The silence which prevailed about the tower, its Desolateness, the very quiet of its inhabitants, had been adduced as proofs that something sinister was perpetrated within.
"Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists"
Washington Irving
Villages there seem none; and you may drive for an hour without meeting more than a stray peasant cutting scrub or quarrying gravel on the hill-side, a train of mules carrying charcoal or faggots; the towns are far between, bleak, black, filthy, and such as only to make you feel all the more poignantly the utter Desolateness of these mountains.
"The Countess of Albany"
Violet Paget (AKA Vernon Lee)
Her contempt of the po' white trash faded before the pathetic Desolateness of Liza's glance.
"A Son of the Hills"
Harriet T. Comstock