I would rather wear the motley garb of a fellow who played the fool in carnival." The old dealer laughed with a crackling sound in his withered throat, like the rattling of stones in a tin pot.
"Good, good!" he croaked.

"I like that, I like that! Thou art old, but thou art merry.

That pleases me; one should laugh always.

Why not?
Death laughs; you never see a solemn skull; it laughs always!" And he plunged his long lean fingers into a deep drawer full of miscellaneous garments, mumbling to himself all the while.

I stood beside him in silence, pondering on his words, "Thou art OLD, but merry." What did he mean by calling ME old?
He must be blind, I thought, or in his dotage.