"Finn's Hotel"

by James Joyce *

[I now believe 5, 6, and 7 are one continuous piece]

I The Irish Chinchinjoss *

Bymby topside joss pidgin fella Luchru Berkeley, archdruid of Irish chinchinjoss, in the his heptachromatic sevenhued septicoloured roranyellgreeblindigan mantle finish he show along the his mister guest Patrick with alb the whose throat he fast all time what time all him Italyman monkfellas with Patrick he drink up words belongahim all too much illusiones of hueful panepiphanal world of lord Joss the of which zoantholithic furniture from mineral through vegetal to animal not appear to full up together fallen man than under but one photoreflection of the several iridals gradationes of solar light that one which that part of it (furnit of huepanepi world) had shown itself (part of fur of huepanwor) unable to absorbere whereas for numpa one seer in seventh degree of wisdom of Entis-Onton he savvy inside true inwardness of reality, tha Ding hvad in idself id ist, all damfool objects (of panepiwor) alloside showed themselves in trues coloribus resplendent with sextuple gloria of light actually retained inside them (goddam obs of epiwo). Patfella no catch all that preachybook belong Luchru Berkeley bymby topside joss pidgin fella Luchru Berkeley say him two time with other words verbigratia to vision so thoroughsighty for Os of E W High King Leary his fiery grassbelonghead all show colour of sorrel green, again of the his sixcolour costume the his fellow saffron pettikilt look same hue of boiled spinasses, other thing the his royal golden breast torc look justsamelike curlicabbis, moreafter verdant readyrainroof belongahim High King Leary very dead spit of plenty laurel leaves, afterthat commander bulopent eyes of Highest King same thing like thyme choppy upon parsley, alongside that enamel Indian gem in maledictive fingerfondler of High High Emperor all same like one fellow olive lentil, otherlongsidethat violaceous warwon contusiones of facebits of Highup Big Autocrat tinged uniformly allaroundside very like you see chowchow of plentymuch sennacassia.

II Kindness to Fishes * fdv

Shortly after having come into this vale of tears, the little stranger Kevineen delighted himself by sporting with the sponge on tubbing night. As a growing boy under the influence of holy religion instilled into him across his grandmother's old king Jones's knee he grew more and more pious like the time God knows when ejaculating for forty days indulgence and ten quarantines he sat down on the plate of mutton broth. He simply had no time for girls and things and often used he to say to his dearest mother and dear sisters as how his dearest mother and dear sisters were good enough for him. Of him we are further told that at the age of six he wrote a school prize essay on kindness to freshwater fish.

III A Tale of a Tub * fdv

Of Kevin, of Increate God the servant, of the Lord Creator a filial fearer, the miracles, death and life are these.

Procreated eugenically on the ultimate island of Ireland in the encyclical Irish polynesian archipelago, come their feast of precreated holy whiteclad angels, voluntarily poor Eugene Kevin, having been granted the privilege of a priest's postcreated portable altare cum balneo when espousing the one true cross, invented and exalted, in celibate matrimony, at matin chime arose and westfrom went and came in alb of cloth of gold to our own midmost Glendalough le Vert by archangelical guidance where amiddle of meeting waters of river Slaney and Liffey river on this one lone navigable lake piously Kevin, lauding the Triune Trishagion, amidships of his conducible miraculoid altar super bath rafted centripetally, diaconal servant of orders Hibernian, midway across the subject lake surface to its supreme epicentric lake isle, whereof its lake is the centrifugal principality, whereon by prime, powerful in knowledge, Kevin came to where its centre is among the circumfluent watercourses of Ishgagrania and Ishgadectera, an enisled lakelet islanding a lacustrine islet, whereupon with beached raft subdiaconal bath propter altar, with oil extremely anointed, accompanied by prayer, holy Kevin isolated bided till the third morn hour but to build a rubric penitential honeybeehivecashelhut in whose enclosure to live in fortitude, acolyte in heroicity of cardinal virtues, whereof the arenary floor most holy Kevin excavated as deep as to a depth of a seventh part of one full fathom, which excavated venerable Kevin anchorite, taking counsel, proceded towards the lakeside of the isletshore whereat seven several times he eastward genuflecting in entire obedience at sextnoon collected infusion of Gregorian water sevenfold and with Ambrosian eucharistic joy of heart as many times receded carrying the lustral domination contained within that most portable privileged altar unacumque bath which severally seven times into the cavity excavated, a lector of waterlevels, most venerable Kevin then effused, thereby letting there be water where was theretofore dry land by him so concreated who now, confirmed a strong perfect christian, blessed Kevin exorcised his holy sister water, perpetually chaste, so that well understanding she should fill to midheight his tubbath altar, which handbathtub most blessed Kevin ninthly enthroned in the interconcentric centre of the translated water whereamid, when violet vesper vailed, Saint Kevin Hydrophilus, having girded his sable cappa magna as high as to his cherubical loins, at solemn compline sat in his seat of wisdom, that hipbathtub whereverafter, recreated doctor insularis insulae continentis of the universal church, keeper of the door of meditation, memory extempore proposing and intellect formally considering, recluse, he, finally persevering, meditated continuously with seraphic ardour the primal sacrament of baptism or the regeneration of all man by affusion of water.

