One was picking up a heavy blacksmith's anvil by the horn and placing it on a kitchen table; for the other he had a block of steel, which, as near as I can remember, must have been about 14 inches long, 12 inches wide, and 7 inches thick.

This block lay on the floor, and his challenge was for anyone to pick it up with bare hands.

I noticed that it required unusually long fingers to grasp it, since one could get only the thumb on one side.

Though thousands tried, I never saw, or heard, of anyone else who could juggle his anvil or pick up the weight.

True, I saw him surreptitiously rub his fingers with resin, to assist in the gripping, but that could have been only of slight assistance to the marvelous grip the man possessed.
It is generally conceded that Louis Cyr was, in his best days, the strongest man in the known world at all-round straight lifting.