about eleven o'clock
Rumblings , rendered low by the thickness of the walls , indicated that the storm still raged . Listening , Dick Sand also heard the rain falling with violence at the base of the ant-hill . As the large drops no longer struck a hard soil , he must conclude that the whole plain was inundated . It must have been about eleven o'clock . Dick Sand then felt that a kind of torpor , if not a true sleep , was going to overcome him . It would , however , be rest . But , just as he was yielding to it , the thought came to him that , by the settling of the clay , washed in , the lower orifice was likely to be obstructed .