be some great fellow landed off the |
| ship and old Sprague the consul that was there from before the flood |
| dressed up poor man and he in mourning for the son then the same old |
| bugles for reveille in the morning and drums rolling and the unfortunate |
| poor devils of soldiers walking about with messtins smelling the place |
| more than the old longbearded jews in their jellibees and levites |
| assembly and sound clear and gunfire for the men to cross the lines and |
| the warden marching with his keys to lock the gates and the bagpipes and |
| only captain Groves and father talking about Rorkes drift and Plevna and |
| sir Garnet Wolseley and Gordon at Khartoum lighting their pipes for |
| them everytime they went out drunken old devil with his grog on the |
| windowsill catch him leaving any of it picking his nose trying to think |
| of some other dirty story to tell up in a corner but he never forgot |
| himself when I was there sending me out of the room on some blind excuse |
| paying his compliments the Bushmills whisky talking of course but hed |
| do the same to the next woman that came along I suppose he died of |
| galloping drink ages ago the days like years not a letter from a living |
| soul except the odd few I posted to myself with bits of paper in them so |
| bored sometimes I could fight with my nails listening to that old Arab |
| with the one eye and his heass of an instrument singing his heah heah |
| aheah all my compriments on your hotchapotch of your heass as bad as now |
| with the hands hanging off me looking out of the window if there was a |
| nice fellow even in the opposite house that medical in Holles street the |
| nurse was after when I put on my gloves and hat at the window to show |
| I was going out not a notion what I meant arent they thick never |
| understand what you say even youd want to print it up on a big poster |
| for them not even if you shake hands twice with the left he didnt |
| recognise me either when I half frowned at him outside Westland row |
| chapel where does their great intelligence come in Id like to know |
| grey matter they have it all in their tail if you ask me those country |
| gougers up in the City Arms intelligence they had a damn sight less than |
| the bulls and cows they were selling the meat and the coalmans bell that |
| noisy bugger trying to swindle me with the wrong bill he took out of his |
| hat what a pair of paws and pots and pans and kettles to mend any broken |
| bottles for a poor man today and no visitors or post ever except his |
| cheques or some advertisement like that wonderworker they sent him |
| addressed dear Madam only his letter and the card from Milly this |
| morning see she wrote a letter to him who did I get the last letter from |
| O Mrs Dwenn now what possessed her to write from Canada after so many |
| years to know the recipe I had for pisto madrileno Floey Dillon since |
| she wrote to say she was married to a very rich architect if Im to |
| believe all I hear with a villa and eight rooms her father was an |
| awfully nice man he was near seventy always goodhumoured well now Miss |
| Tweedy or Miss Gillespie theres the piannyer that was a solid silver |
| coffee service he had too on the mahogany sideboard then dying so far |
| away I hate people that have always their poor story to tell everybody |
| has their own troubles that poor Nancy Blake died a month ago of acute |
| neumonia well I didnt know her so well as all that she was Floeys friend |
| more than mine poor Nancy its a bother having to answer he always tells |
| me the wrong things and no stops to say like making a speech your sad |
| bereavement symphathy I always make that mistake and newphew with 2 |
| double yous in I hope hell write me a longer letter the next time if its |
| a thing he really likes me O thanks be to the great God I got somebody |
| to give me what I badly wanted to put some heart up into me youve no |
| chances at all in this place like you used long ago I wish somebody |
| would write me a loveletter his wasnt much and I told him he could write |
| what he liked yours ever Hugh Boylan in old Madrid stuff silly women |
| believe love is sighing I am dying still if he wrote it I suppose thered |
| be some truth in it true or no it fills up your whole day and life |
| always something to think about every moment and see it all round you |
| like a new world I could write the answer in bed to let him imagine me |
| short just a few words not those long crossed letters Atty Dillon used |
| to write to the fellow that was something in the four courts that jilted |
| her after out of the ladies letterwriter when I told her to say a few |
| simple words he could twist how he liked not acting with precipat precip |
| itancy with equal candour the greatest earthly happiness answer to a |
| gentlemans proposal affirmatively my goodness theres nothing else its |
| all very fine for them but as for being a woman as soon as youre old |
| they might as well throw you out in the bottom of the ashpit. |
| |
| Mulveys was the first when I was in bed that morning and Mrs Rubio |
| brought it in with the coffee she stood there standing when I asked her |
| to hand me and I pointing at them I couldnt think of the word a hairpin |
| to open it with ah horquilla disobliging old thing and it staring her |
| in the face with her switch of false hair on her and vain about her |
| appearance ugly as she was near 80 or a loo her face a mass of wrinkles |
| with all her religion domineering because she never could get over the |
| Atlantic fleet coming in half the ships of the world and the Union Jack |
| flying with all her carabineros because 4 drunken English sailors took |
| all the rock from them and because I didnt run into mass often enough in |
| Santa Maria to please her with her shawl up on her except when there was |
| a marriage on with all her miracles of the saints and her black blessed |
| virgin with the silver dress and the sun dancing 3 times on Easter |
| Sunday morning and when the priest was going by with the bell bringing |
| the vatican to the dying blessing herself for his Majestad an admirer |
| he signed it I near jumped out of my skin I wanted to pick him up when |
| I saw him following me along the Calle Real in the shop window then |
| he tipped me just in passing but I never thought hed write making an |
| appointment I had it inside my petticoat bodice all day reading it up |
| in every hole and corner while father was up at the drill instructing to |
| find out by the handwriting or the language of stamps singing I remember |
| shall I wear a white rose and I wanted to put on the old stupid clock to |
| near the time he was the first man kissed me under the Moorish wall my |
| sweetheart when a boy it never entered my head what kissing meant till |
| he put his tongue in my mouth his mouth was sweetlike young I put my |
| knee up to him a few times to learn the way what did I tell him I was |
| engaged for for fun to the son of a Spanish nobleman named Don Miguel de |
| la Flora and he believed me that I was to be married to him in 3 years |
| time theres many a true word spoken in jest there is a flower that |
| bloometh a few things I told him true about myself just for him to be |
| imagining the Spanish girls he didnt like I suppose one of them wouldnt |
| have him I got him excited he crushed all the flowers on my bosom he |
| brought me he couldnt count the pesetas and the perragordas till I |
| taught him Cappoquin he came from he said on the black water but it was |
| too short then the day before he left May yes it was May when the infant |
| king of Spain was born Im always like that in the spring Id like a new |
| fellow every year up on the tiptop under the rockgun near OHaras tower |
| I told him it was struck by lightning and all about the old Barbary apes |
| they sent to Clapham without a tail careering all over the show on each |
| others back Mrs Rubio said she was a regular old rock scorpion robbing |
| the chickens out of Inces farm and throw stones at you if you went anear |
| he was looking at me I had that white blouse on open in the front to |
| encourage him as much as I could without too openly they were just |
| beginning to be plump I said I was tired we lay over the firtree cove |
| a wild place I suppose it must be the highest rock in existence the |
| galleries and casemates and those frightful rocks and Saint Michaels |
| cave with the icicles or whatever they call them hanging down and |
| ladders all the mud plotching my boots Im sure thats the way down the |
| monkeys go under the sea to Africa when they die the ships out far like |
| chips that was the Malta boat passing yes the sea and the sky you could |
| do what you liked lie there for ever he caressed them outside they love |
| doing that its the roundness there I was leaning over him with my white |
| ricestraw hat to take the newness out of it the left side of my face the |
