I left London at two o'clock in the morning, very ill and out of
spirits; in harmony with the weather, which was perfectly 'à
l'Anglaise.' It blew a hurricane, and rained water-spouts. About eight
o'clock, however, the sky cleared. I had been lulled into a gentle
slumber by the rapid and easy roll of the carriage; all nature shone
with an emerald brightness, and a delicious fragrance poured in at the
open windows from every field and flower; and your care-worn, melancholy
friend was again, in a few moments, the light-hearted child rejoicing in
the beautiful world, and in its mighty and merciful Creator. Travelling
in England is, indeed, most delightful. Could I but witness your
pleasure in it! Could I but feel my own doubled by your participation!
It rained occasionally through the day, but I was little incommoded by
this in a close carriage, and found the air mild and balmy. The former
part of the country through which our road lay, teemed with all the
luxuriant vegetation of the most beautiful park; the next presented
boundless corn fields without hedges, which is a rarity in England; and
the last nearly resembled the rich plains of Lombardy. I passed many
large parks, which, however, weather being uncertain, and time limited,
I left unvisited. It is not easy, after my long park and garden chase
through half England, to find any thing new of this kind. In Cirencester
I visited a beautiful Gothic church of great antiquity, with windows of
coloured glass in pretty good preservation, and curious grotesque
carvings. It is a grievous pity that the Gothic churches in England,
without exception, are defaced by tasteless modern grave-stones and
monuments.
Late in the evening I reached Cheltenham, an extremely pretty
watering-place, of an elegance nowhere to be found on the continent.
Even the splendid gas-lights and the new villa-looking houses, each
surrounded by its little flower-garden, put the mind into a cheerful and
agreeable tone. I arrived, too, just in the hour when the contest
between the light of day and the artificial illumination produces a
peculiar and, to me, pleasing effect. As I entered the inn, which, I
might almost call magnificent, and ascended the snow-white stone
staircase, ornamented with a gilt bronze railing, and trod on fresh and
brilliant carpets, lighted by two servants to my room, I gave myself up,
'con amore,' to the feeling of 'comfort' which can be found in
perfection nowhere but in England. In this point of view, it is a
country completely made for a misanthrope like myself;--since all that
is unconnected with social life, all that a man can procure _with
money_, is excellent and perfect in its kind; and he may enjoy it
isolated, without any other human being troubling himself about him.
A larger mass of varied and manifold enjoyments may certainly be found
in England than it is possible to procure with us. Not in vain have wise
institutions long prevailed here. What especially soothes and gladdens
the philanthropist is the spectacle of the superior comfort and more
elevated condition in the scale of existence, universally prevailing.
What with us are called luxuries, are here looked upon as necessaries,
and are diffused over all classes. Hence arise, even in the smallest and
most ordinary details, an endeavour after elegance, an elaborate finish
and neatness; in a word, a successful combination of the beautiful with
the useful, which is entirely unknown to our lower classes.
The distress, in truth, consisted in this; that the people, instead of
having three or four meals a day, with tea, cold meat, bread and butter,
beef-steaks or roast meat, were now obliged to content themselves with
two, consisting only of meat and potatoes. It was, however, just
harvesttime, and the want of labourers in the field so great, that the
farmers gave almost any wages. Nevertheless, I was assured that the
mechanics would rather destroy all the machinery and actually starve,
than bring themselves to take a sickle in their hands, or bind a sheaf:
so intractable and obstinate are the English common people rendered by
their universal comfort, and the certainty of obtaining employment if
they vigorously seek it. From what I have now told you, you may imagine
what deductions you ought to make from newspaper articles.
_July 13th._
This morning I visited some of the public walks, which fell short of my
expectations; and drank the waters, which have some resemblance to those
of Carlsbad. I found them very heating. The doctors here say, as ours
do, that they must be drunk early in the morning, or they lose a great
part of their efficacy. The joke is, however, that here, _early_ begins
exactly where it ends with us, namely, at ten o'clock.
