midday
It was a good contrivance , for thus by changing about from one to another , and by allowing one horse to be led , the endurance of the whole was maintained longer than would otherwise have been possible . But at length the long and fatiguing journey began to tell most seriously on all the horses , and all began to see that further progress would not be much longer possible . For many hours they had kept on their path ; and , though the distance which they had gone was not more than twenty-five miles , yet , so rough had been the road that the labor had been excessive , and all the horses needed rest . By this time it was midday , and they all found themselves face to face with a question of fearful import , which none of them knew how to answer . The question was , what to do . Could they stop ? Dare they ?