noon before
In times of prosperity , when little is heard of the unemployed , there were seldom less . The same number , winter and summer , in storm or calm , in good times and bad , held this melancholy midnight rendezvous at Fleischmann 's bread box . At both of these two charities , during the severe winter which was now on , Hurstwood was a frequent visitor . On one occasion it was peculiarly cold , and finding no comfort in begging about the streets , he waited until noon before seeking this free offering to the poor . Already , at eleven o'clock of this morning , several such as he had shambled forward out of Sixth Avenue , their thin clothes flapping and fluttering in the wind . They leaned against the iron railing which protects the walls of the Ninth Regiment Armory , which fronts upon that section of Fifteenth Street , having come early in order to be first in . Having an hour to wait , they at first lingered at a respectful distance ; but others coming up , they moved closer in order to protect their right of precedence .