Guiltless he was clearly for so once at least he clearely declared himself to be. They tell the story that one fine spring morning some years after the alleged misdemeanour whisst crossing the fair expanse of the park he met a cad with a pipe. The latter accosted him to ask if he could say what it was o'clock that the clock struck. Earwicker halting drew his enamelled hunter and told the cad it was twelve to the minute adding however that the accusation against him had been made as was well known by a creature in human form who was several degrees lower than a snake. In support of his words the honest goliath tapped his chronometer and pointed to overgrown milestone as he said solemnly: I am prepared to stand on the monument any day at this hour before the deity and my fellows that there is no tittle of truth in that purest of fabrications. The cad thanked him and repeated the words that same evening at his fireside where he was smoking reflectively after having eaten some peas and vinegar a dish he much fancied. The next evening but one the cad's wife spoke of the matter after sadality meeting to the Reverend director, a fresh complexioned clergyman and it was he in all haman probability was overheard to repeat the words to a layteacher of natural science during a priestly flutter on the race course of baldoyle <when> the portmanock plate was won by a full length by Captain Blounts fresh colt drummer coxon at even money. It was two coves of the name of Treacle Tom and his own blood and milk brother Frisky Shorty come off the hulks what was out on the bum around for an oofbird game for a jimmyogoblin or a small thick as heard the reverend parson make use of the language which he was having a gurgle off his own along of the bloke in the specs. Now Treacle Tom had been absent from his usual haunts for some time previously (he was in the habit of frequenting common lodging-houses where he slept in a nude state in strange beds) but returning on Baldoyle night he repeated the tale more than once during uneasy slumber and in the hearing of a ballad monger and a drapery executive out of work for the moment and an illstarred streetsinger who had been tossing on his doss in the hope of soon finding ways & means for blowing the napper off himself. when day dawned that busker was up and afoot thrumming his square fiddle and after a visit to a public house the world was the richer for a new halfpenny ballad This on a slip of blue paper headed by a woodcut soon fluttered to the rose of the winds from lane to lattice and from mouth to ear throughout the land of Ireland, and round the land his rann it ran and this is the rann that Hosty made: [FDV]
A cloud of witnesses indeed! Yet all of these are as much now no more as were they not yet or had they then not ever been. Of Hosty, quite a musical genius in a small way, the end is unknown. O'Donnell is said to have enlisted at the time of the Crimean war under the name of Buckley. Peter Cloran, at the suggestion of the Master in Lunacy, became an inmate of an asylum. Treacle Tom passed away painlessly in a state of nature propelled into the great beyond by footblows of his last bedfellows, 3 Norwegian sailors. Shorty disappeared from the surface of the earth so completely as to lead one to suppose that his habitat had become the interior. Then was the reverend, the sodality director that fashionable vice preacher to whom society ladies often became so enthusiastically attached and was a nondescript who sometimes wore a raffle ticket in his hat & was openly guilty of malpractices with his tableknife the cad with a pipe encountered by HCE?
It is a well authenticated fact that the average human face changes its shape with the passing of years. Hence it is no easy matter to identify the individual with already an inclination to baldness who was asked by some boardschool children to tell them the story. It was the Lord's day and the request was put to the party as he [sat smoking] {paused} for a smoke in his pastime of executing empty bottles. One sad circumstance the narrator mentioned which goes at once to the heart of things. He rose to his feet and told of it in
In words a bit duskish he aptly described the scene, the monolith rising stark from the twilight pinebarren, the the bellwether, the fallow doe belling softly her approach and how brightly outed his wallet and gives him a topping cheroot and says he was to suck that one and spend a half hour in Havana. And says he: As sure as eggs is what they are in high quarters my business credit will stand as straight as that monument's fabrication before the hygienic globe of the Taskmaster's eye (and here the reverent sabbath and bottle breaker uncovered himself of his boater cordially inviting the adolescents whom he was wising up to do in like manner).
