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+<title>The Welsh and Their Literature, by George Borrow</title>
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Welsh and Their Literature, by George
+Borrow
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Welsh and Their Literature
+ from The London Quarterly Review, January 1861, American Edition
+
+
+Author: George Borrow
+
+
+
+Release Date: August 3, 2010 [eBook #33336]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WELSH AND THEIR LITERATURE***
+</pre>
+<p>Transcribed from the 1861 &ldquo;The London Quarterly
+Review,&rdquo; (American Edition) pages 20 to 33, by David Price,
+email ccx074@pglaf.org</p>
+<h1>The Welsh and their Literature<br />
+by George Borrow</h1>
+<p style="text-align: center">taken from the &ldquo;The London
+Quarterly Review&rdquo;, 1861, pages 20&ndash;33.</p>
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">new
+york</span>:<br />
+PUBLISHED BY LEONARD SCOTT &amp; CO.,<br />
+79 <span class="smcap">fulton street</span>, <span
+class="smcap">corner of gold street</span>.</p>
+<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center">1861.</p>
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p><!-- page 20--><a name="page20"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
+20</span>Art. II.&mdash;<i>The Sleeping Bard</i>; <i>or Visions
+of the World</i>, <i>Death</i>, <i>and Hell</i>.&nbsp; By Elis
+Wyn.&nbsp; Translated from the Cambrian British by George
+Borrow.&nbsp; London, 1860.</p>
+<p>The Welsh style themselves Cymry or Cumry, a word which, in
+their language, means a number of people associated together. <a
+name="citation20"></a><a href="#footnote20"
+class="citation">[20]</a>&nbsp; They were the second mass of
+population which moved from Asia into Europe.&nbsp; They followed
+and pushed forward the Gael or Gauls; were themselves impelled
+onward by the Slowaks or Sclavonians, who were themselves hunted,
+goaded, and pestered by a wild, waspish race of people, whom, for
+want of a better name, we will call Tatars or Tartars.&nbsp; The
+Cymry have left their name behind them in various regions far
+eastward of the one where they now sojourn.&nbsp; The most
+easterly countries which still bear their name, or modifications
+thereof, are Cambia, &lsquo;which is two dayes journey from the
+head of the great river Bruapo,&rsquo; and the Cryme or
+Crimea.&nbsp; In those parts, and &lsquo;where Constantinople now
+is,&rsquo; they tarried a considerable time, and increased and
+multiplied marvellously: and it was whilst tarrying in those
+regions, which they called collectively Gwlad yr Haf, or the
+summer country, that an extraordinary man was born amongst them,
+who was called by Greeks and Romans, hundreds of years after his
+death, Hesus, but whom the Cymry called, and still do call, Hu or
+Hee, with the surname of Cadarn, or the Mighty.&nbsp; This Hu or
+Hesus taught his countrymen the use of the plough, and to a
+certain extent civilized them.&nbsp; Finding eventually that the
+summer country was becoming over-populated, he placed himself at
+the head of a vast multitude and set off towards the west.&nbsp;
+Hu and his people fought or negotiated their way through various
+countries possessed by the Gael, till they came to the shore of
+the sea which separates the great isle of the west from the
+continent.&nbsp; Hearing that it was only thinly peopled they
+determined to pass over to it; and put their determination into
+execution, crossing &lsquo;the hazy sea,&rsquo; at present termed
+the German Ocean, in boats made of wicker work and skins, similar
+to but larger than the coracles which the Cymry always carried
+with them in their long expeditions.</p>
+<p>This great island was called Alban, Albyn, or Albion.&nbsp;
+Alban is a Gaelic or Gaulic word, signifying properly a
+hill-region.&nbsp; It is to be found under various modifications
+in different parts of the world, but only where the Gaulic race
+have at some time sojourned.&nbsp; The word Afghan is merely a
+modification of Alban, or Alpan; so is Armenia; so is Alp; so is
+of course Albania.&nbsp; The term was given to the island simply
+because the cliffs which fronted the continent, where the sea
+between the two lands was narrowest, were very high and
+towering.&nbsp; The island at the time of the arrival of the
+Cymry had, as has already been intimated, a scanty
+population.&nbsp; This population consisted of Gael or Gauls, a
+people of cognate race to the Cymry, and speaking a language much
+the same as theirs, differing from it, however, in some
+respects.&nbsp; Hu and his people took possession of the best
+parts of the island, either driving the few Gaels to other
+districts or admitting them to their confederacy.&nbsp; As the
+country was in a very wild state, much overgrown with forests in
+which bears and wolves wandered, and abounding with deep stagnant
+pools, which <!-- page 21--><a name="page21"></a><span
+class="pagenum">p. 21</span>were the haunts of the avanc or
+crocodile, Hu forthwith set about clearing it of some of its
+horrors, and making it more fit to be the abiding place of
+civilized beings.&nbsp; He made his people cut down woods and
+forests, and destroy, as far as was possible, wild beasts and
+crocodiles.&nbsp; He himself went to a gloomy pool, the haunt of
+the king of the efync, baited a huge hook attached to a cable,
+filing it into the pool, and when the monster had gorged the
+snare drew him out by means of certain gigantic oxen, <a
+name="citation21a"></a><a href="#footnote21a"
+class="citation">[21a]</a> which he had tamed to the plough, and
+burnt his horrid, wet, scaly carcass on a fire.&nbsp; He then
+caused enclosures to be made, fields to be ploughed and sown,
+pleasant wooden houses to be built, bees to be sheltered and
+encouraged, and schools to be erected where song and music were
+taught.&nbsp; O, a truly great man was Hu Gadarn! though a
+warrior, he preferred the sickle and pruning-hook to the sword,
+and the sound of the song and lute to the hoarse blast of the
+buffalo&rsquo;s horn:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">The mighty Hu with mead would pay<br />
+The bard for his melodious lay;<br />
+The Emperor of land and sea<br />
+And of all livings things was he. <a name="citation21b"></a><a
+href="#footnote21b" class="citation">[21b]</a></p>
+<p>For many years after the death of Hu the Cymry retrograded
+instead of advancing in civilization; they ceased to be a united
+people; plunder and devastation were of daily occurrence among
+them; every one did as he pleased, as far as in his power lay;
+there was no law, but the law of the strongest; and no justice,
+save that which was obtained from clemency and courtesy.&nbsp; At
+length one Prydain arose, who, either from ambition or a nobler
+motive, determined to introduce a system of government amongst
+them.&nbsp; By strength of arm and character he induced the Cymry
+of the lower country to acknowledge him for their head, and to
+obey certain laws which he enacted for the regulation of
+conduct.&nbsp; But neither his sovereignty nor his laws were
+regarded by the Cymry of the hilly regions.&nbsp; Prydain was the
+first king amongst the Cymry; and from his time the island was
+called Britain, which is a modification of his name, and the
+inhabitants Britons.&nbsp; The independent Cymry, however,
+disdained to call themselves or their districts after him, but
+still styled themselves Cymry, and their districts Cumrie-land
+and Cumberland; whilst the Gael of the North, who never submitted
+to his sway, and who knew little about him, still called
+themselves Gael, and their country Caledon and Alban.</p>
+<p>Various kings succeeded Prydain, during whose reigns the
+Britons continued in much the same state as that in which he had
+left them; on the coming of one Dyfnwal Moelmud, however, to the
+throne, a mighty improvement was effected in their
+condition.&nbsp; This prince was the great lawgiver of the
+Britons, and the greatest benefactor which the race had known
+since the days of Hu Gadarn.&nbsp; Tradition differs as to his
+exact origin, but there is ground for believing that he was the
+chief of a Cornish tribe, and that he was elected to the throne
+on account of his wisdom and virtue.&nbsp; He gave a regular
+system of laws and a constitution to the kingdom, and appointed
+magistrates in every place, whose duty it was to administer
+justice without respect of persons in all disputes, and whenever
+the law had been violated.&nbsp; This great and good man is
+believed to have lived about 400 years before the Christian
+era.</p>
+<p>After the Cymric or British race had been established in the
+island about 1300 years, they were invaded by the Romans, under
+Julius C&aelig;sar.&nbsp; The king, who at that time <!-- page
+22--><a name="page22"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 22</span>ruled
+in Britain, was called Caswallon; he was a great warrior and much
+beloved by his subjects.&nbsp; In him and his Britons the Romans
+found their match and more, for after a month&rsquo;s hard
+fighting and skirmishing, they were compelled to betake
+themselves to Gaul, the country from which they had come.</p>
+<p>Mighty was the triumph in Britain, says an old chronicler, on
+the retreat of the redoubted foe; and Caswallon gave a grand
+festival at Caer Lud, or London, which was reckoned in after
+times one of the three grand festivals of Britain.&nbsp; A grand
+festival indeed it must have been, if, as an ancient bard
+says,</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;Full twenty thousand beeves and deer<br
+/>
+Were slain to find the guests with cheer.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Britain was not subdued by the Romans till the time of
+Claudius C&aelig;sar.&nbsp; When conquered it was still permitted
+to possess a king of its own, on condition that he should
+acknowledge the authority of Rome, and pay tribute to her.&nbsp;
+The first king in the world to confess the faith of Christ was a
+British king, tributary to Rome.&nbsp; This king, whose name was
+Lles ap Coel, made his confession as early as the year 160.&nbsp;
+The Christian faith is supposed by some to have been first
+preached in Britain by Joseph of Arimathea; by others, by St.
