The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 01, No. 05, March, 1858

After the bards and minstrels came the gentry of the county, the clergy, and distinguished strangers, before and behind whom banners floated and flags streamed. On many of these banners were fancy portraits of Saint David, the Patron Saint of Wales, always with a harp in his hand. But the Saint must have had a singularly varied expression of countenance, or else his portrait-painters must have been mere block-heads, for no two of their productions were alike. I saw smiling Davids, frowning Davids, mild Davids, and ferocious Davids,—Davids with oblique eyes, red noses, and cavernous mouths,—and Davids as blind as bats, or with great goggle-orbs, aquiline nasal organs, blue at the tips, and lips made for a lisp. One David had a brown Welsh wig on his head, and was anachronistically attired in a snuff-colored coat, black small-clothes, gray, coarse, worsted stockings, high-low boots, with buckles, and he wore on his head a three-cornered hat, and used spectacles as big as tea-saucers. On my remarking to a bystander, that I was not aware knee-breeches were worn in the time of the ancient kings, I was condescendingly informed that this David was not the celebrated Monarch-Minstrel, but a Mr. Pryce David, the founder of the Cymreiggddyon Society. But the most amusing David was one depicted on a banner carried in front of a company of barbers belonging to the order of Odd Fellows. In that magnificent work of art David was represented bewailing the death of Absalom, that unhappy young man being seen hanging by his hair from a tree. Out of the mouth of David issued a scroll, on which was inscribed the following touching verse:—

  "Oh, Absalom! Oh, Absalom!    Oh, Absalom, my son!  If thou hadst worn a good Welsh wig,    Thou hadst not been undone!"

It was with no little trouble that I elbowed my way into the great temporary hall where the exercises were to be held: but by dint of much pressing forward, I at length reached the reporters' bench. Directly in front was a raised platform, and on two sides of the tent galleries had been erected for the bards and orators. On the platform table were arranged prizes to be given for the best playing, singing, and speaking,—and also for articles of domestic Welsh manufacture, such as plaids, flannels, and the like. A large velvet and gilded chair was placed on a daïs for the president, and on either side of this, seats for ladies and visitors. In a very short time every corner of the spacious area was crammed.

And a pretty and a cheerful spectacle was presented wherever the eye turned. As in almost all other gatherings of the kind, the fair sex were greatly in the majority; and during the interval which elapsed between the opening of the doors and the beginning of business, the clatter of female tongues was prodigious. The sex generally are voluble when in crowds; but as for Welsh women, their loquacity was far beyond anything of the kind I had ever conceived of. And there were some wonderfully handsome specimens of girlhood, womanhood, and matronhood among that great gathering; though I am compelled to admit that in Wales beauty forms the exception, rather than the rule.

But the bards are in their places,—the front rows of either gallery; the president has taken his seat; the leading ladies of the county are in their chairs; and while the large audience are settling down into their places, let us glance at two or three of the celebrities present.

On the foremost seat, to the right of the chairman, sits a lady who is evidently a somebody, since all the gentlemen, on entering, pay her especial respect. She is rather past the middle age, but has worn well; her eye is still bright, her cheek fresh-colored, and her skin smooth. Evidently she takes much interest in the proceedings,—and little wonder,—for it is mainly owing to her exertions that the Festival has not become one of the things that were. Her name? You may see it embroidered in dahlias on yonder broad strip of white cotton, stretching across the breadth of the hall, nearly over her head. These blossoms form the letters and words, GWENNEN GWENT, or "The Bee of Gwent,"—Gwent being the ancient name of that portion of Glamorgan. The title is apt enough; for Lady Hall—that is her matter-of-fact name—is proverbially one of the busiest of her sex in all that relates to the welfare of her poorer neighbors. She is wife of Sir Benjamin Hall, member of Parliament for the largest parish in London, St. Mary-le-bone, and whose county residence is at Llanover Court, near Abergavenny. That tall, aristocratic man near her is her husband; but he looks somewhat out of place there. As a member of the House of Commons, he is prominent; but evidently his present position is not at all to his taste.

