noon
`` You with your stuff about birds , '' shouted the tailor ; `` you 're a rank impostor ! That 's what you are ! '' `` They say that you are the ninth part of a man , but I find that they have grossly exaggerated , '' cried the boy , in retort ; but he had a heavy heart as he made off along the street . By noon he had interviewed the butcher , the cobbler , the milkman , and the maker of candlesticks , but they treated him no better than the tailor had done , and as he was feeling tired he went and sat down under a tree . `` I begin to think that the baker is the best of the lot of them , '' he said to himself ruefully , as he rolled his empty wallet between his fingers . Then , as the folly of singers provides them in some measure with a philosophy , he fell asleep . When he woke it was late in the afternoon , and the children , fresh from school , had come out to play in the dusk .