The weather is unfortunately not favourable: cold and stormy, after a
continuance of heat pretty long for England. For travelling, however, it
is not bad; at least I find myself in far better spirits than in London,
and am in great delight at the anticipation of the beautiful scenery of
Wales, towards which I am now bending my course.
I entreat you to be with me, at least in thought, and let our spirits
journey together over sea and land, look down from the summits of
mountains and enjoy the sweet repose of valleys; for I doubt not that
spirits, in forms as infinitely various as infinity itself is boundless,
rejoice, throughout all worlds, in the beauty of God's magnificent
creation.
I will first lead you to the seven sources of the Thames, which arises
two or three miles from Cheltenham. I set out on this excursion in 'a
Fly' (a kind of small landau, drawn by one horse), on the top of which I
sat, that I might enjoy the beautiful prospect from the highest station.
After a long ascent, you come to some solitary grassy hills; on the top
of these, under the shade of two or three alders, is a little group of
plashy springs, which trickle away, forming, as far as the eye can
follow them, an insignificant brook. Such is the modest infancy of the
proud Thames. I felt a tide of poetry come over my mind, as I thought,
how, but a few hours ago, and but a few miles hence, I had seen these
same waters covered with a thousand vessels; how this glorious stream,
in its short course, bears on its bosom more ships, more treasures, and
more human beings, than any of its colossal brethren; how the capital of
the world lies on its banks, and by her omnipotent commerce may be
almost said to rule the four quarters of the globe. With reverential
admiration I looked down on the gushing drops, and compared them, one
while with Napoleon, who, obscurely born in Ajaccio, in a few years made
all the thrones of the earth tremble;--then with the avalanche, which,
loosened from its bed under the foot of a sparrow, in five minutes
buries a village;--then with Rothschild, whose father sold ribands, and
without whose assistance no power in Europe is now able to carry on war.
My driver, who was at the same time an accredited Cheltenham cicerone,
took me from this spot to a high hill called Lackington Hill, from which
there is a celebrated view, with the appendage of a pleasant inn for the
accommodation of visitors. Hidden under a bower of roses[93] my eye
commanded an extent of seventy English miles;--a rich plain studded with
towns and villages, among which the cathedral of Gloucester is the most
striking and stately object. Behind it rose two ridges, the Malvern
Hills and above them the Welsh mountains. Beautiful as was all around
me, the distant blue mountains, bathed in air, awoke in me only an
intense longing after home. How gladly should I have flown to your side
with the aid of Fortunatus's cap!
Up to this time black clouds had chased each other across the heavens;
just as I turned away from the prospect the sun provokingly broke forth:
it lighted me through a beautiful beech-wood to the charming seat of Mr.
Todd, who has built a smiling village in the midst of the leafy shade,
consisting of straw-roofed cottages and pretty moss houses. In the
centre of a green level turf stands a noble lime-tree, surrounded by
three tiers of benches for as many generations. Not far distant, on the
withered trunk of a tree, is a sun-dial, and on the edge of the hill
overlooking the valley, a rural seat, sheltered by a little arched roof
covered with heather, and its sides tastefully interwoven with roots. On
holidays it is often covered with evergreens and flowers, and lighted at
evening with gay lamps. In the neighbouring park, which has many
distinguishing beauties, are the ruins of a Roman villa: they were
accidentally discovered about eight years ago by the sudden sinking-in
of a tree. Some baths are still in good preservation, as are also two
tessellated floors; they are however of rather coarse workmanship, and
bear no comparison with those discovered at Pompeii. The walls are in
part covered with red and blue stucco, two inches thick, and the brick
pipes for conveying heat are of a quality and durability now unequalled.
About three quarters of a mile further on, the Roman road is distinctly
to be traced, and a portion of it is indeed in actual use: it is to be
distinguished from the English road chiefly by its running, like a
north-German 'Chaussée,' in a perfectly straight line. It is to be
hoped, however, that the taste of the Romans was too good to allow them
to enclose their roads between two endless rows of Lombardy poplars, and
thus inflict a twofold torture of monotony on the unfortunate traveller.
