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“It was always I who emptied the packet into his black snuff-box for his hands trembled too much to allow him to do this without spilling half the snuff about the floor. Even as he raised his large trembling hand to his nose little clouds of smoke dribbled through his fingers over the front of his coat. It may have been these constant showers of snuff which gave his ancient priestly garments their green faded look for the red handkerchief, blackened, as it always was, with the snuff-stains of a week, with which he tried to brush away the fallen grains, was quite inefficacious.”
In this vivid passage, the narrator describes how he would help Father Flynn with his snuff and how Father Flynn would subsequently get the smoke and the tobacco on himself anyway. In addition to highlighting one of Father Flynn’s vices, this passage also demonstrates how frail and ineffectual Father Flynn is. The narrator’s emphasis on Father Flynn’s trembling hands and irrelevant cleaning is just another example of Joyce using Father Flynn’s body to signify his inner corruption.
“Sometimes he used to put me through the responses of the Mass which he had made me learn by heart; and, as I pattered, he used to smile pensively and nod his head, now and then pushing huge pinches of snuff up each nostril alternately. When he smiled he used to uncover his big discoloured teeth and let his tongue lie upon his lower lip—a habit which had made me feel uneasy in the beginning of our acquaintance before I knew him well.”
This description is meant to invoke disgust. The images the narrator presents to the reader are unsettling, from the references to the large pinches of snuff being raised to each nostril to the large discolored teeth to the visual of Father Flynn’s tongue hanging out of his smile. The description of Father Flynn’s smile is perhaps the most important part of the quote because it feels distinctly predatory and emphasizes the power imbalance between the narrator and Father Flynn.
