nine o’clock
PART I Towards the end of November , during a thaw , at nine o'clock one morning , a train on the Warsaw and Petersburg railway was approaching the latter city at full speed . The morning was so damp and misty that it was only with great difficulty that the day succeeded in breaking ; and it was impossible to distinguish anything more than a few yards away from the carriage windows . Some of the passengers by this particular train were returning from abroad ; but the third-class carriages were the best filled , chiefly with insignificant persons of various occupations and degrees , picked up at the different stations nearer town . All of them seemed weary , and most of them had sleepy eyes and a shivering expression , while their complexions generally appeared to have taken on the colour of the fog outside .