nearly ten
o'clock
`` Mark ! Correct me when I fall into the habit of sneering at the episcopate . '' That night Father Rowley was attending a large temperance demonstration in the Town Hall for the purpose of securing if possible a smaller proportion of public houses than one for every eighty of the population , which was the average for Chatsea . The meeting lasted until nearly ten o'clock ; and it had already struck the hour when Father Rowley with Mark and two or three others got back to Keppel Street . There was nothing Father Rowley disliked so much as arriving home himself after ten , and he hurried up to his room without inquiring if everybody was in . Mark 's window looked out on Keppel Street ; and the May night being warm and his head aching from the effects of the meeting , he sat for nearly an hour at the open window gazing down at the passers by . There was not much to see , nothing more indeed than couples wandering home , a bluejacket or two , an occasional cat , and a few women carrying jugs of beer .