two o'clock
This mass rose in hummocks and hills of humanity over the piles of brick and sand and of crates and barrels dumped by the trucks , and out over the water they covered the barges and the tugs , and there were even hundreds upon the roofs of docksheds . The yelp of a dog was heard now and then and the faint cries of children . But the mass as a whole stood motionless , without a sound . They had stood thus since two o'clock , and now the sun was setting . To the west the harbor was empty , no smoke from ships obscured the sun , and it shone with radiant clearness upon eleven races of men , upon Italians , Germans , French , on English , Poles and Russians , on Negroes and Norwegians , Lascars , Malays , Coolies , on figures burly , figures puny , faces white and faces swarthy , yellow , brown and black . The sun shone upon all alike -- except where that Morgan liner , still lying unloaded at her dock , threw a long dark creeping shadow out across the throng . Thirty thousand people were here .