From each side of the promontory on which the castle stood, ran off at right angles a smaller promontory; that, which was on the left side as viewed from the sea, though narrower and lower than the corresponding one on the other side, terminated however in a much larger area: and on that consideration apparently, in spite of its less commanding elevation, had been selected as the station for a watch-tower. This tower was circular; and in that respect accurately fitted to the area or platform on which it stood; the platform itself being a table of rock at the summit of a rude colossal cylinder which appeared to grow out of the waves. The whole of this lateral process from the main promontory presented a most impressive object to a spectator approaching it from sea: for the connecting part, which ran at right angles, from the great promontory to the platform, had been partly undermined; originally perhaps by some convulsion of nature: but latterly the breach had been greatly widened by storms; so that at length a vast aerial arch of granite was suspended over the waves: which arch once giving away and falling in, the rocky pillar and the watch-tower which it carried would be left insulated in the waves.

Bertram was more and more fascinated by the aspect of the ancient castle and the quiet hills behind it, with their silent fields and woodlands, which lay basking as it were in the morning sun. The whole scene was at once gay and tranquil. The sea had put off its terrors and wore the beauty of a lake: the air was "frosty but kindly:" and the shores of merry England, which he now for the first time contemplated in peace and serenity, were dressed in morning smiles; a morning, it is true, of winter; yet of winter not angry—not churlish and chiding—but of winter cheerful and proclaiming welcome to Christmas. The colours, which predominated, were of autumnal warmth: the tawny ferns had not been drenched and discoloured by rains; the oaks retained their dying leaves: and, even where the scene was most wintry, it was cheerful: the forest of ported lances, which the deciduous trees presented, were broken pleasingly by the dark glittering leaves of the holly; and the massy gloom of the yew and other evergreens was pierced and irradiated by the scarlet berries of various shrubs, or by the puce-coloured branches and the silvery stem of the birch. The Fleurs de lys had gradually neared the shore; and in the deep waters upon this part of the coast there was so little danger for a ship of much heavier burthen, that she was now running down within pistol shot of the scenery which Bertram contemplated with so much pleasure. He could distinguish every cottage that lurked in the nooks of the hills, as it sent up its light vapoury column of smoke: here and there he could see the dark blue dresses of the cottage-children: and occasionally a sound of laughter or the tones of their innocent voices, betraying them to the ear where they were not seen,—or the crowing of a cock from the bosom of some hamlet

Answer'd by faintly echoing farms remote,

gave language and expression to the tranquil beauty of the spectacle.

Bertram absolutely shuddered, with the feeling of one who treads, upon a snake, as he turned from these touching images of human happiness to the grim tackling and warlike furniture of the "little bloody: vixen" on board which he was embarked, together with the ferocious though intelligent aspects of her desperate crew. He was already eager to be set ashore; and the sudden shock of contrast made him more so. On communicating his wishes to the boatswain, however, he was honoured by a broad stare and a laugh of derision:

"What," said the boatswain, "put you ashore close under the muzzle of Walladmor Castle?"

"And why not?"

"Ask the Captain, my good lad: ask Captain Jackson."

"Jackson! I thought the Captain's name had been le Harnois."

"All's one for that: le Harnois or Jackson; one name's as good as t'other. But I wouldn't be the man to put you upon asking the Captain any such a thing. It's odds? but you'd be sent overboard, my good lad, head over heels—that's to say on any day when the Captain had taken his breakfast. No, no: high as it's perched up amongst the eagle's nests, that d—-d old castle has been the rock that many a good ship has struck on. But wait till three or four o'clock; and then maybe we'll put you on ashore further down."

When wishes are hopeless, the mind is soon reconciled to give them up. Bertram felt that his were so; and, contentedly stretching himself again upon the deck, surrendered his thoughts to the influence of the lovely scenery before him.

At length the sun was setting, and another reach of coast had unfolded upon his view, when all at once he heard the dash of oars; and on rising up, he observed a little skiff rapidly nearing them. In a few minutes she boarded the Fleurs de lys: and all was life and motion upon deck. Casks and packages were interchanged; and private signals in abundance passed between the different parties. Bertram took the opportunity of bargaining for a passage to shore; and was in the act of stepping into the boat, when he was suddenly summoned before the Captain.

He found the old tiger on the quarterdeck, and in one of his blander humours. Captain le Harnois was sitting on a coil of rope, his back reclining against a carronade, with a keg of brandy on the dexter hand and a keg of whisky on the sinister. An air of grim good humour was spread over his features; he had just awaked from slumber; was for a few minutes sober; and had possibly forgotten the heterodoxy of his passenger; whom he saluted thus:

"Well, sweet Sir, and how goes the world with you?"

"Captain le Harnois, I understand that I can have a passage in the boat alongside; and I am really anxious to go ashore."

"Well, Tom, and what's to hinder it? The shore's big enough to hold you: and, if it isn't, I can't make it bigger."

"Then, Captain, I have the honour to wish you a very good evening."

"The same to you, Tom; and I have the honour, Tom, to drink your worship's health."

"I thank you, Sir; and perhaps you will allow me to leave a trifle to drink for the boat's crew that brought me aboard."

"Do, Tom, leave a trifle: I'll allow you to put fifty francs down on this whisky keg."

"Fifty francs, Captain le Harnois! Permit me to remind you that I only came aboard this morning, and that——"

"Jessamy, it's no use talking: fifty francs: we give no change here. And what the d—-l? Would you think to treat the crew of the Fleurs de lys, four and forty picked men, with less than sixty franks?"

"Sixty! Captain, you said fifty."

"Did I? Well, but that was the first time of asking. Come, quick,—my young gallant,—or I shall hoist it up to seventy. I say, boatswain, tell the smith to send me a hammer and a few tenpenny nails: I've a customer here that's wanting to cheat me; and I see I must nail him to the mast, before we shall balance books. But stop a minute: I'll tell you what, Jessamy,—if you'll enter aboard the Fleurs de lys, I'll let you off for the money."

"I fear, Captain, that your work would be too much for my constitution: I am hardly strong enough to undertake such severe duty."

"Not strong enough? Oh! the dragon! my darling, what should ail you? I'll make you strong enough by to-morrow morning. Just hang him up an hour to the mast head, salt him, take him down, pickle him, hoist him up in the main tops to season, then give him some flap-dragon and biscuit, and I'll be bound there's not a lubber that lives but will be cured into a prime salt-water article. But come, sixty francs!"

Bertram hesitated for a moment: during which Captain le Harnois rose; turned on his heel; placed himself astride the carronade with a large goblet of brandy in his right hand; and with the air of an old Cupid who was affecting to look amiable and to warble, but in reality more like a Boreas who was growling, he opened the vast chasm of his mouth and began to sing a sentimental love song.

Bertram perceived that, as the brandy lowered, Captain le Harnois' demand would be likely to rise; and therefore paid the money without further demur.

"And now, my sweet boy," said Captain le Harnois, "what do you think of the Fleurs de lys? Tight sea-boat! isn't she, and a little better managed than the Halcyon, eh?—Things go on in another guess fashion here than they did on board your d—-d steam boat? Different work on my deck, eh?"

"Very different work, indeed, Captain le Harnois!"

"Aye, a d—-d deal different, my boy. I know what it is I'm speaking to, when I speak to my lads: but I'm d—-d if a man knows what he's speaking to, when he speaks to a boiler."

During this speech Bertram was descending the ship's side: when he had seated himself in the boat, he looked up; and, seeing the Captain lounging over the taffarel, he said by way of parting speech—

"You are right, Captain le Harnois; perfectly right: and I shall always remember the very great difference I found between the Halcyon and the Fleurs de Lys."

The old ruffian grinned, and appeared to comprehend and to enjoy the equivoque. He was in no hurry to clear scores with Bertram; but leisurely pursued the boat with a truculent leer; nailed Bertram with his eye; and, when the boat was just within proper range, he took his speaking-trumpet and hailed him:

"Tom Drum, ahoy!—Take care now, when you get ashore, where you begin your old tricks—portmanteaus, old women, tumbling; mind you don't begin hocus pocus too soon: steer large, and leave Walladmor Castle on the larboard tack: for there's an old dragon in Walladmor that has one of his eyes on you by this time. He's on the look-out for you. So farewell: he's angling for you. Good bye, my lily-white Tom! A handier lad has been caught than you, Tom. So let the old women pass quietly, till Walladmor's out of hearing. I can't cry, Tom: but here's my blessing."

So saying Captain le Harnois drank up his goblet of brandy; and, tossing his heel-taps contemptuously after the boat, rolled away to his orgies at the carronade. And in this manner terminated Bertram's connexion with the Trois Fleurs de lys.

It was not very agreeable to Bertram that the gallant Captain's farewell speech had drawn the attention of all in the boat upon himself, and in no very advantageous way. Most of the party laughed pretty freely: at the bottom of the boat lay a man muffled up in a cloak, and apparently asleep: but it appeared to Bertram that he also was laughing. To relieve himself from this distressing attention, he took out his pocket-book and busied himself with his pencil; using it alternately for minuting memoranda of the scene before him, or sketching some of its more striking features. These were at this moment irresistibly captivating. The boat was gliding through a sea unrippled by a breeze: the water was exquisitely clear and reflecting the rich orange lights of the decaying sunset: a bold rocky shore was before him—haunted by gulls and sea-mews, flights of which last pursued the boat for the sake of the refuse fish which were occasionally tossed overboard: behind the rocky screen of the coast appeared a tumultuous assemblage of mountains, the remotest of which melted away into a faint aerial blue: and finally the boat's company itself, consisting of sailors rowing in their shirt-sleeves, fishermen and their wives in dresses of deep red and indigo, with the usual marine adjuncts of fish, tangle, sea-weed, &c. composed a centre to the spectacle which inspirited the whole by its rich colouring, grouping, and picturesque forms. The living part of the contributors to this fine composition seemed however but little aware of their own share in the production of the picturesque: for most of them were engaged in amusing their fancies at the expense of Bertram, whose motions had but given a different turn to the satiric humour which Captain le Harnois had called forth. One old man, who sate opposite to Bertram, laid aside his pipe, and said in an under tone to his next neighbour:

"Well, in my life I never saw the man that brought as much to paper in a summer's day as young master here has done in one half hour; he beats the parson and 'torney Williams all to nothing. But I see how it is: they say Merlin wrote the History of Wales down to the day of judgment upon these very rocks that lie right a-head: and sure, if he did, there's somebody must come to read it: and that must be young master here. For you see he cocks his eye at the rocks, as if he had some run goods in his pocket, and was looking out for a signal to come on shore. Look at him now! Lord how nimbly his fingers go! One would swear he believed that all must be over with this world, if he should stop above half a minute. See, look at him! there he goes again!"

