St. David’s Day.
THE LEEK.
Written by William Leathart, Llywydd.
Sung at the Second Anniversary of the Society of Undeb Cymry, St. David’s Day, 1825.
Air—Pen Rhaw.
I.
If bards tell true, and hist’ry’s page
Is right,—why, then, I would engage
To tell you all about the age,
When Cæsar used to speak;
When dandy Britons painted,—were
Dress’d in the skin of wolf or bear,
Or in their own, if none were there,
Before they wore THE LEEK.
Ere Alfred hung in the highway,
His chains of gold by night or day;
And never had them stol’n away,
His subjects were so meek.
When wolves they danc’d o’er field and fen;
When austere Druids roasted men;—
But that was only now and then,
Ere Welshmen wore THE LEEK.
II.
Like all good things—this could not last,
And Saxon gents, as friends, were ask’d,
Our Pictish foes to drive them past
The wall:—then home to seek,
Instead of home, the cunning chaps
Resolv’d to stop and dish the APs,
Now here they are, and in their caps
To day they wear THE LEEK.
Yet tho’ our dads, they tumbled out,
And put each other to the rout,
We sons will push the bowl about;—
We’re here for fun or freak.
Let nought but joy within us dwell;
Let mirth and glee each bosom swell;
And bards, in days to come, shall tell,
How Welshmen love THE LEEK.
THE WELSH HARP.
Mr. Leathart is the author of “Welsh Pennillion, with Translations into English, adapted for singing to the Harp,” an eighteenpenny pocket-book of words of ancient and modern melodies in Welsh and English, with a spirited motto from Mr. Leigh Hunt.—“The Ancient Britons had in them the seeds of a great nation even in our modern sense of the word. They had courage, they had reflection, they had imagination. Power at last made a vassal of their prince. There were writers in those times, harpers, and bards, who made the instinct of that brute faculty turn cruel out of fear. They bequeathed to their countrymen the glory of their memories; they and time together have consecrated their native hills, so as they never before were consecrated.”
According to the prefatory dissertation of Mr. Leathart’s pleasant little manual, “Pennillion singing” is the most social relic of ancient minstrelsy in existence. It originated when bardism nourished in this island; when the object of its members was to instil moral maxims through the medium of poetry, and the harp was then, as it still is, the instrument to which they chanted. There is evidence of this use of the harp in Cæsar and other Latin writers. The bards were priest and poet; the harp was their inseparable attribute, and skill in playing on it an indispensable qualification. A knowledge of this instrument was necessary, in order to establish a claim to the title of gentleman; it occupied a place in every mansion; and every harper was entitled to valuable privileges. A “Pencerdd,” or chief of song, and a “Bardd Teulu,” or domestic bard, were among the necessary appendages to the king’s court. The former held his lands free, was stationed by the side of the “judge of the palace,” and lodged with the heir presumptive. He was entitled to a fee on the tuition of all minstrels, and to a maiden fee on the marriage of a minstrel’s daughter. The fine for insulting him was six cows and eighty pence. The domestic bard also held his land free; he had a harp from the king, which he was enjoined never to part with; a gold ring from the queen, and a beast out of every spoil. In the palace he sang immediately after the chief of song, and in fight at the front of the battle. It is still customary for our kings to maintain a Welsh minstrel.
One of the greatest encouragers of music was Gruffydd ap Cynan, a sovereign of Wales, who, in the year 1100, summoned a grand congress to revise the laws of minstrelsy, and remedy any abuse that might have crept in. In order that it should be complete, the most celebrated harpers in Ireland were invited to assist, and the result was the establishing the twenty-four canons of music; the MS. of which is in the library of the Welsh school, in Gray’s Inn-lane. It comprises several tunes not now extant, or rather that cannot be properly deciphered, and a few that are well known at the present day. A tune is likewise there to be found, which a note informs us was usually played before king Arthur, when the salt was laid upon the table; it is called “Gosteg yr Halen,” or the Prelude of the Salt.
The regulations laid down in the above MS. are curious. A minstrel having entered a place of festivity was not allowed to depart without leave, or to rove about at any time, under the penalty of losing his fees. If he became intoxicated and committed any mischievous trick, he was fined, imprisoned, and divested of his fees for seven years. Only one could attend a person worth ten pounds per annum, or two a person worth twenty pounds per annum, and so forth. It likewise ordains the quantum of musical knowledge necessary for the taking up of the different degrees, for the obtaining of which three years seems to have been allowed.
The Welsh harp, or “Telyn,” consists of three distinct rows of strings, without pedals, and was, till the fifteenth century, strung with hair. The modern Welsh harp has two rows of strings and pedals.
Giraldus Cambrensis, in his Itinerary, speaking of the musical instruments of the Welsh, Irish, and Scotch, says, Wales uses the harp, “crwth,” and bag-pipes; Scotland the harp, “crwth,” and drum; Ireland the harp and drum only; and, of all, Wales only retains her own.
