Some Specimens of the Poetry of the Ancient Welsh Bards Part 11

VERSES

_On seeing the Ruins of Ivor Hael's Palace_.

Amidst its alders IVOR'S palace lies, In heaps of ruins to my wondering eyes; Where greatness dwelt in pomp, now thistles reign, And p.r.i.c.kly thorns a.s.sert their wide domain.

No longer Bards inspired, thy tables grace.

Nor hospitable deeds adorn the place; No more the generous owner gives his gold To modest merit, as to Bards of old.

In plaintive verse his IVOR-GWILYM moans, His Patron lost the pensive Poet groans; What mighty loss, that IVOR'S lofty hall, Should now with schreeching owls rehea.r.s.e its fall!

Attend, ye great, and hear the solemn sound, How short your greatness this proclaims around, Strange that such pride should fill the human breast, Yon mouldering walls the vanity attest.

A Letter from Mr. Thomas Carte to the Rev. Evan Evans.

DEAR SIR,

I cannot sufficiently acknowledge Sir Thomas Mostyn's kindness, in the trouble he has taken, of sending up the catalogue of his historical MSS.

and in his obliging offer of communicating them to me. Those which I am desirous to see more than the rest, are these, viz.-

"The Annals of the Abbey of Chester, to A.D. 1297.

"Beda de Gestis Anglorum, if it be a different work from his Chronicon and Ecclesiastical History. It is the same.

"History of England, from William the Conqueror to the 6th of Edward the 6th.

"Annales Cambriae ignoti autoris, et Chronica Cambriae; both which seem to be in the same volume, which begins with a Welsh history of the Kings of the Britons and Saxons, and Princes of Wales, to the time of Edward 4th.

"A chronology from Vortigern downwards, supposed to be collected by Robert Vaughan, of Hengwrt, Esquire, which seems to be in the volume beginning with Sir John Wynne's pedigree of the family of Gwydir.

"Treatises concerning the courts of wards and chancery."

As Sir Thomas proposes to come to town soon, I hope he will be so good as to bring those MSS. with him (as Sir W. W. Wynne will several others, that he has found at Llanvorda) because they will be very useful to me as I conceive, for my first volume.

There are some others I should be glad to look over, but shall have more time for it. Were I on the spot, I should be very curious to consult the MS. of Froissart, though that author's history, so favourable to the English, is printed. My edition of it is that of Paris, 1520, which I take to be the last of any: but there is a MS. finely wrote and illuminated of this author, in the monastery called Elizabeth, at Breslaw, in Silesia, which contains a third part more than any printed edition. Count Bicklar, a Silesian n.o.bleman, who was at Paris, A.D.

1727, promised me to get a printed edition of Froissart collated with that MS. but he could find no monk in the monastery, or any about the place, capable of doing it. I desired him to buy a MS. that seemeth useless to the convent, at the price of 200 ducats, but my offer made them fancy it the more valuable, and they would not sell it. I have seen a MS. in the king's library at Paris, and that of the capuchins at Rouen, but they contained no more than my edition: I should be glad to know if Sir Thomas's does. I gave the Benedictine, who has the care of the new collections of French historians, notice of the MS. at Breslaw, that he might make use of it in his new edition of Froissart; but I have not heard whether he has got the MS. collated, and the supplement copied.

Adredus Rievallensis, Robert of Gloucester, Caradoc of Llancarvan, and Geoffry of Monmouth, are printed; and I have examined several MSS. of the case in the Cotton, Oxford and Cambridge libraries; so are the MSS. of Giraldus Cambrensis; but if Sir Thomas's MSS. contain more than the printed editions, I shall be extremely glad to see them, as also Trussel's original of cities, and antiquities of Westminster, as also the digression left out of Milton's history. The tracts of state in the times of Elizabeth, James I., and Charles I. I shall be very glad to see: but they, as well as some others, I can the better stay for, because they relate to more modern times.

Pray make my humble service and acknowledgments acceptable to Sir Thomas; which will oblige me to be more, if possible, than I am,

Dear Sir,

Your affectionate, and obedient servant, THOS. CARTE.

_Gray's Inn_, _Nov._ 14, 1744.

Mr. Lewis Morris to the Rev. Evan Evans.

DEAR BARD,

I received your's last post, without date, with a _Cowydd Merch_, for which I am very much obliged to you. I cannot see why you should be afraid of that subject being the favourite of your _Awen_. It is the most copious subject under heaven, and takes in all others; and, for a fruitful fancy, is certainly the best field to play in, during the poet's tender years. Descriptions of wars, strife, and the bl.u.s.tering part of man's life, require the greatest ripeness of understanding, and knowledge of the world; and is not to be undertaken but by strong and solid heads, after all the experience they can come at.

Is it not odd, that you will find no mention made of _Venus_ and _Cupid_ amongst our Britons, though they were very well acquainted with the Roman and Greek writers? That G.o.d and his mother are implements that modern poets can hardly write a love-poem without them: but the Britons scorned such poor machines. They have their _Essyllt_, _Nyf_, _Enid_, _Bronwen_, _Dwynwen_, of their own nation, which excelled all the Roman and Greek G.o.ddesses.-I am now, at my leisure hours, collecting the names of these famous men and women, mentioned by our poets, (as Mr. Edward Llwyd once intended,) with a short history of them; as we have in our common Latin dictionaries, of those of the Romans and Grecians. And I find great pleasure in comparing the _Triades_, _Beddau_, _Milwyr Ynys Prydain_, and other old records, with the poets of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries; which is the time when our Britons wrote most and best.

Let me have a short _Cowydd_ from you now and then; and I will send you my observations upon them, which may be of no disservice to you. That sent in your last letter, I here return to you; with a few corrections.

It doth not want many: use them, or throw them in the fire, which you please. Do not swallow them without examination. The authority of good poets must determine all.

Y forwyn gynt, fawr iawn gais, Deg aruthr erioed a gerais.

The word _Aruthr_, though much used, in the sense you take it, seems not proper here; yet Dr. Davies translates it _Mirus_. I cannot think but the original import of the word is _terrible_; and they cannot say in English of a woman, she is _terribly fair_. _Rhuthr_, from whence _Aruthr_ is compounded, I dare say had that sense, at least:-

"Y cythraul accw ruthrwas."

W. LLEYN.

Deg wawr erioed a gerais,

may do as well, and sounds better.

A roist ofal i'm calon, A brath o hiraeth i'm bron: Ni wyr un ar a anwyd A roist o gur, os teg wyd; Enwa anhunedd yn henaint A yr wyn fyth yr un faint.

The first line of the last couplet is too long, and I should write both thus:

Enwa'n hunedd yn henaint E yr wyn fyth yr un faint.

Again:

Cyrchaf, ac ni fynnaf au, I dir angov drwy angau.

The last couplet is a beautiful expression; but it hath too much sweet in it; what our poets call _Eisiau Cyfnewid Bogail_. _Ang_, _ang_, is a fault, which our musicians term _too many_ _concords_; and therefore they mix discords in music, to make it more agreeable to the ear. So the rhetoricians call the same fault in their science, _Caniad y gog_.

Therefore, suppose you would turn it thus:

O dir ing af drwy angau.

Again:

Lle bo dyfnaf yr afon, Ar fy hynt yr af i hon, Oni roi, Gwen eurog wedd, Drwy gariad ryw drugaredd.

_Eurog wedd_ is no great compliment to a fair woman; for _Gwen_, a Flavia, loves to be called white; and the last line hath _gar_-_gar_, therefore I would write thus, or the like: