Welsh Gazette and West Wales Advertiser

NOTICE.—This column is devoted to better thoughts for quiet moments. ray, the wiles of Art, the grasp of Power, snatch the rich relics of a well-spent hour ? These, when the trembling spirit wings her flight, Pour round her path a stream of living light. ROGERS.

To conquer our own fancies, our own lusts, and our ambition, in the sacred name of duty, this is to be truly brave ui-d truly strong. KINGSLEY. ♦ The true man is one who will neither seek an indirect advantage by a specious word, not take an evil path to secure a good purpose. Marcus Aurelius used to say he would not part with the little learning he had acquired for all the gold in the world; and that he had more glory from what he had read and written, than from all the victories he had won, and all the realms he bad conquered. if History often forgets, and the people continually forget, how trivial and how insufficient is generally the cause of war. A free press is just as necessary for political liberty as free air is for our natural lives. I have not the slightest regard for that states- manship which is divorced from the morality which we say ought to guide us in our private life, which we gather for a nation as for individuals from the religion which we profess. JOHN BRIGHT.

♦ Patient Toil. There's no royal road to greatness, Men must ever clime to fame All the wealth in misers' coffers Wouldn't buy a deathless name. Is a noble goal before you, Would you great achievements dare 1 Brother, then be up and doing; Brother! you must Win and Wear. Toil and labour never stopping Till you make the prize your own For you know this constant dropping Wears away the hardest stone. Never slack sublime endeavour, Nor midst cheerless toil despair If you rise above your fellows, Brother! you must Win and Wear. 'Tis the lesson Nature teaches All throughout her wide domain," And the text from which she preaches Is that labour leads to gain. Moral worth and honest merit, Brighter crowns than monarch wear, These you never can inherit; Brothers J these you Win and Wear. FRANCIS.

+. Culture for All. Taste, if it mean anything but a paltry con- noisseurship must mean a general susceptibility to truth and nobleness; a sense to discern, and a heart to love and reverence all beauty, order, good- ness, wheresoever or in whatsoever forms and accompaniments they are to be seen. This surely implies, as its chief condition, not any given external want or situation, but a finely gifted-mind, purified into harmony with itself, into keenness and justness of vision above all, kindled into love and admiration. Is culture of this sort found exclusively among the higher ranks ? We believe it proceeds less from without than within in every rank. The charms of Nature, the majesty of man, the infinite loveliness of truth and virtue, are not hidden from the eye of the poor; but from the eye of the vain, the corrupted, and self-seeking, be he poor or rich. In old ages, the humble minstrel, a mendicant, arid lord of nothing but his harp and his own free soul, had intimations of those glories; while to the proud baron in his barbaric halls they were unknown. CARLYLE.

lWhat are We Doing ? L Heroes have fought, and warriors bled, For home, and love, and glory Your life and mine will soon be sped, Then what will be the story ? Shall it be said when all is o'er, And justice must be meted— We every means of good ignored, Its worthy ends defeated ? Our talents, meant, for active use, Have dormant lain or hidden Nay even worse, were oft employed On objects most forbidden. With opportunities for good I And ample means of doing, T'would be a wretched fate indeed If such should be our ruinL On every hand where'r we turn, A thousand claims are pressing; Shall we for aye ignore the call- For aye withhold the blessing. i Methinks the Master's voice I bear, My friends, be up and doing, 'Twill need the best attempts of all To save the world from ruin. 'Tis not the time to idly wish,^ Your talents more, or better Use well the one, these vain regrets Your efforts do but fetter. "If well employed, one gift at first, To five or more may grow And in the end. when counted up, A good result will show." He simply bids us do our best, No matter great or small, And if 'tis well and truly done, Will so reward it all. I Then let us list to duty's call, And bravely do our best; Assured 'twill then more easy grow, And bring a sweeter rest. JAMES RUSHTON.

