midnight
He knew better . He read the magazines about himself , and pored over portraits of himself published therein until he was unable to associate his identity with those portraits . He was the fellow who had lived and thrilled and loved ; who had been easy-going and tolerant of the frailties of life ; who had served in the forecastle , wandered in strange lands , and led his gang in the old fighting days . He was the fellow who had been stunned at first by the thousands of books in the free library , and who had afterward learned his way among them and mastered them ; he was the fellow who had burned the midnight oil and bedded with a spur and written books himself . But the one thing he was not was that colossal appetite that all the mob was bent upon feeding . There were things , however , in the magazines that amused him . All the magazines were claiming him .