nine in the morning
Will you take me to the corner of the rue Ronsard ? '' The man grumbled again , and shrugged his shoulders until his ears disappeared in the shaggy depths of his fur cape ; but , when all hope seemed fled , he laconically murmured the one word '' _ Bon ! _ '' whipped up his horse , and started off with a fine disregard of whether his fare had taken his seat or been left behind upon the footpath . To those who know Montmartre only as an abode of night -- a place of light and laughter and folly -- Montmartre in the day , Montmartre at half-past nine in the morning , comes as a revelation . The whole picture is as a coin reversed . The theatres , the music-halls , the _ cabarets _ all lie with closed eyes , innocently sleeping ; the population of pleasure-seekers and pleasure-mongers has disappeared as completely as if some magician had waved his wand , and in its place the streets teem with the worker -- the early , industrious shopkeeper and the householder bent upon a profitable morning 's marketing . Max , gazing from the _ fiacre _ with attentive eyes , followed the varying scenes , while his horse wound a careful and laborious way up the cobble-paved streets , and noted with an artist 's eye the black , hurrying figures of the men , cloaked and hooded against the cold , and the black , homely figures of the women , silhouetted against the sharp greens and yellows of the laden vegetable stalls at which they chattered and bargained .