Read the following excerpt. Then answer the questions.
I looked upon the scene before me-upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain-upon the bleak walls-upon the vacant eyelike windows-upon a few rank sedges-and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees-with an utter depression of soul, which I can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the afterdream of the reveler upon opium-the bitter lapse into everyday life-the hideous dropping off of the veil. There was an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart-an unredeemed dreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination could torture into aught of the sublime. What was it-I paused to think-what was it that so unnerved me in the contemplation of the House of Usher?
Which of the following statements best paraphrases the first sentence of the excerpt above?
A) I had a daydream about a vacant house.
B) The house before me was surely haunted.
C) The appearance of the house depressed me.
D) My neighbor's house was vandalized.