midday
Only not the whole lot at once for only her and Michael ! As for that boy , she had sent him off to the baker 's , the minute he came back , to wait till the bit of the best end of the neck was sure to be quite done , and bring it away directly minute . * * * * * That day there was an unusually high spring-tide on the river , and presumably elsewhere ; only that did not concern Hammersmith , which ascribed the tides to local impulses inherent in the Thames . Just after midday the water was all but up to the necks of the piers of Hammersmith Bridge , and the island at Chiswick was nearly submerged . Willows standing in lakes were recording the existence of towing-paths no longer able to speak for themselves , and the insolent plash of ripples over wharves that had always thought themselves above that sort of thing seemed to say : -- `` Thus far will I come , and a little farther for that matter . '' Father Thames never quite touched the landing of the boat-ladder , at the end of the garden at The Pigeons , but he went within six inches of it . `` The water was n't like you see it now , that day , '' said a man in the stern of a boat that was hanging about off the garden .