the hour of eight
And , attaining to it , how could he possibly desire return to the noisy , crowded cells of the city ? Impossible , surely , unless of course the city offered him a living , his life ; and the country -- calm and beautiful -- refused it . And that perhaps is rather often the position , for your sedentary man , at all events ; your modern , who can not dig and is ashamed to beg -- a numerous and ever increasing body . Big Ben struck the hour of eight as we trundled past into Whitehall on the top of an omnibus . I thought of Fanny with some self-reproach . She would have reached the lodgings by about five , and our evening meal hour was seven . I hoped she had not waited without her meal .