"Midnight" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... with the watch before him. He could have gone out at once, but the hour had not struck yet. The hour would be midnight. There was no reason for that choice except that the facts and the words of a certain evening in his past were timing his conduct in the present. The sudden power Natalia Haldin had gained over him he ascribed to the same cause. "You don't walk with impunity over a phantom's breast," ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad
... it quite useless to speak, or even to shout to those persons nearest me. Even the reports of the guns were seldom heard, and I knew only of their going off by seeing their owners reload them. It was past midnight before I perceived a decrease in ...
— True Stories about Cats and Dogs • Eliza Lee Follen
... off, and pretty soon Miss Morganstein came up the stairs. She was stunning, in a white sailor suit with red fixings, eyes black as midnight; piles of raven hair. But as soon as he had introduced us, and she had settled his pillows to suit him—he was lying in one of those invalid chairs—he sent her off to mix a julep or something. Then he said he presumed we were going to have a fine cut of the Aquila ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... the last of them behind me in the person of a wretched drudge, who, after running to and fro all day till midnight, and moping in his stealthy winks of sleep upon the stairs betweenwhiles, was washing the dark passages at four o'clock in the morning; and went upon my way with a grateful heart that I was not doomed to live where slavery ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... not stop for tea at Neville's studio; and, later, when he telephoned, asking her to dine with him, she pleaded the feminine prerogative of tea in her room and going to bed early for a change. But she lay awake until midnight trying to think out a modus vivendi for Neville and herself which, would involve no sacrifice on his part and no unhappiness for anybody ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers
... when, at midnight, sweep Snow-muffled winds, and all is dark To hear—and sink again-to sleep Or, at an earlier call, to mark, 40 By blazing fire, the still suspense Of ...
— Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson • William Wordsworth and Alfred Lord Tennyson
... I have to do, is to hold myself inexcusable for meeting such a determined and audacious spirit; that's all! I have hardly any question now, but that he would have contrived some wicked stratagem or other to have got me away, had I met him at a midnight hour, as once or twice I had thoughts to do; and that would ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... was not accustomed to view me in such a light in itself probably explained the originality of his method. We were on pleasant terms. Drayton was a good fellow. Who knew better than he what would be the professional significance of the circumstance that Dr. Thorne was seen intoxicated down town at midnight? The city would ring with it in twelve hours, and it would not be for me, though I had been the most popular doctor in town, to undo the deed of that slander, if once it so much as lifted its invisible hand against the ...
— The Gates Between • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... fallen in, and the ruins were still burning on the ground. The yard, thanks to Mr. Robson, had been so well cleared, that the watchmen had but little difficulty in keeping the fire isolated. After midnight the wind lulled, and the thick clouds of smoke soared up into the air, and were driven slowly over ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland
... Smith hurling objurgations about bananas and watchmen out upon the midnight air, he knew it was immoral, but he felt his heart warm toward Smith. The next time the watchman tried to get the colonel out by ringing and kicking the colonel refused to respond, and finally the watchman ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)
... the artistic, impressionable temperament, easily disheartened, with little self-reliant courage or grit. But he seems to have felt a little ashamed of his plaint, for at midnight of the same day he wrote a second letter, half apologetic and much more hopeful, just because one or two people had been a little kind and he had been taken out to ...
— A Backward Glance at Eighty • Charles A. Murdock
... youth splendidly buried in Besa. This most extraordinary intermezzo of all Nile journeys supplied dying heathendom with a new god, and art with its last ideal form. Probably, also, during the burial, far-sighted courtiers already saw the star of Antinous shining in Egypt's midnight sky, and ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... there were other riders out on the waste that night, and, with one hand on the slung rifle, I reined in the horse as three white-sprinkled figures came up at a gallop. Generally, as far as anything human is concerned, the prairie is as safe at midnight, if not safer, than a street in London town; but because game is plentiful there is generally a gun in the wagon, and when the settlers ride out they often carry a rifle at ...
— Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... unexpected morass was impracticable; and it extended so far, both to the right and left, that he could not attempt to make the circuit of either extremity. He therefore determined to return; and, about midnight, he again reached the river, excessively fatigued with his ...
— Travels in North America, From Modern Writers • William Bingley
... many times to cry over it that it was midnight when the writing was finished. It was a letter, and ...
