Corrections to Printed Annotations
Corrections and additions to Joyce Annotated (1982), Ulysses Annotated (1989),
and Annotations (2022)
This page offers brief corrections and additions to the published glossaries of Joyce’s work, notably Joyce Annotated: Notes for Dubliners and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, by Don Gifford, Ulysses Annotated: Notes for James Joyce’s Ulysses by Don Gifford (with Robert J. Seidman), and the new and comprehensive Annotations by Sam Slote, Marc A. Mamigonian, and John Turner.
Notes are restricted to the simple format illustrated below, and the editors hope that as the number of these notes builds up they will come to form a useful adjunct to the reading of Joyce. Contributors are invited to send their own findings to the editors for online publication. Contributions that are not identified by name in the text are by the editors.
Entries dated April 2022 and later postdate the publication of Annotations by Sam Slote, Marc A. Mamigonian, and John Turner.
Red highlighting marks new corrections.
Telemachus
1.42 Tripping and sunny like the buck: this anticipates the heraldic allusion at 3.336-7 "On a field tenney a buck, trippant" (see: http://www.heraldicclipart.com/catalog/StagTrippantGu.gif).
1.43 the aunt: for the identity of the aunt see Then here's a health to Mulligan's aunt
1.66 scutter: a word of Irish origin = diarrhoea, loose stool; so a vulgar but apt expletive in the context. (HB)
Terence Patrick Dolan, A Dictionary of Hiberno-English (1998): scutter n., v., a loose stool; to pass such a stool. 'That calf has the scutters: I'll have to get the vet'. See also Bernard Share, Slanguage: a Dictionary of Irish Slang and Colloquial English in Ireland, 1977.
1.128 Dottyville: on the application of the name "Dottyville" to the Richmond District Lunatic Asylum in Grangegorman, Dublin see the article Join up the dots for Paradise
1.161-4: up your nose: read about this unusual idiom in Resentment up your nose against me
1.534-6 Down, sir! How dare you, sir!: the language of dog owners is revealed in the article Dog of my enemy
1.698 that red Carlisle girl: Carlisle is not a surname or a reference to the English town, but relates to Carlisle Pier in Kingstown - see the article Carlisle girls
Nestor
2.74 dragonscaly folds: the expression perhaps derives from William Morris's Earthly Paradise - see the article The dragon slothfully drags her scaly folds
2.131 Mr Deasy: for a brief biography of Francis Irwin, who ran the real-life school at which Joyce taught in this episode, see Francis Irwin, TCD, in the fusty world of Garrett Deasy
2.312 clove of orange: merely a segment of an orange. (Clive Hart 02/12)
Magazine for the young (1852), August, p. 284: The cells are the cloves of the orange into which our fingers can divide it [...]
2.315 medley: a battle or tournament; the mixing or mingling of people in combat (OED first sense). (Ronan Crowley 03/13)
2.258 Koehler: Joyce's friend, who worked as a secretary at Hely's in Dame Street, but was also a poet, musician, and writer, is discussed in the article Some notes on the triple life of Thomas Goodwin Keohler
Proteus
3 Sandymount strand: for the latest on Stephen's route read Stephen's stroll on the strand
3.35 Leahy's terrace: on the location of the terrace see Stepping back to Leahy's terrace
3.39 Edenville: a familiar Dublin address off Mount Merrion Avenue, Blackrock, near where the Joyces lived in 1892/3 - see the article Join up the dots for Paradise
3.51 contransmagnificandjewbangtantiality: earlier references to this and similar expressions in poems, songs, spelling tests, and vocal exercises can been seen in the article Contransmagnificandjewbangtantiality: jaw-breakers and spelling bees
3.54 widowed see: (not annotated in Gifford) an ecclesiastical see which has fallen vacant; one which temporarily lacks an (arch)bishop; well attested before Joyce. (JS)
Orthodox Journal (1814), November, p. 417/2: For several years the metropolitan see of Canterbury was without a pastor, until the king, falling dangerously ill, and dismayed at the sight of a frightful eternity, he was recommended to appoint St. Anselm, the abbot of Bec, to the widowed see.
3.95 Nowhere to put it: a popular nineteenth-century joke is traced through newspaper, postcards, and other sources in the article Nothing to sit down on - nowhere to put it
3.97 the rich of a rasher: explore the meaning of "rich" at a rich breakfast of rashers
3.164 Kevin Egan: for background information of the old Fenian and Joyce family friend Joseph Casey and his son Patrice see the article They simply fade away: news on the life and death of an old soldier - Joseph Casey
3.196-8: Pantalon Blanc et Culotte Rouge: a mysterious reference to a saucy Parisian magazine revealed in the article The Pantalons Blancs and the Culottes Rouges
3.232-3 Vieille ogresse with the dents jaunes: the location of Drumont's reference uncovered in the article The old hag with the yellow teeth
3.297 The two maries: a dialectal use of "mary" is discussed in The two maries re-examined
3.310-12 Dog of my enemy: amongst other King Lear echoes in Proteus (and preceded at 3.149 by "unnumbered pebbles beat”) we find Cordelia’s “Mine enemy’s dog,/Though he had bit me, should have stood that night/Against my fire” (4.7.36-8). Stephen feels himself dispossessed like Cordelia. (David Peacock, Victoria, BC 16/06/2013)
3.337: O'Loughlin's of Blackpitts: Gifford's speculation about a shebeen can be corrected: "O'Loughlin" is J. O'Loughlin of 1 New-row, South, near Blackpitts, grocer and spirit merchant. (HB)
3.391-3 bones for my steppingstones: follow the emergence of the myth in I smell the blood of an EngIishman
3.393-6 holy saint Denis: a popular oath examined in Exclaiming St Denis
3.492: Lawn Tennyson: cited in the popular magazines Punch and Judy and elsewhere before Joyce's use of the expression - see the article Lawn Tennyson: the poetry of motion
Calypso
4.2-5 fried hencods' roe: for more details on Bloom's favourite breakfasts see the article Fried hencods’ roes and mutton kidneys: these are a few of his favourite things
4.62 a short knock: Don Gifford is right in asserting that the expression implies that the auctioneer cut the bidding short in favour of Tweedy, though he offers no documentary evidence for this. The evidence indicates that this was a common expression in Ireland, though not in Great Britain. (JS) The Freeman’s Journal for 27 August, 1881, reports:
Sheriff’s Sale in County Meath […] Captain Coote – I will stop the auction and clear the road if you do not keep quiet… A Voice – Can’t we laugh? He wants to give the Land League a short knock.
In the 1920s we find it used in the work of Katharine Tynan:
There are some chairs David Strong took a fancy to. He says they’re apple-white, or somethin’ like that […] Not much apple that I could see about them, nor white either. I promised David a short knock. He’s a decent fellow.
Katharine Tynan Denys the Dreamer (1920), ch. 7 "The Auction" p. 62
4.84-6 Never grow a day older technically: examine Joyce's use of a popular astronomical text in Camille Flammarion's Astronomy for Amateurs (1904) in Ulysses
4.139 joggerfry: this was everyday school slang in Joyce’s day for “Geography” (the school subject). An example from 1889 occurs in the popular magazine Pick-Me-Up (28 December, p. 215):
Girls olways gits their joggerfry lessons better than a feller, but it they are going anywhere they don’t know their way a bit, and they are sure to git lost.
Alternative forms of the word were joggerfy, geogerfy, and geogerphy (all without the reversed r and f sounds of joggerfry). At the same time as studying joggerfry, pupils could also attempt jollogy. (JS)
4.148-50: Woods his name is: the story of Bloom's next-door neighbours in Eccles Street - see Stopping by Woods next-door
4.148-50 No followers allowed: read about the history of the phrase from the small ads in No followers allowed
4.486 hanging up on the floor: late nineteenth-century references to this popular expression in the article Or hanging up on the floor
4.502-3 Philip Beaufoy: the story of Philip Beaufoy, aka Philip Beaufoy Barry, writer of magazine literature and popular books on history and the theatre, and the younger brother of philosopher Henri Bergson in the article Philip Beaufoy and the philosopher's tone
4.525-6 May’s band: for more information on the musical May brothers and the family shop on Stephen's Green see the article May's band of brothers
Lotus Eaters
5.37-9 in the dead sea floating on his back: photographic evidence for On the Dead Sea, afloat with a parasol
5.71-2 halfseasover empire: see The half-seas-over empire of Britain for further information on Joyce's wordplay
5.112 braided drums: an Irish origin for "drums" in the article Drums of braided cord
5.175 Tolloll: a reinvestigation of the meaning of "Tolloll" in Tolloll: a tolerable goodbye?
5.179 I’d like my job: contemporary examples of the expression (pre-Ulysses) in the article I'd like my job! - Not likely!
5.322-6 Save China's millions: the expression "China's millions" was popularised by a missionary magazine - read about it in Save China's millions.
5.362 Hokypoky penny a lump: references to cheap ice-cream on the streets of Dublin explained in the article Hokypoky hocus pocus
5.372-4 I.N.R.I./I.H.S.: for more information on the tradition of restyling sacred initialisms such as "Iron Nails Ran In", see the article If I have sinned, I have suffered
5.496 strawberries for the teeth: as early as 1810 Maria Eliza Rundell tells her readers:
Easy, safe, and pleasant Method of removing Tartar from the Teeth.
Raspberries or strawberries (particularly the latter) frequently eaten, have been found, by experience, to dissolve the tartareous concretions [tartarous incrustations in other sources] of the teeth.
Maria Eliza Rundell, New Family Receipt-Book (new ed.; London, 1810), p. 338
Washington’s Daily Evening Star (15 June 1853) picked up a syndicated article on the same subject originally from the Philadelphia Inquirer, and adds that they also "give a delicious fragrance to the breath".
5.552 a cod in a pot: to read about the original of this expression before Joyce's day see a cod in the wrong pot.
