now properly deserving the name of a village, was rather more captivating
than our walk before breakfast: it was occasionally enlivened by the
prospect of the wide ocean, boundless to our view on one side, whilst
before us the fantastic shapes of the rocks off St. David’s Head,
exhibited nature in her most awful and striking attitudes. Above the
rest, Caern Thydy lifted its bold promontory, as if to give effect to the
rude landscape. About half way between Newgin and St. David’s, the
beautiful little village of Solva unexpectedly burst upon our view;
studded with neat white-washed cottages, and enclosed on each side with
lofty rocks, which here form a picturesque and interesting chasm. These
rocks, indeed, I could almost imagine were torn asunder by some
convulsive rent of the earth. The cathedral, and dilapidated ruins of
the episcopal palace, are situated at the bottom of a steep hill, and
scarcely visible in the town: these, and the prebendal houses, were
formerly enclosed by a strong stone wall, with four gates, computed at
eleven hundred yards in circuit. David, {84} the national saint of
Wales, with the consent of King Arthur, is said to have removed the
metropolitan see from Caerleon to Menevia, which has ever since been
called Ty Dewi by the Welsh, and St. David by the English. What was the
condition and extent of this town formerly, it is difficult to say,
having been so frequently destroyed. At present it is a very small city,
and has nothing to boast but its ruined palace, and old cathedral,
dedicated to St. Andrew and St. David, which has often been demolished;
but rebuilt, in its present form, by Bishop Peter, according to Giraldus,
in the reign of King Henry II.; or, as Willis, in the year 1110, in Rhos
Vale, below the town. It is still esteemed a noble pile, consisting of
two transepts, measuring in length, from east to west, three hundred
feet; and the body with the aisles, seventy-six feet broad.
Behind the choir is a most beautiful chapel, with a rich roof of carved
stone, built by Vaughan, in the time of King Henry VIII., as a kind of
presbytery, between the choir and Lady Chapel. In the last, whose roof,
as well as those of the aisles of the choir and transepts, have been down
ever since the civil war, are monuments of three bishops, and in the
nave, &c. four or five more. In the north wall of the choir is the
shrine of St. David; a kind of altar tomb, with a canopy of four pointed
arches, and in front four quatrefoil holes, into which the votaries put
their offerings, which were taken out by the monks at two iron doors
behind. In the choir are also the monuments of Owen Tudor, second
husband of Queen Catharine, Rhys ap Tudor, {85a} Bishops Jorwerth and
Anselm, in the thirteenth century, and Edmund, Earl of Richmond, father
of King Henry VII. This last monument is said to have prevented King
Henry VIII. from removing the see to Caermarthen. Giraldus Cambrensis,
who was archdeacon of Brecon, canon of Hereford, and rector of
Chesterton, Oxford, was buried here in 1213. {85b} On the north side of
the church are some walls of St. Mary’s College, founded by Bishop
Houghton, and John of Gaunt, in 1365, valued at one hundred and six
pounds per annum. {85c}
It is much to be regretted, that so little regard has been paid to the
internal appearance of this noble pile; the whole of it has lately been
white-washed, which gives it too much the air of a modern building: the
external part, I am sorry to add, has been equally neglected; and the
chapels and monuments exposed to the wanton mischief of boys and idle
people. The stone, likewise, with which it is built, is of so soft a
substance, that it even moulders with the touch of the finger; but
possibly it may, by being exposed to the air, like the Bath stone, become
more solid; and, when by time it shall have acquired a darker hue, may
then better correspond with the original building.
The Bishop’s Palace now stands a monument of desolation; and as we walked
over the loose fragments of stone, which are scattered through the
immense area of the fabric, the images of former times rose to
reflection,—when the spacious hall stood proudly in its original
splendor; when the long aisles of the chapel were only responsive to the
solemn, slow-breathed chant. In this palace is a very long room,
purposely erected for the reception of King John: at the extremity of it
is a circular window, of very elegant and curious workmanship.
