six o'clock
And the energetic baronet hurried away , whilst Sydney entered the Club , and made straight for the smoking-room . Here he found others just as eager to predict the downfall of the Government as Sir John Pynsent had been ; but he was not in the mood to listen to a number of young men all of the same mind , all of-doubtful intellectual calibre , and all sure to say what he had heard a dozen times already . So he passed on to the billiard-room , and finding that a pool was just beginning , took a ball and played . That served to pass the time until six o'clock , when he went upstairs and read the evening papers for an hour ; and at seven he had his dinner and a bottle of wine . Meanwhile he had met two or three friends , with whom he kept up a lively conversation on the events of the day , seasoned by many a pungent joke , and fatal -LRB- for the moment -RRB- to many a reputation . It is a habit fostered by club life -- as , no doubt , it is fostered in the life of the drawing-room , for neither sex is exempt -- to sacrifice the repute of one 's absent acquaintance with a light heart , not in malice , but more as a parrot bites the finger that feeds it , in sport , or even in affection . If we backbite our friends , we give them free permission to backbite us , or we know that they do it , which amounts to pretty much the same thing .