The “crwth” is upon the same principle as the violin; it has however six strings, four of which are played upon with a bow, the two outer being struck by the thumb as an accompaniment, or bass; its tone is a mellow tenor, but it is now seldom heard, the last celebrated player having died about forty years since, and with him, says the editor of the Cambrian Register, “most probably the true knowledge of producing its melodious powers.” From the player of this instrument is derived a name now common, viz. “Crowther” and “Crowder” (Crwthyr); it may be translated “fiddler,” and in this sense it is used by Butler in his Hudibras.
Within the last few years, the harp has undergone a variety of improvements, and it is now the most fashionable instrument; yet in Wales it retains its ancient form and triple strings; “it has its imperfections,” observes Mr. Parry, “yet it possesses one advantage, and that is its unisons,” which of course are lost when reduced to a single row.
There would be much persuasion necessary to induce “Cymru” to relinquish her old fashioned “Telyn,” so reluctant are a national people to admit of changes. When the violin superseded the “crwth,” they could not enjoy the improvement.
Pennillion chanting consists in singing stanzas, either attached or detached, of various lengths and metre, to any tune which the harper may play; for it is irregular, and in fact not allowable, for any particular one to be chosen. Two, three, or four bars having been played, the singer takes it up, and this is done according as the Pennill, or stanza, may suit; he must end precisely with the strain, he therefore commences in any part he may please. To the stranger it has the appearance of beginning in the middle of a line or verse, but this is not the case. Different tunes require a different number of verses to complete it; sometimes only one, sometimes four or six. It is then taken up by the next, and thus it proceeds through as many as choose to join in the pastime, twice round, and ending with the person that began.
These convivial harp meetings are generally conducted with great regularity, and are really social; all sing if they please, or all are silent. To some tunes there are a great number of singers, according to the ingenuity required in adapting Pennillion. Yet even this custom is on the decline.
In South Wales, the custom has been long lost; on its demise they encouraged song writing and singing, and they are still accounted the best (without the harp) in the principality. In North Wales song-singing was hardly known before the time of Huw Morus, in the reign of Charles I., nor is it now so prevalent as in the south.
In the year 1176, Rhys ap Gruffydd held a congress of bards and minstrels at Aberteifi, in which the North Welsh bards came off as victors in the poetical contest, and the South Welsh were adjudged to excel in the powers of harmony.
For the encouragement of the harp and Pennillion chanting, a number of institutions have lately been formed, and the liberal spirit with which they are conducted will do much towards the object; among the principal are the “Cymmrodorion,” or Cambrian Societies of Gwynedd, Powys, Dyfed, Gwent, and London; the “Gwyneddigion,” and “Canorion,” also in London. The former established so long since as 1771, and the “Undeb Cymry,” or United Welshmen, established in 1823, for the same purpose. In all the principal towns of Wales, societies having the same object in view have been formed, among which the “Brecon Minstrelsy Society” is particularly deserving of notice. The harp and Pennillion singing have at all times come in for their share of encomium by the poets, and are still the theme of many a sonnet in both languages.
From more than a hundred pieces in Mr. Leathart’s “Pennillion,” translations of a few pennills, or stanzas, are taken at random, as specimens of the prevailing sentiments.
The man who loves the sound of harp,
Of song, and ode, and all that’s dear,
Where angels hold their blest abode,
Will cherish all that’s cherish’d there.
But he who loves not tune nor strain,
Nature to him no love has given,
You’ll see him while his days remain,
Hateful both to earth and heaven.
Fair is yon harp, and sweet the song,
That strays its tuneful strings along,
And would not such a minstrel too,
This heart to sweetest music woo?
Sweet is the bird’s melodious lay
In summer morn upon the spray.
But from my Gweno sweeter far,
The notes of friendship after war.
Woe to him, whose every bliss
Centers in the burthen’d bowl;
Of all burthens none like this,
Sin’s sad burthen on the soul;
Tis of craft and lies the seeker,
Murder, theft, and wantonness,
Weakens strong men, makes weak weaker,
Shrewd men foolish, foolish—less.
Ah! what avails this golden coat,
Or all the warblings of my throat,
While I in durance pine?
Give me again what nature gave,
’Tis all I ask, ’tis all I crave,
Thee, Liberty divine!
To love his language in its pride,
To love his land—tho’ all deride,
Is a Welshman’s ev’ry care,
And love those customs, good and old,
Practised by our fathers bold.
We travel, and each town we pass
Gives manners new, which we admire,
We leave them, then o’er ocean toss’d
Thro’ rough or smooth, to pleasure nigher,
Still one thought remains behind,
’Tis home, sweet home, our hearts desire.
Wild in the woodlands, blithe and free,
Dear to the bird is liberty;
Dear to the babe to be caress’d,
And fondled on his nurse’s breast,
Oh! could I but explain to thee
How dear is Merion’s land to me.
Low, ye hills, in ocean lie.
That hide fair Merion from mine eye,
One distant view, oh! let me take,
Ere my longing heart shall break.
Another dress will nature wear
Before again I see my fair;
The smiling fields will flowers bring,
And on the trees the birds will sing;
But still one thing unchang’d shall be,
That is, dear love, my heart for thee.
The original Welsh of these and other translations, with several interesting particulars, especially the places of weekly harp-meetings and Pennillion-singing in London, may be found in Mr. Leathart’s agreeable compendium.