How different from an English road, which winds around the hills in soft
and graceful sweeps, avoiding deep valleys or reverend trees, instead of
following the one inveterate idea of a straight line, at a sixfold cost,
through thick and thin, over hill and valley.
On my return to Cheltenham, I passed through a large village, where I
visited for the first time what is here called a tea-garden. The
ingenuity with which a small space is made to contain a hundred little
niches, benches, and picturesque, nay, often romantic seats, is quite
extraordinary, and forms a curious contrast with the phlegm of the
gaily dressed multitude who rather garnish than animate the scene.
As it was rather early when I reached the town, I took advantage of the
beautiful evening to visit more of the mineral waters, and I found that
in the morning I had stumbled on the least important. These
establishments are extremely splendid, ornamented with marble
decorations, and still more with flowers, green-houses and pretty
plantations. As soon as a thing is the fashion in England it becomes the
subject of enormous speculation. This is to such a degree the case here,
that the value of an acre of land in the neighbourhood of the town has
risen within fifteen years from forty to a thousand guineas. The gardens
and grounds which are destined to be places of public resort and
amusement, are here, and I think rightly, laid out in a totally
different style from the gardens and parks of private gentlemen. Broad
and shady walks, and distinct open spaces, are rather to be aimed at,
than picturesque views, or a large and landscape-like whole. Their
manner of planting shady walks pleases me. A strip of ground about five
feet wide, on each side of the way, is dug and thickly planted with a
mixture of various trees and shrubs. The most flourishing trees are
afterwards left to grow, and the others are kept down by the shears as
irregular underwood. Between this and the top of the high trees the
prospect is as it were set in a beautiful frame; the whole is fuller and
more luxuriant; and wherever the country is uninteresting, it may be
shut out by merely suffering the underwood to grow.
_Worcester, July 14th._
Yesterday, 'entre la poire et le fromage,' I received the twice-declined
visit of the master of the ceremonies,--the gentleman who does the
honour of the baths, and exercises a considerable authority over the
company of an English watering-place, in virtue of which he welcomes
strangers with most anti-English officiousness and pomposity, and
manifests great care and zeal for their entertainment. An Englishman
invested with such a character has _mauvais jeu_, and vividly recalls
the ass in the fable, who tried to imitate the caresses of the lapdog. I
could not get rid of my visitor till he had swallowed some bottles of
claret with me, and devoured all the dessert the house afforded. At
length he took his leave, first extorting from me a promise that I would
honour the ball of the following evening with my presence. However, I
had so little inclination for company and new acquaintances, that I made
'faux bond,' and left Cheltenham early in the morning.
The country continued most lovely, the near ground full of soft meadows
and deep green clumps of trees; the horizon bounded by the mountains,
which at every mile grew in magnitude and distinctness of outline. At
almost every stage I passed a considerable town, which was never without
its towering Gothic church. The situation of Tewksbury struck me as
peculiarly delightful. Nothing can be more tranquil, more pastoral; and
yet all these blooming plains were bloody battle-fields in the times of
the countless civil wars of England, whence they retain the names, now
so inappropriate, of Bloody Field, Field of Bones, &c.
Worcester, where I am now writing, the chief city of the county, has
nothing remarkable except its magnificent cathedral; the windows contain
but small remains of ancient painted glass: to these, new has been
added, which is very little inferior either in softness or brilliancy to
the old. In the middle of the nave King John is buried: his effigy in
stone reposes on the tomb; the oldest monument of an English king which
Great Britain contains. The tomb was opened some years ago, when the
skeleton was found in good preservation, and in precisely the same
dress as that represented in the statue: as soon as it came in contact
with the air, the materials of which it was composed crumbled into dust;
the sword was entirely consumed by rust, and only its handle remained.
