GATEWAY OF HARLECH CASTLE.
Long, long before Henry de Elfreton, king of architects, built this grand fortress at Edward’s command, a royal castle stood upon this rock. So, at least, says one of the “Mabinogion,” and here, under the spell of the land that created those old romances, I would fain believe that Branwen, the daughter of Llyr, lived at Harlech with her royal brother Bendigeid Vran, and that Matholwch, King of Ireland, came across the sea to woo her, with thirteen ships flying beautiful flags of satin. At the wedding, unfortunately, there was trouble between the two kings; but after a certain amount of friction the banquet was “carried on with joyousness,” and the happy pair journeyed towards Ireland with their thirteen ships. In Ireland Branwen “passed her time pleasantly, enjoying honour and friendship,” which she owed to the fact—we are given to understand—that she presented each of her visitors with a clasp, or a ring, or a royal jewel, “such as it was honourable to be seen departing with.”[8] By and by mischief was made between Matholwch and his wife, and she was sent to the kitchen to cook for the Court, which seems a drastic way of treating a Queen Consort. Then came Bendigeid Vran, her brother, to avenge her, with the hosts of seven score countries and four, and there was war between the two islands because of her. And only seven men of the Welsh escaped, and in Ireland none were left alive except five women. And Branwen went with the seven men of Wales to Mona, and she “looked towards Ireland and towards the Island of the Mighty, to see if she could descry them. ‘Alas!’ said she, ‘woe is me that I was ever born; two islands have been destroyed because of me!’ Then she uttered a loud groan and there broke her heart. And they made her a four-sided grave, and buried her upon the banks of the Alaw.” And her name still lives upon this rock of Harlech in Branwen’s Tower.
Bendigeid Vran, the son of Llyr, was not the last Welsh prince who held his Court here within sight of Snowdon. For Glyndwr made his way in between those great towers after a long siege, during which Henry’s garrison, who were at last reduced to sixteen, locked up their governor because they did not trust his constancy. Glyndwr brought his family here, and held a parliament, and gathered a little Court round him; but after another long siege he lost more than the castle, for his son-in-law Mortimer was killed, and his wife and grandchildren were taken prisoners to London. But it was that later siege by Edward IV.’s army that was the most fierce of all. It was then that the March of the Men of Harlech first stirred the sea-breeze and the hearts of men; and it was then that the blood of six thousand men flowed here where we are standing before the gates. Still later on Harlech held very obstinately for Charles I.
At Harlech we look our last on Snowdon, for the road, high above the sea, soon turns a corner, then dips to the shore at Llanbedr. At this pretty village those who are prepared to face a road that finally becomes little more than a track, and are, moreover, tolerably good walkers, may leave the high-road and drive up into a very wild and beautiful bit of country to Cwm Bychan. I freely admit that the enterprise is more suitable for bicycles than for motors, and I further confess that I have never undertaken it in a car myself; but I should be extremely happy to make the attempt on the first fine day. For Llyn Cwm Bychan is a lovely lake lying among moors and steep, rocky hills; it has the wildness of a loch in Galloway. And the only way out of this hollow in the hills, except the track by which we enter it, is a mighty staircase of stone slabs set regularly in the hillside—a staircase a mile in length, which has withstood time and weather since the feet of the Romans passed this way.
Even the best-advertised car could hardly climb the Roman Steps; so we must rejoin the coast road at Llanbedr and go on our way to Barmouth. There was once a time very long ago, it is said, when all the bay that lies upon our right was a fertile plain, the Plain of Gwaelod, with cities and fortresses thick upon the ground, and a great and busy population, and a king called Gwyddno Longshanks. And because the land lay so low and the sea so close at hand a mighty embankment of stone was built along the shore, and all went well for many a year. But there came a time when the chief overseer of this great dyke was Seithenyn ap Seithyn Saidi, and he, unfortunately, has been known ever since as one of the “three immortal drunkards of the Isle of Britain.” It is easy to imagine the result: the decay of the dyke, and the terrible night when the waters swept all before them and drowned the whole Cantref of Gwaelod. The point of Mochras near Llanbedr was at one extremity of the drowned cantref; and still, when the tide is low, you may sometimes see the long line of the broken dyke. As late as the year 1824 there was a stone in existence which had been found below the sea a hundred yards beyond the shore, and bore an inscription meaning, “Here lies the boatman to King Gwynddo.”[9] I do not know if the stone still exists, but as it was used as a footbridge it probably does not. At the beginning of the nineteenth century this seems, in Wales, to have been considered the best way of using up old monuments. It was certainly the quickest.
