four o'clock
Several desultory skrimmages had locality , but they I were altogether sequestered from the great factions of the O 's . Except that it was pleasant and stirred one 's blood to look at them , or occasioned the cudgels to be grasped more firmly , there was no personal interest felt by any of us in them ; they therefore began and ended , here and there , through the fair , like mere flashes in the pan , dying in their own smoke . `` The blood of every prolific nation is naturally hot ; but when that hot blood is inflamed by ardent spirits , it is not to be supposed that men should be cool ; and God he knows , there is not on the level surface of this habitable globe , a nation that has been so thoroughly inflamed by ardent spirits of all kinds as Ireland . `` Up till four o'clock that day , the factions were quiet . Several relations on both sides had been invited to drink by John and Rose 's families , for the purpose of establishing a good feeling between them . But this was , after all , hardly to be expected , for they hated one another with an ardency much too good-humored and buoyant ; and , between ourselves , to bring Paddy over a bottle is a very equivocal mode of giving him an anti-cudgeling disposition . After the hour of four , several of the factions were getting very friendly , which I knew at the time to be a bad sign .