NOTE:
CONCERNING IUAN WYLLT, AN EISTEDDFOD AT NEATH, AND MY FIRST PRIZE POEM.
I think I ought to mention here, that the "Ode on the Death of a very Intimate Friend" (page 199), was written in 1853, before I came to reside in Wales. About three or four years after this—I forget the date—a prize was offered at an Eisteddfod held at Neath, by Mr. James Kenway, the then Mayor, for the best monody on the death of Mr. Edward Evans. I competed for the prize, and obtained it. The model of the Ode was taken by me in writing the Monody, the general conditions of the two events being somewhat similar, and much of the same language is used in both poems. I may add, as a matter that may be interesting to some, that the Neath Eisteddfod prize was the first for which I competed, and the first I obtained. The adjudicator was the late Mr. J. Roberts (Iuan Wyllt), whose death, as I write these lines, is being recorded in the newspapers. In adjudicating upon the poem, Mr. Roberts said: "In this production we have the traces of a muse of a superior order. The language is chaste and poetic, the versification is clear and melodious, and the mournfully pathetic strain that pervades the whole elegy harmonises well with the sorrowful character of the subject. As regards both matter and manner, the writer has excelled by many degrees all the other competitors, and his elegy is fully deserving the offered prize." It is not too much to say, that to the encouragement contained in the foregoing remarks of Iuan Wyllt was due the spirit of emulation which led me subsequently to compete at the various Elsteddfodau in the Principality with so much success.