The Economy of Time. Many persons, seeing me so much engaged in active life, and as much about the world as if I had never been a student, have said to me, When do you get the time to write all your books? How on earth do you contrive to do so much work ?' I I shall perhaps surprise you by the answer I make-- the answer is this I contrive to do so much, by never doing too much at a time.' A man to get through work well must not overwork himself—or if he do too much to-day, the re-action of fatigue will come, and he will be obliged to do too little to-morrow. Now since I began really and earnestly to study, which was not till I had left college and was actually in the world, I may perhaps say that I have gone through as large a course of general reading as most men of my time. I have travelled much—I have mixed much in politics and in the various business of life. and in addition to all this, I have published somewhere about sixty volumes, some upon subjects requiring much special research. And what time do you think, as a general rule, I have devoted to study-to reading and writing ? Not more than three hours a day, and when Parliament is sitting, not always that. But then during those hours I have given my whole attention to what I was about." LYTTON.

«» The Present Age. Let me consider now what I owe to the advanced industry of the present age. I lodge in & house that aff jrds me conveniences and comforts which even a king could not command some centuries ago. There are ships crossing the seas in every direction to bring what is useful to me from all parts of the earth. In China men are gathering the tea-leaf for me in America they are planting cotton for me; in. the West India Islands they are preparing my sugar and my coffee; in Italy they are feeding silkworms for me; in Saxony they are shearing the sheep t o make me clothing: at home powerful steam engines are spinning and weaving for me, and making cutlery for me, and pumping the mines that minerals useful to me may be pro- cured. My patrimony was small, yet I have carriages running day and night to carry my correspondence. I have roads and railways, canal?, and bridges, to bear the coal for my winter fire; nay, I have protecting fleets and armies around my happy country to secure my enjoyments and repose. Then I have editors and printers, who daily send me an account of what is going on throughout the world, among all these people who serve me; and in a corner of my house 1 have books, the miracle of all my possessions, more wonderful than the Wishing-cap of the Arabian tales, for they trans- port me instantly, not only to all places, but to all times. ARNOTT.