IV Issy and the Dragon * *

For her prudence she always left the key of her press in the lock of her press, the pen of the inkbottle in the neck of the ink bottle. Never were they lost.

For her learning in geog she knew that Italy was a jackboot, India a pink ham and France a patched quilt.

For her charm she knew how to stagemanage her legs in the several positions of goody twoshoes, aunty Nance, stepladder, green peas, love me little, funny toast, lovers' lever, love me long.

For her health only her in the house got the measles when she was a bottlefed babe.

For her piety Isolde's night prayer and orison so ran:
-- Howfar wartnevin alibithename Kingcome illbedone nerth tisnevin. Usisday daybread givesdressp sweegivethem dresspas gainstus leesnot tootntation liversm evil Men.

For her learning in zoog she knew lamb, lamb a young sheep.

For her domestic economy she cleaned the chimney flue by setting fire to an Irish Times and hooshing it blazing up the flue and she washed the hall by standing leaving her wet umbrella ?sweeping open in a corner.

For her pity there were times she even pitied the damned old devil himself playing demon patience after his lunch of hot air fanning himself with his asbestos slippers in the coolingroom in hell.

For her charity one day when it was sneezing cold she met a beggargirl in the park and, having no small change about her, she went behind a bramblebush, slipped off her sprigged petticoat and gave it to the beggargirl who instantly disappeared (she having been in point of fact Saint Dympna who got up the exhibition of poverty on purpose) along with the petticoat. On another occasion there was a pestilence caused by a certain dragon who said it would go on for ever unless she took off all her clothes and walked from Cape Clear to Mizzen Head. So she did this. And everybody pulled down all their blinds in Ireland. The dragon was then converted and entered a nunnery.

V The Big Kiss *

As slow their ship, the sea being slight, upon the face of waters moved by courtesy of God that handsome brineburnt sixfooter Gaelic, rugger and soccer champion and the dinkum belle of Lucalizod quite charming in her oceanblue brocade and an overdress of net darned with gold well in advance of the newest fashion exhibits bunnyhugged scrumptiously when it was dark whilst they dissimulated themself on the eighteen inch loveseat behind the chieftaness stewardess's cabin whilst also with sinister dexterity he alternately rightandlefthandled fore and aft, on and offside her palpable rugby and association bulbs. She, after a cough, murmurously then gave her firm order for tootsweet if he wouldn't please mind some though not too much of the six best national poetry quotations reflecting on the situation so long as it was a stroke or two above it's a fine night and yon moon shines bright and all to that, the plain fact of the matter being that being a natural born lover of nature in all her moods and senses, by the light of the moon, of the silvery moon she longed to spoon before her honeyoldmoon at the same time drinking in long draughts of purest air serene and revelling in the great outdoors. That mouth of mandibles vowed to pure beauty promptly elocutionised to her a favourite lyrical bloom bellclear in iambic decasyllabic hexameter:

-- Rollon thoudeep andamp anddark blueo ceanroll!

Lady, it was just too gorgeous for words, the whole sensation. The sea, of a lovely tint embellished by the best charms of nature, with its wellmannered wavelets (the dirty horrid rude ones from the Belfast and Lagan Lough neighbourhood being very properly locked up in cubbyhole) looked really awfully pretty at the mid hour of night and more especially he being emphatically the right man in the right place, the weather conditions could not possibly have been improved upon. Praises be to fair sea. Her rôle was to roll onthedark blueo ceanroll that rolled on round the round roll that Robert Roly rolled round. Breathtaking beauty, Ireland's bonniest, she did but gaze while from his altitude of onehundredandthirtytwo lines his deepseapeepers gazed O gazed O dazedcrazedgazed into her darkblue rolling ocean orbs.

-- Thanks ever so much she sighed, thrilled by that olive throb of his nude neck, and ever so much again for that tiny quote. It sort of made everything ever so much more delightful. How perfectly sweet of you!

Nothing if not amorous, he, rosecrumpler, thrilldriver, sighinspirer, having prealably dephlegmatised his guttur of that ticklish frog in the throat, his useful arm getting busy on the touchline due south of her western shoulder, uttered what was to follow with grand passion from his toploftical voicebox:

-- Isolde!

By elevation of eyelids t'ward her dear coolun that She invoked insinuated desideration of more declaration.

He was instant and he declared:

-- Isolde! O Isolde! Sister soul and hand! When theeuponthus Sir Tristan binoculises his most unwitting ego most subconsciously senses the deprofundity of multimathematical immaterialities whereby in the pancosmic urge the allimmanence of That Which Itself is Itself Alone exteriorates on this here our plane in disunited solid, liquid and gaseous bodies in pearlwhite passionpanting intuitions of reunited selfhood in the higherdimensional selfless Allself.

Hear, O hear, all ye caller herring! Silent be, O Moyle! Milky Way, strew dim light!

