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132 / A M E S [ 1903-1904 ]Under Gogarty's able tutelage, which he decided not to refuse, Joycebegan to drink heavily. At first,to assert a fancied resemblance betweenhimself and the buoyant Elizabethans, he called for sack. The news ofhis 'fall' got round, and the day after his firstnight of utter drunkenness,he was teased by some young men orTfhe~stteet. 'Who are these people?'he said haughtily and walked on. gradually he shifted from sack toGuinness's unpretentious and less expensive stout, 'the wine of the country.'11His capacity for alcohol was small, and he was prone to drunkencollapses. All releases from excessive consciousness attracted him; he wrotein one of his epiphanies of the pleasure of another kind of release, 'Whatmoves upon me from the darkness subtle and murmurous as a flood,passionate and fiercewith an indecent movement of the loins? Whatleaps, crying in answer, out of me, as an eagle to eagle in mid air, cryingto overcome, crying for an iniquitous abandonment?' 12His soul, fed onpride, and declining attachments, longed to give way, to swoon, to bemutilated, and he brought this happy consummation about with the helpof porter.*Once, emerging from a drinking session with his Paris hat which resembledthat of a Protestant cleric, Joyce heard some street gamins callout, 'Jay, look at the drunken minister!'t 13Such exploits would end inhis being trundled home by some friend. Sober Stanislaus Joyce wouldlook on in disgust as one by one his brother James, his father (whosetemporary abstinence had been relaxed), and another brother Charles—who had given up studying for the priesthood in order to become secretaryto a wine merchant—tottered into 7 St. Peter's Terrace, their respectivefrustrations for the time being reveled away. He thought his brotherwas destroying himself, but James met his expostulations with sardonicbalderdash. 'What's the matter with you,' he said to Stanislaus, 'is thatyou're afraid to live. You and people like you. This city is suffering fromhemiplegia of the will. I'm not afraid to live.' Stanislaus expostulated,"Then you don't want to be a writer?' 'I don't care if I never write anotherline. I want to live. I should be supported at the expense of the statebecause I am capable of enjoying life. As for writing, I may perhapsemploy my sober moments in correcting the grammatical errors of themore illiterate among the rugged geniuses.' When Stanislaus asked himwhat he could find to say to 'those drunken yahoos of medical students,'Joyce replied, 'At least, they don't bore me as you do.' 14Stanislaus was now started on the long course of humiliation fromwhich his brother rarely allowed him to play truant. He had formed adesire to become a writer like James, and tried his hand at a philosophicalessay, which, however, he destroyed because his conclusions were not* 'Swooning' was a word, and an act, of which Joyce was fond. Stephen at the end ofChapter II of A Portrait experiences the 'swoon of sin'; Gabriel's soul, at the end of 'TheDead,' 'swooned softly.' See also p. 82.t Used in the boozing scene of Ulysses (424 [556]).