"Aye," said another: "but I think he's hardly writing Merlin's history: though it's true enough that old saying about Merlin: he wrote it all with his fore finger: and yet they tell me it is cut as deep into the rock as if it had been done with chisel and mallet. But he must clear the moss off the face of the rock before he'll read that. And it's not every man that will read it when that's done,"

"Who then?"

"Why none but a seventh son of a seventh son; nor he neither, except in the moonlight."

"Well, I know not," said the first speaker: "but, as to this writing and reading, I see little good it does. Lord! to think of these gentlefolks that come up to Tan-y-bwlch and Festiniog in the summer time like a shoal of herrings: I go with scores of parties to Pont-aber-glas-llyn. Well, now, what should you think there could be to write down consarning a great cobble stone? or consarning a bit of a shaw, or a puddle of water? Yet there's not one of the young quality but, as soon as ever they get sight of the Llyn, bless your eyes! they'll stand, and they'll lift up their hands, and they'll raise the whites of their eyes, and skrike out to one another—that it's awful to be near 'em."

"The d—-l! you don't say so?"

"Aye, and then down they all sits: and out comes their books: and the young gentlemen holds their bits of umbrellas for the ladies; and away all their fingers are running like a dozen of harpers playing Morfa Rhuddlam. And many's the time I've seen 'em stand, whilst a man would walk a mile and a half, staring up at widow Davis's cottage that one can hardly see for the ivy, and writing consarning it—that one would think it was as old and as big as Harlich or Walladmor. Gad I'll make bold some summer to ask 'em what they see about it: for, as widow Davis said to me, 'I wonder what they find on the outside; for I never could find any thing in the inside.'"

"And what do they do with their writings when they've penned 'em?"

"God knows: I'm sure it's past my power to think. For it's clear to me, Owen, that a writ consarning a spring will never quench a man's thirst. And as to these limners that go about making a likeness of the sea, why they'll never get a herring out of it."

By this time the boat was running up a narrow creek, which soon contracted into the mouth of a little mountain brook. Here the boat took the ground, and all on board began to jump ashore—except Bertram, who was lost in contemplation of the long vista of mountains through which the brook appeared to descend. From this abstraction he was at length awakened by the voice of the old fisherman, who was mooring the skiff, and drily asked him if he purposed to go out to sea again in chace of Captain le Harnois. At this summons he started up, and was surprised to observe that his companions were already dispersed, and going off through various avenues amongst the mountains. The boat was quite empty; and his own portmanteau even had been carried out, and was lying on a stone.

"And now, my good friend," said Bertram, "answer me one question—What is the name of the nearest town? For you must know that I am quite a stranger in these parts: in what direction does it lie? how far from this spot? and which is the direct road to it?"

"One question! why that's four questions, master; and more by three than you bargained for. However, as you're a stranger, I'll make shift to fit you with three short answers that shall unlock your four riddles: The nighest town is Machynleth; and a rum-looking town it is. Ifs just fifteen miles off. And you can't miss it, if you follow your nose by the side of this brook till it leads you into yon pass amongst the mountains."

"I'm much obliged to you, friend. But is there any person you know of that could guide me through this pass and carry my portmanteau?"

"Aye, master, I know of three such persons."

"And where are they?"

"Two of them are on board Captain le Harnois: and the other——"

"Is where?"

"At Machynleth, and I'll warrant him as drunk as he can go."

"And of what use will that be to me?"

"Nay, master, it's past my power to find out: but you're a scholar, and can tell more than I can."

Perceiving that he had got all the information from the old fisherman which he was likely to get, Bertram wished him good night; and, hoisting his portmanteau on his shoulder, set off in the direction pointed out.



CHAPTER V.

Wher dwellen ye, if it to tellen be? In the subarbes of a town, quod he, Lurking in bernes and in lanes blind Whereas thise robbours and thise theves by kinde Holden hir privee fereful residence As they that dare not shewen hir presence,— So faren we, if I shal say the sothe.—Chaucer.

Bertram now found himself in a situation of some perplexity: he was alone; perfectly unacquainted with the country; it was already dusk, and he had to make his way through a labyrinth of hills which was likely to present danger in more shapes than one: his experience on board Captain le Harnois had taught him that he was not perfectly secure from behind; and before him was a mountainous region—better peopled in all probability with precipices and torrents than with human habitations. Under these circumstances he had to go in quest of a lodging for the night; and this, from all that he had read of England, on a double account he could scarcely venture to anticipate under any respectable roof; first because he was on foot, and secondly because he carried his own portmanteau. However he entered on his course with spirit; and for some time advanced without much difficulty. The path meandered away along the margin of the little brook, diverging from it at times, but soon winding back upon it. And as long as the road continued to lie over the little common which lay between the sea and the hills, the light being here less intercepted and reflected more freely from the pellucid brook, he had no difficulty in proceeding. But, when he had reached the foot of the hills, and found that the brook suddenly immerged into a mountain ravine, he halted in utter despondency. Looking back upon the shore, which lay due West, he perceived that the last faint blush of color had died away in the sky: a solemn veil of darkness had descended over the sea; even that was disappearing; and, within the narrow windings of the hills upon which he was now entering, the darkness of "chaos and old night" seemed to brood. That his road would be likely to lead him over precipices elevated enough for all purposes of danger, he already knew: for now and then the path began to ascend pretty steeply from the edge of the brook, though it soon again subsided to the same level. All around him was the sound of waters and of torrents: no ray of candlelight or cheerful fire issued from any cottage amongst the hills: he shouted, but received no answer: and he sate down to deliberate upon his situation.

Just at this moment it seemed to him that he heard somewhere in his neighbourhood a low muttering. He looked round: but it was impossible to distinguish any object at more than a few paces distance; and, as he had repeatedly turned to look back in his road from the sea, and had besides walked fast, he felt convinced that no person could have dogged him; and was disposed to think that he had been mistaken. The next minute however the noise recurred: he rose and moved a few paces onwards. Again he heard the low muttering as of some person talking to himself: in a moment after steps rang upon the hard frosty ground as of a heavy foot behind him; and, before he could collect his thoughts, a hand touched him on the shoulder, and a deep-toned voice exclaimed—Halt!

He had now no choice left but to face the danger: he stopped therefore; and, turning round, he perceived close to his elbow a man in no very respectable attire, so far as the obscurity would allow him to judge, but half muffled up in a cloak, and armed with a stout bludgeon. Much as he had just now been wishing for some guide, he yet could not congratulate himself on so unpropitious a rencontre. The stranger's dress and unceremonious greeting were not more suspicious than the abruptness of his appearance: for Bertram felt convinced that he must have way-laid him. Assuming however as much composure as he could, he demanded in a loud tone,

"Why did you not answer me when I shouted just now? You must have heard me.

"Heard you?" said the other, in a low but remarkably firm and deep voice,—"Heard you? Yes, I heard you well enough: but who in his senses goes shouting at night-time up and down a bye-road on a smuggler's coast, as if he meant to waken all the dogs and men in the country."

"Who? why any man that has a good conscience: what difference can the night make?"

"Aye, that has! But take my word for it, friend, a man that comes ashore from Jackson's brig may as well go quietly along and say as little as possible about his conscience. In this country they don't mind much what a man says: many a gay fellow to my knowledge has continued to give the very best character of himself all the way up the ladder of the new drop, and yet after all has been nonsuited by Jack Ketch when he got to the top of it for wanting so little a matter as another witness or so to back his own evidence."

"Well, but, I suppose, something must be proved against a man,—some overt act against the laws, before he can be suspected in any country: till that is done, the presumption is that he is a respectable man: and every judge will act on that presumption."

"Yes, in books perhaps: but when a running-fire of cross-examinations opens from under some great wig, and one's blood gets up, and one doesn't well remember all that one has said before,—I know not how it is, but things are apt to take a different turn."

"Well, my rule is to steer wide of all temptation to do ill; and then a man will carry his ship through in any waters."

"Will he? Why, may be so; and may be not. There are such things as sunk rocks: and it's not so easy to steer wide of them: constables for instance, justices of peace, lawyers, juries."

"But how came you to know that I was put on shore from Jackson's brig?"

"Why, to tell you a secret, it was I that lay at the bottom of the boat, whilst your learned self were writing notes in a pocketbook.—But hush! what's that?"

He stopped suddenly; looked cautiously round; and then went on:

"It was nothing, I believe. We may go on; but we must talk lower: in these cursed times every stone has ears. Here we must cross the brook, and double the rock on the left."

Whilst Bertram went on, he loitered a few steps behind, and then cried out—"Do you see any body?" On receiving an answer in the negative, he advanced; turned the corner, and then began again:

"You are going to Machynleth; and you want a guide to show you the road and to carry your portmanteau: Now I'll do both on cheap terms; for all I ask in return is this—that, up to the inn-door, if we meet any body that asks unpleasant questions, you will just be so good as to let me pass for your servant whom you have brought from abroad. What say you? Is it a bargain?"

