midnight
And after thorough regale on Mrs. Lovejoy 's green tea , and continual return to her constant relays of thin bacon gilded by unnumbered eggs ; after cutting and coming again upon unnumbered mince-pies , which , I am sorry to say , did not in any point compare well with Huldah 's , -- each man thrust many doughnuts into his outside pockets , drew on the long boots again , and his buckskin gloves and mittens , and , unencumbered now by the care of animals , started on the work of the evening . The sun was just taking his last look at them from the western hills , where Reuben and John could see Huldah 's chimney smoking . The plan was , by taking a double hand-sled of Lovejoy 's , and by knocking together two or three more , jumper-fashion , to work their way across the meadow to the railroad causeway , and establish a milk dépôt there , where the line was not half a mile from Lovejoy 's . By going and coming often , following certain tracks well known to Lovejoy on the windward side of walls and fences , these eight men felt quite sure that by midnight they could place all their milk at the spot where the old farm crossing strikes the railroad . Meanwhile , Silas Lovejoy , a boy of fourteen , was to put on a pair of snow-shoes , go down to the station , state the case to old Dix , and get from him a red lantern and permission to stop the first train where it swept out from the Pitman cut upon the causeway . Old Dix had no more right to give this permission than had the humblest street-sweeper in Ispahan , and this they all knew . But the fact that Silas had asked for it would show a willingness on their part to submit to authority , if authority there had been .