— Miss Ludington's Sister • Edward Bellamy
... goo into the say by night for a minute, are you? And to-morrow night would serve, too; 't will be just low tide to midnight." ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... have, surely you will not wander back here, where all that you called home has either vanished or given itself to others, to be their home now and yours no more! What an awful doom the old fancy has allotted you! To dwell in your graves all the year, and creep out, this one night, to enter at the midnight door, left open for welcome! A poor welcome truly!—just an open door, a clean-swept floor, and a fire to warm your rain-sodden limbs! The household asleep, and the house-place swarming with the ghosts of ancient times,—the miser, the spendthrift, the profligate, ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald
... detain us long. Nehemiah and his little band of exiles have come back to a ruined Jerusalem. Their first care is to provide for their safety, and the first step is to know the exact extent of their defencelessness. So we have the account of Nehemiah's midnight ride amongst the ruins of the broken walls. And then we read of the co-operation of all classes in the work of reconstruction. 'Many hands made light work.' Men and women, priests and nobles, goldsmiths, apothecaries, merchants, all seized trowel or spade, and wheeled ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... first, induced the abandonment of their second, intent. Certain of the prowling order of the community, whose numbers had of late been steadily on the increase, reported frightful things. Demons of indescribable ugliness had been espied careering through the midnight streets and courts. A citizen—some said in the very act of housebreaking, but no one cared to look into trifles at such a crisis—had been seized from behind, he could not see by what, and soused ...
— The Princess and the Curdie • George MacDonald
... observation, for the Captain's head had already disappeared in its metal case. I finished harnessing myself. I felt them put an iron-pointed stick into my hand, and some minutes later, after going through the usual form, we set foot on the bottom of the Atlantic at a depth of 150 fathoms. Midnight was near. The waters were profoundly dark, but Captain Nemo pointed out in the distance a reddish spot, a sort of large light shining brilliantly about two miles from the Nautilus. What this fire might be, what could feed ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne
... galloping along the road to Ghent, just as the bell of the cathedral tolled the hour often. Two hours later, without having once checked the speed of their horses, they heard the bells ringing midnight in Ghent. In ten minutes they approached the gate, and were ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty
... By midnight Dobri Petroff had made his rounds—now as a carter gruffly and clumsily driving a cart and horse of which he had managed to possess himself; anon as a stupid countryman belonging to the village on the height, ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... examining with a candle; Voyaging to every port to dicker and adventure, Hurrying with the modern crowd as eager and fickle as any, Hot toward one I hate, ready in my madness to knife him, Solitary at midnight in my back yard, my thoughts gone from me a long while, Walking the old hills of Judaea with the beautiful gentle God by my side, Speeding through space, speeding through heaven and the stars, Speeding amid the seven satellites ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... very gratifying experience, in the simplicity and humanity of her arrangements for troops, in her provision for light and air and cleanliness, and in her care for women and children. It occurs to me, as I explore her, that I would require a handsome sum of money to go aboard her, at midnight by the Dockyard bell, and stay aboard alone till morning; for surely she must be haunted by a crowd of ghosts of obstinate old martinets, mournfully flapping their cherubic epaulettes over the changed times. Though still we may ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... to the Pfeiffer Dye Works and Laundry are under the personal supervision of the proprietors. All our work returned with the quickest despatch. Customers have not to wait until near midnight to have their goods returned. All orders returned ...
— My Pet Recipes, Tried and True - Contributed by the Ladies and Friends of St. Andrew's Church, Quebec • Various
... the daylight wore away, and the coach wheels made no noise. All night and all the next day, they rode, and it was midnight before they came to the town where the two wanderers had ...
— Tales from Dickens • Charles Dickens and Hallie Erminie Rives
... quite cold, and then they water their gardens; but as the day declines, it abates from its coldness, until at last, when the sun sets, the water is warm; and it continues to increase in heat still more until it reaches midnight, when it boils and throws up bubbles; and when midnight passes, it becomes cooler gradually till dawn of day. This spring is called the fountain of ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 1(of 2) • Herodotus
... for a minute. Then shook his head. "I'll be in Blicker's drug-store between 'leven and midnight," he said. ...
— The Penalty • Gouverneur Morris
... peopled with invisible enemies; with innumerable demons, who watched every occasion, and assumed every form, to terrify, and above all to tempt, their unguarded virtue. The imagination, and even the senses, were deceived by the illusions of distempered fanaticism; and the hermit, whose midnight prayer was oppressed by involuntary slumber, might easily confound the phantoms of horror or delight, which had occupied his sleeping ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... As midnight was striking bronze blows upon the dusky air, Dorian Gray dressed commonly, and with a muffler wrapped round his throat, crept quietly out of the house. In Bond Street he found a hansom with a good horse. He hailed it, and in a low voice gave the ...
— The Picture of Dorian Gray • Oscar Wilde
... the smell of the blood from the slain buck would warn its mates away. Only the creatures of prey would be attracted now. So he was down on his knees and had already begun to flay the dead carcass, and Enoch, seeing this, began to help him. It was near midnight, and when the hide was off, the tongue and the most tasty parts removed, Crow Wing built another fire, wrapped his blanket about him, and lay down ...
