one o'clock
The principal was a kind man , but he had two hundred of these rude , awkward farmer-boys , and he could not be expected to study each one closely enough to discover their latent powers . Bradley went away down town to buy his books , with a feeling that the smile of the principal was not genuine , and he felt also that Milton was a little ashamed of him here in the town . Everything seemed to be going hard with him . But his hardest trial came when he entered the classroom at one o'clock . He knew no one , of course , and the long , narrow room was filled with riotous boys and girls all much younger than himself . All the desks seemed to be occupied and he was obliged to run the gauntlet of the entire class in his search for a seat . As he walked down the room so close to the wall that he brushed the chalk of the blackboard off upon his shoulder , he made a really ludicrous figure .