midnight
It was a very old-fashioned barn . About a third of it was floored with wood -- dark with age -- almost as brown as the clay -- for threshing upon with flails . At that labour two men had been busy during the most of the preceding day , and that was how , in the same end of the barn , rose a great heap of oat-straw , showing in the light of the moon like a mound of pale gold . Had Gibbie had any education in the marvellous , he might now , in the midnight and moonlight , have well imagined himself in some treasure-house of the gnomes . What he saw in the other corner was still liker gold , and was indeed greater than gold , for it was life -- the heap , namely , of corn threshed from the straw : Gibbie recognized this as what he had seen given to horses . But now the temptation to sleep , with such facilities presented , was overpowering , and took from him all desire to examine further : he shot into the middle of the loose heap of straw , and vanished from the glimpses of the moon , burrowing like a mole . In the heart of the golden warmth , he lay so dry and comfortable that , notwithstanding his hunger had waked with him , he was presently in a faster sleep than before .