I repeated my question in Welsh.
"Two miles," said she.
"Still two miles to Holyhead by the road," thought I. "Nos da,"
said I to the woman and sped along. At length I saw water on my
right, seemingly a kind of bay, and presently a melancholy ship. I
doubled my pace, which was before tolerably quick, and soon saw a
noble-looking edifice on my left, brilliantly lighted up. "What a
capital inn that would make," said I, looking at it wistfully, as I
passed it. Presently I found myself in the midst of a poor, dull,
ill-lighted town.
"Where is the inn?" said I to a man.
"The inn, sir; you have passed it. The inn is yonder," he
continued, pointing towards the noble-looking edifice.
"What, is that the inn?" said I.
"Yes, sir, the railroad hotel - and a first-rate hotel it is."
"And are there no other inns?"
"Yes, but they are all poor places. No gent puts up at them - all
the gents by the railroad put up at the railroad hotel."
What was I to do? after turning up my nose at the railroad, was I
to put up at its hotel? Surely to do so would be hardly acting
with consistency. "Ought I not rather to go to some public-house,
frequented by captains of fishing smacks, and be put in a bed a
foot too short for me," said I, as I reflected on my last night's
couch at Mr Pritchard's. "No, that won't do - I shall go to the
hotel, I have money in my pocket, and a person with money in his
pocket has surely a right to be inconsistent if he pleases."
So I turned back and entered the railroad hotel with lofty port and
with sounding step, for I had twelve sovereigns in my pocket,
besides a half one, and some loose silver, and feared not to
encounter the gaze of any waiter or landlord in the land. "Send
boots!" I roared to the waiter, as I flung myself down in an arm-
chair in a magnificent coffee-room. "What the deuce are you
staring at? send boots can't you, and ask what I can have for
dinner."
"Yes, sir," said the waiter, and with a low bow departed.
"These boots are rather dusty," said the boots, a grey-haired,
venerable-looking man, after he had taken off my thick, solid,
square-toed boots. "I suppose you came walking from the railroad?"
"Confound the railroad!" said I. "I came walking from Bangor. I
would have you know that I have money in my pocket, and can afford
to walk. I am fond of the beauties of nature; now it is impossible
to see much of the beauties of nature unless you walk. I am
likewise fond of poetry, and take especial delight in inspecting
the birth-places and haunts of poets. It is because I am fond of
poetry, poets and their haunts, that I am come to Anglesey.
