- "I
think
I'll
turn
meself
to
good
works,"
she
told
John.
"God
in
his
mercy
help
the
poor
and
needy,"
thought
John,
for
his
wife
had
no
patience
at
all,
and
a
tongue
that
would
take
a
splint
from
a
horse's
leg.
[Chapter
1,
p. 13]
- Mr
Mullins's
long
ambition
had
been
to
grow
fine
tresses
of
hair
at
the
sides
of
his
clean-shaven
face.
He
had
seen
pictures
of
the
English
parliament
which
looked
like
an
acre
of
seaweed.
Even
in
Ireland
the
dandies
swanked
about
between
feathery
sideburns
so
long
they
sometimes
blew
over
the
curly
brims
of
their
hats.
Mr
Mullins's
master
had
such
dundrearies,
and
he
took
jealous
care
that
none
of
his
servants
sprouted
any
of
the
same.
[Chapter
2,
p. 25]
- [...]
a
tall
hat
like
an
unlicked
cat.
[Chapter
2,
p. 27]
- "I
could
no
sooner
have
been
engaged
to
you
for
years
than
fly,"
she
confessed
to
John.
"Either
I
would
have
gone
off
with
someone
else
or
we
would
have
had
three
christenings
before
the
wedding
bells."
John
was
more
prudish
than
she,
but
agreed
that
might
well
have
been
the
case.
"Still,
not
everyone's
a
gladiator
like
you,
lovie,"
he
whispered.
Eny
pummeled
him,
cherishing
him
body
and
soul
and
anything
else
left
over.
[Chapter
3,
p. 56]
- The
bridegroom
was
godless
and
virulently
anti-Papist.
Rowena
was
aghast
to
hear
that
he
had
ripped
the
Sacred
Heart
off
the
wall
and
used
the
frame
to
enclose
the
photograph
of
a
racehorse.
She
was
more
aghast
to
learn
that
Mrs
Capper
had
thrown
her
religion
overboard
and
wed
in
a
registry
office.
She
was
an
agreeable
heap
who
would
have
done
anything
for
a
quiet
life,
but
Eny
raved
on
as
if
Mrs
Capper
had
driven
the
last
nail,
blunt
at
that,
into
Him
on
the
Cross.
[Chapter
3,
p. 61]
- "Pardon
me,"
she
said
winningly,
"but
you
have
something
stuck
on
your
lip."
Hugh's
moustache
was
dear
to
his
heart.
It
was
not
a
moustached
era;
he
had
to
put
up
with
a
lot
of
slack
from
his
friends.
He
reacted
as
any
other
man
of
Irish
blood
would
have
done;
he
slipped
a
riposte
between
her
ribs.
"Isn't
it
fine
that
your
eyesight
is
so
good
at
your
age,
missus?"
Eny's
eyes
sparkled.
She
had
a
liking
for
him
from
that
moment
[...]
[Chapter
4,
p. 72]
- "Not
a
word
about
the
Pope,
Mr
Hatch,"
advised
Eny.
"This
is
a
happy
day
for
us
all,
and
God
knows
I
don't
want
to
send
you
home
with
a
broken
nose."
[Chapter
5,
p. 95]
- Now
Hughie
had,
long
ago,
been
a
shearer's
cook,
and
could
make
a
curry
hot,
sweet
and
luscious,
with
surprising
bits
of
chopped-up
date,
green
peaches,
and
sliced
banana
floating
mysteriously
in
it.
And
he
could
make
soup,
and
brownie,
and
the
curiously
named
sea
pie,
which
is
nothing
more
than
a
stew
with
an
oversized
dumpling
roofing
it.
But,
best
of
all,
he
could
make
a
boiled
pudding,
dark
as
midnight
and
rich
as
Persia,
and
containing
so
many
dates,
prunes,
cherries,
sultanas,
and
currants,
that,
as
Hughie
himself
modestly
said:
"You
couldn't
spit
between
them."
[Chapter
5,
p. 236]
- "You
should
have
come
down
and
had
Christmas
dinner
with
us.
We
had
a
chook
but
it
was
as
hard
as
a
football."
[Chapter
6,
p. 253]
- The
doctor
was
a
strangely
cubic
creature,
with
his
white
jacket
falling
in
still
perpendicular
folds,
and
his
nose
and
cheeks
all
following
the
same
straight
up-and-down
patterns.
[Chapter
12,
p. 321]
- "And
if
the
whole
world's
got
nothing
better
to
do
than
to
laugh
at
a
little
child's
ignorance,
then
it's
time
it
was
boiled
down
for
glue,"
she
cried.
