Read the passage below from The First Men in the Moon. To the north-east some isolated watering-place was visible, a row of gaunt lodging-houses, the tallest things that I could see on earth, dull dabs against the brightening sky. What strange men can have reared these vertical piles in such an amplitude of space I do not know. There they are, like pieces of Brighton lost in the waste.
Which words from this description of the setting help the reader infer the overall mood of Mr. Bedford’s return?

north-east, vertical, row
brightening, sky, tallest
gaunt, dull, waste
strange, lost, I do not know