5.560-1 Captain Buller: from the Trinity cricket square over square leg towards the Kildare Club in the article Captain Buller: that prodigious hit to square leg
Hades
6.1-506 Bloom entered and sat in the vacant place: can we tell where each of the four friends sat on the ride to Prospect Cemetery? - for contrasting views based on a differnt examination of the evidence see In the carriage for Paddy Digram's funeral: Bloom was right all along and Carriage seating in Hades
6.11 armstrap: for contemporary descriptions and images of the armstrap through which Bloom passed his arm on entering the mourning coach see The forgotten arm-strap
6.121 Whooping cough: Eamonn Finn examines whether breathing in the fumes from a gasworks might cure whooping cough, in The whooping-cough cure from the gasworks
6.151 Did you read Dan Dawson’s speech?: see more about this in Charles Dawson - lecturer on talking about everything
6.180 Antient concert rooms. Nothing on there: was this true as Bloom's carriage drove past? see Rooms for Antient Concerts
6.183 the bleak pulpit of saint Mark's: the church's unusual feature described in The destruction of the open-air pulpit at St Mark's
6.186 Elster Grime Opera Company: for a brief history of the company read the article Elster and Grime and the Grand Old Opera
6.186 Big powerful change: what was a "powerful change" at a theatre?: see All Change at the Empire Palace
6.235 snuff at a wake: a feature of old Irish wakes explained in An expression tossed about like snuff at a wake
6.247 Crofton: the fiction and reality of a minor character, in James Crofton: a tradition of public service
6.256 the hasp of your back: for information on the meaning and origin of this expression see An Irish expression behind “the hasp of your back”?
6.266 About the boatman?: for more information on the young Irishman who jumped in the Liffey to save Reuben Dodd's son read Moses Golden
6.307-9 Cure for a red nose: for possible remedies read What is the cure for a red nose?
6.308 adelite: the origin of the word (not an obscure name for a mineral): see the article adelite - a delightful colour word?
6.394-7 fifth quarter: the horn, skin, and other profitable substances lost to the butcher when cattle are sold as live weight - see the article The fifth quarter is the butcher's profit
6.447-8 James M'Cann's hobby to row me o'er the ferry: references to Thomas Campbell and Samuel Ferguson in the article Two poetic snippets: row me o'er the ferry and maledictive stones
6.448-51 to heaven by water: the old association of the watery road to heaven and drowning in the article Treading water to paradise
6.459-62 Thos. H. Dennany: Dennany's memorial business investigated in Thos. H. Dennany on a spit of land
6.461-2 white silence: Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Hiram Powers's sculpture the "Greek Slave" discussed in White silence in marble
6.612 doner: "doner" validated at the expense of "goner" in the article Done but not forgotten
6.788 Spurgeon went to heaven: the source for the quandary over whether Charles Spurgeon went to heaven or hell immediately after his death in the article Is Spurgeon in heaven?
6.851 picture of sinner's death: for a fine example of the sinner-on-his-deathbed picture see the article Death of a sinner
6.886-7 He died of a Tuesday: for the original anecdote behind this expression see Hanged of a Tuesday
6.939-41 Eulogy in a country churchyard: earlier variations of the misquotation can be found in An anatomy of Gray's Eulogy
Aeolus
7 professor MacHugh: for the life story of Hugh McNeill read The reluctant professor MacHugh
7.21-4 Prince's stores: the true location of the "stores" described in The Prince and the Freeman
7.88 workaday worker: Nannetti's column exposed in the article Workaday workers in the printing works
7.166 spellingbee conundrum: for the background to the symmetry of a peeled potato and other spelling posers see the article Spellingbee conundrum
7.195-202 Old Monks, the dayfather: see Monks, night fathers, and day fathers for further information on dayfather and Old Monks
7.236 GREEN GEM OF THE SILVER SEA: for the history of the expression see The green gem of Ireland set in the silver sea
7.246-53 Changing his drink: the use of this expression in the nineteenth century clarifies Joyce's use, in Changing his drink
7.261-4 Subleader for his death: a term from the everyday jargon of newspapers, in the article Take me to your subleader!
7.292 Cleverest fellow at the junior bar: discover J.J. O'Molloy's real-life counterpart in The short but remarkable life of John O'Mahony
7.337 Wetherup: the fiction and reality of another minor character: see the article William Weatherup: what the newspapers said
7.367-8 Ohio! The editor crowed in high treble from his uplifted scarlet face. My Ohio!: for the song behind the reference see A perfect cretic floating down the O-hi-O
7.388 Sports tissues: the story of the racing telegram, in the article Racing expresses and sporting tissues
7.439-41 crossblind: read up on this decorative feature in The crossblind crux
7.449 Steal upon larks: the expression found in 1912, in the article Stealing upon larks
7.478-9 Brixton: the background to Moore's use of Brixton (and Brixton Empire) is investigated in George Moore and the Brixton Empire
7.497 the first chapter of Guinness's: the history of an old pun told in the article Genesis good for you
7.588 What opera is like a railway line?: earlier references to Lenehan's joke exposed in My brandnew riddle - the Rose of Castile
7.592-4 strong weakness: a strong weakness for drink well documented in nineteenth-century Ireland - see the article Mr O'Madden Burke's strong weakness
7.612-13 a fresh of breath air: two Lenehanisms predated, in the article Lenehan and the great outdoors
7.626-56 Ignatius Gallaher: the true-life story of Joyce's quintessential Dublin journalist investigated in the article Ignatius per ignotius: the short life and extraordinary times of Fred Gallaher
7.655 Bransome's coffee: based on Branson's coffee in the early twentieth century - see the article The Coffee Riddle
7.684-6 The Old Woman of Prince's street: the history of the expression explained in An old woman in Prince's street
7.726/7.735-6 Sufficient for the day is the newspaper thereof: was this Joyce’s little twist on the Biblical text? Read about the history of the expression here
7.768 frozen music: to appreciate the role of Schelling and de Staël in the origin of this expression see The frozen music of architecture
7.813 ferial tone: the implications of this explained in Undertones of the sacred offices and in John O'Mahony and the Language of the Outlaw
7.853 babemaries: a dialectal use of "mary" is discussed in The two maries re-examined
7.922-4 dear dirty Dublin: the history of the celebrated old Dublin expression and its association with Lady Morgan explored in Lady Morgan and "dear dirty Dublin"
7.966-9 a child bit by a bellows: find how Joyce discovered the headline in Newsboys and the child-biting bellows
7.1021-2 SPEEDPILLS: for the various meanings of the word see The benefit of speedpills
7.1067 He halted on sir John Gray's pavement island: Joyce would have spotted this extremely rare compound in Wyndham Lewis's novel Tarr: "... where the Boulevard du Paradis and Boulevard Pfeifer cross with their electric trams. = In the middle is a pavement island". Joyce received the relevant number of the Egoist where the novel was serialized in late April 1916, and by 9 June 1918 he was in possession of it in book form.
Lestrygonians
8.5-6 throwaway: follow the scrap of paper down the Liffey at A crumpled throwaway: an arresting tale
8.117 base barreltone: Fun magazine makes the same joke in 1866 - see the article Beery bass baritones
8.138 Winds that blow from the south: identified in Library World (1960, vol. 61, p. 239) as the refrain from Whisper and I shall hear (c1891): words by G. Hubi Newcombe and music by S. Piccolomini. The sheet music is accessible here, at the NYPL Digital Library. The words are also available here in the Palace Journal (1892), 11 November). See p. 353, column 2. (JS)
8.153-4 Pat Claffey, the pawnbroker's daughter: see the article Pat Claffey and the Dublin convents for the historical facts about Pat Claffey's daughters
8.167 Flies' picnic: (humorously) a "feast" for flies, or a "banquet" around which they cluster. The expression is not unique to Joyce (HB). The New York Journal (cited in the Lafayette Advertiser from Louisiana on 20 July 1889) reproduces this doggerel poem entitled "The Flies' Picnic" in its "Budget of Fun":
The festive flies with vigor flap
Their little wings and stare With winkless eyes to find the chap
Whose head is minus hair.
And when they find their luckless prey
They light upon his head, And skate across his crown all day
Until he goes to bed.
A more sober example occurs in John Ward's Life Histories of Familiar Plants (1908: ch. 2, p. 24), in his discussion of sycamore trees:
Why these flies are gathered there becomes obvious presently; they are seeking the sycamore flowers. There are blow-flies, flesh-flies, dung-flies, house-flies, hover-flies, alder-flies, and innumerable other species; there are honey-bees, humble-bees, and solitary bees of many kinds; indeed, it is a veritable flies' picnic.
