This page needs to be proofread.
PEER
- I see! A pet child has many nicknames.
- So that's it, Peer; it is there you're to harbour!
- But these, my good man, are most unfair proceedings!
- I'm sure I deserve better treatment than this;-
- I'm not nearly so bad as perhaps you think,-
- I've done a good deal of good in the world;-
- at worst you may call me a sort of a bungler,-
- but certainly not an exceptional sinner.
THE BUTTON-MOULDER
- Why that is precisely the rub, my man;
- you're no sinner at all in the higher sense;
- that's why you're excused all the torture-pangs,
- and land, like others, in the casting-ladle.
PEER
- Give it what name you please-call it ladle or pool;
- spruce ale and swipes, they are both of them beer.
- Avaunt from me, Satan!
THE BUTTON-MOULDER
- You can't be so rude
- as to take my foot for a horse's hoof?
PEER
- On horse's hoof or on fox's claws-
- be off; and be careful what you're about!
THE BUTTON-MOULDER
- My friend, you're making a great mistak
