Mulligan leads Stephen and Haines "down towards the fortyfoot hole," an ocean swimming spot about one hundred yards from the Sandycove tower. Several different accounts of the origins of this name have circulated, but none of them are perfectly convincing.

Not far from the tower a rocky ledge juts into the sea, offering swimmers access to the cold ocean waters and also sheltering a narrow inlet. Joyce twice refers to the waters in this little bay as "the creek," apparently because the ceaseless movement of ocean water into and out of the inlet gave him the impression of a river of water. In his time, and until 1976, only men swam at the Forty Foot, and bathing suits were optional. Flann O’Brien’s At Swim-Two-Birds features the same swimming hole.

Various explanations have been offered for the name. The water is deep, but only about half as deep as the name. On an 1833 map the nearby Marine Road was labeled the Forty Foot Road, perhaps because of its width, and so perhaps lent its name to the coastal spot. But the road lies nearly a mile to the west––not all that near. Slote and his collaborators note that "According to one local legend, the name comes from the Fortieth Foot Regiment, but this is unlikely since they were never stationed in a nearby garrison."

Wherever the name may have come from, the swimming spot is locally famous. Slote quotes from a letter that Oliver Gogarty wrote to G. K. A. Bell on 27 August 1904: "The sea here is 'crystalline' on account of Sandycove being sandless; and the bathing is excellent. I swim 3 or 4 times a day for from 1/2 to 3/4 hours at a stretch" (Many Lines to Thee, 21).

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