— With Ethan Allen at Ticonderoga • W. Bert Foster
... of the drawn blinds and the darkness, you have just seen Mr. Hoopdriver's face peaceful in its beauty sleep in the little, plain bedroom at the very top of the Yellow Hammer Coffee Tavern at Guildford. That was before midnight. As the night progressed he was ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... one on top of the other, in hiding from it the gravity of the danger, sink it deeper in its own timidity. At this same session the syndic-attorney of the department reports that the mob is ready, that 900 armed men had just entered Paris, that the tocsin would be rung at midnight, and that the municipality tolerates or favors the insurrection. At this same session, the Minister of Justice gives notice that "the laws are powerless," and that the government is no longer responsible. ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... Concho, after circling the midnight desert and failing to find any trace of Pete, finally drew together and decided to wait until daylight made it possible to track him. As they talked together, they saw a dim figure coming toward them. Swinging from their course, they rode abruptly down a draw. Four of them dismounted. ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... Chaucer by every judge of poetry, to whom his obsolete language has not rendered him unintelligble." Dunbar knew that this Scottish language was but a form of that which, as he declared, Chaucer had made to "surmount every terrestrial tongue, as far as midnight is surmounted by ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward
... the ... fowls went to their roost. Cocks crowed in answer to one another as they commonly do in the night. Woodcocks, which are night birds, whistled as they do only in the dark. Frogs peeped. In short, there was the appearance of midnight at noonday. ...
— Our Day - In the Light of Prophecy • W. A. Spicer
... the post on schedule time early in the morning, two days later. Officers and men had been up and dressed since midnight. Ten minutes after their arising, blankets had been rolled and all personal equipment packed ready for departure with the ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... this service, Co. E, Capt. Rankin commanding, was ordered first to Paris, thence to Carlisle, which place was reached about midnight. Being aided by a small party of citizens, he continued his march about six miles to a mill on the north-fork of Licking river where he captured a picket-post of sixteen rebel soldiers, and then returned to Paris ...
— History of the Seventh Ohio Volunteer Cavalry • R. C. Rankin
... rung out clearly upon the hushed air of midnight; and yet the poor wife was alone. One o'clock found her in a state of agonized alarm, standing at the open street-door, and hearkening, eagerly, first in one direction and then in another; yet all in vain—for the absent ...
— The Two Wives - or, Lost and Won • T. S. Arthur
... had she not remembered that? Why should he speak of her to anyone, since to-morrow he would come to see her? To-morrow? The clocks had struck midnight, to-day they ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... station on the main line between Kunitz and Cologne. Express trains do not stop at Ruehl, but there was a slow train at eight which would get them to Gerstein, the capital of the next duchy, by midnight. Here they would change into the Cologne express; here they would join the bribed maid; here luggage had been sent by Fritzing,—a neat bag for himself, and a neat box for his niece. The neat box was filled with neat garments suggested to him by the young lady ...
— The Princess Priscilla's Fortnight • Elizabeth von Arnim
... away. Outside, the road gleamed in the moonlight as it stretched on to the village. A glimpse of the graveyard through the window made him shudder. It reminded him of a grave he had never seen save in his mind. It was past midnight. He would go back to his bed, though he ...
— Westerfelt • Will N. Harben
... set the first watch, from eight to midnight, of which Jackson, now, as second mate, took charge, when the captain went below, saying he was going to turn in early, so as to be ready when the breeze came, giving strict instructions to be called as soon as any ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... arranging, advising, and soothing by their cheerful, gentle presence. They were now engaged on another mission, to the lost and erring of their own sex; night after night, guarded by a policeman, they had ventured after midnight into the dance-houses where girls are being led to ruin, and with gentle words of tender, motherly counsel sought to win them from their fatal ways,—telling them where they might go the next day to find friends who would open to them an ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... in travail, God our Lord, and from her loins sprang twin Murder and Black Hate. Red was the midnight; clang, crack, and cry of death and fury filled the air and trembled underneath the stars where church spires pointed silently to Thee. And all this was to sate the greed of greedy men who hide behind the ...
— Darkwater - Voices From Within The Veil • W. E. B. Du Bois
... them to a ladleful of frumety, remarking at the same time, with a grim smile, that they were not obliged to eat it; there would be a very different supper after midnight. Then a black-letter Bible was brought him, and he read it all to ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... opposing fleets Difficulties of the allies in leaving port Respective movements of the two fleets Nelson's last letter to Lady Hamilton His last letter to his child Events and incidents of October 20 Relative positions of the fleets at midnight Conditions at daybreak of the 21st The manoeuvres of the two fleets Nelson's intercourse with Blackwood on the 21st He bequeaths Lady Hamilton and Horatia to the care of his Country The hostile fleets forming for battle Nelson's ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... Midnight! The bells rang loud and clear, as if they had great news to tell the world. What noise is that besides the bells? And look, oh, look! who is that striding up the room with a great basket on his back? He has stolen his coat from a polar bear, and his cap, too, I declare! His boots are of red leather ...
— The Book of Stories for the Storyteller • Fanny E. Coe
... from Australia and New Zealand Corps, as to the enemy's attack on 29th-30th on our right flank, state that the action commenced by very heavy fire from midnight till 1.30 A.M., to which our men only replied by a series of cheers. The Turks then launched their attack, and came right on with bayonet and bombs. Those who succeeded in getting into our saps were instantly killed; the remainder were dealt with by bomb and rifle fire from the ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various
... parents seemed to revel in undisturbed joy. The day so big with fate rolled onwards, heavy and dark, like a thunder-cloud. Its eve had arrived, I could scarcely breathe. I had been foresighted enough to fill some chests with gold. I waited for midnight:—it tolled. ...
