"As Great Shapesphere puns it."

(294.5-296.7)  The passage for today begins with Kevin performing a bit of math work:  "I bring down noth and carry awe" (or, I bring down a zero and carry one).  With this introduction out of the way, Kevin continues to construct the figure found on page 293 (which can be viewed in yesterday's post).  He marks "Olaf" (alpha, or A) as "centrum" (or the center) and uses "Olaf's lambtail" (lamda, or L) as "his spokesman" (or the radius point) to construct the left circle.  This showing elicits a round of perhaps mocking praise from Dolph.  "O, dear me now!  Another grand discobely!" he says.  Soon after, he adds, "You've actuary entducked one!"

Dolph calls this first circle "[m]atch of a matchness," which calls to his mind "your Bigdud dadder," or their big, dead daddy, HCE, as represented in the "boudeville song, Gorotsky Gollovar's Troubles" (a vaudeville song from a city of mud that parodies Gulliver's Travels).  This song tells the familiar tale of HCE's fall.  An HCE figure, Abraham Bradley King, once stood smoking in the presence of two ladies, Mary Owens and Dolly Monks, as he was spied upon by three men, Blake-Roche, Kingston, and Dockrell.  King is referred to as "our papacocopotl," which McHugh notes is a volcano in Mexico.  This idea of the hero (who is also represented by Howth Hill) as a volcano explains why he was smoking in the song, and adds some fun color to the way his fall from grace near the Magazine Wall is described:  "By his magmasine fall.  Lumps, lavas and all."

HCE might be dead, but Dolph continues with a note of hope:  "But thunder and turf, it's not alover yet!  One recalls Byzantium.  The mystery repeats itself todate as our callback mother Gaudyanna, that was daughter to a tanner, used to sing . . . ."  Dolph goes on to describe the state of the house as it's kept by ALP after HCE's death and adds, "When I'm dreaming back like that I begins to see we're only all telescopes" (this is a line I like, and it's one of the many in this passage that McHugh notes as referencing portions of the writings of Yeats).  "Rest in peace!" Dolph says to HCE.  "But to return."

With this interlude complete, Kevin continues the math work from the beginning of today's reading:  "I bring town eau and curry nothung up my sleeve" (or I bring down a two and carry zero).  From there, he constructs the right circle on the diagram, which is "springing quickenly" from point L with point A as "her Elder."  Once again, Dolph engages in mock praise of his brother, saying, "O, dear me, that was very nesse!  Very nace indeed!"  He adds, "And makes us a daintical pair of accomplasses!"  This last line in particular has a variety of levels of meaning, from an identical pair of compasses (or circles) to a dainty pair of lasses (again referencing the two young women in the park) to the slang meaning of "a pair of compasses," which McHugh notes as "human legs" (therefore denoting another part of ALP's anatomy, building upon the selection from yesterday).

The two circles thus arranged create what Dolph terms "tew tricklesome poinds."  These two points appear "approxemetely in their suite poi and poi" and "dunloop into eath the ocher."  In other words, they're the points marked "P" and "π."  The "P" that marks the lower point, Dolph explains, stands for "Pride down there on the batom where Hoddum and Heave, our monsterbilker, balked his bawd of parodies," or the point of original sin.

It looks like we'll learn more about point π tomorrow.