My Old Home

Braving the [bitter:sad] cold, I travelled more than seven hundred miles back to the old home I had left over twenty years before. It was late winter. As we drew near my former home the day became overcast and a cold [wind:air] blew into the cabin of our boat, while all one [could:can] see through the chinks in our bamboo awning were a few desolate villages, void of any sign of life, scattered far and [near:deep] under the sombre yellow sky. I could not help feeling depressed. Ah! Surely this was not the old home I had remembered for the [past:prior] twenty years?