"My good friend,—according to the most flattering account I have yet received of your morals (which is your own), they are rather of a loose description; and with all possible respect for your virtue that the case allows, you will admit yourself that I should be running some little risk in confiding my portmanteau to your care: for I know not who you are; and, before I could look round, you might be off with my whole property; in which case I should certainly be on a 'sunk rock.' Some little risk, yon must candidly allow?"

"No," said the stranger—"No, not at all: and if that's all the objection you have, I'll convince you that you are wrong in a moment. Now just look at me (there's a little starlight at this moment). Perhaps you'll admit that I'm rather a stouter man than yourself?"

"Oh! doubtless."

"And possibly this bludgeon would be no especial disadvantage to me in a contest with an unarmed man?"

"I must acknowledge it would not."

"Nor this particular knife? according to your view of my 'morals,' as you call them, I suppose it would not be very difficult for me to cut your throat with it, and then pitch you into one of these dark mountain ravines—where some six weeks hence a mouldering corpse of a stranger might chance to be found, that nobody would trouble his head about?—Are my arguments forcible? satisfactory, eh?"

"Undoubtedly. I must grant that there is considerable force in your way of arguing the case. But permit me to ask, what particular consideration moves you to conduct me and my portmanteau without hire to Machynleth? It seems too disinterested a proposal, to awaken no suspicion."

"Not so disinterested as you may fancy. Suppose now I happen to have left a few debts behind me in this country: or suppose I were an alien with no passport:—or suppose any other little supposes you like: only keep them to yourself, and talk as low if you please as convenient."

"Well, be it so: here's the portmanteau: take care you don't drop this little letter-case."

The stranger tossed the portmanteau over his shoulder; and both pushed forward up the pass at a rapid pace. For some miles they advanced in silence: and Bertram, being again left to his own meditations, had leisure to recur to his original suspicions. Whenever the stranger happened to be a little a-head of him, Bertram feared that he might be then absconding with his property. When he stopped for a moment, Bertram feared that he was stopping for no good. In no way could he entirely liberate himself from uneasy thoughts. Even upon his own account of himself the man wore rather a suspicious character; and what made it most so in the eyes of Bertram was the varying style of his dialect. He seemed to have engrafted the humorous phraseology of nautical life, which he wished to pass for his natural style, upon the original stock of a provincial dialect: and yet at times, when he was betrayed into any emotion or was expressing anger at social institutions, a more elevated diction and finer choice of expressions showed that somewhere or other the man must have enjoyed an intercourse with company of a higher class. In one or other part it was clear that he was a dissembler, and wearing a masque that could not argue any good purposes. Spite of all which however, and in the midst of his distrust, some feeling of kinder interest in the man arose in Bertram's mind—whether it were from compassion as towards one who seemed to have been unfortunate, or from some more obscure feeling that he could not explain to himself.

The road now wound over a rising ground; and the stranger pointed out some lights on the left which gleamed out from the universal darkness.

"Yonder is Machynleth, if that is to be our destination. But, if the gentleman's journey lies further, I could show him another way which fetches a compass about the town."

"It is late already and very cold: for what reason then should I avoid Machynleth?"

"Oh, every man has his own thoughts and reasons: and very advisable it is that he should keep as many of them as possible to himself. Let no man ask another his name, his rank, whither he is bound, on what errand, and so forth. And, if he does, let no man answer him. For under all these little matters may chance to lurk some ugly construction in a court of justice—when a man is obliged to give evidence against a poor devil that at any rate has done him no harm."

"Aye," said Bertram, "and there are other reasons which should make the traveller cautious of answering such questions: for consider—how is he to know in what dark lane he may chance to meet the curious stranger on his next day's journey? Though to be sure you'll say that, for a man with no more baggage than myself, such caution is somewhat superfluous."

The stranger laughed heartily, and said: "True, too true, as the gentleman observes: and indeed the gentleman seems to understand how such matters are conducted very well. However, after all, I would strongly recommend it to the gentleman to avoid the town of Machynleth."

"But why so? Is it a nest of thieves?"

"Oh! Lord bless us! no: quite the other way: rather too honest, and strict, you understand."

"Well, and for what reason then avoid making the acquaintance of so very virtuous a town?"

"Why, for that reason. It's unreasonably virtuous. In particular there is a certain magistrate in the neighbourhood, who hangs his 12 men per annum: and why? For no other cause on God's earth than because their blood is hotter than his own. He has his bloodhounds for tracking them, and his spies for trepanning; and all the old women say that he can read in the stars, and in coffee grounds, where contraband goods come ashore."

"Why, my pleasant friend, what is it you take me for?"

The stranger turned round; pressed his companion's hand; but, not finding the pressure returned, he laughed and said in a significant tone:

"Take him for? I take the gentleman to be as respectable and honourable a gentleman as any that——frequents the highway by night. You are come from abroad: at school you had read flattering accounts of this famous kingdom of England and its inhabitants; and, desiring to see all this fine vision realized, you did not let the distance frighten you. And to a young man, I take it, that is some little credit."

"Well, Sir, well?"

"Before you left home, your purse had been emptied at some watering place, we'll say by gamblers, sharpers, black legs, &c.; but no matter how: there are many ways of emptying a purse; and you are now come over to our rich old England to devise means for filling it again. All right. He, that loses his money at one sort of game, must try to draw it back by some other: and in England there are many. One man marries a rich heiress: another quacks: another opens a tabernacle, and wheedles himself into old women's wills. But perhaps the best way of all is to go into trade, break, take the benefit of the Insolvent Act, and in short get famously ruined; in which case you're made for life."

"So then you do really take me to be an adventurer—a fortune-hunter?"

"Oh, Sir, God forbid I should take a man for any thing that it is not agreeable to him to be taken for; or should call him by any name which he thinks uncivil. But the last name, I think, is civil enough: for I suppose every man is a fortune-hunter in this world. Some there are now that hunt their fortunes through quiet paths where there is little risk and much profit: others again" (and here he lost his tranquil tone, and his self-possession) "others hunt a little profit through much danger, choosing rather to be in eternal strife and to put their hopes daily to hazard than to creep and crawl and sneak and grovel: and at last perhaps they venture into a chase where there is no profit at all—or where the best upshot will be that some dozen of hollow, smiling, fawning scoundrels, who sin according to act of parliament, and therefore are within the protection of parliament, may be——"

He paused suddenly, and made a fierce gesture which supplied the ellipsis to his companion: but the latter had little wish to pursue such a theme, and he diverted the conversation into another channel, resuming a topic which had been once broken off:

"I have come to Wales," said Bertram, "chiefly from the interest I take in its traditions, antiquities, and literature. The ruined monuments of so ancient a people, that maintained its independence so long and so heroically against enemies so potent, have a powerful interest to my mind when connected with their grand historical remembrances. The great architectural relics of older times,—the castles of Aberconway, Caernarvon, Harlech, and Kilgarran"——

"Aye, and Walladmor"—said the other laughing:

"Yes, Walladmor, and many others, possess a commanding interest to him who has familiarised himself with their history. All places too connected with the memory and half fabulous history of king Arthur—the grand forms of Welch scenery ennobled and glorified by the fine old romancers, Norman or English, or by the native bard songs,——

"I know them all," said the stranger interrupting him and laughing heartily,—"there's Arthur's fort at Cairwarnach—Arthur's table—Arthur's chair—the brook at Drumwaller, where he forded without wetting his feet,—and scores of old ruins in this neighbourhood."

"And doubtless you have had much pleasure in ranging through these grey memorials of elder days?"

"Pleasure! aye, that I have: many's the good keg of brandy that I've helped to empty among 'em."

"Keg of brandy!" said Bertram, somewhat shocked.

"Yes, brandy; right Cogniac: better than ever king Arthur drank, I'll be sworn. Faith, I believe he'd have sold his sceptre for a dozen of it; and Sir Gawain would have tumbled through a hoop for a quart.—Oh! the fun that some of those old walls have looked down upon many's the dark night, when I was a little younger: aye, many a wild jolly party have I sat with in some of those old ruins! And such a din we've kept, that I've expected old Merlin would come down from some old gallery and beat up our quarters."

"Why, certainly night is in some respects a favourable time for visiting such buildings: for the lights and shadows are often more grandly and broadly arranged. But were these parties that you speak of, parties of tourists to whom you acted as guide?"

"Tourists, God knows: a rum kind of tourists though: and a rum kind of guide was I. Egad, I led 'em a steeple chase; up hill and down hill; thick and thin—rocks and ruins, nothing came amiss: and there's not many tourists, I think, on the wrong side of twenty-five, that would choose to have followed us.——But I suppose now, as you've come to Wales on this errand, you would be glad to see a few old churches, abbeys, and so on: fine picking there for a man that hungers after the picturesque; owls, ivy, wall, moonshine, and what not."

"Certainly I shall," said Bertram: "I design to see every thing that is interesting; and I understand that Wales is particularly rich in such objects: and I've seen some beautiful sketches with all the picturesque adjuncts and accidents that you mention."

"Aye, bless your heart, but did you ever see a sketch of Griffith ap Gauvon? It lies about 20 miles north of Machynleth, in the eastern ravines of Snowdon. G—-! you'd lift up your hands, if you saw the ruins—how majestically they stand upon the naked peaks of the rocks; and how boldly the pointed arches rise into the air and throw themselves over the unfathomable chasms! Look up from below, and there on a moonlight night you'll see the white pillars all standing in rows, like so many wax lights: and, if one looks down from above, it's half enough to put thoughts into a man's head of throwing himself down."