8.181 Bartell d'Arcy: read about the Pro-Cathedral's famous tenor Bartle M'Carthy in the article The man behind Bartell d'Arcy
8.255-9 What is it? Mr Bloom asked, taking the card. U. P.?: for a historical account of the expression "U.P:up" see the article U.P: up and away
8.258-9 Someone taking a rise out of him: for Breen's possible postcard persecutor see The anonymous libeller of Denis Breen
8.337 James Carlisle: see Carlyle one. Carlisle nil on the spelling of the real James Carlyle's surname
8.242 Husband barging: Gifford notes that "To 'barge' is to speak roughly or abusively". This is OED's barge v.2, though the Irish English use is captured best by Joseph Wright's English Dialect Dictionary, where the noun barging is defined as "scolding in an abusive manner", and is identified from Irish and northern English sources. (JS)
8.316 Going the two days: this mysterious expression is explained at Two days at the races?
8.360-1 thirtytwo chews and muttonchop whiskers: read about the chew-chew theory and the song behind the whiskers in The Chew-Chew school and Mr Purefoy’s whisker problem
8.362-6 Hardy annuals: see Hardy annuals in the nursery of life for the history of annuals as plants and children
8.417 Julia Morkan: see The Misses Flynn's grand annual concerts, in the series of articles on the Flynn family (Flynnlandia, or the rise (and fall) of the House of Usher)
8.470-1 a walk with the band: was this really coined by the Salvation Army - see Musical breakfasts and a walk with the band
8.506-7 puffed, powdered and shaved: follow Joyce's expression in Puffed and powdered, cocked and shaved
8.515-6 retire into public life: Joyce's expression had a history - see Retirement into public life
8.602 harvestmoon face: the popular metaphor is researched in the article Shine on, Harvest Moon
8.605 Take off that white hat: trace the history of this expression in the music halls in Of white hats and stolen donkeys
8.682-6 Born with a silver knife in his mouth: for more on this twist on an old expression see The advantages of being born with a silver knife in your mouth
8.744-7 White missionary too salty: read earlier references to this point of view at Salty missionaries
8.755 Cheese digests all but itself. Mity cheese: see the article Mity cheese for rhymes and sayings behind Joyce's expression
8.889 miss Dubedat: see the article Marie Dubedat - the Irish Nightingale for a brief biography of the singer
8.894-5 ignorant as a kish of brogues: for the history of this expression see Kishes, brogues, and ignorance
8.971-4 one woman ... hid in a clock: who was she? Answers in The Lady Freemason and the clock
8.1035 Wonder if Tom Rochford will do anything with that invention of his?: Thomas Henry Rochford's patent application 27,617 of 19 December 1908 for "Improvements in Programme Indicators for theatres of Varieties, Music Halls and the like" was unearthed, carefully described and illustrated by Eamonn Finn in the James Joyce Broadsheet 80, June 2008, p. 1. The invention is presented to readers of Ulysses in the "Wandering Rocks" episode. See also 10.491.
Scylla and Charybdis
9.48-50 Art has to reveal to us ideas, formless spiritual essences. The supreme question about a work of art is out of how deep a life does it spring: see the article Æ IOU: two debts to Russell? from two contemporary magazines
9.130-2 sledded poleaxe: read Hamlet's sledded poleaxe for an explanation of "sledded"
9.150 limbo patrum: for a likely source in Joyce's Trieste library see A Fuller picture of the Lollards
9.279 yogibogeybox: read The mystic yogibogeybox for new information on the history of the word
9.303 that queer thing called genius: explore the origins of the expression in Genius is a queer thing
9.321 the pigs’ paper: find out the origin of this nickname for the Irish Homestead in Of pigs and poetry.
9.352 Coffined thoughts around me, in mummycases: Joyce’s words were inspired by the following lines from William Edward Hartpole Lecky's poem "On an Old Song", first published in the Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art (1885), April p. 472:
All unread their volumes lie
Mouldering so peaceably,
Coffined thoughts of coffined men ...
9.393-4 genius would be a drug in the market: John Eglinton probably alludes here to an anonymous essay with the title "Our Noble Selves", which Grant Allen contributed to the Fortnightly Review of February 1887. It was reprinted elsewhere several times in the same year. The relevant line reads: “We live in an age when high genius is a drug in the market." "A drug in the market" is "a commodity which is no longer in demand, and so has lost its commercial value or has become unsaleable" (OED).
9.487 You were speaking of the gaseous vertebrate, if I mistake not?: Buck Mulligan's satirical phrase derives from Ernst Häckel's The Riddle of the Universe (Die Welträtsel, 1899), translated into English by Joseph McCabe in 1900. It appears on page 235 in chapter xv of that translation [HB in Alistair Stead, "The Gaseous Vertebrate Unriddled": published in James Joyce Broadsheet No. 62, June 2002, p. 3]:
God is adored as a 'pure spirit' without a body. 'God is a spirit, and they who worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.' Nevertheless, the psychic activity of this 'pure spirit' remains just the same as that of the anthropomorphic God. In reality, even this immaterial spirit is not conceived to be incorporeal, but merely invisible, gaseous. We thus arrive at the paradoxical conception of God as gaseous vertebrate.
9.491 Was Du verlachst wirst Du noch dienen: the quotation, based on a Russian proverb, is from the German translation of Turgenev's essay "Hamlet and Don Quixote", where it correctly reads: "Was du verlachst, dem wirst du noch dienen". The missing pronoun is due to an error in the transmission of the phrase in the genesis of the episode.
9.539 There be many mo: Fittingly, in the context of the so-called Shakespeare chapter, the phrase Stephen quotes is from an Elizabethan lute song "Farewell, dear love". The context there reads [Harald Beck and Alistair Stead, "Resolving 'Risolve’”: published in James Joyce Broadsheet 72, October 2005, p. 3]:
Shall I bid her go? / There be many mo', / Shall I bid her go? / What and if I do? / Shall I bid her go and spare not? / O no, no, no, no, I dare not.
9.552 Have you drunk the four quid?: follow how Bloom and Stephen spend their cash in Stephen's liquidity
9.592 In the daylit corridor: exploring the library's floor plan in the article The Corridors of the National Library
9.615 His pale Galilean eyes were upon her mesial groove. Venus Kallipyge: in his autobiography The Story of my Heart Richard Jefferies (see 9.354) describes a visit to the National Gallery in London [HB in Alistair Stead, "Of Tilebooks and Mesial Grooves": published in James Joyce Broadsheet No. 61, February 2002, p. 3]:
The glowing face of Cytherea in Titian's Venus and Adonis, the heated cheek, the lips that kiss each eye that gazes on them, the desiring glance, the golden hair - moulded into features this face answered me. Juno's wide back and mesial groove, is anything so lovely as the back?
9.961 springhalted: Joyce changed his typescript text “The quaker librarian came anear” to “The quaker librarian springhalted near”, thereby adding another element which may derive from Shakespeare’s vocabulary: Henry VIII act 1 scene 3 line 13: “They haue all new legs, And lame ones; one would take it ... the Spauen A[nd] Spring-halt rain'd among 'em.” The OED defines springhalt as: “A condition in horses characterized by involuntary flexion of the hind leg or legs.” Among the many ironic descriptions of Lyster’s gait in this episode this clearly the most sarcastic one.
9.737-8 The doctor can tell us: the case for Edward Dowden made in A doctor but not Dr Freud
9.731-2 Buck Mulligan suspired amorously: investigate Joyce's quotations from Swinburne in “He told me about, hold on, Swinburne, was it, no?” Buck Mulligan and the poet
9.770-1 Amplius. In societate humana hoc est maxime necessarium ut sit amicitia inter multos: quoting from Aquinas in the article Aquinas on Friendship
9.779-80 the new Viennese school: for the possibility of a new Vienna in Dublin see the article A doctor but not Dr Freud
9.783-6 storm was shelter: for the source in Joyce's Trieste library see A Fuller picture of the Lollards
9.890-2 Come, mess: read help on this unusual usage at A mess of four
9.941: S. D: sua donna. Già: di lui. Gelindo risolve di non amare S. D.: Stephen's recondite allusion here is to a song from Lo scrigno armonico [The Harmonic Jewel-Box], a little-known tablature published circa 1648 by Stefano Pesori, a Mantuan guitarist, guitar teacher and composer: 'Gelindo risolve di non amare la traditrice'. Stephen Dedalus plays with the abbreviation for "sua donna" used in this song and in a few others in the collection and his initials S. D. [Harald Beck and Alistair Stead, "Resolving 'Risolve’”: published in James Joyce Broadsheet 72, October 2005, p. 3
9.1182 CRAB (a bushranger): The definition of a “bushranger” in Slote’s Annotations does not explain Mulligan's indisputably bawdy aptronym (a name perfectly suited to its owner). “Crab” obviously suggests a crablouse: in the OED’s definition, “a parasitical insect, Pediculus pubis, or Phthirus inguinalis, which infests parts of the human body”. The bushranger defines the crab's preferred environment, the bush, a slang term for “pubic hair”. (David Garroch)
9.1105 Irish nights entertainment: was this a common expression? - see A night of Irish entertainment
Wandering Rocks
10.3-5 walk to Artane: find out whether the O'Brien Institute was Father Conmee's objective in Swansway: Father Conmee's walk to Artane
10.41-4 Ger Gallaher: the story of Ignatius Gallaher's nephews, in Gerald and Brendan Gallaher: the next generation
10.44-53 Brunny Lynam: the life of one of Joyce's friends from school or college, researched in Brunny Lynam the medical student
10.385 Susy Nagle's: for details of one of Dublin's fashionable dressmakers see the article Susy Nagle and her concertina skirt
10.491 Crampton court: for new evidence on Rochford's involvement with this Central Dublin location read the article Tom Rochford's smart idea at Crampton Court. See also 8.1035.
10.506 Lynam's: investigate the whereabouts of Lynam's betting office and other details of the Lynam family in the article Popping into Lynam's
10.538 sir Charles Cameron: not the Irish-bom proprietor of newspapers in Dublin and Glasgow, as Gifford suggests. Sir Charles Alexander Cameron (1830-1921) was Chief Medical Officer of Health and Public Analyst for Dublin. Among his recreations he listed "attending musical and Masonic dinners" (Who Was Who 1916-28 (1929), p. 165). (John Smurthwaite 02/12)
10.543 number 7 Eccles street: discover the history of Bloom's house in The demise of Ithaca
10.625-7 Potterton: the background story of Robert Potterton revealed in the article In Lunacy of Potterton
10.651-3 J. A. Jackson, W. E. Wylie, A. Munro and H. T. Gahan: for the real lives of four of Joyce's Trinity sporting cyclists see the article Wheelmen don't eat quiche
10.658 Head upon shoulder: an expression for someone who appears to have no neck explained in the article Head upon shoulder
10.752-4 crumpled throwaway: follow the scrap of paper down the Liffey at A crumpled throwaway: an arresting tale
10.1004 conscript fathers: Gifford refers to the one hundred new Roman senators appointed by Brutus. (HB) The application to local politics is not original to Joyce: see OED conscript adj. sense 1b and references such as this from the Weekly Irish Times of 7 August 1886, p.1:
The Conscript Fathers and leading citizens of Dublin have invited 'the Colonials' to visit Dublin towards the close of August, when the streets of 'the second city in the kingdom', as Ireland's metropolis is style {in Irish prints), will be filled with a gay cosmopolitan crowd, whom the annual Horse Show at Ball's Bridge will attract for the festive week.
