Wales, past and present

Front matter

WALES, PAST AND PRESENT. BY CHARLES WILKINS. AUTHOR OF UTHE HISTORY OF MERTHYR," " HISTOEY OF THE IEON AND COAL TRADES," ETC, ETO. MERTHYR: PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY HARRY WOOD SOUTHEY, 110, HIGH-STREET. MDCCCLXX. is, •> DEDICATION TO THE RIGHT HON. HENRY AUSTIN BRUCE, M.P., HER MAJESTY'S SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT, THIS WORK, BY PERMISSION, DEDICATED, IN PROFOUND ADMIRATION OF HIS ABILITIES, AND HIS PRIVATE WORTH, AND IN RECOGNITION OF THE THOUGHTFUL INTEREST HE HAS EVER SHOWN IN THE MORAL AND EDUCATIONAL WELFARE OF WALES. TO THE READER. This work is intended to convey a better idea of Wales, its people, and its literature, than is held by the English pubUc, whose knowledge of the country is derived in greater part from garbled accounts, or "truveUer's tales." Information which might have corrected many of the erroneous views entertained is confined either to scarce or high priced works, and, were these accessible, it is doubtful if a mass of statistical information would be examined in order to arrive at the grain of fact needed It is hoped that in gathering from a great many sources everything of interest relative to Wales, and presenting it in a readable form, a want loudly expressed may be supplied.

Much original matter, also, the fruit of long research, of observation, of reflection, of mountain wanderings, and study of Welsh character, will be found herein blended with the old facts of Welsh History. The correction of crude or incorrect knowledge does not alone form the object of the author. His intention — and it is for the reader in after time to say how far successful — has been to interweave the lessons history teaches, and so mirror the Past and Present, that from chequered annals the student of history may rise with the moral heroism, in this surface age, to aid his Uttle in making Ftjtuee Histoey brighter. -o-

Chapter I

— PRELUDE. Historical sceptics — Old Traditions — Gomer — Brutus — the Kymry and their march into Gaul — Expedition to Britain — Forecast of their destiny. Scepticism is not confined to the domain of theology, especially in the present age. Nearly every idol we have long retained amongst our gods comes in for its share of criticism, and is either pulled down from its pedestal, or sadly maltreated. It would seem that we reverse the process employed by the ancients in creating their numerous myths and in constructing their annals, and now as a matter of fact, remorselessly, stage by stage, level them to the ground. What substantial gods and goddesses we have destroyed. In school days, Her cules and Venus, Jupiter and Diana, were impersonified to our imagination and stood forth in bold and striking relief.

Then the fairies of the dell and the gnomes of the mine were actual living beings ; our days teemed with such creations, from dwarfs to giants ; and the night world had its race, mute and ghostly links connecting us with the spirit land. Not content with brushing all these away, the sceptic has even invaded history. In connection with Wales there is the story of the descent of the Kymry from Gomer, one of Noah's grandsons. This is now placed on the shelf. Then the tale of the colonization by Brutus, who, with a few chosen followers, escaped after the fall of Troy to Gaul, there built the city of Tours in memory of his brother, and afterwards journeyed to this island and founded a kingdom. This, too, has been denounced as moonshine. Kemble has voted Horsa and Hengist to be Myths ; other English writers place Arthur's exploits amongst the legendary ; and, to come down to later times, even William Shakespeare has been considered by more than one a phantom of the imagination.

There must be limits to this sort of criticism, or else we shall find our selves in the dilemma of Bishop Berkeley, who, according to Byron, " Said there was no matter, and proved it, " And it was no matter what he said." This may be taken as a fair rule for guidance that the more poetic a nation so the more unreliable will be its records. The poetic mind exaggerates and ex tols ; matter of fact personages become heroes, every day actions are highly adorned. The literature of Wales is essentially poetic. Its prose bears but a slight proportion to its poetry. Gifted with the power of imagery, apt in illustration, no wonder that a race of poets and preachers has been bred, the latter especially vivid and impassioned and luxuriating in word pictures which by kindred though less developed minds have been eagerly entertained.

