--Professor Magennis was speaking to me about you, J. J. O'Molloy said to
Stephen. What do you think really of that hermetic crowd, the opal hush
poets: A. E. the mastermystic? That Blavatsky woman started it. She was a
nice old bag of tricks. A. E. has been telling some yankee interviewer
that you came to him in the small hours of the morning to ask him about
planes of consciousness. Magennis thinks you must have been pulling
A. E.'s leg. He is a man of the very highest morale, Magennis.

Speaking about me. What did he say? What did he say? What did he
say about me? Don't ask.

--No, thanks, professor MacHugh said, waving the cigarettecase aside.
Wait a moment. Let me say one thing. The finest display of oratory I ever
heard was a speech made by John F Taylor at the college historical
society. Mr Justice Fitzgibbon, the present lord justice of appeal, had
spoken and the paper under debate was an essay (new for those days),
advocating the revival of the Irish tongue.

He turned towards Myles Crawford and said:

--You know Gerald Fitzgibbon. Then you can imagine the style of his
discourse.

--He is sitting with Tim Healy, J. J. O'Molloy said, rumour has it, on
the Trinity college estates commission.

--He is sitting with a sweet thing, Myles Crawford said, in a child's
frock. Go on. Well?