midnight
Sometimes it was in the Ram , sometimes in the Bull ; one month he would be immersed in alchemy , another in poesy ; one month in the Twins of astrology and astronomy ; then in the Crab of German literature and metaphysics . In justice to him it must be stated that he took such studies as were immediately related to his own profession in turn with the rest , and it had been in a month of anatomical ardor without the possibility of a subject that he had proposed to Grammer Oliver the terms she had mentioned to her mistress . As may be inferred from the tone of his conversation with Winterborne , he had lately plunged into abstract philosophy with much zest ; perhaps his keenly appreciative , modern , unpractical mind found this a realm more to his taste than any other . Though his aims were desultory , Fitzpiers 's mental constitution was not without its admirable side ; a keen inquirer he honestly was , even if the midnight rays of his lamp , visible so far through the trees of Hintock , lighted rank literatures of emotion and passion as often as , or oftener than , the books and materiel of science . But whether he meditated the Muses or the philosophers , the loneliness of Hintock life was beginning to tell upon his impressionable nature . Winter in a solitary house in the country , without society , is tolerable , nay , even enjoyable and delightful , given certain conditions , but these are not the conditions which attach to the life of a professional man who drops down into such a place by mere accident . They were present to the lives of Winterborne , Melbury , and Grace ; but not to the doctor 's .