W. T. Simpson

“ From the dining room on the extreme left, to the conservatory on the right, it is about one hundred and sixty feet.
To particularize or to give an adequate idea of the superb and very tasteful decorations of every room in this elegant mansion is far beyond my power of description; and therefore I dare not make the attempt. Suffice it to say, that every nook seems decorated by the hand of taste, guided by the most correct judgment; all is elegantly superb, and chastely grand. ”

“ It is amusing to see them waft themselves where they please, with a little paddle in one hand, and a fly-rod in the other, fishing every corner of the deep pool; and when tired, rowing to land, throwing their boats on their shoulders, and walking with them to another deep pool, where they again commence operations. ”

“ On its return to the Castle, the young men of the village contended for the honour of assisting it to get up the hill again; and this was the only vehicle of the kind seen once a year in Llangollen, where now the most splendid and elegant carriages, from the gig to the state-coach, roll along, amid these stupendous rocks and mountains, upon roads as smooth, as level, and as good, as any in the kingdom.
The Oswestry old way is not now much frequented, but it continues from Chirk Castle along the top of p. 59the Mountain. Many roads intersect it, but the old road is very distinguishable. ”

“ To Sir David Gam was assigned the important office of reconnoitring the French army, on the approach of the famous battle of Agincourt. Finding the French nearly ten times more numerous than the English army, he replied to the King’s question as to the enemy’s strength—“An’t please you, my Liege, they are enough to be killed, enough to run away, and enough to be taken prisoners.” ”

“ The mazy windings of the Dee, embellished as its banks are with the fresh green shrubs and plants which flourish there in great luxuriance, afford a very delightful walk, independent of the great amusement to anglers for which this river has ever been so famous. The trout are as fine as any in the kingdom, and p. 140are very plentiful. Many men obtain a livelihood during the season, by fishing in this beautiful river, which they contrive to manage in their little coracles, a large kind of round basket, covered with skins or tarpawling, and with a board across the centre for a seat. ”

“ The promises of men in those days were frequently regarded only so long as it suited their interests or convenience. Such was the case with David Gam, who no sooner found himself among his own friends, and in his own country, than he began to assail and annoy all the favourers and adherents of Glyndwr, who being soon apprised of the practices against him, and of the use Sir David made of his liberty, marched with all expedition at the head of a small body of his retainers, intending to make him prisoner ”

“ The Castle stands, as hath before been shown, immediately above and p. 85on the north side of Llangollen, on a conical mountain, about six hundred yards above the level of the river Dee; [85] and is built on the summit of the hill, which probably was leveled to procure materials, as the building occupies the whole flat. It seems to have been about one hundred yards in length, by fifty yards wide. The present remains are almost without form: they are built of the silicious stone of the mountain, set in a coarse mortar or grout, which is grown as hard as the stone itself. ”

“ High o’er Menai’s Straits the bending bridge:
Structures of more ambitious enterprise
Than minstrels, in the age of old romance,
To their own Merlin’s magic lore ascribed.”
The Aqueduct of Pontcysylte is so called from a bridge of three arches over the river Dee, and situated a little higher up the river. This is the most stupendous work of the kind in the kingdom. It was designed and executed by and under the inspection of that British Archimedes, Mr. Thomas Telford, to carry a stream of water for the supply of the Ellesmere Canal ”

“ Salmon come up the river to spawn; and although so many do not reach Llangollen as in former times, owing to the new inventions erected on the river to entrap them p. 141in their way from the sea, yet many of them overcome all impediments, and reach their usual haunts. I saw last summer, at the season when the salmon fray, or fry, seek their way to the sea from the river where they have been bred, large shoals of these fish, and at one time more than forty fishing rods successfully employed in a small space of water near the water-mill just above the bridge. ”

“ Returning towards Llangollen from Glyndyfrdwy, along a beautiful level road, made at the expense of Government, with the Berwyn Mountains rising abruptly on the right hand, and the murmuring Dee pursuing its devious course on the left, I pass a small brook, which divides the counties of Merioneth and Denbigh. A pillar on the top of the mountain above is for the same purpose. The views over the Dee are incomparably charming. ”

“ A porter resides at a small house on the left side of the entrance to the park, who admits all strangers requesting it. A beautiful road leads to the mansion, and large herds of deer exhibit their graceful forms and agility among the surrounding trees. Offa’s Dyke runs through the grounds, which are of p. 15very great extent, well wooded, tastefully laid out, and kept in nice order. The house is very extensive, and the stables also capacious. The premises have acquired their present magnitude by various additions made at different times by the possessors. ”

“ May he rest in happy peace. Amen.
MD . . .
The letters MD seem to have been meant as part of the date marking the time when the Church was repaired, and go far to prove the little veneration shown to this once elegant structure by the neighbouring people, and that its dilapidation was unusually rapid. Now, we will suppose that the inscription MD means 1500, and allow that it was then in complete repair, and that it was one of the first Abbeys dissolved, say in 1538; for I do not read that Henry VIII. began his reformation among the religious houses before that time ”