Another very interesting monument is that of a Templar, of the year
1220, with this Norman inscription: "Ici gist syr guilleaume de harcourt
fys robert de harcourt, et de Isabel de camvile." The figure of the
knight (whose costume, by-the-by, is totally different from that of
Count Brühl's Templar at Berlin[94]) is an admirable piece of sculpture,
and reposes with an ease and 'abandon' which would do no discredit to
antique art: his dress consists of boots or stockings (whichever you
choose to call them) of mail, and golden spurs; the knee is naked; above
the knee is again covered with mail, which so completely encloses the
whole body, and even the head, that only the face is visible. Over this
shirt of mail is a long red mantle, falling in folds below the calf; and
over this a black baldrick, from which hangs a sword in a red scabbard:
the left arm supports a narrow pointed shield bearing the family arms,
and not the cross of the Temple. This is found only on the tomb. The
whole figure is, as you perceive, painted; and the colours are from time
to time renewed.
As the greatest of all curiosities, strangers are shown Prince Arthur's
tomb, the intricate stone tracery of which is really like the most
exquisite carvings in wood or ivory. On one side of the chapel are fine
rows of small figures, one above another. The order is as follows: on
the lowest row the abbesses; above them bishops; above them kings; then
saints; and at the top of all, angels. 'Quant à moi, qui ne suis encore
ni saint, ni ange, souffrez que je vous quitte pour mon diner.'
_Llangollen, July 15th._
If I had the honour to be the wandering Jew (who of course must have
money _ad libitum_), I should most certainly spend the greatest part of
my immortality on the high road, and specially in England. ''Tis so
delightful' for a man of my opinions and character. In the first place,
no human being troubles or constrains me. Wherever I pay well, I am the
first person (always an agreeable feeling for the lordly sons of men),
and meet with none but smiling faces and obliging people, full of zeal
to serve me. Continued motion, without fatigue, keeps the body in
health; and the rapidly succeeding changes in beautiful, free nature
have the same strengthening influence on the mind. I must confess that I
am partly of Dr. Johnson's opinion:--he maintained that the greatest
human felicity was to drive rapidly over an English road in a good
postchaise, with a pretty woman by one's side.
It is one of the most agreeable sensations in the world to me to roll
along in a comfortable carriage, and to stretch myself out at my ease
while my eye feasts on the ever-changing pictures, like those of a magic
lantern. As they pass, they awaken fancies serious and gay, tragic and
comic; and I find an intense pleasure in filling up the sketches thus
presented to my eye. What strange fantastic shapes often start up with
the rapidity of lightning, and flit before my mind like figures in the
clouds! Then if my fancy droops her wings, I read and sleep in my
carriage. I am little troubled with my baggage, which from long practice
is so well arranged that I can get at every thing I want in a moment,
without tormenting my servants. Sometimes, when the weather is fine and
the country beautiful, I walk for miles together: in short, I can desire
no more perfect freedom than I enjoy here. Lastly, it is no slight
pleasure that I can close the day by devoting a tranquil hour to
conversing with the friend of my heart on all that has passed before me.
But to return to my narrative.--I travelled all night, after witnessing
an extraordinary sport of nature in the clouds. From the top of a hill I
saw what appeared to me a gigantic range of black mountains, and at its
foot a boundless lake: it was long before I could persuade myself that
it was only an illusion, created by mist and cloud. The sky above was of
an uniform light grey; upon it lay a coal-black mass of clouds thrown
together in the form of the wildest mountains, the upper edge of which
shaped itself into a bold and abrupt outline, while the lower was
trans-sected by a horizontal line of mist. This wore the appearance of a
boundless extent of silvery water; and, as the green foreground of sunny
wooded plains which lay beneath my feet was immediately bounded by it,
the illusion was indeed complete. As I descended the hill, step by step,
the magic picture faded from before my eyes.
The most beautiful reality, however, awaited me this morning in Wales.
The vision of clouds seemed to have been the harbinger of the
magnificence of the vale of Llangollen,--a spot which, in my opinion,
far surpasses all the beauties of the Rhine-land, and has, moreover, a
character quite its own, from the unusual form of the peaked tops and
rugged declivities of its mountains. The Dee, a rapid stream, winds
through the green valley in a thousand fantastic bendings overhung with
thick underwood. On each side, high mountains rise abruptly from the
plain, and are crowned with antique ruins, modern country-houses,
manufactories, whose towering chimneys send out columns of thick smoke,
or with grotesque groups of upright rocks. The vegetation is every where
rich, and hill and vale are filled with lofty trees, whose varied hues
add so infinitely to the beauty and picturesque effect of a landscape.
