CWM BYCHAN. 279 



the remembrance of the past is upon me \" Then, as if addressing 

 the surrounding objects, he thus continued : — " Farewell to the 

 playmates of my early youth ; to the smiling faces of my kindred 

 and friends ! Farewell to the joyous song of the shepherd on the 

 hills, and the swelling strains of the harp in the banquet hall! 

 Farewell to my country's freedom ! Cambria, thou art fallen ! 

 Thy glory has departed ! Thou, who hast stood against the powers 

 of tyrants and maintained thy liberty for a thousand ages, thou hast 

 no longer a name ! Where are my fathers ; and where the warri- 

 ors whose blood was spilled on thy once happy soil ! Where are 

 the mighty men, the memory of whose deeds shall live in Fame's 

 bright annals ! And where is the line of kings who proudly sway- 

 ed thy sceptre ! Gone ! gone ! for ever gone ! But still I hear 

 their voices in the waving boughs and rippling streamlets ! They 

 speak in the mountain winds and in the roaring cataracts ! Yes ! 

 I hear the full chorus of their spirits as they ride on the sweeping 

 clouds that flit across yon blue expanse ! I hear the pealing shout, 

 the unconquered Briton's cry, We are free ! We are free !" 



During this apostrophe, Thalwyn had raised his face to Heaven, 

 and his beautiful countenance, lighted by the fires of poetry and 

 patriotism, appeared radiant with an expression more than earthly. 

 Mortimer gazed upon him with wonder, not unmixed with awe. 

 That one so young, and apparently so meek, should be enabled to 

 think and speak with the force and energy of mature years, seemed 

 to him both extraordinary and unaccountable. In these times, su- 

 perstition fully sanctioned a belief in the agency of supernatural 

 powers and in the gift of inspiration. The Cambrian youth, brought 

 up from their infancy to disdain slavery and oppression, and to glory 

 in freedom and independence, imbibed from their bards and sages 

 the most enthusiastic sentiments. No wonder, then, that this boy 

 who had enjoyed peculiar advantages of education should have a 

 mind so much beyond his years both in feeling and imagination. 



Time rolled on ; weeks and months passed away. Order began 

 to be established and government maintained in the conquered pro- 

 vinces. At first the yoke pressed hard upon the vanquished ; they 

 felt all the misery of slavery, save the bonds; and their proud 

 spirits were galled under the restraint which was laid upon them: 

 but by degrees they submitted to the victor and yielded a passive 

 obedience to the rule against which they found it vain to struggle. 

 There were still, however, a few desperate men who, driven to the 

 rocky fastnesses, associated themselves together in small bands, and 

 committed petty depredations on the surrounding district: but these 



