CAERWYS,
which lies to the right of the road. It was formerly a place of much consequence, at which the assizes for the county of Flint were held, as were likewise a species of British Olympics, it being the seat of the “Eisteddfod,” or Sessions of the Bards and Minstrels; the grand theatre where, in honourable contention, they tried their skill, poured forth their extemporaneous effusions, awaked their harps to melody,
“And gave to rapture all the trembling strings.”
Under the British princes, the bards and minstrels were associated in corporate, or rather collegiate bodies; into which none were admitted but such as had given proof of their skill in the respective sciences before proper judges, duly appointed by royal commission. And although the institution is now dissolved, and the character officially no more, yet those who, “born with music in their souls, that wish to feast on raptures ever new,” will consentaneously say,
“But hail ye mighty masters of the lay,
Nature’s true sons, the friends of man and truth!
Whose song, sublimely sweet, serenely gay,
Amused my childhood, and inform’d my youth.
O let your spirit still my bosom soothe,
Inspire my dreams, and my wild wanderings guide!
Your voice each rugged path of life can smooth;
For well I know, wherever ye reside,
There harmony, and peace, and innocence abide.”Beattie’s Minstrel.
The distance from Caerwys to Denbigh is about ten miles. You pass Lleweni Hall, formerly occupied by the Hon. Thomas Fitzmaurice, uncle to the Marquis of Lansdowne, brother to the Earl of Shelburne, and father of the late noble possessor. Mr. Fitzmaurice used here to bleach the cloths made on his estates in Ireland. He travelled to Chester in his coach and six, and when there stood behind a counter selling cloth. He lived with the affected humility of a tradesman, and the pomp of a lord: his conduct was singular, but his motives were good.