+Paul himself.&nbsp; After remaining several centuries under the
+sway of Rome, the Britons again became independent, the Roman
+legions being withdrawn from the island for the defence of their
+own country, threatened by barbarian hordes.&nbsp; They did not,
+however, enjoy their independence long; a ferocious race, of
+mysterious origin, whom they called Gwyddelian Fichti, invaded
+them, and filled their country with horror and devastation.&nbsp;
+Unable to offer any effectual opposition to these invaders, they
+called to their assistance, from the neighbourhood of the mouth
+of the Elbe, the Saxons or <i>men of the knives</i>, a bold and
+adventurous, but treacherous and bloody people, who at first
+fought stoutly for them, but soon turned against them, and
+eventually all but extirpated them from Southern
+Britain:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&lsquo;A serpent that
+coils,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; And with fury boils,<br />
+From Germany coming with arm&rsquo;d wings spread,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; Shall subdue and enthral<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; The broad Britain all<br />
+From the Lochlin ocean to Severn&rsquo;s bed;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;And British men<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; Shall be captives then<br />
+To strangers from Saxonia&rsquo;s strand;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; They shall praise their God, and hold<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; Their language, as of old,<br />
+But except wild Wales they shall lose their land.&rsquo; <a
+name="citation22"></a><a href="#footnote22"
+class="citation">[22]</a></p>
+<p style="text-align: right" class="poetry"><i>Taliesin</i>.</p>
+<p>Yes; the Cymric or British race were dispossessed of Britain
+with the exception of that part which they still emphatically
+call Cumrie, but which by other people is called Wales.&nbsp;
+There they remained independent for a long time, governed by
+their own princes; and there, though now under the sway of
+England, they still preserve their venerable language, the oldest
+in the world, with perhaps the exception of the Gaulic or Irish,
+with which it is closely connected.&nbsp; Wales is not a Cymric
+but a Saxon or Teutonic word, bestowed on the land of the Cymry
+by the seed of Hengist.&nbsp; Like the Gaelic word Alban, it
+means a hilly or mountainous region, and is connected with wall,
+wold, and wood.&nbsp; The Germans, from very early times, have
+called the Cymry Welsh or Waldenses, and the country where they
+happened to be, Welschland.&nbsp; They still apply to Italy the
+name of Welschland, a name bestowed upon it by their ancestors,
+because it was originally principally peopled by the Cymry, whom
+the Germans called Welsh from the circumstance of their
+inhabiting some mountainous or forest country in the far East,
+when they first came in contact with them.</p>
+<p>We now proceed to give some account of the literature of the
+Cymry.&nbsp; We commence with their poetry, and from a very early
+period, quoting from a Cymric Triad:&mdash;&lsquo;These are the
+three artificers of poetry and record amongst the nation of the
+Cymry: Gwyddon Ganhebon, who first in the world invented vocal
+song; and Hu the Mighty, who first invented the means of
+recording and preserving vocal song; and Tydan, the father of the
+muse, who first gave rules to vocal song and a system to
+recording.&nbsp; From what these three men effected Bards and
+Bardism were derived; the dignities and customs pertaining to
+which were arranged systematically by the three original bards,
+Plenydd, Alon, and Gwbon.&rsquo;&nbsp; Three ranks or orders
+constituted what was called barddas, or bardism; that of bard or
+poet, that of ovydd or philosopher, and that of druid or
+instructor.&nbsp; The motto of this institution
+was&mdash;&lsquo;Y Gwir yn erbyn y byd,&rsquo; or The Truth
+against the world; from which it would appear that bardism was
+instituted for the purpose of propagating truth.&nbsp; Bardism,
+or as it is generally though improperly styled, druidism, was the
+fount of instruction, moral and religious, in Britain and in
+Gaul.&nbsp; The vehicle by which instruction, or, as it was
+probably termed, truth, was propagated, was poetry.&nbsp; The
+bard wrought the philosophy of the ovydd into song, and the druid
+or instructor, who was also minister of such religion as the
+Celts and Cymry possessed, <!-- page 23--><a
+name="page23"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 23</span>whatever that
+was, communicated to his pupils the result of the labours of the
+bard and ovydd.&nbsp; The Druidical verses then probably
+constituted the most ancient poetry of Britain.&nbsp; These
+verses were communicated orally, and were never written down
+whilst bardism or druidism lasted, though the bards and druids at
+a very early period were acquainted with the use of
+letters.&nbsp; Whether any genuine bardic poetry has been
+preserved, it is impossible to say; it is the opinion, however,
+of Cymric scholars of reputation, that certain ancient strains
+which the Welsh possess, which are composed in a measure called
+Englyn milwr, are either druidical strains or imitations of
+such.&nbsp; Each of these compositions is in three lines; the
+entire pith however of the triplet, generally consisting of a
+moral adage or a piece of wholesome advice, lies in the third
+line, the two first being composed of trivial and unconnected
+expressions.&nbsp; Many of these stanzas are called the stanzas
+of &lsquo;The Mountain Snow,&rsquo; from the circumstance of
+their commencing with &lsquo;Eiry Mynydd,&rsquo; which has that
+signification.&nbsp; The three lines rhyme together at their
+terminations; and a species of alliteration is observable
+throughout.&nbsp; A word or two here on Cymric rhyme and
+measures.</p>
+<p>In Welsh poetry rhyme is found in a twofold shape: there is
+alliteration, that is rhyme produced by the same letters
+following each other at certain distances in the body of the
+line, then there is the common rhyme, produced by two or more
+lines terminating with the same letters.&nbsp; In the older Welsh
+poetry, by which we mean that composed before the termination of
+the first millennium, both rhyme and alliteration are employed,
+but in a less remarkable manner than in the bardic effusions of
+comparatively modern times.&nbsp; The extent to which the bards
+of the middle ages, and those of one or two subsequent centuries,
+carried rhyme and alliteration seems marvellous to the English
+versifier.&nbsp; We English think we have accomplished a great
+feat in rhyme when we have made three lines consonant in their
+terminations; but Dafydd Benfras, or David of the Thick Head,
+would make fifty lines rhyme together, and not think that he had
+accomplished anything remarkable in rhyming either.&nbsp; Our
+English alliterative triumph is the following line, composed by a
+young lady in the year 1800, on the occasion of a gentleman of
+the name of Lee planting a lane with lilacs:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;Let lovely lilacs line Lee&rsquo;s
+lonely lane!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>in which not only every word, but every syllable commences
+with the same letter&mdash;<i>l</i>.</p>
+<p>But what is this English alliterative triumph of the young
+lady compared with the Welsh alliterative triumph of Dafydd
+Nanmawr, who wrote a poem of twelve lines, every syllable of
+which commences with the letter g, with the exception of the
+last, which begins with n?</p>
+<p>The earliest Cymric or British metre seems to have been a
+triban or triplet, in each line of which there were in general
+six syllables.&nbsp; The bards of the sixth, seventh, and several
+succeeding centuries used this metre, and likewise others,
+invented by themselves, in which the lines are of various
+length.&nbsp; There was no regular system of prosody till the
+year 1120, when one was established under the auspices of Grufydd
+ap Cynan, prince of Gwynedd.&nbsp; This Ap Cynan, who, though of
+Welsh origin, was born in Dublin, and educated at the Danish
+Irish court, was passionately fond of poetry, and was not only
+well acquainted with that of the British bards, but with the
+strains of the Icelandic skalds and Irish fileas.&nbsp; Shortly
+after his accession to the throne of Gwynedd, of which he was the
+rightful heir, he proclaimed an eisteddfod, or poetical
+sessions.&nbsp; At this eisteddfod, which was numerously attended
+by poets of various nations, a system of prosody was drawn up by
+competent persons, at his instigation, for the use of the Welsh,
+and established by his authority.&nbsp; This system, in which
+Cymric, Icelandic, and Irish forms of verse are blended and
+amalgamated, has with a few unimportant variations maintained its
+ground to the present time.&nbsp; It contains three primary
+measures, termed respectively, englyn, cywydd, and awdl.&nbsp; Of
+the englyn, there are five kinds; of the cywydd, four; and of the
+awdl, fifteen.&nbsp; Each particular species of englyn, cywydd,
+and awdl has its appropriate name, which it is needless to give
+here.&nbsp; These three primary metres, with their modifications,
+make together twenty-four measures, which embrace the whole
+system of Welsh versification, in which, as somebody has
+observed, each line, word, and letter, are so harmonized by
+consonancy, chained so accurately, woven so closely and
+correctly, that it is impossible to extract one word or even
+letter without causing a hideous gap.&nbsp; Whoever has ventured
+to compose out of these measures, since the time of their
+establishment, has been considered by the Welsh scholar as
+unworthy of the name of poet.</p>
+<p>The earliest recorded poet of the Cymry, after the days of
+Gwyddon Ganhebon and the other personages mentioned with him in
+the triad, is Merddin, Beirdd Emrys Wledig, or Merddin, Bard of
+Prince Emrys.&nbsp; He flourished about the middle of the fifth
+century, the period when the Saxons arrived in Britain, <!-- page
