He told his family timidly he should try for two of those prizes.

They stared in silence, for their breath was gone at his audacity; but one horrid laugh exploded on the floor like a petard.

Gerard looked down, and there was the dwarf, slit and fanged from ear to ear at his expense, and laughing like a lion.

Nature, relenting at having made Giles so small, had given him as a set-off the biggest voice on record.

His very whisper was a bassoon.