midnight
IT is a strange feeling we experience on entering a great city by night , -- a strange mixture of social and solitary impressions . I say by night , because at that time we are most inclined to feel ; and the mind , less distracted than in the day by external objects , dwells the more intensely upon its own hopes and thoughts , remembrances and associations , and sheds over them , from that one feeling which it cherishes the most , a blending and a mellowing hue . It was at night that I re-entered Paris . I did not tarry long at my hotel , before -LRB- though it was near upon midnight -RRB- I conveyed myself to Lord Bolingbroke 's lodgings . Knowing his engagements at St. Germains , where the Chevalier -LRB- who had but a very few weeks before returned to France , after the crude and unfortunate affair of 1715 -RRB- , chiefly resided , I was not very sanguine in my hopes of finding him at Paris . I was , however , agreeably surprised . His servant would have ushered me into his study , but I was willing to introduce myself .