"I protest," said Bertram, "you make my head giddy with your description."

"Aye, but don't be giddy just yet: for we are now going over a narrow path; and there's a precipice below. Here, give me your hand. So!—Now turn to the right: now two steps up: and now take my arm; for it's so dark under these walls—that you'll be apt to stumble."

Both advanced in this way for some hundred paces, when suddenly his guide stopped, and said:

"Here we are at last: and my term of 'service' is out. This is the Walladmor Arms; and it is decidedly the best inn in the town; for there is no other."

If any courteous reader has ever, in the May-time of his own life or in the May-time of the year, made a pedestrian tour among the northern or western mountains of our island, he will understand what was in Bertram's mind at this moment—a vision of luxurious refreshment and rest after a hard day's fatigue, disturbed by anxious doubts about the nature of his reception. In this state he laid his hand upon the latch; and perhaps the light of the door-lamp, which at this moment fell upon his features, explained to his guide what was passing in his mind; for he drew him back by the arm, and said——

"One word of advice before we part: even the 'servant' may presume to counsel his 'master' as he is quitting his service. The landlord within is not one of those landlords who pique themselves on courtesy: and the gentleman tourist, with submission be it said, is not one of those tourists who travel with four horses,—or even by the stage-coach: and foot-travellers in England, especially in the winter season, do not meet with 'high consideration.' Which premises weighed,—if you were to ask for a night's lodging at your first entrance, I bet ten to one that you will get none; no, not though the house were as empty as it is probably full by the infernal din. But do what I tell you: Call for ale, porter, or wine, the moment you enter. As fast as your reckoning mounts, so fast will the frost thaw about the landlord's heart. Go to work in any other way, and I'll not answer for it but you'll have to lie in the street."

With full determination to pay attention to his advice, Bertram again laid his hand upon the latch; opened the door; and made his appearance, for the first time in his life, upon that famous stage in the records of novelists—a British inn.



CHAPTER VI.

Now this is worshipful society.—King John.

The room, into which Bertram now introduced himself, was spacious beyond any thing that he had anticipated: but, spacious as it was, it seemed barely sufficient for its different occupants. A large playbill, hung in a very conspicuous situation, announced the play of Venice Preserved for representation on that evening. It was now a good deal after 10 o'clock, and the performance was over: but the Venetian Nobili, in the dignified solemnity of their black dresses, were scattered about the room in parties—or laying aside the costlier part of their finery in a remote corner partly screened off from public view, which had been allotted to them as a tiring room. Round about the fire-place, in an elevated sort of dais which had been railed off into a bar, a canopy of smoke proclaimed that a festive party were somewhere seated beneath it. On advancing a few steps further, Bertram could distinguish their faces and arrangement. Close by the fire side sate a huge Dutchman with a huge pipe, solemnly fixing his eyes upon the pomp of clouds which he had created or was in the act of creating, and apparently solacing himself with some vague images of multiplication and division. His leaden eye showed that he was completely rapt away from all that was passing about him: two critics disputing at his right ear upon the relative pretensions of two actresses,—two politicians disputing at his back on the Sinking Fund and the Funds in general, as little disturbed his meditations as two disputants before his face, viz. the landlord and the manager of the theatrical company, who were sharply discussing some private point of finance in their daily reckoning. The poor manager,—with his keen, meagre, and anxious countenance, at this moment rendered doubly anxious by the throes of an arithmetical computation,—seemed the antagonist pole of the Dutchman: he was endeavouring, with little success, to bring the night's receipts into something like a counterbalance to the daily bill: this had just been presented by the landlord, who had placed his bulky person immediately behind him, looked over his shoulder, and having encircled him with his arms for the sake of leaning with his knuckles upon the table, had fairly pinned in the poor manager, who continued at intervals upon every perplexing interruption from his antagonist to wheel round and face him like a stag at bay. Nearer to Bertram sate a man, whose curved nose—black hair—ardent looks—and sallow complexion, at once announced him as a Frenchman: he was occupied in painting a portrait of one actress at the same time that he was making complimentary grimaces to three others. In the chimney-corner, and over against the Dutchman, was seated an elderly man, of short thick-set person, dressed in a shabby grey coat—boots—and a white hat. His features were not in themselves very striking, but had been habitually composed to one intense expression of dissatisfaction with all about him. Like the Dutchman he looked away from the company towards the fire, and appeared to take no interest in any thing which went on: but this in him was mere affectation. The Dutchman, as a child could see, was most sincerely indifferent to every thing but the festoons of smoke which formed about him; nor ever seemed to suffer in his peace of mind except when this aerial drapery was rent or too much attenuated: then indeed he puffed with a perceptible agitation, until he had reinstated the vapoury awning—which done he immediately recovered his equanimity. But as to White Hat, by the complexity of his man[oe]uvres for disguising his interest in the conversation about him—by uniformly shifting his chair upon the approximation of any other chair—and by the jealous anxiety with which he affected to turn away his head if any person were talking near him, he made it sufficiently evident that no one person in the room paid so earnest an attention to what was passing as himself. He also had resorted to a pipe for the sake of expressing his abstraction from the world about him; but how different were his short—uneasy—asthmatic puffs from the floating pomp with which the Dutchman sent up his voluminous exhalations! In his right hand he held a newspaper which he appeared to be reading; sometimes glancing his eye over it, sometimes dwelling upon the words as if he were spelling them; in general however giving himself a great deal of trouble to impress upon all about him that he took little or no interest in any thing he read.

These were the most noticeable persons of the company to which Bertram now advanced; taking care at the same time to call for wine in an imposing tone of voice. At this sound the landlord wheeled suddenly round, which fortunately set the poor manager at liberty. Both stared at Bertram: the Frenchman looked up for a moment: even the White Hat, being taken by surprise, made a half wheel on his chair; though immediately reverting, not without some indignation at himself, to his former position; in fact every soul in the room looked at Bertram except the Dutchman. Silence ensued; and the landlord, after raising and dropping his eyes alternately from Bertram's head to his foot, demanded if he had a horse with him.

"No, I am on foot," replied Bertram.

"Very late time of night," the landlord muttered, "to be walking: pray, which way do you come?"

"From the sea-side, where I was set ashore this evening about 5 o'clock."

After a little further cross-examination, the landlord appeared to be satisfied; and directed "Jenny" to bring the wine; the buz of conversation, which had been hushed during the landlord's colloquy with the stranger, freshened again; and Bertram proceeded to take his seat amongst the company.

It is affirmed by some philosophers that Timon of Athens himself, if, on issuing from the darkness and cold of a fifteen miles' walk on a frosty winter's night succeeding to a day of hardship and exposure, he were suddenly to burst on a gay fire-side of human faces, lights, wine, and laughter,—would inevitably forget his misanthropy for that evening, and be glad to take his share in the conversation. Bertram was probably so disposed; it was therefore unfortunate for him that he took his seat by the side of the Dutchman.

"I perceive," said Bertram, "that you have had a play performed this evening."

Without looking up from his pipe, Minheer replied—"Like enough! I was told there were players here."

Nothing discouraged Bertram turned to his opposite neighbour, the White Hat: "You, Sir, probably attended the performance?"

"I?" replied the indignant man, "I trouble myself with such fooleries, when the poor country is ruined and perishing for bread?"

"Fooleries! Mr. Dulberry," exclaimed the manager, "what! Venice Preserved?"

"Venice Preserved, or Venice Treacle; what care I? It's a play-book, isn't it?—Here we are taxed already for the support of libraries, museums, Herculanean manuscripts, Elgin marbles, and God knows what. Very soon, I suppose government will assess us so much a head for the theatres."

"Ah, poor Venice Preserved!" ejaculated the manager, sighing: "it has always some enemy or other. In quiet times it is laid on the shelf. Then comes some season of political ferment: the liberty boys kick up a dust: the public voice calls for the play clamorously: the theatre fills nightly: every allusion is caught at with rapture: and, as to the actors, they may lie upon their oars; for, let them play as ill as they choose, they are sure of applause for the sake of what they utter. But, as often as ever this happens, in steps the government and forbids the representation."

"Forbid the representation?" shrieked Mr. Dulberry; "forbid that excellent play Venice Preserved? What! there's something in it against government, is there? Oh! it's an admirable play. And how, now, how is it they forbid it? Not by act of parliament, I dare swear: bad as parliament is, they would hardly trust it to them. By an order in council, I suppose? and Lord Londonderry sends a regiment of dragoons into the pit, eh?"

"No, Mr. Dulberry: the Lord Chamberlain forbids it."

"The Lord Chamberlain? Worse and worse! And so it's the Lord Chamberlain that sends the dragoons?—Chamberlain! why that's the man that takes care of the government sheets and pillow-slips; the overseer of the chambermaids. And he's to trample on the liberties of the country and to put out the lights of the theatre, by the hoofs of military despotism!—Oh fie! fie! poor old England!"

Partly from political indignation, and partly from some more personal indignation at a little laughing which now arose in some quarter of the room, the patriot returned hastily to the Courier, which he held in his hand; and the conversation seemed likely to droop; when suddenly Bertram's attention was drawn by a bright blaze of light; and, looking up, he beheld his reforming neighbour, Mr. Dulberry, metamorphosed into a pillar of salt. His mouth was wide open; the whites of his eyes were raised to the ceiling; one hand was clenched; the other hung lifeless by his side. The Courier had sunk with one end into the fire; a roaring flame was springing up and enveloping the whole: and, before Mr. Dulberry returned to his self-possession, the newspaper with all its world of history and prophecy was reduced to ashes.

"Mr. Dulberry! for God's sake, Mr. Dulberry! what's the matter?" exclaimed the company on all sides. "Has Bolivar beaten the royalists? Is the Austrian loan repaid? or what is it, for the love of heaven?"

