midnight
Maturin is distinguished from the incompetent horde of romance-writers , whom Scott condemned , by the powerful eloquence of his style and by his ability to analyse emotion , to write as if he himself were swayed by the feeling he describes . His insane extravagances have at least the virtue that they come flaming hot from an excited imagination . The passage quoted by Scott -- Orazio 's attempt to depict his state of mind after he had heard of his brother 's perfidy -- may serve to illustrate the force and vigour of his language : `` Oh ! that midnight darkness of the soul in which it seeks for something whose loss has carried away every sense but one of utter and desolate deprivation ; in which it traverses leagues in motion and worlds in thought without consciousness of relief , yet with a dread of pausing . I had nothing to seek , nothing to recover ; the whole world could not restore me an atom , could not show me again a glimpse of what I had been or lost , yet I rushed on as if the next step would reach shelter and peace . '' _ Melmoth the Wanderer _ has found many admirers . It fascinated Rossetti , -LSB- 60 -RSB- Thackeray -LSB- 61 -RSB- and Miss Mitford .