These were now all consumed; and the rocks, shorn of moss, stood out white and naked in the sun. The willows and alders that fringed the brook were gone; the trunks of the elms and that of the great maple scorched, and the grass all around the house black as a coal. All over the land were blackened stumps and stubs, from which the smoke rose, and among whose roots the fires were smouldering. The beauty of the landscape had vanished, and desolation came in its stead.