Frank Forester and His Friends Author:Henry William Herbert Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: DAY THE SECOND. Much as I had heard of Tom Draw, I was, I must confess, taken altogether aback when I, for the first time, set eyes upon him. I had heard Harr... more »y Archer talk of him fifty times as a crack shot; as a top sawyer at a long day's fag; as the man of all others he would choose as his mate, if he were to shoot a match, two against two;—what then was my astonishment at beholding this worthy, as he reared himself slowly from his recumbent position! It is true, I had heard his sobriquet, " Fat Tom;" but, Heaven and earth! such a mass of beef and brandy as stood before me, 1 had never even dreamed of. About five feet six inches at the very utmost in the perpendicular, by six, or—" by'r lady "—nearer seven, in circumference—weighing, at the least computation, two hundred and fifty pounds—with a broad jolly face, its every feature well-formed and handsome rather than otherwise, mantling with an expression of the most perfect excellence of heart and temper, and overshadowed by a vast mass of brown hair, sprinkled pretty well with gray!—Down he plumped from the counter with a thud that made the whole floor shake, and, with a hand outstretched that might have done for a Goliah, out he strode to meet us. " Why, hulloa, hulloa! Mr. Archer," shaking his hand till I thought he would have dragged th( arm clean out of the socket—" How be you, boy'. how be you ? " " Right well, Tom, can't you see ? Why, con found you, you've grown twenty pound heavier since July!—but here, I'm losing all my manners'. —this is Frank Forester, whom you have heard me talk about so often. He dropped down here out of the moon, Tom, I believe; at least, 1 thought about as much of seeing the man in the moon, as of meeting him in this wooden country; but here he is, as you see, come all the way tt take a ...« less