No More Learning

Refuse christian burial. They used to drive
a stake of wood through his heart in the grave. As if it wasn't broken
already. Yet sometimes they repent too late. Found in the riverbed
clutching rushes. He looked at me. And that awful drunkard of a wife
of his. Setting up house for her time after time and then pawning the
furniture on him every Saturday almost. Leading him the life of the
damned. Wear the heart out of a stone, that. Monday morning. Start
afresh. Shoulder to the wheel. Lord, she must have looked a sight
that night Dedalus told me he was in there. Drunk about the place and
capering with Martin's umbrella.

_And they call me the jewel of Asia,
Of Asia,
The Geisha. _

He looked away from me. He knows. Rattle his bones.

That afternoon of the inquest. The redlabelled bottle on the table. The
room in the hotel with hunting pictures. Stuffy it was. Sunlight through
the slats of the Venetian blind. The coroner's sunlit ears, big and
hairy. Boots giving evidence. Thought he was asleep first. Then saw like
yellow streaks on his face. Had slipped down to the foot of the bed.
Verdict: overdose. Death by misadventure. The letter. For my son
Leopold.

No more pain. Wake no more. Nobody owns.

The carriage rattled swiftly along Blessington street. Over the stones.

--We are going the pace, I think, Martin Cunningham said.

--God grant he doesn't upset us on the road, Mr Power said.

--I hope not, Martin Cunningham said. That will be a great race tomorrow
in Germany. The Gordon Bennett.

--Yes, by Jove, Mr Dedalus said. That will be worth seeing, faith.

As they turned into Berkeley street a streetorgan near the Basin sent
over and after them a rollicking rattling song of the halls. Has anybody
here seen Kelly? Kay ee double ell wy. Dead March from _Saul. _ He's
as bad as old Antonio. He left me on my ownio. Pirouette! The _Mater
Misericordiae_. Eccles street. My house down there. Big place. Ward for
incurables there. Very encouraging. Our Lady's Hospice for the dying.
Deadhouse handy underneath. Where old Mrs Riordan died. They look
terrible the women. Her feeding cup and rubbing her mouth with the
spoon. Then the screen round her bed for her to die. Nice young student
that was dressed that bite the bee gave me. He's gone over to the
lying-in hospital they told me. From one extreme to the other. The
carriage galloped round a corner: stopped.

--What's wrong now?

A divided drove of branded cattle passed the windows, lowing, slouching
by on padded hoofs, whisking their tails slowly on their clotted bony
croups. Outside them and through them ran raddled sheep bleating their
fear.

--Emigrants, Mr Power said.

--Huuuh! the drover's voice cried, his switch sounding on their flanks.

Huuuh! out of that!

Thursday, of course. Tomorrow is killing day. Springers. Cuffe sold them
about twentyseven quid each. For Liverpool probably. Roastbeef for old
England. They buy up all the juicy ones. And then the fifth quarter
lost: all that raw stuff, hide, hair, horns. Comes to a big thing in a
year. Dead meat trade. Byproducts of the slaughterhouses for tanneries,
soap, margarine. Wonder if that dodge works now getting dicky meat off
the train at Clonsilla.

The carriage moved on through the drove.

--I can't make out why the corporation doesn't run a tramline from the
parkgate to the quays, Mr Bloom said. All those animals could be taken
in trucks down to the boats.

--Instead of blocking up the thoroughfare, Martin Cunningham said. Quite
right. They ought to.

--Yes, Mr Bloom said, and another thing I often thought, is to have
municipal funeral trams like they have in Milan, you know. Run the line
out to the cemetery gates and have special trams, hearse and carriage
and all. Don't you see what I mean?

--O, that be damned for a story, Mr Dedalus said. Pullman car and saloon
diningroom.

--A poor lookout for Corny, Mr Power added.

--Why? Mr Bloom asked, turning to Mr Dedalus. Wouldn't it be more decent
than galloping two abreast?

--Well, there's something in that, Mr Dedalus granted.

--And, Martin Cunningham said, we wouldn't have scenes like that when
the hearse capsized round Dunphy's and upset the coffin on to the road.

--That was terrible, Mr Power's shocked face said, and the corpse fell
about the road. Terrible!

--First round Dunphy's, Mr Dedalus said, nodding. Gordon Bennett cup.

--Praises be to God! Martin Cunningham said piously.

Bom! Upset. A coffin bumped out on to the road. Burst open. Paddy Dignam
shot out and rolling over stiff in the dust in a brown habit too large
for him. Red face: grey now. Mouth fallen open. Asking what's up now.
Quite right to close it. Looks horrid open. Then the insides decompose
quickly. Much better to close up all the orifices. Yes, also. With wax.
The sphincter loose. Seal up all.

--Dunphy's, Mr Power announced as the carriage turned right.

Dunphy's corner. Mourning coaches drawn up, drowning their grief. A
pause by the wayside. Tiptop position for a pub. Expect we'll pull up
here on the way back to drink his health. Pass round the consolation.
Elixir of life.

