68 TÎIE BRITISH ISLES. 



to extinction, and a time must come when it will survive only among philologists. 

 Many use it from patriotic motives, others employ it to gratify their craving after 

 literary honours. All men of education learn to think in English, and even at 

 the eisteddfodau the language of the conquering Saxon struggles for pre-eminence 

 with that of the vanquished Celt. It even happens occasionally that the president 

 of these meetings is ignorant of the language in which most of the poetry is being 

 recited. Although Welsh is still general throughout the greater portion of Wales, 

 even in the towns, and in the western part of Monmouthshire, English nevertheless 

 is rapidly gaining ground. It is virtually the language of civilisation, and the 

 only means of communicating with the outside world. Its use is general in all the 

 schools — the Sunday schools attached to chapels excepted — and it is rare nowa- 

 d lys to meet with young people unable to converse in English. A knowledge of the 

 old mother tongue is thus daily becoming of less service, and, together with the 

 old-fashioned heavy cloaks and the men's hats worn by women, is being put aside. 

 The number of persons of Welsh origin scattered throughout the world, who have 

 completely forgotten the language of their ancestors, is probably greater than that 

 of the Welsh who remain at home, and still speak it. At all events we might 

 conclude that such is the case fi'ora the large number of Welsh family names met 

 with in all English-speaking countries, nearly all of them being modifications of 

 Christian names, such as Jones — the most frequent of all— Hoberts, Edwards, 

 Humphreys, and P'ugh, P'owel, P'robert, Ap'jones (son of Ugh, Owel, Robert, or 

 Jones). In the United States alone there are supposed to reside 3,000,000 

 persons of Welsh descent, of whom hardly a third have remained faithful to the 

 lanoruajre of their ancestors.* Most of these Welsh have become as o-ood Americans 

 as the pilgrim fathers of New Plymouth, and the Welshmen of Great Britain can 

 hardly be serious when they claim Thomas Jefferson as one of their compatriots. 

 But the native genius of the race survives in a thousand new forms, and in this 

 sense the Cymry can still repeat their ancient motto, " Tra mor, tra Briton." 



Topography. 



The ancient feudal cities of Wales present a striking contrast to the modern 

 towns which have sprung into existence at the call of industry. The former, irregular 

 and picturesque, with the ruins of one of the twenty-six strongholds of the country 

 perched on a commanding rock, are possessed of individual features, and have long 

 ere this been wedded as it were to the charming country which surrounds them. 

 The latter, on the other hand, are generally mere agglomerations of buildings 

 prematurely blackened. Their only monuments ar*^ factory chimnej^s, and they 

 encroach on the surrounding fields, without that softening of their lines which 

 would bring them into harmony with surrounding nature. 



Fltxtshike (Ffi.ixt), the north-easternmost county of Wales, stretches inland 

 from the estuary of the river Dee. Its surface along that river, and more especially 

 in the tract known as Sealand, is level, but the interior is beautifully diversified 



* Thomas, " Hanes Cjmry America." 