+24--><a name="page24"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 24</span>under
+the command of Hengist and Horsa.&nbsp; Besides poetry he was
+skilled in mathematics, and is said by the Welsh to have been the
+architect of Stonehenge.&nbsp; He has been surnamed Ambrosius,
+which is the Latin modification of the name of his patron
+Emrys.&nbsp; He is the Merddin, or Merlin, who has had to father
+so many of the prophecies which since his death have been
+produced.&nbsp; None of his poems are extant.</p>
+<p>During the period which elapsed between the first coming of
+the Saxons, and the expulsion of the British from the Southern
+and Eastern parts of the island, lived Aneurin, Taliesin,
+Llewarch Hen, and Merddin, surnamed Wyllt or the Wild, all
+celebrated poets, the latter of whom has generally been
+confounded with Merddin Ambrosius.&nbsp; Aneurin was a chief of
+the Ottadinian Britons, and his principal poem is the one styled
+Gododin, a word which probably means that which relates to the
+Ottadini.&nbsp; It is descriptive of the battle of Cattraeth,
+fought between the Britons and the Saxons, in which the former
+were so completely worsted that only three, amongst whom was
+Aneurin himself, escaped with their lives.&nbsp; The poem is
+composed in lines remarkably short, consisting in general of only
+six syllables.&nbsp; Aneurin was the Gildas of ecclesiastical
+history, and the name of Gildas is merely a Saxon translation of
+Aneurin, which signifies golden grove.&nbsp; Taliesin Ben Beirdd,
+or Taliesin Prince of Bards, was a North Welshman, but was
+educated at Llanreithin, in Glamorgan, under Catwg, celebrated
+for his aphorisms, who kept a school of philosophy there.&nbsp;
+He was called Prince of Bards because he excelled all his
+contemporaries in the poetic art.&nbsp; Many of his pieces are
+extant; amongst them is an awdl or ode, containing an abridgment
+of the history of the world, in which there is a stanza with
+regard to the destiny of the ancient Britons as sublime as it is
+true:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;Their Lord they shall praise,<br />
+Their language they shall keep,<br />
+Their land they shall lose<br />
+Except wild Wales.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Llewarch Hen, or Llewarch the aged, was a prince of
+Cumberland.&nbsp; Driven from his domain by the Saxons, he sought
+a refuge at the place which is now called Shrewsbury, and
+subsequently on the shore of the lake of Bala, a beautiful sheet
+of water in Merionethshire, overlooked on the south by the great
+mountain Arran.&nbsp; There he died at the age of one hundred and
+fifty years.&nbsp; His poems consist chiefly of elegies on his
+sons, twenty-four in number, all of whom perished in battle, and
+on his slaughtered friends.&nbsp; They are composed in triplets,
+and abound with simplicity and pathos.&nbsp; Myrddin Wyllt, or
+Myrddin the Wild, was a Briton of the Scottish border.&nbsp;
+Having killed the son of his sister, he was so stung with remorse
+that he determined to renounce the society of men, and
+accordingly retired to a forest in Scotland, called Celydon,
+where he was frequently seized with howling madness.&nbsp; Owing
+to his sylvan life and his attacks of lunacy, he was called
+Merddyn Wyllt, or the Wild.&nbsp; He composed poetry in his lucid
+intervals.&nbsp; Six of his pieces have been preserved: they are
+chiefly on historical subjects.&nbsp; The most remarkable of them
+is an address to his pig, in which he tells the woes and
+disasters which are to happen to Britain: it consists of
+twenty-five stanzas or sections.&nbsp; In all of them a kind of
+alliteration is observable, and in each, with one or two
+exceptions, the first line rhymes with all the rest.&nbsp; Each
+commences with &lsquo;Oian a phorchellan&rsquo;&mdash;listen,
+little porker!&nbsp; The commencement of one of these stanzas
+might be used in these lowering days by many a grey-headed yeoman
+to his best friend:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;Oian a phorchellan: mawr eryssi<br />
+A fydd ym Mhrydan, ac nim dorbi.</p>
+<p class="poetry">Listen, little porker! mighty wonders<br />
+Shall occur in Britain, which shall not con me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Many and great poets flourished in the times of the Welsh
+princes: the three greatest were Meilyr, Gwalchmai, and Dafydd
+Benfras.&nbsp; Meilyr was bard of Gruffudd ap Cynan, prince of
+Gwynedd or North Wales, who died in 1137.&nbsp; He sang the
+praises of his master, who was a celebrated warrior and a
+bountiful patron of the muse, in whose time and under whose
+sanction those forms of composition, generally called the twenty
+four measures, were invented and promulgated.&nbsp; Gwalchmai
+lived in the time of Owain, prince of Gwynedd, about whom he sang
+a piece which is to a certain extent known to the English public
+by a paraphrase made by Gray, which bears the title of &lsquo;The
+Triumphs of Owain.&rsquo;&nbsp; Dafydd Benfras was domestic bard
+of Llywelyn ap Jorwerth, also prince of Gwynedd and titular king
+of Wales, who flourished during the first half of the thirteenth
+century.&nbsp; In one of his odes addressed to his patron, there
+is an animated description of a battle won by Llywelyn over King
+John:</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;Llywelyn of the potent hand oft
+wrought<br />
+Trouble upon the kings and consternation;<br />
+When he with the Lloegrain monarch fought,<br />
+Whose cry was &ldquo;Devastation!&rdquo;<br />
+Forward impetuously his squadrons ran;<br />
+Great was the tumult ere the shoot began;<br />
+Proud was the hero of his reeking glaive,<br />
+<!-- page 25--><a name="page25"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
+25</span>Proud of their numbers were his followers brave. <a
+name="citation25a"></a><a href="#footnote25a"
+class="citation">[25a]</a><br />
+O then were heard resounding o&rsquo;er the fields<br />
+The clash of faulchions and the crash of shields!<br />
+Many the wounds in yonder fight receiv&rsquo;d!<br />
+Many the warriors of their lives bereaved!<br />
+The battle rages till our foes recoil<br />
+Behind the Dike which Offa built with toil.<br />
+Bloody their foreheads, gash&rsquo;d with many a blow,<br />
+Blood streaming down their quaking knees below.<br />
+Llywelyn we as our high chief obey,<br />
+To fair Porth Ysgewin extends his sway;<br />
+For regal virtues and for princely line<br />
+He towers above imperial Constantine.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Dafydd ab Gwilym was born at Bro Gynan, in Cardiganshire, in
+1293, about forty years after the whole of Wales had been
+subjected to the sway of England.&nbsp; He was the Ovid of Wales,
+the poet of love and nature.&nbsp; In his early years he was very
+dissipated, but towards the latter part of his life became
+religious.&nbsp; He died at the age of sixty-three, and was
+buried within the precincts of the great monastery of Strata
+Florida. <a name="citation25b"></a><a href="#footnote25b"
+class="citation">[25b]</a>&nbsp; Such was the power of his
+genius, that the generality of the poets who succeeded him for
+the next four hundred years were more or less his
+imitators.&nbsp; Iolo Goch, or Red Julius, whose real name was
+Llwyd, was the bard of Owen Glendower, and, amongst other pieces,
+composed a graphic ode on his patron&rsquo;s mansion at Sycharth,
+and the manner of life there:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;Its likeness now I&rsquo;ll limn you
+out:<br />
+&rsquo;Tis water-girdled wide about;<br />
+It shows a wide and stately door,<br />
+Reach&rsquo;d by a bridge the water o&rsquo;er;<br />
+&rsquo;Tis formed of buildings coupled fair&mdash;<br />
+Coupled is every couple there;<br />
+Within a quadrate structure tall<br />
+Muster the merry pleasures all;<br />
+Conjointly are the angles bound,<br />
+No flaw in all the place is found.<br />
+Structures in contact meet the eye<br />
+Upon the hillock&rsquo;s top on high;<br />
+Into each other fasten&rsquo;d they<br />
+The form of a hard knot display.<br />
+There dwells the chief we all extol<br />
+In timber house on lightsome knoll;<br />
+Upon four wooden columns proud<br />
+Mounteth his mansion to the cloud.<br />
+Each column&rsquo;s thick and firmly bas&rsquo;d,<br />
+And upon each a loft is plac&rsquo;d;<br />
+In those four lofts, which coupled stand,<br />
+Repose at night the minstrel band.<br />
+Four lofts they were in pristine state,<br />
+But now partition&rsquo;d form they eight.<br />
+Tiled is the roof.&nbsp; On each house-top<br />
+Rise smoke-ejecting chimneys up.<br />
+All of one form there are nine halls,<br />
+Each with nine wardrobes in its walls,<br />
+With linen white as well supplied<br />
+As fairest shops of fam&rsquo;d Cheapside.</p>
+<p style="text-align: center" class="poetry">* * * * *</p>
+<p class="poetry">What luxury doth this hall adorn,<br />
+Showing of cost a sovereign scorn!<br />
+<!-- page 26--><a name="page26"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
+26</span>His ale from Shrewsbury town he brings;<br />
+His usquebaugh is drink for kings.<br />
+Bragget he keeps, bread white of look,<br />
+And, bless the mark, a bustling cook.<br />
+His mansion is the minstrels&rsquo; home,<br />
+You&rsquo;ll find them there whene&rsquo;er you come.<br />
+Of all her sex his wife&rsquo;s the best,<br />
+The household through her care is blest;<br />
+She&rsquo;s scion of a knightly tree,<br />
+She&rsquo;s dignified, she&rsquo;s kind and free.<br />
+His bairns approach me, pair by pair,<br />
+O what a nest of chieftains fair!<br />
+Here difficult it is to catch<br />
+A sight of either bolt or latch;<br />
+The porter&rsquo;s place here none will fill;<br />
+Here largess shall be lavish&rsquo;d still,<br />
+And ne&rsquo;er shall thirst or hunger rude<br />
+In Sycharth venture to intrude.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Iolo composed this ode two years before the great Welsh
+insurrection, when he was more than a hundred years old.&nbsp; To
+his own great grief he survived his patron, and all hopes of
+Welsh independence.&nbsp; An englyn, which he composed a few days
