nine o'clock at night
He wandered over miles and miles of ground , and still came back to the old place . Morning and noon had passed , and the day was on the wane , and still he rambled to and fro , and up and down , and round and round , and still lingered about the same spot . At last he got away , and shaped his course for Hatfield . It was nine o'clock at night , when the man , quite tired out , and the dog , limping and lame from the unaccustomed exercise , turned down the hill by the church of the quiet village , and plodding along the little street , crept into a small public-house , whose scanty light had guided them to the spot . There was a fire in the tap-room , and some country-labourers were drinking before it . They made room for the stranger , but he sat down in the furthest corner , and ate and drank alone , or rather with his dog : to whom he cast a morsel of food from time to time . The conversation of the men assembled here , turned upon the neighbouring land , and farmers ; and when those topics were exhausted , upon the age of some old man who had been buried on the previous Sunday ; the young men present considering him very old , and the old men present declaring him to have been quite young -- not older , one white-haired grandfather said , than he was -- with ten or fifteen year of life in him at least -- if he had taken care ; if he had taken care .