— Peter Schlemihl • Adelbert von Chamisso
... nurse came to him—Yes, she was suffering, but all went well ... it would be about midnight, perhaps. There was ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole
... sublime, inspiring and profitable, in the highest sense, than the "language of the stars"—those silent monitors of the midnight sky, who reveal HIS WILL as secondary causes in the administration of universal law? The science of the stars is the Divine parent ...
— The Light of Egypt, Volume II • Henry O. Wagner/Belle M. Wagner/Thomas H. Burgoyne
... 17th the Marshal continued his march to Hexham, where he arrived, with the first line, about four in the afternoon, but the rear of the army did not come up till near midnight. Having received intelligence that Carlisle had surrendered, he resolved to march back to Newcastle; but, the weather continuing bad, and the roads become in a manner impassable, he did not arrive there with his army till the 16th; and, even then, ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris
... sisters, and mother thought from his tone he was about to disappear again. When she told me of his mood, and I remembered the day, I was afraid he might seek his vent here. Also I heard of his being about town till long after midnight. The minute I opened his office door this morning he flew at me like a panther. I told him I had only dropped in on my rounds for an order, as they were running off right smart, and I didn't know but he might like to pick up some bargains. 'Bargains!' he roared, 'don't you ...
— Friday, the Thirteenth • Thomas W. Lawson
... the combined fleets wore, and headed to the southward. The British remaining on the same tack as before,—the port,—stood to the northward until 8 P.M., when they also wore to the southwest; but this interval of steering in nearly opposite directions changed the relative bearings. At midnight, by the log of Blackwood's frigates, the enemy stretched along the eastern horizon, while the British bore southwest; the space between the two being ten miles. The "Euryalus," three miles from the allies, saw the loom of the lights of her own fleet. Still ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... tower. He had been complaining a little, and I gave him a spoonful of the doctor's dose. My lady had been there in the early part of the evening; she sat far more than an hour by his bed. Then she went away and left me alone. After midnight she came back, and her eldest son was with her. They went to the bed and looked at the marquis, and my lady took hold of his hand. Then she turned to me and said he was not so well; I remember how the marquis, without saying anything, lay staring at her. I can see his white face, at this moment, ...
— The American • Henry James
... a rumour (too soon confirmed) ran through Paris that the King forbade the ascent to be made. At midnight Charles was aroused from sleep and summoned to appear before a high official, who presented him with the royal order to give up his project. We may readily believe that after this he passed a restless night, and his trouble became harder to bear when his enemies whispered that he himself had ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... has for his church should ever by them be known. I know that those visions that the saved shall have in heaven of this love, will far transcend our utmost knowledge here, even as far as the light of the sun at noon, goes beyond the light of a blinking candle at midnight; and hence it is, that when the days of those visions are come, the knowledge that we now have, shall be swallowed up. "When that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away" ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... heard in vain. Like the man in our Lord's parable we plead the lateness of the hour, and our unwillingness to disturb others as our excuse for not rising at the Spirit's summons. But the Spirit, like the Friend at midnight, still knocks at the door, and the sound of the summons penetrates the quietness of the house and breaks in upon our slumbers. Well is it for us if in the end we rise and open ...
— Our Lady Saint Mary • J. G. H. Barry
... and clumsily offered him, in a breath, whisky, shuffleboard, or cowboy pool—sound Pretorian remedies for all human woes. These consolations he refused and took his leave. Midnight found me in the same chair, thinking less of Anitchkoff, whose case now lay clear, than of Mantovani and the Marquesa del Puente, about whom it seemed there still might ...
— The Collectors • Frank Jewett Mather
... midnight attacks, drilling his own soldiers into acting the parts of malcontents, of escaped prisoners, of bloodthirsty barbarians, the while he himself—as chief actor in the play—vanquished the mock foes and took from them mock ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... now, Hennessey. The Charing Cross office is open till midnight, I believe, so at the present rate you should only have about ninety more telegrams to-day. But if you have ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens
... life! Goethe uttered the wisdom of a sage, as did Rousseau, yet their deeds were often those we would expect from a slave with a low brow. Even of Shakespeare, it is said in the morning he polished his sonnets, while at midnight he poached game from a neighboring estate. Our era bestows unstinted admiration upon the essays of Lord Bacon. How noble his aphorisms! How petty his envy and avarice! What scholarship was his, and what cunning also! With what splendor of argument does he plead for the advancement of learning ...