| best my blouse open for his last day transparent kind of shirt he had I |
| could see his chest pink he wanted to touch mine with his for a moment |
| but I wouldnt lee him he was awfully put out first for fear you never |
| know consumption or leave me with a child embarazada that old servant |
| Ines told me that one drop even if it got into you at all after I tried |
| with the Banana but I was afraid it might break and get lost up in me |
| somewhere because they once took something down out of a woman that was |
| up there for years covered with limesalts theyre all mad to get in there |
| where they come out of youd think they could never go far enough up and |
| then theyre done with you in a way till the next time yes because theres |
| a wonderful feeling there so tender all the time how did we finish it |
| off yes O yes I pulled him off into my handkerchief pretending not to |
| be excited but I opened my legs I wouldnt let him touch me inside my |
| petticoat because I had a skirt opening up the side I tormented the |
| life out of him first tickling him I loved rousing that dog in the hotel |
| rrrsssstt awokwokawok his eyes shut and a bird flying below us he was |
| shy all the same I liked him like that moaning I made him blush a little |
| when I got over him that way when I unbuttoned him and took his out and |
| drew back the skin it had a kind of eye in it theyre all Buttons men |
| down the middle on the wrong side of them Molly darling he called me |
| what was his name Jack Joe Harry Mulvey was it yes I think a lieutenant |
| he was rather fair he had a laughing kind of a voice so I went round to |
| the whatyoucallit everything was whatyoucallit moustache had he he said |
| hed come back Lord its just like yesterday to me and if I was married |
| hed do it to me and I promised him yes faithfully Id let him block me |
| now flying perhaps hes dead or killed or a captain or admiral its nearly |
| 20 years if I said firtree cove he would if he came up behind me and |
| put his hands over my eyes to guess who I might recognise him hes young |
| still about 40 perhaps hes married some girl on the black water and is |
| quite changed they all do they havent half the character a woman has she |
| little knows what I did with her beloved husband before he ever dreamt |
| of her in broad daylight too in the sight of the whole world you might |
| say they could have put an article about it in the Chronicle I was a bit |
| wild after when I blew out the old bag the biscuits were in from Benady |
| Bros and exploded it Lord what a bang all the woodcocks and pigeons |
| screaming coming back the same way that we went over middle hill round |
| by the old guardhouse and the jews burialplace pretending to read out |
| the Hebrew on them I wanted to fire his pistol he said he hadnt one he |
| didnt know what to make of me with his peak cap on that he always wore |
| crooked as often as I settled it straight H M S Calypso swinging my hat |
| that old Bishop that spoke off the altar his long preach about womans |
| higher functions about girls now riding the bicycle and wearing peak |
| caps and the new woman bloomers God send him sense and me more money I |
| suppose theyre called after him I never thought that would be my |
| name Bloom when I used to write it in print to see how it looked on a |
| visiting card or practising for the butcher and oblige M Bloom youre |
| looking blooming Josie used to say after I married him well its better |
| than Breen or Briggs does brig or those awful names with bottom in them |
| Mrs Ramsbottom or some other kind of a bottom Mulvey I wouldnt go mad |
| about either or suppose I divorced him Mrs Boylan my mother whoever she |
| was might have given me a nicer name the Lord knows after the lovely |
| one she had Lunita Laredo the fun we had running along Williss road to |
| Europa point twisting in and out all round the other side of Jersey they |
| were shaking and dancing about in my blouse like Millys little ones now |
| when she runs up the stairs I loved looking down at them I was jumping |
| up at the pepper trees and the white poplars pulling the leaves off and |
| throwing them at him he went to India he was to write the voyages those |
| men have to make to the ends of the world and back its the least they |
| might get a squeeze or two at a woman while they can going out to be |
| drowned or blown up somewhere I went up Windmill hill to the flats |
| that Sunday morning with captain Rubios that was dead spyglass like the |
| sentry had he said hed have one or two from on board I wore that frock |
| from the B Marche paris and the coral necklace the straits shining I |
| could see over to Morocco almost the bay of Tangier white and the Atlas |
| mountain with snow on it and the straits like a river so clear Harry |
| Molly darling I was thinking of him on the sea all the time after at |
| mass when my petticoat began to slip down at the elevation weeks and |
| weeks I kept the handkerchief under my pillow for the smell of him there |
| was no decent perfume to be got in that Gibraltar only that cheap peau |
| dEspagne that faded and left a stink on you more than anything else I |
| wanted to give him a memento he gave me that clumsy Claddagh ring for |
| luck that I gave Gardner going to south Africa where those Boers killed |
| him with their war and fever but they were well beaten all the same as |
| if it brought its bad luck with it like an opal or pearl still it must |
| have been pure 18 carrot gold because it was very heavy but what could |
| you get in a place like that the sandfrog shower from Africa and that |
| derelict ship that came up to the harbour Marie the Marie whatyoucallit |
| no he hadnt a moustache that was Gardner yes I can see his face |
| cleanshaven Frseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeefrong that train again weeping tone |
| once in the dear deaead days beyondre call close my eyes breath my lips |
| forward kiss sad look eyes open piano ere oer the world the mists began |
| I hate that istsbeg comes loves sweet sooooooooooong Ill let that out |
| full when I get in front of the footlights again Kathleen Kearney |
| and her lot of squealers Miss This Miss That Miss Theother lot of |
| sparrowfarts skitting around talking about politics they know as much |
| about as my backside anything in the world to make themselves someway |
| interesting Irish homemade beauties soldiers daughter am I ay and whose |
| are you bootmakers and publicans I beg your pardon coach I thought you |
| were a wheelbarrow theyd die down dead off their feet if ever they got |
| a chance of walking down the Alameda on an officers arm like me on the |
| bandnight my eyes flash my bust that they havent passion God help their |
| poor head I knew more about men and life when I was I S than theyll all |
| know at 50 they dont know how to sing a song like that Gardner said no |
| man could look at my mouth and teeth smiling like that and not think of |
| it I was afraid he mightnt like my accent first he so English all father |
| left me in spite of his stamps Ive my mothers eyes and figure anyhow |
| he always said theyre so snotty about themselves some of those cads he |
| wasnt a bit like that he was dead gone on my lips let them get a husband |
| first thats fit to be looked at and a daughter like mine or see if they |
| can excite a swell with money that can pick and choose whoever he wants |
| like Boylan to do it 4 or 5 times locked in each others arms or the |
| voice either I could have been a prima donna only I married him comes |
| looooves old deep down chin back not too much make it double My Ladys |
| Bower is too long for an encore about the moated grange at twilight and |
| vaunted rooms yes Ill sing Winds that blow from the south that he gave |
| after the choirstairs performance Ill change that lace on my black dress |
| to show off my bubs and Ill yes by God Ill get that big fan mended make |
| them burst with envy my hole is itching me always when I think of him I |
| feel I want to I feel some wind in me better go easy not wake him have |
| him at it again slobbering after washing every bit of myself back belly |
| and sides if we had even a bath itself or my own room anyway I wish hed |
| sleep in some bed by himself with his cold feet on me give us room even |
| to let a fart God or do the least thing better yes hold them like that |
| a bit on my side piano quietly sweeeee theres that train far away |
| pianissimo eeeee one more song |
| |
| that was a relief wherever you be let your wind go free who knows if |
| that pork chop I took with my cup of tea after was quite good with the |
| heat I couldnt smell anything off it Im sure that queerlooking man in |
| the porkbutchers is a great rogue I hope that lamp is not smoking fill |
| my nose up with smuts better than having him leaving the gas on all |
| night I couldnt rest easy in my bed in Gibraltar even getting up to see |
