about eleven in the morning
Yet when he put up the price of wheat to a dollar and twenty cents , the great flour mills of Minnesota and Wisconsin stopped grinding , and finding a greater profit in selling the grain than in milling it , threw their stores upon the market . Though the bakers did not increase the price of their bread as a consequence of this , the loaf -- even in Chicago , even in the centre of that great Middle West that weltered in the luxury of production -- was smaller , and from all the poorer districts of the city came complaints , protests , and vague grumblings of discontent . On a certain Monday , about the middle of May , Jadwin sat at Gretry 's desk -LRB- long since given over to his use -RRB- , in the office on the ground floor of the Board of Trade , swinging nervously back and forth in the swivel chair , drumming his fingers upon the arms , and glancing continually at the clock that hung against the opposite wall . It was about eleven in the morning . The Board of Trade vibrated with the vast trepidation of the Pit , that for two hours had spun and sucked , and guttered and disgorged just overhead . The waiting-room of the office was more than usually crowded . Parasites of every description polished the walls with shoulder and elbow .