But as he did so one of the crowd tripped him and sent him rolling upon the prostrate Steve, whose friends leaped like a pack of snarling wolves upon Lime's back.

There came into the giant's heart a terrible, blind, desperate resolution.

With a hoarse, inarticulate cry he gathered himself for one supreme effort and rose from the heap like a bear shaking off a pack of dogs; and holding the stunned and nerveless Steve in his great hands, with one swift, incredible effort literally swept his opponent's body in the faces of the infuriated men rushing down upon him.
"Come on, you red hellions!" he shouted, in a voice like a lion at bay.
The light streamed on his bared head, his hands were clinched, his chest heaved in great gasps.

There was no movement.

The crowd waited with their hands lowered; before such a man they could not stand for a moment.