The Cambrian News and Merionethshire Standard

THE CELT OF WALES AND THE CELT OF IRELAND. The following interesting article is to appear in the Corn/till Magazine for December On Christmas-night last, the present writer witnessed a little spectacle which, trifling in itself, seems, for reasons to be presently stated, not unworthy of description and consideration. The scene was at night in a huge barn outside a village in a certain lonely mountain district in the heart of Wales. Not a fashionable tourist-haunted village the reader is lon.' requested to bear in mind, but a scattering of some twenty cottages of the solid, almost Cyclopfean, Welsh stone- masonry, of which (with the exception of the parsonage) the most imposing edifices are the post office, the smithy, and the turnpike gate house. No "public" or drink- shop of any sort exists in Llan-, but, en revanche, be- sides the church are two large dissenting chapels, be- longing of course to the small farmers whose holdings are dotted over the surrounding hills. The assembly, though modestly announced on the tickets of admission (price 6d.) as only a Cyfarfod Llenyddol (Social Meeting), was in truth a miniature Eisteddfod, or competition for prizes, by poets, essayists, singers, and improvisators. Of course on reading this, the English reader at once beholds with his mind's eye the energetic parson of the parish originating the whole scheme, working it up diligently to the honour of Christmas, laying the squire under contribution for prize-money, and employing all the young ladies in the neighbourhood in decorating the hall with texts in Gothic characters as undecipherable as Chinese to the parish- ioners. Nothing could possibly be further from the Eisteddfod of LIan-, which was devised, paid for, and performed exclusively by and for the villagers themselves, the car- penter, the blacksmith, and a score of farmers. Natur- ally every arrangement was of the simplest kind. The rough hewn stone walls of the barn, with the rod: on which they stand projecting here and there through the floor, were only relieved by two inscriptions-" A Merry Xmaa," and Cymru Idn gw{ad y gc1n, Fair Wales the Land of Song," emblazoned with holly leaves and berries, on white calico, and illuminated by three rather smoky lamps pendant from the beams above. Of what degree of luxury the "stall seats" may have boasted I cannot tell, the well-packed crowd thoroughly occupying every inch of sitting and standing room. At the upper end, ne&r a table, sat the young pleasant-looxiag chairman, with a white rosette on his breast, together with the prin- cipal candidates for the prizes and the competition went on with great verve and rapidity for about a couple of hours. I was unfortunately absent when the Pcnillion were sung—a peculiar Welsh form of improvisation in dia- logue, wherein both performers choose .some theme, and respond to one another in impromptu song to a certain familiar tune. This was said to have been done (as is often the case) with cleverness and humour, little incidents of the hour and friendly personalities being introduced into the rhymes. Afther the Penillion came a really charming glee, sung with feeling and delicacy, and rather erring on tlio side of being too piano and subdued, than of anything approaching the music-hall stylb of exhibi- tion. This was listened to by the audience with breath- lesii attention and encored enthusiastically, and after it followed an original poem of some twenty stanzas on the "Robin," repeated in a sort of recitativo by tha author, an intellectual-looking man, a small shopkeeper in a neigh- bouring village. Each verse of this poom apparently con- tained some playful fancy, or as an Elizabethan writer would have said, a "conceit," which was thoroughly ap- preciated and enjoyed by the audience, and secured a prize for the composer. Next came a short Essay on the Duties of Mothers to their Children," by the wife of the carpenter of the village, whose husband and daughters took the chief parts in a really excellent song which, with the distribution of the prizes, concluded the amusements of the evening. As I walked home in the moonlight, with the snow- capped mountains and silent brown woods around my path, the reflection struck me very forcibly that the people who could originate and enjoy such a refined entertain- ment as I had witnessed must differ in many essential particulars from the peasants of most other countries with whom I had acquaintance. I thought of how the English agriculturist, when left to choose his own diversion, in- vents such sports as tumbling in sacks, grinning through a horse-collar, and climbing a greasy pole for a leg of mutton how his ideal of heaven has been confessed to be a "public with a fiddle going and finally how when the parson and the squire undertake to afford him enter- tainment apart from the supreme attractions of victuals and drink, it is considered indispensable to choose for the Penny Reading or the musical performance, literature and melodies indefinitely less refined than those which the spontaneous good taste of these Welshmen and women had led them to prefer. In France again, I thought how the young men and women would have insisted on a dance—• possibly the Cancan—instead of such an unodyn style of amusement, as they would have deemed our Cyfarfod. When the idea presented itseif of the inhabitants of all Iri.-h village of no greater pretension than Llan un- assisted by squire or clergyman, getting up ou their own account such an Eisteddfod, the incongruitj' of the notion was so startling that it brought vividly to a focus the im- li. -csi pressions I had been receiving through a residence of many years in the two countries, of the vast and not easily ex- plicable difference which exists between the Celtic popu- lations of Wales and Ireland. Perhaps in these days, when a very influential school- of thinkers seem pre- pared to resolve every limn an characteristic—moral, intellectual, religious and awthetie, into a matter of here- ditary transmission, it not he uninteresting or useless to spend a little study on a problem touching so nearly the assumed law of such transmission. Here are two branches of the same great Celtic family, distantly allied —as philologists affirm, considerably more distantly than the Irish from the Highland Scotch, for example—but