midnight
Between that portion of Bellevue occupied as an hospital and the main building lay several enclosures sparsely cultivated with flowers , but altogether possessing a barren and dismal aspect . Scattered through these enclosures were offices and shanties , some occupied by favored paupers , and others used as work-shops and for the culinary purposes of the Hospitals . In one of these shanties a shocking scene presented itself that night . The signal for a secret carouse had been given , and the orderlies and nurses crept stealthily from their posts by the sick , and came through the midnight darkness towards the shanty . Some came slowly and at once ; while others stole like gaunt wild beasts , by the high wall that sweeps parallel with the western front of the main Hospital , sheltering themselves beneath the willow trees and the deep shadow cast by the building , while with their hands they groped eagerly along the wall . They found , after some trouble , the cords for which they were seeking , each with a piece of iron at the end , that had been cast over the wall by an accomplice outside the gate . Three of these cords lay tightened across the wall , their iron ballast sunk into the turf , and with breathless haste they were drawn over each with a bottle at the end , which , as it reached the top of the wall , fell into the foul hands grasping at it .