twelve o'clock
The wide-open glazed eyes were grey , like Seth 's , and had once looked with mild pride on the boys before whom Thias had lived to hang his head in shame . Seth 's chief feeling was awe and distress at this sudden snatching away of his father 's soul ; but Adam 's mind rushed back over the past in a flood of relenting and pity . When death , the great Reconciler , has come , it is never our tenderness that we repent of , but our severity . The Rector BEFORE twelve o'clock there had been some heavy storms of rain , and the water lay in deep gutters on the sides of the gravel walks in the garden of Broxton Parsonage ; the great Provence roses had been cruelly tossed by the wind and beaten by the rain , and all the delicate-stemmed border flowers had been dashed down and stained with the wet soil . A melancholy morning -- because it was nearly time hay-harvest should begin , and instead of that the meadows were likely to be flooded . But people who have pleasant homes get indoor enjoyments that they would never think of but for the rain . If it had not been a wet morning , Mr. Irwine would not have been in the dining-room playing at chess with his mother , and he loves both his mother and chess quite well enough to pass some cloudy hours very easily by their help .