Not very many years before, he had been able to shoulder a sack of flour and take it away at a run, and now he could bend a poker across his shoulders without much trouble.

He stooped down and gripped the ball, expecting, of course, to lift it quite easily.

It didn't move.

He put more force into his arms and tried again.

For "all the move he got on it," as he said afterwards, it might have weighed a ton.