+before his death, commemorates the year of the rising of
+Glendower, and also the year to which the chieftain
+lived:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;One thousand four hundred, no less and
+no more,<br />
+Was the date of the rising of Owen Glendower;<br />
+Till fifteen were added with courage ne&rsquo;er cold<br />
+Liv&rsquo;d Owen, though latterly Owen was old.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Glendower died at the age of sixty-seven: Iolo, when he called
+him old, was one hundred and eighteen.</p>
+<p>Gwilym ap Ieuan Hen flourished about 1450.&nbsp; He was bard
+to Griffith ap Nicholas, chieftain of Dinefor, in whose praise he
+wrote an ode, commencing with lines to the following
+effect:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;Griffith ap Nicholas! who like thee<br
+/>
+For wealth and power and majesty?<br />
+Which most abound&mdash;I cannot say&mdash;<br />
+On either side of Towey gay,<br />
+From hence to where it meets the brine,<br />
+Trees or stately towers of thine?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Griffith ap Nicholas was a powerful chieftain of South Wales,
+something of a poet and a great patron of bards.&nbsp; Seeing
+with regret that there was much dissension amongst the bardic
+order, and that the rules of bardism were nearly forgotten, he
+held a bardic congress at Carmarthen, with the view of reviving
+bardic enthusiasm and re-establishing bardic discipline.&nbsp;
+The result of this meeting&mdash;the only one of the kind which
+had been held in Wales since the days of the Welsh
+princes&mdash;to a certain extent corresponded with his
+wish.&nbsp; In the wars of the Roses he sided with York, chiefly
+out of hatred to Jasper Earl of Pembroke, half-brother of Henry
+VI.&nbsp; He was mortally wounded at the battle of
+Mortimer&rsquo;s Cross, which was gained for Edward IV. by a
+desperate charge made by Griffith and his Welshmen at
+Pembroke&rsquo;s Banner, when the rest of the Yorkists were
+wavering.&nbsp; His last words were: &lsquo;Welcome death! since
+honour and victorie makes for us!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Dafydd ab Edmund was born at Pwll Gwepra, in the parish of
+Hanmer, in Flintshire.&nbsp; He was the most skilful versifier of
+his time.&nbsp; He attended the Eisteddfod, or congress, at
+Carmarthen, held under the auspices of Griffith ap Nicholas, and
+not only carried off the prize, but induced the congress to
+sanction certain alterations in the poetical canons of Gruffudd
+ab Cynan, which he had very much at heart.&nbsp; There is a
+tradition that Griffith ap Nicholas commenced the business of the
+congress by the following question: &lsquo;What is the cause,
+nature, and end of an Eisteddfod?&rsquo;&nbsp; No one appearing
+ready with an answer, Griffith said: &lsquo;Let the little man in
+the grey coat answer;&rsquo; whereupon Dafydd made the following
+reply: &lsquo;To remember what has been&mdash;to think of what
+is&mdash;and to judge about what shall be.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Lewis Glyn Cothi lived during the wars of the Roses.&nbsp; He
+was bard to Jasper Earl of Pembroke, son of Owen Tudor and
+Catharine of France, and brother uterine of Henry VI.&nbsp; He
+followed his patron to the fatal battle of Mortimer&rsquo;s Cross
+as a captain of foot.&nbsp; His pieces are mostly on the events
+of his time, and are full of curious historical information.</p>
+<p>Ieuan Deulwyn was bard and friend of Ryce ap Thomas, to whom
+he addressed a remarkable ode in stanzas of four lines on the
+principle of counter-change, by which any line in the quatrain
+may begin it.&nbsp; His friend and patron Ryce ap Thomas was the
+grandson of that Griffith ap Nicholas who perished at the battle
+of Mortimer&rsquo;s Cross, fighting against Lancaster.&nbsp;
+Ryce, however, when Richmond, the last hope of Lancaster, landed
+at Milford Haven, joined him at the head of &lsquo;all the
+Ryces,&rsquo; and was the main cause of his eventually winning
+the crown.&nbsp; He was loaded with riches and honours by Henry
+VII., and was an especial favourite with Henry VIII., who used to
+call him Father Preecc, my trusty Welshman.&nbsp; He was a great
+warrior, a consummate courtier, and a very wise man; for whatever
+harm he might do to people, he never spoke ill of anybody.&nbsp;
+His tomb, bearing the sculptured figures of himself and wife, may
+be seen in the church of St. Peter, at Carmarthen.</p>
+<p>Sion Tudor was born about the middle of the sixteenth
+century.&nbsp; He had much wit and humour, but was very
+satirical.&nbsp; He wrote a bitter epigram on London, in which
+city, by the bye, he had been most unmercifully <!-- page 27--><a
+name="page27"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
+27</span>fleeced.&nbsp; William Middleton was one of the sea
+captains of Queen Elizabeth; he translated the Psalms into
+several of the four-and-twenty measures whilst commanding a ship
+of war in the West Indian seas.&nbsp; Twm Sion Cati lived in the
+days of James I.: he was a sweet poet, but&mdash;start not,
+gentle reader! a ferocious robber.&nbsp; His cave amidst the wild
+hills between Tregaron and Brecknock is still pointed out by the
+neighbouring rustics.&nbsp; In the middle of the seventeenth
+century was produced a singular little piece, author unknown: it
+is an englyn or epigram of four lines on a spider, all in
+vowels:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;O&rsquo;i wiw wy i weu e
+&acirc;,&mdash;o&rsquo;i au,<br />
+O&rsquo;i wyau y weua;<br />
+E wywa ei we&rsquo; aua,&rsquo;<br />
+A&rsquo;i weuai yw ieuau ia.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>A proest, or kind of counterchange, was eventually added to it
+by one Gronwy Owen, so that the Welsh now can say, what perhaps
+no other nation can, that they have a poem of eight lines in
+their language, in which there is not a single consonant.&nbsp;
+It is however necessary to state, that in the Welsh language
+there are seven vowels, both w and y being considered and sounded
+as such.&nbsp; The two parts may be thus rendered into
+English:</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;From out its womb it weaves with care<br
+/>
+&nbsp;&nbsp; Its web beneath the roof;<br />
+Its wintry web it spreadeth there&mdash;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; Wires of ice its woof.</p>
+<p class="poetry">And doth it weave against the wall<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; Thin ropes of ice on high?<br />
+And must its little liver all<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; The wondrous stuff supply?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Huw Morris was born in the year 1622, and died in 1709, having
+lived in six reigns.&nbsp; The place of his birth was Pont y
+Meibion, in the valley of Ceiriog, in Denbighshire.&nbsp; He was
+a writer of songs, carols, and elegies, and was generally termed
+Eos Ceiriog, or the Nightingale of Ceiriog, a title which he
+occasionally well deserved, for some of his pieces, especially
+his elegies, are of great beauty and sweetness.&nbsp; Not
+unfrequently, however, the title of Dylluan Ceiriog, or the Owl
+of Ceiriog, would be far more applicable, for whenever he thought
+fit he could screech and hoot most fearfully.&nbsp; He was a
+loyalist, and some of his strains against the Roundheads are
+fraught with the bitterest satire.&nbsp; His dirge on Oliver and
+his men, composed shortly after Monk had declared for Charles
+II., is a piece quite unique in its way.&nbsp; He lies buried in
+the graveyard of the beautiful church of Llan Silien, in
+Denbigshire.&nbsp; The stone which covers his remains is yet to
+be seen just outside the southern wall, near the porch.&nbsp; The
+last great poet of Wales was a little swarthy curate;&mdash;but
+this child of immortality, for such he is, must not be disposed
+of in half a dozen lines.&nbsp; The following account of him is
+extracted from an unpublished work, called &lsquo;Wild
+Wales,&rsquo; by the author of &lsquo;The Bible in
+Spain&rsquo;:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;Goronwy, or Gronwy, Owen was born in the
+year 1722, at a place called Llanfair Mathafrn Eithaf, in
+Anglesea.&nbsp; He was the eldest of three children.&nbsp; His
+parents were peasants and so exceedingly poor that they were
+unable to send him to school.&nbsp; Even, however, when an
+unlettered child he gave indications that he was visited by the
+awen or muse.&nbsp; At length the celebrated Lewis Morris
+chancing to be at Llanfair, became acquainted with the boy, and,
+struck with its natural talents, determined that he should have
+all the benefit which education could bestow.&nbsp; He
+accordingly, at his own expense, sent him to school at Beaumaris,
+where he displayed a remarkable aptitude for the acquisition of
+learning.&nbsp; He subsequently sent him to Jesus College,
+Oxford, and supported him there whilst studying for the
+Church.&nbsp; At Jesus, Gronwy distinguished himself as a Greek
+and Latin scholar, and gave proofs of such poetical talent in his
+native language that he was looked upon by his countrymen of that
+Welsh college as the rising bard of the age.&nbsp; After
+completing his collegiate course, he returned to Wales, where he
+was ordained a minster of the Church in the year 1745.&nbsp; The
+next seven years of his life were a series of cruel
+disappointments and pecuniary embarrassments.&nbsp; The grand
+wish of his heart was to obtain a curacy, and to settle down in
+Wales.&nbsp; Certainly a very reasonable wish, for, to say
+nothing of his being a great genius, he was eloquent, highly
+learned, modest, meek, and of irreproachable morals; yet Gronwy
+Owen could obtain no Welsh curacy, nor could his friend Lewis
+Morris, though he exerted himself to the utmost, procure one for
+him.&nbsp; It was true that he was told that he might go to
+Llanfair, his native place, and officiate there at a time when
+the curacy happened to be vacant, and thither he went, glad at
+heart to get back amongst his old friends, who enthusiastically
+welcomed him; yet scarcely had he been there three weeks when he
