Among the gossipers telling tales of HCE, one woman

hoped Sid Arthar would git a Chrissman’s portrout of orange and lemonsized orchids with hollegs and ether, from the feeatre of the Innocident, as the worryld had been uncained.

“Chrissman’s portrout” is at once Christmas present, Christmas portrait, Christmas porter, and Christmas pardon. It also contains the word “trout,” recalling how Finn MacCool gained knowledge by eating a fish (cf. Issy in I.6, “It’s only another queer fish or other in Brinbrou’s damned old trouchorous river again”).

Hollegs and ether is holly and ivy, and the Feast of the Innocents takes place on December 28 (here rendered to look like “theatre of the incident” [HCE’s crime — see the description of him attending the theatre in I.2]. It could also be “in the Occident” or HCE’s Inn).

By his offense, the world has been unchained: on a cosmic level, the world has been produced by the Fall, unleashed into existence. On a personal level, individual misdeeds produce worry and guilt, part of the discursive gauze through which our mind normally perceives (and thus produces) our personal experience of the world.

But also, the world has been un-Cained: the murder of Abel results in the banishment of Cain, which represents the brother battle and the creation of ego/Selfhood/selfish attitudes.

Merry Christmas, all!