CLEAR WATERS 



songs, with more regard to words than melody, and 

 sometimes paraphrasing them to suit his own mild 

 adventures, past and prospective. His boys, my 

 cronies and contemporaries, were of course budding 

 fishermen, and often on some dark January morning 

 in that dull, clay country, smirched even there by the 

 smoke of Birmingham, we would all sit down to fly- 

 tying in the snug library under the auspices of my 

 cheery, white-haired host, while he talked of streams 

 and lakes and fishing holidays already, or to be, en- 

 joyed. I can hear him now singing an extemporised 

 refrain of his own, * And now, boys, now, we '11 be off 

 to Tal-y-llyn.' A little sketch of the lake hung upon 

 the wall, and as I didn't see the subject of it till my 

 old friend had been many years in his grave, the senti- 

 ment of early association was strong within me when 

 that day came, and I eagerly turned to the well-worn 

 visitors' book for the, by that time, faded signature I 

 knew so well, with the boys' names underneath. For 

 they too, even then, alas ! had joined the majority. 



Set in a deep trough, with the mighty mass of Cader 

 rising from its northern shore, the lofty ridge of Arran- 

 y-Gessel springing as sheer and steep upon the other, 

 and the high pass towards Dolgelly shutting out its 

 eastern end, this is assuredly one of the most beautiful 

 little lakes in Wales. It is nearly a mile in length, but 

 narrow in proportion, and though enclosed by moun- 

 tains is neither sombre nor gloomy. It is not, for 

 instance, like Llyn Ogwen, and still less like Idwal, 

 inspiring in their own way as are these grim Snow- 

 donian lakes. Tal-y-llyn is, in short, not a big tarn, 

 but a lake. The lower mountain slopes, though steep, 



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