Right here a pretty thing happened. When her flattering hand of pure diversion mayhap had jessaminely at the just right moment shut his duckhouse the vivid girl, deaf with love, (you know her, that angel being, one of passion's fadeless wonderwomen! You dote on her! You love her to death!) with a queer little cry reunited milkymouthily his her then their disunited lips when, tonguetasting the golden opportunity of a lifetime, quick as greased pigskin the Armorican champion with one virile tonguethrust drove the advance messenger of love flash past the double line of eburnean forwards rightjingbangshot into the goal of her gullet.

Now, I am just putting it direct to you as one manowoman to another, what the blankety blank diggings do you for example candidly suppose that she, a strapping young modern old ancient Irish princess a good eighteen hands high and scaling nine stone twelve paddock weight in her madapolam smock with nothing under her hat but red hair and solid ivory not forgetting a firstrate pair of bedroom eyes of most unholy hazel cared at that precise psychoanalytical moment about tiresome old King Mark that tiresome old milkless ram with his duty peck and his bronchial tubes, the tiresome old ourangoutan beaver in his tiresome old twentytwoandsixpenny shepherd's plaid trousers? Not as much as a pinch of henshit and that's the meanest thing now was ever known since Adam was in the boy's navy. No, heaven knows, far from it, if the unvarnished truth must be told at the very first blush lovingly she lovegulped her American's pulpous propeller and both together in the most fashionable weather they all went off a lulliloving a dither me die me dandy O after which, believing in safety first, before the regulation ten seconds were up volatile Brittany considerately allowed his farfamed sparking plug chokegrip to relax and precautiously withdrew the instrument of rational speech from the procathedral of amorous seductiveness.

-- I'm right glad I ran on to you, Tris, you fascinator you! Miss Erin said, when she had won free, laughing at the same time delightfully in dimpling bliss, being awfully bucked by her gratifying experience of the love embrace from a highly continental bigtimer the like of him possessed of a handsome face well worth watching with an interesting tallow complexion from which great things very expected as a film star for she fully realised that he was evidently a notoriety in the poetry department as well for he never saw her to drink an orange but he offered to bring her a porringer and to cut a long story short taking him by and large the onliest boy of her choice meant pretty well everything to her just then, her beau ideal of a true girl's friend with red blood in his veins neither big ugly nor small nice.

Over them the winged ones screamed shrill glee: seahawk, seagull, curlew and plover, kestrel and capercailzie. All the birds of the sea they trolled out rightbold when they smacked the big kuss of Trustan with Usolde.

So sang seaswans:

-- Three quarks for Muster Mark
Sure he hasn't got much of a bark
And sure any he has it's all beside the mark
But O Wreneagle Highflighty wouldn't un be a sky of a lark
To see that old buzzard whooping about for uns shirt in the dark
And un hunting round for uns speckled trousers around by Palmerston Park.
Hohohoho moulty Mark
You're the rummest old rooster ever flopped out of a Noah's ark
And you think you're cock of the wark.
Fowls, up! Tristy's the spry young spark
That'll tread her and wed her and bed her and red her
Without even winking the tail of a feather
And that's how that chap's going to make his money and mark!

VI The Staves of Memory *

So there they were listening in as hard as they could all four of them they were the big four the four waves of Erin all listening four there was old ?wran Gregory and then besides old Tom there was old Phelim O' Hogan the four waves and oftentimes they used to be saying here now we are the four of us old Tom and Old Phelim and old Jeremy the four of us and sure thank God there are no more of us and old Jeff O'Gorman the four of us and no more of us and so now pass the fish for the Lord's sake amen the way they used to be saying grace before fish for auld lang syne there they were spraining their ears listening and listening to all the kissening with their eyes glistening all the four when he was cuddling his colleen not the cullen no the colleen bawn cuddling her and kissing her with his pogue like Arrah na pogue they all four used to be cuddling and kissing and listening in the good days Dion Boucicault of Arrah na Pogue when they were all four collegians in the queen's colleges it brought it all back again as fresh as ever Matt and Marcus and now there he was and his Arrah na Pogue before the four of them and now thank God there were no more of them and he poguing and poguing they were listening with their mouths watering so pass the pogue for Christ sake Amen listening and watering all the four Luke and Johnny MacDougall for anything at all for a cup of of kindness yet for four big tumblers of woman squash with them all four listening and spraining their ears and their mouths making water

