Wales to punish them. Llewelyn fell in battle in the last month of the year, and ere another had run its course, David was taken and executed as a traitor. The conquest of Wales was now achieved, and in 1284 enactments known as the Statutes of Rhuddlan were passed for the maintenance of order in Wales; and soon after Edward, subsequently Edward II., was born in Carnarvon Castle, and as a native of the country received the title of Prince of Wales and the homage of the nobles and chieftains of his new principality. It was on his return from the battle in which Llewelyn fell that Edward is supposed to have ordered the slaughter of the bards, and to have heard the following denunciation of future calamities on his race from the lips of the last survivor of the band.] "RUIN seize thee, ruthless king, Confusion on thy banners wait; They mock the air with idle state. Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail, Nor e'en thy virtues, Tyrant, shall avail To save thy secret soul from nightly fears He wound with toilsome march his long array. Stout Gloucester3 stood aghast in speechless trance: "To arms!" cried Mortimer, and couched his quivering lance. On a rock, whose haughty brow Frowns o'er old Conway's5 foaming flood, 1 Cambria, the ancient name of Wales, derived from the Cymri or Cimbri, a tribe of ancient Britons. 2 The highest peak of the Cambrian range in Wales in the highlands of Carnarvonshire and Merionethshire, 3590 feet above the level of the sea. 3 Gilbert de Clare, called the Red, Earl of Gloucester, one of the nobles to whom the protection of the counties bordering on Wales was assigned in case of Welsh invasion. 4 Edmund Mortimer, Lord of Wigmore, another of the guardians of the Welsh border, and father of Roger Mortimer, Earl of March, who became the favourite of Isabella, the Queen of Edward II. 5 A river of North Wales falling into Beaumaris Bay at Aberconway. Robed in the sable garb of woe, With haggard eyes the poet stood— Streamed, like a meteor, to the troubled air- "Hark, how each giant oak, and desert cave, To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft Llewelyn's lay. That hushed the stormy main: Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy bed: Modred, whose magic song Made huge Plinlimmon' bow his cloud-capped head. Smeared with gore, and ghastly pale: Dear as the light that visits these sad eyes, On yonder cliffs, a grisly band, I see them sit; they linger yet, With me in dreadful harmony they join, And weave with bloody hands the tissue of thy line. "Weave the warp, and weave the woof, The winding-sheet of Edward's race. 6 This and the following are names of bards, the former companions of the singer, and slain by Edward's orders. 7 Plinlimmon, a mountain in Wales, on the borders of Cardiganshire and Montgomeryshire, from which issue the sources of the Severn and the Wye. 8 The shore of Carnarvon, along the Menai Strait, which separates it from Anglesey. Give ample room, and verge enough The shrieks of death, through Berkeley's hall that ring, She-wolf" of France, with unrelenting fangs That tear'st the bowels of thy mangled mate, From thee be born, who o'er thy country hangs The scourge of Heaven! 12 What terrors round him wait! Amazement in his van, with Flight combined, And Sorrow's faded form and Solitude behind.13 "Mighty victor, mighty lord, Low on his funeral couch he lies! No pitying heart, no eye, afford Is the sable warrior 15 fled? Thy son is gone. He rests among the dead. Fair laughs the morn, and soft the zephyr blows, In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes; Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm ; 9 Alluding to the murder of Edward II. in Berkeley Castle, September 21, 1337 Ag-o-ni-zing, suffering extreme torture, the present participle of the verb "agonize." From the Greek aywviw (a-go-ni-zo), to strive or wrestle. Thus when in an agony of mind or body, we seem to wrestle with pain, mental or physical. Isabella of France, daughter of Philip IV., whom Edward II. married in 1308. (See the Battle of Agincourt, page 48.) 12 Edward III., who claimed the crown of France in virtue of his descent from the daughter of Philip IV. when his three sons had died without leaving male issue. 13 In these two lines a forcible and beautiful picture is given in the fewest possible words of the march of a victorious army through a conquered country. 14 Edward III. died in a pitiable manner, deserted by all save a woman, Alice Ferrers by name, who robbed him of the valuables about his person ere the breath had left his body. 15 The Black Prince, the gallant victor in the battles of Cressy and Poitiers. 16 In allusion to the prosperous commencement of the reign of Richard II., grandson of Edward III., and to his cognizance, the sun rising in its splen dour. Regardless of the sweeping whirlwind's sway," That, hushed in grim repose, expects his evening prey. "Fill high the sparkling bowl, The rich repast prepare; Reft of a crown, he yet may share the feast: Close by the regal chair Fell Thirst and Famine scowl,18 A baleful smile upon their baffled guest. Heard ye the din of battle bray, Lance to lance, and horse to horse? Long years of havoc urge their destined course," And through the kindred squadrons mow their way. Ye towers of Julius,20 London's lasting shame, 22 With many a foul and midnight murder fed, Twined with her blushing foe, we spread : Wallows beneath the thorny shade. Now, brothers, bending o'er the accursed loom, "Edward, lo! to sudden fate (Weave we the woof. The thread is spun.) Half of thy heart we consecrate.2 (The web is wove. The work is done.) 17 The troubles and discontent in the latter part of his reign and his dethronement by Henry IV, 18 Alluding to the story of his having been starved to death in prison, although some authorities assert that Richard II. was murdered. 19 The Wars of the Roses, during the conflict between the factions of York and Lancaster. 20 The Tower of London, whose earliest foundation is ascribed to Julius Cæsar. 21 Margaret of Anjou, the brave queen of Henry VI., styled in the next line, "the meek usurper." 22 Henry V., the conqueror of the French in the battle of Agincourt. 23 Richard III., the murderer of Edward V. and his brother, the Duke of York, in the Tower. His cognizance was a boar under a thorn tree. 24 Alluding to the death of Eleanor of Castile, the queen of Edward I., who died in 1290 and was buried at Westminster. The king loved her so dearly that he erected a cross at every place where the corpse stopped on its way from Grantham, where the queen died, to Westminster. L Stay, O stay! nor thus forlorn Leave me unblessed, unpitied, here to mourn : But, oh! what solemn scenes, on Snowdon's height Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul ! "Girt with many a baron bold, Sublime their starry fronts they rear; And gorgeous dames, and statesmen old In bearded majesty, appear. In the midst a form divine! 27 Her eye proclaims her of the Briton-line; What strings symphonious tremble in the air, "The verse adorn again Fierce War and faithful Love, And Truth severe, by fairy Fiction dressed, In buskined measures move. Pale Grief and pleasing Pain, 25 Arthur, king of the Britons, who was supposed by the Welsh to be still alive in Fairy Land. 26 The bard is now supposed to see a vision of the kings of the Tudor family who owed their origin to a Welsh gentleman, Owen Tudor, who married Catherine, the widow of Henry V. Their son Edmund, Earl of Richmond, was the father of Henry VII., the first of the Tudor line. 37 Queen Elizabeth, the daughter of Henry VIII. by Anne Boleyn. 28 An eminent Welsh bard who lived in the 6th century, who prophesied that the Welsh would be conquered by the English but would regain their sovereignty over the island. This seemed to have been accomplished in the accession of the Tudor family. |