King Frederick William, says Voltaire, "armed with a huge sergeant's cane, marched forth every day to review his regiment of giants. These giants were his greatest delight, and the things for which he went to the heaviest expense.
"The men who stood in the first rank of this regiment were none of them less than seven feet high, and he sent to purchase them from the farthest parts of Europe to the borders of Asia. I have seen some of
them since his death. The king, his son, who loved handsome, not gigantic men, had given those I saw to the queen, his wife, to serve in quality of Heiduques. I remember that they accompanied the old state coach which preceded the Marquis de Beauvau, who came to compliment the king, in the month of November, 1740. The late king, Frederick William, who had formerly sold all the magnificent furniture left by his father, never could find a purchaser for that enormous engilded coach. The Heiduques, who walked on each side to support it in case it should fall, shook hands with each other over the roof."
A pleasant exception in character was one Antony Payne of Cornwall, a region always famous for tall men. (In fact the learned author of a "History of Oxfordshire" in 1676 was strongly of the opinion that a huge Cornish skeleton discovered in his time was that of the famous Arabian giant celebrated by Pliny, Gabbara, and that he had doubtless been brought to Britain by the Emperor Claudius.)
Tony Payne was reputed to measure four inches over seven feet. He was a faithful follower of the Stowe family, as noted for intelligence, vigor and good humor as for size, and fought with distinction in the royal army during the Great Rebellion; after the Restoration Charles II had his portrait painted by Kneller. One Christmas Eve he sent a boy with a donkey to bring in wood from the forest; going out after a while to look for him, he found the youth loitering along, whereupon Payne picked up the loaded donkey and carried it back to the castle. He lived to an old age
and left behind him a reputation for spirit, ability and loyalty to his ideals which seems rare enough among physical prodigies.
Many historical figures have been at least on the border line of gianthood: William of Scotland, Edward III, Godefroy of Bouillon, Philip the Long, Fairfax, Baron Barford, Kléber, Rochester, Charles II's favorite, Gall, Brillat-Savarin, Benjamin Constant, the painter David, and others were men of quite extraordinary stature—just how tall we cannot, unfortunately, find out.
But the facts seem to be that at any one time one could come pretty near counting on one's fingers all the people in the world who really measured over eight feet in height.