When Princess Mary returned to her room after her
nocturnal talk with Pierre, Natasha met her on the threshold.
That occurrence soon became generally known--her
nocturnal visit, the change she underwent, and her entry into a convent.
Her reason told her that all the visions she beheld were but the children of her imagination, and the conviction was strengthened by the fact that in the morning no traces remained of the
nocturnal phantoms, who disappeared with the coming of daylight.
The further moon revolves about Mars in something over thirty and one-quarter hours, and with her sister satellite makes a
nocturnal Martian scene one of splendid and weird grandeur.
New stars hast thou made us see, and new
nocturnal glories: verily, laughter itself hast thou spread out over us like a many-hued canopy.
"I'm glad you brought up the subject; I've felt the influence of this
nocturnal blight upon our city, but I never thought to analyse it before.
"In the meanwhile also the black ground was covered with herbage, and the green banks interspersed with innumerable flowers, sweet to the scent and the eyes, stars of pale radiance among the moonlight woods; the sun became warmer, the nights clear and balmy; and my
nocturnal rambles were an extreme pleasure to me, although they were considerably shortened by the late setting and early rising of the sun, for I never ventured abroad during daylight, fearful of meeting with the same treatment I had formerly endured in the first village which I entered.
We had never before seen them save at night, and indeed they are
nocturnal animals save when disturbed in their lairs, as these had been.
The lights and shades of the
nocturnal jungle are as different as one might imagine the lights and shades of another world to differ from those of our world; its beasts, its blooms, and its birds are not those of the jungle of Kudu, the sun.
The four species have nearly similar habits; the peludo , however, is
nocturnal, while the others wander by day over the open plains, feeding on beetles, larvae, roots, and even small snakes.
The
nocturnal adventures of Gurth were not yet concluded; indeed he himself became partly of that mind, when, after passing one or two straggling houses which stood in the outskirts of the village, he found himself in a deep lane, running between two banks overgrown with hazel and holly, while here and there a dwarf oak flung its arms altogether across the path.
Gondy gazed on these deeds of darkness, on these
nocturnal laborers, with a kind of fear; he asked himself, if, after having called forth these foul creatures from their dens, he should have the power of making them retire again.