i 4 4 MY LIFE 



surface of the rock from top to bottom. This surface is 

 formed by the regular weathering of slaty beds in fine layers ; 

 the upper part curves downward, but the lower half is very 

 nearly or quite vertical and of considerable width, and the 

 whole fall, as seen from near the foot of it, is perhaps sixty 

 feet high. In the valley above this fall is another somewhat 

 more irregular, but I had not time to see this, as it was getting 

 dark when I turned homewards. 



The little inn at which I stayed was very quiet and com- 

 fortable. The landlord and his wife were both quiet and 

 refined-looking people, not the least like the ordinary type 

 of innkeepers. In the evening I sat with them in a parlour 

 where friends and a superior class of visitors only were 

 admitted; and while I was there the district exciseman lodged 

 in the house while making his rounds among the surrounding 

 villages. He was a brisk and intelligent man, and was in no 

 way treated as an enemy, but rather as a confidential friend. 

 One evening when he and the host with myself were alone 

 together, something brought up the names of Heloise and 

 Abelard, whereupon the exciseman told us the whole story 

 of these unfortunate lovers in a way that showed he was well 

 acquainted with their correspondence, from which he quoted 

 some of the more interesting passages, apparently verbatim, 

 and with sympathetic intonation. This is the only occasion 

 on which I have heard the subject dealt with in conversation, 

 or, in fact, any similar subject in a village inn and between 

 landlord and exciseman. 



Early the next year, I think about February, my brother 

 and I went to do some surveying at Rhaidr-Gwy (now more 

 commonly called Rhayader), a small town in Radnorshire on 

 the Upper Wye, and only fifteen miles from its source in the 

 Plynlymmon range. A young man from Carmarthenshire 

 came to us here to learn surveying. He was one of the very 

 loose young men with whom I was often associated, and I 

 think as regards the filthiness of his language and of the 

 stories with which he used frequently to regale us he sur- 