— The Investment of Influence - A Study of Social Sympathy and Service • Newell Dwight Hillis
... a fourth—is it her fun?— With the wide blue eyes of Hope (As though advertising Soap), Shouts, with glee, "Come with me, Unto Norroway, o'er the foam, Far from home, Wait there to see Our (invisible) Midnight Sun!" ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, August 6, 1892 • Various
... be added on the other hand, however, that the warm season was far from being favorable to the energy and perseverance necessary to carry on successfully experiments of this kind. The temperature, even at midnight, was often 38 deg. C. (100.4 deg. F.). Still further, the work was constantly interrupted by the passage of ships through the canal. On an average not more than forty minutes' work to the hour was ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 822 - Volume XXXII, Number 822. Issue Date October 3, 1891 • Various
... the first evening of the Feast, two huge golden lamps, which stood one on each side of the altar of burnt offering in the Temple court, were lighted as the night began to fall, and poured out a brilliant flood over Temple and city and deep gorge; while far into the midnight, troops of rejoicing worshippers clustered about them with dance and song. The possibility of this reference is strengthened by the note of place which our Evangelist gives. 'These things spake Jesus in the treasury, as He taught in the Temple,' ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. John Chapters I to XIV • Alexander Maclaren
... on; the fog still enveloped us, and the situation became darker. We had our supper, and I turned in, with the understanding that at midnight I was to take the watch, and let Walkirk sleep. It was of no use to make ourselves any more uncomfortable than ...
— The House of Martha • Frank R. Stockton
... building was so situated as to become very desirable, in the year 1259, to some monks. So there was forthwith horrid shriekings at night-times, red and green lights shone through the windows, and, finally, a large green ghost, with a white beard and a serpent's tail, came every midnight to a front window, and shook his fist, and howled at those who passed by. Everybody was frightened—King Louis, good simple soul! as well as the rest. Then the bold monks appearing at the nick of time, intimated that ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum
... one upon the capital charge of "Murder." The jury were out for several hours, and it was believed that eventually the result would be that they would not agree upon a verdict at all. However, close upon midnight, they were starved into one, and it was that of "Manslaughter." Next day the particular juryman concerned received his promised reward, and in paying it, the man who had arranged it for him remarked: "I suppose you had a great deal of difficulty in getting the other jurymen to agree to ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... Madeleine Brohan, Delaunay, Worms, and Broisat - an actress, in such parts at least, to whom I have never seen full justice rendered. He had his fill of weeping on that occasion; and when the piece was at an end, in front of a cafe, in the mild, midnight air, we had our fill of talk about the ...
— Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin • Robert Louis Stevenson
... those too of mortals that love him, There are souls that desire and require, Be the glories of midnight above him Or beneath him the daysprings of fire: And their hearts are as harps that approve him And praise him as chords of a lyre That were fain with their music to move him ...
— Studies in Song • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... the evening of the last day in the month; the day when the Federative Council of Railway Workers had sent its ultimatum to Receiver Guilford. The reduction in wages was to go into effect at midnight: if, by midnight, the order had not been rescinded, and the way opened for a joint conference touching the removal of certain obnoxious officials, a general strike and tie-up would be ordered. Trains in transit carrying passengers ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde
... of cribbing came from Ledyard, and Bannon at once set about reorganizing his forces so that work could go on night and day. He and Peterson would divide the time equally into twelve-hour days; but three divisions were necessary for the men, the morning shift working from midnight until eight o'clock, the day shift from eight to four, and the night shift from ...
— Calumet "K" • Samuel Merwin and Henry Kitchell Webster
... disappointed in their ends and aims at the last election, they now stood much in need of a trifle, with which to pay Bishop Hughes for praying a recently-deceased brother through purgatory, a service he never performed without feeling the money safe in his palm. All at once they set up a howl like midnight wolves, which so alarmed me that I hastened into the street, where my companion soon joined me, saying it was a way they had of expressing a joke. Not being accustomed to the ways of working politicians of the New York school, I made my way as fast as possible into Broadway, when, ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... earthquake, the hill where they superstitiously shot their arrows or lances fell into the sea, where it can still be partly seen. It is to be hoped that when it fell, or began to fall, it carried with it the pride of these Mindanao Mohammedans. Our fleet at midnight sighted the enemy's capitana, which was standing out to sea with another little ship which served it for a lanpitao, as they call a boat for reconnoitring, or a tender. The sargento-mayor, who had ever conducted ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 27 of 55) • Various
... prepared to make themselves as comfortable as possible. It was, indeed, a cheerless encampment for a cold, windy December night. Fortunately there was wood in abundance with which to build a fire, and they also piled up for themselves a slight protection against the wind and against a midnight attack. Then, having commended themselves to God in prayer, they established a watch, and sought such repose as fatigue and their cold, hard couch ...
— King Philip - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... of midnight air You hear on its stately and winding stair The echoes of fairy feet. Gentle footsteps that lightly fall Through the enchanted castle hall, And up ...
— Poems • Marietta Holley
... laborious work; and it has ever been my opinion, that on the 14th of October his nerves received a shock of which he never got the better afterwards; for on that day (in particular) he had hardly dismissed his troop of men, when visitors assembled, and from the time it was dark till past midnight he was on the grass-plot, surrounded by between fifty and sixty persons, without having had time for putting on proper clothing, or for the ...
