the hour of six
Reflect upon the mournful gap ! He could scarcely believe in his ill-luck . He suggested it to himself with an inane grin , as one of the far-away freaks of circumstances that had struck him -- and was it not comical ? He waited from the hour of six till the hour of seven . He compared clocks in the hall and the room . He changed the posture of his legs fifty times . For a while he wrestled right gallantly with the apparent menace of the Fates that he was to get no dinner at all that day ; it seemed incredibly derisive , for , as I must repeat , it had never happened to him by any accident before .