+received notice from the chaplain of the Bishop of Bangor that he
+must vacate Llanfair in order to make room for a Mr. John Ellis,
+a young clergyman of large independent fortune, who was wishing
+for a curacy under the Bishop of Bangor, Doctor Hutton.&nbsp; So
+poor Gronwy, the eloquent, the learned, the meek, was obliged to
+vacate the pulpit of his native place to make room for the rich
+young clergyman, who wished to be within dining distance of the
+palace of Bangor.&nbsp; Truly in this world the full shall be
+crammed, and those who have little shall have the little which
+they have taken away from them.&nbsp; Unable to obtain employment
+in Wales, Gronwy sought for it in England, and after some time
+procured the curacy of Oswestry, in Shropshire, where he married
+a respectable young woman, who <!-- page 28--><a
+name="page28"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 28</span>eventually
+brought him two sons and a daughter.&nbsp; From Oswestry he went
+to Donnington, near Shrewsbury, where, under a certain Scotchman
+named Douglas, who was an absentee, and who died Bishop of
+Salisbury, he officiated as curate and master of a grammar school
+for a stipend&mdash;always grudgingly and contumeliously
+paid&mdash;of three-and-twenty pounds a year.&nbsp; From
+Donnington he removed to Walton in Cheshire, where he lost his
+daughter, who was carried off by a fever.&nbsp; His next removal
+was to Northolt, a pleasant village in the neighbourhood of
+London.&nbsp; He held none of his curacies long, either losing
+them from the caprice of his principals, or being compelled to
+resign them from the parsimony which they practised towards
+him.&nbsp; In the year 1756 he was living in a garret in London,
+vainly soliciting employment in his sacred calling, and
+undergoing with his family the greatest privations.&nbsp; At
+length his friend Lewis Morris, who had always assisted him to
+the utmost of his ability, procured him the mastership of a
+Government school at New Brunswick, in North America, with a
+salary of three hundred pounds a year.&nbsp; Thither he went with
+his wife and family, and there he died some time about the year
+1780.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He was the last of the great poets of Cambria, and with
+the exception of Ab Gwilym, the greatest which she has
+produced.&nbsp; His poems, which for a long time had circulated
+through Wales in manuscript, were first printed in the year
+1819.&nbsp; They are composed in the ancient bardic measures, and
+were, with one exception, namely, an elegy on the death of his
+benefactor, Lewis Morris, which was transmitted from the New
+World, written before he had attained the age of
+thirty-five.&nbsp; All his pieces are excellent, but his
+master-work is decidedly the Cywydd y Farn, or Day of
+Judgment.&nbsp; This poem, which is generally considered by the
+Welsh as the brightest ornament of their ancient language, was
+composed at Donnington, a small hamlet in Shropshire, on the
+north-west spur of the Wrekin, at which place, as has been
+already said, Gronwy toiled as schoolmaster and curate under
+Douglas the Scot, for a stipend of three-and-twenty pounds a
+year.&rsquo; <a name="citation28"></a><a href="#footnote28"
+class="citation">[28]</a></p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>The prose literature of Wales is by no means so extensive as
+the poetical; it, however, comprises much that is valuable and
+curious on historical, biographical, romantic and moral
+subjects.&nbsp; The most ancient Welsh prose may probably be
+found in certain brief compositions, called Triads, which are
+said to be of Druidic origin.&nbsp; The Triad was used for the
+commemoration of historical facts or the inculcation of moral
+duties.&nbsp; It has its name because in it three events are
+commemorated, or three persons mentioned, if it be historical;
+three things or three actions recommended or denounced, if it be
+moral.&nbsp; To give the reader at once a tolerable conception of
+what the Triad is, we subjoin two or three specimens of this kind
+of composition.&nbsp; We commence with the historical
+Triad:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;These are the three pillars of the race of
+the isle of Britain: First, Hu the Mighty, who conducted the
+nation of the Cumry from the summer country to the island of
+Britain (bringing them from the continent) across the hazy sea
+(German Ocean).&nbsp; Second, Prydain, son of Aedd Mawr, the
+founder of government and rule in the isle of Britain, before
+whose time there was no such thing as justice except what was
+obtained by courtesy, nor any law save that of the
+strongest.&nbsp; Third, Dyfnwal Moelmud, who first reduced to a
+system the laws, customs, and privileges of his country and
+nation.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The three intruding tribes into the island of Britain
+are the following: First, the Corranians, who came from the
+country of Pwyl.&nbsp; Second, the Gwyddelian (silvan, Irish)
+Fichti (Picts), who came to Alban across the sea of Lochlin
+(Northern Ocean), and who still exist in Alban by the shore of
+the sea of Lochlin (from Inverness to Thursoe).&nbsp; Third, the
+Saxons . . . &rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>So much for the historical Triad: now for the moral.&nbsp; The
+following are selected from a curious collection of admonitory
+sayings, called the &lsquo;Triads of the Cumro, or
+Welshman:&rsquo;&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;Three things should a Cumro always bear in
+mind lest he dishonour them: his father, his country, and his
+name of Cumro.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There are three things for which a Cumro should be
+willing to die: his country, his good name, and the truth
+wherever it be.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Three things are highly disgraceful to a Cumro: to look
+with one eye, to listen with one ear, and to defend with one
+hand.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Three things it especially behoves a Cumro to choose
+from his own country: his king, his wife, and his
+friend.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>After the Triads, the following are the principal prose works
+of the Welsh:&mdash;</p>
+<p>1.&nbsp; &lsquo;The Chronicle of the Kings of the Isle of
+Britain;&rsquo; supposed to have been written by Tysilio, in the
+seventh century.&nbsp; This work, or rather a Latin paraphrase of
+it by Geoffrey of Monmouth, has supplied our early English
+historians with materials for those parts of their works which
+are devoted to the subject of ancient Britain.&nbsp; It brings
+down British history to the year 660.</p>
+<p>2.&nbsp; A continuation of the same to the year 1152, by
+Caradawg of Llancarvan.&nbsp; It begins thus: &ldquo;In the year
+of Christ 660, died Cadwallawn ab Cadfan, King of the Britons,
+and Cadwaladr his son became king in his place; <!-- page 29--><a
+name="page29"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 29</span>and, after
+ten years of peace, the great sickness, which is called the
+Yellow Plague, came over the whole isle of Britain.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>3.&nbsp; The &lsquo;Code of Howel Da;&rsquo; a book consisting
+of laws, partly framed, partly compiled, by Howel Da, or the
+Good, who began to reign in the year 940.&nbsp; It is divided
+into three parts, and contains laws relating to the government of
+the palace and the family of the prince, laws concerning private
+property, and laws which relate to private rights and
+privileges.&nbsp; It is a code which displays much acuteness,
+good sense, and not a little oddity.&nbsp; Many of Howel&rsquo;s
+laws prevailed in Wales as far down as the time of Henry VII.</p>
+<p>4.&nbsp; &lsquo;The Life or Biography of Gruffydd ap
+Cynan.&rsquo;&nbsp; This Gruffydd, of whom we have had more than
+once occasion to speak already, was born in Dublin about the year
+1075.&nbsp; He was the son of Cynan, an expatriated prince of
+Gwynedd, by Raguel, daughter of Anlaf or Olafr, Dano-Irish king
+of Dublin and the fifth part of Ireland.&nbsp; After a series of
+the strangest adventures he succeeded in regaining his
+father&rsquo;s throne, on which he died after a glorious reign of
+fifty years.&nbsp; He was the father of Owen Gwynedd, one of the
+most warlike of the Welsh princes, and was grandsire of that
+Madoc who, there is considerable reason for supposing, was the
+first discoverer of the great land in the West.&nbsp; A truly
+remarkable book is the one above mentioned, which narrates his
+life.&nbsp; It does full justice to the subject, being written in
+a style not unworthy of Snorre Sturlesen, or the man who wrote
+the history of King Sverrer and the Birkebeiners, in the latter
+part of the Heimskringla.&nbsp; It is a composition of the
+fifteenth century, but the author is unknown.</p>
+<p>5.&nbsp; The Mabinogion, or Juvenile Diversions, a collection
+of Cumric legends, in substance of unknown antiquity, but in the
+dress in which they have been handed down to us scarcely older
+than the fourteenth century.&nbsp; In interest they almost vie
+with the &lsquo;Arabian Nights,&rsquo; with which, however, they
+have nothing else in common, notwithstanding that all other
+European tales&mdash;those of Russia not excepted&mdash;are
+evidently modifications of, or derived from the same source as
+the Arabian stories.&nbsp; Of these Cumric legends two
+translations exist: the first, which was never published, made
+towards the concluding part of the last century by William Owen,
+who eventually assumed the name of Owen Pugh, the writer of the
+immortal Welsh and English Dictionary, and the translator into
+Welsh of &lsquo;Paradise Lost;&rsquo; the second by the fair and
+talented Lady Charlotte Guest, which first made these strange,
+glorious stories known to England and all the world.</p>
+<p>The sixth and last grand prose work of the Welsh is the
+&lsquo;Sleeping Bard,&rsquo; a moral allegory, written about the
+beginning of the last century by Elis Wyn, a High-Church Welsh
+clergyman, a translation of which, by George Borrow, is now