The scene was never forgotten for later in the same century one of that little band of factferreters, then an ex civil servant retired under the sixtyfive act, rehearsed it to a cousin of the late archdeacon Coppinger in a pullman of the transhibernian with one still sadder circumstance which is a heartskewer if ever was. For when the archdeacon spoke of it by request all, hearing the cousin's description of that fellow-traveller's features could really imagine themselves as listening to the cockshy shooter's evensong evocation of the doomed liberator, his hand extended towards the monumental leadpencil which as the molyvdokondolin was to be his mausoleum while over his exculpatory features the ghost of a resignation unveiled a spectral appealingness similar in origin and effect to a beam of sunshine upon a coffinplate. [FDV]
Guiltless he was clearly for so once at least he clearely declared himself to be.
(didn't we just convict him of exhibitionism? does a single cleare denial effectively erase that?)
(his denials are usually stuttered, so unclear, so presumed guilty)
"clearly... clearely" repetition survives to publication (misspelling doesn't)
FW2: "Guiltless... he was clearly for so once at least he clearly... expressed himself as being"
They tell the story that one fine spring morning some years after the alleged misdemeanour whisst crossing the fair expanse of the park he met a cad with a pipe.
"They" unspecified
"spring" (the exposure took place in summer?)
"years" (does "testimonies" imply a police investigation at the time? was that before he achieved his fame/rank?)
"alleged misdemeanour" self-exposure to nursemaids
supposedly based on a (lost!?) anecdote of Joyce's father meeting "a cad with a bicycle" in Phoenix Park, who had asked him for a match to light his pipe with
"pipe" mildly phallic, but mostly harmless/generic (it will morph into a 'fender' among infinite other things)
Bois de Boulogne 1911 |
'[Djuna Barnes] was walking with [JAJ] in the Bois de Bologne, when a man brushed by and mumbled something she did not understand. Joyce blanched and trembled. Djuna asked what was the matter. "That man, whom I have never seen before," he said, "said to me as he passed, in Latin, 'You are an abominable writer!'' [cite]
VI.A Circe (July?): "unknown beggar comes to bigtimer in day of triumph to tell of a past betise"
VI.A Penelope (July?) "boydobelong (Bois) : mystery of a handsome cad : (cab)"
FW2: "They tell the story... how one happy-go-gusty Ides-of-April morning... ages and ages after the alleged misdemeanour when the tried friend of all creation... was billowing across the wide expanse of our greatest park... he MET a cad with a pipe." (why these CAPS???)
The latter accosted him to ask if he could say what it was o'clock that the clock struck.
cad accosts HCE
"accosted" already hints at aggression (HCE's paranoia)
"if he could say" timid/superpolite
"o'clock... clock"
"struck" metaphorical here?
in The Bohemian Girl, Florestein is stopped by Devilshoof, who asks the time and then steals his watch
Ellmann p465, pre-1919: 'A Frenchman shouted across the Rhine at a German, 'Filou! Filou!' ('Scoundrel!') The German understood him to say 'Wieviel Uhr? Wieviel Uhr?' ['What time is it?'] He looked at his watch and shouted back obligingly, 'Halber sechse' ['6:30']'
FW2: "The latter... accosted him... to ask could he tell him how much a'clock it was that the clock struck"
Earwicker halting drew his enamelled hunter and told the cad it was twelve to the minute adding however that the accusation against him had been made as was well known by a creature in human form who was several degrees lower than a snake.
"enamelled" (gem) in Berkeley1 since July (maledictive)
enamelled pocketwatches are expensive/fancy |
'hunter' pocketwatch (w/ lid w/ spring) |
VI.A Eolus (July): "what I'm afraid may be said to me I had better say first
myself"
"creature" wasn't it the nursemaids?!?
VI.B10.61: "several degrees lower than a snake" Daily Mail 8 Dec 1922 'He always seemed several degress lower than a snake'
FW2: "The Earwicker... halted, quick on the draw, and... prodooced from his gunpocket his Jurgensen's shrapnel waterbury... but... told the inquiring kidder... it was twelve of em... adding [...] that whereas the hakusay accusation againstm had been made, what was well known... by a creature in youman form who was... several degrees lower than yore triplehydrad snake."
In support of his words the honest goliath tapped his chronometer and pointed to overgrown milestone as he said solemnly:
"honest" (narrator is taking sides)
Goliath = giant defeated by David (so David = cad)
(when did he become a giant?)