According to Le Neve, Dubritius, Archbishop of Caerleon, is called by
this title, as Archbishop of Wales, at the first establishment of the
Christian religion in the British islands. Godwin fixes no time of his
coming in, but only says, that he, waxing old, resigned his see to David,
a disciple of his; that he died, and was buried in the Isle of Bardsee,
Nov. 14, 522.
David removed the see, as before stated, from Caerleon to Menevia; and,
by the time Godwin allows him to sit, viz. sixty-five years, and to die
in 642, we may suppose he came in in 577. It is said he lived to a great
age, viz. 146 years; and dying in 642, as is aforesaid, was buried in the
cathedral which himself had caused to be built; and his successors shewed
so great a respect to his memory, as to call the see by his name, which
it still retains, they for a long time afterwards styling themselves
Archbishops of St. David’s; of these, (including David), there were
twenty-five, with Sampson, who, by reason of a contagious sickness in his
diocese, retiring into Bretagne, and taking his pall with him, his
successors, either for want of that, or by some other occasion, lost
their title of Archbishop; but yet for several years they held the
archiepiscopal power of consecrating bishops, which was exercised under
twenty-two of them, down to Bishop Bernard, who was consecrated in 1115.
He, by command of King Henry I., resigned this power to the see of
Canterbury. From this period, down to the time of Bishop Vaughan, it had
many benefactors; amongst whom, as most prominent, stand the names of
Peter de Leia, Bishops Gervase, Beck, Martin, Gower, and Vaughan.
“During this interval,” says Mr. Rees, “St. David’s acquired the highest
celebrity; and the shrine of the founder was resorted to by the greatest
monarchs of the age. In the list of these royal visitors, are to be
included the names of William the Conqueror, who made his pilgrimage in
1079; King Henry the Second, who honoured Bishop David Fitzgerald with
his company in 1171; and King Edward the First, and Eleanor his queen,
who made their pilgrimage in 1284, when Bishop Beck held the see. The
pilgrims of inferior rank who resorted here were innumerable, and their
offerings served greatly to enrich the ecclesiastics, who spared no pains
to enhance the merit of the penance, by which the poor votaries thus
soothed their consciences, and emptied their pockets.” {87}
Giraldus gives us a true description of the country round St. David’s,
representing it as “a stony, barren, unimprovable territory, undecked
with woods, undivided by rivers, unadorned with meadows, exposed only to
wind and storm.” Such, indeed, is the state and situation of St.
David’s; and, the environs having no hedges to divide the property of the
farmers, the sheep, and even the geese, are all tethered together.
In this now dilapidated city was born Asserius, Bishop of Sherbourne, who
wrote a life of King Alfred, and is supposed to have been instrumental in
inducing that Prince to found the University of Oxford.
The walk to St. David’s Head, though barren, represents a view striking
and awful; sublimity gives place to elegance: yet what is it to view?—a
boundless waste of ocean;—not a glimpse of smiling nature,—not a patch of
vegetation, to relieve the aching sight, or vary the objects of
admiration. The rocks on this shore are shaken into every possible shape
of horror; and, in many parts, resemble the convulsions of an earthquake,
splintered, shivered, and amassed. On these rocks stood the famous
rocking stone, or _Y mean sigl_; which, “though twenty yoke of oxen could
not move it, might be shaken with the slightest touch.” We understood it
was thrown off its balance, by order of the farmer, to prevent the
curious from trampling on his grounds. “A mile strait west from St.
David’s, betwixt Portclais and Porthmaur,” {88} is the shell of Capel
Stinen, St. Stinan’s or St. Justinian’s chapel.
From this spot is an extensive view of Whitsand Bay, called by the Welsh
_Porth Maur_, or the Great Bay; in which stand the six rocks, called the
Bishop and his Clerks. Half a league from hence is