about six o'clock
I walked slowly away from the turnpike , so that the keeper might not suspect me , and then I nipped over a stile , and ran away across country , going inland , away from the sea , as fast as I could travel . I could tell my direction by the sun , and I kept a westerly course , almost due west , for three or four hours , till I was tired out . It was a lonely walk , too ; hardly anything but wild , rather marshy country , with few houses , few churches , and no bigger town than the tiniest of villages . At about six o'clock that afternoon , when I had gone some sixteen miles since daybreak , I felt that I could go no further , and began to cast about for a lodging-place . I plodded on till I came to a sort of copse or little wood , where I expected to find shelter . Supper I had resolved to do without ; I wished to keep my shilling for dinner and breakfast the next day . As I came up to the copse hedge I saw that some gipsies were camped there .