We passed on by various houses till we came nearly to the bottom of the valley. Jones then pointing to a large house, at a little distance on the right, told me that it was a good gwesty, and advised me to go and refresh myself in it, whilst he went and carried home his work to the man who employed him, who he said lived in a farm-house a few hundred yards off. I asked him where we were.
“At Llyn Ceiriog,” he replied.
I then asked if we were near Pont Fadog; and received for answer that Pont Fadog was a good way down the valley, to the north-east, and that we could not see it owing to a hill which intervened.
Jones went his way and I proceeded to the gwestfa, the door of which stood invitingly open. I entered a large kitchen, at one end of which a good fire was burning in a grate, in front of which was a long table, and a high settle on either side. Everything looked very comfortable. There was nobody in the kitchen: on my calling, however, a girl came whom I bade in Welsh to bring me a pint of the best ale. The girl stared, but went away apparently to fetch it. Presently came the landlady, a good-looking middle-aged woman. I saluted her in Welsh and then asked her if she could speak English. She replied “Tipyn bach,” which interpreted, is, a little bit. I soon, however, found that she could speak it very passably, for two men coming in from the rear of the house she conversed with them in English. These two individuals seated themselves on chairs near the door, and called for beer. The girl brought in the ale, and I sat down by the fire, poured myself out a glass, and made myself comfortable. Presently a gig drove up to the door, and in came a couple of dogs, one a tall black greyhound, the other a large female setter, the coat of the latter dripping with rain, and shortly after two men from the gig entered, one who appeared to be the principal was a stout bluff-looking person between fifty and sixty dressed in a grey stuff coat and with a slouched hat on his head. This man bustled much about, and in a broad Yorkshire dialect ordered a fire to be lighted in another room, and a chamber to be prepared for him and his companion; the landlady, who appeared to know him, and to treat him with a kind of deference, asked if she should prepare two beds; whereupon he answered “No! As we came together, and shall start together, so shall we sleep together; it will not be for the first time.”
His companion was a small mean-looking man dressed in a black coat, and behaved to him with no little respect. Not only the landlady but the two men, of whom I have previously spoken, appeared to know him and to treat him with deference. He and his companion presently went out to see after the horse. After a little time they returned, and the stout man called lustily for two fourpennyworths of brandy and water – “Take it into the other room!” said he, and went into a side room with his companion, but almost immediately came out saying that the room smoked and was cold, and that he preferred sitting in the kitchen. He then took his seat near me, and when the brandy was brought drank to my health. I said thank you: but nothing farther. He then began talking to the men and his companion upon indifferent subjects. After a little time John Jones came in, called for a glass of ale, and at my invitation seated himself between me and the stout personage. The latter addressed him roughly in English, but receiving no answer said, “Ah, you no understand. You have no English and I no Welsh.”
“You have not mastered Welsh yet, Mr. – ” said one of the men to him.
“No!” said he: “I have been doing business with the Welsh forty years, but can’t speak a word of their language. I sometimes guess at a word, spoken in the course of business, but am never sure.”
Presently John Jones began talking to me, saying that he had been to the river, that the water was very low, and that there was little but stones in the bed of the stream.
I told him if its name was Ceiriog no wonder there were plenty of stones in it, Ceiriog being derived from Cerrig, a rock. The men stared to hear me speak Welsh.
“Is the gentleman a Welshman?” said one of the men, near the door, to his companion; “he seems to speak Welsh very well.”
“How should I know?” said the other, who appeared to be a low working man.
“Who are those people?” said I to John Jones.
“The smaller man is a workman at a flannel manufactory,” said Jones. “The other I do not exactly know.”
“And who is the man on the other side of you?” said I.
“I believe he is an English dealer in gigs and horses,” replied Jones, “and that he is come here either to buy or sell.”
The man, however, soon put me out of all doubt with respect to his profession.
“I was at Chirk,” said he, “and Mr. So-and-so asked me to have a look at his new gig and horse, and have a ride. I consented. They were both brought out – everything new: gig new, harness new, and horse new. Mr. So-and-so asked me what I thought of his turn-out. I gave a look and said, ‘I like the car very well, harness very well, but I don’t like the horse at all: a regular bolter, rearer, and kicker, or I’m no judge; moreover, he’s pigeon-toed.’ However, we all got on the car – four of us, and I was of course complimented with the ribbons. Well, we hadn’t gone fifty yards before the horse, to make my words partly good, began to kick like a new ’un. However, I managed him, and he went on for a couple of miles till we got to the top of the hill, just above the descent with the precipice on the right hand. Here he began to rear like a very devil.
“‘O dear me!’ says Mr. So-and-so; ‘let me get out!’
“‘Keep where you are,’ says I, ‘I can manage him.’
“However, Mr. So-and-so would not be ruled, and got out; coming down, not on his legs, but his hands and knees. And then the two others said —
“‘Let us get out!’
“‘Keep where you are,’ said I, ‘I can manage him.’
“But they must needs get out, or rather tumble out, for they both came down on the road hard on their backs.
“‘Get out yourself,’ said they all, ‘and let the devil go, or you are a done man.’
“‘Getting out may do for you young hands,’ says I, ‘but it won’t do for I; neither my back nor bones will stand the hard road.’
“Mr. So-and-so ran to the horse’s head.
“‘Are you mad?’ says I, ‘if you try to hold him he’ll be over the pree-si-pice in a twinkling, and then where am I? Give him head; I can manage him.’
“So Mr. So-and-so got out of the way, and down flew the horse right down the descent, as fast as he could gallop. I tell you what, I didn’t half like it! A pree-si-pice on my right, the rock on my left, and a devil before me, going, like a cannon-ball, right down the hill. However, I contrived, as I said I would, to manage him; kept the car from the rock and from the edge of the gulf too. Well, just when we had come to the bottom of the hill out comes the people running from the inn, almost covering the road.
“‘Now get out of the way,’ I shouts, ‘if you don’t wish to see your brains knocked out, and what would be worse, mine too.’
“So they gets out of the way, and on I spun, I and my devil. But by this time I had nearly taken the devil out of him. Well, he hadn’t gone fifty yards on the level ground, when, what do you think he did? why, went regularly over, tumbled down regularly on the road, even as I knew he would some time or other, because why? he was pigeon-toed. Well, I gets out of the gig, and no sooner did Mr. So-and-so come up than I says —
“‘I likes your car very well, and I likes your harness, but – me if I likes your horse, and it will be some time before you persuade me to drive him again.’”
I am a great lover of horses, and an admirer of good driving, and should have wished to have some conversation with this worthy person about horses and their management. I should also have wished to ask him some questions about Wales and the Welsh, as he must have picked up a great deal of curious information about both in his forty years’ traffic, notwithstanding he did not know a word of Welsh, but John Jones prevented my farther tarrying by saying that it would be as well to