Ix 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF 
is briefly this : — The public offices emitted a very- 
strong smell : the impositions there had been accu- 
mulating for a long time. He had not been a week 
in the town before the fumes turned him sick at 
stomach. He vowed he would clear the town of 
the nuisance, and have all the litter wheeled out, 
although he should work day and night. This was 
a second Augean job; and from this he got the 
name of Hercules. 
" Well, and did he set to work in good earnest ? 
He did indeed. He cleared many of the offices 
to their original pavement ; he handled numbers 
of the tenants in the different departments very 
roughly ; some he hurled neck and crop out of the 
fattening pen, and others he frightened nearly out 
of their senses. 
" He could not bear the sight of the Dutch law- 
yers. He told them that their stomachs were as 
craving as that of the vulture on the liver of Tityus ; 
that they were the scourge of the country ; that 
they were worse to manage than the brazen-footed 
bulls of old ; that they belonged to Celeeno ; and 
that, if he only kept his health, he would, ere long, 
drive them all into Stymphalus. 
Poor, well-intending, much lamented Old Her- 
cules ! In the openness of his heart, oftentimes, at 
table after dinner (which is the very worst place 
and time for a man to open his mouth on things of 
consequence), he would talk of his intended plans 
and operations to those around him. He was too 
sincere himself to suspect the want of sincerity in 
some of those who ate his bread and drank his wine. 