On the left of the chairman is another lady, whose name is well known in literary circles. She is not Welsh by birth, though she is so by marriage,—she being united to one of the great iron-masters. She has a large face, open and cheerful-looking, if not handsome. The forehead is broad and white,—the eyes dark and lustrous. Formerly she was known to the reading world as Lady Charlotte Lindsay; now she is Lady Charlotte Guest; a woman than whom very few archaeologists are better acquainted with the Welsh language and its ancient literature. She is the author of that very learned work, "The Mabinogion," a collection of early Welsh legends. This book was printed a few years since by the pale-faced, intelligent-looking man who is standing behind her chair,—Mr. Rees,—a printer in an obscure Welsh hamlet, named Llandovery. He has, with perfect propriety, been termed the Welsh Elzevir; and certainly a finer specimen of typography than that furnished by the "Mabinogion" can scarcely be produced.

The chairman is a pompous old nobody. Him I need not describe. The presiding and directing spirit of the place is a tall, slender gentleman with snow-white hair, dark, flashing eyes, and a graceful bearing; it is the Rev. Thomas Price, or, as his Welsh title has it, Carnuhanawc. He is a thorough believer in the ultra-excellence of everything Welsh,—Welsh music, Welsh flannels, Welsh scenery, Welsh mutton; and so far as regards the latter, I am quite of his opinion. After a very animated speech, he directs the competitors on the triple harp to stand forward and begin a harmonious contest.

There are three,—an old blind man, a young man, and a girl some fourteen years of age. Every one cheers the latter lustily, and "wishes she may get it." So do I, of course; and I listen with great interest as Miss Winifred Jenkins commences her performance, which she does without blush or hesitation, and with quite an I-know-all-about-it sort of air. I forget the particular piece the young lady played; but upon it she extemporized so many variations, that long before she came to an ending I had lost all remembrance of the text from which she had deduced her melodious sermon. There was, I thought, more mechanical tact than expression in her performance, but it was enthusiastically applauded for all that; and with an awkward curtsy—much like Sydney Smith's little servant-maid Bunch's "bobbing to the centre of the earth"—the red-cheeked little harpist vanished.

Next came the young man; but several of the harp-strings at once snapped in consequence of his fierce fingering, and he broke down amidst howls of guttural disapprobation. So far as competition was concerned, he was, in sporting parlance, nowhere!

The old blind gentleman followed, and I do not think that I ever witnessed a more melancholy spectacle. Apollo playing on his stringed instrument presents a very graceful appearance; but fancy a Welsh Orpheus with a face all seamed and scarred by smallpox,—a short, fiery button in the middle of his countenance, serving for a nose,—a mouth awry and toothless,—and two long, dirty, bony hands, with claw-like fingers tipped with dark crescents,—and I do not think the picture will be a pleasant one. If the horrible-looking old fellow had concealed his ghastly eyes by colored glasses, the effect would not have been so disagreeable; but it was absolutely frightful to see him rolling his head, as he played, and every now and then staring with the whites of his eyes full in the faces of his unseen audience. At length, greatly to my relief, he gave the last decisive twang, and was led away by his wife. It is almost needless to say that the musical "Bunch" took the prize.

"Penillionn Singing" was the next attraction. This was something like an old English madrigal done into Welsh, and, as a specimen of vocalization, pleasing enough,—as pleasing, that is, as Welsh singing can be to an English ear; but how different from the soft, liquid Italian trillings, the flexible English warblings, the melodious ballads of Scotland, or the rollicking songs of Ireland! There was only one of the many singers I heard at the Festival who at all charmed me, and that was a little vocalist of much repute in Southern Wales for her bird-like voice and brilliancy of execution. Her professional name was pretty enough,—Eos Vach Morganwg,—"The Little Nightingale of Glamorgan." Her renderings of some simple Welsh melodies were delicious; they as far excelled the outpourings of the other singers as the compositions of Mendelssohn or Bellini surpass a midnight feline concert. I have heard Chinese singing, and have come to the conclusion, that, next to it, Welsh prize-vocalism is the most ear-distracting thing imaginable.

