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[Aetat. 33-34 ] J O Y C E 395inlaid in ivory, and one said, 'Vous aimez les objets d'art, monseigneur.Regardez celal' Pecci looked it over, then handed it back calmly andreplied, 'O, c'esf tres beau. C'est Madame, sans doute?'Weiss and his guests began to trade stories of repartee. Joyce's preference^was-forexamples of-self-possession in difficult situations, the qualitywith which he endowed'Stepmen Dedalus, especially in Ulysses. He tolda second anecdote about Leopold II of Belgium, whose mistress was thefamous dancer Cleo de Merode. Leopold's connection with her was sonotorious that he was called Cleopold. One day the Archbishop of Brusselscame to remonstrate with the king about this liaison. The king listenedto him and said, 'Votre Eminence, on ma raconte la meme chosede vous, mais moi, je ne I'ai pas crue.' Joyce had another incident thatdisplayed the Prince of Wales at his most dignified. It was understoodamong Edward's friends that, although he might be treated without specialceremony, the prince's rank must be kept always in mind. But in thecourse of a drinking bout at Karlsbad, a young man forgot himself andcalled out, 'Ring that bell for me, Eddie, will you?' The prince rang thebell, and when the maitre d'hotel came in response and bowed low beforehim, he said simply, 'La voiture pour monsieur.'The afternoon drew to a close, and Joyce, obviously delighted by hiscompany, said merrily to Weiss as he rose to go, 'Merci de votre bonte,et de votre bon the.'Now that Joyce was free to devote himself to Ulysses, he often discussedtopics related to the book. One such subject was the similarity ofthe Jews and the Irish, on which Joyce insisted. They were alike, hedeclared, in being impulsive, given to fantasy, addicted to associativethinking, wanting in rational discipline.* He held, perhaps with Arnold's'Hebraism and Hellenism' in mind, that there were two basically differentways of thinking, the Gj3^^nd_ih£_Jje^^ that the Greek waslogical and rational. One day he and Weiss were~~Walkiiig--and--Tnet*"aGiyek, "with w+fom they talked for a long time. Afterwards Joyce remarked,it's strange—you spoke like a Greek and he spoke like a Jew.'He had perhaps already conceived the brothel scene in Ulysses, whenBloom and Stephen come together and Joyce writes, 'Extremes meet.Jewgreek meets greekjew,' following which Bloom becomes utterly rationaland self-contained, and Stephen is impulsive. Joyce recognized hisown affinities to both groups. He had a little book on the Jews by a mannamed Fishberg, which contained pictures of Chinese Jews with pigtails,Mongolian Jews with Mongolian features, and the like. 15Such curiositiesabout the race were what especially interested Joyce. He knew little of* These are made qualities of Bloom's mind.tTo indicate how unmistakable Jewish characteristics were, Joyce had a story of a Scotchmanand a Jew traveling on a ship which foundered and sank. They spent three daystogether in a lifeboat. At the end of that time, the Jew said, 'I'm a Jew.' The Scotchmansaid, 'I'm a hunchback.' 14