"Jonathan
Hughes was my grandfather!" and as he spoke his eyes flashed fire.
"Dear me!" said I; "I read some of his pieces thirty-two years ago
when I was a lad in England. I think I can repeat some of the
lines." I then repeated a quartet which I chanced to remember.
"Ah!" said the man, "I see you know his poetry. Come into the next
room and I will show you his chair." He led me into a sleeping-
room on the right hand, where in a corner he showed me an antique
three-cornered arm-chair. "That chair," said he, "my grandsire won
at Llangollen, at an Eisteddfod of Bards. Various bards recited
their poetry, but my grandfather won the prize. Ah, he was a good
poet. He also won a prize of fifteen guineas at a meeting of bards
in London."
We returned to the kitchen, where I found the good woman of the
house waiting with a plate of bread-and-butter in one hand, and a
glass of buttermilk in the other - she pressed me to partake of
both - I drank some of the buttermilk, which was excellent, and
after a little more discourse shook the kind people by the hand and
thanked them for their hospitality. As I was about to depart the
man said that I should find the lane farther up very wet, and that
I had better mount through a field at the back of the house. He
took me to a gate, which he opened, and then pointed out the way
which I must pursue. As I went away he said that both he and his
family should be always happy to see me at Ty yn y Pistyll, which
words, interpreted, are the house by the spout of water.
I went up the field with the lane on my right, down which ran a
runnel of water, from which doubtless the house derived its name.
I soon came to an unenclosed part of the mountain covered with
gorse and whin, and still proceeding upward reached a road, which I
subsequently learned was the main road from Llangollen over the
hill. I was not long in gaining the top which was nearly level.
Here I stood for some time looking about me, having the vale of
Llangollen to the north of me, and a deep valley abounding with
woods and rocks to the south.
Following the road to the south, which gradually descended, I soon
came to a place where a road diverged from the straight one to the
left. As the left-hand road appeared to lead down a romantic
valley I followed it.
