The patience of that official, often strained in extending leniency toward the disturber's misdeeds, had been overtaxed.
The emperor did as Virgilius advised, but thieves and murderers laughed at the horse, and went about their misdeeds as usual.
Billy, however, attacked each new duty with a feverish eagerness that seemed to make the performance of it very like some glad penance done for past misdeeds.