midnight
Now , if only there had been freedom of discourse during the dinner hour , the ten disembarrassed minutes allotted to close it would have afforded time sufficient for hearty finishing blows and a soothing word or so to dear old innocent Mr. Rumford , and perhaps a kindly clap of the shoulder to John Mattock , no bad fellow at bottom . Rockney too was no bad fellow in his way . He wanted no more than a beating and a thrashing . He was a journalist , a hard-headed rascal , none of your good old-fashioned order of regimental scribes who take their cue from their colonel , and march this way and that , right about face , with as little impediment of principles to hamper their twists and turns as the straw he tosses aloft at midnight to spy the drift of the wind to-morrow . Quite the contrary ; Rockney was his own colonel ; he pretended to think independently , and tried to be the statesman of a leading article , and showed his intention to stem the current of liberty , and was entirely deficient in sympathy with the oppressed , a fanatical advocate of force ; he was an inveterate Saxon , good-hearted and in great need of a drubbing . Certain lines Rockney had written of late about Irish affairs recurred to Captain Con , and the political fires leaped in him ; he sparkled and said : ` Let me beg you to pass the claret over to Mr. Rockney , Mr. Rumford ; I warrant it for the circulating medium of amity , if he 'll try it . ' `` Tis the Comet Margaux , ' said Dr. Forbery , topping anything Rockney might have had to say , and anything would have served .