five o'clock
Are you to dine with Colonel Strafford to-day ? ' ` I am , Sir , ' said the major ; ` an ' it goes again ' the colonel 's grain to have a party at all just now , with the respect he has for the family up there , ' and he nodded his head , pensively , toward the Elms . ` But he asked Lowe ten days ago , and Mr. Dangerfield , and two or three more ; and you know he could not put them off on that ground -- there being no relationship , you see -- and , ` pon my oath , Sir , I 'd rather not go myself , just now . ' That evening , at five o'clock , Colonel Stafford 's dinner party assembled at the King 's House . The colonel was a serene man , and hospitality -- even had he been in the dumps -- demands her sacrifices . He , therefore , did the honours as beseemed a genial and courteous old officer of the Royal Irish Artillery , who , if his conversation was not very remarkable in quality , and certainly not exorbitant in quantity , made up by listening a great deal , and supplying no end of civility , and an affluence of very pretty claret . Mr. Justice Lowe was there , and Mr. Dangerfield , and old Colonel Bligh , of the Magazine , and honest Major O'Neill , notwithstanding his low spirits .