midnight
In one of these the miners left their clothes , and put on rough canvas suits before going down , and here also they were searched on coming up in order to see if they had carried away any gold . From this room a long , narrow passage led to the top of the shaft , so that any miner having gold concealed upon him could not throw it away and pick it up afterwards , but had to go right into the searching room from the cage , and could not possibly hide a particle without being found out by the searchers . The other room was the sleeping apartment of such miners as stayed on the premises , for the majority of the men went home to their families when their work was done . There were three shifts of men on the Pactolus during the twenty-four hours , and each shift worked eight hours at a time -- the first going on at midnight and knocking off at eight in the morning , the second commencing at eight and ending at four in the afternoon , and the third starting at four and lasting until midnight again , when the first shift of men began anew . Consequently , when M. Vandeloup awoke next morning at six o'clock the first shift were not yet up , and some of the miners who had to go on at eight were sleeping heavily in their beds . The sleeping places were berths , ranging along two sides of the room , and divided into upper and lower compartments like those on shipboard . Gaston having roused himself naturally wanted to see where he was , so rubbing his eyes and yawning he leaned on his elbow and took a leisurely survey of his position .