Fiction

Ulysses

James Joyce

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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
ROLE 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 l8th
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, DISTINGUE
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.
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The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan
W.S. Gilbert

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