It sollows conclusively that at an earlier age, when the restraints to the too active exercise of the imagination did not exist, many a wild fancy was fashioned and ushered forth and handed down to us which for centuries has held its ground, and has only perished at last under the close criticism brought into exercise by men of the highest scholastic attainments. The story of Brutus is by the majority of English and foreign critics now placed amongst the myths. They will have none of it, and yet there are not lacking many plausible supports of the legend. Bede, the venerable, accepted it as a fact. Suggestive proofs were given by Marcellinus, and until the 1 5th century all who wrote on English history took the same view. Geoffrey of Monmouth cited the war like habits of the Briton as identical with those of the Greeks, and, referring to Xenophon it is remarkable to note the mode of chariot fighting which, classical historians say, was, in the western countries, confined to Britain.

Then, too, the old bards are credited with being conversant with Greek, and the ex plorers amongst manners, customs, usages, and laws, will not unfrequently stumble over a resemblance to those of ancient Troy, which, to say the least, is singular. We cannot incorporate this story of Brutus in these pages bat notice it simply as boldly stated and by some stoutly held. The amount of learning brought to bear on both sides is commendable, but such as effectually to deter us from meddling with the question. This, however, we may urge, as a passing thought, but in keeping with the course of our criticism in general, that if not true it is singular how such a fiction could have been invented, whence the materials could have been gathered. If refugees from Troy found an asylum in Spain, wliich, according to Justin, they did, and in Gaul, according to Ammianus Marcellinus, why not also in Britain *!

With this passing review of Brutus we enter a more legitimate domain, and open our review of the leading incidents of our history with a notice of The Kymry and their JExpedition to Britain. It has been maintained by authorities of considerable erudition, that Bri tain was an Erse, or Gaelic country, peopled by the Gwydhelion, the progenitors of the Irish, and the etymology of the old names of mountain, lake, and river, has been given in support of this Gaelic settlement. Other authorities of equal ability claim priority of settlement for the Kymry, the ancient Britons. Both are well supported, and leave the matter pretty well in the condition of an open question, and a problem for ingenuity to exercise itself upon, but, never solve. In claiming precedence for the Kymry as composing the first wave of Keltic migration, we are supported by some of the ablest antiquarian scholars in Wales, and not a few who having, no national bias, give the question the most impartial treatment.

The question again, as to the origin of the Kymry, has aroused the most animated discussion during the last half century. Language has been subjected to the severest analysis, numberless investigations made of classical authors, THE KYMRY IN GAUL. 7 past customs, observances, characteristics diligently examined, and even the old tumuli of Denmark, the Baltic shores, and of English wilds, made to tell their tale by skull, ornament, or vase ; but the result is slight, and in some instances unsatisfactory ; there is scarcely a writer who does not hold a different opinion from his predecessor, and not an opinion which is invulnerable. Some have regarded them as pure Kelts, others as Kelto-Germans. The obscurity of early history, the meagre details of early nations, the maze of myth and legend, the identity between early races, springing, as all did, from the same great source, the similarity in physical structure of some as regards the skull, and strange affinity in others as regards observance, custom, and worship, present insuperable difficulties to the inquirer, and keen as the curiosity may be, it has to remain to a great extent unsatisfied.

Let us link together the little that is known. For ages prior to the time ■when Britain is first noticed by reliable authorities, the Kelts, wandering from the east, the cradle of the human race, roamed over the land in tribes or com munities, invariably skirting the shores, and leaving behind them tumuli and cairns which, opened in modern days, have yielded subjects of most interesting ethnological enquiry. Occasionally locating themselves until attracted by fairer scenes, or driven away by stronger tribes, they appear to have settled in con siderable numbers in Jutland. The Cumbri (1) of Jutland, from whom our Kymry are believed to be descended, bore a valorous character, in strict harmony with the later British renown. We hear of them in Illyria, where they defeated Papirius Carbo, at the head of a consular army, B.C., 113; then in Gaul, B.C., 112; passing quickly through which they entered Spain, and, showing in formidable proportions on the frontiers of Transalpine Gaul, defeated two Roman armies, B.C., 109, and 107.