"overgrown milestone" witticism attributed to George IV or Daniel O'Connell
"fair expanse... overgrown milestone" |
overgrown by weeds |
FW2: "In greater support of his word... the flaxen Gygas tapped his chronometrum drumdrum and... pointed... towards his duc de Fer's overgrown milestone... and... averred with solemn emotion's fire:"
I am prepared to stand on the monument any day at this hour before the deity and my fellows that there is no tittle of truth in that purest of fabrications.
"stand on the monument" at the base, or on top via 250ft ladder?
"to stand... that" = to maintain my position that?
"the accusation against him... that purest of fabrications"
FW2: "I am woowoo willing to take my stand, sir, upon the monument... any hygienic day to this hour... before the Great Taskmaster's eye... and in the Presence of the Deity Itself andwell... of all such of said my immediate withdwellers... that there is not one tittle of truth... in that purest of fibfib fabrications."
the Cad's mis/hearing of HCE echoes Bantam Lyons mishearing Bloom (U82)
The cad thanked him and repeated the words that same evening at his fireside where he was smoking reflectively after having eaten some peas and vinegar a dish he much fancied.
smoking his pipe
(what color peas?) |
FW2: "Gaping Gill... thanked um... and erebusqued... as many of the bigtimer's verbaten words which he could balbly call to memory that same kveldeve... while... he spat in careful convertedness... musefed with his thockits after having supped of... a supreme of excelling peas balled under minnshogue's milk into whitemalt winesour, a proviand the littlebilker hoarsely relished"
The next evening but one the cad's wife spoke of the matter after sadality meeting to the Reverend director, a fresh complexioned clergyman and it was he in all haman probability was overheard to repeat the words to a layteacher of natural science during a priestly flutter on the race course of baldoyle <when> the portmanock plate was won by a full length by Captain Blounts fresh colt drummer coxon at even money.
sad sodality?
'in all human probability' cliche
"layteacher" maybe implies religious school, but not priest (or nun)
(cf Bloom's chemistry teacher Vance?)
"flutter" = small bet, but also fluttering hand gesture
1933 Baldoyle races [silent video]
Portmarnock is 2mi from Baldoyle (no Portmarnock Plate, but many others like Metropolitan Plate)
"baldoyle... portmanock plate... drummer coxon" why no caps?
maybe Captain Charles Blount aka Lord Mountjoy? [c1600]
'The Drummer' was a known horse name
cf Humphrey Coxon
FW2: "Our cad's bit of strife... broke of the matter... the next night nudge one... to her particular reverend, the director... yet... it was this overspoiled priest... who... was overheard... to pianissime a slightly varied version of Crookedrib's confidentials... and... hushly pierce the rubiend aurellam of one Philly Thurnston, a layteacher of rural science... during a priestly flutter... at the hippic runfields of breezy Baldoyle... when the classic Encourage Hackney Plate was captured by two noses... by Captain Chaplain Blount's roe hinny Saint Dalough (Drummer Coxon nondepict third) at breakneck odds"
It was two coves of the name of Treacle Tom and his own blood and milk brother Frisky Shorty come off the hulks what was out on the bum around for an oofbird game for a jimmyogoblin or a small thick as heard the reverend parson make use of the language which he was having a gurgle off his own along of the bloke in the specs.
"coves" maybe from Romani, fellow
George Formby, 1915: 'My grandfather's clock was me mother's peramberlator, Round the park in it we used to ride. There was me and Treacle Tommy, Liza Ann and Justice Hawkins, Screaming Jimmy and the twins all stuck inside' [♬] full lyrics
blood brother
Eoin MacNeill: Celtic Ireland 55: 'Lugaid Cichech... reared the two sons of Crimthann, Aed and Laegaire, on his breasts. It was new milk he gave from his breast to Laegaire, and blood he gave to Aed.'