In the midst of this luxuriant nature, arises, with a grandeur
heightened by contrast, a single long, black, bare range of mountains,
clothed only with thick, dark heather, and from time to time skirting
the high road. This magnificent road, which from London to Holyhead, a
distance of two hundred miles,[95] is as even as a 'parquet,' here runs
along the side of the left range of mountains, at about their middle
elevation and following all their windings; so that in riding along at a
brisk trot or gallop, the traveller is presented at every minute with a
completely new prospect; and without changing his position, overlooks
the valley now before him, now behind, now at his side. On one side is
an aqueduct of twenty-five slender arches, a work which would have done
honour to Rome. Through this a second river is led over the valley and
across the Dee, at an elevation of a hundred and twenty feet above the
bed of the natural stream. A few miles further on, the little town of
Llangollen offers a delightful resting-place, and is deservedly much
resorted to.
There is a beautiful view from the churchyard near the inn: here I
climbed upon a tomb, and stood for half an hour enjoying with deep and
grateful delight the beauties so richly spread before me. Immediately
below me bloomed a terraced garden, filled with vine, honey-suckle,
rose, and a hundred gay flowers, which descended to the very edge of the
foaming stream. On the right hand, my eye followed the crisped waves in
their restless murmuring course through the overhanging thicket; before
me rose two lines of wood, divided by a strip of meadow-land filled with
grazing cattle; and high above all, rose the bare conical peak of a
mountain crowned by the ruins of the old Welsh castle Dinas Bran, or the
Crow's Fortress. On the left, the stone houses of the town lie scattered
along the valley; the river forms a considerable waterfall near the
picturesque bridge, while three colossal rocks rise immediately behind
it like giant guards, and shut out all the more distant wonders of this
enchanting region.
Permit me now to turn to some less refined and romantic, but not less
real, enjoyments of sense--to my own room; where my appetite, enormously
sharpened by the mountain air, was most agreeably invited by the aspect
of the smoking coffee, fresh guinea-fowls' eggs, deep yellow mountain
butter, thick cream, 'toasted muffins' (a delicate sort of cake eaten
hot with butter), and lastly, two red spotted trout just caught; all
placed on a snow-white table-cloth of Irish damask;--a breakfast which
Walter Scott's heroes in 'the highlands' might have been thankful to
receive at the hands of that great painter of human necessities. 'Je
dévore déjà un oeuf.'--Adieu.
_Bangor.--Evening._
The rain, which with short intervals accompanied me from London,
remained constant to me to-day; but the weather seems now inclined to
change for the better. I have all sorts of things to tell you, and a
very interesting day to recount. Before I left Llangollen I recollected
the two celebrated ladies who have inhabited this valley for more than
half a century, and of whom I had heard once as a child, and again
recently in London. You have doubtless heard your father talk of
them,--'si non voilà leur historie.' Fifty-six years ago, two young,
pretty and fashionable ladies, Lady Eleanor Butler, and the daughter of
the late Lord Ponsonby, took it in their heads to hate men, to love only
each other, and to live from that hour in some remote hermitage. The
resolution was immediately executed; and from that time neither lady has
ever passed a night out of their cottage. On the other hand, no one who
is presentable travels in Wales unprovided with an introduction to them.