+before us:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;The following translation of the Sleeping
+Bard,&rsquo; says Mr. Borrow, in his preface, &lsquo;has long
+existed in manuscript.&nbsp; It was made by the writer of these
+lines in the year 1830, at the request of a little Welsh
+bookseller of his acquaintance, who resided in the rather
+unfashionable neighbourhood of Smithfield, and who entertained an
+opinion that a translation of the work of Elis Wyn would enjoy a
+great sale, both in England and Wales.&nbsp; On the eve of
+committing it to the press, however, the Cambrian Briton felt his
+small heart give way within him: &ldquo;Were I to print
+it,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I should be ruined.&nbsp; The terrible
+descriptions of vice and torment would frighten the genteel part
+of the English public out of its wits, and I should to a
+certainty be prosecuted by Sir James Scarlett.&nbsp; I am much
+obliged to you for the trouble you have given yourself on my
+account&mdash;but myn Diawl! I had no idea, till I had read him
+in English, that Elis Wyn had been such a terrible
+fellow.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yet there is no harm in the book.&nbsp; It is true that
+the author is anything but mincing in his expressions and
+descriptions, but there is nothing in the Sleeping Bard which can
+give offence to any but the over fastidious.&nbsp; There is a
+great deal of squeamish nonsense in the world; let us hope,
+however, that there is not so much as there was.&nbsp; Indeed,
+can we doubt that such folly is on the decline, when we find
+Albemarle Street in &lsquo;60 willing to publish a harmless but
+plain-speaking book which Smithfield shrank from in
+&rsquo;80?&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>The work is divided into three parts, devoted to three
+separate and distinct visions, which the Bard pretends to have
+seen at three different times in his sleep.&nbsp; In assuming the
+title of &lsquo;Sleeping Bard&rsquo; Elis Wyn committed a kind of
+plagiarism, as it originated with a certain poet who flourished
+in the time of the Welsh princes, some nine hundred years before
+he himself was born, and to this plagiarism he humorously alludes
+in one of his visions.&nbsp; The visions are described in prose,
+but each is followed by a piece of poetry containing a short
+gloss or comment.&nbsp; The prose is graphic and vigorous, almost
+beyond conception; the poetry wild and singular, each piece
+composed in a particular measure.&nbsp; Of the measures, two are
+quite original, to be found nowhere else.&nbsp; The first vision
+is the Vision of the World.&nbsp; The object of the Bard is to
+describe the follies, vices, and crimes of the human race, more
+especially those of the natives of the British Isles.&nbsp; In
+his sleep he imagines that he is carried away by fairies, and is
+in danger of perishing owing to their malice, but is rescued by
+an angel, who informs him that <!-- page 30--><a
+name="page30"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 30</span>he has been
+sent by the Almighty with orders to give him a distinct view of
+the world.&nbsp; The angel, after a little time, presents him
+with a telescope, through which he sees a city of a monstrous
+size, with thousands of cities and kingdoms within it; and the
+great ocean, like a moat, around it; and other seas, like rivers,
+intersecting it.</p>
+<p>This city is, of course, the world.&nbsp; It is divided into
+three magnificent streets.&nbsp; These streets are called
+respectively the streets of Pride, Pleasure, and Lucre.&nbsp; In
+the distance is a cross street, little and mean in comparison
+with the others, but clean and neat, and on a higher foundation
+than the other streets, running upwards towards the east, whilst
+they all sink downwards towards the north.&nbsp; This street is
+the street of True Religion.&nbsp; The angel conducts him down
+the three principal streets, and procures him glances into the
+inside of various houses.&nbsp; The following scene in a cellar
+of what is called the street of Pleasure, goes far to show that
+the pen of Elis Wyn, at low description, was not inferior to the
+pencil of Hogarth:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;From thence we went to a place where we
+heard a terrible noise, a medley of striking, jabbering, crying
+and laughing, shooting and singing.&nbsp; &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s
+Bedlam, doubtless,&rdquo; said I.&nbsp; By the time we entered
+the den the brawling had ceased.&nbsp; Of the company, one was on
+the ground insensible; another was in a yet more deplorable
+condition; another was nodding over a hearthful of battered pots,
+pieces of pipes, and oozings of ale.&nbsp; And what was all this,
+upon inquiry, but a carousal of seven thirsty neighbours,&mdash;a
+goldsmith, a pilot, a smith, a miner, a chimney-sweeper, a poet,
+and a parson who had come to preach sobriety, and to exhibit in
+himself what a disgusting thing drunkenness is!&nbsp; The origin
+of the last squabble was a dispute which had arisen among them
+about which of the seven loved a pipe and flagon best.&nbsp; The
+poet had carried the day over all the rest, with the exception of
+the parson, who, out of respect for his cloth, had the most
+votes, being placed at the head of the jolly companions, the poet
+singing:&mdash;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O where are there seven beneath the sky<br />
+Who with these seven for thirst can vie?<br />
+But the best for good ale these seven among<br />
+Are the jolly divine and the son of song.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>After showing the Bard what is going on in the interior of the
+houses of the various streets, and in the streets themselves, the
+angel conducts him to the various churches of the City of
+Perdition: to the temple of Paganism, to the mosque of the Turk,
+and to the synagogue of the Jews; showing and explaining to him
+what is going on within them.&nbsp; He then takes him to the
+church of the Papists, which the angel calls, very properly,
+&lsquo;the church which deceiveth nations.&rsquo;&nbsp; Some
+frightful examples are given of the depravity and cruelty of
+monks and friars.&nbsp; The dialogue between the confessor and
+the portly female who had murdered her husband, who was a member
+of the Church of England, is horrible, but quite in keeping with
+the principles of Popery; also the discourse which the same
+confessor holds with the young girl who had killed her child,
+whose father was a member of the monastery to which the monk
+belonged.&nbsp; From the Church of Rome they go to the Church of
+England.&nbsp; It is lamentable to observe what an attached
+minister of the Church of England describes as going on within
+the walls of a Church of England temple a hundred and fifty years
+ago.&nbsp; Would that the description could be called wholly
+inapplicable at the present time!</p>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Whereupon he carried me to the gallery of
+one of the churches in Wales, the people being in the midst of
+the service, and lo! some were whispering, talking, and laughing,
+some were looking upon the pretty women, others were examining
+the dress of their neighbours from top to toe; some were pushing
+themselves forward and snarling at one another about rank, some
+were dozing, others were busily engaged in their devotions, but
+many of these were playing a hypocritical part.&rdquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>The angel finally conducts the Bard to the small cross street,
+that of True Religion, where, of course, everything is widely
+different from what is found in any of the other streets.&nbsp;
+In that street there was no fear but of incensing the King, who
+was ever more ready to forgive than be angry with his subjects,
+and no sound but that of psalms of praise to the Almighty.</p>
+<p>The second section is a Vision of Death in his palace
+below.&nbsp; The author&rsquo;s aim in this vision is less
+apparent than in the preceding one.&nbsp; Perhaps, however, he
+wished to impress upon people&rsquo;s minds the awfulness of
+dying in an unrepentant state, from the certainty, in that event,
+of the human soul being forthwith cast headlong down the
+precipice of destruction.&nbsp; The Bard is carried away by sleep
+to chambers where some people are crying, others screaming, some
+talking deliriously, some uttering blasphemies in a feeble tone,
+others lying in great agony with all the signs of dying men, and
+some yielding up the ghost after uttering &lsquo;a mighty
+shout.&rsquo;&nbsp; He is then conducted to a kind of limbo or
+Hades, where he meets with his prototype the Sleeping Bard of old
+and two other Welsh poets, one of whom is Taliesin, who is
+represented as watching the caldron of the witch Cridwen, even as
+he watched it in his boyhood.&nbsp; From thence he is hurried to
+the palace of Death, where he sees the King of Terrors swallowing
+flesh and blood, who, after a time, places <!-- page 31--><a
+name="page31"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 31</span>himself on a
+terrific throne, and proceeds to pass judgment on various
+prisoners newly arrived.&nbsp; They are dealt with in an awful
+but very summary manner.&nbsp; It is to be remarked that all the
+souls introduced in this vision are those of bad people, with the
+exception of those of the poets which the Bard meets in
+limbo.&nbsp; A dark intimation, however, is given that there is
+another court or palace, where Death presides under a far
+different form, and where he pronounces judgment over the souls
+of the good.&nbsp; There is much in this vision which it is very
+difficult to understand.&nbsp; The gloss, or commentary, called
+&lsquo;Death the Great,&rsquo; abounds with very fine poetry.</p>
+<p>The last Vision, that of Hell, is the longest of the
+three.&nbsp; The Bard is carried in his sleep by the same angel
+who in his first vision had shown him the madness and vanity of
+the world, to the regions of eternal horror and woe, where he
+beholds the lost undergoing tortures proportionate to the crimes
+which they had committed on earth.&nbsp; After wandering from