T&I5 in August had had "milkless ram"
VI.B10.43: "frisky shorty (tramp)" Irish Times 18 Nov 1922: 'stealing free rides on freight trains with kindred knights of the road known as "Boston Slim" and "Frisky Shorty"'
hulks = prison ships
VI.B3.22: "oofbird" rich person (from Slang oof: money)
Jimmy O'Goblin: a sovereign
thick 'un = sovereign or crown piece
"which" ?= who
gargle = a drink
"bloke in the specs" ?= "layteacher of natural science"
FW2: "'Twas two pisonouse Timcoves... of the name of Treacle Tom... and his own blood and milk brother Frisky Shorty... a tipster come off the hulks... what was out on the bumaround for an oofbird game for a jimmy o'goblin or a small thick un as chanced... to ear wick their own hears the passon... make use of his law language... which he was... having a gurgle off his own along of the butty bloke in the specs."
Now [it was the habit] Treacle Tom had been absent from his usual haunts for some time previously (he was in the habit of frequenting common lodging-houses where he slept in a nude state in strange beds) but returning on Baldoyle night he repeated the tale more than once during uneasy slumber and in the hearing of [a ballad monger] and a drapery executive out of work for the moment and an illstarred streetsinger who had been tossing on his doss in the hope of soon finding ways & means for blowing the napper off himself.
"absent" (any clue where/why?)
VI.A Cyclops "frequenting (crime)"
"slept in a nude state in strange beds" strongly hinting gay sex
"returning" to his usual haunts after absence
"Baldoyle night" ie the night of the same day
"repeated the words... spoke of the matter... was overheard to repeat the words... he repeated the tale more than once" words → matter → tale
"repeated" (so TT was troubled by the tale somehow?)
talking in sleep is a very improbable way to share a "tale"
(what started as a guilty slip is being embroidered by Dublin gossips into a tragicomedy)
"drapery" was prominently mentioned in Dubliners: "It was an unassuming shop, registered under the vague name of Drapery. The drapery consisted mainly of children's bootees and umbrellas, and on ordinary days a notice used to hang in the window saying: Umbrellas Recovered."
in Ulysses, Simon's relative Peter Paul McSwiney might be called a (former) drapery executive
ballad monger → streetsinger ( → busker)
"illstarred" survives 1st-to-last
"doss" = bed (or laziness)
cf? VI.A Sisters "she tossed on the couch of separation and her eyes were blackened by the punch of sleeplessness"
"ways & means" old political cliche
"napper" = head (also a name, eg Napper Tandy)
FW2: "This Treacle Tom... had been absent from his usual wild and woolly haunts... for some time previous to that (he was, in fact, in the habit of frequenting common lodginghouses where he slept in a nude state... in strange men's cots) but on racenight... he... resnored... the substance of the tale... during uneasy slumber in their hearings of a small and stonybroke cashdraper's ex-executive, Peter Cloran (discharged), O'Mara, an ex-private secretary of no fixed abode... and Hosty (no slouch of a name), an illstarred beachbusker who... had been towhead tossing on his shakedown, devising ways and manners of means of... getting a hold of some chap's parabellum in the hope of taking a wing sociable and lighting upon a sidewheel dive... where he could throw true and go and blow the sibicidal napper off himself"
when day dawned that busker was up and afoot thrumming his square fiddle and after a visit to a public house the world was the richer for a new halfpenny ballad
VI.B3.106: "busker (beach & town)"
square fiddle
'the world is the richer' cliche
1904 ½ p ≈ 2014 25¢
FW2: "the bustling tweeny dawn-of-all-works... had not been many jiffies furbishing potlids... when... the rejuvenated busker... and his broadawake bedroom suite... were up and ashuffle... to the thrummings of a crewth fiddle... and, after... a prolonged visit to a house of call... the rhymers' world was with reason the richer for a wouldbe ballad"
This on a slip of blue paper headed by a woodcut soon fluttered to the rose of the winds
broadside ballad |
compass rose |
FW2: "This... on to a slip of blancovide and headed by an excessively rough and red woodcut... soon fluttered... to the rose of the winds"
from lane to lattice and from mouth to ear throughout the land of Ireland, and round the land his rann it ran and this is the rann that Hosty made:
lane/lattice = outside/inside? street/yard-house-window-fence
mouth/ear = outside/inside??
a "rann" is a very specific form of Irish poem
VI.B3.88: "rann" Fitzpatrick: Ireland and the Making of Britain 164: 'Crimthann... gained victories and extended his sway over Alba, Britain and Gaul, as the Shanachie tells us in the following rann: "Crimthann, son of Fidach, ruled The Alban and the Irish lands, Beyond the clear blue seas he quelled The British and the Gallic might"'
"Hosty" is a surname in Galway and Mayo
Latin hostis: stranger, enemy
he's been described as a ballad monger, streetsinger, or busker, which doesn't imply writing his own songs
FW2: "from green archway to gold lattice and from black hand to pink ear... through the five pussyfours of the united states of Scotia Picta...
