disposition in re the real and personal estate of the late lamented Jacob Halliday, vintner, deceased, versus Livingstone, an infant, of unsound mind, and another.  And to the solemn court of Green street there came sir Frederick the Falconer.  And he sat him there about the hour of five o’clock to administer the law of the brehons at the commission for all that and those parts to be holden in and for the county of the city of Dublin.  And there sat with him the high sinhedrim of the twelve tribes of Iar, for every tribe one man, of the tribe of Patrick and of the tribe of Hugh and of the tribe of Owen and of the tribe of Conn and of the tribe of Oscar and of the tribe of Fergus and of the tribe of Finn and of the tribe of Dermot and of the tribe of Cormac and of the tribe of Kevin and of the tribe of Caolte and of the tribe of Ossian, there being in all twelve good men and true.  And he conjured them by Him who died on rood that they should well and truly try and true deliverance make in the issue joined between their sovereign lord the king and the prisoner at the bar and true verdict give according to the evidence so help them God and kiss the book.  And they rose in their seats, those twelve of Iar, and they swore by the name of Him Who is from everlasting that they would do His rightwiseness.  And straightway the minions of the law led forth from their donjon keep one whom the sleuthhounds of justice had apprehended in consequence of information received.  And they shackled him hand and foot and would take of him ne bail ne mainprise but preferred a charge against him for he was a malefactor.

—­Those are nice things, says the citizen, coming over here to Ireland filling the country with bugs.

So Bloom lets on he heard nothing and he starts talking with Joe, telling him he needn’t trouble about that little matter till the first but if he would just say a word to Mr Crawford.  And so Joe swore high and holy by this and by that he’d do the devil and all.

—­Because, you see, says Bloom, for an advertisement you must have repetition.  That’s the whole secret.

—­Rely on me, says Joe.

—­Swindling the peasants, says the citizen, and the poor of Ireland.  We want no more strangers in our house.

—­O, I’m sure that will be all right, Hynes, says Bloom.  It’s just that Keyes, you see.

—­Consider that done, says Joe.

—­Very kind of you, says Bloom.

—­The strangers, says the citizen.  Our own fault.  We let them come in.  We brought them in.  The adulteress and her paramour brought the Saxon robbers here.

—­Decree Nisi, says J. J.

And Bloom letting on to be awfully deeply interested in nothing, a spider’s web in the corner behind the barrel, and the citizen scowling after him and the old dog at his feet looking up to know who to bite and when.

—­A dishonoured wife, says the citizen, that’s what’s the cause of all our misfortunes.