At the end of II.3, as HCE cleans up his tavern, he hears the approach of the people singing the ballad that will destroy him. This is a version of the song that ends I.2, which was created and sung by Hosty (a variant of the Cad, the other side of HCE — from the Latin hostis, meaning stranger, foreigner, or enemy). Of course, the ballad is different now, so much later in the dream.

Read on for a few of my thoughts on one excerpt of this ballad. This will be a pretty brief close reading post, less ambitious in scope than some of my others. Perhaps as time goes on, I will make more frequent brief posts like this.