Mrs. Rodolph Stawell

“ Long, long before Edward’s magnificent towers rose over the desecrated burial-place of the great Llewelyn there was a castle guarding the river-mouth at Deganwy. We can see its fragments still if we choose to drive round that way before crossing to Conway; but there is only a remnant left, a few stones on a hillside facing the sea—stones that tell of Maelgwyn of the sixth century, and of Norman Robert, lord of Rhuddlan, who rebuilt Maelgwyn’s fortress and met his death there, and of King John of England, who was starved out by the Welsh. ”

“ There is a charm about Machynlleth. Its wide central street is planted with trees. In most Welsh towns, History, though she has lived in them so long, has rather an uneasy air: tales of valour, or of treachery on a large scale, blend rather incongruously with prim grey houses and slate roofs. But in Machynlleth we are quite prepared to learn that these quaint and quiet streets—and some of the houses, even—are bound up very closely with the picturesque life of the last of the Welsh princes: so closely indeed, that Owen Glyndwr’s royal seal figures in the arms of the town. ”

“ In the foreground is a wide expanse of rich colouring, of red and brown, green and gold and russet; beyond it shines a thin line of silver; and beyond that again rise the hills of South Wales—not so imposing by any means as that massive bulwark of mountains that we saw from the other side and are now close under, but yet very beautiful in colour and bold in outline. As the estuary widens a succession of headlands stretch out before us, one beyond another, and round these the road curves, sometimes very sharply. At the extreme mouth of the estuary lies Aberdovey, in the shelter of the hills. ”

“ The narrow wooded valley hems us in, the trees are close round us, the waters of the fishpond, in their absolute stillness, add to the sense of aloofness and peace. And under our very feet, perhaps, is the dust of Iolo Goch, the famous bard who sang of “Owain Glyndwr, the great, the good”; for Iolo’s unmarked grave is here; and here, too, lies Madoc, who built this abbey in the last year of the twelfth century; and Myfanwy, the beautiful princess, “fairer than the cherry’s bloom”; and others who died long, long before them. ”

“ Five miles of hard walking over rather dull downs will procure them the satisfaction of seeing the first gleams of the thin silver thread that is destined to grow into the most beautiful river of England. Most of us, however, will be content to meet the Wye for the first time when it is five miles old, so to speak, at the point where it touches the high-road from Aberystwith to Newtown. Even here it is a tiny stream, rushing lightheartedly down the hill over the rocks, unsobered as yet by the dignified reflections of Hereford and Tintern and Chepstow Castle. ”

“ The landscape changes gradually. The hills lose their bleak desolation only to become cultivated and commonplace: then the fields yield to moorlands and the rounded curves to bold and jagged rocks; and at last, near the spot where the river Marteg adds its waters to the Wye and the railway joins the road, the great hills rise on each side so precipitously that the way lies almost through a defile. The hilltops are bare and grey, but by the banks of the river is a belt of trees; and as the valley widens the slopes are no longer bare but are glorious in purple and gold, in heather and gorse. ”

“ At Tyn-y-Groes is a charming little hotel, much frequented by fishermen, with a fine view of the Mawddach and the peak of Moel Offrwm; a delightful place to spend a week in summer, since it is within a drive of many of the loveliest parts of Wales, and has itself an outlook of very striking beauty.
Beyond Tyn-y-Groes the scenery grows wilder and the hills more bare; the road rises rather steeply and the surface is not all that could be wished. ”

“ Presently we pass under the hideous excrescence of the Penrhyn slate quarries, grey terraces of rubbish contrasting cruelly with the glowing gorse of the opposite slopes; and then through the equally hideous town of slate, Bethesda, the miners’ town, whose slate walls, slate steps, and slate porches are enough, as Dr. Johnson, would say, “to make a man hang himself.” Let us hurry on into the Cochwillan Woods.
Very soon after passing the modern towers of Penrhyn Castle we reach the town of Bangor, “which for the beauty of its situation, was called Ban-cor, the high or conspicuous choir.” ”

“ There is not much to be said in favour of this road’s surface, but the beauty of it increases every moment, and for the last few miles, as we drop gently down on to that plain of gorse that lies like a sheet of flame between two ranges of purple mountains, we have as fine a sight above, below, and before us as any we shall find in Wales. ”

“ He was a member of that Court of the Marches of which we heard so much at Ludlow, and he left a very valuable record of his family behind him.
This bit of country between Bettws and Capel Curig is one of the gems of North Wales. Moel Siabod towers above us; and beyond it soon appears that cloud-capped peak whose name quickens every Welsh heart—the rallying-point of heroes, the symbol and stronghold of the liberties of Wales. The finest view of Snowdon is from Capel Curig, where the double peak is reflected in the double lake. ”

“ We know very well as we look at it that fair faces once looked down through those Tudor windows, and gay satins swept between the classic columns of the doorway, and the walls echoed to music and singing and laughter, until the fatal day that an enchantment was laid upon the beautiful white doorway of the love-lorn Welshman who learnt his art in Italy, and upon the avenue that once led the Bassetts out to war and home to love, and upon every stone of the old castle, so that it became a farmhouse. ”

“ It was on the ruins of Aberconwy that Edward’s glorious castle rose later on to overawe the Welsh. This Castle of Conway is the most beautiful of all Henry de Elfreton’s works, I think; more beautiful in itself even than Harlech; and we can well believe, as we drive across the bridge and under the great machicolated town gate, that in early days it could only be taken by the help of guile or famine. ”

“ One thinks, not of its history, but of itself. One cannot believe that it is merely the entrance to a vanished mediæval castle; it is rather the Gate of Dreams, through which every man sometimes passes in search of his heart’s desire.
There is an old Norman-French romance that tells us how the White Tower was built by William Peverel of the Peak, and how he promised it as a dowry to Melette, the fairest of his nieces. ”

