Three Men in A Boat by Jerome K. Jerome

George said that the same kind of thing, only worse, had happened to him some eighteen months ago, when he was lodging by himself in the house of a certain Mrs. Gippings.  He said his watch went wrong one evening, and stopped at a quarter-past eight.  He did not know this at the time because, for some reason or other, he forgot to wind it up when he went to bed (an unusual occurrence with him), and hung it up over his pillow without ever looking at the thing.

It was in the winter when this happened, very near the shortest day, and a week of fog into the bargain, so the fact that it was still very dark when George woke in the morning was no guide to him as to the time.  He reached up, and hauled down his watch.  It was a quarter-past eight.

“Angels and ministers of grace defend us!” exclaimed George; “and here have I got to be in the City by nine.  Why didn’t somebody call me?  Oh, this is a shame!”  And he flung the watch down, and sprang out of bed, and had a cold bath, and washed himself, and dressed himself, and shaved himself in cold water because there was not time to wait for the hot, and then rushed and had another look at the watch.

Whether the shaking it had received in being thrown down on the bed had started it, or how it was, George could not say, but certain it was that from a quarter-past eight it had begun to go, and now pointed to twenty minutes to nine.

George snatched it up, and rushed downstairs.  In the sitting-room, all was dark and silent: there was no fire, no breakfast.  George said it was a wicked shame of Mrs. G., and he made up his mind to tell her what he thought of her when he came home in the evening.  Then he dashed on his great-coat and hat, and, seizing his umbrella, made for the front door.  The door was not even unbolted.  George anathematized Mrs. G. for a lazy old woman, and thought it was very strange that people could not get up at a decent, respectable time, unlocked and unbolted the door, and ran out.

He ran hard for a quarter of a mile, and at the end of that distance it began to be borne in upon him as a strange and curious thing that there were so few people about, and that there were no shops open.  It was certainly a very dark and foggy morning, but still it seemed an unusual course to stop all business on that account.  He had to go to business: why should other people stop in bed merely because it was dark and foggy!