Setting aside the Patagonians, we maintain that two thirds of mortal
humanity were comprised in Neal; and perhaps we might venture to
assert that two thirds of Neal's humanity were equal to six thirds
of another man's. It is right well known that Alexander the Great
was a little man, and we doubt whether, had Alexander the Great
been bred to the tailoring business, he would have exhibited so
much of the hero as Neal Malone. Neal was descended from a fighting
family, who had signalised themselves in as many battles as ever
any single hero of antiquity fought. His father, his grandfather,
and his great-grandfather were all fighting men, and his ancestors
in general, up, probably, to Con of the Hundred Battles himself.
No wonder, therefore, that Neal's blood should cry out against the
cowardice of his calling; no wonder that he should be an epitome
of all that was valorous and heroic in a peaceable man, for we
neglected to inform the reader that Neal, though "bearing no base
mind," never fought any man in his own person. That, however,
deducted nothing from his courage. If he did not fight it was simply
because he found cowardice universal. No man would engage him; his
spirit blazed in vain; his thirst for battle was doomed to remain
unquenched, except by whisky, and this only increased it. In
short, he could find no foe. He has often been known to challenge
the first cudgel-players and pugilists of the parish, to provoke
men of fourteenstone weight, and to bid mortal defiance to faction
heroes of all grades-but in vain. There was that in him which
told them that an encounter with Neal would strip them of their
laurels. Neal saw all this with a lofty indignation; he deplored
the degeneracy of the times, and thought it hard that the descendant
of such a fighting family should be doomed to pass through life
peaceably, whilst so many excellent rows and riots took place around