ten o'clock
The farmer left his rowen to lie in the field and take the chances of the weather , the miller gave his mill-stream a holiday , the carpenter left the house half-shingled with rain threatening , and the painter his brush in the pot , to collect on the street corners with their neighbors and discuss the portentous aspect of affairs . And even where there was little or no discussion , to stand silently in groups was something . Thus merely to be in company was , to these excited men , a necessity and a satisfaction , for so does the electricity of a common excitement magnetize human beings , that they have an attraction for one another , and are drawn together by a force not felt at other times . There were not less than three hundred men , a quarter of the entire population of the town , on and about Stockbridge Green at ten o'clock that Monday morning , twice as many as had assembled to hear the news from the convention the Saturday preceding . The great want of the people , for the most part , tongue-tied farmers , seemed to be to hear talk , to have something said , and wherever a few brisk words gave promise of a lively dialogue , the speakers were at once surrounded by a dense throng of listeners . The thirsting eagerness with which they turned their open mouths toward each one as he began to speak , in the hope that he would express to themselves some one of the ideas formlessly astir in their own stolid minds , was pathetic testimony to the depth to which the iron of poverty , debt , judicial and governmental oppression had entered their souls . They had thought little and vaguely , but they had felt much and keenly , and it was evident the man who could voice their feelings , however partially , however perversely , and for his own ends , would be master of their actions .