"What is it, gentlemen? a thing to make your ears tingle! the Manchester massacres were a trifle to it. An Englishman——Oh Lord! gentlemen, it's all over with the habeas corpus act——an Englishman has been arrested by the emissaries of government after he had quitted the kingdom."

"What government? the French government?"

"No, gentlemen, by the English government: arrested out of the kingdom: think of that, gentlemen!"

"But where, where?" exclaimed several voices: "in France?"

"Why yes, I think I may say in France: for he was going to France; and he had actually put off in a boat from the Isle of Wight, and was three hundred yards from shore, on his way towards a French ship, which he was going to board."

"Oh come, Mr. Dulberry," said some of the company, laughing, "but that's England, however: as far as an English cannonball will reach, and a little farther too in the opinion of some jurists, the four seas are English property: England's domain; her manor; her park; and she has a right to set up turnpike gates if she pleases."

"By no means, gentlemen, by no means; Blackstone says that, to constitute possession, there must go two things—the act of possessing, and the will to possess. So also no doubt of a man's domicile: to make this bar my domicile, I must not only be here; but secondly, I must will to be here. Now this man willed to be in France; and England was no longer his domicile. And where a man is not, there he ought not by law to be arrested."

This pretty piece of subtilty was received by most of the company with a smile; but as Mr. Dulberry remarked that some little murmuring arose, which announced that some of his auditors were impressed with what he had said, he seized his opportunity, jumped upon his chair, flourished his white hat, and briefly harangued the company.

"Gentlemen," said he, "we all know that ministers have sealed this country against all unhappy foreigners, and have tarnished the old English character for generous hospitality by their cursed alien bill. This we knew before: but now comes a fresh assault on liberty. Not only must we look on and see nets and lines set all round our once hospitable shores to catch the unhappy fugitives from continental tyranny; but at length, it seems, ministers are to be allowed to throw out their grappling hooks after English fugitives from the tyranny of Lord Londonderry. If a man runs to the North Pole, I suppose Lord Londonderry and Ally[1] Croaker will soon be after them: and that, by the way, is the meaning of all these polar voyages.—I see that even the ministerial gentlemen present cast down their eyes and look ashamed. No man has a word to say in defence. What I propose therefore is, that we all unite in an address to the king—testifying our abhorrence of this last act which has made the cup of our afflictions run over, and begging that his majesty would dissolve the present administration, and form a new one on a more patriotic basis."

"But, Mr. Dulberry, who is it that has been arrested?" cried many of the company.

"That's nothing to the purpose, gentlemen: the man's an Englishman; and that's enough, I hope."

"But how if he should turn out to be an English lunatic escaped from his keepers?" said a cynical looking man in the corner.

A laugh followed, and a general cry of—, "Name! name!"

Not to forfeit his hold upon the public attention, Mr. Dulberry found himself obliged to relax the rigor of his principles, and to descend from the universal character of Englishman to so impertinent a consideration as the character of the individual.—"His name, gentlemen, is Edward Nicholas."

"Nicholas! Edward Nicholas!" said a number of voices at once: "what our Nicholas?"

"As to that, I know not: he was described in the Courier as a bold adventurer: many honourable traits were recited of his conduct; and in particular I remember it was said that he had fought on the side of liberty in South America, and had once commanded a sloop of war—as a commissioned officer—under Artigas."

"Oh! the same, the same!" exclaimed the greater part of the company: "our Nicholas, sure enough: but what mad trick has he been playing now?"

The patriot was evidently uneasy, and reluctant to answer this question. Being pressed however on all sides, he replied—"I don't know, gentlemen, that he has been playing any tricks: the Courier pretends that he is charged with some knowledge of the Cato-street affair; treason, or misprision of treason, as they call it in their d—-d treasury jargon."

"Oh! Cato-street? Is that it?" cried the whole room with one voice, "then we'll have no addresses for him: no, no! we'll not address his Majesty for a Cato-street conspirator."

"But, gentlemen," said the disconcerted patriot—"But gentlemen, I say——"

"Mr. Dulberry, it won't do," interrupted a grave-looking tradesman: "Attack the ministers as much as you will. Let every man attack them. It's all fair. And I dare say they deserve it: for I'm not the man to think any of them saints. But let's hear it all in the old English way; all fair and above board: no foul play: no stabbing of unarmed men: set Junius upon them—set Cato upon them—set Publicola upon them in the newspapers. But no slipping into men's friendly meetings! no cutting throats by the fire-side! No Venice conspirators in England."

"Friendly meetings! and fire-sides!" said Dulberry; "why, God bless me, how you varnish the matter! To hear you talk,—one would suppose these ministers of ours were so many lambs, and met for nothing but to kiss and sing psalms. I tell you, they never meet but to plot against us and our liberties. And as to conspirators, if you come to that, I know of none except at Lord Harrowby's. You say there was a conspiracy of Cato-street against Grosvenor-square: I say—No: there was a conspiracy of Grosvenor-square against Cato-street."

This view of the case seemed so new and original to the company, that a general laugh followed; and the reformer, finding that he was no longer accompanied by the sympathy of his audience, sate down in dudgeon—muttering something about "lacqueys of Lord Londonderry." The politician being silenced, an opening was now allowed for a subject far more interesting to the majority of those who were present, and to many more in this part of Wales.

"And so Nicholas is taken at last?" said Mr. Bloodingstone a butcher: "Well, now that's what I could never have thought—that Nicholas should let himself be taken as quietly as a lamb. Bless your hearts, on all this coast there's not a creek or a cranny big enough for a field-mouse but he knew it: and all the way from Barmouth to Carnarvon I'll be sworn there's not a man on the Preventive Service, simple or gentle, but Nicholas has had his neck under his foot at one time or another."

"Aye, Mr. Bloodinsgtone," replied the landlord: "but a Bow-street officer with his staff is like Joshua the son of Nun; he can make the sun and moon stand still. So that's not the thing I wonder at. What surprizes me is—that a man like Nicholas should ever meddle with these politics and politicians, that get nothing for their pains but bloody heads and a trifle of fame that would never pay for one glass of good whiskey punch. What! Nicholas was a man of sense; and a d—-d long head he had of his own. And, if he would but have been quiet and have gone on in a regular way, he might have been a rich man by this time: for he had credit for evermore with the merchants in Amsterdam and Antwerp; and with some others too that I'll say nothing about."

"Was this Nicholas then settled in business at this place?" asked the Frenchman.

A smile appeared on the major part of the faces present; and the landlord answered with a loud laugh—"Settled! my God! I would be glad to see the place where Nicholas was ever settled for twenty-four hours together. No, bless you! Nicholas was no settler. And there's some folk will say that he never sate down in his life: but that's not true; for I've seen him sit many a time in that very arm-chair where the young gentleman is now sitting:" here he pointed to Bertram who felt somewhat uneasy at the very marked attention which was at this moment directed on him by the company. The landlord however took no notice, but proceeded in his answer: "No, Nicholas was no settler: and just as little can I call him a man in business. He was a sort of agent, you see, in other people's business; and a d—-d dangerous sort of business too; and I suppose there's never been his match in that way since the time of Owen Owalys. However we'll say nothing about all that: he stocked the whole country with cheap brandies and other little matters. And so I'll say nothing against his way of doing business; though I reckon we mustn't praise it, except in a corner."

"You must understand, Monsieur," said a voice from behind, "that this Nicholas set up an opposition trade against the government; and undersold it, so that government lost all its trade in this part of the country: for which reason government is jealous of him, and can't abide him.—But, landlord, it seems you knew this Nicholas?"

"I knew him in a manner: but how? I knew him, and I knew him not. Scores of times he has sate in this bar, and I never knew it to be him until after he was gone. Sometimes he would come dressed like an old beggar, and slink into a corner; sometimes like a labouring man, and argue with me for the value of a halfpenny; other times I have known him come like a lord, and make his guineas fly about like so much dust. And once—egad! I can't help laughing—he came in the uniform of a dragoon officer, and he would needs cudgel me for letting Nicholas escape. He got me by the throat: I sung out for my very life: Jenny—she ran for the constables: the neighbours came flocking in: Alderman Gravesand brought all his posse comitatus down, for he was then on the look-out for Nicholas at the town's end: and, would you believe it? by that time all was settled the whole party of the smugglers, bag and baggage, was clean through the town, and ten miles on the road to Ap Gauvon. And all this at noon-day."

"Well, landlord, and what said Nicholas when you saw him next?"

"The next time I saw him, gentlemen, was in my own bar; and dressed in one of my own wigs, jacket, and apron. Gad, I never was so frightened in the whole course of my life. I had just walked a mile out of town to our parson's; and, as I was coming back, a man shot by me like an arrow: but, as quick as he was, says I to myself,—That's Nicholas! And sure enough many minutes had'nt passed before up comes a great company of men, and asks me which way Nicholas had gone. I thought to myself—These'll be the Blazer's men of the revenue service, that's stationed off Caernarvon. So I did'nt trouble myself to give 'em much of an answer, and away they pelted after him in full cry. Well, gentlemen,—before I got home, both hare and hounds (as it happened) had turned into my bar. And, if you'll believe me, the first man I clapt my eyes on as I came into my own house—egad, I thought it was myself or my own ghost."

"And if this had been in the Scotch Highlands now, landlord, you would have been sure of being in your coffin before the year was out."

"Why I know not for that, Sir: but it's not lucky in any country for a man to see his own likeness walking about: and I'll not deny but I was a little startled; and I sate me down amongst the Blazer's men, and could not speak a word. And says he to me—(but he turned his face rather away)—'Good man, did you call for whiskey?' And I could have sworn to the voice for my own amongst a thousand: But, when he served me the whiskey, I looked hard at him; and I saw it was Nicholas. But I had'nt the heart to betray him: and I says to him—'Landlord, how are you? and how goes business?'—'Business?' says he, 'we've business for evermore; I'm run off my feet with business.' And sure enough he took sixpence of me in my own bar; and fifteen shillings of the revenue men for smuggled brandy. And whilst they were drinking, out he slips—and whips away at the north gate by the very same road they had all come; and two minutes after the lieutenant and his company were off, as if the devil drove 'em, to the south."