[Chapter
14,
p. 338]
- "I
tell
you,
he
comes
nearly
every
night,"
said
Patrick
Diamond.
"And
the
poor
coot
thinks
the
world
of
her.
He'd
give
her
the
eyes
out
of
his
head
to
play
marbles
with."
"And
she'd
do
it
too,"
agreed
Hughie,
"for
she's
just
like
them
old
dames
who
used
to
sit
around
the
guillotine
waiting
for
the
heads
to
fall
so
that
they
could
cart
them
off
to
make
soup
of
them."
"Now,
you're
wrong
there,
Hughie
man,"
protested
Patrick,
to
whom
the
breath
of
life
was
returning.
"Sure
there's
no
one
in
the
world,
not
even
the
French,
who
would
make
soup
of
a
human
being's
nob."
"Miss
Sheily's
that
sort,"
said
Hugh
decisively.
[...]
[Chapter
15,
p. 356]
- Mumma
cried
like
anything
when
the
shining-eyed
Roie
told
her
that
she
and
Charlie
Rothe
were
to
be
married,
but
she
did
not
allow
Roie
to
see
her
tears.
She
kept
them
for
the
night,
robbing
Hughie
of
sleep,
so
that
he
spent
hour
after
hour
explosively
swearing
and
thanking
God
audibly
that
he
had
only
two
children
to
get
married
off
with
such
fuss
and
clatter.
"I
wish
Grandma
was
here
to
advise
me,"
wept
Mumma.
"She'd
tell
you
to
stop
roaring
like
a
runover
baboon,"
cried
Hughie
furiously
[...]
[Chapter
16,
p. 357]
- "We'll
have
to
get
you
a
nice
red
dress
for
the
wedding.
A
nice
red
dress."
"Sure,
I'd
look
like
a
house
in
red,"
protested
Mumma,
secretly
pleased
that
he
had
suggested
such
a
bold
and
flashing
colour.
"Black's
right
for
stout
people."
"Not
black,"
cried
Hughie.
"I
won't
have
my
wife
looking
like
a
morepork's
widow."
This
pleased
him,
and
he
lay
there
chuckling
for
some
minutes,
repeating
"morepork's
widow".
[...]
[Chapter
16,
p. 357-358]
- [...]
The
room
was
as
clean
as
a
scrubbing
brush
could
make
worn
and
hideous
linoleum,
and
a
manilla
broom
the
crude
blue
kalsomined
walls.
The
bed
sagged
forlornly
in
the
middle,
and
the
blankets
were
stained
with
tea
and
coffee
and
a
dozen
other
unanalysable
things.
But
it
was
no
worse
than
a
thousand
other
lodgings
in
Surry
Hills;
it
was
a
lot
better
than
Charlie's
present
room.
It
had
a
door
which
locked,
and
it
had
a
window
which
looked
out
on
the
alleyway
which
ran
down
beside
the
house,
and,
across
that,
into
three
crammed
and
hideous
backyards
full
of
garbage
cans,
tomcats,
and
lavatories
with
swinging
broken
doors
and
rusty
buckled
tin
roofs.
But
these
were
all
things
they
were
used
to.
They
didn't
mean
anything
to
Roie
and
Charlie.
A
stranger
in
this
attic
room
would
have
withered
and
died
with
the
sheer
ugliness
and
sordidness
and
despair
of
it;
but
to
Roie
and
Charlie
it
was
a
room
of
their
own.
[Chapter
17,
p. 366]
- [...]
The
hairdresser
did
her
best
with
it,
but
Mumma
came
out
of
the
shop
with
a
sort
of
electrified
bolster
on
top
of
her
head.
[...]
"I
been
permed,"
began
Mumma,
with
a
piteous
attempt
at
dignity.
Hughie
laughed
until
he
nearly
fell
on
the
floor.
Roie
came
out
of
the
scullery
and
cried:
"Don't
you
mind
him,
Mumma.
All
perms
are
funny
for
a
while.
Yours'll
be
good.
You
see."
[...]
So
she
washed
it
twice
a
day
until
the
wedding
day
came,
and
by
that
time
it
had
only
a
flyaway
fluffy
effect,
which
Mumma
privately
thought
youthful,
and
indeed
beguilling.
It
made
her
very
happy.
[Chapter
17,
p. 368-9]
- [...]
Mumma!
How
should
she
know
what
her
daughter
was
capable
of
feeling?
Her
life
had
only
been
housework,
and
babies,
and
trouble.
Nothing
like
the
glamourous,
golden,
and
misty
life
which
stretched
out
before
Dolour
Darcy.