still of the same blood, members of that same earliest swarm which left the old Aryan Home for the West before history began. They have dwelt for several thousand years side by side as next neighbours, in countries under the same latitude and with a similarly pluviose climate, and pro- pinquity to the melancholy ocean." For several centuries they have both been under the rule of the same conquerors. Intercourse between them at a very early period was so close that several saints and heretics" legends and musical airs, are to this day attributed to Wales by Welsh, and to Ireland by Irish arch geologists. Yet instead of exhibiting such obvious and striking resemblances as might have been anticipated, under circumstances so similar, and instead of progressing together step by step in prosperity, the differences, or rather contrasts, in the characteristics and fortunes of the two people are so much more salient than their likenesses, that nine Englishmen out of ten forget that they are anywise akin, and no statesman dreams that because one Act of Parliament is fitted for Ireland, it is likely to be needed in Wales. Without pretending to offer novel observations on themes so familiar as the characteristics of the two countries, I think that an attempt to lay them side by side in parallelism may not be without a certain interest and possibly not with- out use. Either the laws of heredity are not exactly what we have of late been led to suppose, or the causes which have interfered with their action on so large a scale and in so decided a manner deserve to be carefully investi- gated. Could Ireland be rendered prosperous, contented, and loyal as Wales, could the Irish be clothed, and edu- cated, and inspired with the same hopeful industry as the Welsh, no greater boon could befall the Empire. And, it may be added, could the Welsh be made to observe certain laws of moral conduct as sacredly as do the poor peasantry of laws of moral conduct as sacredly as do the poor peasantry of Ireland, it would likewise be a gain to the virtue of the world. Whether we are to look for the cause of the differ- ence in the wrongs and miseries of past ages or in the existing economical, political, or religious conditions of the two countries, is therefore a problem fairly claiinin, the attention of every thoughtful Englishman. The chief //resent differences between Wales and Ireland I (which ought to be borne in mind, but on which we shall not further touch in this paper) are as follows Ireland is ultra-Catholic, Wales ultra-Protestant. Wales has an Established Church which is not the Church of the masses. The Church of Ireland has been disestablished. The land of Ireland is chiefly held by men of Saxon race. The landowners of Wales are still very generally Welshmen by blood and sentiment. Wales possesses innumerable mines and quarries all over the country, holding out bribes to speculation and keeping the wages of labour exceed- ingly high. Ireland, being almost exclusively an agri- cultural country with little industry except the linen trade, there exist few opportunities of fortune-making, and the wages of labour are proportionately small. Finally, while Ireland has gone in a vicious circle, her wrongs and suffer- ings creating a class of agitators, and agitation preventing the development of the resources of the country, Wales has had few wrongs and no agitators jealousy has been out of question between the small and poor and the great and rich country; and patriotism has assumed the harmless form of enthusiasm for the national language, music, and monuments. Instead of a Home Rule meeting, there is an Eisteddfod. Preliminary to any parallel between the Welsh and Irish nations it is to be remarked en passant that, while both have vvell-marked characteristics, the smaller and geographically less isolated country is more distinctly individualised "nd keeps closer to its traditions than the large island, [f, for example we take Language as a test of sustained nationality, we find the old Cymraeg" to this day both the spoken and written language of the whole Principality; scarcely a Welshman, save a few of the upper classes, being ignorant of it, and about half the nation, it is sup- oosed—for no statistics exist—understanding no other tongue. Books in considerable numbers are yearly printed in Welsh, and a great many very popular and fairly-edited newspapers. Nor do the zealous Cambrians forsake their beloved language even when they cross the Atlantic no less than fourteen journals, we are told, are published in Welsh in the United States and Canada. Pretty nearly the converse of all this holds good respect- ng Ireland. [ have been favoured by the Registrar- :"n",)1 of Ireland, Mr. Burke, with calculations founded on the admirable returns prepared under his edon awl that of his predecessor Mr. Donnelly, from whence the following facts come to light :— In the year lStil, 19.1 per cent, of the population of Ire- ,>nd spoke Irish, namely 1,105,536 persons. In the year ,¡I thi-; proportion had sunk to 15 T of the population, VB dy, to 817,875 persons. Thus it appears that the use if the Irish language is dying out at the rate of more than ".HO,000 persons in ten years a fact made still more obvious IV another table, showing that during the ten years in piestion the proportion of ages had changed still more narkeclly than the numbers of speakers. The younger generation are all learning English, and only the parents etain the use of their native tongue. How many persons tan read and write in Irish as well as speak it I do not mow; but the number must be very small, as is certainly dio that of the publications of any kind in the Irish language issuing from the press of recent years. Of an Irish newspaper I have never heard. Next to Language perhaps we may place Music as a feature of distinctive nationality ;§ and he; e again the Welsh hold their own most tenaciously. The exquisite old Irish airs, wild and melancholy with the sadness wherewith Nature sweeps the organ of the autumn woods and wintry waves, or simply joyous like the song of the and wintry waves, or simply joyous like the song of the thrush, this rich treasure of melody-where is it now to be found save bound up with Moore s tinsel verses in the volumes printed fifty years ago in London ? There may be districts in Ireland where the peasants