fcription, which will fufficiently explain the nature of the undertaking: The Noblity and Gentry of the adjacent counties having united, their efforts with the great commercial interest of this country, by a navigable communication of the three rivers, for the mutual benefit of agriculture and trade, to be laid, on the 25th day of July, MDCCXCV. was Lord of this manor, and in the reign of our fovereign GEORGE THE THIRD, when the equity of the laws and promoted the general welfare of the nation, the conduct of civil life, was improved I returned to Llangollen by the Ofweftry road on the fouth fide of the river. This is confiderably elevated above the bottom of the vale, and from hence all the furrounding objects are seen to great advantage. From these steep banks the Dee's tranfparent stream is seen to wind in elegant curves, along the wooded meadows beneath. The mountains on the oppofite fide of the vale are finely varied in fhape and tints; and Trevor Hall, feated on its eminence, embofomed in woods, lent its aid to decorate the scene. From hence Caftell Dinas Brân, and its conical hill, feem to close up the end of the vale, and imperiously to hold in fubjection all the furrounding country. This fylvan vale, juftly celebrated for its numerous beauties, affords many picturesque and highly romantic fcenes. The Hand is the only tolerably good inn in Llangollen, but in fummer I have more than once found it very unpleasant, from the crowd of travellers that are conftantly paffing on the great roads to and from Ireland, and from the number of Welsh tourists that vifit Llangollen. I never yet heard any one fay that he received either civility, or good accommodation, at this houfe: I have often heard, and I have experienced the contrary. CHAP. XIX. LLANGOLLEN TO CORWEN. The Vale of the Dee.-Llandyfilio Hall.-Extensive Profpec.Memoranda of Owen Glyndwr. - Corwen.-Church. - Pidure que Scene.-Cefyn Creini.-Excurfion to Glynn Bridge. ALL the country betwixt Llangollen and Corwen is exceedingly beautiful. The road, for about a mile, extends along the picturefque vale of Crucis, which, through its whole length, is adorned with woods, and in many places enlivened by neat little cottages peeping from among the trees.-I had not paffed this vale far before I entered the valley of the Dee, Glyn Dyfrdwy, celebrated as, fome centuries ago, the property of the Welfh hero, Owen Glyndwr. The mountains are high; and their features bold and prominent. From the winding of the river, and the turnings of the vale, almost every step prefented a new landscape. I paffed Llandyfilio hall, the family feat of the Jones's, feated on a woody flat, near the oppofite edge of the Dee. From its fituation in the bosom of the mountains, it is fecluded from the world, but there is fo much elegance around it, that it appeared to me a charming retreat.-This Tyfilio, to whom the the parish church is dedicated, and from whom the hall takes its name, was a Welsh faint, and held in fuch veneration, that no fewer than fix churches have been dedicated to him. He was the fon of a prince of Powis, and the writer of the most ancient history of Britain now extant. Looking back upon the country I had left, I faw Caftell Dinas Brân, and its accompanying rock, Craig Eglwyfeg, at the head of the vale. The latter forms from hence a very confpicuous ob. ject. About half a mile beyond Llandyfilio, I clambered to the top of a lofty hill on the left of the road. I was confiderably deceived in its height. I fancied that it extended no higher than the ridge vifible from the road; but I had no fooner attained this, than I had another eminence before me: I perfevered, and found two others equally high beyond this. From the fummit of this eminence I had a view of the whole vale and its various windings, with its ftill more ferpentizing river, immediately beneath me. Caftell Dinas Brân was very evidently lower than my present ftation. I could carry my eye along the entire vale of Llangollen, and over the flat country for many miles beyond, to the far diftant mountains on the verge of the horizon. I defcended to the road, and continued my journey.Beyond the fourth mile-ftone, the vale began to to change its appearance. The road, inftead of winding amongst mountains, now lay in a direct line. About three miles farther on, an oak wood on the left, and a small clump of firs on an eminence on the right of the road, mark the place near which the palace of" the wild and irregular" Owen Glyndwr once ftood. There are at present no other remains of it than a few fcattered heaps of ftones. Iolo Goch, Owen's bard, about the year 1390, wrote a poem containing a defcription of this palace. He fays it was furrounded by a moat filled with water, and that the entrance was by a coftly gate over a bridge. The ftile feems to have been of gothic architecture, for he compares one of the towers to a part of Westminster abbey. It was a Neapolitan building, containing eighteen apartments, "a fair timber ftructure, on the fummit of a green hill." MEMORANDA OF OWEN GLYNDWR. This celebrated hero, whofe actions make fo confpicuous a figure in the English history at the commencement of the fifteenth century, was the fon of Griffith Vychan, a defcendant of Meredith, prince of North Wales. He received a liberal education; and when of proper age, was admitted a ftudent in one of our inns of court, and was afterwards regularly called to the bar. It is probable that he foon quitted the profeffion of the law, and adopted that of arms, which, as it afterwards proved, was much VOL. II. N more |