On that occasion the place had seemed strangely and dissonantly changed by the numerous children who were diverting themselves before the open door, and whose playthings and clothes strewed the house-place, and made it one busy scene of confusion and untidiness, more like the Corneys' kitchen in former times, than her mother's orderly and quiet abode.

Those little children were fatherless now; and the house was shut up, awaiting the entry of some new tenant.

There were no shutters to shut; the long low window was blinking in the rays of the morning sun; the house and cow-house doors were closed, and no poultry wandered about the field in search of stray grains of corn, or early worms.

It was a strange and unfamiliar silence, and struck solemnly on Sylvia's mind.

Only a thrush in the old orchard down in the hollow, out of sight, whistled and gurgled with continual shrill melody.
Sylvia went slowly past the house and down the path leading to the wild, deserted bit of garden.