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Exmoor by Amy Clampitt
Lost aboard the roll of Kodac- olor that was to have super- seded all need to remember Somerset were: a large flock
of winter-bedcover-thick- pelted sheep up on the moor; a stile, a church spire, and an excess, at Porlock,
of tenderly barbarous antique thatch in tandem with flower- beds, relentlessly pictur- esque, along every sidewalk;
a millwheel; and a millbrook running down brown as beer. Exempt from the disaster. however, as either too quick
or too subtle to put on rec- ord, were these: the flutter of, beside the brown water, with a butterfly-like flick
of fan-wings, a bright black- and-yellow wagtail; at Dulver- ton on the moor, the flavor of the hot toasted teacake
drowning in melted butter we had along with a bus-tour- load of old people; the driver
's way of smothering every r in the wool of a West Countr- y diphthong, and as a Somer-
set man, the warmth he had for the high, wild, heather- dank wold he drove us over.
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