'Julia's got rid of--, there's nothing to connect me with that beast Forsyth; the men were all drunk, and (what's better) they've been all discharged.

O, come, I think this is another case of moral courage! I'll deny all knowledge of the thing.' A moment more, and he stood again before the Hercules, his lips sternly compressed, the coal-axe and the meat-cleaver under his arm.

The next, he had fallen upon the packing-case.

This had been already seriously undermined by the operations of Gideon; a few well-directed blows, and it already quaked and gaped; yet a few more, and it fell about Morris in a shower of boards followed by an avalanche of straw.
And now the leather-merchant could behold the nature of his task: and at the first sight his spirit quailed.

It was, indeed, no more ambitious a task for De Lesseps, with all his men and horses, to attack the hills of Panama, than for a single, slim young gentleman, with no previous experience of labour in a quarry, to measure himself against that bloated monster on his pedestal.