midnight
A more recent case was that of a young navy lieutenant who likewise stabbed to death with his sword a former schoolfellow and townsman who had not saluted him on the street with sufficient ceremoniousness . That , he said , was his only reason for killing the man , and he , too , received a very mild sentence . Even worse was the case of two officers quartered in a small garrison of the province of East Prussia , close to the Russian border . These men , being somewhat in liquor on New Year 's Eve , mortally wounded one civilian and gravely wounded another for no other reason than that these men had shouted a song distasteful to them , the whole occurrence happening in the street after midnight . The officers got off with a ludicrously small punishment . Such facts as these -- and they could be multiplied indefinitely -- show , above all , one thing : the striking difference in the conception of what is termed `` honor '' obtaining between the officers in the army and the bulk of the population , the citizen element . The so-called `` army code '' embodies views which it is euphemism to call mediæval -- remnants of the dark ages .