For the next fifteen months Coleridge and Southey were close companions,
Coleridge being the elder by two years.
Upon the present occasion, however, he left Oxford with an acquaintance,
Mr. Hucks, for a pedestrian tour in Wales. [2] Two other friends,
Brookes and Berdmore, joined them in the course of their ramble; and at
Caernarvon Mr. Coleridge wrote the following letter to Mr. Martin, of
Jesus College.
[Footnote 2: It is to this tour that he refers in the "Table Talk", p. 88.—"I took the thought of "grinning for joy" in that poem ("The Ancient Mariner") from my companion (Berdmore's) remark to me, when we had climbed to the top of Penmaenmaur, and were nearly dead with thirst. We could not speak from the constriction, till we found a little puddle under a stone. He said to me,—'You grinned like an idiot.' He had done the same.">[
LETTER 8. To HENRY MARTIN [1]
July 22d, 1794.
Dear Martin,
From Oxford to Gloucester,+ to Ross,+ to Hereford, to Leominster, to Bishop's Castle,+ to Montgomery, to Welshpool, Llanvelling,+ Llangunnog, Bala,+ Druid House,+ Llangollin, Wrexham,++ Ruthin, Denbigh,+ St. Asaph, Holywell,+ Rudland, Abergeley,+ Aberconway,+ Abber,+ over a ferry to Beaumaris+ (Anglesea), Amlock,+ Copper Mines, Gwindu, Moeldon, over a ferry to Caernarvon, have I journeyed, now philosophizing with Hucks, 1 now melancholizing by myself, or else indulging those daydreams of fancy, that make realities more gloomy. To whatever place I have affixed the mark +, there we slept. The first part of our tour was intensely hot—the roads, white and dazzling, seemed to undulate with heat—and the country, bare and unhedged, presenting nothing but stone fences, dreary to the eye and scorching to the touch. At Ross we took up our quarters at the King's Arms, once the house of Mr. Kyrle, the celebrated Man of Ross. I gave the window-shutter a few verses, Which I shall add to the end of the letter. The walk from Llangunnog to Bala over the mountains was most wild and romantic; there are immense and rugged clefts in the mountains, which in winter must form cataracts most tremendous; now there is just enough sun-glittering water dashed down over them to soothe, not disturb the ear. I climbed up a precipice on which was a large thorn-tree, and slept by the side of one of them near two hours.
At Bala I was apprehensive that I had caught the itch from a Welsh democrat, who was charmed with my sentiments; he bruised my hand with a grasp of ardour, and I trembled lest some discontented citizens of the "animalcular" republic might have emigrated. Shortly after, in came a clergyman well dressed, and with him four other gentlemen. I was asked for a public character; I gave Dr. Priestley. The clergyman whispered his neighbour, who it seems is the apothecary of the parish—"Republicans!" Accordingly when the doctor, as they call apothecaries, was to have given a name, "I gives a sentiment, gemmen! may all republicans be "gull"oteened!" Up starts the democrat; "May all fools be gulloteened, and then you will be the first!" Fool, rogue, traitor, liar, &c. flew in each other's faces in hailstorms of vociferation. This is nothing in Wales—they make if necessary vent-holes for the sulphureous fumes of their temper! I endeavoured to calm the tempest by observing that however different our political opinions might be, the appearance of a clergyman assured me that we were all Christians, though I found it rather difficult to reconcile the last sentiment with the spirit of Christianity! "Pho!" quoth the clergyman; "Christianity! Why we a'nt at "church" now, are we? The gentleman's sentiment was a very good one, because it shows him to be sincere in his principles." Welsh politics, however, could not prevail over Welsh hospitality; they all shook hands with me (except the parson), and said I was an open-speaking, honest-hearted fellow, though I was a bit of a democrat.
On our road from Bala to Druid House, we met Brookes and Berdmore. Our rival pedestrians, a "Gemini" of Powells, were vigorously marching onward, in a postchaise! Berdmore had been ill. We were not a little glad to see each other. Llangollen is a village most romantically situated; but the weather was so intensely hot that we saw only what was to be admired—we could not admire.
At Wrexham the tower is most magnificent; and in the church is a white marble monument of Lady Middleton, superior, "mea quidem sententia", to anything in Westminster Abbey. It had entirely escaped my memory, that Wrexham was the residence of a Miss E. Evans, a young lady with whom in happier days I had been in habits of fraternal correspondence; she lives with her grandmother. As I was standing at the window of the inn, she passed by, and with her, to my utter astonishment, her sister, Mary Evans, "quam afflictim et perdite amabam",—yea, even to anguish. They both started, and gave a short cry, almost a faint shriek; I sickened, and well nigh fainted, but instantly retired. Had I appeared to recognise her, my fortitude would not have supported me: