Happy Bloomsday!

He had spoken himself into boldness. Stephen, shielding the gaping wounds which the words had left in his heart, said very coldly:

— I am not thinking of the offence to my mother.

— Of what, then? Buck Mulligan asked.

— Of the offence to me, Stephen answered.

Buck Mulligan swung round on his heel.

— O, an impossible person! he exclaimed.

He walked off quickly round the parapet. Stephen stood at his post, gazing over the calm sea towards the headland. Sea and headland now grew dim. Pulses were beating in his eyes, veiling their sight, and he felt the fever of his cheeks.

A voice within the tower called loudly:

— Are you up there, Mulligan?

— I’m coming, Buck Mulligan answered.

He turned towards Stephen and said:

— Look at the sea. What does it care about offences? Chuck Loyola, Kinch, and come on down. The Sassenach wants his morning rashers.

His head halted again for a moment at the top fo the staircase, level with the roof.

— Don’t mope over it all day, he said. I’m incosequent. Give up the moody brooding.

His head vanished but the drone of his descending voice boomed out of the stairhead:

And no ore turn aside and brood
Upon love’s bitter mystery
For Fergus rules the brazen cars.

Woodshadows floated silently by through the morning peace from the stairhead seaward where he gazed. Inshore and farther out the mirror of water whitened, spurned by lightshod hurrying feet. White breast of the dim sea. The twining stresses, two by two. A hand plucking the harpstrings, merging their twining chords. Wavewhite wedded words shimmering on the dim tide.