And he will accept cheerfully punishment enough to kill three ordinary men.

It takes one of his kind really to hurt him.
Thorpe, at the first hostile movement, sprang back to the door, seized one of the three-foot billets of hardwood intended for the stove, and faced his opponents.
"I don't know which of you boys is coming first," said he quietly, "but he's going to get it good and plenty." If the affair had been serious, these men would never have recoiled before the mere danger of a stick of hardwood.

The American woodsman is afraid of nothing human.

But this was a good-natured bit of foolery, a test of nerve, and there was no object in getting a broken head for that.

The reptilian gentleman alone grumbled at the abandonment of the attack, mumbling something profane.
"If you hanker for trouble so much," drawled the unexpected voice of old Jackson from the corner, "mebbe you could put on th' gloves." The idea was acclaimed.