237 



Hearty applause followed the conclusion of the lecture, and the route was 

 then taken for Harper's Quarry, the Rev. W. Jones Thomas — who some years 

 ago called the attention of the late Professor Sedgwick to the splendid fossils 

 then beginning to be found at this quarry— leading the pai-ty. On reaching 

 the quarry, the eager geologists spread themselves over the rocks, and the 

 sound of a couple of scores of hammers speedily astonished the echoes. Those 

 of the party who were not so eager in pur.^uit of the far-gone past, gratified 

 eye and mind with a survey of the very beautiful aspect of the country at 

 present. Looking N. and N.W., they admired a fine scene of hills, varied 

 in shape from the rounded knoll to the long Drygarn ridge, the lower hilla 

 being rich with crops, while the loftier shone brown and purple in the bright 

 sunlight, and the rich valleys between, here and there golden with the 

 ripened corn, gave the scene a human interest. Southward and S. E. rose 

 the huge Epynt hills, and over them some of the loftier summits of the Black 

 Mountain system made a fine background. For the botanists, this and other 

 promising spots proved to be blanks, the very short time allowed rendering it 

 impossible to examine any of the places visited. A remarkable example of 

 Carduus (plume thistle) which had apparently grown up between two slabs of 

 rock, and which had consequently extended itself laterally, forming a thin 

 sheet some five or six inches across, was the only plant noticed at Harper's 

 quarry. 



The party then made their way across the slope of the hill to Castell 

 Cymerda, an ancient British camp of small size, apparently a look-out, com- 

 manding a view of the Wye valley beneath, which is at that spot fuU of 

 legendary interest as well as of picturesque beauty. The valley here broadens 

 out considerably and is crossed at its broadest part by the line of the Central 

 Wales Railway, which here points the old moral of time's changes in an 

 impressive manner. The point where the railway crosses the turnpike-road, 

 which here runs parallel with the Wye at no great distance from it, is known 

 as Llech-yrhid ("the flat stone of Yrhid," a prince of olden time who fell 

 here in battle with a North Walian invader), and in more recent yet now 

 almost equally dim times was the last resting-place of the unfortunate Llewelyn, 

 the last of British chiefs. Here he is recorded to have eaten the breakfast 

 served to him on the morning of the day on which he perished. Close to 

 this spot redolent of heroic recollections, in which (as Burke puts it) " the 

 obscurity is a great element of the sublime," runs, as we have said, the railway 

 for which Wales is indebted to the enterprise of Mr. Savin, one of the practical 

 heroes of the present day ; and the genius loci was probably somewhat startled 

 the other day when the iron railway bridge was placed, by one well-planned 

 operation, aloft above the Wye, near the spot where Yrhid fell and Llewelyn 

 ate his last meal. 



Passing by another quarry, the party descended to Gwernyfed, the 

 poetically named spot where the Wye, with difficulty making its way among 

 a group of alder-bearing islets, was said to be " eaten up by the alders." 