So it went on; Welsh, Welsh, Welsh, nothing but Welsh, until I was heartily sick of it. Then, the singing part of the performance being concluded, the bardic portion of the business commenced. It was conducted in this manner:—

The names of several subjects were written on separate slips of paper, and these being placed in a box, each bard took one folded up and with but brief preparation was expected to extemporize a poem on the theme he had drawn. The contest speedily commenced, and to me this part of the proceedings was far and away the most entertaining. Of course, being, as I said, ignorant of the language, I could not understand the matter of the improvisations; but as for the manner, just imagine a mad North American Indian, a howling and dancing Dervise, an excited Shaker, a violent case of fever-and-ague, a New York auctioneer, and a pugilist of the Tom Hyer school, all fused together, and you may form some faint idea of a Welsh bard in the agony of inspiration. Such roaring, such eye-rolling, such thumping of fists and stamping of feet, such joint-dislocating action of the arms, such gyrations of the head, such spasmodic jerkings—out of the language of the ancient Britons, I never heard before, and fervently pray that I never may again. And, let it be remembered, the grotesque costume of the bard wonderfully heightened the effect. His long beard, made of tow, became matted with the saliva which ran down upon it from the corners of his mouth; his make-believe bald scalp was accidentally wiped to one side, as he mopped away the perspiration from his forehead with a red cotton handkerchief; and a nail in the gallery front catching his ancient robe, in a moment of frenzy, a fearful rending sound indicated a solution of continuity, and exposed a modern blue _un_bardic pair of breeches with bright brass buttons beneath,—an incident in keeping with the sham nature of all the proceedings. For a mortal half hour this exhibition lasted, and when the impassioned speaker sat down, panting and perspiring, the multitude stamped, clapped, and hallooed, and went into such paroxysms of frenzy, that Bedlam broke loose could alone be compared with it.

During the three days the Festival lasted, such scenes as I have described were repeated,—the only changes being in the persons of the singers and spouters. Glad enough was I when all was over, and my occupation as reporter gone, for that time at least. With the aid of a Welsh friend I managed to make a highly florid report of the proceedings, which occupied no less than eight columns of the "M– Beacon." As several of the speakers were only too glad to give me, sub rosâ, copies of their speeches in their native language, and as none knew of the fact but ourselves, I gained no little reputation as an accomplished Welsh scholar. The result of this was, that presents of Welsh Bibles, hymn-books, histories, topographies, and the like, by the score, were forwarded to me,—some out of respect for my talents as a great Welsh linguist, others for review in the newspaper. I was neither born to such greatness, nor did I ever achieve it; it was literally thrust on me; so also were sundry joints of the delicious Liliputian Welsh mutton, which latter I am not ashamed to say I thoroughly understood, appreciated, and digested. The ancient litter-ature, I am sorry to confess, I sold as waste paper, at so much per pound; but to show that some lingering regard for at least two of Cambria's institutions yet reigns in this – bosom, I am just about to begin upon a Welsh rabbit, and wash it down with a pitcher of cwrw dach.

CORNUCOPIA

  There's a lodger lives on the first floor,    (My lodgings are up in the garret,)  At night and at morn he taketh a horn    And calleth his neighbors to share it,—  A horn so long, and a horn so strong,    I wonder how they can bear it.  I don't mean to say that he drinks,    For that were a joke or a scandal;  But, every one knows it, he night and day blows it;—    I wish he'd blow out like a candle!  His horn is so long, and he blows it so strong,    He would make Handel fly off the handle.  By taking a horn I don't hint    That he swigs either rum, gin, or whiskey;  It's we who drink in his din worse than gin,    His strains that attempt to be frisky,  But are grievously sad.—A donkey, I add,    Is as musical, braying in his key.  It's a puzzle to know what he's at;    I could pity him, if it were madness:  I never yet knew him to play a tune through,    And it gives me more anger than sadness  To hear his horn stutter and stammer to utter    Its various abortions of badness.  At his wide open window he stands,    Overlooking his bit of a garden;  One can see the great ass at one end of his brass    Blaring out, never asking your pardon:  This terrible blurting he thinks is not hurting,    As long as his own ear-drums harden.  He thinks, I've no doubt, it is sweet,    While thus Time and Tune he is flaying;  The little house-sparrows feel all through their marrows    The jar and the fuss of his playing,—  The windows all shaking, the babies all waking,    The very dogs howling and baying.  One note out of twenty he hits,    And, cheered, blows pianos like fortes.  His time is his own. He goes sounding alone,    (A sort of Columbus or Cortés,)  On a perilous ocean, without any notion    Whereabouts in the dim deep his port is.  Like a man late from club, he has lost    His key, and around stumbles moping,  Touching this, trying that, now a sharp, now a flat,    Till he strikes on the note he is hoping,  And a terrible blare at the end of the air    Shows he's got through at last with his groping.  There,—he's finished,—at least, for a while;    He is tired, or come to his senses;  And out of his horn shakes the drops that were borne    By the winds of his musical frenzies.  There's a rest, thank our stars, of ninety-nine bars,    Ere the tempest of sound recommences.  When all the bad players are sent    Where all their false notes are protested,  I am sure that Old Nick will play him a trick,    When his bad trump and he are arrested,  And down in the regions of Discord's own legions    His head with two French horns be crested.* * * * *