Eight miles from Llanbedr is Barmouth. The town itself is becoming every year more entirely a prey to the family group. Every year there are more hotels, more bathing-boxes, more wooden spades. But I doubt if anywhere in England or Wales a town is built in a more beautiful spot. You cannot drive across the long bridge that spans the estuary at its mouth, but you will be a thousandfold repaid if you leave your car and cross the bridge on foot, for the best view—I think I am not too rash in saying the best view in Wales—is from about the middle of the bridge. The Mawddach winds away between two ranges of mountains, on whose grand slopes the brilliant greens and purples, the rich browns and far-away faint blues change every moment under the varying sky. Cader Idris rises on the right in gloomy dignity from the soft drapery of foliage that is flung about his feet. And in the foreground, when the tide is low—and that, I maintain, is the loveliest time—the blue sea is riven with the rosy gold of wet sands, dotted with countless sea-gulls.
A great deal of this we can see as we drive up the estuary on its northern bank to Dolgelley, by an excellent road that clings close under the hills. Every moment the scene changes, and all the changes are good; whether we look across at Cader’s grand shoulder against the sky, or up the valley at the winding water and the distant hills, or overhead on our left at the mountain-sides that rise so steeply from the very road, or even when, the trees hemming us in for a moment, we see only glimpses through them of purple rock or shining river. At Llanelltyd the Mawddach meets the Wnion, and our way lies to the right over the bridge. As we cross the bridge the ruins of Cymmer Abbey lie upon our left on the river-bank—a Cistercian abbey, as we may easily guess, since we know the pretty taste in scenery possessed by that sagacious Order. If the truth were known, I fear we might find that their motive in choosing, as they always did, the loneliest and loveliest spots in the country, was one of self-denial, for the mountainous solitude that we love was in their day regarded with little less than terror. This particular abbey was founded in the last years of the twelfth century, and it was patronised by Llewelyn the Great. Behind it, about two miles away, are the slopes of Nannau, where Owen Glyndwr once went for a walk with his cousin and came back without him.
Owen, as I have already said, was a man of swift and extremely complete vengeance, and treachery made his gorge rise. His cousin, Howel Sele, the lord of Nannau, lived on that hill at the foot of Moel Offrwm, and had little sympathy—so far and so safe was he from the Marcher Lords—with Owen’s overbearing ways. Their relations had been strained, therefore; but when Howel asked his kinsman to visit him at Nannau Owen consented without hesitation—yet not without a coat of mail beneath his outer garment. As they walked in the park with a few retainers they saw a buck at some distance among the trees, and Owen, anxious to please, suggested that Howel should show his well-known prowess with the bow. Howel raised his bow, took aim, paused a moment; then suddenly turned upon his traitor’s heel and shot the arrow straight at the heart of his kinsman. One can picture Owen’s smile as the arrow rang upon the coat of mail that he wore unseen.
Howel went home no more. What dreadful fate befel him no one knows for certain; for probably all his own retainers were killed and Owen’s were too busy to talk. But long afterwards a skeleton was found in a hollow tree quite near the spot where the famous bowman had drawn his bow for the last time. The house of Nannau was burnt to ashes.
Before we cross the bridge to Dolgelley I should like to call attention to a very beautiful drive over the hills between this spot and Maentwrog. Beautiful as it is, it must on no account be substituted for the route by Harlech and the Barmouth Estuary, by those who are travelling in this neighbourhood for the first time; but those who know the estuary well, or those who are staying at Dolgelley and wish for a circular drive, could not do better than go up the Vale of Ganllwyd and over the hills to Trawsfynydd and Maentwrog, lunch at the Tan-y-Bwlch hotel, and return by Harlech.