Besides the family and
ourselves there was Mr R- and one or two more.
We had a very
pleasant party; and as most of those present wished to hear
something connected with Spain, I talked much about that country,
sang songs of Germania, and related in an abridged form Lope de
Vega's ghost story, which is decidedly the best ghost story in the
world.
In the afternoon of Wednesday I went and took leave of certain
friends in the town; amongst others of old Mr Jones. On my telling
him that I was about to leave Llangollen, he expressed considerable
regret, but said that it was natural for me to wish to return to my
native country. I told him that before returning to England I
intended to make a pedestrian tour in South Wales. He said that he
should die without seeing the south; that he had had several
opportunities of visiting it when he was young, which he had
neglected, and that he was now too old to wander far from home. He
then asked me which road I intended to take. I told him that I
intended to strike across the Berwyn to Llan Rhyadr, then visit
Sycharth, once the seat of Owain Glendower, lying to the east of
Llan Rhyadr, then return to that place, and after seeing the
celebrated cataract across the mountains to Bala - whence I should
proceed due south. I then asked him whether he had ever seen
Sycharth and the Rhyadr; he told me that he had never visited
Sycharth, but had seen the Rhyadr more than once. He then smiled
and said that there was a ludicrous anecdote connected with the
Rhyadr, which he would relate to me. "A traveller once went to see
the Rhyadr, and whilst gazing at it a calf which had fallen into
the stream above, whilst grazing upon the rocks, came tumbling down
the cataract. 'Wonderful!' said the traveller, and going away
reported that it was not only a fall of water, but of calves, and
was very much disappointed, on visiting the waterfall on another
occasion, to see no calf come tumbling down." I took leave of the
kind old gentleman with regret, never expecting to see him again,
as he was in his eighty-fourth year - he was a truly excellent
character, and might be ranked amongst the venerable ornaments of
his native place.
About half-past eight o'clock at night John Jones came to bid me
farewell. I bade him sit down, and sent for a pint of ale to
regale him with. Notwithstanding the ale, he was very melancholy
at the thought that I was about to leave Llangollen, probably never
to return. To enliven him I gave him an account of my late
expedition to Wrexham, which made him smile more than once. When I
had concluded he asked me whether I knew the meaning of the word
Wrexham: I told him I believed I did, and gave him the derivation
which the reader will find in an early chapter of this work.
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