Where the land falls away to the north-west of Castle Cary, long views opened up to Glastonbury Tor and the hazy blue distance beyond. We were on our way to the plain below, where the river Brue turns northwards before heading across the levels on its way to the Bristol Channel. A mile or two before we reached the village of Baltonsborough, a little humpbacked bridge beside a farm took our road over the river. There were blossoming cider orchards and the river was lined with slender willow in delicate early leaf. This was traditional scenery for the Somerset levels in springtime.
But beside the bridge and on towards the village, both banks were carpeted by vivid yellow with the flower of the rape plant. Some deplore the great seasonal outburst of yellow, from a pictorial point of view, as spoiling the native scene, turning great expanses of the countryside to a glaring and unfamiliar colour, but a woman walking her dog on the river bank was struck by its beauty: "Doesn't it look lovely!" she called out. At Baltonsborough, the grassy churchyard slopes down to a fast-flowing stream I took to be the Brue, but when I checked with someone on the opposite bank, she said no, this was the mill leat.
Then a man came out into the porch from inside the church and told us more. He pointed towards a spot some way upstream where the mill leat leaves the Brue to make a wide arc, and then indicated a spot downstream, just beyond the churchyard and beside his own home, where, he said, had once stood the mill built by St Dunstan's father. He told us the saint ("Our local boy made good") was born here around AD900, became abbot of Glastonbury and later archbishop of Canterbury. The church is dedicated to St Dunstan, whose festival had been celebrated the Sunday before our visit. And, we were told, they had sung St Dunstan's hymn.