— The Story of the Herschels • Anonymous
... About midnight Aedituus came to wake us that we might drink. He himself showed us the way, saying: You men of t'other world say that ignorance is the mother of all evil, and so far you are right; yet for all that you do not take the least care to get rid of it, but still plod on, and ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... great Dutch doll, depending on the pressure of certain springs, as duty, reflection, and the like; without the impulse of which, thou wouldst doubtless have me believe thou wouldst not budge an inch! But have I not seen Gravity out of his bed at midnight? and must I, in plain terms, remind thee of certain mad pranks? Thou hadst ever, with the gravest sentiments in thy mouth and the most starched reserve in thy manner, a kind of lumbering proclivity towards mischief, although with more inclination to set it a-going than address to ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... were, very largely, instituted and organised with the idea that a university was a place where young men were sent to absorb the contents of books and to listen to lectures in the class rooms. The student was pictured as a pallid creature, burning what was called the "midnight oil," his wan face bent over his desk. If you wanted to do something for him you gave him a book: if you wanted to do something really large on his behalf you gave him a whole basketful of them. If you wanted to go still further and be a benefactor to the college at large, you endowed a competitive ...
— My Discovery of England • Stephen Leacock
... time the craving for nicotine increased in intensity, until he was half frantic. Midnight found him, torch in hand, crawling around on the ground where his tent had been pitched, hunting for cigarette stubs. He had only to look close in order to find any number. Most were no more than cork tips, but some had at least one puff left in them, and a few had ...
— Out of the Depths - A Romance of Reclamation • Robert Ames Bennet
... superiors, threw off their uniforms and joined the mob. The hose at last got to work. The mob responded by throwing stones, breaking the windows of the police station. This was the only violence. On the following day, Sunday, the churches were closed. At midnight, the police had summoned Dr. Moffett to their office and told him that no services could be allowed. Early in the morning, the leaders of the Saturday meetings were arrested, and were now in ...
— Korea's Fight for Freedom • F.A. McKenzie
... Legation and two policemen want to speak to you." On arriving I had done the correct thing in giving the house-master my passport, which, according to law, he had copied into his book, and had sent a duplicate copy to the police-station, and this intrusion near midnight was as unaccountable as it was unwarrantable. Nevertheless the appearance of the two mannikins in European uniforms, with the familiar batons and bull's-eye lanterns, and with manners which were respectful without being deferential, gave me immediate relief. I should have welcomed twenty of their ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... in the company of some old crony, some visiting ship's captain or business acquaintance. But before retiring old Henriksen always lit a lamp, shambled down-stairs to the office, and took a last survey of the books. He took his time; and when he came up about midnight he retired immediately. ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... of my surprise then, when, short as was the time, an affidavit has been made before me, that he and his family have come to the determination of emigrating to America, and, I suppose, by the aid of a midnight mob to take away all that is valuable of their property by force. I consequently must remove it at once, as the law, under such circumstances, empowers me to do—for I cannot sit by and suffer your lordship' to be robbed, ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... sickness in the world from which only kittens, some children, and mad people are free. It appears that the cure for this sickness, so says the book, is to stand on the top of the pyramid of Khufu at midnight at that moment when the moon is largest in the whole year, and drink from the cup of dreams, reciting meanwhile a spell written here at length in language which ...
— Moon of Israel • H. Rider Haggard
... Midnight of August 4, 1914, came and the German Government had not yet made a reply to this note; fifteen minutes of grace were allowed, and then the British Government ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various
... having thus come round to the subject which Mr. Hazard wanted to discuss, the three men plunged deep into serious talk which lasted till after midnight had ...
— Esther • Henry Adams
... castle, and when it was evening the youth went in and made himself a bright fire in one of the rooms, and, placing his cutting-board and knife near it, he sat down upon his lathe. "Ah, if I could but shiver!" said he. "But even here I shall never learn." At midnight he got up to stir the fire, and, as he poked it, there shrieked suddenly in one corner, "Miau, miau! how cold I am!" "You simpleton!" he exclaimed, "what are you shrieking for? If you are so cold come and sit down by the fire and warm ...
— Grimm's Fairy Stories • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... it was midnight, and the captain returned to his station on the bridge, reflecting to himself that some of the most insurmountable difficulties, apparently, are overcome by the simplest means, and that there are some persons in the world who really seem ...
— Adrift on the Pacific • Edward S. Ellis
... past midnight. Jerry went to bed. But I sat oblivious of the passing hours, wide awake, somber, my gaze fixed upon the square of the window which turned from moonlight to dark and then at last shimmered with the dusk of ...
— Paradise Garden - The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment • George Gibbs
... midnight when I descried a faint light in the distance. It grew as we tramped on. I knew therefore it was no deceptive star setting in the horizon, but the welcome firelight of a human habitation. This ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse
... delivered, that this woman was delivered also: and we were together; there was no stranger with us in the house, save we two in the house. And this woman's child died in the night; because she overlaid it. And she arose at midnight, and took my son from beside me, while thine handmaid slept, and laid it in her bosom, and laid her dead child in my bosom. And when I rose in the morning to give my child suck, behold, it was dead: but when I had considered it in ...