Two years later, they again severely chastised a Roman general, but afterwards suffered a terrible defeat under Marius. Similar or cognate tribes, from the same warlike stock, had long previously not only invaded Italy, but assailed Rome. The heroic Greeks, too, had felt the fierce fury of Keltic invasion, and there were few nations who did not respect then* prowess, and dread their enmity. (2) The Crimea and the Western shores of the Bosphorus, were on " the great high road " of nomadic races, for their vast herds, on which they chiefly subsisted, and the immense number of their people, compel them to keep to the land. Directing our attention to that scene, where the ancient and modern repre sentatives of the Kymry have displayed their valour, we find that in remote times there was a nomadic race of Kelts known as the Kimnierii, and these Mr. Stephens, in his Literature of the Kymry, suggests were the Kimmerioi of Homer.

The suggestion, in common with all others from the same source, is entitled to great respect, but it is not quite certain that the " Kimmerians " of the western shores of the Bosphorus, were identical with our Kymry. Prichard and Latham think not, nor is it positive they were the people referred to by Homer. The reference is as follows : — We quote from the Odyssey — " When lo, we reached old Ocean's utmost bounds, Where rocks control his waves with ever during mounds, There in a lonely land, and gloomy cells, The dusky nation of Cimmeria dwells. The sun ne'er views the uncomfortable seats ; When radiant he advances, or retreats. Unhappy race, whom endless night invades, Clouds the dull air, and wraps them round in shades." This doleful picture is the original of the " Cimmerian Gloom " so often quoted, and may have been suggested to the poet by the dark woods, mystic groves, and gloomy rites, associated with the Keltic race Pope, in his notes on the passage, remarks that in the opinion of many commentators Homer constantly made use of a fabulous geography.

In this passage, on the supposition that the Kimmerii of the shores of the Bosphorus were referred to, Ulysses must have been represented as doing that which was physically impossible, sailing from Circe to the Cim merians in one day ; but the translator suggests, quoting Lycophron, that there were a people in Italy, named Cimmerians, who dwelt near Baiæ, and the lake Avernus, and from the nomadic and powerful character of the race, the con clusion is drawn that the relationship is established between the dwellers by the Bosphorus and the Avernus. The Kimmerii, although a nomadic race, seem to have located themselves in the Crimea for a long time, until driven out by the Scythians, when they passed along the shores of the Euxine, invaded Asia Minor, and pillaged Sardis, in the time of Ardyes, the son of Gyges, striving, it would appear, in every possible way to retaliate on others the like injuries to those inflicted on themselves.

In Lydia (of wliich Sardis was the capital) they remained eighteen years, when they were defeated, and driven forth to find a new home. (3) At this stage of inquiry, the question arises, did our Kymry colonise Britain from Jutland, wandering to the opposite coast, Northumberland, and gradually spread over the island t This is the view taken by many eminent antiquarians who maintain that the Gaelic branch of the Kelts (ancestry of the Irish) colonised from Gaul and the Kymry from Jutland. Ancient Welsh poems, such names as Cumber land in the Northern district, and the affinity between the names of the Southern parts to Gaelic, are adduced in proof. Pritchard and Latham would seem to favour this view, and support it with voluminous researches, references to Diodorus Siculus, and Strabo, who class the Kinibri as a Gaulish tribe, to Vellerius Paterculus, to Pliny and Ptolemy, who locate them in the north, the second as far north as Norway.

Herodotus, Aristotle, and Ephorus, write of the Kelts inhabiting Western Europe, in then* time. But identifying the Kimmerioi of the Crimea, with the Kymry, and on the supposition that once they had enjoyed the luxuries THE TRIADS. of eastern and southern districts, they would not return into Jutland, though from Jutland, afterwards, colonies may have settled in Britain, attracted by the success of kindred tribes, we take up the trail supplied by the Triads, and find our Kymry located on the site of Constantinople. These Triads, doubtful (though some are unquestionably ancient), mythical, visionary, as many are, yet may contain a kernel of fact. Ancient or modern, they were written at a time when critical scholarship, learned analysis and infer ence, such as our eminent antiquaries have brought to bear, could not have been expected, so that in such investigations as to origin of races, the traditions handed down from sire to son, and proofs, now lost, were the only guides.

