_Gelert._--BINGLEY, altered.
1. I have one more story to tell you about the Highland greyhound. It is
an old Welsh story, and shows how extremely dangerous it is to indulge
in anger and resentment.
2. In a village at the foot of Snowden, a mountain in Wales, there is a
tradition that Llewellyn (_pronounced_ Lewel´lin), son-in-law to King
John, had a residence in that neighborhood.
3. The king, it is said, had presented him with one of the finest
greyhounds in England, named Gelert. In the year 1205, Llewellyn, one
day, on going out to hunt, called all his dogs together; but his
favorite greyhound was missing, and nowhere to be found.
4. He blew his horn as a signal for the chase, and still Gelert came
not. Llewellyn was much disconcerted at the heedlessness of his
favorite, but at length pursued the chase without him. For want of
Gelert, the sport was limited; and getting tired, Llewellyn returned
home at an early hour, when the first object that presented itself to
him, at his castle gate, was Gelert, who bounded, with his usual
transport, to meet his master, having his lips besmeared with blood.
5. Llewellyn gazed with surprise at the unusual appearance of his dog.
On going into the apartment where he had left his infant son and heir
asleep, he found the bed-clothes all in confusion, the cover rent, and
stained with blood.
6. He called on his child, but no answer was made, from which he hastily
concluded that the dog must have devoured him; and, giving vent to his
rage, plunged his sword to the hilt in Gelert's side.
7. The noble animal fell at his feet, uttering a dying yell, which
awoke the infant, who was sleeping beneath a mingled heap of the
bed-clothes, while beneath the bed lay a great wolf covered with gore,
which the faithful and gallant hound had destroyed.
8. Llewellyn, smitten with sorrow and remorse for the rash and frantic
deed which had deprived him of so faithful an animal, caused an elegant
marble monument, with an appropriate inscription, to be erected over the
spot where Gelert was buried, to commemorate his fidelity and unhappy
fate. The place, to this day, is called Beth-Gelert, or The Grave of the
Greyhound.