JOURNEY OVER THE PRECELLY MOUNTAIN TO CARDIGAN—EXTENSIVE PROSPECT—CARDIGAN—ST. DOGMAEL’S PRIORY—ANOTHER ROUTE FROM HAVERFORDWEST TO CARDIGAN, BY ST. DAVID’S—THE CATHEDRAL OF ST. DAVID’S—GRAND RUINS OF ITS PALACE—A LOGGAN, OR ROCKING STONE—RAMSAY ISLAND—FISHGUARD—NEWPORT—KILGARRAN CASTLE—SALMON LEAP—NEWCASTLE.
The choice of our journey from Haverfordwest [81] to Cardigan was a matter of some difficulty; we were desirous of traversing the Precelly Mountain, but could not think of leaving the ruins of St. David’s unexamined. At last we hit upon the expedient of each taking a different road: my companion, having the better horse, took the circuitous route by St. David’s; and I, the direct road over the mountains.
Proceeding upon this arrangement two of three miles, I halted to take a retrospective view of the country. Haverfordwest new wore a singular appearance, with its houses piled on each other; but, accompanied by a fine river well furnished with vessels, and by its bridge and massive castle, it presented an agreeable picture. At some distance westward, the lofty tower of Roche castle was conspicuous; and partly in the same direction, the Trogan rocks, rising from the verdure in abrupt crags, so as to be generally mistaken for stupendous ruins. Turning to the east, within a short distance appeared an ancient encampment called St. Leonard’s rathe, crowning a bold eminence; this work is circular, and, from the height of its vallum and depth of its ditch, may be attributed to the Saxons.
As I advanced from this spot I parted with the beauties of the country: no objects of interest occurred; the unadorned views became compressed in narrow limits, until at length they were shut up in mountainous hollows. In this dreary track stands a poor solitary house called New inn, half way between Haverford and Cardigan: however, I here obtained part of a goose for my dinner, and then proceeded up the Precelly Mountain.
This mountain, reckoned the highest in South Wales, is part of a great ridge crossing Pembrokeshire in a direction East and West. On gaining the summit, a prodigious extent of prospect burst upon me. In front, a wild hilly tract, yet not undiversified with patches of cultivation, stretched nearly to the northern confines of South Wales, where the pale summit of Plinlimmon, in Montgomeryshire, might be just distinguished from the atmospheric blue: more westward, beyond a vast expanse of sea, like a doubtful mist rising from it, appeared Bardsey island, and the neighbouring shores in Caernarvonshire; and looking across the miserable country about Fishguard and St. David’s, my guide assured me, that “on a very clear day a very good eye might discover the mountains of Ireland;” but, I confess, it was not my good fortune to discover any such appearance. On looking backward, the whole of the interesting country that I had travelled in the neighbourhood of Milford-haven appeared in one comprehensive though distant display. From dwelling a considerable time on these extensive scenes, I traversed an uninteresting country made up of lumpy hills, and left Pembrokeshire in crossing the handsome old bridge of Cardigan.
Cardigan (in Welch chronicles Abertivy [84]) is a neat respectable town, though many of its streets are narrow and steep, seated on the north bank of the river Tivy, near its junction with the sea: the river is navigable for ships of small burthen up to the quay, which enables the inhabitants to carry on a pretty brisk trade with Ireland. This town, though small, is governed by a mayor, thirteen aldermen, and as many common councilmen. The ruins of its castle, appearing on a low cliff at the foot of the bridge, are very inconsiderable, scarcely showing more than the fragments of two circular bastions overgrown with ivy; yet it was once a large and important fortress. Its foundation is ascribed to Gilbert de Clare, about the year 1160; but it was soon after taken, and in part destroyed, by Rhys ap Gryffith. [85]
Here are also the remains of a priory of Black monks, which was dedicated to St. Mary, and was subordinate to the abbey of Chertsey in Surrey.
Near Cardigan, in the year 1136, the English army, commanded by Ranolph earl of Chester, was shamefully worsted, and the two barons Robert Fitz Roger and Pain Fitz John, with 3000 others, slain on the spot, besides a great number drowned by the fall of a bridge. In this battle the English soldiers appeared to be planet-struck, surrendering themselves prisoners to mere old women; and the general with a few men made their escape not without great difficulty.
