Wonder no more...

I'm reading The Beetle by Richard Marsh, a "lurid classic" about a creature stalking "British politician Paul Lessingham through fin de siècle London in search of vengeance for the defilement of a sacred tomb in Egypt." (Sweet, no?) In Chapter 12, Sydney Atherton, our narrator at the moment, is tormenting himself because the woman he's in love with, Marjorie Lindon, loves Lessingham:

All through the night, waking and sleeping, and in my dreams, I wondered what Marjorie could see in him!

Later that day, he is visited by Lessingham, and takes a moment to appraise him:

I am free to confess,--I have owned it before!--that, in a sense, I admire that man,--so long as he does not presume to thrust himself into a certain position. He possesses physical qualities which please my eye--speaking as a mere biologist I like the suggestion conveyed by his every pose, his every movement, of a tenacious hold on life,--of reserve force, of a repository of bone and gristle on which he can fall back at pleasure. The fellow's lithe and active; not hasty, yet agile; clean built, well hung,-- the sort of man who might be relied upon to make a good recovery. You might beat him in a sprint,--mental or physical--though to do that you would have to be spry!--but in a staying race he would see you out.

Ummmmm. "Well hung" must have meant something else in 1896. But the juxtaposition of "I wondered what Marjorie could see in him!" and "The fellow's ... well hung" made me laugh.

Not what an occult horror novel is aiming at...