still sing their own music, but it has never happened to the present writer to hear them whereas every man, woman, and child in Wales seems to know and to be able to sing remaritablj well a whole repertory of the line old martial national airs Nothin" is more common in passing a mountain cottage than to hear the March of the Men of Harlech" or "Arlivd y Nos" in the voice of the young farmer or his wife at their work, or of a group of the lovely Welsh children playing round the door. In Dress again the Welsh have kept longer to their national costume than the Irish. The red cloak has utterly disappeared from the grey Irish landscape which it once brightened; and even before the cloak, the reu petticoat vanished that once famous red petticoat whica formed the theme of one of the oldest and quaintest of the national ditties—grotesque enough and yet pathetic too. But even yet about one Welshwoman in fifty (bless her ') wears the dear old high crowned broad-brimmed beaver hat, the tidy white cap, the cotton bed-gown, and the short stout linsey petticoat, leaving free the agile foot and ancle cased in strong shoes and home-made worsted stock- ings. To see one of these women at seventy and even eighty years of age, carrying a bundle of sticks or half a sack of potatoes, or any such "unconsidered trifle, on her back, or walking straight up a mountain like the side of a house, knitting all the way, and never pausing to taico breath or else digging away in her garden, and wheeling about huge loads of soil or gravel, is to behold a spectacle of vigour and cheerfulness for which it will take a world of reading, writing, and arithmetic to compensate when the stuffy school and the love of vulgar finery learnt tnere shall have made it altogether a thing of the past. Other particulars might be added, but those of Lan- guage, Music, and Dress I think suffice to prove that Welsh nationality is better preserved and more pro- nounced at the present day than the nationality of Ire- land. We may now proceed to draw our intended parallel between the recognised characteristics of the two nations, noticing the broad features of family likeness where they come into view, and the less accountable unlikeness which seems to prevail in nine points out of ten. Of course such a sketch might be made much more complete and instructive by including the other great brandies of the Celtic tree in our purview, G aelic, Breton, and Cornish. For such a task, however, a volume would be needed, not an article. Physically, it seems impossible to trace the cousinship between Welsh and Irish. Nothing in the form of head, countenance, or complexion betrays the fact. There are, of course, tall and short men in both countries, but no districts in Wales are inhabited by sucii dwarfs as people Connemara, or such Anakim as may be found in Tip- perary. In both countries the women have special claims to beauty, but Irish loveliness is always in the free and unconfined" genre of Nora Creina, while a "Maid of Merioneth" belongs to the well-braced, sure-footed, self- reliant typo, which might claim the eulogium of Ring Lemuel: "She girdeth her loins with strength, she strengtheiieth her arms." Unhappily, this grand figure, resembling the Tmsteycrina. in Rome, is becoming daily more rare. As to particular features, the beautiful Irish eye-grey, with long dark lashes, and with the lids deep set and well chiselled-an eye speaking mingled innocence, mirth, and tenderness, quite unmatched by any human orb—this loveliest eye has no analogue in the Welsh feature. On the other hand, the Irishman's frightful prognathous jaw, as seen in Munster and Connemara, is unknown in Wales as is also the coarse lip which, in a lesser degree, is likewise distinctive of the Milesian race. The question is surely curious, What has caused this difference in the physique of the two nations? Both have lived for ages on the same simple fare of oatmeal, milk, and potatoes (to which the Welsh now add endless tea- drinkings), under equally rainy skies. Yet while the Welshman is said to display the very same form of skull and delicacy of the muscular attachments which dis- tinguished his progenitors who dwelt in the Denbighshire caves in the Stone Age, in the society of the Bos Longi- frons and the wolf,t his Irish cousin has managed to in- troduce (or preserve ?) in the human countenance a mouth scarcely improved since the much remoter date when we were apes; and to forestall eyes which might beam be- neath our brows when we become angels. Pass we now upward to mental characteristics. Hero there is certainly some family likeness. There isanimble- ness about th0 wits of a Celt which gives him an advan- tage over a Saxon such as that possessed by a man with a stiletto over one with an unwieldy Excalibur—that is to say, a Celt of Wales or Ireland, for the Scotchman is as much slower than the Englishman, as the Welshman and Irishman are more rapi( I. The whole mental machinery of the Welsh and Irish seems better oiled than that of the Saxon. They catch an idea as a good player catches a shuttlecock; and the speaker is never called upon, in the ineffably tiresome way so common in England, to repeat his remark that his auditor may be enabled to swallow and digest it before lie reply. The retort comes sharp and quick as the snap of a revolver. Anger, pleasure, tears, and laughter follow the flash which gives occasion to them, and do not go on rumbling in English fashion three minutes afterwards. The Celt may deserve sometimes to be called indiscreet, wrong-headed, and scatter-brained; but no one would ever dream of applying to him the epithets of dullard, Boeotian, clodpdle, JlUmsk111l, 01' dunderhead. He may be silly, but is never beef-witted. As a consequence of this rapid consumption of ideas, Welshmen in particular are ready to be excited about everything, and, (ns always happens far away from the great centres of public interest,) more especially in local gossip. Their lively wits seem actually to famish for such pabulum. To hear the clatter of tongues when Welsh- man encounters Welshman on the road, or the still more animated buzz as of a whole swarm of bees, at a little railway station where a dozen passengers await the train, is to be reminded rather of the streets of Marseilles than of any English place of meeting, where a nod and a "good morning" are