about nine o'clock
As this spot offered many advantages , our travellers halted for the night , and resolved to make it their headquarters for a season , till they should meet with an eligible situation for building a winter shelter . Here , then , at the head of the valley , sheltered by one of the rounded hills that formed its sides , our young people erected a summer hut , somewhat after the fashion of an Indian wigwam , which was all the shelter that was requisite while the weather remained so warm . Through the opening at the gorge of this ravine they enjoyed a peep at the distant waters of the lake , which terminated the vista , while they were quite removed from its unwholesome vapours . The temperature of the air for some days had been hot and sultry , scarcely modified by the cool , delicious breeze that usually sets in about nine o'clock and blows most refreshingly till four or five in the afternoon . Hector and Louis had gone down to fish for supper , while Catharine busied herself in collecting leaves and dried deer-grass , moss and fern , of which there was abundance near the spring . The boys had promised to cut some fresh cedar boughs near the lake shore , and bring them up to form a foundation for their beds , and also to strew Indian-fashion over the floor of the hut by way of a carpet . The fragrant carpet of cedar or hemlock-spruce sprigs strewn lightly over the earthen floor , was to them a luxury as great as if it had been taken from the looms of Persia or Turkey , so happy and contented were they in their ignorance .