about nine
o'clock
He was being carried along the road at a rate rather considerable for a vehicle without springs , and under circumstances of physical uneasiness , his head being dandled up and down on the bed of the waggon like a kettledrum-stick . He then distinguished voices in conversation , coming from the forpart of the waggon . His concern at this dilemma -LRB- which would have been alarm , had he been a thriving man ; but misfortune is a fine opiate to personal terror -RRB- led him to peer cautiously from the hay , and the first sight he beheld was the stars above him . Charles 's Wain was getting towards a right angle with the Pole star , and Gabriel concluded that it must be about nine o'clock -- in other words , that he had slept two hours . This small astronomical calculation was made without any positive effort , and whilst he was stealthily turning to discover , if possible , into whose hands he had fallen . Two figures were dimly visible in front , sitting with their legs outside the waggon , one of whom was driving . Gabriel soon found that this was the waggoner , and it appeared they had come from Casterbridge fair , like himself .