the utmost efforts of good fellow- ship. All this refers pre-eminently to Wales. In Ireland the energy for chatter is obviously less vehement, and the equally quick wits are conteut with reasonable intervals of silence. But the different pace of Celtic minds may there be no less traced by a comparison of the really delightful 1 intelligence of a school of Irish children with the heavi- ness and slowness of a similar and much better fed and clothed class, in any part of England, even in the great towns. I have often tested the ability of young Irish boys and girls, either to understand a piece of humour or to appreciate an act of heroism, or, generally, to take in any idea quite new to them and never yet failed of suc- cess. But the very same joke, or story, or new idea, pre- sented to very1 "sharp" English town boys has been ut- terly misunderstood. Imagination is a faculty which I suppose will on all hands be conceded pre-eminently to the Celtic race, and yet perhaps it would be more proper to credit it with the poetical temperament than with the actual power of imagination in its higher walks. The phrases, the ideas, the music, a thousand sweet wild-flower like ways of both Welsh and Irish, show that temperament, and distinguish it from the dull commonplace of the vulgar Saxon, very much as the names of the two conical moun- tains over the Bay of Dublin pertain to the Irish, who called them the "Gilded Spurs," jand to the English, who named them the Sugar Loaves." But when it comes to the creation of great poems, the Celt is certainly open to the sneering question whereby illogical persons have supposed that the claims of women to political rights might be dismissed Where is your Iliad, your Macbeth, Your soul-wrought victories? The kind heavens will preserve me, I trust, from the audacity of attempting to form an estimate of the rank justly belonging to Celtic poetry compared to the master- pieces of Greece, India, Italy, Germany, and England, but I have never heard the most enthusiastic Welshman claim for Dafydd ap Gwilym himself a place much above Chaucer and one point at all events is patent, that the merits of Erse and Cymric poetry is not of that solid kind which can bear translation, but depends in principal measure on the apt fulfilment of a number of arbitrary and intricate rules of rhythm and rhyme, whose shackles the higher class of poetic genius would hardly condescend to endure. In later centuries some millions of Irishmen and thousands of Welsh have spoken English. How does it chance, if either race have ueat poetic gifts, that we have no Welsh-English poetry at all, and in Ireland only a few spirited Fenian ballads, beside older poems which can scarcely be called national, since Goldsmith and Moore might as well have been cockneys? Why is there no Irish, or Welsh, Walter Scott, or Robert Burns ? Gibson made in marble the only Welsh poems I have ever seen which could convey the sense of beauty to the Saxon, and they were inspired very evidently by a muse whose birthplace was much nearer to Parnassus than to the bardic seat of genius-Cader Id lis. Again, it would be hard to define in what way aesthetic taste has been displayed (except in music) by either Celtic nation for ages back, since the days of the beautiful anti- que Irish jewellery. Certainly it is not exhibited in ar- chitecture. No uglier towns or houses than Irish ones exist in Europe and when the most has been made of the Rock of Cashel. and a very few other early ruins, and of the four or five fine classic buildings of the last century in Dublin, there is scarcely a relief from architectural hideousness from Cape Clear to the Causeway, unless in the modern mansions of the Anglo-Irish gentry undistin- guishable from those of England. Such a thing of beauty as a genuine old English cottage —brick, stone, or wooden, thatched, and rose-grown, such as may be seen by scores in Warwickshire, or Kent, or the New Forest—never yet came from Celtic hands. An Irish peasant or farmer, if he be left to himself, .without interference from his landlord, builds his house (even if he be well able to afford a good one) in the least pretty spot on his holding, and in a manner to render his materials, whether stone and -date, or mud and thatch, as little sightly as it is possible to be. As to the regular typical mud ("thil1, tl1er, is something about it absolutely sottish. Nor is the complacent squalor of the place ever relieved by a well-kept bit of flower-garden, or a few creepers over the walls, unless beneath the tyrannical rule of the neigh- bouring squire. Indoors, the furniture is simply the cheapest and commonest which can be made to serve the necessary use of bed, cupboard, chairs, and tables; and the works of art are confined to coloured prints, which may possibly fulfil some religious purpose, but assuredly do not meet any aesthetic want of human nature. Not even in dress do the Irish peasantry display any taste. A farmer going to market at Mullingar in his long, ill-made coat, whose tails, if the day be rainy, he is compelled to tiielc under his arms on either side to prevent them from dabbling his legs, is a spectacle of clumsiness at which it is scarcely possible to refrain from laughing, and even the charming beauty of Irish girls of all classes, fails often to obtain its due mead of admiration for want of better taste in its adornment. Poverty, of course, explains much; but the poverty of an Italian contadina, or the wife of a fellah Arab, is quite as great as that of most Irishwomen, and their dress renders even personal ugliness picturesque and graceful. The case against Welsh taste is not so strong. If the Cymry do not create beauty, they do not mar the beauty which nature spreads so richly around them. Their houses (of massive stone, in most parts of the country), with dormer windows breaking the outline, and latticed panes, have an aspect of durability, and even of dignity, which accords well with the landscape and almost invariably they are placed in good positions, backed by the heather- crowned hills, and with brooks babbling by the moss- grown walls of the little old orchard of plum and apple trees. Honeysuckles, wild roses, foxgloves, ferns, and ivy hang from every bush or nestle undisturbed beneath every Willi—and a painter could scarcely choose a lovelier scene than some of these