of an extremely cold winter's day (which in
Hanover means something like cold), he resolved
to change his quarters, and, having by a desperate
effort uprooted the huge pole to which his neck
was chained, he took, it on his shoulder and
walked off with it to the nearest public-house.

It is uncertain whether Belgium or France
had produced a real giant, that is to say, something
above seven feet and a half; but Holland
gave birth to the giant of Utrecht, described by
both Diemerbrock the anatomist and Mr. Ray.
They agree in their accounts that he was eight
feet and a half high, with well-shaped Iimbs.
Leyden possesses the frontal bone of a man who
must have been nine feet high at least. It is
quite double the size of the frontal bone of an
ordinary skull, and from the engraving and
careful description of it in the Royal Society's
Transactions, there seems no reason to doubt
that this size is in no way owing to disease.

Scotland has in modern days given to the
world one fair-sized giant—Big Sam, the Prince
of Wales's porter, who was nearly eight feet high,
robust and well made. His size was no burden
to him, and he was as active in his movements
as other men. He performed as a giant in the
romance of Cymon, at the Haymarket. But his
health failed so fast in the prime of life, that he
had to return to his native country, and there, we
believe, soon afterwards died. Sir Thomas Dick
Lauder has likewise preserved the memory of a
gigantic Highland man who shattered a prize-fighter's
skull with a single blow of his fist;
carried off a cannon he was set to watch, and put it
in his bed, thinking this was the best way to
take care of it on a wet night. He laid the famous
Captain Barclay on the ground as if he had been
a child. He was a merry giant, loved the Highland Fling,
and danced it to a good old age;
but, like General Man, Bradly of York, Hales
the Norfolk giant, and Walter Parsons King
James's porter, he was not much above seven
feet, and only fit to rank in a lower class than
the Irish and Hanover giants.

England has made one or two tolerable
attempts to produce a giant. One of these
was chronicled by a Mr. Dawkes, surgeon
of St. Ives, in that quaint, vigorous, natural
style which gives a peculiar charm to the
medical writers of a century and a half ago.
The first communications respecting the
prodigy in question were made to Dr. Mead
and the Royal Society, who encouraged Mr.
Dawkes to prosecute his inquiries. This
immense creature, long known as the
gigantic boy of Willingham, was called Thomas
Hall, and was the son of a little father and
almost a little mother. He himself, at his
entrance upon this scene, was only a fine lusty
baby. But he began to grow at a rate which
astonished the whole neighbourhood, and, when
two years and eleven months old, he was more
than three feet nine inches high. Two months
later, he had reached the height of three feet
eleven: growing at the rate of nearly an inch
a month. Nearly a twelvemonth after, he had
attained the height of four feet five inches;
so that had he grown to manhood at this rate,
he would have been at least nine or ten feet
high.

The cause of the first check in his growth
appears to have been extreme stuffing. After
his third year, he was taken about for a
show, and created an extraordinary sensation.
But, he was so crammed that he soon
learned to care for nothing but dainties, and
was frequently "debauched with wine;" a nice
state of matters for a child three years old! The
natural upshot was that he had a crop of boils,
fell into ill health, and was checked in his
growth. Previously he had been but a small
eater and drinker.

His bulk and strength were quite
proportionate to his great height. Before he was three
years old, the calf of his leg was above ten
inches round, and he weighed, in his "cloaths,"
four stone two pounds. When five years old,
he weighed, even after his illness, upwards
of six stone. His strength was prodigious.
When less than four years old, Mr. Dawkes saw
him take a hammer, seventeen pounds' weight,
and throw it from him to a considerable
distance. When little more than three years old,
he could place a large Cheshire cheese upon his
head, and lift a runlet (two gallons, Winchester
measure) full of ale to his mouth, and drink
freely from it. By this time, he was the champion
of the school. Boys of seven or eight
years had no chance against him; he never
condescended to fight with them; he simply
collared them and brought them to the ground.
Sometimes, at a later date, he would offer
to fight all the boys in the school, two at a
time, and threaten to put them in his pocket.
When he was five years old, and still suffering
from illness, Mr. Dawkes got him to exhibit
his strength. A wheelbarrow of uncommon
size and very heavy, was selected; one of the
biggest boys in the school got into it, and Tom
trundled him off with ease. Two of the biggest
boys then got in, and the young Anak made it
move "two rotations of the wheel." This was
all he could do—and not amiss either, as the
two boys weighed twelve stone two pounds, and
he was not well.

Even at a very early age his voice was like a
man's. When three years old he seems to have
possessed as much sense as boys of five or six,
and, by the time he had passed his fifth year,
he behaved himself in every way as a grown
man. He was extremely fond of music, sculpture,
and painting, and "seemed rather inclined to
mechanics than, to any other kind of learning."
His look was rather savage, and always sedate.
Though never violent nor cruel, he seems to have
had as little of love as of fear in his composition,
and of the latter he had certainly little
enough, for he was as "indomitable as a
panther;" except with Mr. Dawkes, who kept
him in awe by threatening him with his
dissecting-knife. Even this gentleman never
seems to have succeeded (notwithstanding the
dissecting-knife) in thoroughly gaining his affections.
Always cold and gloomy after his illness,