Sentence:  The slimy little causeway had dropped into the river by a slow process of suicide, and two or three stumps of piles and a rusty iron mooring-ring were all that remained of the departed Break-Neck glories. [...] [T]hrough three-fourths of its rising tides the dirty indecorous <WSD>drab</WSD> of a river would come solitarily oozing and lapping at the rusty ring, [...] 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  A dull or uninteresting appearance or situation.