midnight
Farewell , lost Hour ! -- and may the gods defend us from thy reproach at the Day of Doom ! In the name of the Sun and Nagaya , ... Peace ! '' The voice died away in a muffled echo , and the slow , solemn boom of a brazen-tongued bell struck midnight . Then Theos , raising his eyes , saw that all further progress was impeded by a great wall of solid rock that glistened at every point with flashes of pale and dark violet light -- a wall composed entirely of adamantine spar , crusted thick with the rough growth of oriental amethyst . It rose sheer up from the ground to an altitude of about a hundred feet , and apparently closed in and completed the vestibule . Surely there was no passing through such a barrier as this ?