But suppose now it did happen. Would he bleed if a nail say cut him
in the knocking about? He would and he wouldn't, I suppose. Depends on
where. The circulation stops. Still some might ooze out of an artery. It
would be better to bury them in red: a dark red.

In silence they drove along Phibsborough road. An empty hearse trotted
by, coming from the cemetery: looks relieved.

Crossguns bridge: the royal canal.

Water rushed roaring through the sluices. A man stood on his
dropping barge, between clamps of turf. On the towpath by the lock a
slacktethered horse. Aboard of the _Bugabu. _

Their eyes watched him. On the slow weedy waterway he had floated on his
raft coastward over Ireland drawn by a haulage rope past beds of
reeds, over slime, mudchoked bottles, carrion dogs. Athlone, Mullingar,
Moyvalley, I could make a walking tour to see Milly by the canal. Or
cycle down. Hire some old crock, safety. Wren had one the other day at
the auction but a lady's. Developing waterways. James M'Cann's hobby
to row me o'er the ferry. Cheaper transit. By easy stages. Houseboats.
Camping out. Also hearses. To heaven by water. Perhaps I will without
writing. Come as a surprise, Leixlip, Clonsilla. Dropping down lock by
lock to Dublin. With turf from the midland bogs. Salute. He lifted his
brown straw hat, saluting Paddy Dignam.

They drove on past Brian Boroimhe house. Near it now.

--I wonder how is our friend Fogarty getting on, Mr Power said.

--Better ask Tom Kernan, Mr Dedalus said.

--How is that? Martin Cunningham said. Left him weeping, I suppose?

--Though lost to sight, Mr Dedalus said, to memory dear.

The carriage steered left for Finglas road.

The stonecutter's yard on the right. Last lap. Crowded on the spit of
land silent shapes appeared, white, sorrowful, holding out calm hands,
knelt in grief, pointing. Fragments of shapes, hewn. In white silence:
appealing. The best obtainable. Thos. H. Dennany, monumental builder and
sculptor.

Passed.

On the curbstone before Jimmy Geary, the sexton's, an old tramp sat,
grumbling, emptying the dirt and stones out of his huge dustbrown
yawning boot. After life's journey.

Gloomy gardens then went by: one by one: gloomy houses.

Mr Power pointed.

--That is where Childs was murdered, he said. The last house.

--So it is, Mr Dedalus said. A gruesome case. Seymour Bushe got him off.
Murdered his brother. Or so they said.

--The crown had no evidence, Mr Power said.
--Only circumstantial, Martin Cunningham added. That's the maxim of the
law. Better for ninetynine guilty to escape than for one innocent person
to be wrongfully condemned.

They looked. Murderer's ground. It passed darkly. Shuttered, tenantless,
unweeded garden. Whole place gone to hell. Wrongfully condemned. Murder.
The murderer's image in the eye of the murdered. They love reading about
it. Man's head found in a garden. Her clothing consisted of. How she met
her death. Recent outrage. The weapon used. Murderer is still at large.
Clues. A shoelace. The body to be exhumed. Murder will out.

Cramped in this carriage. She mightn't like me to come that way without
letting her know. Must be careful about women. Catch them once with
their pants down. Never forgive you after. Fifteen.

The high railings of Prospect rippled past their gaze. Dark poplars,
rare white forms. Forms more frequent, white shapes thronged amid the
trees, white forms and fragments streaming by mutely, sustaining vain
gestures on the air.

The felly harshed against the curbstone: stopped. Martin Cunningham put
out his arm and, wrenching back the handle, shoved the door open with
his knee. He stepped out. Mr Power and Mr Dedalus followed.

Change that soap now. Mr Bloom's hand unbuttoned his hip pocket swiftly
and transferred the paperstuck soap to his inner handkerchief pocket.
He stepped out of the carriage, replacing the newspaper his other hand
still held.

Paltry funeral: coach and three carriages. It's all the same.
Pallbearers, gold reins, requiem mass, firing a volley. Pomp of death.
Beyond the hind carriage a hawker stood by his barrow of cakes and
fruit. Simnel cakes those are, stuck together: cakes for the dead.
Dogbiscuits. Who ate them? Mourners coming out.

He followed his companions. Mr Kernan and Ned Lambert followed, Hynes
walking after them. Corny Kelleher stood by the opened hearse and took
out the two wreaths. He handed one to the boy.

Where is that child's funeral disappeared to?

A team of horses passed from Finglas with toiling plodding tread,
dragging through the funereal silence a creaking waggon on which lay a
granite block. The waggoner marching at their head saluted.

Coffin now. Got here before us, dead as he is. Horse looking round at it
with his plume skeowways. Dull eye: collar tight on his neck, pressing
on a bloodvessel or something. Do they know what they cart out here
every day? Must be twenty or thirty funerals every day. Then Mount
Jerome for the protestants. Funerals all over the world everywhere every
minute. Shovelling them under by the cartload doublequick. Thousands
every hour. Too many in the world.

