The owners had fled, knowing that the sinister march of war would pass here.
Harry's mood changed suddenly from gladness to depression.

The desolate house brought home to him the terrible nature of war.

It meant destruction, wounds and death, and they were all the worse because it was a nation divided against itself, people of the same blood and the same traditions fighting one another.
But youth cannot stay gloomy long, and his spirits presently flowed back.

There was too much tang and life in that crisp wind from the west for his body to droop, and a lad could not be sad long, with brilliant sunshine around him and that shining little river before him.
The thrill of high adventure shot up from his soul.

He had ceased to hate the Northern soldiers, if he had ever hated them at all.