He did not understand in the least the tenor of these wild words, but he was awed and impressed, and felt at once that the strife and stress of the great world into which he was faring was something very different from anything he had conceived of before.
By this time the travellers had reached the dreary waste called by the inhabitants Hammerton Heath.

At some seasons of the year it was golden with gorse or purple with ling, but in this drear winter season it was bare and colourless, and utterly desolate.

The outline of dark forests could be seen all around on the horizon; but the road led over the exposed ground, where not a tree broke the monotony of the way.

Cuthbert was glad enough to have a companion to ride by his side over the lonely waste, which looked its loneliest in the cold radiance of the moon.

He did not reply to the strange words he had just heard, and his companion, after a brief pause, resumed his discourse in a different tone, telling the lad more about London and the life there than ever he had heard in his life before.