The Passenger.
Where I come from, there smiles are prized
As highly as pathetic style.
Peer.
All has its time; what fits the taxman,[1]
So says the text, would damn the bishop.
The Passenger.
The host whose dust inurned has slumbered
Treads not on week-days the cothurnus.
Peer.
Avaunt thee, bugbear! Man, begone!
I will not die! I must ashore!
The Passenger.
Oh, as for that, be reassured;—
One dies not midmost of Act Five. [Glides away.
Peer.
Ah, there he let it out at last;—
He was a sorry moralist.
SCENE THIRD.
Churchyard in a high lying mountain parish.
A funeral is going on. By the grave, the Priest and a gathering of people. The last verse of the psalm is being sung. Peer Gynt passes by on the road.
Peer.
[At the gate.]
Here's a countryman going the way of all flesh.
God be thanked that it isn't me.
[Enters the churchyard.
- ↑ "Tolder," the biblical "publican."
