midnight
`` If you would only try to put your mind on some body or something else , may be you would n't remember that you are at all unlike other people . I know mamma and Auntie Lincoln talk so about you very often when they are together ; but I did n't tell you about Archie . You see , I 've found out where he lives -- in that hut that you can see from the library window , and he 's the boy that we are to visit some day , dear Willie ; '' and Kittie fondled her deformed cousin , smoothing down the obtrusive hump , as if it were a graceful and comely thing . One little bit of candle , and a few old school-books , and a mind swelling with big desires after knowledge , were beside the small window , long after the midnight hour had struck and the noisy city was hushed into a comparative calm . It did not signify that the bowed frame was wearied by a day of physical toil , or that the aching head pleaded for `` tired nature 's sweet restorer , '' or that a voice from the outer room came often to his ear , with the petition that he would no longer rob himself of his needful rest ; there were new and holy impulses that refused to be put aside , and hungerings and thirstings that must be satisfied , and not until the candle gave out its last flicker did Archibald Mackie spare himself the pittance of slumber that was to prepare him for another toilsome day . Even in his fitful and nervous sleep was he mentally solving some abstruse problem , or following out some philosophical train of reasoning , while all the time in his dreams the strange lady would urge him onward in his tasks , smiling upon him with the sweet and gentle face . Forgetful of the simple hovel and its uncouth accompaniments , unmindful of the deformed figure , and the tattered raiment , and the taunts and jeers of an unfeeling multitude , the poor boy reveled amid visions of knowledge , and wisdom , and beauty , and love , as happy as if an angel form were resting where the hideous body lay .