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. Twilightsleep 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  after all of a sudden! Peaceful eyes.  Weight off their
minds. 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 nyumyum. 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.  Goose  step.  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 into 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. <i>There  is  not in this  wide
world a vallee</i>. 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 horse policeman 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. Luck 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  mortar-boards.
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  plain clothes men are always courting slaveys.
Easily  twig  a man used to uniform.  Square-pushing 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, get along with  your great times  coming. Barmaids too.  Tobacco
shopgirls.
     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. Want to  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.  Shove  us  over  those apricots,  meaning
peaches. The not far distant day. Home Rule 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.  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 silver
ware in Walter Sexton's window opposite 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 Boulger 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 like  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. Wind and watery 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 field glasses. Or will I drop into old Harris's
and have a chat  with young Sinclair? Well-mannered fellow. Probably at  his
lunch. Must get those  old  glasses  of  mine set right. G<oe>rz 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 cloak
rooms. What do  they  be thinking  about? Women  too.  Incredible. Last year
travelling to Ennis had to pick up that  farmer's daughter's bag 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.
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  art 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 again to his side.
     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, 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, quick breathing, slowlier walking, passed Adam court.
     With  a  keep quiet relief, his eyes  took note:  this  is  street here
middle of the  day  Bob Doran's bottle  shoulders. On his annual bend, M'Coy
said. They drink in order to say or do something or <i>cherchez la femme</i>. Up in
the Coombe with chummies and streetwalkers and then the rest  of the year as
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? Twenty-eight 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,
silk, dames  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. Country bred 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. <i>La causa å santa!</i> Tara tara.  Great chorus that. Tara. Must  be washed
in rainwater. Meyerbeer. Tara: bom bom bom.
     Pincushions. I'm a long  time  threatening to  buy one. Stick  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,  silk webs, 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,  slop 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:  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 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  ma 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 soup pot
as big as the Phoenix Park. Harpooning  flitches and hindquarters out of it.
Hate people all round you. City Arms hotel <i>table d'hâte</i> 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 Italian organgrinders  crisp  of
onions, mushrooms  truffles.  Pain  to  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 wobble 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, smoking hot, 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?
     -- Hellow, 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 mustered  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. <i>There  was a
right  royal old nigger. Who ate or something the somethings of the reverend
Mr MacTrigger</i>. 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. Mighty 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. <i>Mr MacTrier</i>. Easier than
the  dreamy creamy stuff.  His  <i>five hundred wives.  Had  the time of  their
lives</i>.
     -- Mustard, sir?
     -- Thank you.
     He  studded  under  each lifted strip yellow blobs. <i>Their lives</i>. I have
it. <i>It grew bigger and bigger and bigger</i>.
     -- 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  hauched 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
boxing match 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 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 petty cash 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 numskull. 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. Dog's
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
doggy-bowwowsywowsy!
     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 oyster  old fish  at table. Perhaps he young flesh
in  bed.  No. June has  no  ar no oysters. But there are people like 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
<i>Ølite.  Cråme  de  la cråme</i>.  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 <i>chef</i>
like a rabbi. Combustible duck. Curly  cabbage <i>î la  duchesse de Parme</i>. 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. <i>Du, de la</i>, 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 sweet  and sour
with spittle. Joy: I ate it: joy. Young life, her lips that gave me pouting.
Soft, warm, sticky  grumjelly 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 woman 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 fall 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 <i>Freeman</i>.
     -- 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 <i>Freeman?</i> 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.
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  has 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,  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's  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