ten o'clock
`` My progress through the squalid streets was quite triumphal . A large juvenile crowd attended me , with appropriate vocal music , and adults cheered from the pavements , though no one embarrassed me with gifts . But , for all my outward gaiety , I was secretly anxious . It was barely ten o'clock and many hours of the dreary November day had yet to run before it would be safe for me to approach my destination . The prospect of tramping the streets for some ten or twelve hours with this very conspicuous appendage was far from agreeable , to say nothing of the increasing risk of detection , and I looked forward to it with gloomy forebodings . If a suspicion arose , I could be traced with the greatest ease , and in any case I should be spent with fatigue before evening . Reflecting on these difficulties , I had decided to seek some retired spot where I could dismount the effigies , cover them with the tarpaulin that was rolled up in the barrow and take a rest , when once more circumstances befriended me .