Ah well sure that s the way and there was poor Matt Gregory leaning on his staff of memory and Gregory and the others and now really and truly they were four dear old heladies and they looked so nice and respectable with their grey half tall hat and tailormade frock coat and then they had their fathom glasses to find out the fathoms and their tall hats just now like lord Powerscourt or the auctioneer there near the place near that street Trinity College that arranges all the auctions of valuable houses Smith like the auctioneer Smith or not Smith that sells all the fine houses and mansions James H North Mike North the auctioneer going to the horse show with all the people over from England and American visitors in his grey half tall hat and his fathom glasses to find out all the horses. And poor Marcus Lyons and poor Johnny and the four of us and there they were now listening the four saltwater widowers and all they could remember long long ago when my heart knew no care the landing of sir Arthur Casement in 1132 and the coronation of Brian by the bishop and then there was the drowning of Pharaoh and they were drowned in the sea the red sea and then poor Martin Cunningham out of the castle when he was drowned off Dunleary in the red sea and and then there was the Flemish Armada all scattered and all drowned off the coast of Cunningham and Saint Patrick and all they remembered and then there was the French fleet in 1132 landing under general Boche and there he was cuddling and poguing her in Arranapogue behind the queen's colleges. And then they used to give the lectures in Roman history in all the four collegians in the four trinity colleges Killorcure and Killthemall and Killeachother and Kilkelly-on-the-Flure those were the four great history colleges for auld lang syne all the Roman history past and present and present and absent and past and present and future arma virumque romano. Ah dearo a dear how it all came back to them to hear him there kissing her and cuddling her in his Roman arms ah dearo dear it was so sorry for the four of us Tim Tom Tarpey and the four shehusbands the four waves in their hat and thank God they were all summarily divorced by their shehusbands in the bygone days but still they parted on the best of terms by decree absolute well they could remember Justice Squelchman in 1132 at the Married Male Offenders' Court in Arrahnapogue. Poor Johnny MacDougall and the four masters because she was backscratching all divorced by their four master and poor Marcus Powerscourt by decree absolute because he broke wind in the pew and because he forgot to make a request in writing on stamped paper before saying his grace before fish and then there was poor Dion Boucicault all divorced too poor Dion because he attempted to well he ah well now sure we won't be too hard on him attempted some hunnish familiarities after eating a bad crab in the red sea ah dearo dearo dear and where do you leave Matt poor Matt in his grey frock hat all divorced by woman squelch and all on account the appearance of his face poor Matt Gregory. of his mouth watering so now pass the face for Christ' sake Amen. Poor Matt Gregory

Poor Martin Cunningham! And still and all they were always thinking of their four masters that were four beautiful sisters and there they were always counting the lovely periwinkle buttons in the front part of their dresses and there she was the beautiful four sisters and that was her name and they were looking for her everywhere in all the fathoms and then they had their night tentacles and they used to be all hanging around all the waists of the ships the steamships and peering in through the steaming windows into the honeymoon cabins on board the big steamers and saloon ladies toilet apartments and rubbing off the cataract off the windows to see all the honeymooners and all the toilet ladies and their familiarities saying their grace before meals and watering and there they used to be counting all their peributtons to remember her beautiful name poor Gregory and Johnny the four sisters and there she was now asthore as in days of yore of planxty Gregory they used to be always singing and so now they started their singing and old Luke for auld luke syne and we make a cupboard coinerset for the pays savole shanghai..

Hear, Isolde la belle! Tristan, sad hero, hear! *

Anno Domini nostri sancti Jesu Christi
Nine hundred and ninetynine pound sterling in the black bowels of the bank of Ulster.
Braw pennies and good gold pounds, by God, my girleen, 'll prank thee finely
And no damn lout 'll come courting thee or, by the Holy Ghost, there'll be murder!

O come all ye sweet nymphs of Dingle beach to cheer Brinabride from Sybil a - riding
In her curragh of shells of daughter-of-pearl and her silverymoonblue mantle round her!
Crown of the waters, brine on her brow, she'll dance them a jig and jilt them fairly.
Yerra, why would she ride with Sir Sloomysides or the gogram grey barnacle gander?

You'll not be lonesome, Lizzy my love, when your yank is the worst for his steel and his soldiering
Nor wake in winter, widow machree, for you'll have my old Balbriggan surtout.
Wisha, won't you agree now to take me for nothing at all as your own nursetender?
A power of fine fellows died game right enough. But who lives for you?

I had that one long before anyone in this place.
It was of a good Friday too and as I'm given now to understand, she was clean mad gone on me.
Grand goosegreasing we had entirely with an eiderdown picnic to follow
'By the cross of Christ, Mac Dougall' says she after 'but you're the most likable lad that's come my ways yet from the barony of Bohermore'.

Isolde, her longfamous lashes butterflykissing his near and farfamous cheek, felt him sweeter than cherry or plum, than candy kisses or Lipton's fruitcake, than the hawthorn valley in the first fortnight of May, than the finest band music going than lovely thick with the sleep. She murmured googooeyes:

-- My precious since last we parted it seems to me that I have been continually in your company, even when I close my eyes at night. I am continually seeing you, hearing you, meeting you in different places so that I am beginning to wonder whether my soul does not take leave of my body in sleep and go to seek you and what is more find you or perchance this is only a phantasy. Tell me Daniel, my precious darling.

He, her whitehaired doughboy, hero of tens of serums, carrier of the ovum, Kisser of hundreds, blocker of thousands, ejaculator of jugfuls, ?loudly ??sniggled, his nasal voice falling in strange ineffectual dropkick, so; in the language of diplomacy

Mais pourquoi es-tu andrée dans ma ?fie, Henritte S, je ?croyais mon âme déjà morte

VII Skyward to Stardom * *

...She lifted her head, her eyes supremely satisfied. For now she rather gathered from his persiflage that he was a loveslave for life [and] she knew full well that she was the one and not that mousy mop ?Katiagnes O Halloran [with the] golliwog curls.