Young Wales in London: A Plea. P.Y "PHILIP SIDNEY." 1 TW-id Price, by letter from Wales so runs an enirv by the Kev. Dr. Abraham Rees, in 1785, in the register of Old Jewry Chapel, London, the vellum and time stained pages of which have lain open to this week. What, does this entry mean ? Why has the ac- curate and methodical old minister been so careful to record it? It means nothing more and nothing less than that David Price had made his way to London from the Principality, and that he had carried with him in his wallet a letter of commendation from the minister of his chapel on some Welsh hill side, reconi mending him to the notice of Dr. Abraham Rees and his people in the busy and crowded city. To the Old Jewry Chapel then he had wended his steps, delivered his precious letter, been wel- comed with a true Welsh greeting, and had found a home from home in the religious community assembling for worship within the sound of Bow Bells. It is in the crying necessity for a general and ex- tensive carrying out of this old practice-formerly y so common—that I find a theme to say a much needed word to my readers this week. The more I increase my acquaintance with the highways and bye-ways of London, the oftener I find my steps leading me to some of its less frequented streets, the better in fact I learn my London, the greater is my conviction of the very large part which Welsh men and women occupy in its life. On all sides Welsh names abound-nearly 20 closely printed columns of the Directory are given up to the family of Jones alone-the platform at Euston, on the arrival of a popular priced trip from Cardiganshire resounds with the language said to have been spoken in the garden of Eden—everywhere is evidence that the Welsh- man has come to stay in London. Now what generally happens when a young man leaves his home in Wales to make his fortune in London ? In nine cases out of ten he goes up knowing gome one already gone on before, who perhaps meets him, or perhaps not, at the station. He goes to lodgings, or lives in with the firm which employs him. All is strange, terribly strange, all so unlike the one street of his native village, on all sides strange faces. Sunday comes he thinks he'd like to go to some church or chapel, as has been his wont. He knows not where to go; he has no letter of introduction from his minister at home to one in London; he is stranded. Terribly dull and lonely is a City Sunday to such an one; he cannot stay in doors all the day, he must find some place to go, something to do to break the monotony of his week's work. Is it to be wondered at then, reader mine, that he sinks instead of rising ? Of course there are numbers of young men in such positions who are well looked after, who have friends to whom they can go, and whose ministers at home in Cardigan- shire have taken the precaution to get them intro- duced to other ministers of their pursuation to London. But the fact remains that some 4,000 young Welshmen and women annually migrate to London and that 3,000 are not absorbed into any of the organised Welsh Congregations. And much of this lamentable state of things might be prevented by a few hearty lines from one brother minister to another. Not a man or a woman should leave any con- gregation in Wales for a London situation without carrying in the pocket such a letter of commenda- tion. And I go further and say that no minister in the Principality should wait until he is asked for such a letter, but that he should make it his business to write such an introduction and personally give it to John or Mary bound for London town, and not rest until he had written a second letter and posted it to the brother minister, telling him that such a son or daughter of one of his congregation is leaving for London, and urging him to meet the traveller on arrival, or at least to call the day after; in fact to interest himself in the welfare and happiness of the latest Welsh arrival. Shall I be told that we ministers are too busy to be bothered like this ? I reply it is our first busi- ness to give our time and thought to the young ones of our congregations. Committees, and school boards, and guardians, and district councils, im- portant as they are, take a second place in matters of this kind. Our congregations which pay us for ministering to them—I am putting the matter, I fear, very plainly, but I can't wrap it up-are the first calls upon our time, and God knows, this emigration of Welsh to London is now of such proportions that we dare not--if we are to be true to our highest ideals—leave any step ifte can take untrodden in seeing that the young people committed to our charge shall not go up to town without some com- mendation to a trustworthy person. And it is because I have seen the crying need of a thorough and complete adoption of this course of procedure that 1 venture to urge it as strongly as I can upon all ministers and congregations through- out the Principality, and more especially in our own home counties around Aberystwyth. If a young person, fortified with such a letter, and looked after by a London minister at the beginning, does disappear and sink in the deep stream, or be landed upon the sand-bank of life's wreckages and failures, then the consciences of both country and city ministers are clear. They could do no more. Do they always so much? As the years go on, and the struggle for more Secuirics more and more acute in London, it is doubly incumbent, upon all parents and minis- prs to see that no young person starts a career without some such a safeguard as that for which I plead. Think of the agony a mother in some lonely cottage by Cardigan Bay, or in some Teify farm- stead often feels when no news comes to her from her boy up here in a situation, no letter from her girl away in service in the West End no one look- ing after them what are they doing 7 She can but pray all is well, and wait. Happy for her if indeed all be well; if her boy be not in bookmakers hands, her girl walking Picadilly." Once stranded here in London, no friends, no real home, no one in whom to be interested, no one to love you, no one to help you, there can be nothing worse for any young man or woman. The loneliness of the never-ceasing crowds- always fair day as the old Welsh woman phrased it-the hurrying to and fro, the struggle for wealth and power and position, the treading down of the weak, the simple, the pure and the beautiful, have but to be seen to be fully realized. And once realized no minister will fail to take a personal and individual interest in every mem- ber of his flock who bends steps to town, and no young person will come up without a letter of com- mendation to some faithful friend. Readers, one and all, because these things are so —and I have purposely abstained from painting my picture in too dark colours-I have written of them. May we read, mark, learn and ACT.

CARDIGAN. DEATH—Early on Monday Mr Owen Williams, of Biongwyn Mawr, died suddenly, it is supposed from apoplexy. He was in town on Saturday tran- sacting business. Mr Williams was a former sur- vevor to the District Council, and was deputy registrar of births and deaths. He was recently placed on the commission of the peace. In politics Mr Williams was a Conservative, and was a deacon at Verwig Baptist Chapel. He leaves a widow and one daughter.

