“Earth, you are mistaken; I have seen them often before, and I assure you I have given the correct solution.”
“Now, Rolfe, tell me, is it true? You know I can face the living, but I cannot bear to meet the dead.”
“It is, I assure you. Have you never, while hunting, seen a jack-a-lantern?”
“A jack-a-lantern! yes, often; although I don't even like them much.”
“Well, these are the same.”
“Oh, no.”
“Indeed they are.”
“Well, now, Rolfe, if you have any respect for me, hereafter call things by their proper names; if you had said they were jack-a-lanterns, I would have known at once what they were; but you said something about knees fat, and I took it for granted at once that they were spirits; although I might have known, if I had thought, that jack-a-lanterns were greasy.”
Rolfe, amused at the idea of their being greasy, laughed outright, asking, “In the name of heaven, Earth, how did you find out they possessed that property?”
“Because I once caught one,” said Earth, “and laid it out upon an old stump, as cold as a wedge.”