| why am I so damned nervous about that though I like it in the winter its |
| more company O Lord it was rotten cold too that winter when I was |
| only about ten was I yes I had the big doll with all the funny clothes |
| dressing her up and undressing that icy wind skeeting across from those |
| mountains the something Nevada sierra nevada standing at the fire with |
| the little bit of a short shift I had up to heat myself I loved dancing |
| about in it then make a race back into bed Im sure that fellow opposite |
| used to be there the whole time watching with the lights out in the |
| summer and I in my skin hopping around I used to love myself then |
| stripped at the washstand dabbing and creaming only when it came to the |
| chamber performance I put out the light too so then there were 2 of us |
| goodbye to my sleep for this night anyhow I hope hes not going to get in |
| with those medicals leading him astray to imagine hes young again coming |
| in at 4 in the morning it must be if not more still he had the manners |
| not to wake me what do they find to gabber about all night squandering |
| money and getting drunker and drunker couldnt they drink water then he |
| starts giving us his orders for eggs and tea and Findon haddy and hot |
| buttered toast I suppose well have him sitting up like the king of |
| the country pumping the wrong end of the spoon up and down in his egg |
| wherever he learned that from and I love to hear him falling up the |
| stairs of a morning with the cups rattling on the tray and then play |
| with the cat she rubs up against you for her own sake I wonder has she |
| fleas shes as bad as a woman always licking and lecking but I hate their |
| claws I wonder do they see anything that we cant staring like that when |
| she sits at the top of the stairs so long and listening as I wait always |
| what a robber too that lovely fresh place I bought I think Ill get a bit |
| of fish tomorrow or today is it Friday yes I will with some blancmange |
| with black currant jam like long ago not those 2 lb pots of mixed plum |
| and apple from the London and Newcastle Williams and Woods goes twice as |
| far only for the bones I hate those eels cod yes Ill get a nice piece |
| of cod Im always getting enough for 3 forgetting anyway Im sick of that |
| everlasting butchers meat from Buckleys loin chops and leg beef and rib |
| steak and scrag of mutton and calfs pluck the very name is enough or |
| a picnic suppose we all gave 5/- each and or let him pay it and invite |
| some other woman for him who Mrs Fleming and drove out to the furry glen |
| or the strawberry beds wed have him examining all the horses toenails |
| first like he does with the letters no not with Boylan there yes with |
| some cold veal and ham mixed sandwiches there are little houses down |
| at the bottom of the banks there on purpose but its as hot as blazes he |
| says not a bank holiday anyhow I hate those ruck of Mary Ann coalboxes |
| out for the day Whit Monday is a cursed day too no wonder that bee bit |
| him better the seaside but Id never again in this life get into a boat |
| with him after him at Bray telling the boatman he knew how to row if |
| anyone asked could he ride the steeplechase for the gold cup hed say |
| yes then it came on to get rough the old thing crookeding about and the |
| weight all down my side telling me pull the right reins now pull the |
| left and the tide all swamping in floods in through the bottom and his |
| oar slipping out of the stirrup its a mercy we werent all drowned he can |
| swim of course me no theres no danger whatsoever keep yourself calm in |
| his flannel trousers Id like to have tattered them down off him before |
| all the people and give him what that one calls flagellate till he was |
| black and blue do him all the good in the world only for that longnosed |
| chap I dont know who he is with that other beauty Burke out of the City |
| Arms hotel was there spying around as usual on the slip always where he |
| wasnt wanted if there was a row on youd vomit a better face there was no |
| love lost between us thats 1 consolation I wonder what kind is that book |
| he brought me Sweets of Sin by a gentleman of fashion some other Mr de |
| Kock I suppose the people gave him that nickname going about with his |
| tube from one woman to another I couldnt even change my new white shoes |
| all ruined with the saltwater and the hat I had with that feather all |
| blowy and tossed on me how annoying and provoking because the smell of |
| the sea excited me of course the sardines and the bream in Catalan bay |
| round the back of the rock they were fine all silver in the fishermens |
| baskets old Luigi near a hundred they said came from Genoa and the tall |
| old chap with the earrings I dont like a man you have to climb up to to |
| get at I suppose theyre all dead and rotten long ago besides I dont like |
| being alone in this big barracks of a place at night I suppose Ill have |
| to put up with it I never brought a bit of salt in even when we moved |
| in the confusion musical academy he was going to make on the first floor |
| drawingroom with a brassplate or Blooms private hotel he suggested go |
| and ruin himself altogether the way his father did down in Ennis like |
| all the things he told father he was going to do and me but I saw |
| through him telling me all the lovely places we could go for the |
| honeymoon Venice by moonlight with the gondolas and the lake of Como he |
| had a picture cut out of some paper of and mandolines and lanterns O |
| how nice I said whatever I liked he was going to do immediately if |
| not sooner will you be my man will you carry my can he ought to get a |
| leather medal with a putty rim for all the plans he invents then leaving |
| us here all day youd never know what old beggar at the door for a crust |
| with his long story might be a tramp and put his foot in the way to |
| prevent me shutting it like that picture of that hardened criminal he |
| was called in Lloyds Weekly news 20 years in jail then he comes out and |
| murders an old woman for her money imagine his poor wife or mother or |
| whoever she is such a face youd run miles away from I couldnt rest easy |
| till I bolted all the doors and windows to make sure but its worse again |
| being locked up like in a prison or a madhouse they ought to be all shot |
| or the cat of nine tails a big brute like that that would attack a poor |
| old woman to murder her in her bed Id cut them off him so I would not |
| that hed be much use still better than nothing the night I was sure |
| I heard burglars in the kitchen and he went down in his shirt with a |
| candle and a poker as if he was looking for a mouse as white as a sheet |
| frightened out of his wits making as much noise as he possibly could |
| for the burglars benefit there isnt much to steal indeed the Lord knows |
| still its the feeling especially now with Milly away such an idea for |
| him to send the girl down there to learn to take photographs on account |
| of his grandfather instead of sending her to Skerrys academy where shed |
| have to learn not like me getting all IS at school only hed do a thing |
| like that all the same on account of me and Boylan thats why he did |
| it Im certain the way he plots and plans everything out I couldnt turn |
| round with her in the place lately unless I bolted the door first gave |
| me the fidgets coming in without knocking first when I put the chair |
| against the door just as I was washing myself there below with the glove |
| get on your nerves then doing the loglady all day put her in a glasscase |
| with two at a time to look at her if he knew she broke off the hand off |
| that little gimcrack statue with her roughness and carelessness before |
| she left that I got that little Italian boy to mend so that you cant |
| see the join for 2 shillings wouldnt even teem the potatoes for you of |
| course shes right not to ruin her hands I noticed he was always talking |
| to her lately at the table explaining things in the paper and she |
| pretending to understand sly of course that comes from his side of the |
| house he cant say I pretend things can he Im too honest as a matter of |
| fact and helping her into her coat but if there was anything wrong with |
| her its me shed tell not him I suppose he thinks Im finished out and |
| laid on the shelf well Im not no nor anything like it well see well see |
| now shes well on for flirting too with Tom Devans two sons imitating |
| me whistling with those romps of Murray girls calling for her can Milly |
| come out please shes in great demand to pick what they can out of her |
| round in Nelson street riding Harry Devans bicycle at night its as well |
| he sent her where she is she was just getting out of bounds wanting to |
| go on the skatingrink and smoking their cigarettes through their nose I |
| smelt it off her dress when I was biting off the thread of the button |