"This extraordinary talent for personating every age and character," said the manager, "he learned (or improved however) whilst he was in my troop. He was the best actor I ever had: nothing came amiss to him—Richard the Third, or Aguecheek; Shylock or Pistol—Romeo or the Apothecary—Hamlet or the Cock[2]: for by the way he once took it into his head to play the Cock in the first scene of Hamlet; and he crowed in so very superior a style that the oldest cock in the neighbourhood was taken in, and got to answering him; and the crowing spread from one farm-house to another till all the cocks in Carnarvonshire were crowing."

"Ha! ha! ha! Mr. Manager, and what said the audience to this?"

"What said the audience? Why they encored him—pit, boxes, and gallery: and the ghost was obliged to come on again, that he might be crowed off again. But all this was when he was a boy of 17: for he soon got tired of the stage."

"Aye, he grows tired of every thing," said some of the company: "and by this time, I'll be bound for it, he's grown tired of smuggling: and, if it be true that he has had any thing to do with Thistlewood, that's the reason."

"No," said another, "that's not the reason; tired of smuggling, I dare say he was; for a man, like Nicholas, could never have liked it for any thing but its active life, and its danger and its difficulties. But, if any thing has brought him connected with Cato-street, it is love."

"Love! what love for Lord Londonderry?"

"No, no, you guess what I mean; there are few in this room but know pretty well what I mean; love for a young lady in the neighbourhood."

"Miss Walladmor, I suppose?"

"Hush! hush!" said the landlord,—"let us name no names."

"Well! no matter for the name: but we all know that love had turned his brain: he was desperate; and for this last year and a half it's notorious that he has been as mad as a March hare."

"Nicholas in love!" said Mr. Bloodingstone, "well, now that sounds as comical to me as if I should say, that my bull-dog Towser was in love with a bull."

"Why, God bless my soul! haven't the Rotterdam merchants turned him out of their service for that very reason? I know it to be a fact that, no farther back than last February, when one of them was promising him 400 guineas if he'd do this and that,—'Damn your guineas!' says he, 'if it were not for a fairer face than ever I saw on a guinea, I would never set foot in Wales again.' And he raved at such a rate about the young lady, that all the owners began to be shy of him: and the end of it was, that Captain le——what's his name?—has been put in his room."

"Captain Jackson you mean," said the landlord, "for that's his real name; aye, it's true enough that Jackson has now got the command."

"Well, but mad or not mad, what became of Nicholas after the Bow-street officers had laid hold of him? Mr. Dulberry, you had the paper: what became of him? Clapt into a post-chaise for London, eh?"

"No, sir: with all their plots, it seems government couldn't make sure of catching him on the Cato-street business: witnesses couldn't be bought, or juries couldn't be packed, I suppose: and so they've sent him to this part of the country; and he's to take his trial at Dolgelly or Carnarvon for some old affairs, God knows what, with the Custom-house or the Blazer."

"God bless me!" exclaimed almost every man in the room, "so then we shall see Edward Nicholas once more; and I'll walk fifty miles rather than miss the sight. And which way does he come, Mr. Dulberry?"

"By sea, gentlemen; they shipped him on board the steam-packet Halcyon; and God, in his mercy, grant that this cursed instrument of despotic power may blow up and deliver so good a patriot from their snares!"

"The Halcyon!" exclaimed Bertram, with a vehemence proportioned to his sudden surprise and the interest which by this time he felt in the subject of the conversation—"The Halcyon! Why then, Mr. Dulberry, your prayer is granted: for the Halcyon blew up two days ago in St. George's Channel; somewhere, I believe, off the Isle of Anglesea: I was one of the passengers; and, to the best of my belief, all on board have perished—except myself."

In Lloyd's coffee-house, or other places of great resort in London, when a placard is exhibited reporting any important news, the restlessness of public impatience seems often as though it would extort an answer to its further curiosity from the inanimate pillar or post to which the placard is affixed: it may be supposed how much more liable to such importunity is the bearer of a placard that happens to be no stone pillar but a living man. Bertram was pressed upon from all sides for his narrative of the catastrophe, which he gave in substance as the reader has already heard it. Of Nicholas, whom he now understood to have been his fellow-passenger, he knew nothing: that some state prisoner, of extraordinary character, was on board—he had indeed casually heard; but had seen nothing of him to his own knowledge; and if he were under hatches and in irons, there was no room to doubt that he must have been amongst those who were most sure to have perished. All that he could certainly report of the final sequel to his own share in the adventure—was that, since his eyes had opened on shore, they had rested on no countenance which he remembered to have seen on board the Halcyon. It is needless to say that a mixed expression of wonder, deep interest in the events, and compassion for the unfortunate sufferers, accompanied Bertram's narrative. The narrator himself was the object of a mingled sympathy of condolence and congratulation—blended however with an air of keen examination directed to his features (now that they were brought nearer to the observers and under a steadier light) which had once before distressed him in the course of the evening, and for which he could find no satisfactory explanation. The prevailing sentiment, which arose at the end of the account, was a lively regret that the near prospect of seeing Edward Nicholas again—so suddenly opened upon them—should have been so suddenly overcast. Nevertheless, such was the general confidence in his good fortune and his unrivalled resources in presence of mind and bodily activity—that considerable odds were offered by many of the company that Nicholas, who had outlived so many desperate storms, both by sea and land, in all climates of the world, would yet be heard of again.

For any of these feelings or considerations Mr. Dulberry had no leisure: the moral, which he drew from this, as from all other events great or small—sad or merry, was exclusively civic and full of patriotic spleen:—"So then," said he, "you see what sort of ships government choose for transporting their state prisoners?"

"But, good God, Mr. Dulberry, you can hardly suppose that the boiler of the Halcyon was in the pay of my Lord Londonderry?"

"The boiler!—No: but where was the engineer that should have been in his pay? Didn't Mr. Bennett propose a year or two ago, that no steam-packet should be lawfully turned off the stocks before it was thoroughly examined by a state engineer? Didn't——"

But here supper was announced, a summons welcome in itself, and at this moment doubly so as putting a stop to the reformer. Even that person condescended to be pleased on the former consideration, though reasonably incensed on the other; and he advanced to the table in a continued ejaculation of inarticulate grunts—a sort of equivocal language in which he designed to convey alike his approbation of supper and displeasure at the interruption.

Bertram took his seat with the rest of the party; but sought an early opportunity of withdrawing himself from a scene of convivial merriment, in which his previous fatigues had by this time wholly disqualified him for sharing with any cordiality. Wearily he followed the person who conducted him to his bedchamber: but, spite of his sleepiness and exhaustion, he was roused to a slight shock of something like terror, by a little incident which occurred on the way:—in one of the galleries, through which they passed, a man was standing at the further end: he was apparently in the act of admitting himself into a bedroom: but something, which embarrassed him about the lock or the key, detained him until they advanced near enough to throw the light of a candle full upon his profile. It was the profile of a face tanned into a gypsey complexion, and for so young a face—weather-beaten, thin, and wasted; but otherwise of Grecian beauty of outline; and, as far as could be judged from so hasty and oblique a glance, remarkably expressive and dignified. The man did not look round or take any other notice of them, as they advanced: and the attendant either had not, or affected not to have, any knowledge of his person: but Bertram felt a bewildering remembrance, as if suddenly snatched and recovered from a dream, of the same features seen under circumstances of some profounder interest. He labored anxiously to recollect in what situation and when; but the events of the last few days had so agitated and bewildered his mind, that he labored in vain; and, the more he thought, the more he entangled himself in a web of perplexity. From this and all other perplexities, however, he was speedily liberated by the sound sleep which seized him the moment he had laid his head on the pillow.

FOOTNOTES TO "CHAPTER VI.":

[Footnote 1: A joke upon an Irish accentuation of Mr. Croker's, the Secretary to the Admiralty. In his Talavera he accentuated the word Ally Hibernice, with the accent on the first syllable. On which Mr. Southey playfully called him Ally Croaker.]

[Footnote 2: A joke borrowed from ——, by whom it was applied to a better man than himself; one of the most extraordinary men of genius in this age, and whose life has been more romantic than that of Edward Nicholas.]



CHAPTER VII.

Pand. Hark, they ate coming from the field: shall we stand up here, and see them as they pass towards Ilium? Good niece do, sweet niece Cressida.

Cress. At your pleasure.

Pand. Here, here, here's an excellent place: here we may see most bravely. I'll tell you them all by their names as they pass by: but mark Troilus above the rest.

Troilus and Cressida: Act. 1.

When Bertram awoke, the sun was already high and pouring a golden light through the frosted window of his bedroom. The church-bells of Machynleth were ringing gaily: from one or two neighbouring villages arose a fainter sound of bells; and the stir and motion within doors and without proclaimed that this was some festal day. On descending to breakfast, he found the house arranged in the neatest order and garnished with branches of fir. The door was crowded and the street was swarming with groups of country people—men, women, and children; the women adorned with gay ribbons, and the men with bouquets of leeks. The landlord and many of his inmates paid the same honor to the day: and every thing announced that it was the great national festival of Wales, sacred to good St. David; a day on which no man of Welch blood, though he should be at Seringapatam, would think it lawful to forget this ancient recognizance of Cambrian fraternity.—True it is however, that, like all other old usages, this also (except in the principality itself) is rapidly falling into disuse. Else surely it could never have happened that precisely on this day a certain noble lord of Welch descent should have thought fit to rise in his place in the House, and make an eloquent exposition and apology for the jacobinical creed of his friends. We cannot doubt that, had a bunch of leeks been suddenly presented to his lordship at this moment, his face would have crimsoned with a blush as deep as that of the red night-cap which apparently is the object of his homage; for surely no hostility can be deeper than that between the badge of jacobinism and this antique symbol of honor, good faith, and loyal brotherhood, and reverence for the dust of our forefathers.