Mourners came out through the gates: woman and a girl. Leanjawed harpy,
hard woman at a bargain, her bonnet awry. Girl's face stained with dirt
and tears, holding the woman's arm, looking up at her for a sign to cry.
Fish's face, bloodless and livid.

The mutes shouldered the coffin and bore it in through the gates. So
much dead weight. Felt heavier myself stepping out of that bath. First
the stiff: then the friends of the stiff. Corny Kelleher and the
boy followed with their wreaths. Who is that beside them? Ah, the
brother-in-law.

All walked after.

Martin Cunningham whispered:

--I was in mortal agony with you talking of suicide before Bloom.

--What? Mr Power whispered. How so?

--His father poisoned himself, Martin Cunningham whispered. Had the
Queen's hotel in Ennis. You heard him say he was going to Clare.
Anniversary.

--O God! Mr Power whispered. First I heard of it. Poisoned himself?

He glanced behind him to where a face with dark thinking eyes followed
towards the cardinal's mausoleum. Speaking.

--Was he insured? Mr Bloom asked.

--I believe so, Mr Kernan answered. But the policy was heavily
mortgaged. Martin is trying to get the youngster into Artane.

--How many children did he leave?

--Five. Ned Lambert says he'll try to get one of the girls into Todd's.

--A sad case, Mr Bloom said gently. Five young children.

--A great blow to the poor wife, Mr Kernan added.

--Indeed yes, Mr Bloom agreed.

Has the laugh at him now.

He looked down at the boots he had blacked and polished. She had
outlived him. Lost her husband. More dead for her than for me. One must
outlive the other. Wise men say. There are more women than men in the
world. Condole with her. Your terrible loss. I hope you'll soon follow
him. For Hindu widows only. She would marry another. Him? No. Yet who
knows after. Widowhood not the thing since the old queen died. Drawn on
a guncarriage. Victoria and Albert. Frogmore memorial mourning. But
in the end she put a few violets in her bonnet. Vain in her heart of
hearts. All for a shadow. Consort not even a king. Her son was the
substance. Something new to hope for not like the past she wanted back,
waiting. It never comes. One must go first: alone, under the ground: and
lie no more in her warm bed.

--How are you, Simon? Ned Lambert said softly, clasping hands. Haven't
seen you for a month of Sundays.

--Never better. How are all in Cork's own town?

--I was down there for the Cork park races on Easter Monday, Ned Lambert
said. Same old six and eightpence. Stopped with Dick Tivy.

--And how is Dick, the solid man?

--Nothing between himself and heaven, Ned Lambert answered.

--By the holy Paul! Mr Dedalus said in subdued wonder. Dick Tivy bald?

--Martin is going to get up a whip for the youngsters, Ned Lambert said,
pointing ahead. A few bob a skull. Just to keep them going till the
insurance is cleared up.

--Yes, yes, Mr Dedalus said dubiously. Is that the eldest boy in front?

--Yes, Ned Lambert said, with the wife's brother. John Henry Menton is
behind. He put down his name for a quid.

--I'll engage he did, Mr Dedalus said. I often told poor Paddy he ought
to mind that job. John Henry is not the worst in the world.

--How did he lose it? Ned Lambert asked. Liquor, what?

--Many a good man's fault, Mr Dedalus said with a sigh.

They halted about the door of the mortuary chapel. Mr Bloom stood behind
the boy with the wreath looking down at his sleekcombed hair and at the
slender furrowed neck inside his brandnew collar. Poor boy! Was he there
when the father? Both unconscious. Lighten up at the last moment
and recognise for the last time. All he might have done. I owe three
shillings to O'Grady. Would he understand? The mutes bore the coffin
into the chapel. Which end is his head?

After a moment he followed the others in, blinking in the screened
light. The coffin lay on its bier before the chancel, four tall yellow
candles at its corners. Always in front of us. Corny Kelleher, laying a
wreath at each fore corner, beckoned to the boy to kneel. The mourners
knelt here and there in prayingdesks. Mr Bloom stood behind near the
font and, when all had knelt, dropped carefully his unfolded newspaper
from his pocket and knelt his right knee upon it. He fitted his black
hat gently on his left knee and, holding its brim, bent over piously.

A server bearing a brass bucket with something in it came out through a
door. The whitesmocked priest came after him, tidying his stole with one
hand, balancing with the other a little book against his toad's belly.
Who'll read the book? I, said the rook.

They halted by the bier and the priest began to read out of his book
with a fluent croak.

Father Coffey. I knew his name was like a coffin. _Domine-namine. _ Bully
about the muzzle he looks. Bosses the show. Muscular christian. Woe
betide anyone that looks crooked at him: priest. Thou art Peter. Burst
sideways like a sheep in clover Dedalus says he will. With a belly on
him like a poisoned pup. Most amusing expressions that man finds. Hhhn:
burst sideways.

_--Non intres in judicium cum servo tuo, Domine. _

Makes them feel more important to be prayed over in Latin. Requiem mass.
Crape weepers. Blackedged notepaper. Your name on the altarlist. Chilly
place this.