"Phew!"

(9.2-11.3)  As I picked up in the tour of the Wellington Museum, I settled in to watch Joyce's dream-vision of the Battle of Waterloo, which begins with a volley of insults between Wellington and Napoleon.  Napoleon's three male soldiers and two "jinnies" essentially act as the messengers.  The battle then breaks out.  Eventually the jinnies retreat, and Wellington takes advantage of this opportunity to pull out his telescope to watch the two women.  Napoleon's three soldiers approach Wellington, who picks up the remaining half of Napoleon's hat from the battlefield and hangs it on the rear end of his horse (which is named Copenhagen) as a final insult.  

With the museum tour nearing its conclusion, we begin to understand its significance, for we see a dream reversal of Waterloo when one of Napoleon's soldiers, angered by this final insult, shoots Wellington's horse.  It is here in the museum -- which is located on the site of Finnegan's fall in Phoenix Park -- that we see Wellington's fall.  Wellington, in turn, stands for HCE, for Wellington's fall -- "How Copenhagen ended." -- foreshadows how HCE will fall when three soldiers catch him ogling two women in this same park.

The museum scene ends with Kathe guiding the visitors to the exit:  "Mind your boots goan out."  Once we're safely outside, there's a one-word paragraph -- "Phew!" -- which feels like Joyce giving everyone a chance to catch their collective breath.  We haven't left the idea of war behind, though, as the park outside bears the scars (and corpses: there's the phrase "Skud ontorsed." that I read as skull un-torso-ed) of battle.  Today's passage ends with Joyce noting the horrors of war with a sense of jovial resignation: "Wail, 'tis well!"

Once again, I've found the material in these two pages to be much more easily digestible on the second and subsequent readings after having consulted my secondary materials.  It's also helping that I'm developing the instinct to watch for the themes/overarching figures that Joyce has been setting up since the first page, e.g., three men/two women, HCE, and ALP.  Only good news today:  As I continue to flail through Joyce's Wake, I feel increasingly compelled to push further in (rather than to swim out).