midnight
I saw how little and feeble is the life of man , a thing of chances , preposterously unable to find the will to realise even the most timid of its dreams . And I wondered if always it would be so , if man was a doomed animal who would never to the last days of his time take hold of fate and change it to his will . Always , it may be , he will remain kindly but jealous , desirous but discursive , able and unwisely impulsive , until Saturn who begot him shall devour him in his turn ... ` I was roused from these thoughts by the sudden realisation of the presence of a squadron of aeroplanes far away to the north-east and very high . They looked like little black dashes against the midnight blue . I remember that I looked up at them at first rather idly -- as one might notice a flight of birds . Then I perceived that they were only the extreme wing of a great fleet that was advancing in a long line very swiftly from the direction of the frontier and my attention tightened . ` Directly I saw that fleet I was astonished not to have seen it before .