— The Dore Gallery of Bible Illustrations, Complete • Anonymous
... it was after midnight, the other girls ran laughing away, and Patty climbed in behind the chintz curtains, almost persuading herself that she was a ...
— Patty in Paris • Carolyn Wells
... chatties in the cocoa-nut trees, which results either in their returning home in the early morning in a state of extreme and riotous intoxication, or in being found the next day at the foot of the trees sleeping off the effects of their midnight drinking." These "chatties," I may explain, are bowls containing various liquors belonging to natives, which are placed in the trees to ...
— Little Folks - A Magazine for the Young (Date of issue unknown) • Various
... transferred her affections from her own true love to a gentleman of her father's choice. The gentleman of her father's choice was beloved in his turn by a school friend of his would-not-be betrothed, and the play which lasted from eight until nearly midnight, was devoted to setting this simple (in more senses than one) imbroglio right. By a clumsy device, Oberon King of the Fairies bewitched the two pairs of lovers during their sleep in a wood, so that one lady had two ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari Volume 98, January 4, 1890 • Various
... a trumpery thing it is!' cried the stepmother; 'and now take your supper and go to bed, for it is near upon midnight.' ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Various
... Have no longing for the morning, And the evening is unwelcome; Have no pleasure in the future, All my pleasures gone forever, With my faithful life-companion Slaughtered by the hand of witchcraft! Often will my heart-strings quiver When I rest within my chamber, When I wake at dreamy midnight, Half-unconscious, vainly searching For my noble wife departed." Wifeless lived the mourning blacksmith, Altered in his form and features; Wept one month and then another, Wept three months in full succession. Then the magic metal-worker Gathered gold from deeps of ocean, Gathered silver from the ...
— The Kalevala (complete) • John Martin Crawford, trans.
... but it is hardly likely, for the redskins, as a rule, don't like to do their work until the latter part of the night. People are too apt to be wide awake in the earlier portion of the evening; and I am quite sure Red Jack will wait till beyond midnight before he makes a move in ...
— The Wilderness Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... stared. They did not care. They did not wish to hide their passion. At last they went into the garden. He flung a light cloak over her shoulders and put her in a waiting cab. They caught the midnight train to Paris; and they sped through the silent, star-lit night ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... of fuel, for the use of one who lived so little in town as Piercy, appeared a little extraordinary;[**] and upon comparing all circumstances, it was resolved that a more thorough inspection should be made. About midnight, Sir Thomas Knevet, a justice of peace, was sent with proper attendants; and before the door of the vault finding Fawkes, who had just finished all his preparations, he immediately seized him, and turning over ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... arrived where two roads branched off in different directions, we took not the left hand road, which would have conducted us to Segovia, but turned to the right, in the direction of La Granja, where we arrived at midnight. ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... would be pleasant to try it across the strings. So I did try it just a very, very little, and it did sing to me so sweetly. At first I did play very soft. But presently I did begin a capriccio, which I like very much, and it did go ever louder and louder; and I forgot that it was midnight and that everybody was asleep. Presently I hear something crack; and the next minute I feel my father's whip across my shoulders. My little red violin dropped on the floor, and was broken. I weep much for it, but it did ...
— Eclectic School Readings: Stories from Life • Orison Swett Marden
... its passage by the swift beating of a sort of chapel bell upon the engine; and as it was for this we had been waiting, we were summoned by the cry of "All aboard!" and went on again upon our way. The whole line, it appeared, was topsy-turvy; an accident at midnight having thrown all the traffic hours into arrear. We paid for this in the flesh, for we had no meals all that day. Fruit we could buy upon the cars; and now and then we had a few minutes at some station with ...
— Across The Plains • Robert Louis Stevenson
... her humane tolerance in his alarmed heart, when Mabel awoke from her troubled slumbers at midnight, in extreme pain, that culminated before dawn, ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... if his camp were attacked at midnight. There were swift feet, the trampling of a horse; and soon the skill of science, the experience of age, and motherly tenderness confronted the black shadows, but they ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe
... will never forget it. When night reigns over these immeasurable wilds, whilst lying in your hammock you will hear this goat-sucker lamenting like one in deep distress. A stranger would never conceive it to be the cry of a bird. He would say it was the departing voice of a midnight murdered victim or the last wailing of Niobe for her poor children before she was turned into stone. Suppose yourself in hopeless sorrow, begin with a high loud note, and pronounce "ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha," each note lower and lower, till the last is ...
