CHAPTER VIII
A BURIED VILLAGE
To-day we are going to take a glimpse at two Welsh lakes, to one of which a most romantic story is attached.
We start from Lake Bala, or Llyn Tegid, as it was called in the days of Taliesin. Borrow, that whimsical traveller, who walked throughout Wales, and knew the country as few Welshmen do themselves, thus describes it:
“I wandered to the northern shore of Llyn Tegid ... the wind was blowing from the south, and tiny waves were beating against the shore, which consisted of small brown pebbles. The lake has not its name, which signifies Lake of Beauty, for nothing. It is a beautiful sheet of water, and beautifully situated. It is oblong, and about six miles in length. On all sides except to the north it is bounded by hills. Those at the southern end are very lofty, the tallest of which is Aran, which lifts its head to the clouds like a huge loaf.” Then he recalls how a hut by the edge of this lake was in former days the refuge of Llewarch the Aged, who lived to the age of 140, and had twenty-four sons, all of whom were slain by the Saxon invader in the grim days of old.
In more recent times the town of Bala was noted for the knitting industry; and a hundred years ago one might have seen the Tomen of Bala, a great mound overlooking the valley, covered with a crowd of knitters—men, women, and children—all plying their needles with busy fingers.
And now we turn our backs on the old lake and its prosperous little market-town, and set off to find a new lake, which only came into existence in the year 1881, which yet, in many ways, has a stranger and more romantic story than any that Llyn Tegid can boast.
Up and up climbs the steep, rough road to the top of the wild pass on the ridge of the Berwyns; or, if we want a yet wilder walk, we may strike off it to the left across the moorlands, steering our way through pathless bogs and treacherous swamps, till we reach a steep precipice guarding a valley through which rushes a torrent of waterfalls. Along the side of this sheer rock runs a narrow sheep-path—so narrow that we creep along on hands and feet across chasms, where it disappears altogether, and finally drop down a headlong descent into the valley of Lake Vyrnwy.
Five miles of peaceful grey water lie below us, fed by mountain torrents such as that we have skirted in our perilous descent.