10.1134-6 Dublin's pet lamb: Pet lambs in Dublin examines the meaning of "pet" in 19th-century boxing circles
10.1220-2 charming Soubrette: follow the history of the expression in The "charming soubrette" of the stage
Sirens
11 Ormond: track the movements of Bloom and the other characters around the Ormond Hotel in Joyce's Ormond Hotel
11.64 miss Douce’s head by miss Kennedy’s head: find both ladies at the Bailey Tavern in the Dublin censuses, in the article Miss Douce and Miss Kennedy at a different bar
11.185-6 Nannetti's father: on Giuseppe rather than Giacomo Nannetti see the article J.P. Nannetti and the Lord Mayor's antecedents
11.222: He fingered shreds of hair, her maidenhair: "maidenhair" probably carries a sexual meaning here ("pubic hair"), which can be documented back to at least 1908:
So then she it go: she touched me more gently still, she forced her spittle into me, licked me slowly, with lingering almost imperceptible tongue, or nibbled and sucked at my maidenhair and my skin with such refined and delicate sensual gentleness that only to think of her loving ways as she did that, makes me spend now. Oh what delights intoxicated me then.
"Baron Alcide de M***" (perhaps Alfred de Musset), Gamiani, or, Two Passionate Nights (London, 1908) p. 101
11.323 A duodene of birdnotes: a duodene or set of twelve notes encountered in the article Duodenal harmony
11.333 Did she fall or was she pushed?: Lenehan's quip explained in Miss Kennedy's reading matter
11.460-2 crossblind: read up on this decorative feature in The crossblind crux
11.496-7 left off clothes: for advertisement evidence for the wordplay involved see the article Left-off clothes
11.615 Bright's bright eye: the medical condition traced back into the nineteenth century in the article Bright's bright eye
11.665-9 Braintipped: for the meaning of this irregular expression see His brain tipped over
11.699-700 Jenny Lind soup: for the history of the soup favoured by the Swedish Nightingale see Jenny Lind soup for the professional soprano
11.1050 Shah of Persia liked that best: the story that the Shah of Persia admired western orchestras tuning up described in the article The Shah's nose and ears
11.1090-1 brass in your face: for early allusions to the expression see Brass by gold in your pocket
11.1128-30 Mickey's Rooney's band: ragtime or dance? Explore the mystery of the band in A medley from Mickey Rooney's Macaronic Band
11.1225 that Wonderworker: advertisements for the Bakelite contraption for rectal troubles in the article That Wonder Worker
Cyclops
12.144-7 Ditto MacAnaspey: see the article Ditto MacAnaspey and the same for me, please to examine whether the McAnaspey family of memorial-makers could be responsible for this expression
12.181 Thomas Conneff: for the life of the real-life Irish athletic champion from Kildare read Wondrous little Thomas Conneff from the short-grass county of Kildare
12.218-9 the Old Woman of Prince's street: the history of the expression explained in An old woman in Prince's street
12.234-7 my brown son: see early uses and history in Brown sons
12.241 And all down the form: to the use of forms (benches) in public houses see Sitting on a form
12.355 volupcy: evidence for the existence of the word before Joyce in the article Volupcy and mystic bliss
12.362 We greet you, friends of earth, who are still in the body: by the late nineteenth century both “friend of earth” and “(still) in the body” were conventional spiritualist and theosophist expressions describing those who had not yet passed over to the spiritual side through death. (HB) Examples:
The first thing out of the ordinary which I came across, is a weakness in the stilted friends phraseology of Rector… Then Prudens takes a turn at the same thing (p. 312): "Good morrow, of earth. We greet thee again". Then Rector turns up again with similar grammar (p. 324): "Good morrow, friends of earth. We hail thee once more."
Henry Holt On the Cosmic Relations (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1914) vol. 2, bk. 2, pt. 4, ch. 37, p. 598, citing Professor James Hyslop’s contribution to the Second Piper-Hodgson Report (1892-5) commissioned by the American Society for Psychical Research
The more frequently it is appealed to by the affection of friends still in the body to avail itself of the opportunities furnished by mediumship for manifesting its existence on the physical plane, the more vehement will be the impulses which draw it back to physical life.
A. P. Sinnett Esoteric Buddhism (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1889) Appendix p. 316 [Appendix first published in 1887 ed.]
12.451 codology: for the history of the word codology in the nineteenth century see the article The kidology of codology
12.510 by the holy farmer: Gifford cites Eric Partridge’s Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English (1937) for this “low Dublin” corruption of “by the Holy Father” [i.e. the Pope]. Irish use is well documented in the nineteenth century, with an early example in Charles Marsh’s Clubs of London (1828) vol. 2, p. 239:
Micky. – "O, by the holy farmer! Now, I know nothing at all about any service but Mr. Giles’s; and he is the man who will give me a crakter [= character] any day I ax him."
The speaker here is "[Mr.] Giles's hostler, well known in Dublin by the name of Blinker Micky, because blind of one eye". (HB)
12.517 going home footless in a cab: Wright's English Dialect Dictionary (vol. 2, p. 446) defines “footless” as “unsteady on the feet; apt to stumble; also used figuratively”, but other sources from the time show that it could also mean specifically “incapable through drink” (HB):
"Big drunk, three days – all right now." [...] "Just because you were too footless to answer a cable, I’ve come sixteen thousand miles out of my way."
Gouverneur Morris Tom Beauling (1901), ch. 16 p. 168
12.612 Hand by the block: "hand by" or "hard by" - see the genetic exploration in The case for "Hard by the block"
12.756-7 Could a swim duck?: an old rejoinder is investigated in the article Ducks swim?
12.784-5 Shake hands, brother. You're a rogue and I'm another: for the background to a macabre rhyme alluded to in Ulysses see the article You're a rogue and I'm another
12.829-30 Hairy Iopas, says the citizen, that exploded volcano: for an illustration of MP William Field's volcanic explosion of hair, see the article William Field, the bard with the tumbling hair at Queen Dido's banquet
12.836-7 here's my head and my heels are coming: an expression for stooping forwards unpicked in contemporary sources - see the article Head first and everything else next
12.838 Teach your grandmother how to milk ducks: the history of the expression is explained in Milking ducks grandmother's way
12.1045-7 get his hat on with a shoehorn: is this the behaviour of a lunatic? - see Shoehorning your head into your hat
12.976-8 the milk in the cocoanut: for more information on how the milk got into the coconut in the first place see the article The Milk in the coconut - a hairy puzzle
12.1129 the tribe of Ossian: references to James McPherson's poems and Hugh Blair's Critical Dissertation on Ossian uncovered in Ossian's poems - notesheets
12.1170 Norman W. Tupper: the National Police Gazette provides the story and the illustration - see the article Norman W. Tupper and the policeman's lap
12.1209 Conspuez les anglais! Perfide Albion! for the history of two French phrases in English see the article Perfide Albion - Perfidious Albion
12.1227 talking about bunions: Lenehan's debt to the fictional Lord Dundreary disclosed in Lenehan's bunions
12.1234 only for the other dog: nineteenth-century documentation for the expression in the article Only for the other dog
12.1269 Mrs Poll Ash: early allusions to Poll Ash traced, in the article As ugly as Poll Ash
12.1318 Imperial Yeomanry: read how this refers to a pint of Allsopp's beer in Hand(s) up for the Imperial Yeomanry
12.1347-9 cottonball barons: why "cottonball"? See cottonball officers and cottonball barons
12.1367 the Times rubbed its hands: two newspaper quotations relating to Irish emigration combine in the article Vengeance and the shores of Manhattan
12.1369 Grand Turk sent us his piasters: for the details of mid-century Middle Eastern generosity see the article Famine relief from the Sultan of Turkey
12.1398 come where the boose is cheaper: the song-writer and lyricist identified in the article Cheaper booze
12.1448 maledictive stones: a quotation from Samuel Ferguson investigated in the article Two poetic snippets: row me o'er the ferry and maledictive stones
12.1559 Show us the entrance out: trace the expression back in To the going-out entrance
12.1589 Crofton: the fiction and reality of a minor character, in the article James Crofton: a tradition of public service
12.1635 He's a perverted jew: the reading "turned away" not "corrupted" proposed in the article Perverted from the truth
12.1649 Expecting every moment will be his next: Robert Dent realised that Lenehan’s expression had a history, but evidence was thin. Dent offers Punch in 1902 (HB). More recent research finds the comical twist to "expecting every moment will be his last" in Punch’s Australian counterpart the Melbourne Punch thirty-five years earlier in 1867:
He was drunk. Mr. B-–d-n is laid up with a severe attack of "surprise", brought on by the audacity of the Council. He is not expected to recover. The doctor says he expects every moment will be his next. (22 August p. 58)
The same expression occurs earlier in an entry for 12 August 1862 in Josie Underwood’s Civil War Diary (2009), though we should perhaps be cautious of claiming it as a first use in case this section was written up slightly later:
Morgan hasn't come this time and we quiet down to wait in anxious expectation for the next excitement as George Todd used to say "expecting every moment to be our next". (ch. 5, p. 195)
The thought survived into 1904, as the Otago Witness of 22 June shows:
Lying there, tossing and turning, I expected every moment to be my next. (p. 73)
12.1901 The jarvey saved his life by furious driving as sure as God made Moses: (HB) correcting the page proofs for the episode Joyce introduced the change from “as sure as God made me” to “as sure as God made Moses”, to emphasise a specific anti-Semitic element in the episode’s narrator that begins with his comments on Moses Herzog ("Jesus, I had to laugh at the little jewy getting his shirt out": U 12.30-1) and continues with the following passage:
There was an ancient Hebrew Zaretsky or something weeping in the witnessbox with his hat on him, swearing by the holy Moses he was stuck for two quid. (U 12.1091-3)
“As sure as God made Moses” turns up frequently (but not exclusively) in contemporary Irish sources:
If any rascal come into our Court, the Police must have him, as sure as God made Moses. (Head Constable stoutly nods assent.)
