Presently he saw the river, and then the marshes with brown dots that were his cattle straying over them, and beyond these the home landing and the masts of the Golden Rose.  The sun was near its setting; the men had left the fields; over all things were the stillness and peace, the encroaching shadows, the dwindling light, so golden in its quality, of late afternoon.  When he crossed the bridge over the creek, the hollow sound that the boards gave forth beneath his horse’s hoofs had the depth and resonance of drumbeats, and the cry of a solitary heron in the marsh seemed louder than its wont.  He passed the rolling-house and drew near to the river, riding again through tobacco.  These plants were Oronoko; the mild sweet-scented took the higher ground.  Along the river bank grew a row of tall and stately trees:  passing beneath them, he saw the shining water between brown columns or through a veil of slight, unfolding leaves.  Soon the trees fell away, and he came to a stretch of bank,—­here naked earth, there clad in grass and dewberry vines.  Near by was a small landing, with several boats fastened to its piles; and at a little distance beyond it, shadowed by a locust-tree, a strongly built, two-roomed wooden house, with the earth around it trodden hard and bare, and with two or three benches before its open door.  Haward recognized the store which his father—­after the manner of his kind, merchant and trader as well as planter and maker of laws—­had built, and which, through his agent in Virginia, he had maintained.

Before one of the benches a man was kneeling with his back to Haward, who could only see that his garb was that of a servant, and that his hands were busily moving certain small objects this way and that upon the board.  At the edge of the space of bare earth were a horse-block and a hitching-post.  Haward rode up to them, dismounted, and fastened his horse, then walked over to the man at the bench.

So intent was the latter upon his employment that he heard neither horse nor rider.  He had some shells, a few bits of turf, and a double handful of sand, and he was arranging these trifles upon the rough, unpainted boards in a curious and intricate pattern.  He was a tall man, with hair that was more red than brown, and he was dressed in a shirt of dowlas, leather breeches, and coarse plantation-made shoes and stockings.

“What are you doing?” asked Haward, after a moment’s silent watching of the busy fingers and intent countenance.

There was no start of awakened consciousness upon the other’s part.  “Why,” he said, as if he had asked the question of himself, “with this sand I have traced the shores of Loch-na-Keal.  This turf is green Ulva, and this is Gometra, and the shell is Little Colonsay.  With this wet sand I have moulded Ben Grieg, and this higher pile is Ben More.  If I had but a sprig of heather, now, or a pebble from the shore of Scridain!”

The voice, while harsh, was not disagreeably so, and neither the words nor the manner of using them smacked of the rustic.