mountain homesteads for a back- ground, and in front of them a group of the beautiful, re- fined-looking Welsh children, playing with the puppy or paidling i' the burn." AVitliin the cottage will be found two or three ancestral pieces of fine old oak furniture, dresser and coffer, and perchance a chair or bedstead, which, with the huge wide fireplace entirely relieves the ve poverty of the place from any aspect of sordidness. The dress of the inmates too, though far gone of late from the original admirable old costume, is never ragged, and is indeed in general only too soignd and expensive for the fortunes of the wearers, whose pride causes them to spend much more on their clothes than on their food. This matter of the commisariat is not to be altogether passed over in discussing the tastes of the Welsh and Irish, who equally regard it with ill-omened indifference. The stimulus to the industry of man and the housewifeliness of woman which a taste for good and varied food affords elsewhere, is absolutely wanting in Ireland' and Wales; and in the latter country even well-to-do farmers live on a miserable diet of everlasting tea and exceedingly bad bread. Indifferent butter, abominably ill-cured bacon, and herrings salted always a day too late and never eaten fresh at aU, seem to afford their only and rarely admitted luxuries. Nor can those whose business it is to cater for English tra- vellers in Wales be by any means induced to ray proper attention to securing vegetables and fruits, and better meat than the wretchedly ill-fed mutton, which enjoys an alto- gether fictitious reputation, on the strength of the very diffei-ent Welsh mutton fattened for the table of private gentlemen or for the London market. Till Welsh inn- keepers and lodging-house keepers mend their ways in this respect, they must be contented to limit their cus- tomers to persons who are willing to practice a good deal of mortification of the flesh during their scenery-hunting, and to pay for it too as if they were dwelling among the flesh-pots of Clifton, Bournemouth, or Brighton. In many pretentious "Welsh hotels it is usual to behold four or five dishes set out for luncheon on an imposing long table, every one of them consisting of the last remains of a joint of cold mutton in a state which would scarcely be presented in an English servants' hall. Of other food of any kind—non c' L Surely it is idle to go on talking of the peculiar festhetic capacities of two nations who have never possessed any national art, except music, and whose houses, dress, tables and gardens display less taste and care even than those of the confessedly poorly-endowed Saxon ? So far as Imagination creates superstitious fears and fancies, both Welsh and Irish notoriously exhibit it freely, but the guess may be hazarded that the prevailing Calvinism of the Principality has given it the graver complexion which it therein seems to wear. Ghosts still appear constantly all over Wales, and (according to a by- gone fashion, of which they ought to be ashahied) always leave behind them an odouv of brimstone after their appa- ritions while birds of evil omen (kittiwakes and curlews especially) screaming at night round a house are regarded with unaffected dread and abhorrence. i Irish imagination, though it has called up the banshee and an abundance of hereditary curses, revels chiefly in more riante dreams—the Leprachaun and Phuca (Puck); the beautiful invisible Island of St. Brandan in the far Atlantic; the towers of the submerged city beneath Lough Neagh and the endless droll legends of the giant Fin McCoul. As regards Humour, it would appear that both Welsh and Irish Celts (notably not Scotch ones) have vastly quicker and keencr sense of wit and fun than any class of Saxons, short of the most intellectual and cultivated of all. But, though the Welsh peasant knows a joke the moment he sees it (which is much more than can be said of his English brothers), and is a merry fellow in his own way, it is. very rare indeed to hear from him any such l)ons mots as may be freely gathered from an Irishman's discourse. To bamboozle a Manchester tourist by selling him a hawk as a Welsh parrot and in a court of justice to turn the tables on an overbearing cross-examining barrister, who was sneering at the witness for carrying turf in a sack, by the rejoinder that it was "always carried so formerly at T." (the parvenu barrister's native pbce-the Nazareth of the Principality, from whence no good thing can come); these are jests in the true Welsh spirit. It will be seen at a glance how widely they differ from the pure fun of Hibernia: such jokes, for example, as that of the car-driver whom the prim and elderly Eng- lish governess engaged for an hour," and who replied to the obnoxious stipulation, "Ah, thin, Ma'am, and won't ye take me for life ?" Or the priest who, when consulted by a parochial sceptic about the nature of miracles, gave the man a kick, and asked him, Did he feel it ? In coorse I did," responded the injured inquirer. "Well then, remember this It would have been a mimdeif you did not." §

Pelagius = Morgan (Sea-born) being one ot the most eminent. t See .Mr. Boyd Dawkins* charming book on Cave Hunting. This observation of the superior qualities of the Welsh in- tellect is as old as the days of that great light of the Principality Giraldns Canibrensis. Ho says of his countrymen These people being of a sharp and acute intellect, and "gifted with a rich and powerful understanding, excel in whatever studies they pursue, and are more quick and cunning than the other inhabitants of a western climate."—Itinerary,edit. 1SGG, p. 296. § Another good typical instance of Irish wit bas never to my knowledge been properly recorded. A certain Pat Callaghan had stolen and eventually killed and eaten a pig belonging to a Widow Maloney. On hearing of his crime, his priest severely rebuked the offender, and set before him a fearful picture of the Judgment Day. And there'll be the Judge in front, and to wan side the Widow Maloney, and the pig in the middle, and you foremost her, and what will ye say thin, Pat Callaghan Did your Reverence say the pig would he to the fore '<" Well, yes, sure it will be-to testify agin ye—and what will you have to say for yourself?" "I'll say, plaze your Reverence, Widow Maionoy, take your pig (To be concluded in our next.)

