At water’s brink, above Stoke Gabriel’s little pier and gleam of white and rose-washed cots, black swine were rooting for acorns; while westerly an arm of Dart extended up Bow Creek through such sunlight as made the eyes throb and turn to the cool shadows. Another silver loop and Duncannon cuddled in an elbow of the river; then, higher yet, the hills heaved along Sharpham’s hanging woods turned from the sun. The immense curtain of trees faced north in tapestry of temperate tones painted with purple and grey and the twilight colours of autumn foliage seen through shadows. The ash was already naked—a clean skeleton against the dun mass of dying foliage—and other trees were casting down their garments; but the firs and spruce made rich contrast of blue and green upon the sere.
Beyond Sharpham, long river flats rolled out, where plover and gulls sat on tussocks of reed, or rush, and curlew wheeled and mewed overhead. Then opened a point, where, robbed of colour, all mist-laden, amid gentle passages of receding banks and trees, there lifted the church tower of Totnes, with Dartmoor flung in a dim arc beyond.
So Dart came, beside old, fern-clad wharves, through sedge-beds and reed ronds to the end of her estuary under the glittering apron of a weir. Then the pulse of the sea ceased to beat; the tide bade farewell, and the salmon leapt from salt to fresh.
Worthy of worship in all her times and seasons; by her subtleties and sleights, her sun and shadow; by her laughter and coy approaches; by her curves and colours; her green hills and delight of woods and valleys; by her many voices; her changing moods and little lovelinesses, Dart is all Devon and so incomparably England.
A boat moved on Bow Creek, and in it there sat two men and a young woman. One man rowed while his wife and the other man watched him. He pulled a long, powerful stroke, and the little vessel slipped up the estuary on a tide that was at flood, pondering a moment before the turn. The banks were a blaze of autumn colour, beneath which shelving planes of stone sank down to the water. The woman twirled an umbrella to dry it from the recent storm. She was cold and shivered a little, for though the sun shone again, the north wind blew.
“I’m fearing we oughtn’t to have come, Medora,” said the man who sat beside her.
“Take my coat,” advised Medora’s husband. “It’s dry enough inside.”
He stopped rowing, took off his coat and handed it to his wife, who slipped it over her white blouse, but did not thank him.
Medora Dingle was a dark-faced girl, with black hair and a pair of deep, brown eyes—lovely, but restless—under clean, arched eye-brows. Her mouth was red and small, her face fresh and rosy. She seemed self-conscious, and shivered a little more than was natural; for she was strong and hearty enough in body, tall and lithe, one who laboured six days a week and had never known sickness. Two of her fingers were tied up in cotton rags, and one of the wounds was on her ring finger so that her wedding ring was not visible.
Presently Edward Dingle put down the oars.