“ Once it was the grandest house of worship in all Wales, the burial-place of her southern princes, the depository of her archives; but there is little left to show its past greatness but the unique west doorway and the remains of six side chapels—roofed now with corrugated iron! Behind the south transept is a wedge-shaped strip of ground that was the monks’ cemetery, where, under a stone carved plainly with a cross, lies Cadell, the brother of the Lord Rhys. The large cemetery that holds the dust of eleven Welsh princes is between the Abbey and the river. ”

“ Beyond this village we climb through lovely woods of birch and larch, and then we run down, leaving the trees behind us, into the beautiful estuary of the Dyfi. A wide sea of gorse is at out feet; the river winds through the shallows beyond; and, bounding the valley and the view, rises the mighty wall of North Wales.
This is on the left—a wide and splendid landscape; and meanwhile on the right [Pg 150] are wild hills rising from the road, cleft here and there by narrow wooded gorges or tumbling mountain streams. ”

“ Beaumaris Castle does not make so brave a show as most of Edward’s fortresses; but its ten low towers and its double line of defence were no doubt formidable enough before their thick drapery of ivy gave them so soft an air. The rusty iron rings that hang on the outer wall give one of those little touches of the commonplace that bring the past so near. Edward I. cut a canal and filled the moat of Beaumaris Castle from the sea, and so the ships that brought supplies to the garrison were moored and unladed at the very walls. ”

“ We have six miles of climbing before us, close under the heights of Cader Idris, through one of the wildest tracts of country in wild Wales, where the road at last rises steeply between rough stone walls across a desolate moor, and a mountain stream dashes below us on the right, and in all probability a flock of little Welsh sheep makes excitedly for the nearest gap. ”

“ It is only the eastern extremity of the lake that we see, and this we leave behind us, turning at this point sharply to the right into a defile of extreme barrenness. This narrow gorge, with its towering sides reft and lacerated by landslips, its huge boulders poised as though about to fall, its grey slopes softened only here and there by patches of short grass, is the most utterly, the most desolately savage spot I have seen in Wales. ”

“ History and the camera must wait; the first day must be given up to the sheer joy of the road.
So, as we shall not be able to hurry in Shropshire, seeing that there history cannot be ignored, we shall do well to cross its border in the evening, and spend the night in Ludlow. We will drop gently down the hill by Ludford House, and cross the Teme when the light is growing dim, and we can only tell by the deepening of the shadows in the trees on the left that the castle stands among them. ”

“ The town itself is becoming every year more entirely a prey to the family group. Every year there are more hotels, more bathing-boxes, more wooden spades. But I doubt if anywhere in England or Wales a town is built in a more beautiful spot. You cannot drive across the long bridge that spans the estuary at its mouth, but you will be a thousandfold repaid if you leave your car and cross the bridge on foot, for the best view—I think I am not too rash in saying the best view in Wales—is from about the middle of the bridge. ”

“ The Mawddach winds away between two ranges of mountains, on whose grand slopes the brilliant greens and purples, the rich browns and far-away faint blues change every moment under the varying sky. Cader Idris rises on the right in gloomy dignity from the soft drapery of foliage that is flung about [Pg 126] his feet. And in the foreground, when the tide is low—and that, I maintain, is the loveliest time—the blue sea is riven with the rosy gold of wet sands, dotted with countless sea-gulls. ”

“ We left the quiet orderliness of England behind us when we dipped down into this little valley, where the sparkling, bubbling Ceiriog—every inch a Celt—calls to us to follow it up into the hills. And so we will, as soon as we have climbed the other side of the valley into Chirk village; turning there to the left, though our rightful road, the road to Llangollen, lies directly in front of us. In Wales we shall find ourselves constantly tempted to leave the highway, and in most cases we shall be rewarded if we yield to the temptation without ado. ”

“ From Wilton to Monmouth the scenery grows in beauty. At Goodrich Cross we should turn sharply to the left to visit the castle, and this is a matter that will take some time. For in the first place the castle is at some distance from the road, and in the second place there is much to see, and much, too, to hear. Yet there is little history connected with Goodrich, considering its age and dignity, and the great names of Pembroke and Talbot that are bound up with it. ”

“ Our road, still climbing, turns to the right in Capel Curig and takes us up into the heart of the hills, through a scene of splendid desolation—bare heights, huge boulders tossed and heaped upon the ground, jagged outlines, and dark sullen colours—a land that was vastly disconcerting to those travellers of an earlier day whose idea of beauty was “a smiling landscape.” As we reach the summit and see the waters of Llyn Ogwen below us, [Pg 97] sapphire-blue or lead-grey according to circumstances, the great sides of Tryfaen and the Glydyrs tower on the left. ”

“ Range beyond range, the hills completely encircle us: stern, bare hills with rugged outlines, and never a tree to soften them; and in the foreground great sweeping curves covered with short grass and here and there a glowing patch of heather. Then, when the summit is reached, and Cardiff waterworks are passed, begins the descent of nine miles on a perfect surface, close under the shoulder of the Brecon Beacons. ”

“ There are hills near [Pg 228] and far, and on every hill are all the colours of the rainbow, and with the passing of every cloud the colours move and change. Close at hand are slopes of bracken topped by rugged crags; far away the hills of the Elan Valley are blue and amethyst. The river rushes through the town, giving to it its name of Rhayader Gwy, the Falls of the Wye, though the falls are not what they once were, I believe, before the bridge was built. Of course there is a castle-mound, for no Welsh town of a respectable age is complete without one. The castle itself has disappeared. ”