Nor did I
speak to him, though he pleased me so much, because a friend of mine
in Lambourne had once told me that of all things in Nature what a
fish most fears is the voice of a man.
He, however, first spoke to me in a sort of easy tone that could
frighten no fish. He said "Hullo!"
I answered him in a very subdued voice, for I have no art where
fishes are concerned, "Hullo!"
Then he asked me, after a good long time, whether his watch was
right, and as he asked me he pulled out his, which was a large,
thick, golden watch, and looked at it with anxiety and dread. He
asked me this, I think, because I must have had the look of a tired
man fresh from the towns, and with the London time upon him, and yet
I had been for weeks in no town larger than Cricklade: moreover, I
had no watch. Since, none the less, it is one's duty to uplift,
sustain, and comfort all one's fellows I told him that his watch was
but half a minute fast, and he put it back with a greater content
than he had taken it out; and, indeed, anyone who blames me for what
I did in so assuring him of the time should remember that I had
other means than a watch for judging it. The sunlight was already
full of old kindness, the midges were active, the shadow of the
reeds on the river was of a particular colour, the haze of a
particular warmth; no one who had passed many days and nights
together sleeping out and living out under this rare summer could
mistake the hour.
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