And around the lann the rann it rann and this is the rann that Hosty made."
A cloud of witnesses indeed! Yet all of these are as much now no more as were they not yet or had they then not ever been.
Hebrews 12:1 'having so great a cloud of witnesses over our head'
U-14: "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."
Apocrypha: Sirach 44:9: 'And some there be, which have no memorial; who are perished, as though they had never been; and are become as though they had never been born'
FW2: "Therewith was released... a poisoning volume of cloud barrage indeed! Yet all they who heard or redelivered are now with that family... as much no more as be they not yet now or had they then notever been."
Of Hosty, quite a musical genius in a small way, the end is unknown. O'Donnell is said to have enlisted at the time of the Crimean war under the name of Buckley.
October 1853–February 1856
Buckley [bio]
FW2: "Of... poor Osti-Fosti, described as quite a musical genius in a small way... no one end is known... His husband, poor old A'Hara (Okaroff?)... accepted the (Zassnoch!) ardree's shilling at the conclusion of the Crimean War and... enlisted in Tyrone's horse... and soldiered a bit... under the assumed name of Blanco Fusilovna Bucklovitch"
Peter Cloran, at the suggestion of the Master in Lunacy, became an inmate of an asylum. Treacle Tom passed away painlessly in a state of nature propelled into the great beyond by footblows of his last bedfellows, 3 Norwegian sailors.
Thom's Directory of Ireland/Dublin: (of the lunacy department at Four Courts) 'Registrar in Lunacy... Chief Clerk in Lunacy'
VI.B25.149: "passed away ?to the Beyond by means of poison"
state of nature: in theology, natural moral state as opposed to state of grace
FW2: "Poor old dear Paul Horan... at the suggestion thrown out by the doomster in loquacity... was thrown into a Ridley's for inmates in the northern counties.. Sordid Sam... passed away painlessly... in the state of nature, propelled... into the unwished Beyond by footblows... of his last fishandblood bedscrappers, a Northwegian and his mate of the sheawolving class."
Shorty disappeared from the surface of the earth so completely as to lead one to suppose that his habitat had become the interior.
cf Kevin
FW2: "the decentest dozendest short of a frusker whoever stuck his spickle through his spoke, disappeared... from the sourface of this earth... so entirely spoorlessly... as to tickle the speculative to all but opine... that the hobo... had transtuled his funster's habitat to its finsterest interrimost."
Then was the reverend, the sodality director that fashionable vice preacher to whom society ladies often became so enthusiastically attached and was a nondescript who sometimes wore a raffle ticket in his hat & was openly guilty of malpractices with his tableknife the cad with a pipe encountered by HCE?
the Mad Hatter in Lewis Carroll: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is illustrated with a ticket (price tag) attached to his hat
"malpractices with his tableknife" bad tablemanners: holding it wrong, licking it, eating off it
if the cad was the reverend, his wife would have been redundant/ imaginary
FW2: "Again... was the reverend, the sodality director, that eupeptic viceflayer... to whose palpitating pulpit... sinning society sirens... fortunately became so enthusiastically attached and was an objectionable ass who very occasionally cockaded a raffles ticket on his hat... and was semiprivately convicted of malpractices with his hotwashed tableknife... that same snob of the dunhill... encountered by the General on that redletter morning or maynoon jovesday?"
It is a well authenticated fact that the average human face changes its shape with the passing of years.
Hence it is no easy matter to identify the individual with already an inclination to baldness who was asked by some boardschool children to tell them the story.
maybe the cad, maybe the reverend, maybe neither?
in his U-Circe hallucinations Bloom is described by Mulligan as "prematurely bald from selfabuse" in Eumeus, WB Murphy is described as "a trifle prone to baldness" (also Richie Goulding, the waiter Pat in Sirens, Lyster, Aristotle)
Clongowes was Joyce's only experience of boarding school
if they have to walk back to the school by dinnertime, they must be less than an hour away?
