At last, finding him silent, and having finished my brandy and
water, I got up, rang the bell, paid for what I had had, and left
him looking very miserable, perhaps at finding that he was not
quite so certain of eternal damnation as he had hitherto supposed.
There can be no doubt that the idea of damnation is anything but
disagreeable to some people; it gives them a kind of gloomy
consequence in their own eyes. We must be something particular
they think, or God would hardly think it worth His while to torment
us for ever.
I inquired the way to Festiniog, and finding that I had passed by
it on my way to the town, I went back, and as directed turned to
the east up a wide pass, down which flowed a river. I soon found
myself in another and very noble valley, intersected by the river
which was fed by numerous streams rolling down the sides of the
hills. The road which I followed in the direction of the east lay
on the southern side of the valley and led upward by a steep
ascent. On I went, a mighty hill close on my right. My mind was
full of enthusiastic fancies; I was approaching Festiniog the
birthplace of Rhys Goch, who styled himself Rhys Goch of Eryri or
Red Rhys of Snowdon, a celebrated bard, and a partisan of Owen
Glendower, who lived to an immense age, and who, as I had read, was
in the habit of composing his pieces seated on a stone which formed
part of a Druidical circle, for which reason the stone was called
the chair of Rhys Goch; yes, my mind was full of enthusiastic
fancies all connected with this Rhys Goch, and as I went along
slowly, I repeated stanzas of furious war songs of his exciting his
countrymen to exterminate the English, and likewise snatches of an
abusive ode composed by him against a fox who had run away with his
favourite peacock, a piece so abounding with hard words that it was
termed the Drunkard's chokepear, as no drunkard was ever able to
recite it, and ever and anon I wished I could come in contact with
some native of the region with whom I could talk about Rhys Goch,
and who could tell me whereabouts stood his chair.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 373 of 856
Words from 102932 to 103332
of 235675