"How now, landlord"—said the reformer—"Is this absurd, superstitious, commemoration of St. David's day never to cease?"

"Have a care, Mr. Dulberry: don't talk too loud. There's some of our country friends outside, that, if they should overhear you, might take a fancy for trying the strength of your head with ice-clods—or put you under the pump."

"Or perhaps," said the manager, "give you a leek to eat; and not in so courtly a manner as I once saw Fluellen administer his leek to Pistol on the London boards; the part of Fluellen on that particular night by Garrick; to whom, by the way, in that part I was myself considered equal."

"All rank superstition, trash, and mummery from the days of darkness and barbarism," continued Dulberry. "And hence it comes that sound principles make so little progress in Wales. As if we hadn't red-letter days in the calendar more than enough already from national and general superstition, but these local superstitions must step in to add another. Gentlemen! it seems to me that Parliament should put a stop to all bell-ringing, wearing of leeks, flaunting about with ribbons, and flocking together in the street. Suppose, gentlemen, we should have an Address prepared against leeks."

"No addresses," Mr. Dulberry, said the landlord, "for this day at any rate! Sir Morgan Walladmor would send the beadle to you with a rod of nettles, if he was to hear of such a thing: for he doats upon the leek and St. David's day. This is one of his great jollification days: and he sends bread, meat, drink, coals, and money, to every poor cottage for a dozen miles round: nay, I may go farther and tell no lie: for though the baronet's an old man now, and has had some sorrow to bear of his own, by his good will there shouldn't be a sad heart in Machynleth on St. David's day; and that's five and twenty long miles from Castle Walladmor."

"Abominable despotism! and the poor oppressed creatures do actually swallow his drink?"

"Swallow it? Aye, Mr. Dulberry, it's no physic."

"And they dance too, I suppose?"

"Every mother's child of them, Mr. Dulberry: not a soul but'll dance to-day except babies and cripples. Lord! Mr. Dulberry, if you don't like to see poor labouring folks happy for one day in the year, I'll tell you this—you must keep out of Machynleth on St. David's day."

"Well! this tyranny goes beyond any thing I've seen: we all know that Lord Londonderry has compelled Manchester and all England to wear mourning: but this rustic tyrant is determined to make people merry when, as every body must know, they want to cry."

"Come, come, Sir, the Baronet's a good man and no tyrant; though he may have his fancies and his faults, like the rest of us: but we most of us like him pretty well, tenants and all: and, as to his niece—Miss Genevieve, I believe there's not many between this and the Castle but would go through fire and water for her."

"Sir Morgan Walladmor," said Alderman Gravesand, "is a wise man; and, in these times of change and light-mindedness, he sticks up for ancient customs. It's a pity but there were more such."

"Aye and he's a clever man," added the landlord, "and knows how to tack with the wind: for, let who would be in or out of the ministry, he has still been the king's lieutenant for these two counties of Carnarvon and Merioneth ever since I can think on."

"There you're wrong, landlord,"—replied the Alderman: "Sir Morgan never shifts or tacks for any body: he's a staunch Whig like all his ancestors from 1688; and, though he doesn't go up to Parliament now so often as he did in his younger days, yet there has never been a Tory administration but Sir Morgan Walladmor has opposed it so far as he thought honorable; that is to say, he has opposed it on the fine old Whig principles of the Russels—the Cavendishes—and the Spencers."

"And why doesn't he go up to Parliament, I'd be glad to know?" said Dulberry: "What the d—-l does he stay here for, like a ruminating beast chewing the cud of his youthful patriotism? Because he has got some pleasant sinecure for himself, I suppose—and some comfortable places for his sons, his grandsons, his nephews, and his cousins."

"I'll tell you, Mr. Dulberry, why he doesn't go up to Parliament," said Alderman Gravesand; "not, as you say, out of consideration for his sons, grandsons, nephews, and cousins; for he happens to have neither son, grandson, nephew, nor cousin:—not, as you say, to preserve his own sinecures; for he has never had a shilling for his services; nor any reward at all from the state, except indeed what a man like Sir Morgan thinks the greatest of all rewards—the thanks of Parliament, and the approbation of his Sovereign: not, as you say, to take his ease and pleasure, for he has troubles enough of his own to keep him waking at Walladmor House as much as if he were in St. James's-square:—these are not his reasons, Mr. Dulberry. But now I'll tell you what is:—There are just now in London and elsewhere a set of presumptuous—illiterate—mechanical rogues who take upon themselves to be the defenders of Old England and her liberties; and they have made the very name of liberty ridiculous: and all the old authentic champions of constitutional rights in Parliament or elsewhere shrink back in shame from the opprobrium of seeming to make common cause with a crew so base and mechanical. And, if there were any person of that stamp here, and he were to take liberties with better men than himself,—I would take him by the shoulder just as I do you, Mr. Dulberry; and I would pin him down into his chair; and I would say to him—'Thou ridiculous reformer, if I hear a word of insolence from thy lips against our worthy lord lieutenant, I will most unceremoniously toss thee neck and heels out of the window.' For a day of peace and festivity that would be an unsuitable spectacle: and therefore glad I am that I see no such ridiculous person before me, but on the contrary my worthy old friend and acquaintance Samuel Dulberry."

The reformer made no manual reply to this significant threat; but contented himself with turning his back contemptuously on the Alderman—at the same time uttering these words:

"Well, Mr. Gravesand, serve your master after your own fashion: what is it to me? Carry his lap-dogs; fondle his cats; fawn upon his spaniels: what care I? But——" What dreadful form of commination hung pendant upon this 'But,' was never known: for precisely at this moment, and most auspiciously for the general harmony of the company, the reformer's eloquence was cut short by a joyous uproar of voices "They're coming! they're coming!" And immediately a sea-like sound of glad tumultuous crowds, in advance of the procession, swelled upon the ear from the open door: every window was flung up in a moment: mothers were hurrying with their infants; fathers were raising their lads and lasses on their shoulders: the thunders of the lord lieutenant's band began to peal from a distance: in half a minute the head of the procession appeared in view wheeling round the corner: heads after heads, horses after horses, in never-ending succession, kept pouring round into the street: the whole market-place filled as with the influx of a spring tide: and all eyes were turned upon the ceremonial part of the procession, which now began to unfold its pomp.

First came the Snowdon archers, two and two, in their ancient uniform[1] of green and white, in number one hundred and twenty. Immediately behind them rode a young man in black and crimson, usually called Golden-Spear from the circumstance of his carrying the gilt spear of Harlech Castle, with which, by the custom, he is to ride into Machynleth church at a certain part of the service on St. David's day, and into Dolgelly church on the day of Pentecost, and there to strike three times against 'Traitors' grave'[2] with a certain form of adjuration in three languages. After him came the rangers of Penmorfa, all mounted, and riding four abreast. They were in number about eighty-four; and wore, as usual, a uniform of watchet (i.e. azure) and white—with horse-cloths and housings of the same colors:—and the ancient custom had been that all the horses should be white: this rule had been relaxed in later times from the poverty of the Penmorfa people in consequence of repeated irruptions of the sea, but was now restored, with brilliant effect on the coloring of the procession, by the liberality of Sir Morgan Walladmor. Next after these rode the sheriff of Merionethshire and his billmen, all in ancient costume: and then came the most interesting part of the cavalcade. On St. David's day it had always been the custom that the Bishop of Bangor should send some representative to do suit and service for a manor which he held of the house of Walladmor: and the usage was—that, if there were an heir male to that ancient house, the Bishop sent four young men who carried falcons perched on their wrists; but, if the presumptive claimant of the Walladmor honors and estates were a female, in that case he sent four young girls who carried doves. Both the doves and the falcons had an allusion to the arms of the Walladmors: and for some reason, in the present year, Sir Morgan had chosen himself to add the four falcons and their bearers to the Bishop's doves. These were arranged in the following manner. Four beautiful girls drest altogether in white, without bonnets, and having no head-dress but white caps, were ranged in line with the four falcon-bearers, who were young boys dressed in complete suits of bishop's purple and purple mantles: all the eight rode on white horses: and immediately behind them came a kind of triumphal car, low but very spacious, and carrying Sir Morgan's five domestic harpers and the silver harps which they had won in the contests first introduced under Queen Elizabeth's reform in 1567: behind the car again rode five horsemen on gigantic horses carrying the five banners of the five several castles belonging to Sir Morgan in Wales. The banners were so managed as to droop over the heads of the young women and boys: and thus the doves, the falcons, their beautiful bearers, the white horses, the venerable harpers and their silver harps, were all gathered as it were into one central group by means of the banners of purple and gold which spread their fine floating draperies above them all.