So we select the Triads, partly to give both sides of the question, and in part from the con secutive narration they afford of the route the known Keltic tribes must have taken from the Baltic coast to the sunnier landscapes of France. In the beautiful summer country, then, of Deffrobani, we see them by the light of the Triads, settled as a nation and prospering. Unused to agriculture, their flocks and herds supply them with abundance and render the weariness of toil unnecessary. They are at peace, at rest from their wanderings. Foes are afar ; as yet, they think not of the foes within their camps, such as in future days were to enervate the fiery Moslem and make a vigorous nation effete. In the beautiful summer land the nation gradually increased in power and riches, and with these improved conditions the old hardihood of the race began to fade, luxuriant living to render them effeminate, and the influence which kept surrounding enemies at bay to weaken and decline.

Early as this was in human history, it was not too early for the abuse of natural laws, and the infraction of social conditions to meet with just results. The wealth and lands, guarded by a divided and weakened people, offered temptations to foes which were readily grasped, and the Kymry had to face perils which at an earlier time would have been easily overcome. Straggle they did, we must believe, and heroically ; luxury fled appalled, and in the storm of battle the old qualities of a noble race were roused from their slumbers ; but it was too late, the sword and pillage played havoc, the beautiful summer country was abandoned, and enfeebled by their exertions, but strong in determination, made powerful by the bitter lesson of their defeat, they again roamed away over the Con tinent, and appear to have congregated in large numbers in the district of Gaul known as Armorica, in modern times better described as Brittany, in the north west of France.

Here they settled down again, and again peace and prosperity attended them. But the increase of population, the desire to become masters of other scenes, the necessity of gratifying those wandering habits which had become part of their nature, all tended to impel the enter prising and youthful to migrate again, and this time Albion was the goal. In default of historical record, we must exercise the imagination, and pic ture the expedition. It is most likely that the Kymry were guided in the selection of their future home by the favourable report of one or more adventurers. Some daring spirits had voyaged the channel, and after a series of perils landed on the white cliffs of Albion. Fair was the scene that met their delighted gaze. Man had not marred the beautiful, nor were there hedegerows, furrowed land, or mansions.

Instead of these, woodlands unshorn of their luxuriance, a wide expanse of landscape, rocky dells with sinuous windings ofa river, wild flowers in abundance, and the air and woods vocal, animal life abundant, beavers, " strange wild cattle," and glimpses of wolf or more daring future disturbers of their peace, and objects of their chace. Supplying themselves with food by the dexterous use of their bows and arrows and spears, they journeyed inland, but nowhere found man. Not the slightest trace of his existence or of his handiworks. No footprint on the sand, no axe-levelled tree, no tent. Man had not appeared in Britain ! Had it been given to one of these adventurers to foresee the future what a marvellous vision would it not have been ! The landing of the Kymry, their settlement, and gradual spread over the island.

Centuries of peace and progress, then the irruption of other Keltic tribes, the appearance of the Roman, each great and striking incident varied with tu multuous war, all ending in the calm, and the civilization, and the high mental advancement of the Victorian era. This foreseeing Druid would have beheld the wild and luxuriant picture of vale, and mountain, and plain teem with fruit and corn ; the desert bloom, vast cities arise, blended races found a mighty name, which the farthest parts of the world should learn first to fear, then to respect and honour. He would see the narrowed mind expand, idolatry fade, faith evoked, and thousands of spire ornamented temples tell of a great nation, who bowed the knee to the only and the true God. He would see the dim perceptions of man, the faint reason broaden forth into fulness, and a new governing power dawn into being that should exercise a greater sway than that yielded by prowess, and the strong arm.

