The enormous stomach of this giant rested on thighs which were as large as the body of an ordinary adult, and feet like those of an elephant.

Anger was a rare thing with him, but it was terrible, apoplectic, when it did burst forth.

Though violent and quite incapable of reflection, the man had never done anything that justified the sinister suggestions of his bodily presence.
To all those who felt afraid of him his postilions would reply, "Oh! he's not bad." The master of Nemours, to use the common abbreviation of the country, wore a velveteen shooting-jacket of bottle-green, trousers of green linen with great stripes, and an ample yellow waistcoat of goat's skin, in the pocket of which might be discerned the round outline of a monstrous snuff-box.

A snuff-box to a pug nose is a law without exception.
A son of the Revolution and a spectator of the Empire, Minoret-Levrault did not meddle with politics; as to his religious opinions, he had never set foot in a church except to be married; as to his private principles, he kept them within the civil code; all that the law did not forbid or could not prevent he considered right.

He never read anything but the journal of the department of the Seine-et-Oise, and a few printed instructions relating to his business.