He, the gentleman was, sadvisaged. First he was rather liable to piles procured by sitting on stone walls where he contracted a stubborn cough while revelling in their beauty of feature and over and above that by medical advice of Dr Codd he had been lowering daily potions of extract of willow bark to keep off the Hibernian flu. With feverish pallor he beheld the holy ghosts of his undergradual loves, Henriette atop of the haycock, Nenette de l'Abbaye behind the taproom dor, Marie Louise all fun and fleas, tipsy Suzanne catch as catch can, and last but not least the rawboned housekeeper of the local parish priest ?Ghupthly, he pastloveyed her with a blackedged expression.

-- Smiling Johnny, pleaded she gynelexically, do you care for me just a little?

Offsong and partially selfstrangled tried to reply he:

-- Lady, I am not worthy. You little know. Why were we born in two different places? Wherefore have we met yesterday so to speak? Why this strangulation, this yearning for a bonum arduum as distinguished from a bonum simpliciter? Will you accept a portion of my divided heart? Well away, alas, for death in, with, for and on account of my well beloved I mutely yearn.

-- O, can that sobstuff! My own loverman must not talk like that, answered the bold puss impatiently after her waiting patiently all through the damned old dinner of burnt loinchops and ignoble potatoes with everybody talking from soup to nuts about loinchops and potatoes and the pig's arse and cabbage the day before and the silversides boiled cowbeef of the day before that again with purpletop swedes and equally ignoble potatoes without a morsel of appetite.

Love she wanted the obtainable, true new blind bottomless staggerhumanity love at first sight for which reason she again kissed him and he, being an inborn gentleman, counterkissed because it was his one maxim in this life that if a lady, for example, wanted a bite of a piece of Stilton cheese and he happened, for argument' sake, to have a quarter of a pound or so of Stilton cheese in his pocket why he'd just simply put his hand in his pocket, don't you know, and well he'd just give her the cheese, don't you see, to take a bite off. However first and foremost, before testing her triangle to prove whether she was as the newspapers reported a wife intacta, he asked her whether she had ever indulged in clandestine fornication.

-- No, Nein, Never, she sang. By the axecleft of my notch! By the hair of my dearest parents! By the inviolable devil of Ben Bulben! By the fresh water ?pullan ?heavy

Her mournful embracer pointed to the starry host. By them he bade her swear, them that were and are and shall be, the silently strewing, the strikingly shining, the twittingly twinkling and as he uranographically remarked the lamplights of lovers in the Beyond.

Up they gazed skyward to stardom while in his girleen's ear that loveless lover sinless sinner breathed

-- How gentlemanlike am I, Issy. I never hurt the feelings of another?

-- And, ?Tris, what a sweet nature is mine, is not it?

It wasn't exactly anything he said or it wasn't anything he actually did but all the same it was something about him like the way he was always sticking his finger into his trousers pocket and then sticking it into his eye like a borny baby, the great big slob or the once she dropped her ittly ittly hankyfuss and the way so graceful he picked it up with his near hoof and footed it up so politefully to her ittly ittly nibblenose. She was tearing.

-- Go away instantly, she roared, you scum!

-- Perfect, he said, you bloody bitch.

He took French leave of her and circulated as bidden. Before many instants had passed she let out a whistle. Hearing his name called most sagaciously he ceased to walk about and turned on her, his look now charged with purpose seemed to say.

-- Curse your stinking putrid soul to hell, you thing, and all belonged to you

-- No, come back, she ?ogled. Forget me not. I do so want you!

-- It is perfect, her all but nephew said.

Having ?already stopped he turned and circulated in reverse direction and presently halted vis a vis his soon to be aunt who welcomed him as she said:

-- How nobly you have responded to our call, loyal one.

