eight o'clock in the morning
A csárdás it must be , and of the liveliest ! And after that another and yet another . Would it not be an awful pity to waste Erös Béla 's money , even though he was not here to enjoy its fruits ? So dancing was kept up till close on eight o'clock in the morning -- till the sun was high up in the heavens and the bell of the village church tolled for early Mass. . Until then the gipsies scraped their fiddles and banged their czimbalom almost uninterruptedly ; hundreds of sad and gay folk-songs were sung in chorus in the intervals of dancing the national dance . Cotton petticoats of many hues fluttered , leather boots -- both red and black -- clinked and stamped until the morning . Then it was that the merry company at last broke up , and that Fehér Károly and his brother took the short cut behind the inn , and found the bridegroom -- at whose expense they had just danced and feasted -- lying stark and stiff under the clear September sun .