nine at night
What walks I took alone , down muddy lanes , in the bad winter weather , carrying that parlour , and Mr. and Miss Murdstone in it , everywhere : a monstrous load that I was obliged to bear , a daymare that there was no possibility of breaking in , a weight that brooded on my wits , and blunted them ! What meals I had in silence and embarrassment , always feeling that there were a knife and fork too many , and that mine ; an appetite too many , and that mine ; a plate and chair too many , and those mine ; a somebody too many , and that I ! What evenings , when the candles came , and I was expected to employ myself , but , not daring to read an entertaining book , pored over some hard-headed , harder-hearted treatise on arithmetic ; when the tables of weights and measures set themselves to tunes , as ` Rule Britannia ' , or ` Away with Melancholy ' ; when they would n't stand still to be learnt , but would go threading my grandmother 's needle through my unfortunate head , in at one ear and out at the other ! What yawns and dozes I lapsed into , in spite of all my care ; what starts I came out of concealed sleeps with ; what answers I never got , to little observations that I rarely made ; what a blank space I seemed , which everybody overlooked , and yet was in everybody 's way ; what a heavy relief it was to hear Miss Murdstone hail the first stroke of nine at night , and order me to bed ! Thus the holidays lagged away , until the morning came when Miss Murdstone said : ` Here 's the last day off ! ' and gave me the closing cup of tea of the vacation . I was not sorry to go .