MY JOURNAL TO MY COUSIN MARY

March, 1855.

Of all the letters of condolence I have received since my misfortune, yours has consoled me most. It surprises me, I confess, that a far-away cousin—of whom I only remember that she had the sweetest of earthly smiles—should know better how to reach the heart of my grief and soothe it into peace, than any nearest of kin or oldest of friends. But so it has been, and therefore I feel that your more intimate acquaintance would be something to interest me and keep my heart above despair.

My sister Catalina, my devoted nurse, says I must snatch at anything likely to do that, as a drowning man catches at straws, or I shall be overwhelmed by this calamity. But is it not too late? Am I not overwhelmed? I feel that life is a revolting subject of contemplation in my circumstances, a poor thing to look forward to. Death itself looks pleasanter.

Call up to your mind what I was, and what my circumstances were. I was healthy and strong. I could run, and wrestle, and breast strong winds, and cleave rough waters, and climb steep hills,—things I shall henceforth be able only to remember,—yes, and to sigh to do again.

I was thoroughly educated for my profession. I was panting to fulfil its duties and rise to its honors. I was beginning to make my way up. I had gained one cause,—my first and last,—and my friends thought me justified in entertaining the highest hopes.

It had always been an object of ambition with me to—well, I will confess—to be popular in society; and I know I was not the reverse.—So much, Mary, for what I was. Now see what I am.

I am, and shall forever be,—so the doctors tell me,—a miserable, sickly, helpless being, without hope of health or independence. My object in life can only be—to be comfortable, if possible, and not to be an intolerable trial to those about me! Worth living for,—isn't it?

An athlete, eager and glowing in the race of life, transformed by a thunder-bolt into a palsied and whining cripple for whom there is no Pool of Bethesda,—that is what has befallen me!

I suppose you read the shocking details of the collision in the papers. Catalina and I sat, of course, side by side in the cars. We had that day met in New York, after a separation of years. She had just returned from Europe. I went to meet and escort her home, and, as we whirled over the Jersey sands, I told her of all my plans and hopes. She listened at first with her usual lively interest; but as I went on, she looked me full in the face with an air of exasperated endurance, as if what I proposed to accomplish were beyond reason. I own that I was in a fool's paradise of buoyant expectation. At last she interrupted me.

"Ah, yes! No doubt! You'll do those trifles, of course! And, perhaps, among your other plans and intentions is that of living forever? It is an easy thing to resolve upon;—better not stop short of it."

At this instant came the crash, and I knew nothing more until I heard people remonstrating with Kate for persisting in trying to revive a dead man, (myself,) while the blood was flowing profusely from her own wound. I heard her indignantly deny that I was dead, and, with her customary irritability, tell them that they ought to be ashamed of themselves for saying so. They still insisted that I was "a perfect jelly," and could not possibly survive, even if I came to consciousness. She contradicted them energetically. Yet they pardoned, and liked her. They knew that a fond heart keenly resents evil prophecies of its beloved ones. Besides, whatever she does or says, people always like Kate.

After a physician arrived, it was found that the jellying of my flesh was not the worst of it; for, in consequence of some injury to my spine, my lower limbs were paralyzed. My sister, thank Heaven, had received only a slight cut upon the forehead.

Of course I don't mean to bore you with a recital of all my sufferings through those winter months. I don't ask your compassion for such trifles as bodily pain; but for what I am, and must forever be in this life, my own heart aches for pity. Let yours sympathize with it.

I thought to be so active, so useful, perhaps so distinguished as a man, so blest as husband and father!—for you must know how from my boyhood up I have craved, what I have never had, a home.