VIII The House of a Hundred Bottles *

So anyhow after that to wind up that long to be chronicled get together day, the anniversary of his first holy communion, after that same barbecue beanfeast was all over poor old hospitable King Roderick O'Conor, the paramount chief polemarch and last preelectric king of all Ireland who was anything you say yourself between fiftyfour and fiftyfive years of age at the time after the socalled last free supper he greatly gave in his umbrageous house of the hundred bottles or at least he wasn't actually the then last king of all Ireland for the time being for the jolly good reason that he was still such as he was the eminent king of all Ireland himself after the last preeminent king of all Ireland, the whilom joky old top that went before him in the dienasty King Art MacMurrough Kavanagh of the leather leggings, now of parts unknown, God guard his generous soul that put a poached fowl in the poor man's pot before he took to his pallyass with the weeping eczema for better and worse until he went and died nevertheless the year the sugar was scarce and himself down to three cows that was meat and drink and dogs and washing to him 'tis good cause we have to remember it anyhow wait till I tell you what did he do poor old Roderick O'Conor Rex the auspicious waterproof monarch of all Ireland when he found himself all alone by himself in his grand old historic pile after all of them had all gone off with themselves as best they could on footback in extended order a tree's length from the longest way out down the switchbackward road, the unimportant Parthalonians with the mouldy Firbolgs and the Tuatha de Danaan googs and all the rest of the notmuchers that he didn't care the royal spit out of his ostensible mouth about well what do you think he did, sir, but faix he just went heeltapping through the winespilth and weevily popcorks that were kneedeep round his own right royal round rollicking topers' table with his old Roderick Random pullon hat at a cant on him, the body, you'd pity him, the way the world is, poor he, the heart of Midleinster and the supereminent lord of them all, overwhelmed as he was with black ruin like a sponge out of water and singing all to himself through his old tears starkened by the most regal belches I've a terrible errible lot todo today todo toderribleday well what did he go and do at all His Most Exuberant Majesty King Roderick O'Conor but arrah bedamnbut he finalised by lowering his woolly throat with the wonderful midnight thirst was on him as keen as mustard and leave it if he didn't suck up sure enough like a Trojan in some particular cases with the assistance of his venerated tongue whatever surplus rotgut sorra much was left by the lazy lousers of maltknights and beerchurls in the different bottoms of the various different replenquished drinking utensils left there behind them on the premises, by the departed honourable homegoers and other slygrogging suburbanites such as it was no matter whether it was chateaubottled Guinness's or Phoenix brewery stout it was or John Jameson and Sons or Roob Coccola or for the matter of that O'Connell's famous old Dublin ale that he wanted like hell as a fallback of several different quantities and qualities amounting in all to I should say considerably more than the better part of a gill or naggin of imperial dry or liquid measure.

IX Here Comes Everybody *

Now, concerning the genesis of Harold or Humphrey Chimpden's occupational agnomen and discarding once for all those theories from older sources which would link him back with such pivotal ancestors as the Glues, the Gravys, the Northeasts, the Ankers and the Earwickers of Sidlesham in the hundred of manhood or proclaim him a descendant of vikings who had founded or settled in Herrick or Eric the best authenticated version has it that it was this way. We are told how in the beginning it came to pass that, like cabbaging Cincinnatus, the grand old gardener was saving daylight one sultry sabbath afternoon in prefall paradise peace by following his plough for rootles in the rere garden of ye olde marine hotel when royalty was announced by runner to have been pleased to have halted itself on the highroad along which a leisureloving dogfox had cast followed, also at walking pace, by a lady pack of cocker spaniels. Forgetful of all save his vassal's plain fealty to the ethnarch Humphrey or Harold stayed not to yoke or saddle but stumbled out hotface as he was (his sweatful bandanna loose from his pocketcoat) hasting to the forecourts of his public in topee, surcingle, plus fours and bulldog boots ruddled with red marl, jingling his turnpike keys and bearing aloft amid the fixed pikes of the hunting party a high perch atop of which a flowerpot was fixed earthside up with care. On his majesty, who was, or often feigned to be, noticeably longsighted from green youth, and had been meaning to inquire what, in effect, had caused yon causeway to be so potholed, asking, substitutionally, to be put wise as to whether paternoster and silver doctors were not now more fancied bait for lobstertrapping honest blunt Haromphreyld answered in no uncertain tones very similarly with a fearless forehead: Naw, yer maggers, aw war jist a cotchin on thon bluggy earwuggers. Our Sailor King, who was draining a gugglet of obvious water, upon this, ceasing to swallow, smiled most heartily beneath his walrus moustaches and indulging that none too genial humour which William the Conk on the spindle side had inherited with the hereditary whitelock and some shortfingeredness from his great aunt Sophy, turned towards two of his retinue of gallowglasses, Michael, etheling lord of Leix in Offaly and the jubilee mayor of Drogheda, Elcock, (the two scatterguns being Michael Manning, protosyndic of Waterford and an Italian excellency named Giubilei according to a later version cited by the learned scholarch Canavan of Canmakenoise) and remarked dilsydulsily: Holybones, how our red brother of Pouringrainia would audibly fume did he know that we have for trusty bailiwick a turnpiker who is by turns a pikebailer no seldomer than an earwigger! Comes the question are these the facts as recorded in both or either of the collateral andrewpomurphyc narratives. We shall perhaps not so soon see. The great fact emerges that after that historic date all holographs so far exhumed initialled by Haromphrey bear the sigla H.C.E. and while he was only and long and always good dook Umphrey for the hungerlean spalpeens of Lucalizod and Chimbers to his cronies it was equally certainly a pleasant turn of the populace which gave him as sense of those normative letters the nickname Here Comes Everybody. An imposing everybody he always indeed looked, constantly the same as himself and magnificently well worthy of any and all such universalisation, every time he continually surveyed from good start to happy finish the truly catholic assemblage gathered together from all quarters unanimously to applaud Mr. W.W. Semperkelly's immergreen tourers in the problem passion play of the millentury a Royal Divorce with ambitious interval band selections from the Bo Girl and The Lily on all gala command nights from his viceregal booth where, a veritable Napoleon the Fourth, this father of the people all of the time sat having the entirety of his house about him with the invariable broadstretched kerchief cooling his whole neck, nape and shoulderblades and in a wardrobepanelled tuxedo completely thrown back from a shirt well entitled a swallowall, on every point far outstarching the laundered clawhammers and marbletopped highboys of the pit stalls and early amphitheatre. A baser meaning has been read into these characters the literal sense of which decency can safely scarcely hint. It has been blurtingly bruited by certain wisecracks that he suffered from a vile disease. To such a suggestion the one selfrespecting answer is to affirm that there are certain statements which ought not to be, and one should like to be able to add, ought not to be allowed to be made. Nor have his detractors, who, an imperfectly warmblooded race, apparently conceive him as a great white catterpillar capable of any and every enormity in the calendar recorded to the discredit of the Juke and Kellikek families, mended their case by insinuating that, alternatively, he lay at one time under the ludicrous imputation of annoying Welsh fusiliers in the people's park. To anyone who knew and loved the Christlikeness of the big cleanminded giant H.C. Earwicker throughout his long existence the mere suggestion of him as a lustsleuth nosing for trouble in a boobytrap rings particularly preposterous. Truth compels one to add that there is said to have once been some case of the kind implicating, it is sometimes believed, a quidam about that time walking around Dublin with a bad record who has remained completely anonymous but was, it is stated, posted at Mallon's at the instance of watch warriors of the vigilance committee, and years afterwards, writes one, seemingly dropped dead whilst waiting for a chop somewhere near Hawkins street. Slander, let it lie its flattest, has never been able to convict that good and great and no ordinary Southron Earwicker, as a pious author calls him, of any graver impropriety than that, advanced by some woodward or regarder who did not dare deny that he had that day consumed the soul of the corn, of having behaved in an ungentlemanly manner opposite a pair of dainty maidservants in the greenth of the rushy hollow, whither, or so the two gown and pinners pleaded, dame nature in all innocency had spontaneously and about the same hour of the eventide sent them both but whose published combinations of testimonies are, where not dubiously pure, visibly divergent on minor points touching the intimate nature of this, a first offence in vert or venison which was admittedly an incautious but, at its widest, a partial exposure with such attenuating circumstances as an abnormal Saint Martin's summer and a ripe occasion to provoke it.

