It was a homely, simple scene,--yet till now it had been all the world to me.
With a final wave of the hand, I moved forward, until the intervening trees, like the falling of a curtain, hid it all from view.

Seth was astride the old mare, riding bareback, his white goat-like beard hanging down his breast until it mingled with her mane, while his long thin legs were drawn up in the awkward way he had.

He was a strange, silent, gloomy man, as austere as his native hills; and we rode on with no exchange of speech.

Indeed, my thoughts were of a nature that I had no wish to share with another; so it was some time before the depth of loneliness which oppressed my spirits enabled me to feel even passing interest in the things at hand.
"I 'd hate like thunder ter be a-goin' on your trip, Maester John," volunteered Seth at last, solemnly turning on the mare's broad back to face me.
"And why ?" I asked, wonderingly; for the man's rare gift of silence had won him a certain reputation for deep, occult knowledge which I could not wholly ignore.

"It will bring me the sight of some wonderful country, no doubt." His shrewd gimlet eyes seemed fairly to pierce me, as he deliberately helped himself to tobacco from a pouch at his waist.
"Wal, that may all be, Maester John; but I've heerd tell ther is some most awful things goes on out yonder," and he swung his long arm meaningly toward the west.