It resembled an outlook on the steppes.

In point of the discipline he was to expect, he might be compared to a raw recruit, and in his own home! However, she was a woman of mind.

One would be proud of her.
But did he know the worst of her?
A dreadful presentiment, that he did not know the worst of her, rolled an ocean of gloom upon General Ople, striking out one solitary thought in the obscurity, namely, that he was about to receive punishment for retiring from active service to a life of ease at a comparatively early age, when still in marching trim.

And the shadow of the thought was, that he deserved the punishment! He was in his garden with the dawn.

Hard exercise is the best of opiates for dismal reflections.