X Here's Lettering You *

Revered

Majesty well Ive heard all those muckbirds what they are bringing up about him and they will come to no good. The Honourable Mr Earwicker, my devout husband, and he is a true gentleman who changes his two shirts a day which is what none of the sneakers ever will be because as sings the royal poet their likes must be first born like he was, my devout, and it was between Williamstown and the Ailesbury road I first saw the lovelight in your eyes like a pair of candles on the top of the longcar I think he is looking at me yet as if he would pass away in a cloud when he woke up all of a sweat beside me and told me his true opinion to pardon him golden one, but he dreamt about me I had got a lovely face that day and I simply thought I was back again in paradise lost when all the world was June, love, where us two walked hand in hand.

Well, revered majesty, I hereafter swear never in his life did my husband send out the swags with a drop of anything in them but milk as it came from the natural cow and that is all a pure makeup by a snake in the grass and his name is McGrath Brothers against that dear man, my honorary husband. If I was to let out to your revered all that caffler whispered to me was it this time last year as I told Mrs Pat for his accomodation McGrath Brothers I'm saying and his bacon not fit to look at never mind butter which is strictly forbidden by the ten commandments thou shalt not unbare your false witness against thy neighbour's wife. Aha, McGrath, the lies is out on him like freckles. But I could read him. When I think what that slime had the shame to suggest about my dearly respected husband can I ever forget that? Never! So may the Lord forget McGrath Brothers for all his trespasses against the Honorary Mr Earwicker. For two straws, yes and less, I could let out to someone I know and they would make a corpse of him with the greatest of pleasure by private shooting and not leave enough of McGrath Brothers for the peelers to pick up.

Lies! There never was any girl in my house expecting trouble off my esteemed husband never! Those pair of prostitutes that committed all the nuisance, neither of them were virtuous, pursuant to said declaration of their medical officer out of the Lock whereas I shall bring under revered notice the above Honourable Earwicker to possess from a child a chest seemed to none very hairy with eyebrows of same for it to be able to be seen which I am the most privileged to behold and pursuant to same very affectionate after salesladies' company. I will not have a wriggling reptile the like of the McGraths to be sprinkling his lies all around where we live if he thinks he is the big noise here about the prostitutes as I simply agree to it. There, you wurrum, you! I know you now. I would hate to have to say what I think about him. I exgust sneak McGrath, purveyors and Italian warehouseman by royal appointment, wanting to live on me and my noblest husband like a dirty pair of parachutes. I wouldn't dream of a sausage of his to poison a cat and it was in all the Sunday papers about Earwicker's farfamed fatspitters that they were eaten and appreciated by over fifteen thousands of people in Dublin this weekend. The obnoxious liar! First he was a Scotchman at one time and then he was fired out of Clunne's where he was only one of your common floorwalkers for giving guff.

