VIRAG Perfectly logical from his standpoint. Fall of man. (Harshly， his pupils waxing.) To hell with the pope！ Nothing new under the sun. I am the Virag who disclosed the sex secrets of monks and maidens. Why I left the Church of Rome. Read the Priest， the Woman and the Confessional. Penrose. Flipperty Jippert. (He wriggles.) Woman， undoing with sweet pudor her belt of rushrope， offers her allmoist yoni to man's lingam. Short time after man presents woman with pieces of jungle meat. Woman shows joy and covers herself with featherskins. Man loves her yoni fiercely with big lingam， the stiff one. (He cries.) Coactus volui. Then giddy woman will run about. Strong man grasps woman's wrist. Woman squeals， bites， spucks. Man， now fierce angry， strikes woman's fat yadgana. (He chases his tail.) Piffpaff！ Popo！ (He stops， sneezes.) Pchp！ (He worries his butt.) Prrrrrht！

LYNCH I hope you gave the good father a penance. Nine glorias for shooting a bishop.

ZOE (Spouts walrus smoke through her nostrils.) He couldn't get a connection. Only， you know， sensation. A dry rush.

BLOOM Poor man！

ZOE (Lightly.) Only for what happened him.

BLOOM How？

VIRAG (A diabolic rictus of black luminosity contracting his visage， cranes his scraggy neck forward. He lifts a mooncalf nozzle and howls.) Verfluchte Goim！ He had a father， forty fathers. He never existed. Pig God！ He had two left feet. He was Judas Iacchias， a Libyan eunuch， the pope's bastard. (He leans out on tortured forepaws， elbows bent rigid， his eye agonising in his flat skullneck and yelps over the mute world.) A son of a whore. Apocalypse.

KITTY And Mary Shortall that was in the lock with the pox she got from Jimmy Pidgeon in the blue caps had a child off him that couldn't swallow and was smothered with the convulsions in the mattress and we all subscribed for the funeral.

PHILIP DRUNK (Gravely.) Qui vous a mis dans cette fichue position， Philippe？

PHILIP SOBER (Gaily.) C'était le sacré pigeon， Philippe.

(Kitty unpins her hat and sets it down calmly， patting her henna hair. And a prettier， a daintier head of winsome curls was never seen on a whores shoulders. Lynch puts on her hat. She whips it off.)LYNCH (Laughs.) And to such delights has Metchnikoff inoculated anthropoid apes.

FLORRY (Nods.) Locomotor ataxy.

ZOE (Gaily.) O， my dictionary.

LYNCH Three wise virgins.

VIRAG (Agueshaken， profuse yellow spawn foaming over his bony epileptic lips.) She sold lovephiltres， whitewax， orange flower. Panther， the Roman centurion， polluted her with his genitories. (He sticks out a flickering phosphorescent scorpion tongue， his hand on his fork.) Messiah！ He burst her tympanum. (With gibbering baboon's cries he jerks his hips in the cynical spasm.) Hik！ Hek！ Hak！ Hok！ Huk！ Kok！ Kuk！

(Ben Jumbo Dollard， rubicund， musclebound， hairynostrilled， hugebearded， cabbageeared， shaggychested， shockmaned， fatpapped， stands forth， his loins and genitals tightened into a pair of black bathing bagslops.)BEN POLLARD (Nakkering castanet bones in his huge padded paws， yodels jovially in base barreltone.) When love absorbs my ardent soul.

(The virgins， Nurse Callan and Nurse Quigley， burst through the ringkeepers and the ropes and mob him with open arms.)THE VIRGINS (Gushingly.) Big Ben！ Ben MacChree！

A VOICE Hold that fellow with the bad breeches.

BEN DOLLARD (Smites his thigh in abundant laughter.) Hold him now.

HENRY (Caressing on his breast a severed female head， murmurs.) Thine heart， mine love. (He plucks his lutestrings.) When first I saw.

VIRAG (Sloughing his skins， his multitudinous plumage moulting.) Rats！ (He yawns； showing a coalblack throat and closes his jaws by an upward push of his parchment roll.) After having said which I took my departure. Farewell. Fare thee well. Dreck！

(Henry Flower combs his moustache and beard rapidly with a pocketcomb and gives a cows lick to his hair. Steered by his rapier， he glides to the door his wild had slung behind him. Virag reaches the door in two ungainly stilthops， his tail cocked， and deftly claps sideways on the wall a pusyellow flybill， butting it with his head.)THE FLYBILL K. 11. post no bills. Strictly confidential. Dr Hy Franks.

HENRY All is lost now.

(Virag unscrews his head in a trice and holds it under his arm.)VIRAG'S HEAD Quack！

(Exeunt severally.)

STEPHEN (Over his shoulder to Zoe.) You would have preferred the fighting parson who founded the protestant error. But beware Antisthenes， the dog sage， and the last end of Anus Heresiarchus. The agony in the closet.

LYNCH All one and the same God to her.

STEPHEN (Devoutly.) And Sovereign Lord of all things.

FLORRY (To Stephen.) I'm sure you are a spoiled priest. Or a monk.

LYNCH He is. A Cardinal's son.

STEPHEN Cardinal sin. Monks of the screw.

(His Eminence， Simon Stephen Cardinal Dedalus， Primate of all Ireland， appears in the doorway， dressed in red soutane， sandals and socks. Seven dwarf simian acolytes， also in red， cardinal sins， uphold his train， peeping under it. He wears a battered silk hat sideways on his head. His thumbs are stuck in his armpits and his palms outspread. Round his neck hangs a rosary of corks ending on his breast in a corkscrew cross. Releasing his thumbs， he invokes grace from on high with lace wave gestures and proclaims with bloated pomp.)THE CARDINAL

Conservio lies captured.

He lies in the lowest dungeon

With manacles and chains around his limbsWeighing upwards of three tons.

(He looks at all for a moment， his right eye closed tight， his left cheek puffed out. Then， unable to repress his merriment， he rocks to and fro， ads akimbo， and sings with broad rollicking humour.) O， the poor little fellow Hi-hi-hi-hi-his legs they were yellow He was plump， fat and heavy and brisk as a snake But some bloody savage To graize his white cabbage He murdered Nell Flaherty's duckloving drake.