+nook to nook, the Bard and his guide at last come to the court
+before the palace of the hellish regions, where, amidst thousands
+of horrible objects, the Bard perceives two feet of enormous
+magnitude, reaching to the roof of the whole infernal firmament,
+and inquires of his companion what those horrible things may be,
+but is told to be quiet for the present, as on his return he will
+obtain a full view of the monster to whom they belong, and is
+then conducted into the palace of Lucifer, who is about to hold a
+grand council.&nbsp; The Arch-Fiend is described as seated on a
+burning throne in a vast hall, the roof of which is of glowing
+steel.&nbsp; Around him are his potentates on thrones of fire,
+and above his head is a huge fist, holding a very frightful
+thunderbolt, towards which he occasionally casts uneasy
+glances.&nbsp; In the midst of the palace is a gulf, of yet more
+horrible and frightful aspect than hell itself, which is
+continually opening and closing, and which, the angel says, is
+the month of &lsquo;Unknown&rsquo; or extremest hell, to which
+the devils and the damned are to be hurled for ever on the last
+day.&nbsp; The council is held in order to devise measures for
+the farther extension of the kingdom of Lucifer.&nbsp; The
+Arch-Fiend, in a speech which he makes, boasts that three parts
+of the world have already been brought to acknowledge his sway,
+chiefly through the instrumentality of his three
+daughters&mdash;Pleasure, Pride, and Lucre; and he hopes that
+eventually the whole world will be brought to do the same.&nbsp;
+He is particularly desirous that Britain should be subject to
+him, and requests the advice of his counsellors as to the best
+means to be employed in order to accomplish his wish.&nbsp;
+Various infernal potentates then arise and give him their advice,
+each of whom is a personification of some crime, vice, or
+folly.&nbsp; The debate is frequently interrupted by the sound of
+war; for, as the angel observes, there is continual war in
+hell.&nbsp; There is at one time a terrible disturbance and
+outbreak, arising from a dispute between the Papists, the
+Mahometans, and the bloody-minded Roundheads, as to which has
+done most service to the cause of hell,&mdash;the Koran, the
+Creed of Rome, or the Solemn League and Covenant.&nbsp; Lucifer
+is only able to quell this disturbance&mdash;during which Mahomet
+and Pope Julius assault each other tooth and nail&mdash;by
+causing his old picked soldiers, the champions of hell, to tear
+the combatants from each other.&nbsp; Amidst interruptions like
+these the debate proceeds.&nbsp; Each of the personified crimes
+and vices in succession&mdash;amongst whom are Mammon, Pride,
+Inconsiderateness, Wantonness, and the Demon of
+<i>Tobacco</i>&mdash;offers to go to Britain and do his best to
+further the views of his master.&nbsp; Lucifer, however, after
+listening to them all and acknowledging the peculiar merit of
+each, says that none of them is of sufficient power to be relied
+upon in the present emergency, but that he has a darling friend,
+who, with their co-operation, is equal to the enterprise.&nbsp;
+The friend turns out to be Ease&mdash;pleasant Ease&mdash;on
+whose merits he expatiates with great eloquence, and with whom he
+requests them to co-operate.&nbsp; &lsquo;Go with her,&rsquo;
+says he, &lsquo;and keep everybody in his sleep and his rest, in
+prosperity and comfort, abundance and carelessness, and then you
+will see the poor honest man, as soon as he shall drink of the
+alluring cup of Ease, become a perverse, proud, untractable
+churl; the industrious labourer change into a careless waggish
+rattler; and every other person become just as you would desire
+him . . . Follow her to Britain,&rsquo; he says in conclusion,
+&lsquo;and be as obedient to her as to our own royal
+Majesty&rsquo;!</p>
+<p>Then comes the finale:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;At this moment the huge bolt was shaken,
+and Lucifer and his chief counsellors were struck to the vortex
+of extremest hell, and oh! how horrible it was to see the throat
+of Unknown opening to receive them!&nbsp; &ldquo;Well!&rdquo;
+said the Angel, &ldquo;we will now return; but you have not seen
+anything in comparison with the whole which is within the bounds
+of Destruction, and if you had seen the whole, it is nothing to
+the inexpressible misery which exists in Unknown, for it is not
+possible to form an idea of the world in extremest
+hell.&rdquo;&nbsp; And at that word the celestial messenger
+snatched me up to the firmament of the accursed kingdom of
+darkness by a way I had not seen, whence I obtained, from the
+palace along all the firmament of the black and hot
+<i>Destruction</i>, and the whole land of forgetfulness, even to
+the walls of the city of Destruction, a <!-- page 32--><a
+name="page32"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 32</span>full view of
+the accursed monster of a giantess, whose feet I had seen
+before.&nbsp; I do not possess words to describe her
+figure.&nbsp; But I can tell you that she was a triple-faced
+giantess, having one very atrocious countenance turned towards
+the heavens, barking, snorting, and vomiting accursed abomination
+against the celestial King; another countenance, very fair,
+towards the earth, to entice men to tarry in her shadow; and
+another, the most frightful countenance of all, turned towards
+Hell to torment it to all eternity.&nbsp; She is larger than the
+entire earth, and is yet daily increasing, and a hundred times
+more frightful than the whole of hell.&nbsp; She caused hell to
+be made, and it is she who fills it with inhabitants.&nbsp; If
+she were removed from hell, hell would become paradise; and if
+she were removed from the earth, the little world would become
+heaven; and if she were to go to heaven, she would change the
+regions of bliss into utter hell.&nbsp; There is nothing in all
+the universe, except herself, that God did not create.&nbsp; She
+is the mother of the four female deceivers of the city of
+Destruction; she is the mother of Death; she is the mother of
+every evil and misery; and she has a fearful hold on every living
+man: her name is Sin.&nbsp; &ldquo;<i>He who escapes from her
+hook</i>, <i>for ever blessed is he</i>,&rdquo; said the
+angel.&nbsp; Thereupon he departed, and I could hear his voice
+saying, &ldquo;<i>Write down what thou hast seen</i>, <i>and he
+who shall read it carefully</i>, <i>shall never have reason to
+repent</i>.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The above is an outline of the work of Elis Wyn&mdash;an
+extraordinary work it is.&nbsp; In it there is a singular mixture
+of the sublime and the coarse, of the terrible and ludicrous, of
+religion and levity, of the styles of Milton, of Bunyan, and of
+Quevedo.&nbsp; There is also much in it that is Welsh, and much
+that may be said emphatically to belong to Elis Wyn alone.&nbsp;
+The book is written in the purest Cambrian, and from the time of
+its publication has enjoyed extensive popularity in Wales.&nbsp;
+It is, however, said that the perusal of it has not unfrequently
+driven people mad, especially those of a serious and religious
+turn.&nbsp; The same thing is said in Spain of the &lsquo;Life of
+Ignatius Loyola.&rsquo;&nbsp; Peter Williams, in
+&lsquo;Lavengro,&rsquo; the Welsh preacher who was haunted with
+the idea that he had committed the sin against the Holy Ghost, is
+frequently mentioning the work of Elis Wyn.&nbsp; Amongst other
+things, he says that he took particular delight in its
+descriptions of the torments of hell.&nbsp; We have no doubt that
+many an Englishman, of honest Welsh Peter&rsquo;s gloomy
+temperament, when he reads the work in its present dress will
+experience the same kind of fearful joy.</p>
+<p>The translation is accompanied by notes explanatory of certain
+passages of the original beyond the comprehension of the common
+reader.&nbsp; These notes are good, as far as they go, but they
+are not sufficiently numerous, as many passages relating to
+ancient manners and customs&mdash;perfectly intelligible, no
+doubt, to the translator&mdash;must, for want of proper notes,
+remain dark and mysterious to his readers.&nbsp; In the Vision of
+Hell, a devil, who returns from the world to which he has been
+despatched, and who gives an account of his mission, says that he
+had visited two young maidens in Wales who were engaged in
+turning the shift.&nbsp; Not a few people&mdash;ladies, amongst
+the rest&mdash;will be disposed to ask what is meant by turning
+the shift.&nbsp; Mr. Borrow gives elsewhere the following
+explanation: &lsquo;It was the custom in Britain in ancient times
+for the young maiden who wished to see her future lover to sit up
+by herself at Hallowmass Eve, wash out her smock, shift, or
+chemise, call it which of the three you please, place it on a
+linen-horse before the fire, and watch it whilst drying, leaving
+the door of the room open, in the belief that exactly as the
+clock began to strike twelve the future bridegroom would look in
+at the door, and remain visible till the twelfth stroke had
+ceased to sound.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Of the notes which Mr. Borrow has given, the most important is
+certainly that which relates to Taliesin, who, in the Vision of
+Death, is described as sitting in Hades, watching a caldron which
+is hanging over a fire, and is continually going bubble,
+bubble.&nbsp; We give it nearly entire:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;Taliesin lived in the sixth century.&nbsp;
+He was a foundling, discovered in his infancy lying in a coracle
+on a salmon weir, in the domain of Elphin, a prince of North
+Wales, who became his patron.&nbsp; During his life he arrogated
+to himself a supernatural descent and understanding, and for at
+least a thousand years after his death he was regarded by the
+descendants of the ancient Britons as a prophet or something
+more.&nbsp; The poems which he produced procured for him the
+title of &ldquo;Bardic King.&rdquo;&nbsp; They display much that
+is vigorous and original, but are disfigured by mysticism and
