nine o'clock
He carried with him his books from the other garret-room where he kept them , and sat down at the table by his grandmother , preparing his Latin and geography by her lamp , while she sat knitting a white stocking with fingers as rapid as thought , never looking at her work , but staring into the fire , and seeing visions there which Robert would have given everything he could call his own to see , and then would have given his life to blot out of the world if he had seen them . Quietly the evening passed , by the peaceful lamp and the cheerful fire , with the Latin on the one side of the table , and the stocking on the other , as if ripe and purified old age and hopeful unstained youth had been the only extremes of humanity known to the world . But the bitter wind was howling by fits in the chimney , and the offspring of a nobleman and a gipsy lay asleep in the garret , covered with the cloak of an old Highland rebel . At nine o'clock , Mrs. Falconer rang the bell for Betty , and they had worship . Robert read a chapter , and his grandmother prayed an extempore prayer , in which they that looked at the wine when it was red in the cup , and they that worshipped the woman clothed in scarlet and seated upon the seven hills , came in for a strange mixture , in which the vengeance yielded only to the pity . ` Lord , lead them to see the error of their ways , ' she cried . ` Let the rod of thy wrath awake the worm of their conscience that they may know verily that there is a God that ruleth in the earth .