five o'clock
Get carpenters and tell them to run up a platform in front of the hotel ; tell them to take the bar door clean off its hinges and be all ready the minute the poll quits . '' It was that last hour that did it . Just as soon as the big posters went up in the windows of the Mariposa Newspacket with the telegraphic despatch that Josh Smith was reported in the city to be elected , and was followed by the messages from all over the county , the voters hesitated no longer . They had waited , most of them , all through the day , not wanting to make any error in their vote , but when they saw the Smith men crowding into the polls and heard the news from the outside , they went solid in one great stampede , and by the time the poll was declared closed at five o'clock there was no shadow of doubt that the county was saved and that Josh Smith was elected for Missinaba . I wish you could have witnessed the scene in Mariposa that evening . It would have done your heart good , -- such joy , such public rejoicing as you never saw . It turned out that there was n't really a Liberal in the whole town and that there never had been .