+extravagant metaphor.&nbsp; When Elis Wyn represents him as
+sitting by a cauldron in Hades, he alludes to a wild legend
+concerning him, to the effect that he imbibed awen or poetical
+genius whilst employed in watching &ldquo;the seething pot&rdquo;
+of the sorceress Cridwen, which legend has much in common with
+one of the Irish legends about Fin Macoul, which is itself nearly
+identical with one in the Edda describing the manner in which
+Sigurd Fafnisbane became possessed of supernatural
+wisdom.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>It is curious enough that the legend about deriving wisdom
+from <i>sucking the scalded finger</i> should be found in Wales,
+Ireland, and Scandinavia.&nbsp; But so it is, and Mr. Borrow is
+clearly entitled to the credit of having been the first to point
+out to the world this remarkable fact.&nbsp; In his work called
+the &lsquo;Romany Rye,&rsquo; published some years ago, a story
+is related containing parts of the early history <!-- page
+33--><a name="page33"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 33</span>of
+the Irish mythic hero Fion Mac Comhail, <a
+name="citation33"></a><a href="#footnote33"
+class="citation">[33]</a> or Fin Mac Coul, in which there is an
+account of his burning his thumb whilst smoothing the skin of a
+fairy salmon which is broiling over a fire, and deriving
+supernatural knowledge from thrusting his thumb into his mouth
+and sucking it; and Mr. Borrow tells the relater of that legend,
+his amusing acquaintance Murtagh, that the same tale is told in
+the Edda of Sigurd, the Serpent-Killer, with the difference that
+Sigurd burns his finger, not whilst superintending the broiling
+of a salmon, but whilst roasting the heart of Fafnir, the
+man-serpent, whom he had slain.</p>
+<p>Here, in his note on Taliesin, he shows that the same thing in
+substance is said of the ancient Welsh bard.&nbsp; Of the three
+versions of the legend, the one of which Sigurd Fafnisbane is the
+hero is probably the most original, and is decidedly the most
+poetical.</p>
+<h2>Footnotes</h2>
+<p><a name="footnote20"></a><a href="#citation20"
+class="footnote">[20]</a>&nbsp; It is but right to state that the
+learned are divided with respect to the meaning of
+&lsquo;Cumro,&rsquo; and that many believe it to denote <i>an
+original inhabitant</i>.</p>
+<p><a name="footnote21a"></a><a href="#citation21a"
+class="footnote">[21a]</a>&nbsp; Yehen banog: humped or bunched
+oxen, probably buffaloes.&nbsp; Banog is derived from ban&mdash;a
+prominence, protuberance, or peak.</p>
+<p><a name="footnote21b"></a><a href="#citation21b"
+class="footnote">[21b]</a>&nbsp; Above we have given what we
+believe to be a plain and fair history of Hu Gadarn; but it is
+necessary to state, that after his death he was deified, and was
+confounded with the Creator, the vivifying power and the sun, and
+mixed up with all kinds of myths and legends.&nbsp; Many of the
+professedly Christian Welsh bards when speaking of the Deity have
+called Him Hu, and ascribed to the Creator the actions of the
+creature.&nbsp; Their doing so, however, can cause us but little
+surprise when we reflect that the bards down to a very late
+period cherished a great many druidical and heathen notions, and
+frequently comported themselves in a manner more becoming
+heathens than Christian men.&nbsp; Of the confounding of what is
+heavenly with what is earthly we have a remarkable instance in
+the ode of Iolo Goch to the ploughman, four lines of which,
+slightly modified, we have given above.&nbsp; In that ode the
+ploughman is confounded with the Eternal, and the plough with the
+rainbow:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;The Mighty Hu who reigns for ever,<br />
+Of mead and song to men the giver,<br />
+The emperor of land and sea<br />
+And of all things which living be,<br />
+Did hold a plough with his good hand,<br />
+Soon as the deluge left the land,<br />
+To show to men, both strong and weak,<br />
+The haughty hearted and the meek,<br />
+There is no trade the heaven below<br />
+So noble as to guide the plough.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>To the Deity under the name of Hu there are some lines by one
+Rhys, a Welsh bard of the time of Queen Elizabeth, though they
+are perhaps more applicable to the Universal Pan or Nature than
+to the God of the Christians:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;If with small things we Hu compare,<br
+/>
+No smaller thing than Hu is there,<br />
+Yet greatest of the great is He,<br />
+Our Lord, our God of Mystery;<br />
+How swift he moves! a lucid ray,<br />
+A sunbeam wafts him on his way;<br />
+He&rsquo;s great on land, and great on ocean,<br />
+Of one more great I have no notion;<br />
+I dread lest I should underrate<br />
+This being, infinitely great.&rsquo;</p>
+<p><a name="footnote22"></a><a href="#citation22"
+class="footnote">[22]</a>&nbsp; The poetical translations in this
+notice are taken from Borrow&rsquo;s &lsquo;Songs of
+Europe.&rsquo;</p>
+<p><a name="footnote25a"></a><a href="#citation25a"
+class="footnote">[25a]</a></p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;Oedd balch gwalch golchiad ei lain,<br
+/>
+Oedd beilch gweilch gweled ei werin.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>In this couplet there is three-fold rhyme.&nbsp; We have the
+alliteration of lch in the first line:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;ba<i>lch</i> gwa<i>lch</i>
+go<i>lch</i>iad;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>and of the <i>w</i> in the second:&mdash;</p>
+<p class="poetry">&lsquo;g<i>w</i>eilch g<i>w</i>eled
+<i>w</i>erin;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>secondly, we have the rhymes of balch and gwalch; and thirdly,
+the rhyming at the lines&rsquo; ends.</p>
+<p><a name="footnote25b"></a><a href="#citation25b"
+class="footnote">[25b]</a>&nbsp; Of this celebrated place we are
+permitted to extract the following account from Mr.
+Borrow&rsquo;s unpublished work, &lsquo;Celtic Bards, Chiefs, and
+Kings&rsquo;:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;After wandering for many miles towards the
+south, over a bleak moory country, you come to a place called
+Ffair Rhos, or something similar, a miserable village consisting
+of a few half-ruined cottages, situated on the top of a
+hill.&nbsp; From the hill you look down on a wide valley of a
+russet colour, along which a river runs towards the south.&nbsp;
+The whole scene is cheerless; sullen hills are all around.&nbsp;
+Descending the hill you enter a large village divided into two by
+the river, which here runs from east to west, but presently takes
+a turn.&nbsp; There is much mire in the street; immense swine lie
+in the mire, who turn up their snouts at you as you pass.&nbsp;
+Women in Welsh hats stand in the mire, along with men without any
+hats at all, but with short pipes in their mouths.&nbsp; They are
+talking together; as you pass, however, they hold their tongues,
+the women leering contemptuously at you, the men glaring sullenly
+at you, and causing tobacco-smoke to curl in your face.&nbsp; On
+your taking off your hat, however, and inquiring the way to the
+Monachlog, everybody is civil enough, and twenty voices tell you
+the way to the monastery.&nbsp; You ask the name of the river:
+&ldquo;The Teivi, Sir, the Teivi.&rdquo;&nbsp; The name of the
+bridge: &ldquo;Pont y Rhyd Fendigaid&mdash;the Bridge of the
+Blessed Ford, Sir!&rdquo;&nbsp; You cross the bridge of the
+Blessed Ford, and presently leaving the main road you turn to the
+east, by a dunghill, up a narrow lane, parallel with the
+river.&nbsp; After proceeding a mile up the lane amidst trees and
+copses, and crossing a little brook which runs into the Teivi,
+out of which you drink, you see before you in the midst of a
+field, in which are tombstones and broken ruins, a rustic-looking
+church; a farmhouse is near it, in the garden of which stands the
+framework of a large gateway.&nbsp; You cross over into the
+churchyard, stand on a green mound and look about you.&nbsp; You
+are now in the very midst of the Monachlog Ystrad Flur, the
+celebrated monastery of Strata Florida, to which in old times
+popish pilgrims from all parts of the world repaired.&nbsp; The
+scene is solemn and impressive.&nbsp; On the north side of the
+river a large bulky hill, called Bunk Pen Bannedd, looks down
+upon the ruins and the church; and on the south side, some way
+behind the farmhouse, is another hill which does the same.&nbsp;
+Rugged mountains form the background of the valley to the east,
+down from which comes murmuring the fleet but shallow
+Teivi.&nbsp; Such is the scenery which surrounds what remains of
+Strata Florida; those scanty broken ruins compose all that
+remains of that celebrated monastery in which kings, saints, and
+mitred abbots were buried, and in which, or in whose precincts,
+was buried Dafydd ab Gwilym, the greatest genius of the Cimbric
+race, and one of the first poets of the world.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><a name="footnote28"></a><a href="#citation28"
+class="footnote">[28]</a>&nbsp; It must be mentioned, however, in
+justice to Douglas, that in the autobiography of Dr. Carlyle,
+lately published, we find that &lsquo;John Douglas, who has for
+some time been Bishop of Salisbury, and who is one of the most
+able and learned men on that bench, had at this time (1758, some
+years after Gronwy had left him) but small preferment.&rsquo;</p>
+<p><a name="footnote33"></a><a href="#citation33"
+class="footnote">[33]</a>&nbsp; In a late number of the
+Transactions of the Dublin Ossianic Society&mdash;a most
+admirable institution&mdash;there is an account of the early life
+of Fin ma Coul, in which the burnt finger is mentioned; but that
+number did not appear till more than a year subsequent to the
+publication of the &lsquo;Romany Rye,&rsquo; and contains not the
+slightest allusion either to Fafnisbane, <i>i.e.</i> the slayer
+of Fafnir, or Taliesin&mdash;to the Eddacal or the Cumric
+legend.</p>
+<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WELSH AND THEIR LITERATURE***</p>
+<pre>
+
+
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