about twenty minutes to ten
Now , however , I made up my mind to seek safety in a multitude , and by consulting ALL the English classics to avoid ?? the danger of imitating any one too closely . I had just accomplished the task of reading through the majority of the standard novels at the time when my narrative commences . It was , then , about twenty minutes to ten on the night of the fourth of June , eighteen hundred and eighty-six , that , after disposing of a pint of beer and a Welsh rarebit for my supper , I seated myself in my arm-chair , cocked my feet upon a stool , and lit my pipe , as was my custom . Both my pulse and my temperature were , as far as I know , normal at the time . I would give the state of the barometer , but that unlucky instrument had experienced an unprecedented fall of forty-two inches -- from a nail to the ground -- and was not in a reliable condition . We live in a scientific age , and I flatter myself that I move with the times .