It is affirmed that the 'scandal' of the great world interests them as
much as when they lived in it; and that their curiosity to know what
passes has preserved all its freshness. I had compliments to deliver to
them from several ladies, but I had neglected to furnish myself with a
letter. I therefore sent my card, determined if they declined my visit,
as I was led to fear, to storm the cottage. Here, as elsewhere, however,
in England, a title easily opened the door, and I immediately received a
gracious invitation to a second breakfast. Passing along a charming
road, through a trim and pretty pleasure-ground, in a quarter of an hour
I reached a small but tasteful Gothic cottage, situated directly
opposite to Dinas Bran, various glimpses of which were visible through
openings cut in the trees. I alighted, and was received at the door by
the two ladies. Fortunately I was already prepared by hearsay for their
peculiarities; I might otherwise have found it difficult to repress some
expression of astonishment. Imagine two ladies, the eldest of whom, Lady
Eleanor, a short robust woman, begins to feel her years a little, being
now eighty-three; the other, a tall and imposing person, esteems herself
still youthful, being only seventy-four. Both wore their still abundant
hair combed straight back and powdered, a man's round hat, a man's
cravat and waistcoat, but in the place of 'inexpressibles,'[96] a short
petticoat and boots: the whole covered by a coat of blue cloth, of a cut
quite peculiar,--a sort of middle term between a man's coat and a lady's
riding-habit. Over this, Lady Eleanor wore, first, the grand cordon of
the order of St. Louis across her shoulder; secondly, the same order
around her neck; thirdly, the small cross of the same in her
button-hole, and, 'pour comble de gloire,' a golden lily of nearly the
natural size, as a star,--all, as she said, presents of the Bourbon
family. So far the whole effect was somewhat ludicrous. But now, you
must imagine both ladies with that agreeable 'aisance,' that air of the
world of the 'ancien regime,' courteous and entertaining, without the
slightest affectation; speaking French as well as any Englishwoman of my
acquaintance; and, above all, with that essentially polite,
unconstrained, and simply cheerful manner of the good society of that
day, which, in our serious hard-working age of business, appears to be
going to utter decay. I was really affected with a melancholy sort of
pleasure in contemplating it in the persons of the amiable old ladies,
who are among the last of its living representatives; nor could I
witness without lively sympathy the uninterrupted, natural and
affectionate attention with which the younger treated her somewhat
infirmer friend, and anticipated all her wants. The charm of such
actions lies chiefly in the manner in which they are performed,--in
things which appear small and insignificant, but which are never lost
upon a susceptible heart.
I began by saying that I esteemed myself fortunate in being permitted to
deliver to the fair recluses the compliments with which I was charged by
my grandfather, who had had the honour of visiting them fifty years ago.
Their beauty indeed they had lost, but not their memory: they remembered
the C---- C---- very well, immediately produced an old memorial of him,
and only expressed their wonder that so young a man was dead already.
Not only the venerable ladies, but their house, was full of interest;
indeed it contained some real treasures. There is scarcely a remarkable
person of the last half century who has not sent them a portrait or some
curiosity or antique as a token of remembrance. The collection of these,
a well furnished library, a delightful situation, an equable, tranquil
life, and perfect friendship and union,--these have been their
possessions; and if we may judge by their robust old age and their
cheerful temper, they have not chosen amiss.
I had made my visit to them in a tremendous rain, which continued
undiminished as I proceeded on my journey past the ruins of an abbey,
and then by the palace of Owen Glendower, a personage whom you must
remember from my Shaksperian readings at M----. The variety of the
scenery is extraordinary; sometimes you are hemmed in by a chaotic heap
of mountains, of every form; in a few minutes you have so extensive a
view before you that you could almost believe yourself in a level
country; the scene shifts again, and you are in a road enclosed and
overshadowed by wood. Further on, the stream turns a peaceful mill, and
immediately after rushes foaming over masses of rock, and forms a
magnificent waterfall.
But the vale of Llangollen is only the proem to the true epopea, the
high mountain district. After quitting the waterfall and riding for
about half an hour through a nearly level country, all at once, a
little beyond the inn at Cernioge Maur, you enter the holy of holies.
Huge black rocks form a sublime amphitheatre, and their jagged and rent
peaks seem to float in the clouds. Below, at a depth of eight hundred
feet of perpendicular rock, the mountain torrent forces its difficult
way, leaping headlong from chasm to chasm. Before me lay mountains
rising one above another in endless perspective. I was so enchanted that
I exclaimed aloud with delight. And in the midst of such scenery, it is
impossible to say enough in praise of the road, which, avoiding every
great inequality of surface, allows the traveller to enjoy at his ease
all the 'belles horreurs' of this mountain region. Wherever it is not
protected by the rocks, it is fenced by low walls; at equal distances
are niches neatly walled in, in which are deposited the stones for
mending the roads: this has a much better effect than the open heaps by
the sides of our roads.