Cardiganshire Main Roads Committee. A quarterly meeting of the main roads and bridges committee (Northern Division) of the Cardiganshire County Council was held on Monday last at the Town Hall, Aberystwyth, Mr. David Jenkirrs presiding. There were also present: Messrs. Joseph Parry, Goginan; John Jones, Taliesin; J. E. James, Aberystwyth Henry Bonsall, Bow Street; Edward "11a Florida; Charles Davies, Liangeitho; Thomas Morgan, Ysbytty Ystwyth; D. J. Williams, Tregaron; David Davies, Llanddewi; Edward Jones, Talybont; William Evans, Cwmrheidol; Evan Richards, Llanfihangel; the Mayor and D. C. Roberts, Aberystwyth; Benjamin Jones, Llanilar; J. M. Williams, Borth; Evan Jones, Llanrhystyd; T. Mason Jones, Ysbytty Ystwvth; and William Evans, Llanfihangel; with Mr. H. C. Fryer (clerk), and Mr. Roderick Lloyd (surveyor). ROAD MAINTENANCE. The County Surveyor presented a summary of ex- penditure incurred during the quarter ended Dec. 30th last in the maintenance of roads in the division, which showed that the cost was P,553 Os 2d over a length of 115 miles, 890 yards. CLASSIFICATION OF ROADMEN. At the last meeting of the County Council it was decided that the roadmen be placed in classes by the surveyors, and be paid rates of wages according to their qualifi- cations and merits. This proposal was now con- sidered by the committee, and it was decided, on the motion of Alderman Evan Richards, seconded by Mr. T Mason Jones, that the surveyor place the roadmen in classes. It was further resolved that the question be referred to the executive com- mittee to consider after receiving from Mr. Lloyd (surveyor) a report as to the classes and wages he would suggest, and that that committee report to the next meeting of this .committee. DEVIL'S BRIDGE. The report of sub-committee upon the plans of the iron work for the Devil's Bridge was presented, and on the motion of Mr. Henry Bonsall, seconded by Alderman C. M. Williams, it was re- solved that the report be adopted. The Committee considered the plans and estimate of cost of the new bridge to be erected at Llanilar. These were approved of, and it was decided the cost should not exceed £350. It was also resolved to thank rr. Loxdale for his generosity in giving the land required to widen the bridge. MAESBANGOR BRIDGE. A deputation was received from the Aber- ystwyth Rural District Council in reference to this bridge. Amended plans were produced, the estimate of the cost being E142. On the proposition of Mr. H. Bonsall, seconded by Mr. T. Mason Jones, it was decided that the plans be submitted to the surveyor to report to the County Council. FORESHORE AT BORTH. A communication which Colonel Fielden, Bortli, had received from Messrs. Case and Gray, London, was read. It stated they had pleasure in reporting that good progress bad been made in the improve- ment of the foreshore by means of the nine groynes erected in the summer of 1898. The foreshore generally had improved in gradient and stability. It was advisable to complete the original scheme of 16 groynes, spaced 200 feet apart, as the length of shore over which the nine existing groynes were distributed, could be adequately improved only by this reason. And it was of immediate importance that the two short groynes should be extended sea- wards to the length to which they were originally designed. On the motion of Alderman C. M. Williams, seconded by Mr. E. H. James, it was decided that the letter be referred to the county surveyor to report upon the matter to the next meeting, and get an estimate of the cost from Mr. Case. STONE ^UUSHER. Mr. J. W. Szlumpey engineer of the M. & M. Railway, made application for the use of the County Council's stone crusher. It was resolved that the same be granted at the convenience of the surveyor, and at a charge of £1 per day, to include the services of engine driver and assistant. THE STEAM ROLLER. An application by Mr. D. J. Williams on behalf of the Tregaron Rural District Council the use of the steam roller, was granted at a charge of Zl per day. SURVEYOR'S QUARTERLY REPORT. The Surveyor's quarterly report was read as fol- lows :—" Gentlemen, I beg to submit to you my quarterly report up to the 30th of December last, together with the estimate of the sum required for the purpose of main roadsMn this division for the ensuing three months. The roads, on the whole, were in a fair condition considering the state of the weather. I beg to remind you to make good the damage caused to the main roads by the water streaming down from the line by the Rhy- dhir and Llanbadarn railway bridges, and at other places, which matter was reported to you twelve months ago. I regret that I have to inform you that the ancient bridge at Devil's Bridge is giving way, and if it was the wish of the Council to pre- serve it something must be done at once. Accord- ing to instructions from the Council concerning the classing of the roadmen, I am still of the same opinion as when I last reported the matter, that the workmen should be classed according to merit, but that the work was one of great difficulty. I estimate my quarterly expenses at £ 600.