Thomas Sheahan, "Articles" of Irish manufacture; or, Portions of Cork history (1833), p. 13
'Na bock-lish, for that,' answered the woman; 'if you never opened your mouth I would deal kindly with such a strapping boy as this; for as sure as God made Moses, the same chap will smell powder before he is twelve months older.'
"Gleanings in the Green Isle" in Dolman's Magazine (1847), p. 20
"Furious driving" was a legal commonplace at the time, and cases of furious driving were often reported in the newspapers. The New Sporting Magazine for March 1834 gives us a description:
The question now is — what is generally meant by "furious driving"? [...] What I term furious driving is, racing against another coach; going fast in improper places, such as in streets, around corners, down hills, or in short over any ground but that on which the experience of a coachman instructs him he may do so with safety. (p. 315)
Nausicaa
13.87 that tired feeling: Hood's Sarsaparilla advertisements demonstrated as the source - see the article A tonic for that tired feeling
13.111 eyebrowleine: examples of the eye-catching advert documented in Bewitching eyes beneath a well-drawn eyebrow line
13.119 Thursday for wealth: the rhyme behind Gerty's folk wisdom, in the article A good day for trimming your nails
13.125-6 joyous little laugh (and other references): for references taken from Beatrice Harraden's Guiding Thread see Beatrice Harraden guiding the thread and Clarence E. Mulford shanghaied: Nausicaa notesheets 4 and 8
13.253 to pay a visit to the miss white: (not in Gifford) to pay a visit to the chamberpot:
OED Online: "Miss White n. Irish English colloq. (now rare) a chamberpot (also personified)."
Gerry O'Flaherty provided the vital clue in Austin Clarke's Twice Round the Black Church (p. 25: "I saw Miss White peeping at me from under the bed".) (HB)
13.613: Puddeny pie: as the commentators say, this phrase echoes the nursery rhyme “George Porgie, pudding and pie”. With reference to Joyce’s use of “puddeny pie” [probably = "puddingy pie”] we should be aware that this was a well-attested nursery form, and may even represent an attempt to make sense of the unusual “pudding and pie”. It occurs in R. D. Blackmore’s Maid of Sker (originally published in Blackwood’s Magazine, October 1871, p. 528/1):
"And my dear papa say "'Hot a good gal!' and mama come and tiss 'a all over a'most, and then 'e all have some more puddeny-pie."
and by 1884 the expression is used in a parody of the nursery rhyme by Grace Stebbing in What a Man Soweth (1884, ch. 26 p. 176):
"And does he ever sing anything but 'Come into the garden, Maud?'"
"Yes, occasionally, Sometimes 'Willie, we have missed you,' and 'Frankie, Rankie, Puddeny-pie'. [Willie and Frankie are characters in the novel]
A popular song of 1910 (Once One Girl at a Time, written and composed by Herbert Rule and James McGhee, and sung by George D'Albert) opens with the line “Georgie, Georgie Puddeny Pie”. (JS)
13.617-8 catch it while it was flying: for early references to the expression, especially from American newspaper ads, see Caught it while it was flying
13.690 a light broke in upon her (and other references): for references taken from one of Clarence E. Mulford's Hopalong Cassidy stories see Beatrice Harraden guiding the thread and Clarence E. Mulford shanghaied: Nausicaa notesheets 4 and 8
13.725 pettiwidth: petticoat widths of material cited from advertisements in the article Pettiwidths: thrills and spills with Gerty McDowell
13.792 Catch em alive, O: the fly-trap vendor's street cry investigated in the article Caught alive - oh!
13.1007-8 far away on the pillow: the poem that provided the expression shown in the article A pillow on the billow
13.1062 Corns on his kismet: the fateful riddle exploded in Corny kismet
13.1068-9 Bailey light: discover which lighthouse Bloom was observing in A load of Bull about the Bailey
Oxen of the Sun
14 passim Holles Street Hospital: for new information on the layout of the Hospital see A floor plan for the Holles Street Hospital
14.39 loose boyconnel flux: buide connaill: informal Irish for the 'yellow plague'. (HB)
Patrick Weston Joyce, A smaller social history of ancient Ireland: treating of the government, military system, and law: religion, learning, and art; trades, industries, and commerce; manners, customs, and domestic life, of the ancient Irish people, vol. 1 (1920) (the 1908 edition is shorter and does not include the legend of St. Mochua.): Within historic times, the most remarkable and destructive of all the ancient plagues was the Blefed, or Buide-Connaill [boy-connell] or yellow plague, which swept through Ireland twice, in the sixth and seventh centuries, and which we know from outer sources desolated all Europe about the same time. The Irish records abound in notices of its ravages. There is a curious legend in the Life of St. Mochua, that when the Sil-Murray were suffering from this pestilence, the saint cured them, and transferred the yellow colour of their skin to his crosier, which was thence called the Bachal-bhuidhe, the 'yellow crosier'. (p. 610)
14.71-106 Some man that wayfaring was [...] sorrowing one with other: references traced to a life of St Cuthbert in Saintsbury's History of English Prose Rhythm - see the article Cuthbert the Wanderer. Commentary includes identification of numerous allusions in Joyce's notesheets
14.143 Shrieks of silence: for more on the history of Lenehan's expression see Shrieks of silence!
14.167-86 This meanwhile this good sister [...] Woman's woe with wonder pondering: references to Malory uncovered in the article Malory and Sir Leopold, King. Commentary includes identification of numerous allusions in Joyce's notesheets
14.232-4 Malachi's praise of that beast the unicorn: an allusion to Gogarty's verse in The unicorn's song
14.244-5: moonflowers: where did Joyce find his references to moonflowers and an unusual route to pregnancy? See Moonflowers and pregnancy at one remove
14.501-2 to crush a cup of wine: a quotation from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. (HB 03/12)
Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, I. ii. 80: "My master is the great rich Capulet; and if you be not of the house of Montagues, I pray, come and crush a cup of wine."
14.729-30 or was due as with the noted physician, Mr Austin Meldon, to a wolf in the stomach: Constantine Curran provides the background to this allusion: (HB 11/12)
Dr Meldon was famously obese [...] we all knew Dublin's joke about Dr Meldon getting out from a fly - a greater miracle than Jonah's emergence from the belly of the whale.
Under the Receding Wave, p. 18
14.888 old Glory Allelujurum: follow the history of the expression in religious praise songs in the article Praise Be! Here comes Old "Glory Hallelujurum" Purefoy
14.972-3: That distressing manner of delivery called by the Brandenburghers Sturzgeburt: Joyce obviously refers to an 18th century publication by the Brandenburg court midwife Justina Siegmund, who published a book on midwifery called Die Chur-brandenburgische Hoff-Wehe-Mutter, das ist höchst nöthiger Unterricht von schweren und unrecht stehenden Geburten, in einem Gespräche vorgestellet in 1688 (an 1874 reprint is accessible on Google Books). However, the word "Sturzgeburt" (“precipitate delivery”) is not in the book, simply because it did not come into use before the early 19th century. Siegmund has a chapter on "Stürzung", which warns of the application of two hair-raising methods of bringing about a delivery by turning the mother upside down or pushing her from a table. Several English 19th-century medical publications mention Justina/e Siegmund, but never in connection with the word Sturzgeburt. For details see Udo Benzenhöfer, "What the Brandenburghers called Sturzgeburt" in James Joyce Broadsheet, 22 February 1987, p. 3.
14.1055-8 Jacob's pipe: for more on the continental tradition of the Jacob pipe see the article The longstemmed Jacob pipe
14.1122-3 leave his mother an orphan: an old Irish quip documented in the article Don't leave your mother an orphan!
14.1221 the inspired pencil of Lafayette: James Stack Lauder (1853-1923), Dublin photographer, assumed the professional name “James Lafayette” when he founded his photography studio in 1880. In 1887 he was invited to Windsor to photograph Queen Victoria and was granted a Royal Warrant as “Her Majesty's Photographer in Dublin”. The “inspired pencil” (already a cliché with reference to artists such as Raphael) is not a poetic reference to photography (e.g. “the pencil of nature”) but to the pencil of a photographic retoucher. Molly has been touched up in Bloom's photograph. (Ronan Crowley, 03/13)
14.1344-78 the wellremembered grove of lilacs at Roundtown: references from Marius the Epicurean explored in the article Pater: Leopold the Epicurean
14.1391 Burke's! outflings my lord Stephen: for a summary of information on John Burke read Burke's!
14.1440 armstrong halloring (etc.): references from the work of Edward FitzGerald in the article Edward FitzGerald at sea: Oxen notesheet 17
14.1440-591 All off for a buster [...] Just you try it on: untangle the speaking roles in this section with the help of Oxen of the Sun - allocating text in the closing paragraphs
14.1453 Ma mère m’a mariée: the old French bawdy song uncovered in My mother has married me...
14.1466 bet to the ropes: "Bet" is here a dialect form of "beaten". The phrase is "Beat s.o. to the ropes". (Vincent Deane 08/12)
Pierce Egan, Boxiana; or Sketches of Antient and Modern Pugilism (1823), vol. 1, p. 329: "Sam beat his opponent to the ropes with considerable ease."
Jack London, "A Piece of Steak" from The Chinago and other stories (1911), p. 283: "No longer could he do a fast twenty rounds, hammer and tongs, fight, fight, fight, from gong to gong, with fierce rally on top of fierce rally, beaten to the ropes and in turn beating his opponent to the ropes ..."
