“I asked the young fellow the price of hogs,” says Mr. Borrow, “whereupon his face brightened up, and he not only answered my question, but told me that he had a fat hog to sell.”
“Ha, ha!” said the old man, “he plenty of Welsh now, for he see reason; to other question he no Welsh at all, no more than English, for he see no reason. What business he on Tap-Nyth, with eagle? His business down below in sty with pig. Ah! he look lump, but he no fool. Know more about pig than you, or I, or anyone, ’twixt here and Machunleth.”
It has been said, that the inhabitants of a mountainous country cannot be insensible to religion, and whether, or not this is universally true, it is, certainly, true of Wales. The magnificent scenery seems to create a pensive awe upon the spirit. Often the pedestrian, passing along a piece of unsuggestive road, suddenly finds that the stupendous mountains have sloped down, to valleys of the wildest, and most picturesque beauty, valley opening into valley, in some instances; in others, as in the vale of Glamorgan, stretching along, for many miles, in plenteous fruitfulness, and beauty, illuminated by some river like the Tivy, the Towy, or the Llugg, some of these rivers sparkling, and flashing with the glittering _gleisiad_, as an old Welsh song sings it—
“_Glan yw’r gleisiad yn y llyn_, Full fair the _gleisiad_ in the flood Which sparkles ’neath the summer’s sun.”
The_ gleisiad_ is the salmon. We have dwelt on the word here, for the purpose of calling the reader’s attention to its beautiful expressiveness. It seems to convey the whole idea of the fish—its silvery splendour, gleaming, and glancing through the lynn.
It seems rather in the nature of the Welsh mind, to take instantly a pensive, and sombre idea of things. A traveller, walking beneath a fine row of elms, expressed his admiration of them to a Welsh companion. “Ay, sir,” said the man; “they’ll make fine chests for the dead!” It was very nationally characteristic, and hence, perhaps, it is that the owl (the _dylluan_) among birds, has received some of the most famous traditions of the Welsh language. Mr. Borrow thought there was no cry so wild, as the cry of the _dylluan_—“unlike any other sound in nature,” he says, “a cry, which no combination of letters can give the slightest idea of;” and, surely, that Welsh name far better realizes it, than the _tu whit tu whoo_ of our Shakespeare.