about midnight
`` They seem to me to sweep all their worries with the dust over the edge of the veranda , '' she thought . `` I think England will feel a little stiff and shut in after it . '' It was a bright moonlight night . A deluded cock at about midnight awoke and fancied it must be day . He crowed so loudly over his discovery that he roused a great enemy of his , who replied in husky irritation and no measured terms that he was a fool . But the mischief was done -- some half-dozen young cockerels took the matter up as a joke , and crowed persistently in spite of all remonstrance from the rest of the poultry . Miss Chase put her head under the bedclothes and tried to shut out the sound , but in vain .