an hour after midnight
He had the sense of a wild animal to detect danger in the forest when the eye and ear gave no proof . He stood like a stag , sniffing the night air , and peering with his deep eyes into the gloom . Fortunately , though the moon was all but full , the sky was so overcast that only the faintest yellow glow broke into the darkness of the hill-tops . It must have been an hour after midnight when we got our next warning of the enemy . Suddenly a firebrand leaped from farther up the hill , and flew in a wide curve into the middle of the stockade . It fell on the partition between the horses and ourselves and hung crackling there . A shower of arrows followed it , which missed us , for we were close to the edges of the palisade .