All around him in the then present, he would behold the Keltic tribes, eager to advance into the interior. Men of varied capacities, some clever in tent-making, others with marvellous aim ; here one whose strength was gigantic ; another who could outstrip the hart ; still another noted for prowess ; this for feats of skill ; that for wisdom in debate. Varied, yet limited their abilities ; the necessities of life, the need of shelter, of food, of outwitting enemies, of excelling ; then* very cravings, passions, feelings, and desires ; all had developed these capacities, and for the time no more would be needed. But the seer, finding in this infancy of England far more attraction than the Eastern cradle-land of humanity could supply, would still gaze in rapt wonderment as the gray generations flitted by like shadows, and he beheld the skill that was needed to build the homely tent in the greenwood expand into the capacity that yielded us abbeys and cathedrals of historic fame ; the warlike ability and prowess give us illustrious and ever memorable sons to glorify their country on sea and land, and insure an independence such as the LANDING OF THE KYMRY IN BRITAIN.

Roman never won. And the solitary representative of mind, the skilful in debate, how long and glorious the list of statesmen and lawgivers, of orators, and preachers, who would spring from his loins ! Comely, yet humble, the Cam brian mothers, but they were to be the mothers of Shakespeare and Milton ; sturdy, and to an enemy unprepossessing, the men ; but they were the ancestors of noble warriors, who on every field which genius was to adorn, would win their immortal laurels. A more sublime earthly vision could not have been conceived by man. Filled with hope, yet inspired with awe, he hurries back to the sea-shore whither his companions have preceded him. Haste now, western gale ! bear them to the distant coast. They have found the new land, they have discovered the future home, the island of security, the haven of rest.

Gladly would they flee on the wings of the wind, the speed of thought can only keep pace with their feelings. But it must be the measured sweep of the oar, the passing of wave after wave, and the dawn of another day, ere they reach Armorica, and to the host of eager Kelts tell their tale of wonder. No time was lost in making ready for the expedition. We have a tolerably clear idea of the sailing means at command given us in Cæsar's Commentaries, in his description of the Veneti, one of the Gallic States, and the close relationship existing between these and the Kelts, who peopled Britain, is shown by the fact that when it was known Cæsar was on the eve of entering their territory, the Veneti at once sent to Britain for auxiliaries. The Veneti were able to muster no less than 220 ships built wholly of oak, designed, says Cæsar, to endure any violence whatever, formed to weather the storms, their anchors secured by iron chains, and for sails they used skins, and thin dressed leather. — (Book hi., chap, xiii.)

According to the Triads, the first to land were the three pacific tribes, under the leadership of Hu Gadarn. Quickly the others followed, and as they landed they marched on, led by their chiefs, the most adventurous proceeding to the farthest part of the island, but the mass remaining in the south. That march of possession, when every chieftain established his claim to the spot that pleased his fancy, must have been one of the most exciting kind. None knew what fresh beauties awaited them at the next point, the selfish and ambitious hesitated to pitch their tents, lest a scene more delightful still would meet their gaze. Eager must have been their onward march, roving the eye, pleasurable the incidents of sport, and the chace, and then, gradually, tribe after tribe were located, and the southern parts of Britain became peopled for the first time in the history of man.

Chapter II

Lack qf Historical Details — Legendary Epoch — Primitive Times. If historical details were extant the gradual advance of civilization would be a most interesting subject for mental review ; to note the wanderers settling down, manufacturing, trading on the most primitive scale, arise ; and, eventually, professions and all the important necessaries of our civilized life be developed by the wants, the fears, the necessities, the passions, and the loves of men. There is a vast gulf between the primitive Kymro and his civilized de scendant. The manufacturer and trader who cut his wooden spoons from the grove and exchanged them for corn ; who made leather thongs and buckles in a primitive way ; and out of the wool from the back of his own flocks prepared his own garments, is a very different being to the gentlemanly manufacturer of the present day ; and the trader, who, behind his plate-glass windows, exhibits practical art, and is polished and urbane in his intercourse with the public.

So too is the difference great between the early settler, who, having discovered by pure animal instinct the qualities of herbs, supplied his brothers with them, and the Esculapius of modern days, whose splendid mansion in the West End and superb equipage correspond with a skill and a profundity of dearly-bought experience which might well make him the envy of his brother man. Still, great as the gulf unquestionably is, time has bridged it. Like that which Mirza saw in his dream — so delicately and beautifully etched by Addi son — that bridge is remarkable alike for its sighs, its tragedies, and the successes thereon wrought. What myriads have fallen through; what a succession of generations ! No abstract beings, but personalities like ourselves, having their home circles, their individualities, their home life, their hopes, perhaps their ambitions.

