The Indian Chief by Gustave Aimard

It is especially at night, about two hours after sunset, that American scenery assumes grand proportions. Under the influence of the first night shadows the trees seem to put on majestic forms; the animated silence of the desert becomes more mysterious; and man experiences involuntarily a feeling of undefinable respect, which contracts his heart, and fills him with superstitious dread. At that hour the waters of the rivers flow with hoarse murmurings; the heavy and sinister flight of the birds of night agitates the air with a fluttering of evil augury; and the wild beasts, aroused in their hidden dens, salute the darkness with long howlings of joy, for at night they are incontestably the kings of the desert, for man is deprived of his greatest strength -- the power of the eye.

Father Seraphin was riding by the side of the two females along the foot of a lofty mountain, whose wooded slopes were lost in the black depths of the Barrancas. Since leaving the camp they had not stopped once. They were following at this moment a narrow path traced by mules, which wound with countless turnings along the sides of the mountain. This path was so narrow that two horses could scarce go along side by side; but the steeds on which our travellers were mounted were so sure-footed, that the latter proceeded without any hesitation along a road on which no other animal would have ventured in the darkness.