The mountain region of Wales has a very peculiar character, which it is
difficult to compare with any other. Its height is about that of the
Riesengebirg, but it is infinitely grander in form, richer in striking
and picturesque grouped peaks. The vegetation is more varied in plants,
though there is less wood, and it contains rivers and lakes, in which
the Riesengebirg is quite deficient. On the other hand, it wants the
majestic impervious forests of the abode of Rübezahl;[97] and in some
places cultivation has already occupied the middle ground in a manner
which would harmonize better with the beautiful than with the sublime.
The road from Capel Cerig to within a few miles of Bangor is, however,
wild and rugged as can be desired; and broad masses of red and yellow
heath flowers, ferns and other plants which do not bloom in our severe
climate, clothe the rocks and replace the trees which do not flourish at
such an elevation. But the most striking variety of the picture is
produced by the strange, wild and colossal forms of the mountains
themselves; some of them are much more like clouds than solid masses.
The peak of Trivaen is surmounted by such extraordinary basaltic
pillars, that travellers can hardly be persuaded they are not men: they
are only mountain spirits, keeping the everlasting station to which
Merlin condemned them.
I was struck with the good taste which had rendered all the houses along
the high-road so perfectly in keeping with the scenery: they are built
of rough stone of a reddish colour, roofed with slate, in a heavy,
simple style of architecture, and enclosed by iron gates, the gratings
of which are so disposed as to represent the intersecting rays of two
suns. The post-boy pointed out to me the remains of a Druidical castle,
into which, as my guide-book informed me, Caractacus retired after his
defeat at Caer Caredoc. The Welsh language sounds like the cawing of
rooks. Almost all their names begin with C, pronounced with a guttural
explosion which no foreign organs can imitate. The ruin is converted
into two or three inhabited huts, nor are the boundaries of the original
building even distinguishable.
A more remarkable object is a rock a little further on, in the form of a
bishop with crozier and mitre, as if he had just started from the
caverns of the mountain to preach Christianity to the heathen. Whence
comes it that when Nature plays these sportive tricks, the effect is
almost always sublime; when Art seeks to imitate them, it is invariably
ludicrous?
A minor 'tormento' in this region is the multitude of children, who
start up and vanish like gnomes: they pursue the carriage, begging with
inconceivable pertinacity. Wearied by their importunity, I had made a
positive determination not to give anything to any-body; a single
deviation from which rule insures your never being rid of them for a
moment. However, one little girl vanquished all my resolutions by her
perseverance: she ran at least a German mile, up hill and down dale, at
a brisk trot, sometimes gaining upon me a little by a foot-path, but
never losing sight of me for a minute. She ran by the side of the
carriage, uttering the same incessant tone of plaintive lamentation,
like the cry of a sea-mew, which at length became so intolerable to me
that I surrendered, and purchased my deliverance from my untireable
pursuer at the price of a shilling. The ill-boding tone had however
taken such possession of my ear, that I could not get rid of it for the
whole day.
_August 16th._
I have slept admirably, and am now sitting at the window of an inn on
the sea-shore, and enjoying the sight of the ships cutting the
transparent waters in every direction. On the landward rises a castle
built of black marble, surrounded by ancient oaks.
As I am very comfortably housed, I shall make this inn my head-quarters,
and begin my excursions by this castle. I found here, very unexpectedly,
an amusing countryman. You know the clever A----, who is so thin, and
yet exhibits such magnificent calves, so elegantly dressed, and yet so
frugal, so good-natured, and yet so sarcastic, so English, and yet so
German. Well, this same A---- ate a second breakfast with me, without
any visible diminution of appetite from the former one; and in return,
regaled me with the most diverting conversation. He came from S----,
concerning which he told me as follows.