midnight
Hour after hour glided away , and not until the last page was concluded did she lay it aside . The work contained very little that was new ; the same trains of thought had passed through her mind more than once before ; but here they were far more clearly and forcibly expressed . She drew her chair to the window , threw up the sash , and looked out . It was wintry midnight , and the sky blazed with its undying watch - fires . This starry page was the first her childish intellect had puzzled over . She had , from early years , gazed up into the glittering temple of night , and asked : `` Whence came yon silent worlds , floating in solemn grandeur along the blue , waveless ocean of space ? Since the universe sprang phoenix-like from that dim chaos , which may have been but the charnel-house of dead worlds , those unfading lights have burned on , bright as when they sang together at the creation .