She
drifted
in
and
began
handing
around
cups
of
tea,
gobbling
a
tomato
sandwhich
meantime,
for
love
had
not
affected
her
appetite.
[Chapter
21,
p. 403]
- The
Irish
in
these
people
was
like
an
old
song,
remembered
only
by
the
blood
that
ran
deep
and
melancholy
in
veins
for
two
generations
Australian.
The
great
tree,
kernelled
in
the
rich
dust
of
Patrick
and
Columbanus,
Finn
and
Brian,
and
Sheena
of
the
unforgotten
hair
--
the
tree
whose
boughs
had
torn
aside
the
mist
of
Ultima
Thule
bore
in
this
sun-drowned
southern
land
leaves
in
which
the
sap
welled
sharp,
sweet,
as
any
on
Galway
quay,
or
the
market
at
Moneymore.
The
great
music
that
had
clanged
across
the
world,
of
lion
voice
of
missionary,
of
sword
and
stylus;
the
music
that
spoke
aloud
in
the
insurrections,
in
the
holds
where
the
emigrants
sweltered
in
vermin
and
hunger
--
this
music
was
heard
in
Plymouth
Street,
Surry
Hills,
and
was
unrecognised.
For
how
could
Hughie
Darcy,
stumbling
up
that
street
in
the
dusk,
with
the
wind
blowing
dead
leaves
about
his
feet,
and
in
his
heart
the
helpless,
defenceless
despair
that
comes
after
drunkenness,
know
that
what
he
sought
his
forefathers
sought,
and
equally
misdirectedly?
The
rainbow
that
never
ended
anywhere,
the
unbeatable
conviction
that
somewhere,
sometime,
things
would
be
better
without
his
bothering
his
head
to
make
them
so.
[Chapter
2,
p. 417]
- [...]
"She
always
did
have
a
tongue
in
her
head
that
would
scare
the
hair
off
a
coconut."
"Don't
go
poking
borax
at
the
dead,"
remonstrated
Mumma
[...]
[Chapter
9,
p. 491]
- "Listen,"
said
Charlie.
Mumma
put
the
black
earphone
of
the
crystal
set
to
her
ear,
and
Spike
Jones
made
her
hair
lift.
An
astonished,
delighted
grin
spread
over
her
face.
"Ain't
it
clever!
Lord,
fancy
that!"
Dolour
was
overcome
by
the
sight
of
her
present,
but
she
did
not
know
how
to
thank
Charlie.
She
put
her
ear
to
the
black
plastic
circle,
and
a
minute
budgerigar
voice
assured
her
of
everlasting
glamour
if
she
used
R-O-S-E-B-U-D
soap.
[Chapter
10,
p. 504]
- Mumma
thought
nothing
of
this.
She
was
dead
scared
of
fresh
air
blowing
on
babies.
They
swallowed
the
wind,
she
said,
and
belched
themselves
blue
in
the
face
for
days
afterwards.
They
had
to
be
well-wrapped
all
the
time,
and
taken
outside
only
when
necessary.
In
Mumma's
babyhood,
in
the
emigrant
days
of
fifty
years
before,
babies
had
always
been
kept
in
a
room
with
a
fire,
where
they
could
get
a
good
warm
[...]
[Chapter
16,
p. 571]
- [...]
She
twisted
around
and
stared
up
at
the
choir-loft,
and
there
was
Mr
Siciliano
leaning
over,
looking
with
beaming
interest
at
the
latecomers.
He
had
once
been
slender
and
romantic
with
hair
like
black
Florentine
silk,
but
now
he
had
an
equator,
and
a
bald
spot
from
which
radiated
locks
grey
and
straight,
except
at
the
ends
where
they
kinked
desperately
in
memory
of
the
old
days.
There
was
Michaelangelo
at
the
altar,
and
in
the
front
row
were
Rosina
and
Violetta
in
their
Children
of
Mary
blue
cloaks
and
over
with
the
Holy
Name
Society
was
Gio
making
big
black
sparkling
eyes
at
the
girls,
and
towards
the
back
was
Mama,
with
Tonetta,
expecting
a
child
herself,
helping
her
to
keep
an
eye
on
Julio,
Alberto,
and
Redempta,
and
Van,
who
was
named
after
Mama's
favourite
film
star.
"This
next
bambino,"
thought
Mr
Siciliano,
"we
call
him
Finito,
and
perhaps
God
tak-a
the
hint."
[Chapter
21,
p. 638-639]
- [..]
