midnight
he cried . `` My dear but mistaken young friend , you distress me infinitely . You do not think -- it can not be possible that you think that this poor child has -- has formed any such -- such monstrous conception ? If I thought so , I should resign my being , -- a -- cease upon the midnight , not without pain , but unspeakably the reverse . It is a most extraordinary thing that twice within a single summer I should have been exposed , sir , to a misapprehension of this amazing , this -- a -- portentous , this -- a -- unspeakably inauspicious description . I am not a marrying man , Thomas . Though regarding the Sex with the deepest veneration , sir , I have for many years regarded it across a gulf , if I may so express myself ; a chasm , sir ; a -- a -- maelstrom of separation , to speak strongly .