Now that I have been thrust out of active life and forced to make up my mind to perfect passiveness, I have become a bugbear to myself. I cannot endure the thought of ever being the peevish egotist, the exacting tyrant, which men are apt to become when they are thrown upon woman's love and long-suffering, as I am.

My only safeguard is, I believe, to keep up interests out of myself, and I beg of you to help me. I believe implicitly in your expressed desire to be of some service to me, and I ask you to undertake the troublesome task of correspondence with a sick man, and almost a stranger. I will, however, try to make you acquainted with myself and my surroundings, so thoroughly that the latter difficulty will soon be obviated.

First, let me present my sister,—named Catalina,—called Kate, Catty, or Lina, according to the fancy of the moment, or the degree of sentimentality in the speaker. You have not seen her since she was a child, so that, of course, you cannot imagine her as she is now. But you know the circumstances in which our parents left us. You remember, that, after living all his life in careless luxury, my father died penniless. Our mother had secured her small fortune for Kate; and at her death, just before my father's, she gave me—an infant a few weeks old—into my sister's young arms, with full trust that I should be taken care of by her. You know of all my obligations to her in my babyhood and for my education, which she drudged at teaching for years to obtain for me. I could never repay her for such devotion, but I hoped to make her forget all her trials, and only retain the happy consciousness of having had the making of such a famous man! I expected to place her in affluence, at least.

And now what can I bring to her but grief and gray hairs? I am dependent upon her for my daily bread; I occupy all her time, either in nursing or sewing for me; I try her temper hourly with my sick-man's whims; and I doom her to a future of care and economy. Yet I believe in my soul that she blesses me every time she looks upon me!

Thackeray says women like to be martyrized. I hardly think it is the pursuit of pleasure which leads them to self-denial. Men, at any rate, do not often seek enjoyment in that form. If women do make choice of such a class of delights, even instinctively, they need advance no other claim to superiority over men. The higher the animal, the higher its propensities.

Kate the other day was asserting a wife's right to the control of her own property, and incidentally advocating the equality of the sexes,—a touchy point with her. I put in,—

"Tell me, then, Lina, why animals form stronger attachments to men than to women. Your dog, your parrot, even your cat, already prefers me to you. How can you account for it, unless by allowing that there is more in us to respect and love?"

"I account for it," said she, with her most decided nod, "by affinity. There is more affinity between you and brutes. It is the sons of God who find the daughters of men fair. We draw angels from the skies;—even your jealous, reluctant sex has borne witness to that."

"Pshaw! only those anomalous creatures, the poets. But please yourself with such fancies; they encourage a pretty pride that becomes your sex. Conscious forever of being your lords, we feel that the higher you raise yourselves, the higher you place us. You can't help owning that angelic woman-kind submits—and gladly—to us."

"Nonsense! conceited nonsense!"

"But don't they?"

"Some do; but I do not."

"Why, all my life you have been to me a most devoted, obedient servant, Kate."

"Yes, I have my pets," she answered, "and I care for them. I am housemaid to my bird; my cat makes her bed of my lap and my best silk dress; I am purveyor to my dog, head-scratcher to my parrot, and so forth. It is my pleasure to be kind. Higher natures always are so,—yes, Charlie, even minutely solicitous for the welfare of the objects of their care; for are not the very hairs of our head all numbered by the Most Beneficent?"

She began in playful insolence, but ended with tearful eyes, and a grateful, humble glow upon her face. Its like I had never seen before in her rather imperious countenance. I gazed at her with interest. She saw me, and was irritated to be caught with moistened eyes. She scorns crying, like a man.

"Come, come!" said she, childishly and snappishly, "what are you looking at?"

Of course you cannot have any idea of her personal appearance from memory, and I will try to give you one by description.

Though over thirty, she is generally considered very handsome, and is in the very prime of her beauty; for it is not of the fragile, delicate order. She has jet-black, very abundant hair, hazel eyes, and a complexion that is very fair, without being blonde. A bright, healthy color in cheek and lip makes her look as fresh as a rose. Her nose is the doubtful feature. It is—hum!—Roman, and some fastidious folks think a trifle too large. But I think it suits well her keen eyes and slightly haughty mouth. She has fine hands, a tall figure, and an independent "grand action," that is not wanting in grace, but is more significant of prompt energy.