| I sewed on to the bottom of her jacket she couldnt hide much from me I |
| tell you only I oughtnt to have stitched it and it on her it brings a |
| parting and the last plumpudding too split in 2 halves see it comes out |
| no matter what they say her tongue is a bit too long for my taste |
| your blouse is open too low she says to me the pan calling the kettle |
| blackbottom and I had to tell her not to cock her legs up like that on |
| show on the windowsill before all the people passing they all look at |
| her like me when I was her age of course any old rag looks well on |
| you then a great touchmenot too in her own way at the Only Way in the |
| Theatre royal take your foot away out of that I hate people touching |
| me afraid of her life Id crush her skirt with the pleats a lot of that |
| touching must go on in theatres in the crush in the dark theyre always |
| trying to wiggle up to you that fellow in the pit at the Gaiety for |
| Beerbohm Tree in Trilby the last time Ill ever go there to be squashed |
| like that for any Trilby or her barebum every two minutes tipping me |
| there and looking away hes a bit daft I think I saw him after trying to |
| get near two stylishdressed ladies outside Switzers window at the same |
| little game I recognised him on the moment the face and everything but |
| he didnt remember me yes and she didnt even want me to kiss her at the |
| Broadstone going away well I hope shell get someone to dance attendance |
| on her the way I did when she was down with the mumps and her glands |
| swollen wheres this and wheres that of course she cant feel anything |
| deep yet I never came properly till I was what 22 or so it went into the |
| wrong place always only the usual girls nonsense and giggling that |
| Conny Connolly writing to her in white ink on black paper sealed with |
| sealingwax though she clapped when the curtain came down because he |
| looked so handsome then we had Martin Harvey for breakfast dinner and |
| supper I thought to myself afterwards it must be real love if a man |
| gives up his life for her that way for nothing I suppose there are a |
| few men like that left its hard to believe in it though unless it really |
| happened to me the majority of them with not a particle of love in their |
| natures to find two people like that nowadays full up of each other that |
| would feel the same way as you do theyre usually a bit foolish in the |
| head his father must have been a bit queer to go and poison himself |
| after her still poor old man I suppose he felt lost shes always making |
| love to my things too the few old rags I have wanting to put her hair up |
| at I S my powder too only ruin her skin on her shes time enough for that |
| all her life after of course shes restless knowing shes pretty with her |
| lips so red a pity they wont stay that way I was too but theres no use |
| going to the fair with the thing answering me like a fishwoman when |
| I asked to go for a half a stone of potatoes the day we met Mrs Joe |
| Gallaher at the trottingmatches and she pretended not to see us in her |
| trap with Friery the solicitor we werent grand enough till I gave her 2 |
| damn fine cracks across the ear for herself take that now for answering |
| me like that and that for your impudence she had me that exasperated of |
| course contradicting I was badtempered too because how was it there was |
| a weed in the tea or I didnt sleep the night before cheese I ate was it |
| and I told her over and over again not to leave knives crossed like that |
| because she has nobody to command her as she said herself well if he |
| doesnt correct her faith I will that was the last time she turned on the |
| teartap I was just like that myself they darent order me about the place |
| its his fault of course having the two of us slaving here instead of |
| getting in a woman long ago am I ever going to have a proper servant |
| again of course then shed see him coming Id have to let her know or shed |
| revenge it arent they a nuisance that old Mrs Fleming you have to be |
| walking round after her putting the things into her hands sneezing and |
| farting into the pots well of course shes old she cant help it a good |
| job I found that rotten old smelly dishcloth that got lost behind the |
| dresser I knew there was something and opened the area window to let out |
| the smell bringing in his friends to entertain them like the night he |
| walked home with a dog if you please that might have been mad especially |
| Simon Dedalus son his father such a criticiser with his glasses up with |
| his tall hat on him at the cricket match and a great big hole in his |
| sock one thing laughing at the other and his son that got all those |
| prizes for whatever he won them in the intermediate imagine climbing |
| over the railings if anybody saw him that knew us I wonder he didnt tear |
| a big hole in his grand funeral trousers as if the one nature gave wasnt |
| enough for anybody hawking him down into the dirty old kitchen now is he |
| right in his head I ask pity it wasnt washing day my old pair of drawers |
| might have been hanging up too on the line on exhibition for all hed |
| ever care with the ironmould mark the stupid old bundle burned on them |
| he might think was something else and she never even rendered down the |
| fat I told her and now shes going such as she was on account of her |
| paralysed husband getting worse theres always something wrong with them |
| disease or they have to go under an operation or if its not that its |
| drink and he beats her Ill have to hunt around again for someone every |
| day I get up theres some new thing on sweet God sweet God well when Im |
| stretched out dead in my grave I suppose 111 have some peace I want to |
| get up a minute if Im let wait O Jesus wait yes that thing has come on |
| me yes now wouldnt that afflict you of course all the poking and rooting |
| and ploughing he had up in me now what am I to do Friday Saturday Sunday |
| wouldnt that pester the soul out of a body unless he likes it some men |
| do God knows theres always something wrong with us 5 days every 3 or 4 |
| weeks usual monthly auction isnt it simply sickening that night it came |
| on me like that the one and only time we were in a box that Michael Gunn |
| gave him to see Mrs Kendal and her husband at the Gaiety something he |
| did about insurance for him in Drimmies I was fit to be tied though I |
| wouldnt give in with that gentleman of fashion staring down at me with |
| his glasses and him the other side of me talking about Spinoza and his |
| soul thats dead I suppose millions of years ago I smiled the best I |
| could all in a swamp leaning forward as if I was interested having to |
| sit it out then to the last tag I wont forget that wife of Scarli in |
| a hurry supposed to be a fast play about adultery that idiot in the |
| gallery hissing the woman adulteress he shouted I suppose he went and |
| had a woman in the next lane running round all the back ways after |
| to make up for it I wish he had what I had then hed boo I bet the cat |
| itself is better off than us have we too much blood up in us or what O |
| patience above its pouring out of me like the sea anyhow he didnt make |
| me pregnant as big as he is I dont want to ruin the clean sheets I just |
| put on I suppose the clean linen I wore brought it on too damn it damn |
| it and they always want to see a stain on the bed to know youre a virgin |
| for them all thats troubling them theyre such fools too you could be a |
| widow or divorced 40 times over a daub of red ink would do or blackberry |
| juice no thats too purply O Jamesy let me up out of this pooh sweets of |
| sin whoever suggested that business for women what between clothes and |
| cooking and children this damned old bed too jingling like the dickens |
| I suppose they could hear us away over the other side of the park till I |
| suggested to put the quilt on the floor with the pillow under my bottom |
| I wonder is it nicer in the day I think it is easy I think Ill cut |
| all this hair off me there scalding me I might look like a young girl |
| wouldnt he get the great suckin the next time he turned up my clothes on |
| me Id give anything to see his face wheres the chamber gone easy Ive a |
| holy horror of its breaking under me after that old commode I wonder |
| was I too heavy sitting on his knee I made him sit on the easychair |
| purposely when I took off only my blouse and skirt first in the other |
| room he was so busy where he oughtnt to be he never felt me I hope my |
| breath was sweet after those kissing comfits easy God I remember one |
| time I could scout it out straight whistling like a man almost easy O |
| Lord how noisy I hope theyre bubbles on it for a wad of money from some |
| fellow 111 have to perfume it in the morning dont forget I bet he |
| never saw a better pair of thighs than that look how white they are the |
