The gathering

...he came to the ultimate source of the river.

It was a kind of meadow in which nothing happened: no cattle, no mysteriously gushing water....

merely the slow accumulation of moisture from many unseen and unimportant sources..

... the gathering of dew, so to speak....

...... the beginning, the unspectacular congregation of nothingness....

.... the origin of purpose.

Bright sunlight fell on the meadow, and where the moisture stood.....

...... sharp rays were reflected back until the whole area seemed golden.....

....... and hallowed........... as if here life itself were beginning.

He looked at this moist and pregnant land and thought.......

......... This is how everything begins - the mountains, the oceans, life itself.

A slow accumulation - the gathering together of meaning.