It catches a whisper from the other side the room, and can understand the scratch of a pen.

It has one ear open toward the east and the other toward the west, and hears everything in both directions.

All the tittle-tattle of the world pours into those ears like vinegar through a funnel.

They are always up and open, and to them a meeting of the sewing society is a jubilee and a political campaign is heaven.
SIZE OF THROAT.
The snake has hard work to choke down a toad, and the crocodile has a mighty struggle to take in the calf; but the monster of which I speak can swallow anything.

It has a throat bigger than the whale that took down the minister who declined the call to Nineveh, and has swallowed whole presbyteries and conferences of clergymen.