Complete Works of James Joyce (252 page)

 
— Of course you despise the peasant because you live in the city.

 
— I don’t despise his office in the least.

 
— But you despise him — he’s not clever enough for you.

 
— Now, you know, Madden that’s nonsense. To begin with he’s as cute as a fox — try to pass a false coin on him and you’ll see. But his cleverness is all of a low order. I really don’t think that the Irish peasant represents a very admirable type of culture.

 
— That’s you all out! Of course you sneer at him because he’s not up-to-date and lives a simple life.

 
— Yes, a life of dull routine — the calculation of coppers, the weekly debauch and the weekly piety — a life lived in cunning and fear between the shadows of the parish chapel and the asylum!

 
— The life of a great city like London seems to you better?

 
— The [English] intelligence of an English city is not perhaps at a very high level but at least it is higher than the mental swamp of the Irish peasant.

 
— And what about the two as moral beings?

 
— Well?

 
— The Irish are noted for at least one virtue all the world over.

 
— Oho! I know what’s coming now!

 
— But it’s a fact — they are chaste.

 
— To be sure.

 
— You like to run down your own people at every hand’s turn but you can’t accuse them . . .

 
— Very good: you are partly right. I fully recognise that my countrymen have not yet advanced [to] as far as the machinery of Parisian harlotry because . . .

 
— Because . . . ?

 
— Well, because they can do it by hand, that’s why!

 
— Good God, you don’t mean to say you think . . .

 
— My good youth, I know what I am saying is true and so do you know it. Ask Father Pat and ask Dr Thisbody and ask Dr Thatbody. I was at school and you were at school — and that’s enough about it.

 
— O, Daedalus!

This accusation laid a silence on the conversation. Then Madden spoke:

 
— Well, if these are your ideas I don’t see what you want coming to me and talking about learning Irish.

 
— I would like to learn it — as a language, said Stephen lyingly. At least I would like to see first.

 
— So you admit you are an Irishman after all and not one of the red garrison.

 
— Of course I do.

 
— And don’t you think that every Irishman worthy of the name should be able to speak his native tongue?

 
— I really don’t know.

 
— And don’t you think that we as a race have a right to be free?

 
— O, don’t ask me such questions, Madden. You can use these phrases of the platform but I can’t.

 
— But surely you have some political opinions, man!

 
— I am going to think them out. I am an artist, don’t you see? Do you believe that I am?

 
— O, yes, I know you are.

 
— Very well then, how the devil can you expect me to settle everything all at once? Give me time.

So it was decided that Stephen was to begin a course of lessons in Irish. He bought the O’Growney’s primers published by the Gaelic League but refused either to pay a subscription to the League or to wear the badge in his buttonhole. He had found out what he had desired, namely, the class in which Miss Clery was. People at home did not seem opposed to this new freak of his. Mr Casey taught him a few Southern songs in Irish and always raised his glass to Stephen saying “Sinn Fein” instead of “Good Health.” Mrs Daedalus was probably pleased for she thought that the superintendence of priests and the society of harmless enthusiasts might succeed in influencing her son in the right direction: she had begun to fear for him. Maurice said nothing and asked no questions. He did not understand what made his brother associate with the patriots and he did not believe that the study of Irish seemed in any way useful to Stephen: but he was silent and waited. Mr Daedalus said that he did not mind his son’s learning the language so long as it did not keep him from his legitimate work.

One evening when Maurice came back from school he brought with him the news that the retreat would begin in three days’ time. This news suddenly delivered showed Stephen his position. He could hardly believe that in a year his point of view had changed so completely. Only twelve months ago he had been clamouring for forgiveness and promising endless penances. He could hardly believe that it was no other than he who had clung so fiercely to the sole means of salvation which the Church vouchsafes to her guilty children. He marvelled at the terror which had then possessed him. One evening during the retreat he asked his brother what kind of sermons the priest was giving. The two were standing together looking into the window of a stationer’s shop and it was a picture of S. Anthony in the window which had led to the question. Maurice smiled broadly as he answered:

 
— Hell today.

 
— And what kind of a sermon was it?

 
— Usual kind of thing. Stink in the morning and pain of loss in the evening.

Stephen laughed and looked at the square-shouldered boy beside him. Maurice announced facts in a dry satirical voice and his cloudy complexion did not change colour when he laughed. He made Stephen think of the pictures in ‘Silas Verney.’ His sombre gravity, his careful cleansing of his much-worn clothes, and the premature disillusionment of his manner all suggested the human vesture of some spiritual or philosophic problem transplanted from Holland. Stephen did not know in what stage the problem was and he thought it wiser to allow it its own path of solution.

 
— Do you know what the priest told us also? asked Maurice after a pause.

 
— What?

 
— He said we weren’t to have companions.

 
— Companions?

 
— That we weren’t to go for walks in the evenings with any special companions. If we wanted to take a walk, he said, a lot of us were to go together.

Stephen halted in the street and struck the palms of his hands together.