FFESTINIOG. STOICUYDD.—Er's llawer o fIynydtLu, ni bu em cymyd- o.iaethau yn fwy o fangre stormydd, gwlawogydd, &c., d s na'r wythnos ddiweddaf, yn enwedig nos Fercher a nos Sadwrn. Er i adeiladau ddioddef, da genym grybwyllna ddigwyddodd damwain i neb dynol. RHEILFFOKDD FFESTINIOG.—Dydd Sadwrn aeth cer- bydres foreuol o'r ffordd ar y llinell uchod yn y twnel ger- llaw Tanygrisiau. Lluddiwyd y cymundeb am oriau lawer, a gwnaeth gryn atalfa ar drosglwyddiad llechau i Port- madog, ond da genym etc hysbysu na ddigwyddodd damwain i neb, yr hyn sydd braidd yn hynocl. Y LONDON A'R NOlrrH WESTEUX.—JParha y Cwmni uchod i weithio gyda bywiogrwydd ar y llinell newydd. Hvsbysir ni y dcehreuir yn ddioed ar yr orsaf fawr yng nghors Glanypwll, gerllaw Marclinadfa y Blaenau. Tawel iawn mae yn ymdcLmgos yw Cwmni y Great Western gyd a'u llinell hwy o gyfeiriad y Bala. LLYS YjtCHWtLiADOii.—Dydd Gwener diwecldaf cyn- haliwyd llys ymchwiliadol (court of enquiry) i'r gwrth- wynebiadau i ddefnyddiad dwfr Llyn y Morwynion at wasanaeth y plwyf. Bwriedir hefyd apelio am £ 8,000 at wneud y gwaith dwfr ynghyda phrynu yr un presenoi sydd yn Llan Ffestiniog. Ar ran y Lly wodraeth daeth Air. Smith, C.E., a chynhaliodd y llys yn Pengwem Arms. Yr unig dclau Gwmni a ddaeth ymlaen i wrthwynebu ydoedd gynrychiolvvyr Bron'rerw a Lletygwilym. Deallwn ddarfod i berchenogion y Bwrdd Iechydol gytuno i dalu £ 2 10s. y flwyddyn fel ardreth yn hytraeh na galw eto am lys cyflafareddol. Diau genym yr edrycha y trethdal- vvyr ar y swiri yn uchel. Daw ateb Mr. Smith, neu y Llywodraeth, eto i law, a chawn, o bosibl, fanylu yr adeg hono. Ond nid oes un amheuaeth na bydd yn gadarnhaol, yr hyn a alluoga y Bwrdd i fyned ymlaen gyda y gwaith dwfr. Bydd hyn, pan y daw oddi amgylch, yn fendith neiilduol i IJlwyf Ffestiniog.—Cofnodydd.

DINAS MAWDDWY. FATAT, GUN Accil)ENT.-On Monday, November 19, a fatal accident befel a young man, aged 18, named Richard Griffiths, son of Owen Griffiths, farmer, Troedyrhiw. It appears he had a gun in his pocket, and being desirous of evading the collectors for the British and Foreign Bible Society, he got out through a window, when the gun went off, killing him instantaneously. On Wednes- day, November 21, an inquest was held at the Troedy- rhiw, before Mr. G. J. Williams, coroner, and a respect- able jury, Mr. R. P. Jones (mayor) being fore iii -an. -John Jones, sworn, said-I live at Tyceinant. I knew the de- ceased. I was with him last Monday at the Groes, in the parish of Llanymawddwy. I was there at work. He came in at about 3 p.m. He only remained a short time. He spoke to me. He said This is the way I shall go, Jack." He went out through the window. There was no gap in. It was open the same as the door. I did not see a gun. I heard a shot. Deceased was on the ground, and I found he was dead. The stock was not attached to the gun. The shot penetrated the head under the left ear. The verdict returned was to the effect that the de- ceased was accidentally killed by a gun going off while in his pocket.