— Wanderings In South America • Charles Waterton
... darkness and storm and never have known it. The tide was still setting out, the sea was very high, and there was not a ray of light from White Island. My best course seemed to be to continue pulling slowly and keep the boat stern to the sea till after midnight, when the tide would change and the wind would lull for a short time,—unless it should prove to be the beginning of the gale, and not its forerunner, as I had thought. The hours passed slowly. There was much to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various
... time, and fancy yourself a majestical Spaniard, or an oppressed and patriotic Dutchman at your leisure. You enter the inn, and the old Quentin Durward court-yard, on which the old towers look down. There is a sound of singing—singing at midnight. Is it Don Sombrero, who is singing an Andalusian seguidilla under the window of the Flemish burgomaster's daughter? Ah, no! it is a fat Englishman in a zephyr coat: he is drinking cold gin-and-water in ...
— Little Travels and Roadside Sketches • William Makepeace Thackeray
... glass-factory, and little Angelo walked to and from his work along the railroad-track. It is a peculiarity of the glass-factory that it has to eat its children both by day and by night; and after working six hours before midnight and six more after midnight, little Angelo was tired. He had no eye for the birds and flowers on a beautiful spring morning, but as he was walking home, he dropped in his tracks and fell asleep. The driver of the first morning train on that branch-line saw what he took to be an old coat lying on ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... A little after midnight, she rose from bed, slipped on her dressing-gown, and sat down by the still burning lamp to write ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... Canteen, of course, and there was the Temperance Room with the second-hand papers in it; but a man of any profession cannot read for eight hours a day in a temperature of 96 degrees or 98 degrees in the shade, running up sometimes to 103 degrees at midnight. Very few men, even though they get a pannikin of flat, stale, muddy beer and hide it under their cots, can continue drinking for six hours a day. One man tried, but he died, and nearly the whole regiment went to his funeral because ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... corner—sew a peseta here—and a two-real piece there; then, in the middle you must sew a gold coin—a doubloon would be best." The doubloon and all the other coins were duly sewn in. "Now give me the scarf, and I'll take it to the Campo Santo when midnight strikes. You come along with me, if you want to see a fine piece of witchcraft. I promise you shall see the man you love to-morrow!" The gipsy departed alone for the Campo Santo, since my Spanish friend was too much ...
— Carmen • Prosper Merimee
... It was midnight when he rose from the big chair and went to his room. The door was closed. He opened it and entered. Even as his hand groped for the switch on the wall, his nostrils caught the scent of something which was familiar and yet which should not have been there. It filled the room, just ...
— The River's End • James Oliver Curwood
... to time, of their designs; and, providentially, the Queen my mother defeated their intentions when a day had been fixed on for the arrival of the Huguenot troops at St. Germain. To avoid this visit, we set off the night before for Paris, two hours after midnight, putting King Charles in a litter, and the Queen my mother taking my brother and the King my husband with her in her ...
— Memoirs And Historical Chronicles Of The Courts Of Europe - Marguerite de Valois, Madame de Pompadour, and Catherine de Medici • Various
... 'Tis midnight's holy hour—and silence now Is brooding, like a gentle spirit, o'er The still and pulseless world. Hark! on the winds, The bell's deep-notes are swelling. 'Tis the knell Of the ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly
... fires were glowing and blazing. Nothing pleased the marquis worse than the least appearance of stinting the consumption of coal. In the library two huge gratefuls were burning from dawn to midnight—well for the books anyhow, if their owner seldom showed his face amongst them. There were days during which, except the servant whose duty it was to attend to the fires, not a creature entered the room but Malcolm. To him it was as the cave of Aladdin to the worshipper of Mammon, ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... Governor Geary about midnight of his second day in Lecompton. One of the brigadiers of the skeleton militia was apparently in command, and not yet having caught the cue of the Governor's intentions, reported the force for orders, "in the field, ready for duty, and impatient to act."[11] At about the same hour the Governor received ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... About midnight most of the men left. Rainham remained, and Lightmark, who professed himself too lazy to move. Rainham lapsed into his familiar state of half-abstraction, while his friend cross-examined a ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... not afraid," she said, "meet me at midnight by the statue of Fate in the great temple, for I would speak with you, Humphrey, where, if ...
— When the World Shook - Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot • H. Rider Haggard
... one play?" Yes. He would, with pleasure. He intended to give a banquet to some of his friends that evening, and after the opera, and when the supper was over, she might come to his rooms at the Hotel de France. She sat in her usual corner in the orchestra all through the evening, and then, near midnight, with her violin under her arm, she crossed the Place Graslin and called at the Hotel de France. The great artist was sitting in the dining room by the long table where the banquet had been given. There were goblets ...
— Camilla: A Tale of a Violin - Being the Artist Life of Camilla Urso • Charles Barnard
... dome? If she must wed, from other hands require The dowry: is Telemachus her sire? Yet through my court the noise of revel rings, And waste the wise frugality of kings. Scarce all my herds their luxury suffice; Scarce all my wine their midnight hours supplies. Safe in my youth, in riot still they grow, Nor in the helpless orphan dread a foe. But come it will, the time when manhood grants More powerful advocates than vain complaints. Approach that hour! insufferable ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope |
