eight o'clock
in the morning
Pushkin suffered terrible agonies before his death , poor Heine lay paralyzed for several years ; why , then , should not some Andrey Yefimitch or Matryona Savishna be ill , since their lives had nothing of importance in them , and would have been entirely empty and like the life of an amoeba except for suffering ? Oppressed by such reflections , Andrey Yefimitch relaxed his efforts and gave up visiting the hospital every day . His life was passed like this . As a rule he got up at eight o'clock in the morning , dressed , and drank his tea . Then he sat down in his study to read , or went to the hospital . At the hospital the out-patients were sitting in the dark , narrow little corridor waiting to be seen by the doctor . The nurses and the attendants , tramping with their boots over the brick floors , ran by them ; gaunt-looking patients in dressing-gowns passed ; dead bodies and vessels full of filth were carried by ; the children were crying , and there was a cold draught .