noons
Although fish were not numerous he never tired of his vigil , lulled by the sound of the current as it splashed among the stones and rippled through the rushes ; a deeper music coming from its higher reaches , where it fell over a ledge of rock and leapt like a live thing into the air . And , indeed , what thing could be more living than this fresh , pure , untroubled water , glad as a child , swift as a swallow , singing for sport , as a happy boy sings , as it ran down on its way from the hills ? To the young man sitting now on its bank amidst the bulrushes it was as living as himself , his playmate , friend , and master , all in one . First of all things which he could remember were the brightness and the coolness of it as it had laved his limbs in his childhood on mid-summer noons , his mother 's hands holding him safely as he waded with rosy feet and uncertain steps along its pebbly bottom ! How many mornings , when he had grown to boyhood and to manhood , had he escaped from the rays of the vertical sun into its acacia-shadowed pools ; how many moonlit , balmy nights had he bathed in its still reaches , the liquid silver of its surface breaking up like molten metal as he dived ! How many hours of peace had he passed , as he was spending this , waiting for the fish to float into his great net , whilst the air and the water were alike so still that he could hear the little voles stealing in and out amongst the reeds , and the water-thrush pushing the pebbles on its sands in search for insects , though beast and bird were both unseen by him ! How many a time upon the dawn of a holy-day had he washed and swam in its waters whilst the bells of the old church in the village above had tolled in the softness of dusk !