This was the centre of the procession: but immediately in advance of this part (i.e. between it and the sheriff's party) rode the two presiding persons of the ceremony; and who in that character, as well as for the interest connected with their own appearance, commanded universal attention.—Immediately before the falcon-bearers, and mounted upon a grey charger, rode a tall meagre man in a dress well fitted to raise laughter in the spectator and with a countenance well fitted to repress it. This was Sir Morgan Walladmor. His dress was an embroidered suit something in the fashion of the French court during the regency of the Duke of Orleans in the minority of Louis the Fifteenth; and having been worn by the baronet in his youth upon some memorable occasion, where it had either aided his then handsome person in making a conquest or in some other way had connected itself with remembrances that were affecting to him, he never would wear this dress on any day but St. David's——nor on that day would ever wear any other. The dress was sacred to the festival; which, like all joyous ceremonials and commemorations, to those who are advanced in years bring with them some sorrow blended with their joy. In such sorrow however, where it is a simple tribute of natural regrets to the images of vanished things, and the fleeting records of poor transitory man, there is often an overbalance of pleasure. But the merest stranger, who read the features of Sir Morgan Walladmor with a discerning eye, might see a history written there of a sorrow that went deeper than that—a sorrow not tempered by any pleasure. On ordinary occasions this was the predominant expression of his countenance—mixed however at all times with something of a humorous aspect, a half fantastic sense of the ludicrous, and perhaps a few reliques of that sternness which at one time was said to have had some place in the composition of his character. But this had long given way to the influences of time and the softening hand of affliction: all harshness, that might once have thrown a shade over the milder graces of his character, was now removed: and on this day, above all days in the year, his heart had no leisure for any feelings but those of kindness—dilated as it was by the old ancestral glories that were revived and shadowed forth in the pomps before him. Every part of the ceremonial to his eye was rich with meaning and symbolic language: and in the eye of the rudest of his countrymen he saw this language repeated and reflected—the language of exulting national pride, with a personal application to himself as its chief local representative. Apart from these patriotic feelings, Sir Morgan was capable of enjoying that purest of all happiness which is reflected from the spectacle of happiness in others: he was besides now riding for the sixtieth time in this annual procession, having begun to ride when he was no more than five years old: and finally Sir Morgan was a gentleman in the most emphatic sense of that emphatic word. Hence it arose that his manners on this occasion were more than merely courteous or condescending; all thought of condescension was lost and forgotten in the expression of paternal benignity with which he looked on those around him: the meanest and the highest, the youngest and oldest, came in alike for the salutation of his eye: to the poorest cottagers, as he past, he bowed and smiled with an air of cordial sincerity that allowed no thought of artifice: and young and old, man and woman, all smiled with delighted faces and happy confidence as they bowed and curtsied in return.

As he passed under the inn, Sir Morgan threw up his eyes to the upper windows; and, observing them thickly crowded with strangers, he moved with a courtly politeness—at the same time smiling archly but goodnaturedly as his eye caught that of Mr. Dulberry, whose character as a reformer had reached him; and who at this moment was the only one amongst the gentlemen present that stood bolt upright, and proclaimed his radical patriotism by refusing to acknowledge the lord lieutenant's salutation. Impressive as Sir Morgan's aspect and costume were, the attention of every body however was at this moment drawn off to his youthful companion, who just now turned her eyes with a hurried glance on the inn—but immediately withdrew them, as she observed the crowd of gentlemen at the windows. All the strangers were aware that this was the baronet's niece; who was now an object of sufficient interest from the disclosures of the preceding night, even though she had been less attractive in her person.

Sorrow in Miss Walladmor wore its most touching shape: as yet it had made no ravages in her beauty; and, if it had laid a hand of gentle violence upon her health, it had as yet cropped only the luxuriance of her youthful charms. It was clear to every eye that Miss Walladmor was not one of those persons who surrender themselves unresisting victims to dejection, and sink without a struggle into premature valetudinarians. Somewhat indeed her early acquaintance with grief had dimmed the lustre of her fine blue eyes; and had given a pensive timidity to her manner. But, if her eye were less bright, it was still full of spirit and intelligence: and, if the roses were stolen from her cheek, her paleness was rather the paleness of thought than of constitutional languor; or to express it in the exquisite lines of a modern poet, if she wore 'a pale face' it was however a pale face

'————that seem'd undoubtedly As if a blooming face it ought to be:'

and her whole person and deportment expressed that naturally she was of redundant health and gaiety, but suffering under the shocks of a trial to which she had been summoned too early for her youthful fortitude.

Having mounted on horseback only at the entrance of Machynleth, Miss Walladmor did not wear a riding-habit; but had gratified her uncle by assuming the plain white morning dress, white ribbons, and cap, which ancient custom had consecrated to the occasion; adding only, in consideration of the frosty day, an ermine tippet. The horse she rode was a white palfrey of the beautiful breed so much valued by Charles I.; and in fact traced its pedigre from the famous White Rose which had been presented by the sister of that prince [the Electress Palatine] to an ancestor of Sir Morgan's, who had attended her to Heidelberg. At the moment of passing the inn,—one of the doves, which Miss Walladmor had been in the habit of feeding, quitted the hand of the young bearer behind, and perched upon the shoulder of her mistress; making up a picture of innocent beauty somewhat fanciful and allegoric, but not on that account the less fitted to harmonize with the antique pageantries of this heraldic solemnity.

Such were the two central and presiding figures: every eye strained after them, and all that followed was unnoticed: the bailiff of Talyllyn with the surcoat, and the silver spurs of Llewellyn; the high constable of Aber-glas-llyn, with his gorgeous display of antique liveries; the tawny coats of the Bishop of St. Asaph, who came to ride the boundaries of the old episcopal demesne of Aberkilvie, in company with the retainers of Sir Morgan; the Mayor and Corporation of Machynleth, in their crimson robes;—all alike passed unheeded: and the spectators were first roused from the fascination of the departing spectacle by the clangor of the band, which with the Barmouth sea-fencibles—two troops of dragoons and the cortege of the Sheriff of Carnarvonshire brought up the rear of the cavalcade.

As fast as the procession cleared the ground, with the fluent motion of water, the crowd closed up in its wake—all eager to press after it into the church. Bertram, who had shared deeply in the general admiration and pity expressed for Miss Walladmor, sympathized no less with the national feeling belonging to the day. Who can blame him? The spectacle of a whole multitude swayed by one feeling, however little the object of that feeling may be approved by the judgment of the spectator, appeals irresistibly to his sympathies, if he be not more than usually cold-hearted: and I remember well that, though myself a faithful son of the Scotish church, I was once seduced by such an occasion into an involuntary act of idolatrous compliance with popery. It was at Orleans: the day was splendid: the bells proclaimed a festival: a vast procession of a mixed composition, religious and military, was streaming towards the cathedral; and by a moral compulsion, rather than by any physical pressure of the crowd, I was swept along into the general vortex. Suddenly an angle of the road brought me into such a position with respect to all who were in advance of my station, that I could see the whole vast line bent into the form of a crescent, and with its head entering at the great-doors of the cathedral: I gazed on the tossing of the plumes and the never ending dance of heads succeeding to heads as they plunged into what seemed the dark abysses of the church: one after one I beheld the legions and their eagles, the banners and the lilies of France swallowed up by the cathedral: then, as I came nearer and nearer, I could hear the great blair of the organ—throwing off its clouds of ascending music, like incense fuming from an altar: nearer still I could look through the high portals into the nave of the church, and could distinguish the opposite windows storied with gorgeous emblazonries of saints and martyrs, angels and archangels, whilst above them were seen the Madonna, and "the Lamb of God" with the cross; and through the upper panes streamed in the golden rays of the sun, and the blue light of the unfathomable heavens: then, as I myself was entering, suddenly the shattering trumpet-stop was opened: and I heard the full choir singing the great anthem of Pergolesi—"And the Dead shall arise:" at which instant I also wept with the multitude, and acknowledged a common faith and a common hope: and for a moment I will confess that I apostatized to the church of Rome for the sake of her pomps and vanities: a sin which I trust is forgiven me, as I can assure the church of Scotland that it is the single occasion throughout my life on which I have had any wanderings of thought from her pure and orthodox creed.

Under a similar impulse, caught from the contagion of public enthusiasm, Bertram pressed after the procession into the church. He was carried by the crowd into a situation from which he could overlook the entire nave which was in the simplest style of Gothic architecture and naked of all the ornaments which belong to the florid Gothic of a later age. The massy pillars were left unviolated by the petty hand of household neatness: they stood severe in monumental granite, unwhitewashed, unstuccoed, without tricks or frippery. All the gingerbread work of plinths to the base, or fretted cornices to the capitals, had been banished by the austerity of the presiding taste. And it struck Bertram also, as a picturesque circumstance in the whole effect and at the same time a circumstance of rude grandeur which well accorded with the spirit of the architecture, that there was no ceiling: the whole was open to the slates; and the vast beams and joists of oak, which had been laid for upwards of four hundred years, were clearly distinguishable. Below these were suspended antique banners which floated at times in the currents of air: and all the pillars were hung with shields, helmets, shirts of mail, and other ancient records of warlike achievements—arranged in the manner of trophies. All these were covered with venerable dust, the deposition of centuries, which no loyal-hearted Welchman would on any account have disturbed.

The service, as is usual at Machynleth—at Bangor Cathedral and other great churches in North Wales, was partly performed in Welch and partly in English. The singing, which was fine and supported by an organ of prodigious power, was chiefly of a triumphant and (as it appeared to Bertram) almost martial character. Just before the sermon however an ancient ceremony showed that, if the religion of the day clothed itself in the attire of earthly pride and exultation, the martial patriotism of Wales could sometimes soar into a religious expression. The people divided to the right and the left, leaving a lane from the great door: a trumpet sounded; and in rode Golden-spear, lance in rest, the whole length of the nave—passed into the choir—and halted before a monument of black marble. He paused for a few moments: then cried with a loud voice in Welch, English, and Latin, "Bastard of Walladmor!" to which summons the choir sang a penitential antiphony. Then he raised his spear and struck the outside of the tomb: to which again the organ muttered and the choir sang a response. Then a second time he raised the golden spear, and plunged it through an iron grating which occupied the place of heart in the stony figure of a knight recumbent on the tomb: the spear sank within a foot of the head: and again the organ muttered some sad tones; after which he pronounced these words: