Central to this chapter is the contrast between Mulligan and Stephen: the cynic vs. the idealist, the scientist vs. the artist, and the robust extrovert vs. the contemplative introvert. Buck offers Stephen the temptation of an enjoyably physical but conventional existence, but Stephen treads deftly between such a life and its opposite, a labyrinthine maze of self-doubt, self-examination, and unhappiness. For example, Stephen is a nonbeliever in traditional Catholicism, but he is unable to tolerate Mulligan's blaspheming lifestyle, although in many ways it is attractive to him.
From the start of Ulysses, Mulligan's treatment of Stephen is brutal. He speaks to Stephen "coarsely," he ridicules Stephen's Greek name, and he reminds Stephen constantly of his refusal to pray at the bedside of his dying mother (who died a little less than a year before the opening of Ulysses); thus Mulligan augments the guilt from which Stephen suffers throughout the novel. In addition, Mulligan takes Stephen's money without qualm; while patronizing the old milk woman (whom he feels superior to), Mulligan says that if Irish people drank such good beverages regularly, they wouldn't have rotten teeth — which Stephen has. In contrast, Mulligan's teeth are solidly white and gold edged; he chides Stephen further for not washing frequently, while he, Mulligan, enjoys diving into the cold sea, and once he even saved a person from drowning (Stephen, metaphorically, could not even save his own mother from "drowning"). Mulligan also scolds Stephen for querulously discussing money in front of Haines, although he himself dislikes the bland Englishman and although he himself is unable to pay the old milk woman's entire bill.
In contrast to Mulligan, who can think of little else than the immediate future — that is, sharing Stephen's pay-day salary for drinks at The Ship pub — Stephen is mired in the past, chained to memories of his mother's death. It is not until Stephen smashes the symbolic chandelier in the brothel in "Circe" that he begins to take a small, first step to rid himself of his obsession with the past. The details of Mary Dedalus's death, both in Stephen's recurrent dream and in actuality, are indeed horrible and naturalistic, but they are balanced against such delicate pictures as Stephen's singing William Butler Yeats's "Who Goes with Fergus?" to his mother on her deathbed and also with his memory of how much his mother enjoyed, long ago, the Dublin version of Turko the Terrible's pantomime.
