about
eleven o'clock
Say nothing to the others , ' he added ; and giving our horses the rein we rode into camp on a gallop . `` Three days before Christmas we drove up this Wyoming stray and beefed him . We hung the beef up overnight to harden in the frost , and the next morning bright and early , we started for the stage-stand with a good pair of ponies to a light wagon . We reached the widow 's place about eleven o'clock , and against her protests that she had no use for so much , we hung up eight hundred pounds of as fine beef as you ever set your peepers on . We wished her a merry Christmas , jumped into the wagon , clucked to the ponies , and merely hit the high places getting away . When we got well out of sight of the house -- well , I 've seen mule colts play and kid goats cut up their antics ; I 've seen children that was frolicsome ; but for a man with gray hair on his head , old Bibleback Hunt that day was the happiest mortal I ever saw . He talked to the horses ; he sang songs ; he played Injun ; and that Christmas was a merry one , for the debt was paid and our little widow had beef to throw to the dogs .