| smoothest place is right there between this bit here how soft like a |
| peach easy God I wouldnt mind being a man and get up on a lovely woman |
| O Lord what a row youre making like the jersey lily easy easy O how the |
| waters come down at Lahore |
| |
| who knows is there anything the matter with my insides or have I |
| something growing in me getting that thing like that every week when was |
| it last I Whit Monday yes its only about 3 weeks I ought to go to the |
| doctor only it would be like before I married him when I had that white |
| thing coming from me and Floey made me go to that dry old stick Dr |
| Collins for womens diseases on Pembroke road your vagina he called it I |
| suppose thats how he got all the gilt mirrors and carpets getting round |
| those rich ones off Stephens green running up to him for every little |
| fiddlefaddle her vagina and her cochinchina theyve money of course so |
| theyre all right I wouldnt marry him not if he was the last man in |
| the world besides theres something queer about their children always |
| smelling around those filthy bitches all sides asking me if what I did |
| had an offensive odour what did he want me to do but the one thing gold |
| maybe what a question if I smathered it all over his wrinkly old face |
| for him with all my compriments I suppose hed know then and could you |
| pass it easily pass what I thought he was talking about the rock of |
| Gibraltar the way he put it thats a very nice invention too by the |
| way only I like letting myself down after in the hole as far as I can |
| squeeze and pull the chain then to flush it nice cool pins and needles |
| still theres something in it I suppose I always used to know by Millys |
| when she was a child whether she had worms or not still all the same |
| paying him for that how much is that doctor one guinea please and asking |
| me had I frequent omissions where do those old fellows get all the words |
| they have omissions with his shortsighted eyes on me cocked sideways I |
| wouldnt trust him too far to give me chloroform or God knows what else |
| still I liked him when he sat down to write the thing out frowning so |
| severe his nose intelligent like that you be damned you lying strap O |
| anything no matter who except an idiot he was clever enough to spot |
| that of course that was all thinking of him and his mad crazy letters |
| my Precious one everything connected with your glorious Body everything |
| underlined that comes from it is a thing of beauty and of joy for ever |
| something he got out of some nonsensical book that he had me always at |
| myself 4 and 5 times a day sometimes and I said I hadnt are you sure |
| O yes I said I am quite sure in a way that shut him up I knew what was |
| coming next only natural weakness it was he excited me I dont know how |
| the first night ever we met when I was living in Rehoboth terrace we |
| stood staring at one another for about lo minutes as if we met somewhere |
| I suppose on account of my being jewess looking after my mother he used |
| to amuse me the things he said with the half sloothering smile on him |
| and all the Doyles said he was going to stand for a member of Parliament |
| O wasnt I the born fool to believe all his blather about home rule |
| and the land league sending me that long strool of a song out of the |
| Huguenots to sing in French to be more classy O beau pays de la Touraine |
| that I never even sang once explaining and rigmaroling about religion |
| and persecution he wont let you enjoy anything naturally then might he |
| as a great favour the very 1st opportunity he got a chance in Brighton |
| square running into my bedroom pretending the ink got on his hands to |
| wash it off with the Albion milk and sulphur soap I used to use and the |
| gelatine still round it O I laughed myself sick at him that day I better |
| not make an alnight sitting on this affair they ought to make chambers a |
| natural size so that a woman could sit on it properly he kneels down to |
| do it I suppose there isnt in all creation another man with the habits |
| he has look at the way hes sleeping at the foot of the bed how can he |
| without a hard bolster its well he doesnt kick or he might knock out |
| all my teeth breathing with his hand on his nose like that Indian god |
| he took me to show one wet Sunday in the museum in Kildare street all |
| yellow in a pinafore lying on his side on his hand with his ten toes |
| sticking out that he said was a bigger religion than the jews and |
| Our Lords both put together all over Asia imitating him as hes always |
| imitating everybody I suppose he used to sleep at the foot of the bed |
| too with his big square feet up in his wifes mouth damn this stinking |
| thing anyway wheres this those napkins are ah yes I know I hope the old |
| press doesnt creak ah I knew it would hes sleeping hard had a good time |
| somewhere still she must have given him great value for his money of |
| course he has to pay for it from her O this nuisance of a thing I hope |
| theyll have something better for us in the other world tying ourselves |
| up God help us thats all right for tonight now the lumpy old jingly |
| bed always reminds me of old Cohen I suppose he scratched himself in it |
| often enough and he thinks father bought it from Lord Napier that I used |
| to admire when I was a little girl because I told him easy piano O |
| I like my bed God here we are as bad as ever after 16 years how many |
| houses were we in at all Raymond terrace and Ontario terrace and Lombard |
| street and Holles street and he goes about whistling every time were on |
| the run again his huguenots or the frogs march pretending to help the |
| men with our 4 sticks of furniture and then the City Arms hotel worse |
| and worse says Warden Daly that charming place on the landing always |
| somebody inside praying then leaving all their stinks after them |
| always know who was in there last every time were just getting on right |
| something happens or he puts his big foot in it Thoms and Helys and Mr |
| Cuffes and Drimmies either hes going to be run into prison over his old |
| lottery tickets that was to be all our salvations or he goes and gives |
| impudence well have him coming home with the sack soon out of the |
| Freeman too like the rest on account of those Sinner Fein or the |
| freemasons then well see if the little man he showed me dribbling |
| along in the wet all by himself round by Coadys lane will give him much |
| consolation that he says is so capable and sincerely Irish he is indeed |
| judging by the sincerity of the trousers I saw on him wait theres |
| Georges church bells wait 3 quarters the hour l wait 2 oclock well |
| thats a nice hour of the night for him to be coming home at to anybody |
| climbing down into the area if anybody saw him Ill knock him off that |
| little habit tomorrow first Ill look at his shirt to see or Ill see if |
| he has that French letter still in his pocketbook I suppose he thinks I |
| dont know deceitful men all their 20 pockets arent enough for their lies |
| then why should we tell them even if its the truth they dont believe you |
| then tucked up in bed like those babies in the Aristocrats Masterpiece |
| he brought me another time as if we hadnt enough of that in real life |
| without some old Aristocrat or whatever his name is disgusting you more |
| with those rotten pictures children with two heads and no legs thats the |
| kind of villainy theyre always dreaming about with not another thing in |
| their empty heads they ought to get slow poison the half of them then |
| tea and toast for him buttered on both sides and newlaid eggs I suppose |
| Im nothing any more when I wouldnt let him lick me in Holles street one |
| night man man tyrant as ever for the one thing he slept on the floor |
| half the night naked the way the jews used when somebody dies belonged |
| to them and wouldnt eat any breakfast or speak a word wanting to be |
| petted so I thought I stood out enough for one time and let him he does |
| it all wrong too thinking only of his own pleasure his tongue is too |
| flat or I dont know what he forgets that wethen I dont Ill make him do |
| it again if he doesnt mind himself and lock him down to sleep in the |
| coalcellar with the blackbeetles I wonder was it her Josie off her head |
| with my castoffs hes such a born liar too no hed never have the courage |
| with a married woman thats why he wants me and Boylan though as for her |
| Denis as she calls him that forlornlooking spectacle you couldnt call |
| him a husband yes its some little bitch hes got in with even when I was |
| with him with Milly at the College races that Hornblower with the childs |
| bonnet on the top of his nob let us into by the back way he was throwing |
| his sheeps eyes at those two doing skirt duty up and down I tried to |
| wink at him first no use of course and thats the way his money goes this |
