seven in the evening
During the last week of October , sixteen hundred and five , near the day for the convening of Parliament , Lord Monteagle suddenly appeared in his house at Hoxton , from which he had been absent a month . His manner was perturbed and preoccupied in the extreme . Usually of a genial disposition , he surprised the servants who attended him , by an impatient order that supper be served at once , as he and the gentlemen accompanying him had already fasted too long . Soon after seven in the evening he dispatched a footman upon an errand into the neighboring street . This man shortly returned in haste , presenting to his lordship a sealed letter , addressed , in a cramped hand , to `` The Right Honorable , the Lord Monteagle . '' He received the missive , handling it in a fastidious manner , and inquired with some show of spirit how it had come through a servant , instead of being delivered in the usual way . '' 'T was given me , '' replied the footman , `` by a reasonably tall person who stood upon a corner of the street , and directed with much semblance of authority that I give it into thy lordship 's hand and to no other . '' ''