"The night that changes not," from Songs of Love and Death by Margaret Armour, 1896.

From The Exeter Road by Charles George Harper, 1899.

"It seemed to Elma ... that the sea moaned in an unreasonable and very dreadful manner."  From Wild Kitty by Elizabeth Thomasina Meade, 1897.

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An illustration from a 1922 issue of Scribner's magazine.  The caption reads: "It was in the night, in the moonlight, in the road ... or the forest—it was everywhere!"

An illustration from an 1893 issue of The Quiver magazine.  The caption reads: "Out of the darkness behind her was slowly growing a human face."

An illustration from Illustrated British Ballads: Old and New by George Barnett Smith (1886).  The caption reads: "Bar the door! Put out the light, for it gleams across the night."

An illustration from an 1888 issue of Frank Leslie's Pleasant Hours magazine.

An illustration from a 1907 issue of The Reader magazine.  The caption reads: "May the journey you take to-night have no ending at all."

An illustration from a 1905 issue of The Quiver magazine.

An illustration from Clear as the Noon Day by Ethel Penrose (1893).  The caption reads: "Paul tried to peer into the gathering darkness."

An illustration from Jock of the Bushveld by Sir Percy Fitzpatrick (1907).  The caption reads: "The haunting mystery of eyes and nothing more."

Here's a winter's night from The Poetry of Robert Burns, Vol. 1 (1896).

An illustration from The Wrong Woman by Charles D. Stewart (1912).  The caption reads: "The stars, a vast audience, had all taken their places."

An illustration from Etidorhpa, or The Strange History of a Mysterious Being and the Account of the Initiate's Remarkable Journey by John Uri Lloyd (1895).  The caption reads: "Facing the open window he turned the pupils of his eyes upward."

An illustration from an 1874 issue of London Society Illustrated magazine.  The caption reads: "They held the door partly open, and peered out into the dark night."

"The sky is pocked with stars.  What eyes the wise men must have had to see a new one in so many.  I wonder, were there fewer stars then?  I don't know.  I fancy there's a mystery in it." —The Lion in Winter

Our illustration appears in Pleasant Hours, 1887.

An illustration from a 1900 issue of Punch magazine.  The caption reads: "Watchman: What of the Night?"

Traditionally, a falling star is considered an inauspicious omen.  To propose marriage during a meteor shower is surely tempting fate.

This image appeared in Punch, 1866, two weeks after a dramatic Leonid meteor shower (with reports of a stunning 2000 to 5000 meteors per hour).