| is the fruits of Mr Paddy Dignam yes they were all in great style at the |
| grand funeral in the paper Boylan brought in if they saw a real officers |
| funeral thatd be something reversed arms muffled drums the poor horse |
| walking behind in black L Boom and Tom Kernan that drunken little |
| barrelly man that bit his tongue off falling down the mens W C drunk |
| in some place or other and Martin Cunningham and the two Dedaluses and |
| Fanny MCoys husband white head of cabbage skinny thing with a turn in |
| her eye trying to sing my songs shed want to be born all over again and |
| her old green dress with the lowneck as she cant attract them any other |
| way like dabbling on a rainy day I see it all now plainly and they call |
| that friendship killing and then burying one another and they all with |
| their wives and families at home more especially Jack Power keeping that |
| barmaid he does of course his wife is always sick or going to be sick |
| or just getting better of it and hes a goodlooking man still though |
| hes getting a bit grey over the ears theyre a nice lot all of them well |
| theyre not going to get my husband again into their clutches if I can |
| help it making fun of him then behind his back I know well when he goes |
| on with his idiotics because he has sense enough not to squander every |
| penny piece he earns down their gullets and looks after his wife and |
| family goodfornothings poor Paddy Dignam all the same Im sorry in a |
| way for him what are his wife and 5 children going to do unless he was |
| insured comical little teetotum always stuck up in some pub corner and |
| her or her son waiting Bill Bailey wont you please come home her widows |
| weeds wont improve her appearance theyre awfully becoming though if |
| youre goodlooking what men wasnt he yes he was at the Glencree dinner |
| and Ben Dollard base barreltone the night he borrowed the swallowtail |
| to sing out of in Holles street squeezed and squashed into them and |
| grinning all over his big Dolly face like a wellwhipped childs botty |
| didnt he look a balmy ballocks sure enough that must have been a |
| spectacle on the stage imagine paying 5/- in the preserved seats for |
| that to see him trotting off in his trowlers and Simon Dedalus too he |
| was always turning up half screwed singing the second verse first the |
| old love is the new was one of his so sweetly sang the maiden on the |
| hawthorn bough he was always on for flirtyfying too when I sang Maritana |
| with him at Freddy Mayers private opera he had a delicious glorious |
| voice Phoebe dearest goodbye _sweet_heart sweetheart he always sang it |
| not like Bartell Darcy sweet tart goodbye of course he had the gift of |
| the voice so there was no art in it all over you like a warm showerbath |
| O Maritana wildwood flower we sang splendidly though it was a bit too |
| high for my register even transposed and he was married at the time to |
| May Goulding but then hed say or do something to knock the good out of |
| it hes a widower now I wonder what sort is his son he says hes an author |
| and going to be a university professor of Italian and Im to take lessons |
| what is he driving at now showing him my photo its not good of me I |
| ought to have got it taken in drapery that never looks out of fashion |
| still I look young in it I wonder he didnt make him a present of it |
| altogether and me too after all why not I saw him driving down to the |
| Kingsbridge station with his father and mother I was in mourning thats |
| 11 years ago now yes hed be 11 though what was the good in going into |
| mourning for what was neither one thing nor the other the first cry was |
| enough for me I heard the deathwatch too ticking in the wall of course |
| he insisted hed go into mourning for the cat I suppose hes a man now by |
| this time he was an innocent boy then and a darling little fellow in his |
| lord Fauntleroy suit and curly hair like a prince on the stage when I |
| saw him at Mat Dillons he liked me too I remember they all do wait by |
| God yes wait yes hold on he was on the cards this morning when I laid |
| out the deck union with a young stranger neither dark nor fair you met |
| before I thought it meant him but hes no chicken nor a stranger either |
| besides my face was turned the other way what was the 7th card after |
| that the 10 of spades for a journey by land then there was a letter on |
| its way and scandals too the 3 queens and the 8 of diamonds for a rise |
| in society yes wait it all came out and 2 red 8s for new garments look |
| at that and didnt I dream something too yes there was something about |
| poetry in it I hope he hasnt long greasy hair hanging into his eyes or |
| standing up like a red Indian what do they go about like that for only |
| getting themselves and their poetry laughed at I always liked poetry |
| when I was a girl first I thought he was a poet like lord Byron and not |
| an ounce of it in his composition I thought he was quite different I |
| wonder is he too young hes about wait 88 I was married 88 Milly is 15 |
| yesterday 89 what age was he then at Dillons 5 or 6 about 88 I suppose |
| hes 20 or more Im not too old for him if hes 23 or 24 I hope hes not |
| that stuckup university student sort no otherwise he wouldnt go sitting |
| down in the old kitchen with him taking Eppss cocoa and talking of |
| course he pretended to understand it all probably he told him he was |
| out of Trinity college hes very young to be a professor I hope hes not |
| a professor like Goodwin was he was a potent professor of John Jameson |
| they all write about some woman in their poetry well I suppose he wont |
| find many like me where softly sighs of love the light guitar where |
| poetry is in the air the blue sea and the moon shining so beautifully |
| coming back on the nightboat from Tarifa the lighthouse at Europa point |
| the guitar that fellow played was so expressive will I ever go back |
| there again all new faces two glancing eyes a lattice hid Ill sing that |
| for him theyre my eyes if hes anything of a poet two eyes as darkly |
| bright as loves own star arent those beautiful words as loves young star |
| itll be a change the Lord knows to have an intelligent person to talk |
| to about yourself not always listening to him and Billy Prescotts ad |
| and Keyess ad and Tom the Devils ad then if anything goes wrong in their |
| business we have to suffer Im sure hes very distinguished Id like to |
| meet a man like that God not those other ruck besides hes young those |
| fine young men I could see down in Margate strand bathingplace from the |
| side of the rock standing up in the sun naked like a God or something |
| and then plunging into the sea with them why arent all men like that |
| thered be some consolation for a woman like that lovely little statue he |
| bought I could look at him all day long curly head and his shoulders |
| his finger up for you to listen theres real beauty and poetry for you |
| I often felt I wanted to kiss him all over also his lovely young cock |
| there so simple I wouldnt mind taking him in my mouth if nobody was |
| looking as if it was asking you to suck it so clean and white he looks |
| with his boyish face I would too in 1/2 a minute even if some of it went |
| down what its only like gruel or the dew theres no danger besides hed |
| be so clean compared with those pigs of men I suppose never dream of |
| washing it from I years end to the other the most of them only thats |
| what gives the women the moustaches Im sure itll be grand if I can only |
| get in with a handsome young poet at my age Ill throw them the 1st thing |
| in the morning till I see if the wishcard comes out or Ill try pairing |
| the lady herself and see if he comes out Ill read and study all I can |
| find or learn a bit off by heart if I knew who he likes so he wont think |
| me stupid if he thinks all women are the same and I can teach him the |
| other part Ill make him feel all over him till he half faints under |
| me then hell write about me lover and mistress publicly too with our 2 |
| photographs in all the papers when he becomes famous O but then what am |
| I going to do about him though |
| |
| no thats no way for him has he no manners nor no refinement nor no |
| nothing in his nature slapping us behind like that on my bottom because |
| I didnt call him Hugh the ignoramus that doesnt know poetry from a |
| cabbage thats what you get for not keeping them in their proper place |
| pulling off his shoes and trousers there on the chair before me so |
| barefaced without even asking permission and standing out that vulgar |
| way in the half of a shirt they wear to be admired like a priest or a |
| butcher or those old hypocrites in the time of Julius Caesar of course |
| hes right enough in his way to pass the time as a joke sure you might |
| as well be in bed with what with a lion God Im sure hed have something |