“ As Eliseg’s Pillar has given a name to a fertile valley, to a township, and to the wonderful and stupendous Egwlseg Rocks, and which they all retain to this day, I presume to ask, is it not as reasonable to suppose, since we find it recorded that there was a British King of the name of Bran, that the name of the Castle I p. 93am describing should have been derived from him, rather than from a paltry stream bearing the name of Bran, or from an insignificant bird; for Bran in the Welch language signifies Crow. ”

“ His skill in devices, together with his local knowledge of the country, kept the Principality in a dreadful state of fear and fermentation; and although he eluded every effort made to entrap him, yet his turbulent spirit drew upon his country the vengeance of the King, in the most severe laws that were ever enacted against a civilised people. [166]
p. 167Owen Glyndwr, once Prince of Wales, was now reduced to hide himself in the caves and fastnesses of the country, to avoid the pursuit of his enemies. ”

“ Concenn and Eliseg probably resided at Castell Dinas Bran; and a township adjacent bears the name of Eglwyseg, as well as the stupendous and picturesque mass of rocks that range along the vale, called the Eglwyseg Rocks, from Eliseg. Brochmail, another of the persons mentioned, deserted the protection of the Monks of Bangor at the battle of West Chester, when twelve hundred of those unfortunate unarmed religious were cut to pieces by the forces of Athelfrid or Edilfred, King of Northumberland, A.D. 607. ”

“ The Abbey of Llan Egwest, or Valle Crucis, so called from a very ancient inscribed pillar or cross, the mutilated remains of which stand in an adjacent field, and will next come under consideration, was built and founded by Madog Ap Gryffydd Maelor, Lord of Dinas Bran, as before related under the head of Dinas Bran.
p. 114This Abbey was built in the year of our Lord 1200, was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, and belonged to a community of Cistercian Monks, an order founded in France in the year 1098. The remains of the Abbey Church are the most picturesque and entire part. ”

“ Leaving the Dyke, I now return to the Berwyn Mountains.
p. 47Berwyn MOUNTAINS.
“Clouds rest on the hills: spirits fly, and travellers fear.
“Where are our chiefs of old? Where our Kings of mighty name? The fields of their battle are silent: scarce their mossy tombs remain.”
Returning towards Llangollen by the old road near Chirk Castle, called Oswestry way, the Berwyn Mountains begin to raise their lofty summits. [47] These Mountains occupy the eastern side of Merionethshire, and branch into the counties of Denbigh and Montgomery. ”

“ The Church of Llantysilio is dedicated to a Welch saint, from whom the township takes its name. He was Prince of Powis, and was called St. Tysilio. It is a neat little edifice, with a very pleasant church-yard, and contains nothing very ancient in the monumental way; but there are around it many very venerable yew trees, with their wide spreading sombre foliage. I had the curiosity to measure one, and found it above twenty feet in girth. The inside of the Church is, like its neighbour at Llangollen, indebted for some of its decorations to the Abbey Crucis, which seems after its p. ”

“ The town consists of one long badly paved street, and a short cross one, together with some courts and alleys, called squares, but which at present ill deserve an appellation generally conveying to the mind an idea of neatness, if not of superiority, as they are for the most part formed with obscure mean-looking houses, built of the dark-coloured silicious stone procured from the rocky bed of the river, and from the surrounding hills. ”

“ A market house once stood where the Hand Gardens now are, and is a convenience much wanted. Besides the London Mail to Holyhead, which passes through Llangollen every afternoon at five o’clock, and leaves the letter bags, which it takes up again about eight o’clock every morning, there are regular stage coaches passing to and from London and Holyhead every day. ”

“ A large brick mansion, presents itself. It is situated on a rising ground, on the north side of the Wrexham road; and was once the residence of John Trevor, Bishop of St. Asaph, who in the year 1346 caused a stone bridge to be built over the Dee, at Llangollen, which is accounted one of the wonders of Wales. ”

“ Lord of Bromfield, and of Dinas Bran, near Llangollen. It was then called Wattstay, from another old dyke still visible, named Watt’s Dyke; and the space between that and Offa’s Dyke was a sort of neutral territory, on which the Welch and Saxons used to traffic with each other. [15b] When the noble family of the Wynns became its possessors, p. 16the original name was changed to Wynnstay. The house is replete with elegance and convenience, and is the seat of hospitality as unbounded as the benevolence of its owner’s heart. ”

“ The attraction of North Wales, by its romantic scenery, the antiquity of its language, and the well authenticated records of its desperate struggle for independence, renders every part of the Principality interesting, and perhaps none more so than the beautifully picturesque town and neighbourhood of Llangollen, which have deservedly excited p. ”

“ The peculiar taste and beauty with which these noble and highly distinguished ladies have decorated and adorned both the exterior and the interior of their far-famed retreat, excites universal admiration from the first characters and families, who are continually visiting them. ”

“ It is an example of simple neatness and good taste. The cottages are built in the Swiss style, with singular rustic elegance, and have the appearance of comfort and quiet. The inhabitants are mainly indebted for the beauty of their rustic cottages to the Countess Dungannon of Brynkinallt, and for the uniformity and useful convenience of water in every house, which is conveyed by leaden pipes, to the exertions and influence p. 31of Mrs. Myddelton Biddulph, the owner of the Castle, and the elder branch of the much-respected family of the Myddeltons. ”