In many places where there used to be a thick shade, the foliage was now quite thin, and through it he could see a good deal of the sky.

The Virginia creepers, or "poison oaks," whichever they were, were growing red upon the trunks of the trees as if they had been at table too long and showed it, and when he rode out of the woods he saw that the fields, which he remembered as wide, swelling slopes of green, with cattle and colts feeding here and there, were now being ploughed into corrugated stretches of monotonous drab and brown.
If he had been there through all the gradual changes of the season, he, probably, would have enjoyed them as much as people ordinarily do; but coming back in this way, the altered landscape slightly shocked him.
When he had turned into the Midbranch gate, but was still a considerable distance from the house, he involuntarily stopped his horse.

He could see the broad steps which crossed the fence of the lawn, and on one side of the platform on the top sat a lady whom he instantly recognized as Miss Roberta; and on the other side of the platform sat a gentleman.
These two occupied very much the same positions as Lawrence, himself, and Miss March had occupied when we first became acquainted with them.
Lawrence looked very sharply and earnestly at the gentleman.

Could it be Mr Brandon?
No, it was a much younger person.
His first impulse was to turn and ride away, but this would be silly and unmanly, and he continued his way to the stile.

His disposition to treat the matter with contempt made him feel how important the matter was to him.