14.1479-80: Your starving eyes and allbeplastered neck you stole my heart, O gluepot: Joyce's inspiration from 1829 uncovered in the article Glue-pot steals heart
14.1482 Lapland: for the mother's lap as a baby's comfort see Lapland closer home
14.1486 Cribbed out of Meredith: George Moore as an intermediary in identifying George Meredith as the author of Stephen's quotation in From Meredith to Mulligan via Moore
14.1498 smutty Moll for a mattress jig: The collocation "smutty moll" existed independently of "Moll Peatley's Jig", which was originally a dance tune of the 17th century, before it became a synonymous expression for "a rogering bout" (Grose, 1796). "mattress jig" itself was slang for copulation. (HB 02/12)
George Atkins Brine, The king of the beggars: the life and adventures of George Atkins Brine (1883), p. 44: And where've you left your smutty moll?
"MATTRESS-JIG subs. phr. (venery). - copulation."
Farmer/Henley, Slang and its analogues past and present (1896)
14.1509-72 Sign on long o' me: quotations traced to Joseph Lincoln's Cap'n Eri in the article Lincoln, but not Abraham
14.1510 How come you so?: As well as appearing in Joseph Lincoln's Cap'n Eri (see 14.1509-72), this expression is defined as “tipsy; drunk” in Jonathan Lighter’s Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang (vol. 2, 1997), and is cited first (as “how came you so”) from Mason Locke Weems’s Drunkard’s Looking-glass (1813-18); he cites the precise form "how-come-you-so" from James Fenimore Cooper's Red Rover of 1827. OED cites “how came you so” from a list of “all the terms I have been able to recollect having heard in Staffordshire to express the state of intoxication, and the different degrees of it” by “T. Bakewell” in the Monthly Magazine for 1 July 1816.
14.1513 blurry: bloody (Not in Gifford) (HB 03/12): see PLURRY adj. on OED Online, where the variant form is illustrated (JS). Also:
Chambers Haldane C. Macfall, The wooings of Jezebel Pettyfer (1898), p. 174: He sighed: "No one got a blurry lantern." He dug his hands further into his pockets. "Then how the blue thunder can I find my blurry ship?"
14.1515-17 Tell a cram: for evidence for the expression since the mid-nineteenth-century see the article Telling crams
14.1531-2 Landlord, landlord, have you good wine, staboo?: Gogarty's bawdy poem "Staboo, Stabella", sung by a soldier, and beginning with these lines: "Landlord, landlord, have you good wine?/Staboo, staboo!" was not accessible before its publication by Jeffares. See also 14.314 (HB 03/12)
For the full text of Gogarty's poem see: The Poems & Plays of Oliver St. John Gogarty, ed. Norman A. Jeffares (London 2001), p. 828-30.
14.1532-3 cut and come again: Hotten's Dictionary of Modern Slang, Cant, and Vulgar Words of 1859 defines this as “plenty, if one cut does not suffice, plenty remains to "come again". This seems to be a plausible answer to the question "Landlord, landlord have you good wine [...]?"
14.1536 Bonsoir la compagnie: follow the history of the French song in the article Bonsoir la compagnie
14.1543 prandy palls: Just as "God's blood" becomes "Cot's plood" in line 1542, this is brandy balls; perhaps in imitation of a German accent. (HB 02/12)
E. Carter, The frugal cook (1851), p. 61: BRANDY BALLS. Boil your sugar as for rock [...] when sufficiently done use brandy instead of the essence of lemon, and form your balls to the proper size.
The Academy (1900), vol. 59 p. 118: [...] 'brandy balls,' great shiny golden marbles that you must pop into your mouth whole.
Mayne Reid, The headless horseman (1866), ch. xix. p. 111: 'Prandy und pitters — prandy und pitters,' repeated the German Boniface, as he hastened to place the decanter before his ill-mannered guest.
14.1546 Dusty Rhodes: see the familiar cartoon character tracked down in the article Dusty Rhodes the Popular Tramp
14.1542 Tarnally dog gone my shins if this beent the bestest puttiest longbreak: see article the bestest puttiest longbreak
14.1556-7 Unwell in his abominable regions: Joyce’s pun on “abdominal” is prefigured almost a hundred years earlier in Captain Marryat’s King's Own (1830), vol. 3, pp. 62-3:
Again the talents of the interpreter were called into action, to explain the reason why her majesty could not receive them, which he did by laying his hand across what medical men would term the abdominal region ( or, as Mrs. Ramsbottom would have said, “her abominable region" ), and informing them that the queen was not well there.
Circe
See Ronan's Crowley's Some Further Additions from Wrankmore's translation of Moritz Busch's Guide for more Circe notesheet discoveries.
For further information about the performances of the English Players and Henry Carr in Zurich, see Exit Carr.
15.40 tatts: Gifford is correct in interpreting “tats” as “tangles” (see OED tat | tatt n.6: “a tangle, matted tuft or lock of wool or hair”, citing Joyce and other sources from 1887). Joyce originally wrote “natts” (a regional variant of “knots”) (MS Buffalo V.A.19, correctly transcribed in Phillip F. Herring Joyce’s Notes and Early Drafts for Ulysses (1977), p. 211). (HB)
15.94 stag: The OED regards this as STAG n.1, sense 6 (1684-1922, citing both Joyce and Lawrence), rather than sense 7. (JS)
OED STAG n.1, sense 6: 'a big, romping girl; a bold woman'.
OED STAG n.1, sense 7: 'an informer'.
15.210 that tired feeling: Hood's Sarsaparilla advertisements as the source for the saying - see the article A tonic for that tired feeling
15.338-41 THE SOAP We're a capital couple are Bloom and I. / He brightens the earth. I polish the sky: this couplet comes from an advertisement for Brooke's soap (Monkey Brand) that shows a monkey playing guitar on the moon [HB: published in James Joyce Broadsheet No. 85, February 2010 (title page)]
We're a capital couple the Moon and I.
I polish the Earth, she brightens the sky:
And we both declare, as half the world knows,
Though a capital couple, we "WONT WASH CLOTHES"
15.442-5 Irving Bishop game: for Bishop's thought-reading entertainment in Dublin see the article Fred's Brilliant Career with Sport and the Invincibles
15.639 Once is a dose: a medical instruction since the seventeenth century traced in the article A dose of quackery
15.732-4 watching and besetting: the background to the legal phrase is explained in Unlawfully watching and/or besetting
15.760 light of love: Gifford and Slote are wrong in linking this phrase with the Elizabethan dance and an inconstant woman. The context shows that it is a Masonic term, as illustrated by these examples (HB 08/13):
... but what is that which binds together all families, all faiths, all parties, and all nations? Only Freemasonry. And why? Because all of its sons have been "brought to light" and learned the true principles of brotherhood. The light of love and of obligation, at the flat of the Worshipful Master, has flashed upon their minds and moulded them to order.
Freemason's Monthly (1877), vol. 8 p. 53
Masonry at all times carried the torch of liberty and of thought; carried always the light of love and universal tolerance to all Mankind.
Freemason (1892), vol. 29 p. 67
15.767 Bective rugger fullback: Rugby in Dublin and the Griffin family - see the article Fullback for the Bective Rangers
15.795 absentminded war: from the title of a book published in 1900 - see Absent-minded warriors
15.887 twict: Mary Driscoll accuses Bloom: "And he interfered twict with my clothing". Twict is a dialect variant of twice that betrays that, like most servant girls, she comes from a rural area. It is frequently used as "onct or twict".
... as the grandees passed up the bank, wild cheerful laughter onct or twict broke on their ear.
Anna Maria Hall, Sketches of Irish Character (1831), 2nd Ser. p. 134
She does not exaggerate her phonetic reproduction of the peculiar pronunciation of the peasantry; but is "twict" the best way to indicate that they add a t to twice?
Irish Monthly (1908), vol. 36 p. 292
Joseph Wright’s English Dialect Dictionary enters the spelling twict under TWICET, and (in 1905) notes instances of Joyce’s spelling from northern Ireland and America. (Harald Beck 11/13)
15.978 a girl who took the wrong turning: the popular melodrama The Girl Who Took the Wrong Turning, by Walter Melville, was first performed at the Standard Theatre in the East End of London on 1 October 1906. The People of 7 October noted the new play as “a fine and stirring drama, full of good thoughts and with a sterling moral” about a girl who was temporarily distracted from her absent and faithful seafaring lover by the bright lights of the city. The play was staged regularly until at least 1916, and the expression briefly entered general use
15.1104 Give him ginger: Gifford explains the practice somewhat gingerly and does not offer written evidence:
Feague, to feague a horse, to put ginger up a horse's fundament, to make him lively and carry his tail well; it is said, a forfeit is incurred by any horse dealer’s servant who shall show a horse without first feagueing him, used figuratively for encouraging or spiriting one up.
Francis Grose Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1785), at Feague
Joyce owned a copy of Grose (1785): see Thomas J. Connolly Personal Library of James Joyce (1955: University of Buffalo), p. 18. (HB 08/13)
15.1241-2 Jacobs. Vobiscuits: Gifford calls this "Bloom-Latin for Dominus vobiscum (the Lord be with you)". It seems more convincing to assume that this pun on Jacob's biscuits was inspired by “Deus Abraham, Deus Isaac, et Deus Jacob vobiscum sit” (Liber Tobiae, VII, 15), which Bloom - who distorts Father Coffey's words - might have heard at a wedding. (HB)
15.1285 Mrs Mack’s: read about the story of Mrs Mack, businesswoman and brothel-owner, in the article The Madams of Nighttown; or, a Dublin lupanarology
15.1287 Mrs Cohen’s: follow Mrs Cohen's career in the trade in prostitution in the article The Madams of Nighttown; or, a Dublin lupanarology
15.1395 grassing their royal mountain stags: this sense of "grass" represents OED's GRASS v. 4d ("to bring down (birds, game) by a shot", and not sense 2 ("to feed (cattle) on grass", "to supply (cattle) with grass").
15.1396 shooting peasants and phartridges: the humorous substituion of "peasant" for "pheasant" may be found earlier in Hogg's Weekly Instructor of 7 June 1845:
Lord had capital sport on the moors yesterday, having in the course of two hours bagged five brace of peasants.
