midnight
The skin clung closely to the bones , as though some inward fire were incessantly drying its juices . Sometimes , when he gazed into space , as if to see the realization of his hopes , it almost seemed as though the flames that devoured his soul were issuing from his nostrils . The inspired feelings that animate great men shone forth on the pale face furrowed with wrinkles , on the brow haggard with care like that of an old monarch , but above all they gleamed in the sparkling eye , whose fires were fed by chastity imposed by the tyranny of ideas and by the inward consecration of a great intellect . The cavernous eyes seemed to have sunk in their orbits through midnight vigils and the terrible reaction of hopes destroyed , yet ceaselessly reborn . The zealous fanaticism inspired by an art or a science was evident in this man ; it betrayed itself in the strange , persistent abstraction of his mind expressed by his dress and bearing , which were in keeping with the anomalous peculiarities of his person . His large , hairy hands were dirty , and the nails , which were very long , had deep black lines at their extremities . His shoes were not cleaned and the shoe-strings were missing .