Packet Teas in perfection.—POLAND, KOI!!TS()> tte Co's. Pure Teas, Guaranteed by Government Inspcction can be ob- tained in air-tight packets in quantities ranging from Two Ounces to One Pound, of most respectable Grocers, Chemists, Bakers, Confectioners, Stationers and others, in all towns and villages throuiihout the United Kingdom, at prices from 2s. per lb., and upwards. Tiie public are respectfully requested to ask for Poland, Robertson, & Co.'s Puro Teas, which are guaranteed to be unadulterated. An 81b. Tin of Pure Tea sent carriage paid to any Railway Station in the United Kingdom on Receipt of Post Office Order. For particulars ?f agency apply to the London Warehouses, Curtain Road, K C. HOLT.OWAY'S OINTMENT AND PILLS.-Abscesses, Erysi- pelas, Piles.—Unvarying success attends all who treat these diseases according to the simple printed directions, wrapped round each pot and box. They are invaluable to the young and timid, whose bashfulness sometimes en- dangers life. A little attention, moderate perseverance, and trifling expense will enable the most diffident to con- duct any case to a happy issue without exposing secret in- firmities to any one. The Ointment arrests the spreading inflammation, restrains the excited vessels, cools the over- heated skin, alleviates throbbing and smarting pains, and gives great ease. The same directions also clearly point out when and how Holloway's Pills are to be taken, that their purifying and regulating powers may assist by ad- justing and strengthening the constitution. BUSINESS ADDRESSES. ABERYSTWYTH. RELIANCE HOUSE, GREAT DARKGATE STREET, (OppoitTthTlMe^^arketX WILLIAM" PROBIN, BWORIdNG LAPIDARY, JEWELLER, AND SILVERSMITH, I BEGS to inform the Gentry, Inhabitants, and Visitors of Aberystwyth, that he lias now on hand a well- -L' selected Stock of Diamond Rings, Wedding Rings, Signet Rings, and Gem Rings. Bright and coloured Gold I J ewellery, in all its branches, made upon the premises. Every article warranted. Aiso a large Stock of Whitby Jet r?' Oak Ornaments. Old Cxold and Silver purchased. WiiolesaleandReta.il Dealer in New and Second-hand Plate. I JOHN ROBERTS, I GOGERDDAN ARMS, AND LION ROYAL HOTEL, ABERYSTWYTH.. WINE AND SPIRIT STORES, 1, BRIDGE STREET, (Round the Corner.) A First class Smoke Room, and the Largest Billiard Room in Wales. PRICE LIST: WINES. PER BOTTLE. s. d. s. d. s. (I. frine Old Claret 2 0.2 6 to 3 G Port 3 0 to 5 0 Sherry .2 0 to 4 0 Champagnes 5 0 to 6 0 Moet and Chandon's .0 0 to 7 0 Hock, Chablis, Burgundy, Moselle, ) The finest Brands are and all other Wines j sold at lowest prices Good Cigars 12s. per 100 I Foreign Eine ditto 16s. Forei,, ick. Ditb-a splendid'bold Cigar for smoking in or out of doors 14s. per box. (These are really a splendid Cigar.) SPIRITS. PER BOTTLB. Fine Old Brandy, Pale or Brown 3 6 to 4 6 MarteH's. 4 6 to 5 6 Fine Old Irish Whiskey 3 0 to 3 6 t,, Scotch ditto .3 0 to 3 6 Very Fine Jamaica Rum .2 6 to 3 9 Finest Imported ditto .3 0 to 3 6 Best London Gin 2 3 to 2 6 Ditto Hollands .3 0 to 3 6 Those who appreciate a glass of good Scotch Toddy should try my Mountain Dew—it is really a treat out of Scotland Pale Ale in Bottles 4s. per doz. Duhlin Stout ditto 4s. Burton Bitter and Mild Ales in 9 and 18 gallon casks at Brewer's Prices. oarriap-o naid. -0 .r' N.B.-Families are respectfully informed that none but good sound Wines and Spirits are sold at The Lion. POSTING IN ALL ITS BRANCHES. GOOD HORSES AND STEADY POST BOYS. A Break leaves the Hotel every morning at 9.30 a.m., for Devil's Bridge. Fare, 4s. ELLIS AND OWEN, ABERYSTWYTH PLAIN AND ENAMEL SLATE AND MARBLE WORKS, 1 MANUFACTURERS of Enamelled and Plain Shite Chimney Pieces, Baths, Cisterns, Milk Coolers Headstones, Urinals, Manners, Cattle Troughs, Dairy, Larder, and Wine Cellar Shelves; Window Sjlfa' Door Steps, Hearth Stones, Flooring, Skirtings, and every description of Plain and EnameUed Slate Work. CRESTS, &c., ENAMELLED ON KEYSTONES OF CHIMNEY PIECES. Designs of every description executed to order. An Artist sent to take Views when required. Ilfij The First Prize for Slate Carving was awarded to this Firm, both at the Chester Exhibition (1866), and the Carmarthen Exhibition (1867), of the National Eisteddfod of Wales. DAVID ELLIS, IRONMONGER, 7 Shots. I1, Gunpowder. 