15.1695 Free fox in a free henroost: for the German original see Free fox, free hen-roost
15.1630 solution of doubles: for a puzzle solved by a puzzle see the article Solving the doubles
15.1757 bronzed with infamy: a phrase from Blacow's sermon in Ulysses discussed in the article The irreverent Richard Blacow in Ulysses
15.1769 guiltless as the unsunned snow: another phrase from Blacow - see The irreverent Richard Blacow in Ulysses
15.1889-91 You hig, you hog, you dirty dog!: follow the surprising journey of this rhyme in Orphans in the Underworld
15.2047-8 In the grate is spread a screen of peacock feathers: the peacock screen was not unusual in the earlier twentieth century as an elegant ornament gracing a hearth (Eamonn Finn 9/13: photo credit). Octave Thanet describes one in Stories that end well (1911, p. 65):
There was a rug with a very bright and fierce-looking tiger on it before the fireplace (Mr. Marsh would have a fireplace), and Mr. Marsh's grandmother's andirons glittered behind the big peacock fan in summer time.
15.2192 Rush your order: for an expression from the world of mail order see the article Advertising patter
15.2192 slick ace: cheating playing cards explained in the article Slippery gamblers
15.2193 eternity junction: a sad story of suicide reported in the newspapers - see the article Next stop Paradise!
15.2193-4 a god or a doggone clod: follow the historical and literary contrast between gods and clods at Gods and clods
15.2205 harmonial philosophy: Joyce's brush with "Harmonial philosophy" described in the article The Great Harmonia and the music of the spheres
15.2207 sunphone: discover Thomas Shelton and his vibrations in the article Silly Sunphonies: does Jesus want me for a sunbeam?
15.2207 Bumboosers, save your stamps: an injunction that time-wasters need not apply, in the article Philately is for bumboosers
15.2277 judashand: did Joyce invent the "judashand" - for more information see The unseen judashand of the nineteenth century
15.2304 basilicogrammate: the story of the word in Greek, French, and English in the article basilicogrammate: the Egyptian royal secretary
15.2426-7 Chase me, Charley!: find the lyrics of the song at Chase me Charlie, chase me Charlie, chase me Charlie do
15.2480-2 Jacob's pipe: for more on the continental tradition of the Jacob pipe see the article The longstemmed Jacob pipe
15.2702 Thank your mother for the rabbits: find evidence for a forgotten colloquial expression in the article The rabbits that caused all the trouble
15.2708 Fingers was made before forks: Weldon Thornton (Allusions in Ulysses: 1973, p. 401) correctly alludes to Swift’s use of this traditional proverb in his Polite Conversation (1738): “Fingers were made before Forks, and Hands before Knives”. Joyce (or at least Zoe) prefers “was” for the more grammatically correct “were” (JS). This less formal variant was well established before Joyce’s time. It occurs, for example, in an article by “J. Cypress, Jr.” (William Post Hawes) in the American Monthly Magazine of 1835 (vol. 5, p. 465):
Forcibly was I reminded of that ancient and sententious maxim, "fingers was made before forks"; and of that other pleasant household phrase, "make a long arm and help yourself".
15.2817-18 cobweb hose: the thinnest material called cobweb reported in Fashionable cobwebs
15.2897-8 Stock Exchange cigar: for information on and advertisements promoting the Stock Exchange cigar see the article A good cigar is a smoke
15.3105-6 If I had only my gold piercer here!: this refers to a cigar piercer or drill, which Bella Cohen, cigar smoker, wishes she had, not to pierce her cigar, but Bloom's flesh. (John Gordon: April 2022)
15.3256 Neverrip brand: advertisements for the Neverrip brand revealed in Reliable rubber goods - perish the thought
15.3257 He cures fits!: for documentation on Henry Root's advertising slogan see the article He cures fits!
15.3259 Mrs Gus Rublin: the story of the Irish girl Sarah Mulrooney and her American boxer husband Gus Ruhlin disclosed in the article Mrs Gus Ruhlin: boxing and women's suffrage
15.3274-5 that English invention: for more on the wonder-working cure for haemorrhoids see the article That English invention: The Wonder Worker in nighttown
15.3385-7 kitefaced: for the etymological story behind "kitefaced" Nannetti read Jaundiced (kite-faced) Nannetti
15.3502 Mind your cornflowers: This is one of several allusions to people's problems with corns on their feet in Ulysses. As this poem from Thomas Haynes Bayly's novel Weeds of Witchery of 1837 shows, "cornflowers" could be used as a playful and painful pun. It is not unique to Ulysses as commentators suggest.
CORNFLOWERS
"The weather will change," cries my Lady in pain
"My feet are in torture, I'm sure there'll be rain;
The Admiral whispered he'd take me in tow
and he glanced at my feet as he said it, I know;
But now down at heel must my slipper be worn!
"T'will end in a cut! Oh, this horrible corn!"
15.3514-18 Give a thing and take it back: see Give and take is not fair play for a history of Joyce's verse
15.3655 thy father's gimlet: on the historical wordplay of Hamlet and gimlet see Gimlet sounded like poetry with Hamlet
15.3909 omlet on the belly: discover evidence of this this old practice or belief in The omelette cure.
15.4024 Anybody here for there?: railway humour explained in "Is there anybody here for there?", as the railway porter asked the passengers
15.4170 the afflicted mother: documentary evidence from Gogarty's mother to Thomas Kettle, in The afflicted mother - two letters
15.4435 human philirenists: the history of "Philirene" traced, in Philirenists: peace-loving monarchs
15.4525-30 May the God above: sources for the Citizen's bitter invective uncovered in the article A heaven-sent dove with razor-sharp teeth
15.4585-6 the king of Spain's daughter: follow the allusion, beyond the nursery rhyme, in The King of Spain's daughter
15.4612-6 Major Tweedy: for the biography of Major Powell, on whom Tweedy was based, see ‘One of Britain’s fighting men’: Major Malachi Powell and Ulysses
15.4631-4 The brave and the fair: for the development of the expression after Dryden see the article And do the brave deserve the fair?
15.4717-18 Kick the Pope: Orange anthems investigated in the article Kicking the Pope before us
Eumaeus
16.30 redolent of rotten cornjuice: As corn juice was used as a synonym for whiskey, probably cheap, bad whiskey.
Adrian (Michigan) Weekly Press (1887), 22 July: "Geo. Bains, a large man with a weak brains one afternoon last week took in too much rotten corn juice for his personal good; our marshal kindly gave him rest for the night in the cooler."
16.404-5 Buffalo Bill shoots to kill: for the history of the rhyme see Pom! he shouted twice: Some Memories of Buffalo Bill (1909) in Ulysses
16.460 I seen a crocodile bite the fluke of an anchor: follow the allusion back to its source in What make a crocodile bite the fluke of an anchor?
16.472-4 Choza de Indios. Beni, Bolivia: see the postcard Bloom examines at A postcard from Bolivia
16.487-9 Galeria Becche: for the real name of the Galeria see A galería masquerading under the name of “Becche”
16.491-4 the former’s ball passed through the latter’s hat: a duelling tale exposed in the article An Affair of Honour
16.536-8 Brown, Robinson and Co.: discover the original characters in the article Mr Brown, Mr Robinson and the average Joe
16.801 Sulphate of copper poison: for newspaper reports on the chemical preservation and enhancement of peas see the article The deleterious effect of coppersulphate on green peas
16.850 Marcella, the Midget Queen: the story of the diminutive Elizabeth Paddock, told in the article Marcella, the Midget Queen
16.865 those italianos: news about the Italian quarter of turn-of-the-century Dublin in The Italian Colony in South Dublin
16.1189 a suit of brown paper (a fact): for more on these suits in Joyce's day read Brown-paper suits in fashion
16.1242-4 Marshall's dark horse Sir Hugo: what was the connection between Robert Marshall and sir Hugo? Consult Captain Marshall's horse
16.1257 .)eatondph 1/8 ador dorador douradora: what happened when a compositor miskeyed a sentence - see article Eatondph and douradora
16.1274-81 20 to 1 Throwaway (off): discover the meaning of "off" at All bets are "off"
16.1354-9 a cottonball one: why "cottonball"? See cottonball officers and cottonball barons
16.1446-8 posed for the ensemble: discover more about the French artists' expression behind this at Altogether now for the ensemble
16.1451-5 Saint Joseph's sovereign thievery: for light on a confusing and possibly garbled passage of text read You find my words dark?