 
— What’s up with you? said Maurice.

 
— I know what’s up with them, said Stephen. They’re afraid.

 
— Of course they’re afraid, said Maurice gravely.

 
— By the bye of course you have made the retreat?

 
— O, yes. I’m going to the altar in the morning.

 
— Are you really?

 
— Tell the truth, Stephen. When mother gives you the money on Sunday to go in to short twelve in Marlboro’ St do you really go to Mass?

Stephen coloured slightly.

 
— Why do you ask that?

 
— Tell the truth.

 
— No . . . I don’t.

 
— And where do you go?

 
— O anywhere . . . about the town.

 
— So I thought.

 
— You’re a ‘cute fellow, said Stephen in a sidewise fashion. Might I ask do you go to mass yourself?

 
— O, yes, said Maurice.

They walked on [then] for a short time in silence. Then Maurice said:

 
— I have bad hearing.

Stephen made no remark.

 
— And I think I must be a little stupid.

 
— How’s that?

In his heart Stephen felt that he was condemning his brother. In this instance he could not admit that freedom from strict religious influences was desirable. It seemed to him that anyone who could contemplate the condition of his soul in such a prosaic manner was not worthy of freedom and was fit only for the severest shackles of the Church.

 
— Well today the priest was telling us a true story. It was about the death of the drunkard. The priest came in to see him and talked to him and asked him to say he was sorry and to promise to give up drink. The man felt that he was going to die in a few moments but he sat upright in the bed, the priest said, and pulled out a black bottle from under the bedclothes

 
— Well?

 
— And said “Father, if this was to be the last I was ever to drink in this world I must drink it.”

 
— Well?

 
— So he drained the bottle dry. That very moment he dropped dead, said the priest lowering his voice. “That man fell dead in the bed, stone dead. He died and went . . . “ He spoke so low that I couldn’t hear but I wanted to know where the man went so I leaned forward to hear and hit my nose a wallop against the bench in front. While I was rubbing it the fellows knelt down to say the prayer so I didn’t hear where he went. Amn’t I stupid?

Stephen exploded ill laughter. He laughed so loudly that the people who were passing turned to look at him and had to smile themselves by attraction. He put his hands to his sides and the tears almost fell out of his eyes. Every glimpse he caught of Maurice’s solemn olive-coloured face set him off on a new burst. He could say nothing between times but—”I’d have given anything to have seen it—’Father, if this was the last’ . . . and you with your mouth open. I’d have given anything to have seen it.”

The Irish class was held every Wednesday night in a back room on the second floor of a house in O’Connell St. The class consisted of six young men and three young women. The teacher was a young man in spectacles with a very sick-looking face and a very crooked mouth. He spoke in a high-pitched voice and with a cutting Northern accent. He never lost an opportunity of sneering at seoninism and at those who would not learn their native tongue. He said that Beurla was the language of commerce and Irish the speech of the soul and he had two witticisms which always made his class laugh. One was the ‘Almighty Dollar’ and the other was the ‘Spiritual Saxon.’ Everyone regarded Mr Hughes as a great enthusiast and some thought he had a great career before him as an orator. On Friday nights when there was a public meeting of the League he often spoke but as he did not know enough Irish he always excused himself at the beginning of his speech for having to speak to the audience in the language of the [gallant] ‘Spiritual Saxon.’ At the end of every speech he quoted a piece of verse. He scoffed very much at Trinity College and at the Irish Parliamentary Party. He could not regard as patriots men who had taken oaths of allegiance to the Queen of England and he could not regard as a national university an institution which did not express the religious convictions of the majority of the Irish people. His speeches were always loudly applauded and Stephen heard some of the audience say that they were sure he would be a great success at the bar. On enquiry, Stephen found that Hughes, who was the son of a Nationalist solicitor in Armagh, was a law-student at the King’s Inns.

The Irish class which Stephen attended was held in a very sparely furnished room lit [with] by a gasjet which had a broken globe. Over the mantelpiece hung the picture of a priest with a beard who, Stephen found, was Father O’Growney. It was a beginners’ class and its progress was retarded by the stupidity of two of the young men. The others in the class learned quickly and worked very hard. Stephen found it very [hard] troublesome to pronounce the gutturals but he did the best he could. The class was very serious and patriotic. The only time Stephen found it inclined to levity was at the lesson which introduced the word ‘gradh.’ The three young women laughed and the two stupid young men laughed, finding something very funny in the Irish word for ‘love’ or perhaps in the notion itself. But Mr Hughes and the other three young men and Stephen were all very grave. When the excitement of the word had passed Stephen’s attention was attracted to the younger of the stupid young men who was still blushing violently. His blush continued for such a long time that Stephen began to feel nervous. The young man grew more and more confused and what was worst was that he was making all this confusion for himself for no-one in the class but Stephen seemed to have noticed him. He continued so till the end of the hour never once daring to raise his eyes from his book and when he had occasion to use his handkerchief he did so stealthily with his left hand.