Yachting in Cardigan Bay. The offer made by Messrs. Solomon Andrews and Son, Cardiff and Pwllheli, to give a challenge cup of the value of 500 guineas, to be competed for by first-class yachts in Cardigan Bay, has now been under the consideration of a committee, who are making the necessary arrangement under the auspices of the Royal Welsh Yacht Club. The regatta, says the" Yachting World," will be held at Pwllheli on Tuesday, the 19th of June, and the events will be as follows :—Class I.-For yachts above 52, and not exceeding 65 rating. First prize, challenge cup, 300 guineas, and R50 cash; second prize, £ 25 cash. Class II —For yachts above 42 and not exceeding 52 rating. First prize, challenge cup, value 150 guineas and L30 cash; second prize, £15 cash. Class III.—Handicap for yachts over 15 tons (Thames measurement). First prize, challenge cup. value 50 guineas and P,50 cash; second prize, zP,25 cash; third prize, Z10 cash. It will be thus seen that the committee have thought it better to divide the sum offered into three prizes, and provide three challenge cups, representing a total value of 500 guineas, as the latter sum seemed rather excessive for one prize. Messrs Andrews have agreed to supplement their previous offer with Z205 to provide cash prizes.

Death of the Rev. Isaac Thomas. EX-PRESIDENT OF THE WELSH BAPTIST UNION. The death occurred on Thursday after a short illness of the Rev. Isaac Thomas, Caersalem Newvdd, Land ore, ex-president of the Baptist Union of Wales. Mr. Thomas had not been in robust health of late years, but he prosecuted his work with untiring zeal, and preached regularly up to within three or four weeks ago. The news of his demise will he received with keen regret throughout Wales, and especially in the western portion of the Principality, where he had for many years occupied a prominent position in public life. The Rev. Isaac Thomas, Landore, was one of the ablest preachers of the Welsh Baptist pulpit, and his dignified eloquence and popular delivery created a profound impression upon the minds of thousands of his fellow-countrymen. His ministry extended over 40 years, and proved to be one unbroken chain of unqualified success. He was born at Goginan, near Aberystwyth. His father for nearly 40 years filled the office of a deacon in Jezreel Baptist Church of that place. The influence of his parents was a powerful factor in the formation of their son's character, and at the age of 16 he was bantised. A few vears later he commenced to preach, and was admitted as a student to Pontypool College in 1859. After spending three years there he accepted a cordial invitation to the Welsh Baptist Church at Birken- head, and during his seven years' pastorate there the membership increased so considerably that it became necessary to enlarge the chapel. In March, 1868, he took charge of the well-known church of Blaeu-y-Waun and Gerizim, Pembrokeshire, but preaching three times and travelling many miles every Sunday for nearly four years was too much for his strength, and, much to the regret of his flock, he resigned and accepted an invitation to the pastorate of Cacrsalem Newydd, near Swansea, where lie settled in November, 1871, and where he laboured to the day of his death. His church was enlarged during'his pastorate at a cost of £2,500 and is now one of the largest in South Wales. Mr. Thomas took a deep interest in local affairs, and received the highest honours that the Baptist body could confer upon anyone. In 1882 he preached at the Union meeting at Llandudno, and in 1884 he also preached to the students of Llangollen and Pontypool Colleges in conjunction with the Rev. R. H. Roberts, principal of Regent's Park College, and Dr. Culross, piesident of the Bristol Baptist College. Mr. Thomas during the whole of his ministry was a zealous advocate of temperance, and had been chairman of the Welsh Baptist Temper- ance Society. He was also a member of the Council of the South Wales and Monmouthshire Temperance Association. He was elected presi- dent of the West Glamorgan Baptist Association for 1886, and president of the Baptist Union of Wales in 1897, when he delivered his presidential address at Rhyl.