Race after race, now swiftly and in crowds, amid the battle's storm falling to the deep ; then singly, calmly, amid the gleam of sunset, and in the sound of reverential prayer. So by the bridge of time the past and present are joined, but so vast the distance, so great and varied the incidents that we can but note the most striking here and there, and such as are characteristic of their epoch, ere passing on. The space of time from the peopling of the land to the arrival of the Romans is a border land, wherein the poet and the dramatist, the writers of romances and legends have found their most prolific field. As Woodward well states : " It has furnished to Shakespeare, Milton, Spenser, and a host of other bards, both in this and other lands, noble materials from which to weave EARLY CUSTOMS OF THE KYMRY. 13 lays and dramas, whose philosophy and whose poesy are equally profound and beautiful."

In the history, legendary if the reader will, of that epoch, Shake speare found his Lear and Cordelia, and Milton his Sabrina. In the more voluminous works of writers on Wales these and other legends will be found at length. Here we only notice them incidentally, and in order to point the evident moral, that in this captious and under-rating age it is only the ignorant declaimer who scoffs and derides the old Welsh institutions. They forget, or know not, that the broad foundation of our early British history, quaint and conglomerate, here philosophy of the loftiest character, there purest legend and minstrelsy ; here substantial valour, there deeply planted reverence, and well thought out laws, constitute, far more than Roman teachings and Anglo-Saxon institutions, the grand base whereon have been reared in duly suggested and fitting order the character of the great British nation.

Centuries elapsed, teeming with " unwise armaments," incidents of impulsive but injudicious valour, according to the Triads, and events which, sur rounded by the legends of a poetic race, contain unfortunately no key by wliich to educe the plain historic facts. Some are plain enough. Thus we are told Hu Gadarn taught the Kymry how to plough the land and to use vocal song, invented by Gwyddon Ganhebon ; how Coll the son of Collvrewi first brought wheat and barley into Britain, where before his time only oats and rye were grown ; Corvinwr, the bard of Ceri, who, far more practical than bards of later days, taught how to make ships having sails and rudders ; and Morddal made the people familiar with stone and mortar, and, we may infer, led to the abandonment of the nomadic tent and turf decked hut ; and chief of all the descendants of the great Corineus, and son of Clydno, ruler of Cornwall, Dyvnwal Moelmud (4), the lawgiver of Britain, from whose wise laws Hywel the Good at a far later period derived much of the wisdom incorporated in his enactments.

The most reliable account we have of the ancient Britons, and this only too brief, is given by Cæsar in his Commentaries. Most of the inland inhabitants, he states, do not sow corn, but live on milk and flesh, thus depending on their herds and the spoils of hunting. They are clad in skins, and dye themselves with woad, which occasions a bluish tint, and thereby they have a most terrible appearance in fight. They wear their hair long, and have every part of their body shaved except their head and upper lip. Ten and even twelve have wives in common to them, and particu larly brothers among brothers, and children amongst children. Giraldus notices the same customs as existing in his time (13th century), and however distasteful to our more refined morality, it must be observed that in the beginning of the human race still more repulsive customs must have been necessary, and would in consequence be continued until either christian teachings or the precepts of philosophers came into operation.

Cæsar adds that if there were any issue by these wives they were reputed to be the children of those by whom the wives were first espoused Their dwellings were mere wigwams, made of wattled stakes, plastered with clay_ with a paling around, and the location generally in a wood, or on solid ground surrounded by a swamp. The number of the people Cæsar describes as count less, and also their cattle. The currency was most primitive, composed either of brass or iron rings, and the weight determined the value. Tin was pro duced in the midland regions, and iron in the maritime, but brass was imported. There, he adds, as in Gaul, is timber of every description, except the beech and the fir. They do not consider it lawful, he continues, to eat the hare, the cock, or the goose, though bred for amusement — what more palatable to a Welshman now than the last named luxury 1 — and the climate is more temperate than in Gaul, the cold being less severe.