Old Milford is a prettily situated town terraced above the Haven, with quays and embankments on its shore-line, ready for the traffic that is still withheld from it. Master Atkins's red coat helps to enliven it. The blue water, the green level ridges that run west to the sea, and the Atlantic itself in the distance, all prepossess in its favour. But Liverpool and Holyhead both hold it aloof from the fortune it aspired to.
Before proceeding north to that little known yet seductive river, the Teifi, Haverfordwest, on one of the two Cleddaus, which enter the Haven at its northern and westernmost arms, must be briefly mentioned. It is an ancient town, as its castle--built about 1112 by the father of Richard Strongbow, that eminent castle-builder--testifies. Among its other privileges was that of being county and capital town in one; also of having its own lord-lieutenant. Here the Flemings of the twelfth century most did congregate in this peninsula, and no doubt the little town's prosperity was largely due to them. Nowadays, however, it is a waning place, in spite of its lively look and, considering its remoteness, its fine buildings. This is proven by the number of its Maiden Assizes in the later years of its independence, before its annexation to Carmarthen for judicial purposes, as well as by other less agreeable tokens. It is, perhaps, the most hilly town in the kingdom. Ere you are half a mile away from it on the road to St. David's, it is lost to sight; while, approaching it from Milford, its situation seems quite Alpine.
The /Teifi/ (or Tivy), like the Towy, is little known to Englishmen other than anglers; and again, like the Towy, it well deserves knowing. The two rivers both rise among the heather-clad moors of Cardiganshire; so near, indeed, that you may stand on the watershed and mark the different trend of their streams. Teifi's chief supply, however, comes from the Teifi pools, three miles from Strata Florida Abbey, a congeries of mountain lakes, the abode of interesting and capricious trout that may be recommended to the traveller with a fishing rod--and a mackintosh. It has as wild an origin as any of the rivers of South Wales. The Cistercians of Strata Florida probably fished these lakes far more than do the moderns.