six o’clock
Even upon ordinary occasions , and where means were ample , a great entertainment in those days was not such a sinecure as in modern times , when the lady who presides has but to intimate to her menials the day and hour when she wills it to take place . At that simple period , the lady was expected to enter deeply into the arrangement and provision of the whole affair ; and from a little gallery , which communicated with her own private apartment , and looked down upon the kitchen , her shrill voice was to be heard , from time to time , like that of the warning spirit in a tempest , rising above the clash of pots and stewpans -- the creaking spits -- the clattering of marrowbones and cleavers -- the scolding of cooks -- and all the other various kinds of din which form an accompaniment to dressing a large dinner . But all this toil and anxiety was more than doubled in the case of the approaching feast at Martindale Castle , where the presiding Genius of the festivity was scarce provided with adequate means to carry her hospitable purpose into effect . The tyrannical conduct of husbands , in such cases , is universal ; and I scarce know one householder of my acquaintance who has not , on some ill-omened and most inconvenient season , announced suddenly to his innocent helpmate , that he had invited `` Some odious Major Rock , To drop in at six o'clock . '' to the great discomposure of the lady , and the discredit , perhaps , of her domestic arrangements . Peveril of the Peak was still more thoughtless ; for he had directed his lady to invite the whole honest men of the neighbourhood to make good cheer at Martindale Castle , in honour of the blessed Restoration of his most sacred Majesty , without precisely explaining where the provisions were to come from . The deer-park had lain waste ever since the siege ; the dovecot could do little to furnish forth such an entertainment ; the fishponds , it is true , were well provided -LRB- which the neighbouring Presbyterians noted as a suspicious circumstance -RRB- ; and game was to be had for the shooting , upon the extensive heaths and hills of Derbyshire .