“Why you know, you might break your neck like that!  I very nearly flew out, and I didn’t even notice you had been thrown out.  I can fancy what it is like driving in autumn!”

The postman did not speak.

“Have you been going with the post for long?” the student asked.

“Eleven years.”

“Oho; every day?”

“Yes, every day.  I take this post and drive back again at once.  Why?”

Making the journey every day, he must have had a good many interesting adventures in eleven years.  On bright summer and gloomy autumn nights, or in winter when a ferocious snowstorm whirled howling round the mail cart, it must have been hard to avoid feeling frightened and uncanny.  No doubt more than once the horses had bolted, the mail cart had stuck in the mud, they had been attacked by highwaymen, or had lost their way in the blizzard....

“I can fancy what adventures you must have had in eleven years!” said the student.  “I expect it must be terrible driving?”

He said this and expected that the postman would tell him something, but the latter preserved a sullen silence and retreated into his collar.  Meanwhile it began to get light.  The sky changed colour imperceptibly; it still seemed dark, but by now the horses and the driver and the road could be seen.  The crescent moon looked bigger and bigger, and the cloud that stretched below it, shaped like a cannon in a gun-carriage, showed a faint yellow on its lower edge.  Soon the postman’s face was visible.  It was wet with dew, grey and rigid as the face of a corpse.  An expression of dull, sullen anger was set upon it, as though the postman were still in pain and still angry with the driver.

“Thank God it is daylight!” said the student, looking at his chilled and angry face.  “I am quite frozen.  The nights are cold in September, but as soon as the sun rises it isn’t cold.  Shall we soon reach the station?”

The postman frowned and made a wry face.

“How fond you are of talking, upon my word!” he said.  “Can’t you keep quiet when you are travelling?”

The student was confused, and did not approach him again all the journey.  The morning came on rapidly.  The moon turned pale and melted away into the dull grey sky, the cloud turned yellow all over, the stars grew dim, but the east was still cold-looking and the same colour as the rest of the sky, so that one could hardly believe the sun was hidden in it.

The chill of the morning and the surliness of the postman gradually infected the student.  He looked apathetically at the country around him, waited for the warmth of the sun, and thought of nothing but how dreadful and horrible it must be for the poor trees and the grass to endure the cold nights.  The sun rose dim, drowsy, and cold.  The tree-tops were not gilded by the rays of the rising sun, as usually described, the sunbeams did not creep over the earth and there was no sign of joy in the flight of the sleepy birds.  The cold remained just the same now that the sun was up as it had been in the night.