Wild Wales Part 27

"We have."

"Are they in the house?"

"They have gone to Capel Curig."

"And they left you alone?"

"They did. With the cat and the trin-wire."

"Do your father and mother make wire-work?"

"They do. They live by making it."

"What is the wire-work for?"

"It is for hedges to fence the fields with."

"Do you help your father and mother?"

"We do; as far as we can."

"You both look unwell."

"We have lately had the cryd" (ague).

"Is there much cryd about here?"

"Plenty."

"Do you live well?"

"When we have bread we live well."

"If I give you a penny will you bring me some water?"

"We will; whether you give us the penny or not. Come, sister, let us go and fetch the gentleman water."

They ran into the house and presently returned, the girl bearing a pan of water. After I had drunk I gave each of the children a penny, and received in return from each a diolch or thanks.

"Can either of you read?"

"Neither one nor the other."

"Can your father and mother read?"

"My father cannot, my mother can a little."

"Are there any books in the house?"

"There are not."

"No Bible?"

"There is no book at all."

"Do you go to church?"

"We do not."

"To chapel?"

"In fine weather."

"Are you happy?"

"When there is bread in the house and no cryd we are all happy."

"Farewell to you, children."

"Farewell to you, gentleman!" exclaimed both.

"I have learnt something," said I, "of Welsh cottage life and feeling from that poor sickly child."

I had pa.s.sed the first and second of the hills which stood on the left, and a huge long mountain on the right which confronted both when a young man came down from a gulley on my left hand, and proceeded in the same direction as myself. He was dressed in a blue coat and corduroy trowsers and appeared to be of a condition a little above that of a labourer. He shook his head and scowled when I spoke to him in English, but smiled on my speaking Welsh and said: "Ah, you speak c.u.mraeg: I thought no Sais could speak c.u.mraeg." I asked him if he was going far.

"About four miles," he replied.

"On the Bangor road?"

"Yes," said he; "down the Bangor road."

I learned that he was a carpenter, and that he had been up the gully to see an acquaintance-perhaps a sweetheart. We pa.s.sed a lake on our right which he told me was called Llyn Ogwen, and that it abounded with fish.

He was very amusing and expressed great delight at having found an Englishman who could speak Welsh. "It will be a thing to talk of," said he, "for the rest of my life." He entered two or three cottages by the side of the road, and each time he came out I heard him say: "I am with a Sais, who can speak c.u.mraeg." At length we came to a gloomy-looking valley trending due north; down this valley the road ran having an enormous wall of rocks on its right and a precipitous hollow on the left, beyond which was a wall equally high as the other one. When we had proceeded some way down the road my guide said: "You shall now hear a wonderful echo," and shouting, "taw, taw," the rocks replied in a manner something like the baying of hounds. "Hark to the dogs!" exclaimed my companion. "This pa.s.s is called Nant yr ieuanc gwn, the pa.s.s of the young dogs, because when one shouts it answers with a noise resembling the crying of hounds."

The sun was setting when we came to a small village at the bottom of the pa.s.s. I asked my companion its name. "Ty yn y maes," he replied, adding as he stopped before a small cottage that he was going no farther, as he dwelt there.

"Is there a public-house here?" said I.

"There is," he replied, "you will find one a little farther up on the right hand."

"Come, and take some ale," said I.

"No," said he.

"Why not?" I demanded.

"I am a teetotaller," he replied.

"Indeed," said I, and having shaken him by the hand, thanked him for his company, and bidding him farewell, went on. He was the first person I had ever met of the fraternity to which he belonged, who did not endeavour to make a parade of his abstinence and self-denial.