midnight
Above each of these a still keener vision suggested a brown forehead and two staring though not unfriendly eyes , and above all a pair of whitish crescent-shaped horns like two particularly new moons , an occasional stolid `` moo ! '' proclaiming beyond the shade of a doubt that these phenomena were the features and persons of Daisy , Whitefoot , Bonny-lass , Jolly-O , Spot , Twinkle-eye , etc. , etc. -- the respectable dairy of Devon cows belonging to Bathsheba aforesaid . Her way back to the house was by a path through a young plantation of tapering firs , which had been planted some years earlier to shelter the premises from the north wind . By reason of the density of the interwoven foliage overhead , it was gloomy there at cloudless noontide , twilight in the evening , dark as midnight at dusk , and black as the ninth plague of Egypt at midnight . To describe the spot is to call it a vast , low , naturally formed hall , the plumy ceiling of which was supported by slender pillars of living wood , the floor being covered with a soft dun carpet of dead spikelets and mildewed cones , with a tuft of grass-blades here and there . This bit of the path was always the crux of the night 's ramble , though , before starting , her apprehensions of danger were not vivid enough to lead her to take a companion . Slipping along here covertly as Time , Bathsheba fancied she could hear footsteps entering the track at the opposite end .