R. M. Ballantyne 
Shifting Winds A Tough Yarn 

Excerpt: "The hour was midnight. This fact was indicated by the family clock-a Dutch one, with a face which had once been white, but was now become greenish yellow, probably from horror at the profanity of the artist who had painted a basket of unrecognisable fruit above it, an irate cockatoo below it, and a blue church with a pink steeple as near to the centre of it as the hands would admit of."