| better to say for himself an old Lion would O well I suppose its because |
| they were so plump and tempting in my short petticoat he couldnt resist |
| they excite myself sometimes its well for men all the amount of pleasure |
| they get off a womans body were so round and white for them always I |
| wished I was one myself for a change just to try with that thing they |
| have swelling up on you so hard and at the same time so soft when you |
| touch it my uncle John has a thing long I heard those cornerboys saying |
| passing the comer of Marrowbone lane my aunt Mary has a thing hairy |
| because it was dark and they knew a girl was passing it didnt make me |
| blush why should it either its only nature and he puts his thing long |
| into my aunt Marys hairy etcetera and turns out to be you put the handle |
| in a sweepingbrush men again all over they can pick and choose what they |
| please a married woman or a fast widow or a girl for their different |
| tastes like those houses round behind Irish street no but were to be |
| always chained up theyre not going to be chaining me up no damn fear |
| once I start I tell you for their stupid husbands jealousy why cant we |
| all remain friends over it instead of quarrelling her husband found it |
| out what they did together well naturally and if he did can he undo it |
| hes coronado anyway whatever he does and then he going to the other |
| mad extreme about the wife in Fair Tyrants of course the man never even |
| casts a 2nd thought on the husband or wife either its the woman he wants |
| and he gets her what else were we given all those desires for Id like to |
| know I cant help it if Im young still can I its a wonder Im not an old |
| shrivelled hag before my time living with him so cold never embracing |
| me except sometimes when hes asleep the wrong end of me not knowing I |
| suppose who he has any man thatd kiss a womans bottom Id throw my hat at |
| him after that hed kiss anything unnatural where we havent I atom of any |
| kind of expression in us all of us the same 2 lumps of lard before ever |
| Id do that to a man pfooh the dirty brutes the mere thought is enough |
| I kiss the feet of you senorita theres some sense in that didnt he kiss |
| our halldoor yes he did what a madman nobody understands his cracked |
| ideas but me still of course a woman wants to be embraced 20 times a day |
| almost to make her look young no matter by who so long as to be in love |
| or loved by somebody if the fellow you want isnt there sometimes by the |
| Lord God I was thinking would I go around by the quays there some dark |
| evening where nobodyd know me and pick up a sailor off the sea thatd be |
| hot on for it and not care a pin whose I was only do it off up in a gate |
| somewhere or one of those wildlooking gipsies in Rathfarnham had their |
| camp pitched near the Bloomfield laundry to try and steal our things if |
| they could I only sent mine there a few times for the name model |
| laundry sending me back over and over some old ones odd stockings that |
| blackguardlooking fellow with the fine eyes peeling a switch attack me |
| in the dark and ride me up against the wall without a word or a murderer |
| anybody what they do themselves the fine gentlemen in their silk hats |
| that K C lives up somewhere this way coming out of Hardwicke lane the |
| night he gave us the fish supper on account of winning over the boxing |
| match of course it was for me he gave it I knew him by his gaiters and |
| the walk and when I turned round a minute after just to see there was |
| a woman after coming out of it too some filthy prostitute then he goes |
| home to his wife after that only I suppose the half of those sailors are |
| rotten again with disease O move over your big carcass out of that for |
| the love of Mike listen to him the winds that waft my sighs to thee so |
| well he may sleep and sigh the great Suggester Don Poldo de la Flora if |
| he knew how he came out on the cards this morning hed have something to |
| sigh for a dark man in some perplexity between 2 7s too in prison for |
| Lord knows what he does that I dont know and Im to be slooching around |
| down in the kitchen to get his lordship his breakfast while hes rolled |
| up like a mummy will I indeed did you ever see me running Id just like |
| to see myself at it show them attention and they treat you like dirt |
| I dont care what anybody says itd be much better for the world to be |
| governed by the women in it you wouldnt see women going and killing one |
| another and slaughtering when do you ever see women rolling around drunk |
| like they do or gambling every penny they have and losing it on horses |
| yes because a woman whatever she does she knows where to stop sure they |
| wouldnt be in the world at all only for us they dont know what it is to |
| be a woman and a mother how could they where would they all of them be |
| if they hadnt all a mother to look after them what I never had thats |
| why I suppose hes running wild now out at night away from his books |
| and studies and not living at home on account of the usual rowy house I |
| suppose well its a poor case that those that have a fine son like that |
| theyre not satisfied and I none was he not able to make one it wasnt my |
| fault we came together when I was watching the two dogs up in her behind |
| in the middle of the naked street that disheartened me altogether I |
| suppose I oughtnt to have buried him in that little woolly jacket I |
| knitted crying as I was but give it to some poor child but I knew well |
| Id never have another our 1st death too it was we were never the same |
| since O Im not going to think myself into the glooms about that any |
| more I wonder why he wouldnt stay the night I felt all the time it was |
| somebody strange he brought in instead of roving around the city meeting |
| God knows who nightwalkers and pickpockets his poor mother wouldnt |
| like that if she was alive ruining himself for life perhaps still its a |
| lovely hour so silent I used to love coming home after dances the air of |
| the night they have friends they can talk to weve none either he wants |
| what he wont get or its some woman ready to stick her knife in you I |
| hate that in women no wonder they treat us the way they do we are a |
| dreadful lot of bitches I suppose its all the troubles we have makes us |
| so snappy Im not like that he could easy have slept in there on the sofa |
| in the other room I suppose he was as shy as a boy he being so young |
| hardly 20 of me in the next room hed have heard me on the chamber arrah |
| what harm Dedalus I wonder its like those names in Gibraltar Delapaz |
| Delagracia they had the devils queer names there father Vilaplana of |
| Santa Maria that gave me the rosary Rosales y OReilly in the Calle las |
| Siete Revueltas and Pisimbo and Mrs Opisso in Governor street O what a |
| name Id go and drown myself in the first river if I had a name like |
| her O my and all the bits of streets Paradise ramp and Bedlam ramp and |
| Rodgers ramp and Crutchetts ramp and the devils gap steps well small |
| blame to me if I am a harumscarum I know I am a bit I declare to God I |
| dont feel a day older than then I wonder could I get my tongue round |
| any of the Spanish como esta usted muy bien gracias y usted see I havent |
| forgotten it all I thought I had only for the grammar a noun is the |
| name of any person place or thing pity I never tried to read that novel |
| cantankerous Mrs Rubio lent me by Valera with the questions in it all |
| upside down the two ways I always knew wed go away in the end I can |
| tell him the Spanish and he tell me the Italian then hell see Im not |
| so ignorant what a pity he didnt stay Im sure the poor fellow was dead |
| tired and wanted a good sleep badly I could have brought him in his |
| breakfast in bed with a bit of toast so long as I didnt do it on |
| the knife for bad luck or if the woman was going her rounds with the |
| watercress and something nice and tasty there are a few olives in the |
| kitchen he might like I never could bear the look of them in Abrines |
| I could do the criada the room looks all right since I changed it the |
| other way you see something was telling me all the time Id have to |
| introduce myself not knowing me from Adam very funny wouldnt it Im his |
| wife or pretend we were in Spain with him half awake without a Gods |
| notion where he is dos huevos estrellados senor Lord the cracked things |
| come into my head sometimes itd be great fun supposing he stayed with us |
| why not theres the room upstairs empty and Millys bed in the back room |
| he could do his writing and studies at the table in there for all the |
| scribbling he does at it and if he wants to read in bed in the morning |
| like me as hes making the breakfast for I he can make it for 2 Im sure |
| Im not going to take in lodgers off the street for him if he takes |
