Ruthin, the stronghold of Lord Grey, now a quiet country-town, was first attacked and burnt to the ground. Before Henry’s army, under the government of Harry Percy, or Hotspur, and the young Prince Henry, then a boy of fourteen, could act against them, the revolt had spread all over Wales, and had declared its aim to be independence of English rule. The success with which Glendower met soon earned for him the reputation of a wizard.
“I can call spirits from the vasty deep,” Shakespeare makes him boast to Hotspur; who rudely replies: “Ay, but will they answer?” But let the rough Northern Earl scoff as he might, Owen certainly met with almost uncanny success. The English troops, “bootless and weatherbeaten,” were driven back across the borders again and again. Not only North Wales, but the South country also rose under him. Midway between the two stands “Pumlumon,” better known as Plynlimmon, a five-pointed peak that rises, almost solitary, from the surrounding plain. Upon this top Glendower planted his standard, and from thence he managed to capture Mortimer, the powerful English Earl of royal blood, who became before long his son-in-law.
Owen was now openly acknowledged as Prince of Wales; castle after castle fell into his hands, and Parliaments were held by him at Dolgelly, under the shadow of Cader Idris, and elsewhere. But meantime Prince Henry, the future Henry V., was growing up and learning the art of war. It was he who, while Owen was busy in South Wales, came to his own valley of Glyndyfrdwy, and burnt his house down. For seven years the war went on, until the land was wellnigh ruined and the people weary of warfare. Pardons were freely offered and as freely accepted, until at last Owen Glendower found himself deserted. Still he would not give in, and when Henry V., soon after he was made King, sent him an unasked for pardon by the hands of Glendower’s own son, it came too late; the hero of Wales’ last bid for independence was dead.
Nearly eighty years later Wales recovered her name for loyalty to an English Sovereign when a certain Henry Tudor, grandson of a Welsh country gentleman who had married a King’s widow, landed at Milford Haven, and, with the aid of his fellow-countrymen, won the Battle of Bosworth, and was crowned King as Henry VII. And so, when Henry VIII., his son, wished to bring about the Union of England and Wales by Act of Parliament, no voice was lifted against it. But if Henry thought by this Act, and by forbidding all magistrates in Wales to use the Welsh language, he was going to make the country actually a part of England, he was greatly mistaken. The upper classes might flock to the English Court and forget their Welsh homes, but the greater part of the people—the workers of the nation—kept their own speech, their own customs, their own traditions. The days of warfare were over; but still you can tell a Welshman from an Englishman wherever he is found. He may talk the purest English, but the fall and rise of his voice as he talks differs from the more monotonous tones of his Anglo-Saxon companion. He is more excitable, more easily moved to wrath, or tears, or laughter, and he possesses, as a rule, a far more vivid imagination than is found anywhere outside the Celtic race of which he forms a part.
CHAPTER IV
A WELSH MARKET-TOWN
We have come to the end of Glendower’s story, but before we leave his part of the country altogether let us pay a visit to Corwen, the old market-town that lies so near his own valley.
Someone has said that Corwen is “relentlessly tucked away under the dark shoulder” of the heather-clad Berwyns, for above it lies the height of Pen-y-Pigyn, which certainly keeps the sun off very effectually. In the porch of the old church, indeed, we shall find a great stone, called by a Welsh name that means “the pointed stone in the icy nook.” A legend, found in many other parts of Wales, says that the builders vainly tried to erect the church, which was built before the town, on a sunnier position farther down the valley, but every night the walls were destroyed and the materials carried down to the sunless spot under the hill. Just above the vestry door of that same church is a curious mark, said to have been made by the dagger of Glendower, flung by him in a fit of rage one day from the top of Pen-y-Pigyn.
So far away is Corwen from mines or flannel mills or tourist centres, that it forms in many ways a good example of a Welsh country-town, as it might have existed not long after the days of Glendower himself.
The great interest lies in the monthly fair-day, when the streets and market-place are full of shaggy Welsh ponies, black-faced mountain-sheep, and cattle with immense horns. At every corner stand groups of farmers, talking eagerly with hands and shoulders as much as with lips, and with that curious rise and fall of the voice which, they tell us, is the secret of Welsh oratory. Of that conversation the Saxon from over the border understands not a word; but no sooner does he make a remark than with the utmost ease the Welshmen respond in excellent English. The power of expressing themselves equally well in both languages is a striking feature of even the most uneducated classes in Wales. Only here and there in some farm hidden far away among the hills could one meet with the experience of one who, weary and thirsty after a long tramp over the high moors, approached a tiny farm-house and asked the old woman who opened the door for a cup of milk. A shake of the head was the only reply. “But you must have milk or water in the house!” persisted the visitor. Another shake and a stream of words in an unknown tongue followed. Not to be baffled, the Saxon raised his hand to his mouth and made as if to drink.