U25 "Tell us a story, sir. — Oh, do, sir. A ghoststory."
It was the Lord's day and the request was put to the party as he [sat smoking] {paused} for a smoke in his pastime of executing empty bottles.
"Lord's day" Sunday
smoking = cad with pipe
"executing" shooting, or throwing stones at
no hint where this took place
One sad circumstance the narrator mentioned which goes at once to the heart of things. He rose to his feet and told of it in
(he was breaking bottles, then sitting and smoking, now standing again)
In words a bit duskish he aptly described the scene, the monolith rising stark from the twilight pinebarren, the the bellwether, the fallow doe belling softly her approach and how brightly outed his wallet and gives him a topping cheroot and says he was to suck that one and spend a half hour in Havana.
"twilight" instead of noon
pine barren (North America only?) |
bellwether sheep |
fallow deer doe |
Havana had a reputation for gay prostitution as early as 1888
(HCE's encounter with the cad is escalating into his sin with the soldiers)
And says he: As sure as eggs is what they are in high quarters my business credit will stand as straight as that monument's fabrication before the hygienic globe of the Taskmaster's eye (and here the reverent sabbath and bottle breaker uncovered himself of his boater cordially inviting the adolescents whom he was wising up to do in like manner).
phrase 'as sure as eggs are eggs'
"high quarters" phrase
12" Hygienic (washable) Globe £1/12/6 (1920)
Milton: 'All is if I have grace to use it so As ever in my great taskmaster's eye.'
The scene was never forgotten for later in the same century one of that little band of factferreters, then an ex civil servant retired under the sixtyfive act, rehearsed it to a cousin of the late archdeacon Coppinger in a pullman of the transhibernian with one still sadder circumstance which is a heartskewer if ever was.
retire at age sixty-five
(so the adolescent from boarding school has grown up and retired, 50+ years, but still in the same century, so before 1850)
"Coppinger" is a good Catholic name but the Catholics hadn't had archdeacons since 1600 (Church of Ireland did)
1st appearance of motif: Archdeacon JFXP Coppinger [fweet-20]
Swift and Dodgson were deacons
('Archdeacon' is a common lastname in Cork; c1700 an Archdeacon even married a Coppinger)
VI.B6.64: "Return to Coppinger"
Trans-Siberian Railway
on train 50yrs later, factferreter and cousin
For when the archdeacon spoke of it by request all, hearing the cousin's description of that fellow-traveller's features could really imagine themselves as listening to the cockshy shooter's evensong evocation of the doomed liberator, his hand extended towards the monumental leadpencil which as the molyvdokondolin was to be his mausoleum while over his exculpatory features the ghost of a resignation unveiled a spectral appealingness similar in origin and effect to a beam of sunshine upon a coffinplate.
"archdeacon... cousin's" so the archdeacon hadn't died yet, and heard and repeated his cousin's version of the factferreter's 50-years-later memory of the cad's memory of HCE
Coppinger himself with requesters (no hint where)
cock shy
"evensong" eg Milton and Dryden, evening or evening prayers
Modern Greek molybdokondylon? supposedly lead pencil from mólubdos, “graphite”
+ condyle = knuckle?? κόνδυλος = tuber/knuckle/fist; kondylom (Swedish for genital wart)
+ mandolin?
Daniel O'Connell said Robert Peel's smile was like 'the silver plate on a coffin'
FW2: "For as often as the Archicadenus... spoke of it by request, all, hearing... the copycus's description of that fellowcommuter's play upon countenants, could simply imagine themselves... listening to the cockshyshooter's evensong evocation of the doomed but always ventriloquent Agitator... his manslayer's gunwielder protended towards that overgrown leadpencil which was soon, monomentally at least, to rise as Molyvdokondylon to, to be, to be his mausoleum... while ollover his exculpatory features... the ghost of resignation diffused a spectral appealingness... similar in origin and akkurat in effect to a beam of sunshine upon a coffinplate."