six o'clock in the morning
The Widow Ducket lived in a small village about ten miles from the New Jersey sea-coast . In this village she was born , here she had married and buried her husband , and here she expected somebody to bury her ; but she was in no hurry for this , for she had scarcely reached middle age . She was a tall woman with no apparent fat in her composition , and full of activity , both muscular and mental . She rose at six o'clock in the morning , cooked breakfast , set the table , washed the dishes when the meal was over , milked , churned , swept , washed , ironed , worked in her little garden , attended to the flowers in the front yard , and in the afternoon knitted and quilted and sewed , and after tea she either went to see her neighbors or had them come to see her . When it was really dark she lighted the lamp in her parlor and read for an hour , and if it happened to be one of Miss Mary Wilkins 's books that she read she expressed doubts as to the realism of the characters therein described . These doubts she expressed to Dorcas Networthy , who was a small , plump woman , with a solemn face , who had lived with the widow for many years and who had become her devoted disciple . Whatever the widow did , that also did Dorcas -- not so well , for her heart told her she could never expect to do that , but with a yearning anxiety to do everything as well as she could .