St. Dogmael’s Priory
Early in the morning after my reaching Cardigan, I made an excursion in search of St. Dogmael’s Priory, about a mile and a half distant. This fragment of antiquity is very much dilapidated, and boasts scarcely any picturesque appearance; the few parts standing are converted into barns, sheds, and habitations; but enough remains to shew the original extent of the church; which was cruciform, of no considerable dimensions, and of the early Gothic style; in the cemetery adjoining the ruin, and the village church,
—“a church-yard yew,
Decay’d and worn with age,”
has a pleasing characteristic effect: and here the scene, finely interspersed with wood, and overlooking the Tivy, is undoubtedly picturesque. This priory was founded for Benedictine monks by Martin de Turribus, a Norman chieftain, who first conquered the surrounding territory called Kames or Kemish, and deluged it with the blood of its natives. This was a common trick for cheating the devil, practised by the organized plunderers of that day. After pillaging a country, and enslaving or massacreing the legitimate proprietors, they hoped to expiate their crime, and quell the rising qualms of conscience, by appropriating a part of their booty to a monkish foundation—to a set of idle jugglers, scarcely less inimical to the rights of society, though less ferocious, than themselves.
Returning to the inn, I rejoined my fellow-tourist, who had just completed his circuit of between forty and fifty miles round the coast: of this route I learn the following particulars:
From Haverfordwest the road passes neat the elevated ruin of Roche castle; thence extends through a wild dreary country, near St. Bride’s dangerous bay, and crossed the romantic creek of Solva to the once flourishing city of St. David’s, now in appearance an inconsiderable village. This deserted place occupies a gentle eminence on that projecting rocky cape called St. David’s head. In a sheltered hollow beneath the town, are the noble ruins of the Metropolitan episcopacy of Wales; yet the Cathedral of St. David’s, though long a mouldering pile, having lately undergone a thorough repair, with a just attention to the antique style of architecture, now appears in renewed magnificence. This venerable structure is cruciform, of large dimensions, and of the early Gothic architecture, though not without much of the high-wrought fret-work additions of later ages. The nave alone wears all the simplicity of its original construction; the tower, highly ornamented, rises from the middle of the church to the height of 127 feet; Bishop Vaughan’s chapel behind the choir, and the dilapidated one of St. Mary’s, exhibit all the elegant tracery of the ornamented Gothic; as does also the chapter-house, and St. Mary’s hall, now a ruin. Among the numerous ancient monuments that are to be met with in the church and its chapels, those of Owen Tudor, and Edward Earl of Richmond, father of Henry the VIIth, both situated near the middle of the choir, are worthy of notice.The episcopal palace is a superb ruin, surmounted with a light parapet raised upon arches, in the style of Swansea castle and Lamphey court. “The area of the great court is 120 feet square; on the east side of which is the Bishop’s hall, 58 feet in length, and 23 in breadth; the King’s hall, on the south side, is 88 feet by 80. This grand saloon is said to have been built expressly for the reception of King John, on his return from Ireland in 1211.” But we are informed by Godwin, that the palace itself was not erected until about the year 1335: which must be an anachronism, unless the story of King John be unfounded. The first hall is a grand room; but the latter has been particularly splendid. Over the fine arched entrance are the statues of King John and his queen; and at the cast end is a curious circular window with bars diverging from the centre, still in a perfect condition. The chapel containing the remains of a font, and kitchen amply furnished with four chimneys, are also entire: nor are the forsaken apartments deficient in proofs of the regal splendor assumed by the Romish pastors of Christian humility.Many ruinous buildings, once habitations of ecclesiastical functionaries, surround the cathedral; yet sufficient are kept in repair for the diminished number of officers now appointed: the cathedral service is, nevertheless, performed with an attention that would do credit to more eminent establishments. The whole of these buildings are inclosed by a wall eleven hundred yards in circumference.
St. David’s is supposed to have been a Roman station, the Octapitarum of Ptolemy; and here St. Patrick is said to have founded a monastery to the honour of St. Andrew in the year 470: to this place St. David translated the archbishopric of Wales, from Caerleon, about the year 577, and founded the cathedral, which was afterwards dedicated to him; but the primacy was withdrawn, and annexed to that of Canterbury, in the reign of Henry the First. Here also a college was founded for a master and seven priests by John Duke of Lancaster, in conjunction with his wife and the Bishop of the diocese, in the year 1369.
At the extremity of St. David’s promontory is a disjointed craig; so large, that it is supposed a hundred oxen could not drag it away; but so placed on smaller stones, as to have been easily rocked by the pressure of a man’s hand. [91]
In druidical ages, this formed the grand ordeal: if a man was to appear guilty, the priests managed that he should apply his pressure near the axis, and the stone remained immoveable; but if his peace or priest offerings were deemed commensurate to his sins, he was instructed to lean near the extremity, and it easily gave way. Near this head-land is Ramsay island, a fruitful little spot, and once particularly so in holiness, if we may credit ancient histories, which state that no less than twenty thousand saints lie interred in it. The dangerous rocks called the Bishop and his Clerks, near this island, are covered with wild fowl in the breeding season.
