ten o'clock
No , a far vaster one was upon the cast of this die : _ the life of knight-errantry _ . I was a champion , it was true , but not the champion of the frivolous black arts , I was the champion of hard unsentimental common-sense and reason . I was entering the lists to either destroy knight-errantry or be its victim . Vast as the show-grounds were , there were no vacant spaces in them outside of the lists , at ten o'clock on the morning of the 16th . The mammoth grand-stand was clothed in flags , streamers , and rich tapestries , and packed with several acres of small-fry tributary kings , their suites , and the British aristocracy ; with our own royal gang in the chief place , and each and every individual a flashing prism of gaudy silks and velvets -- well , I never saw anything to begin with it but a fight between an Upper Mississippi sunset and the aurora borealis . The huge camp of beflagged and gay-colored tents at one end of the lists , with a stiff-standing sentinel at every door and a shining shield hanging by him for challenge , was another fine sight . You see , every knight was there who had any ambition or any caste feeling ; for my feeling toward their order was not much of a secret , and so here was their chance .