"Why, a real salamander hat won't burn!"
"No? I never heard of that before: I don't believe it's one of that kind."
"Sartain sure; I'll bet you a mug of flip of it."
"Well, I'll stand you!"
"Done: now I'll just put it under the fore-stick?"
"Well."
It being thus arranged, Mat put the hat under the fore-stick into a glowing mass of coals. In an instant it took fire, collapsed, and rolled into a black, crumpled mass of cinders.
"I du declare," said Mat Olmstead, affecting great astonishment, "it ain't a salamander hat arter all! Well, I'll pay the flip!"
Yet wit is not always wisdom. Keen as this man was as to things immediately before him, he was of narrow understanding. He seemed not to possess the faculty of reasoning beyond his senses. He never would admit that the sun was fixed, and that the world turned round.