1] V Caps. Jj HAS in stock best ELECTRO PLATE and CUTLERY, and also ROYAL DAYLIGHT LAMP OIL, and all kinds of J31\, U AT DAYID ELLIS'S, Ironmonger (Opposite tiie Police Station), Abeiystivytli. /f Lamps. I I Lamps. J t V Lamps. J I THOMAS ELLIS, If DRAPER AND MERCER (OPPOSITE THE POST OFFICE), TERRACE-ROAD, ABEBYSTWYTH. SPECIAL ATTENTION SHOWN TO THE HOSIERY DEPARTMENT. CUFFS & COLLARS SCARFS TIES, RIBBONS, LACES, AND HABERDASHERY. NOTE THE ADDRESS! OPPOSITE THE posr OFFICE. ') .J.!J ..['\J.J.I.J.j .)WI l.J D ROBERT ELLIS, 7 J PHARMACEUTICAL CHEMIST (FROM PICCADILLY,- LONDON), PRESCRIPTIONS DISPENSED. FAMILY RECEIPTS ACCURATELY MADE UP. TERRACE ROAD (FOUR DOORS FROM THE MARINE TERRACE). T POWELL & CO., I v i MARKET-STREET, ABERYSTWYTH, H ARE NOW OFFERING HARRIS'S WILTSHIRE SMOKED BACON, CHEDDAR AND OTHER CHEESE. AND A SELECT STOCK OF FIRST CLASS GROCERIES. í t -f r JAMES McILQUHAM, BRIDGE END HOUSE, ABERYSTWYTH. í t WHOLESALE and Retail Dealer in all kinds of EARTHENWARE, GLASS, CHINA, BIRMINGHAM tY and SHEFFIELD GOODS, &c., &c. Goods Let out on Hire. An experienced Packer kept. SACKS, OIL SHEETS AND TARPAULINGS, a Large Stock always on hand. MILLINERY ESTABLISHMENT, j 3, LITTLE DARK GATE-STREET, ABERYSTWYTH, HAS just received her Winter Fashions in MILLINERY, FELT HATS and BONNETS, CHILDRFNX PELISSE COSTUMES, ULSTERS, FROCKS, HATS, &c. i HOSIERY, HABERDASHERY, RIBBONS, LACE, FEATHERS, FLOWERS, BERLIN WOOLS &c., &c. | ESTABLISHED IN THE YEAR 1820. WILLIAM JULIAN, WHOLESALE: AND RETAIL GROCER, TEA, COFFEE, PROVISION AND FLOUR DEALER, 10, NORTH PARADE, ABERYSTWYTH. A constant supply of First-CIass Australian Preserved Meats, Labrador Salmon, Lobstc -3, Sardines, &c. HOME-CURED BACON AND HAMS. A CONSTANT SUPPLY OF CROSSE AND ELACIvWELL'S GOODS. — -—— —- -.TV MACHYNLLETH. 1 T A /CELEBRATED WELSH GRIPE POWDER FOR HORSES, Is. Gd. per Bottle. Also GRIPE \J MIXTURE FOR HORSES, 2s. Gd. per Bottle. ALTERATIVE AND CONDITION POWDERS FOR HORSES, Is. Per packet. Prepared only by JOHN THOMAS, Chemist, Machynlleth. Directions accompany each bottle and Sole Agent for LONG'S SCAB LOTION for Sheep. — A certain mire for Scab. "'77 OSWJSSTRY, *——• THE BIDDULPTI VALLEY COAL COMPANY^ ) ARE PREPARED TO SUPPLY BEST WREXHAM AND WELSH WALL'S END COALS IN TRUCK LOADS, AT FOLLOWING PRICES:- Best Welsh Station. Wrexham, Wall's End, per ton. per ton. I;} M- Llandinara 14s. 9d ^(J- Dolwen 15s. Id lbs. (k1. Llanidloes 15s. ^d. Caersws 15s-7d 17s-0d- Llanbrynmair o ■ Best Welsh i Station. Wrexham Wall's End P Per ton. pep ton. Ceinmes Road ). 1nl Machynlleth f los- 10d 17s. 3d. All stations south of i Machynlleth to Aber- > IGs. 2d 17a, 7d. ) All stations south of Machynlleth to Aber- 16s. 2d. 17a, 7d. ) ystwyth and Towyn J Prices for other stations not mentioned above forwarded on application. j WIGAN, STAFFORDSHIRE, AND SOUTH WALES COALS AT MARKET PRICES. Orders to be addressed to the Secretary, MR. EDWD. LLOYD, COMPANY'S OFFICE, 1, HERBERT^VILLAS, OSWESTRY JULY, 1877. I In consequence of spurious imitations of J 0 LEA AND PERRINS' SAUCE, I which are calculated to deceive the Public, Lea and Perrins have adopted A NEW LABEL, bearing their Signature, thus, ( which is placed on every bottle of WORCESTERSHIRE "J SA UCE, and without which none is genuine. t4V Sold Wholesale by the Proprietors, Worcester; Crosse and Blackwell, London; and Export Oilmen generally. Retail, by dealers in sauces throughout the World.