For
once
Motty
had
stayed
clean,
and
for
the
moment
her
little
face
looked
like
an
Italian
angel's,
as
richly
coloured
as
wine.
Mumma
held
her
hand
so
tightly
that
Motty
was
compelled
to
direct
her
energies
in
subtle
directions.
She
sneaked
a
piece
of
chalk
out
of
her
pocket
and
began
furtively
to
draw
cats
on
the
skirt
of
the
woman
standing
in
front
of
her.
[...]
"God
bless
'er,"
said
Mamma.
"She's
a
bad
woman,
but
she's
done
more
good
than
a
lot
who'd
like
to
think
God's
got
a
pair
of
wings
on
the
hook
for
them."
She
spotted
the
red
hieroglyphics
on
the
skirt
of
the
woman
near
by
and,
full
of
horror,
dragged
Motty
away
and
up
the
street
before
she
was
discovered.
"And
you
just
after
going
to
Christmas
Mass
and
seeing
the
little
Baby
in
the
crib
and
everything,"
she
scolded.
"Just
wait
till
the
Sisters
get
you
in
their
dear
kind
hands
when
school
opens,"
she
added
pleasurably.
A
look
of
inward
absorption
came
over
Motty's
face.
She
had
inspected
the
Sisters
minutely
as
they
filed
into
church,
and
it
seemed
to
her
that
they
had
stomachs
to
be
kicked
just
like
anyone
else.
[Chapter
21,
p. 641-643]
- "I
brought
a
little
something,
Mr
Darcy,
for
your
kindness,"
he
said,
tendering
a
long
parcel.
It
was
two
bottle
of
the
cheapest,
most
potent
port,
which
he
had
bought
out
of
the
remains
of
the
six
pounds
he
had
earned
the
previous
week
when
the
Council,
out
of
the
carity
of
its
heart,
had
put
old-age
pensioners
to
a
week's
sweeping
of
paths
and
weeding
of
parks.
The
rest
of
the
money
Mr
Reilly
had
put
towards
an
interesting
purchase
which
he
intended
to
use
at
the
very
end
of
his
life.
"I
don't
want
any
of
your
porpoises'
coffins,"
he
often
said
to
himself,
his
little
chin
trembling
with
pride.
"God,
keep
the
man!"
roared
Hughie
now,
and
he
kissed
the
bottles
resoundingly
on
their
cool
smooth
side.
Mumma
sniffed.
She
slapped
down
the
last
plate
and
said
gallantly,
"Well,
Merry
Christmas,
Mr
Reilly,
I'm
sure."
At
the
sight
of
the
steaming
food
Mr
Reilly's
eyes
watered,
and
a
piercing
arpeggio
sounded
from
under
his
waistcoat.
"And
plenty
to
fill
that
little
tin-can,
too,"
said
Hughie
cordially.
They
all
sat
down
in
the
dizzy
heat,
with
Motty
sitting
between
Dolour
and
Mumma,
and
fixing
baleful
eyes
on
Mr
Reilly,
who
dropped
his
gaze
to
his
plate.
He
was
terrified
of
Motty.
She
reached
out
with
her
short
legs
as
far
as
she
could,
but
Mr
Reilly
had
tucked
his
underneath
the
chair.
Dolour
gave
her
a
sideways
glare,
which
Motty
understood
perfectly.
[Chapter
21,
p. 645]
- Christmas
had
been
a
bad
one
for
Hughie,
and
there
was
an
indigestible
lump
inside
him
not
caused
entirely
by
Mumma's
cooking.
[Chapter
21,
p. 652]
- Almost
with
a
shock
Dolour
watched
Lick
Jimmy's
papery
fingers
putting
the
jar
of
purple
immortelles
into
his
window.
So
it
was
winter
again.
Once
the
seasons
had
been
to
her
as
the
slow
turning
of
a
book's
pages,
each
with
its
unique
delights
and
troubles.
But
this
last
half-year
had
gone
like
a
dream,
and
she
realized
with
ache
that
it
was
because
she
had
grown
up.
There
were
so
many
things
to
think
of
that
she
hadn't
noticed
the
bed-bugs
sluggishly
sidling
into
cracks
and
crannies
for
their
cold-weather
hibernation,
or
the
wet-stains
on
the
walls
growing
green-velvety
with
renaissant
fungus,
or
Mikey
in
the
house
all
the
time
because
he
couldn't
play
in
the
flooded
yard.
It
was
winter
again,
and
at
the
thought
the
piercing,
dusty
wind
whipping
up
Plymouth
Street
seemed
to
gain
an
added
shrill
bitterness.
[Chapter
22,
p. 663]