Rather daunted by the failure of their first attempt to seize Twm, his assailants had held back awed by his resolute and defiant attitude, but recovering their courage on reflecting upon the odds against him, they now, headed by Evans of Tregaron, got behind him, and clung to his right arm, but with one violent effort Twm shook them away, as the mighty bull throws off the yelping curs that dare to attack him. Then, with a single leap, he sprang from the table into the crowded court, where a lane was formed for him, and rushed out of the door unimpeded, and pursued by his accusers. They soon lost sight of him among the moving multitude, some of whom dispersed from fear of accidents, while others followed him as spectators.
To the great astonishment of his pursuers they next caught a view of him mounted on that grand subject of contention, the grey horse. He took the route of Ystrad Feen, followed by several constables in the employ of Evans of Tregaron, and many disinterested persons from the fair. Loud were the shouts of the numerous riders; loud the tramp of galloping horses; and wild the disorder and terror created, as Twm at different intervals turned on his pursuers, and fired his pistols. This caused a powerful retrograde movement among them, by which the foremost horses fell back to those behind them, unhorsing some who lay groaning and crying with fright on the ground, and frightening others altogether from the pursuit.
It was on this occasion that a bard of that day wrote the stanza which appears on the title page, thus translated by the late Iolo Morganwg:—
“In Ystrad Feen a doleful sound Pervades the hollow hills around; The very stones with terror melt, Such fear of Twn Shon Catty felt.”
Fortune still favoured Twm, who reaching the foot of Dinas somewhat in advance of his motley train of pursuers, dismounted, sprung from stone to stone, that formed the ford of the Tower, and climbed the steep side of that majestic mount, with the utmost ease. Like a prudent sea-captain, Twm was chased in his small boat by a fleet of rovers, till he reaches his own war-ship, and springs up her fort-like side, and treads his deck in the ecstasy of surmounted peril, conscious strength, and superiority.