twelve o'clock
Let alone the brutality of announcing the hour to a refined household by four , eight , or ten rude bangs , without introduction or apology , this method of announcement was not even tolerably intelligible . Unless you happened to be attentive at the moment the din began , you could never be sure of your count of strokes so as to be positive whether it was eight , nine , ten , or eleven . As to the half and quarter strokes , they were wholly useless unless you chanced to know what was the last hour struck . And then , too , I should like to ask you why , in the name of common sense , it should take twelve times as long to tell you it is twelve o'clock as it does to tell you it is one . '' The manager laughed as heartily as Hamage had done on learning of my scare of the night before . `` It was lucky for you , '' he said , `` that the clock in your room happened to be a simple time announcer , otherwise you might easily have been startled half out of your wits . '' I became myself quite of the same opinion by the time he had shown us something of his assortment of clocks .