six in the evening
It recalled the description of Bryce : `` The place seems consecrated to great affairs . '' The Secretary was about to call the roll for the vote which would decide the fate of Cuba and alter for ever the position of the United States in the family of nations . Betty had been in the gallery all night and a part of the preceding day . When the Senate took a recess at half-past six in the evening , she and Mary Montgomery , while Mrs. Shattuc guarded their seats , had forced their way down to the restaurant , but had been obliged to content themselves with a few sandwiches bought at the counter . But Betty was conscious of neither hunger nor fatigue , although the strain during the last eight hours had been almost insupportable : the brief sharp debates , the prosing of bores , interrupted by angry cries of `` Vote ! Vote ! '' the reiterated announcement of the Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations that the conferees could not agree , the perpetual nagging of two Democrats and one Populist , the long trying intervals of debate on matters irrelevant to the great question torturing every mind , during which there was much confusion on the floor : the Senators talked constantly in groups except when the Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations brought in his amended bill ; -- all this had made up a day trying to the stoutest nerves , and more than one person had fainted and been carried from the galleries .