sour milk & half-babies-in-law

[public domain]

…when the elderly milk lady arrives, Stephen
                  thinks of an old folksong that she
reminds him of. Later, he imagines her as a
                  witch on a milking stool, again as
Mother Ireland, and finally as the sister of
                  his dead mother, Mary Dedalus.
Through Stephen's imagination at work, the
                  themes of maternity and decay are
co-developed. This process only becomes
                  more complex as the novel
progresses, and at times it is difficult to separate
                  Stephen's hyperactive mental
activity from the true narrative action of the
                  novel. 
                
Buck Mulligan, hewing thick slices from the loaf, said
in an old woman's wheedling voice: 

-- When I makes tea I makes tea, as old mother Grogan
said. And when I makes water I makes
water.

He turned to Stephen and asked in a fine puzzled
voice, lifting his brows: 

-- Can you recall, brother, is mother Grogan's tea and
water pot spoken of in the Mabinogion or is it
in the Upanishads? 

-- I doubt it, said Stephen gravely. 

-- Do you now? Buck Mulligan said in the same tone.
Your reasons, pray? 

-- I fancy, Stephen said as he ate, it did not exist
in or out of the Mabinogion. Mother Grogan was,
one imagines, a kinswoman of Mary Ann.

He watched her pour into the measure and thence into
the jug rich white milk, not hers. Old shrunken
paps. She poured again a measureful and a tilly. Old
and secret she had entered from a morning
world, maybe a messenger. She praised the goodness of
the milk, pouring it out. Crouching by a
patient cow at daybreak in the lush field, a witch on
her toadstool, her wrinkled fingers quick at the
squirting dugs. They lowed about her whom they knew,
dewsilky cattle. Silk of the kine and poor old
woman, names given her in old times. A wandering
crone, lowly form of an immortal serving her
conqueror and her gay betrayer, their common
cuckquean, a messenger from the secret morning. To
serve or to upbraid, whether he could not tell: but
scorned to beg her favour.




Hetty blushed a deep rose-colour when Captain
Donnithorne entered the
                 dairy and spoke to her; but it was
not at all a distressed blush, for it was
                 inwreathed with smiles and dimples,
and with sparkles from under long,
                 curled, dark eyelashes; and while her
aunt was discoursing to him about
                 the limited amount of milk that was
to be spared for butter and cheese so
                 long as the calves were not all
weaned, and a large quantity but inferior
                 quality of milk yielded by the
shorthorn, which had been bought on
                 experiment, together with other
matters which must be interesting to a
                 young gentleman who would one day be
a landlord, Hetty tossed and
                 patted her pound of butter with quite
a self-possessed, coquettish air,
                 slyly conscious that no turn of her
head was lost.

Adam Bede, George Eliot

Reader! did you ever taste such a cup of tea as Miss
Gibbs is this moment
      handing to Mr Pilgrim ? Do you know the dulcet
strength, the animating
      blandness of tea sufficiently blended with real
farmhouse cream?
      No—most likely you are a miserable
town-bred reader, who think of
      cream as a thinnish white fluid, delivered in
infinitesimal pennyworths down area
      steps; or perhaps, from a presentiment of
calves' brains, you refrain from any
      lacteal addition, and rasp your tongue with
unmitigated bohea. You have a vague
      idea of a milch cow as probably a white-plaster
animal standing in a butterman's
      window, and you know nothing of the sweet
history of genuine cream, such as
      Miss Gibbs's: how it was this morning in the
udders of the large sleek beasts, as
      they stood lowing a patient entreaty under the
milking-shed; how it fell with a
      pleasant rhythm into Betty's pail, sending a
delicious incense into the cool air;
      how it was carried into that temple of moist
cleanliness, the dairy, where it quietly
      separated itself from the meaner elements of
milk, and lay in mellowed whiteness,
      ready for the skimming-dish which transferred it
to Miss Gibbs's glass cream-jug.
      If I am right in my conjecture, you are
unacquainted with the highest possibilities
      of tea; and Mr Pilgrim, who is holding that cup
in his hands, has an idea beyond
      you.

      Mrs Hackit declines cream; she has so long
abstained from it with an eye to the
      weekly butter-money, that abstinence, wedded to
habit, has begotten aversion.
      She is a thin woman with a chronic
liver-complaint, which would have secured
      her Mr Pilgrim's entire regard and unreserved
good word, even if he had not
      been in awe of her tongue, which was as sharp as
his own lancet. She has
      brought her knitting—no frivolous fancy
knitting, but a substantial woollen
      stocking; the clickclick of her knitting-needles
is the running accompaniment to all
      her conversation, and in her utmost enjoyment of
spoiling a friend's
      self-satisfaction, she was never known to spoil
a stocking.

      Mrs Patten does not admire this excessive
click-clicking activity. Quiescence in
      an easy-chair, under the sense of compound
interest perpetually accumulating,
      has long seemed an ample function to her, and
she does her malevolence gently.
      She is a pretty little old woman of eighty, with
a close cap and tiny flat white curls
      round her face, as natty and unsoiled and
invariable as the waxen image of a little
      old lady under a glass-case; once a lady's-maid,
and married for her beauty.

Scenes of clerical life, George Eliot


Don't have a Moo cow, Artist!  
http://www.jersey.syd-fyn.dk/literature.htm


Say, got milk? Maybe you got baby too?  Mason and
Dixon's baby has been delivered and now, like
everything else, must be divided. 

>From Father's Property To Children's Rights: A History
of Child Custody
http://www.grad.berkeley.edu/deans/mason/booksfathersfirsten.shtml

Another play on prison/slavery/custody and the black
hole. 

Tiresias, old man with wrinkled dugs
         Perceived the scene, and foretold the rest--
    230
         I too awaited the expected guest.
         He, the young man carbuncular, arrives,
         A small house agent's clerk, with a bold
stare,
         One of the low on whom assurance sits
         As a silk hat on a Bradford millionaire.
         The time is now propitious, as he guesses;
         The meal is ended, she is bored and tired.
         Endeavors to engage her in caresses
         Which still are unreproved, if undesired.
         Flushed and decided, he assaults at once;
    240
         Exploring hands encounter no defence;
         His vanity requires no response,
         And makes a welcome of indifference.
         (And I Tiresias have foresuffered all
         Enacted on this same divan or bed;
         I who have sat by Thebes below the wall
         And walked among the lowest of the dead.)
         Bestows one final patronizing kiss,
         And gropes his way, finding the stairs
unlit...





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