BY E. M. WILMOT-BUXTON F.R.Hist.S. AUTHOR OF “BRITAIN LONG AGO”, ETC. CONTAINING TWELVE FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR LONDON ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK 1911...

These peeps at Wales will take us into a country busy with its various industries of coal-mining, slate-quarrying, and wool manufacture, yet one which, in spite of its modern developments and trade interests, has never lost the magic and glamour of an earlier age. Every country-town, almost every hill and mound in the district, has its legend, its romance, which lives in the hearts of an intensely patriotic and imaginative people, and blends the past and the present into one. This is the reason

WILD WALES Once upon a time, says a famous Welsh legend, a certain witch named Caridwen set to work to brew a cauldron of knowledge that might make her youngest son the wisest man in the world. Now, this cauldron had to boil for a year and a day, and at the end of that time it would yield three drops of precious liquid which would make whoever drank them the wisest of all men. So she set a passing tramp named Gwion Bach to stir the cauldron and to keep it on the boil, and made up her mind to kil

SNOWDONIA, THE FASTNESS OF LLEWELYN The story of the great struggle of Wales for freedom under a Prince of her own is laid, fitly enough, amid the wild scenery that surrounds the highest point in Southern Britain. The whole district of Snowdon, with its grim moorlands and towering heights forming a bulwark to the western shore, breathes an air of freedom, and it was here that the last Llewelyn defied the might of the first English Edward. Roused by the bitter lament of those who had fallen under

IN GLENDOWER LAND As the name of Llewelyn is connected with the Snowdon district, so the name of another Welsh hero, Owen Glendower, lives still in that valley of the Dee that lies between Corwen and Llangollen. The valley itself is one of the most interesting in Wales. Almost of a horseshoe shape, it is bounded by ranges of mountains, not very high, but beautiful in shape and colour. On one side, a blaze of yellow gorse, Moel Gamelin rears his rounded head; on the other the heather-clad heights

A WELSH MARKET-TOWN We have come to the end of Glendower’s story, but before we leave his part of the country altogether let us pay a visit to Corwen, the old market-town that lies so near his own valley. Someone has said that Corwen is “relentlessly tucked away under the dark shoulder” of the heather-clad Berwyns, for above it lies the height of Pen-y-Pigyn, which certainly keeps the sun off very effectually. In the porch of the old church, indeed, we shall find a great stone, called by a Welsh

A VISIT TO ANGLESEY AND HOLYHEAD We took such a brief backward glimpse at Anglesey and Holy Island when we were visiting Llewelyn’s country that we may as well now make a longer visit. Crossing the Menai Straits by the suspension bridge, we pass through a treeless moorland and over a causeway into Holy Island, from whence rises up the great headland known as Holyhead. “A divine promontory,” Ruskin calls it, “looking westward—the Holy Headland—still not without awe when its red light glares first

AN EISTEDDFOD No one who knows and loves Wales will have failed to be present at some time or another at that most interesting and curious ceremony known as an Eisteddfod. The name simply means a “sitting,” and probably refers, not to the spectators, but to the “chairing” of the bard, which forms a chief part in the proceedings. These gatherings, for the purpose of preserving the poetry and music of the country, are held all over the land; but each year a great national Eisteddfod is held at som

“MEN OF HARLECH” When Edward I . had completed his so-called conquest of Wales, he safeguarded the land he had won by building seven strong castles in seven danger-spots. Those at Carnarvon and Conway we have already visited, but most interesting of all is Harlech Castle, linked as it is with the story of the far-off past as well as with the more modern history of Wales. Built on a crag of rock that juts from a terrace two hundred feet above the plain, stand the great stone towers, looking towar

A BURIED VILLAGE To-day we are going to take a glimpse at two Welsh lakes, to one of which a most romantic story is attached. We start from Lake Bala, or Llyn Tegid, as it was called in the days of Taliesin. Borrow, that whimsical traveller, who walked throughout Wales, and knew the country as few Welshmen do themselves, thus describes it: “I wandered to the northern shore of Llyn Tegid ... the wind was blowing from the south, and tiny waves were beating against the shore, which consisted of sma

THE SACRED RIVER In our peeps at North Wales we have more than once had a glimpse of the River Dee. To-day we will pretend we have taken a “coracle,” one of the curious oval boats which were used in the very earliest days, and which you may sometimes see a man carrying on his shoulders from one bend of the river to another. “Carry thou me, and I will carry thee,” an old Welsh proverb makes the coracle say to the fisherman; and it shall now carry us down the course of the river as far as it lies

A PEEP AT PEMBROKE To-day we will leave North Wales and travel south to take a glimpse at Pembrokeshire, in some ways one of the most interesting counties in Wales. Between the northern and southern parts of the country runs a stream, flowing into St. Bride’s Bay, which divides the Welsh Pembroke from a district known as “Little England beyond Wales.” Here, in this latter region, one hears nothing but English spoken. The towns, the people, are typically English, or, at least, very far from being

THE VALLEY OF THE WYE To-day let us take a journey up the course of the Upper Wye, loveliest of Welsh rivers, from the point where it crosses the border between England and Wales. The course of the Upper Wye begins just below the ruins of Clifford Castle, one of the many built upon the “Marches,” or borderland, nominally to keep the Welshmen within bounds, actually to shelter the robber-barons who gained their livelihood by harassing the country on either side. The grey stones of Clifford, cover

THE GREAT PLYNLIMMON “ Cardigan is a country to itself,” says one who knows Wales well. Except, indeed, for the towns on the coast, Lampeter, with its college, and a famous abbey in the south, the whole country has been described as a “mountain wilderness.” But since some of us prefer such untrodden wastes to those parts that have become merely playgrounds for the English tourist, we will pay it a visit to-day. At the north-eastern corner of the county stands Plynlimmon, the home of the Severn,

THE VALE OF TEIFY Welshmen call the county of Cardigan the Shire Aber Teivi, or the shire of the River Teify. The valley of this river forms the boundary between the shire and those of Pembroke and Carmarthen, and then turns north-east to the famous monastery of Strata Florida, which is well worth a visit to those who love to remember that Wales was the home of the Christian faith in days when England lay in heathen darkness. We saw in the last chapter that Cardigan is a lonely county, cut off f

THE DEVIL’S BRIDGE Central Wales is a land of hills and breezy uplands, enclosed by low mountain-ranges full of romantic gorges and hidden valleys. It includes the north of Cardiganshire and part of the shire of Montgomery, and is famous in history as the battle-ground upon which many a struggle between the Men of the South and the Men of the North was fought out. The first place of interest on its coast-line is Aberystwith. Here you will find the moated mound, which is all that is left of a cas

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