James Joyce

Ulysses James Joyce

Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on whicha mirror and a razor lay crossed. A yellow dressinggown, ungirdled, was sustained gentlybehind him on the mild morning air. He held the bowl aloft and intoned: -Introibo ad altare Dei. Halted, he peered down the dark winding stairs and called out coarsely: -Come up, Kinch! Come up, you fearful jesuit!Solemnly he came forward and mounted the round gunrest. He faced about and blessedgravely thrice the tower, the surrounding land and the awaking mountains. Then, catchingsight of Stephen Dedalus, he bent towards him and made rapid crosses in the air, gurglingin his throat and shaking his head. Stephen Dedalus, displeased and sleepy, leaned his armson the top of the staircase and looked coldly at the shaking gurgling face that blessed him, equine in its length, and at the light untonsured hair, grained and hued like pale oak. Buck Mulligan peeped an instant under the mirror and then covered the bowl smartly.-Back to barracks! he said sternly. He added in a preacher's tone: -For this, O dearly beloved, is the genuine Christine: body and soul and blood and ouns. Slow music, please. Shut your eyes, gents. One moment. A little trouble about those whitecorpuscles. Silence,