ten o'clock
He made up his mind to withhold nothing from the Poysers , but to tell them the worst at once , for there was no time to rob the tidings of their suddenness . Hetty 's trial must come on at the Lent assizes , and they were to be held at Stoniton the next week . It was scarcely to be hoped that Martin Poyser could escape the pain of being called as a witness , and it was better he should know everything as long beforehand as possible . Before ten o'clock on Thursday morning the home at the Hall Farm was a house of mourning for a misfortune felt to be worse than death . The sense of family dishonour was too keen even in the kind-hearted Martin Poyser the younger to leave room for any compassion towards Hetty . He and his father were simple-minded farmers , proud of their untarnished character , proud that they came of a family which had held up its head and paid its way as far back as its name was in the parish register ; and Hetty had brought disgrace on them all -- disgrace that could never be wiped out . That was the all-conquering feeling in the mind both of father and son -- the scorching sense of disgrace , which neutralised all other sensibility -- and Mr. Irwine was struck with surprise to observe that Mrs. Poyser was less severe than her husband .