midnight
But they could not dig far enough without spades to get many , and when they did get to the nest , it was hardly worth taking for the sake of the one white egg and the little splattering , oily inmate . Yet on the wild sea-cinctured Stack , and in that young fresh morning , the children tasted the joy of life ; and only the fascinating vision of the unknown habitant of the Glistering Beaches had power to wile them away . But there before them , a mile and a half round the point of Stack , lay the Beaches . On either side of the smooth sweep of the sands rose mighty cliffs , black as the eye of the midnight and scarred with clefts like battered fortresses . Then at the Beaches themselves , the cliff wall fell back a hundred yards and left room for the daintiest edging of white sand , shining like coral , crumbled down from the pure granite -- which at this point had not been overflowed like the rest of the island of Suliscanna by the black lava . Such a place for play there was not anywhere -- neither on Suliscanna nor on any other of the outer Atlantic isles . Low down , by the surf 's edge , the wet sands of the Glistering Beaches were delicious for the bare feet to run and be brave and cool upon .