Moreover I have heard a certain remark stated about setting his bad example before those military but did space permit it is the best of my belief I could show that it was from the earliest wish of his mind to mitigate the King's evil and I hereinafter swear by your revered majesty that it was him gave me the price of my new bulletproof dress with the angel sleeves for my looking about twentyone and he said to my presence in these words : Just as there is a God of all, Livvy, my mind is a complete blank.

Well, revered, I tender your heartbroken thanks with regrets for lettering you and will now close, hoping you are in the best. I don't care a fig for such and erronymous letter about an experience on the part of me as girl, alleged unpleasant, with a handsome prepossessing clerical friend. How about it! I was young and easy then and my shape admired from the first to feast his eyes on with my sweet auburn hair hanging to my innocent thighs and I can do just as I simply please with them because now it's my own by married women's impropery act. Never mind poor Father Michael now (the Lord reward him!) but chat me instead. If McGrathBrothers could only handle virgins like he used he would simply jump out of his dirty skin. When next you see M.G. ask him what about his wife, Lily Kinsella who became the wife of Mr Sneak, with the kissing solicitor, at present engaging attention by private detectives being hidden under the grand piano to find out whether nothing beyond kissing goes on. Lily is a lady, liliburlero bullenalaw! And she had a certain medicine brought her in a licensed victualler's bottle. Shame! Thrice shame! I only wish he would look in through his letterbox one day and he would not say that that was a solicitor's business. What ho, she bumps! My, he would be so surprised to see his old girl in the hands of a solicitor with Mr Brophy, solicitor, quite affectionate together, kissing and looking into a mirror.

So much for sneakery talk that I was treated not very grand by the thicks off Bully's Acre. If any of Sully's thicks was to pull a gun on me he will know better manners the way I'll sully him. I will herewith lodge my complaint on him to police sergeant Laracy who does be on the corner of Buttermilk Lane with the Rafferty's nurse and he will take such steps so as to have his head well and lawfully broken in consequence by a Norwegian who has been expelled from christianity.

Dear Majesty, I hope you are quite well. How are ye all? We are always talking of all of ye in bed. I am anxious myself about ye all. I'm feeling the cold more than I used and has to wear flannels to the skin. To speak truth I was rather put out latterly in my health about the thugs got up for McGrath by Sully. I am advised the waxy is at the present in hospital with palpitations from all he drunk and it's seldom I saw him any other way. That he may never come out but he is a rattling fine bootmaker in his profession. And now whereas I will let all whom it may concern to know that I am perfectly proud of this great civilian, A.L.P. Earwicker, long life to him my once handsome husband who is as gentle as a mushroom to be seen from my improved looks and a greatly attractable when he always sits fornenst me, poor ass, for his wet to resume our polite conversations with Earwicker over lawful business and pleasures when he is after a good few mugs of four ale and shag and he never chained me to a chair or followed me about with a fork on Thanksgiving Day ever since this native island was born and that is why all the police and everybody is all bowing around to me whenever I go out in all directions. Earwicker is a hundred percent human, I tell slysneakers and you, Master McGrath, pale bellies our mild cure, back and streaky, ninepence. I can hereby show whoever likes original bag of one apiece cakes and Adam Findlater's choice figrolls which was given to me when so fondly remembered on occasion of our last golden wedding by Mr Earwicker. Thank you, beloved, for your beautiful parcel. Always the born gentleman can be plainly seen by all from such behaviour.

Well I simply like their damn cheek for them to go and say about he being as bothered as he possible could. I must beg to contradict in the strongest as indeed I think I may add at this stage in the matter of hearing that he is after his manner and certified of so being quite agreeable deef. I'd give him his answer if he was to dare to say my revered husband was never a true widower in the eyes of the law on consideration of his diseased obsolete inasmuch as the present Mr Earwicker Esquire has often given said deponent full particulars answering to description of the late diseased in dear delightful twilit hours when this truly timehonoured man is a great warrant to play slapsam and population peg and Sally Shortclothes when he can proudly hold his own always whilst we frankly enjoyed more than anything the secret workings of nature (thank heaven for it, I humbly pray!) and was really so delighted of the nice time. Who would stoop to argue with a particularly mean stinker called McGrath Brothers. If I am credibly informed cannonballs is the only true argument with a low sneak. Ping! Ping! Hit him again! Ping! That ought to make him hop it. Ha! Ha! Ha! I must simply laugh. Sneak McGrath has stuffed his last black pudding. 3.p.m. Wednesday. Grand funeral by torchlight of McGrath Brothers. Don't forget. His funeral will now shortly take place. Remains must be removed before 3 sharp. R.I.P.

Well, revered majesty, I take this liberty of cherishing expectations that the clouds will soon dissipate looking forward to the fine day we had and will now conclude above epistle with best thanks and my thousand blessings for your great kindest and all the trouble to took for self and dearest of husbands who I'll be true to you unto life's end as long as he has a barrel full of Bass with love to Majes and all at home in the earnest hopes you will soon enjoy perusal of same most completely.

So help me witness to this day to my hand and mark from your revered Majesty's most duteous I remain

Your affectionate
Dame Anna Livia Plurabelle Earwicker
(Only lawful wife of A.L.P. Earwicker)

N.B. This simply puts the tin hat on M.G.