THE WELSH DEE 



sound and vale of infinite beauty. I remember how 

 melodiously it rung in my boyish ears, stirring its 

 elementary sense of the music and cadence of words, 

 blended doubtless with one's earliest glimpse into the 

 then mysterious mountains of North Wales. And 

 my kind hostess used to tell me of the two famous 

 old ladies whom as a girl she had known intimately, 

 and indeed it was only the other day I was reading 

 some old letters from them to her. A mental 

 picture of the vale of Llangollen fixed itself then 

 and there in my mind, as such things do, and stuck 

 in it till, twenty and odd years later, I discovered 

 that the original infinitely exceeded the vale of my 

 dreams. 



The Dee roars finely over the great rock ledges 

 above Bishop Trevor's fifteenth-century bridge in the 

 heart of the little town. The encompassing moun- 

 tains and the high, shining, limestone ridges of the 

 Eglwyseg and the woody steeps, the bosky glens that 

 come down from this side and from that, are Nature's 

 contribution to this enchanting vale. And of memories 

 what a crowd for those who happily can feel them in 

 this very gateway of North Wales. Abbey and manor- 

 house, castle and battlefield, the footprints of kings 

 and princes, monks and bards, lie everywhere. And 

 in the centre of the high encircling hills, perched on 

 a sharp green sugar-loaf many hundred feet above the 

 town and river, are the fang-like splintered ruins of 

 the ancient fortress of the chieftains of Powys and their 

 successors, the proud race of Trevor : 



Relic of kings, wreck of forgotten wars ; 



To the winds abandoned and the prying stars. 



63 



