Page 280 (12.1-28) "I was just... for trading"

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I was just passing the time of day with old Troy of the D.M.P. at the corner of Arbour hill there and be damned but a bloody sweep came along and he near drove his gear into my eye. I turned around to let him have the weight of my tongue when who should I see dodging along Stony Batter only Joe Hynes.

1:31 "Troy: liege bailiff's LB got in wooden horse"

44yo in 1901

collision

eyes

('chimney sweep' requires a circumlocution like volcano-fire-pipe-dash-litter-shower-caduceus)

it was Hynes on p107 who got McIntosh's name wrong, and who on p115 owes Bloom 3 shillings ("dodging" suggests dodging creditors)

1909 map
streetview now


— Lo, Joe, says I. How are you blowing? Did you see that bloody chimneysweep near shove my eye out with his brush?

the 1st of 39 "says I"s in the episode


— Soot's luck, says Joe. Who's the old ballocks you were talking to?

chimney sweeps were said to be good luck


— Old Troy, says I, was in the force. I'm on two minds not to give that fellow in charge for obstructing the thoroughfare with his brooms and ladders.

factually neither old nor retired
Troy:narrator::57C:Corny

(ladder to get onto roof)


— What are you doing round those parts? says Joe.



— Devil a much, says I. There is a bloody big foxy thief beyond by the garrison church at the corner of Chicken Lane— old Troy was just giving me a wrinkle about him— lifted any God's quantity of tea and sugar to pay three bob a week said he had a farm in the county Down off a hop of my thumb by the name of Moses Herzog over there near Heytesbury street.

(why not 'There's'? implied italics for "is"?)

1909 map

(diagram this sentence)

58yo in 1901

— Circumcised? says Joe.

for Hynes, apparently, welshing on a debt to a Jew is less serious


— Ay, says I. A bit off the top. An old plumber named Geraghty. I'm hanging on to his taw now for the past fortnight and I can't get a penny out of him.

'A little bit off the top' ♬ and ♬ [lyrics]
['dirty' alternate] to tune of When Johnny Comes Marching Home

"taw" is ambiguous, maybe 'whip' or maybe 'marble' as on p74: "Near the timberyard a squatted child at marbles, alone, shooting the taw with a cunnythumb."



— That the lay you're on now? says Joe.



— Ay, says I. How are the mighty fallen! Collector of bad and doubtful debts. But that's the most notorious bloody robber you'd meet in a day's walk and the face on him all pockmarks would hold a shower of rain. Tell him, says he, I dare him, says he, and I doubledare him to send you round here again or if he does, says he, I'll have him summonsed up before the court, so I will, for trading

Nameless has been reduced to debt collector

"shower of rain" faintly echoes LB's thoughts on p87: "A raindrop spat on his hat. He drew back and saw an instant of shower spray dots over the grey flags. Apart. Curious. Like through a colander."

"doubledare" is infantile

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