Answer: "the north and the west... are good hunting ground"
"it is forbidden to go east"
"it is there that there are the ashes of the Great Burning"
Explanation:
The short story "By the Waters of Babylon", by Stephen Vincent Benét, narrates John's journey to New York City. John is a priest and son of a priest in a post-apocalyptic future. New York City is known by his people as the Place of the Gods. After the Great Burning - which is later revealed to have been some sort of bomb or another weapon of mass destruction - the world and the people who still inhabit it have returned to a primitive, superstitious state. They believe metal to be cursed and the people who once lived upon this Earth to have been gods.
In this specific excerpt, the details that seem to reveal the setting are:
- "the north and the west... are good hunting ground"
- "it is forbidden to go east"
- "it is there that there are the ashes of the Great Burning"
John eventually goes east, crosses the Hudson and reaches New York. He then realizes that the gods were actually people, and that their greed was what caused their own destruction.
