"Our library he is hoping to ye public."

(311.5-313.6)  And now it gets fun.  Tonight was one of those nights where I really enjoyed the reading.  The passage was dense, and I imagine this chapter will get denser and more confusing as it moves forward, but I flew through these two pages, and was laughing out loud for a few moments (so you know the text was resonating with me).  The overwhelming depth of this chapter is quickly becoming apparent, but I feel like I got at least a decent handle on the basics.

We've reached the point in the Wake where HCE begins to tell a story of the Norwegian Captain.  This captain, as an invader of Ireland, represents one aspect of HCE.  Before HCE starts his tale, however, he invokes his muses in a manner reminiscent of an epic poet:  "O, lord of the barrels, comer forth from Anow . . . , O, Ana, bright lady, comer forth from Thenanow . . . , O!"

He's promptly interrupted by his patrons, who first "would deal death to a drinking."  They shout, "Our svalves are svalves aroon!  We rescue thee, O Baass, from the damp earth and honour thee.  O Connibell, with mouth burial!"  There's a lot of stuff going on here, from the patrons' rowdy show of Irish patriotism (McHugh points out the echo of the Feinian motto, "Ourselves, ourselves alone") in the face of the foreigner, HCE, to the comic addresses to Bass and O'Connell's ale, which mock HCE's invocation of the gods.

With the patrons' encouragement (they mock Wellington's "Up, guards, and at 'em!" by shouting, "Up draught and whet them!"), HCE finally gets to the story.  The Norwegian Captain asks the ship's husband (a Dubliner helping to manage the ship while it's docked, who also seems to represent another aspect of HCE) to help him find a tailor for a suit.  A tailor is produced, and a bargain is struck.  (Here's where I had to stop and laugh at the captain's language:  "chunk pulley muchy chink topside numpa one sellafella, fake an capstan make and shoot!")  But things escalate when the Norwegian Captain sails off without paying.  (There are obvious echoes here from the tale of the Prankquean (together with literal references to her later on page 312), with the added wrinkle that now an HCE figure (the captain) is playing the role of the invading Prankquean.)  The captain travels the world for 40 days and 40 nights.

The story is interrupted by the patrons, who are getting rowdier and chant at our narrator (Humphrey C. Earwicker):  "Hump!  Hump!"

HCE tries to resume the story:  "I will do that, sazd Kersse, mainingstaying the rigout for her wife's lairdship."  Kersse is another HCE figure (and another form of Persse O'Reilly), who is going to save the day by setting off in search of the captain.

But HCE is once again interrupted by the patrons:  "Nett sew?  they hunched back at the earpicker."  HCE is undaunted -- as the narrator says, "he nought feared crimp or cramp of shore sharks" -- and the narrator explains that he's ever-indulgent of the rowdiness of these "people of the shed."  The narrator goes on to give the professions of each of these twelve working-classs men, who form the "quorum" or jury that will sit in judgment of HCE:  "Lorimers and leathersellers, skinners and salters, pewterers and paperstainers, parishclerks, fletcherbowyers, girdlers, mercers, cordwainers and first, and not last, the weavers."  All are welcome in HCE's pub, the narrator concludes:  "Our library he is hoping to ye public."

The final paragraph serves a dual role as representing both the patrons' encouragement of HCE (the "Innholder, upholder") and the crowd's encouragement of Kersse (as the avenging Dubliner).  "Sets on sayfohrt!" they shout.  "Godeown moseys and skeep thy beeble bee!"  Tomorrow we'll get to see if Kersse/Moses sets his people free, or if HCE gets interrupted again.