two o'clock
`` Losh keep us , Mistress Chalmers , ye maunna speak like that , for it 's no chancy , he micht be taken away sudden , and ye would have regrets ; forbye your laddie 's naithing to my Archie , for the last time I saw him , as I 'm a livin ' woman , there wasna more than two inches of his necktie left , and he was fishing his new Balmoral bonnet out of the water-barrel in the playground . Ye needna expect peace if the Almichty give ye laddies , but I wouldna change them for lassies -- na , na , I 'll no ' go that length . '' And the two matrons sustained themselves with the thought that if their boys were only a mere wreck of what they had been in the morning , other people 's boys were no better , and some of them were worse , for one of them had inflicted such damages on his trousers that , although he was able to face the public , he had to retire as from the royal presence ; nor was it at all unlike the motherly mind to conceive a malignant dislike to the few boys who were spick and span , and to have a certain secret pride even in their boys ' disorder , which at any rate showed that they were far removed from the low estate of lassies . The great function of the day came off at two o'clock , and before the hour the hall was packed with fathers , mothers , sisters , elder brothers , uncles , aunts , cousins and distant relatives of the boys , while the boys themselves , beyond all control and more dishevelled than ever , were scattered throughout the crowd . Some were sitting with their parents and enduring a rapid toilet at the hands of their mothers ; others were gathered in clumps and arranging a reception for the more unpopular prize-winners ; others were prowling up and down the passages , exchanging sweetmeats and responding -LRB- very coldly -RRB- to the greeting of relatives in the seats , for the black terror that hung over every Seminary lad was that he would be kissed publicly by a maiden aunt . Mr. Peter McGuffie senior came in with the general attention of the audience , and seated himself in a prominent place with Speug beside him . Not that Mr. McGuffie took any special interest in prize-givings , and certainly not because Speug had ever appeared in the character of a prize-winner .