| a gesabo of a house like this Id love to have a long talk with an |
| intelligent welleducated person Id have to get a nice pair of red |
| slippers like those Turks with the fez used to sell or yellow and a |
| nice semitransparent morning gown that I badly want or a peachblossom |
| dressing jacket like the one long ago in Walpoles only 8/6 or 18/6 Ill |
| just give him one more chance Ill get up early in the morning Im sick of |
| Cohens old bed in any case I might go over to the markets to see all |
| the vegetables and cabbages and tomatoes and carrots and all kinds of |
| splendid fruits all coming in lovely and fresh who knows whod be the 1st |
| man Id meet theyre out looking for it in the morning Mamy Dillon used |
| to say they are and the night too that was her massgoing Id love a |
| big juicy pear now to melt in your mouth like when I used to be in the |
| longing way then Ill throw him up his eggs and tea in the moustachecup |
| she gave him to make his mouth bigger I suppose hed like my nice cream |
| too I know what Ill do Ill go about rather gay not too much singing a |
| bit now and then mi fa pieta Masetto then Ill start dressing myself to |
| go out presto non son piu forte Ill put on my best shift and drawers let |
| him have a good eyeful out of that to make his micky stand for him Ill |
| let him know if thats what he wanted that his wife is I s l o fucked yes |
| and damn well fucked too up to my neck nearly not by him 5 or 6 times |
| handrunning theres the mark of his spunk on the clean sheet I wouldnt |
| bother to even iron it out that ought to satisfy him if you dont believe |
| me feel my belly unless I made him stand there and put him into me Ive a |
| mind to tell him every scrap and make him do it out in front of me serve |
| him right its all his own fault if I am an adulteress as the thing in |
| the gallery said O much about it if thats all the harm ever we did in |
| this vale of tears God knows its not much doesnt everybody only they |
| hide it I suppose thats what a woman is supposed to be there for or |
| He wouldnt have made us the way He did so attractive to men then if he |
| wants to kiss my bottom Ill drag open my drawers and bulge it right out |
| in his face as large as life he can stick his tongue 7 miles up my hole |
| as hes there my brown part then Ill tell him I want LI or perhaps 30/- |
| Ill tell him I want to buy underclothes then if he gives me that well he |
| wont be too bad I dont want to soak it all out of him like other women |
| do I could often have written out a fine cheque for myself and write his |
| name on it for a couple of pounds a few times he forgot to lock it up |
| besides he wont spend it Ill let him do it off on me behind provided he |
| doesnt smear all my good drawers O I suppose that cant be helped Ill do |
| the indifferent l or 2 questions Ill know by the answers when hes like |
| that he cant keep a thing back I know every turn in him Ill tighten my |
| bottom well and let out a few smutty words smellrump or lick my shit or |
| the first mad thing comes into my head then Ill suggest about yes O wait |
| now sonny my turn is coming Ill be quite gay and friendly over it O |
| but I was forgetting this bloody pest of a thing pfooh you wouldnt know |
| which to laugh or cry were such a mixture of plum and apple no Ill have |
| to wear the old things so much the better itll be more pointed hell |
| never know whether he did it or not there thats good enough for you |
| any old thing at all then Ill wipe him off me just like a business his |
| omission then Ill go out Ill have him eying up at the ceiling where is |
| she gone now make him want me thats the only way a quarter after what an |
| unearthly hour I suppose theyre just getting up in China now combing out |
| their pigtails for the day well soon have the nuns ringing the angelus |
| theyve nobody coming in to spoil their sleep except an odd priest or two |
| for his night office or the alarmclock next door at cockshout clattering |
| the brains out of itself let me see if I can doze off 1 2 3 4 5 what |
| kind of flowers are those they invented like the stars the wallpaper |
| in Lombard street was much nicer the apron he gave me was like that |
| something only I only wore it twice better lower this lamp and try again |
| so as I can get up early Ill go to Lambes there beside Findlaters and |
| get them to send us some flowers to put about the place in case he |
| brings him home tomorrow today I mean no no Fridays an unlucky day first |
| I want to do the place up someway the dust grows in it I think while Im |
| asleep then we can have music and cigarettes I can accompany him first I |
| must clean the keys of the piano with milk whatll I wear shall I wear |
| a white rose or those fairy cakes in Liptons I love the smell of a rich |
| big shop at 7 1/2d a lb or the other ones with the cherries in them |
| and the pinky sugar I Id a couple of lbs of those a nice plant for the |
| middle of the table Id get that cheaper in wait wheres this I saw them |
| not long ago I love flowers Id love to have the whole place swimming in |
| roses God of heaven theres nothing like nature the wild mountains then |
| the sea and the waves rushing then the beautiful country with the fields |
| of oats and wheat and all kinds of things and all the fine cattle going |
| about that would do your heart good to see rivers and lakes and flowers |
| all sorts of shapes and smells and colours springing up even out of the |
| ditches primroses and violets nature it is as for them saying theres no |
| God I wouldnt give a snap of my two fingers for all their learning why |
| dont they go and create something I often asked him atheists or whatever |
| they call themselves go and wash the cobbles off themselves first then |
| they go howling for the priest and they dying and why why because theyre |
| afraid of hell on account of their bad conscience ah yes I know them |
| well who was the first person in the universe before there was anybody |
| that made it all who ah that they dont know neither do I so there you |
| are they might as well try to stop the sun from rising tomorrow the sun |
| shines for you he said the day we were lying among the rhododendrons on |
| Howth head in the grey tweed suit and his straw hat the day I got him to |
| propose to me yes first I gave him the bit of seedcake out of my mouth |
| and it was leapyear like now yes 16 years ago my God after that long |
| kiss I near lost my breath yes he said I was a flower of the mountain |
| yes so we are flowers all a womans body yes that was one true thing he |
| said in his life and the sun shines for you today yes that was why I |
| liked him because I saw he understood or felt what a woman is and I knew |
| I could always get round him and I gave him all the pleasure I could |
| leading him on till he asked me to say yes and I wouldnt answer first |
| only looked out over the sea and the sky I was thinking of so many |
| things he didnt know of Mulvey and Mr Stanhope and Hester and father and |
| old captain Groves and the sailors playing all birds fly and I say stoop |
| and washing up dishes they called it on the pier and the sentry in front |
| of the governors house with the thing round his white helmet poor devil |
| half roasted and the Spanish girls laughing in their shawls and their |
| tall combs and the auctions in the morning the Greeks and the jews and |
| the Arabs and the devil knows who else from all the ends of Europe and |
| Duke street and the fowl market all clucking outside Larby Sharons |
| and the poor donkeys slipping half asleep and the vague fellows in the |
| cloaks asleep in the shade on the steps and the big wheels of the carts |
| of the bulls and the old castle thousands of years old yes and those |
| handsome Moors all in white and turbans like kings asking you to sit |
| down in their little bit of a shop and Ronda with the old windows of the |
| posadas 2 glancing eyes a lattice hid for her lover to kiss the iron |
| and the wineshops half open at night and the castanets and the night we |
| missed the boat at Algeciras the watchman going about serene with his |
| lamp and O that awful deepdown torrent O and the sea the sea crimson |
| sometimes like fire and the glorious sunsets and the figtrees in the |
| Alameda gardens yes and all the queer little streets and the pink |
| and blue and yellow houses and the rosegardens and the jessamine and |
| geraniums and cactuses and Gibraltar as a girl where I was a Flower |
| of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian |
| girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the |
| Moorish wall and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked |
| him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to |
| say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and |
| drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his |
| heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes. |