16.1498 clothed in the mantle of adultery: a quotation from one of Blacow's sermons in the article The irreverent Richard Blacow in Ulysses
16.1550-1 fair and forty: for the history of the expression see Fair and forty goes far in a day
16.1598-1603 destruction of the fittest: see post-Darwinian examples of the expression in the article The destruction of the fittest
16.1685 Iremonger: see the article Iremonger among the runs for the true state of the Nottinghamshire scoreboard
16.1884 Und alle Schiffe brücken: explore the meaning of this unlikely expression in The Jeep-crux.
Ithaca
17.103 leverage of the first kind: according to traditional mechanics, there are three kinds or orders of levers, distinguished by whether the fulcrum, the weight, or the power is in the centre. In levers of the first kind, the fulcrum is in the centre (OED at LEVER n.1 2): examples include a balance, a crowbar, and a poker. A pair of scissors consists of two levers of the first kind. (JS)
17.128-30 best Abram coal: follow the history of the advertisements and pricing for Abram coal in Dublin in The cost of coal from Flower and M'Donald
17.150 housebells: the architecture of the calling bell in Dublin's terraces explored in the article Bells to call the servants
17.240 aquacities: for the long history of aquacity see the article Aquacity: awash with watery thoughts
17.592 Bacilikil: see article Advertising names that speak to you: 1 - Bacilikil for advertisements promoting the disinfectant
17.593 Veribest: a trade-name for types of processed foodstuff brought to light in the article Advertising names that speak to you: 2 - Veribest
17.594-5 Uwantit: for aspirational uses of the name see the article Advertising names that speak to you: 3 - Uwantit
17.621-5 The queen’s Hotel, Ennis: for a possible model for Rudolph Bloom's suicide see Death in Ennis
17.868-9 Herr Hauptmann Hainau: for new information on Millie's violating ancestor see Heinous Hainau and the Blooms
17.1039 heaventree: see the article The tree of heaven for references to the real and the mythical trees
17.1253 Matthew F. Kane: an illustrated biography of a Joyce family friend presented in the article James Joyce and Matthew Kane
17.1254 Michael Hart: for the story of the talented athlete and writer see Gallant Mick Hart
17.1369 Beauties of Killarney: a book title found only on the spine described in the article Killarney's Beauties
17.1394 The Hidden Life of Christ: for another mysterious book title located see the article The Hidden Life of Christ Revealed
17.1988-9 eaters of soap: for the origins of the myth see the article Soap-eating in the Arctic
17.2000-5 missing gent: read the missing-person notice on which this flight of fancy is based, in the article A missing gent answering to the name of Bloom
17.2056 Where was Moses when the candle went out?: Bloom's answer is quite traditional, and can be traced back to at least 1821, though the riddle is older (later usually with light(s) rather than candle. The second example given here is the closest to be found to the version in Ulysses. (HB)
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine (1821), December, p. 572: "[...] like Moses when the candle went out, you find yourself once more in the dark."
Yorkshire magazine (1874), vol. 3, p. 484: "'And where was Moses when the candle went out?'
'In the dark.'"
Penelope
18.14-16 smelling my fur: find out what Joyce intended by this description in Molly’s furbelow or fur below?
18.29 to never see thy face again: new sources identified in the article Two unidentified songs in the Penelope episode
18.32-3 if it was a thing: Hiberno-English, meaning "if it was the case that"/"if it happened that" (HB). See, for example, the final verse of "Ould Ireland! you’re my darling", from the Emerald Songster section of Songs of Ireland and Other Lands (New York, 1847: p. 152):
Sweet spot of earth that gave me birth,
Deep in my soul I cherish,
While life remains within these veins,
A love that ne’er can perish.
If it was a thing that I could sing,
Like any thrush or starlin’,
In cage or tree, my song should be,
Ould Ireland! your’e [sic] my darlin’.
18.78-9 in my hand there steals another: discover the popular song behind the allusion in the article In Molly's hand there steals another
18.129-30: that American that had the squirrel: for more on the squirrel in question see Squirrel - dead or alive?
18.159-61 give us a swing out of your whiskers: see the story of this and similar expressions at The swinging whiskers
18.204-6 did you wash possible: for further information of this euphemistic expression see Washing possible is more than possible
18.398 the Spanish cavalry at La Roque: It is true that Joyce definitely refers to San Roque, a town close to Gibraltar where the Spanish population fled after the British occupation of the rock. However, Molly could not have seen the Spanish cavalry, since the Alcántara Spanish Cavalry Regiment left the town in 1823. Thus, Joycean sources for the fact were either wrong or more easily, Joyce, who was not a historian, did not pay attention to the dates. He took the information about the cavalry from Field’s book on Gibraltar.
See Adolfo Muñoz Pérez, “San Roque y su historia military: 1704-1900”. Almoraima: revista de estudios campogibraltareños (2010), pp. 207-18; Phillip F. Herring, Joyce's “Ulysses” Notesheets, p. 511, l. 45. (Rafael Garcia: April 2016)
18.446 kidfitting corsets: read advertisements for the undergarments in the article Kidfitting corsetry
18.546 the statue of the fish: Phillip F. Herring identifies the sources of Joyce’s Gibraltar references in Buffalo Notebook V.A.2 as H. M. Field’s Gibraltar (1888) and The Traveller’s Hand-book for Gibraltar (London, 1844) by “An Old Inhabitant” (see Joyce’s Notes and Early Drafts for Ulysses (1977), p. 60). Another helpfully descriptive account of the statue may be found in G. R. B. Horner’s Medical and topographical observations upon the Mediterranean (Philadelphia, 1839: pp. 67-8):
(Eamonn Finn 10/13)
Near these summer-houses is the statue of General Elliott, who distinguished himself so much during the last and celebrated siege, and that of Neptune, which was the figure head of the St Juan, a Spanish ship of the line, of one hundred and twenty guns, captured by the English. Both of these statues are of wood, but well worthy of notice. That of Neptune is admirably executed. It is of colossal size, represents him naked, with his muscular limbs well displayed, and his trident plunged into the head of a fish at his feet. This statue is highly prized, and carefully preserved by paint.
To show it to advantage it is placed over a ravine, across which is thrown a rustic bridge, much used by persons rambling about the gardens, and passing to and from the town.
18.616 wogger: see dog-allusions as nicknames in the article Molly's doggery-woggery
18.673 taittering: for Joyce's source for the term see the article Molly's taittering lips
18.731 if its a thing: see 18.32-3 above.
18.740-1 long crossed letters: for an explanation of (and attitudes to) crossed letters see Cross words for crossed letters
18.870 pure 18 carrot gold: Molly's spelling mistake (or her pun on carat/carrot) was prefigured on many occasions in the 19th century. One mid-century example comes from Sophie May’s Dotty Dimple at her grandmother's (1868), p. 65:
She had been in the habit of twirling it about her finger, and telling the little girls it was made of real "carrot gold”.
One of the earliest pieces of modern evidence uncovered to date derives from an advertisement for artificial teeth offered in a local newspaper, the Hereford Times, on 6 October 1838:
A set of the best Mineral, with Mineral Block, on 18 carrot gold plate, with springs of the same.
It should be noted, however, that before spelling became more standardised, the plural form “carrotes” (for "carats") is recorded from 1575-6 (OED).
18.871 Sandfrog showers: see Molly's sandfrog shower in Gibraltar for newspaper reports of the strange cloudbursts
18.879 Miss This Miss That Miss Theother: nineteenth-century evidence for the informal phrase presented in the article Miss This Miss That and Miss Theother
18.953 Whit Monday is a cursed day: see Bad luck arrives at Whitsuntide for more information about the myth.
18.988: will you be my man will you carry my can: a written source to confirm Gifford's note in the article Will you be my man will you carry my can
18.1089-90 one thing laughing at the other: follow the history of this expression in It's just one thing laughing at another
18.1135: wouldnt he get the great suckin: a “suck-in” is a slang term (originally American) for “a deception; a disappointing event or result” (OED) (JS). The dictionary cites “a grand suck-in” from the Short Patent Sermons (1841) of “Dow, Jr.” (Elbridge Gerry Paige), and “great suck-in” occurs on the front page of the Milwaukee Sentinal of 20 July 1844. Joyce’s expression can also be found in the Connacht Tribune of 4 December 1909 (p. 6):
I have got a great "suck-in" from Kearns, and am terribly deceived by those men who deceived me to pay £52 10s for such land as you have mentioned.
As Joyce’s text developed, he changed from “takein” to “suckin”, which gave him a wider range of contextual innuendo.
18.1292 so sweetly sang the maiden on the hawthorn bough: the sources provided for these Two unidentified songs in the Penelope episode - see the article
18.1294 Freddy Mayers private opera: find the story of Frederick Mayer, cicerone for Joseph Poole's show, in the article Freddy Mayer and Joseph Poole's Myriorama
18.1346 those fine young men I could see down in Margate strand bathingplace from the side of the rock: As Joyce's note sheet entry (Herring, p. 511) reads: "Margate on N.E. side", Ford and Field seem to be his most likely sources. Molly's memory is of Gibraltar not England. (HB)
"The North Front is a great source of comfort for the inhabitants during the summer months. The eastern beach, known commonly by the name of Margate, is the general afternoon resort. A raised Esplanade with band stand has been built, and trees planted along the main road."
Richard Ford, The handbook for travellers in Spain, vol. 2, 1890, p. 419:
"On the north the townsfolk pour out of the gates to get under the giant cliff which casts its mighty shadow across the Neutral Ground. A little farther to the east, they come to the sands of a beach, which seems so like a watering-place in dear Old England that they have christened it Margate."
Henry Martyn Field, Gibraltar, 1890, p. 134
18.1565-7 cobbles: discover cobbles of coal in the kitchen fire in the article Washing off the cobbles
Joyce Annotated (and additional glosses for Stephen Hero)
Dubliners
Alfred Hunter: see Fitz-Epsykure: the further adventures of Alfred and Marion Hunter to read more about the life and activities of Hunter
1.44-51 etc. old Cotter: see the article Edward Graham Cotter: another collector of rates? for another minor character from the Rate-Collector's Office
1.262-5 rheumatic wheels: cycling wordplay in the article Rheumatic wheels
6.45 racing tissues: for an explanation of Lenehan's racing telegrams see Sporting issues and racing tissues
8.2-6, etc. Ignatius Gallaher: the life of a Joyce family friend and Dublin newspaperman told in the article Ignatius per ignotium: the short life and extraordinary times of Fred Gallaher
8.165-7: dear dirty Dublin: an endearing expression for Dublin, but Lady Morgan's role in its coinage questioned, in the article Lady Morgan and "dear dirty Dublin"
12.395-404, etc. Mr Henchy: follow the life of another minor character at the Rate-Collector's Office in the article Robert Henchy: a choice of two collectors
12.477-80, etc. and 12.1588-92, etc. Crofton: the real life of another minor character - see James Crofton: a tradition of public service
15 Kate and Julia Morkan: see the series of articles on the Flynn family at Flynnlandia, or the rise (and fall) of the House of Usher
15 Bartell d'Arcy: the life of Bartle McCarthy, a popular tenor at the Pro-Cathedral, investigated in The man behind Bartell d'Arcy
15.4 halldoor bell: the system of calling bells operated from an ironwork device on the front railings explained in Bells to call the servants