The road continues on a barren tempestuous waste to Fishguard, a miserable fishing town, only remarkable for the late descent of 1400 French invaders, who, after a few days possession of the neighbourhood, surrendered to the Welch peasantry, headed by Lord Cawdor. Newport, a few miles farther, is another poor fishing town, at the bottom of a small bay: the ruined castle, seated on a hill above the town, was built by the Anglo-norman settlers in 1215, but afterwards nearly destroyed by Llewellyn. In Nevern churchyard, near Newport, is the shaft of a stone cross about thirteen feet high, curiously carved all over with scrolls and knots. At Pentere Evau, in Nevern parish, is a circle of rude stones, 150 feet in circumference; in the midst whereof is a cromlech [92] of great dimensions: in the same parish is another altar monument, called Llech-y-drybedh, having a furrow in the flat stone, which might be to carry off the blood of the victims. In Grose’s Antiquities, five stone altars are stated to be in this neighbourhood, and also four barrows; one of which, on being opened, was found to contain five urns full of burnt bones. Nothing worthy of particular notice occurs from this spat to Cardigan.
We projected an aquatic excursion, to explore the scenery of the Tivy; but, the tide not answering, we were obliged to desert the river for two or three miles, and proceed by land to Kilgarran. The Tivy above Cardigan becomes environed by high hills, whose approaching bases contract the bed of the river, changing its character from a broad and majestic, to an impetuous eddying stream: the sides of these hills rise from the water in almost perpendicular steepness, yet clothed with trees from the river’s brink to their ridgy summits. In the midst of this imbowered glen, a naked rock, crowned with the truly picturesque remains of Kilgarran castle, proudly advances, and forms a striking contrast to the dark rich verdure that prevails in the other accompanyments of the river.
Kilgarran Castle
The position of Kilgarran castle is nearly on all sides self-defended; but on the isthmus that connects the projecting rock with the main land, two ponderous round towers seem to have formerly defied the assault of war, as they now do that of pilfering dilapidation. The broken walls, watch-towers, and apartments that compose the minor parts of this fortress, bespeak it to have been of no great original extent, or highly ornamented; yet the scattered relics, variously interwoven with ivy, offer an appearance from most points of view highly imposing and grand.The foundation of the castle is uncertain, and the styles of different ages appear throughout the building. According to Carradoc, this fortress was erected about the year 1222, when Marshall Earl of Striquil (Chepstow) vanquished the Welch under their Prince Gruffydth, and gained an undisputed footing in these parts. The town of Kilgarran is diminished into one street, thinly inhabited by labouring farmers and fishermen.
In a romantic hollow, a mile or two higher up, the Tivy, throwing itself over a ledge of rock in one bold sheet, though not more than six feet in depth, forms a salmon leap generally esteemed the most remarkable in Wales. The salmon, in its course up the river, meeting with the fall, coils itself into a circle, and by a sudden distension springs up the precipice, and cleaves the torrent with astonishing vigour; [94] yet it is frequently baffled, and greatly amuses the spectator with its repeated attempts to overleap the cataract. We were not entertained with this display of strength and agility on our visit, but were much interested by the curious means employed in catching the fish. The fisherman is seated in a sort of canoe, called a coracle, formed of open basket-work of thin laths, covered with a horse’s hide, or a well-pitched piece of sail-cloth: the vessel is of a figure nearly oval, about four feet and a half long and three wide, yet so light as to be carried with ease on the man’s shoulder from his home to the river: in this he whirls among the eddies of the river; with a paddle in one hand, he alters or accelerates his course with surprizing dexterity; while with the other he manages the net, the line being held between his teeth. In this way the fishing in most of the rivers of Wales is pursued. Coracles have been peculiar to British rivers from time immemorial. Lucan very clearly describes them; and in latter times, Sir Walter Raleigh relates, that “the Britons had boats made of willow twigs covered on the outside with hides.”
Near the water-fall is a manufacture of iron and tinned plates, belonging to Sir Benjamin Hammet. Two or three miles higher up the river is Newcastle, a small irregular town situated upon its banks, and graced with the venerable ruins of a castle, but of no great antiquity. Thence a road of twenty miles extends through a dreary uninteresting country to Caermarthen.
A more romantic and sequestered path than is traced beside “the hollow stream that roars between the hills” from Lechryd bridge to Llangoedmor on the north margin of the river, can scarcely be imagined; continuing upwards of two miles, beneath the umbrage of its high and well-wooded banks, and commanding delightful landscapes of the sombre kind at every turn. In the parish of Llangoedmor, we learned, there were several monuments of the druidical ages: one is a remarkably large cromlech; the flat stone being eight or nine yards in circumference, with one edge resting on the ground: there is a smaller monument of the same kind near it; also a circle of rude stones about twelve yards round; and five beds of loose stones, each about six feet over. Llechly gowress (the stone of a giantess) in the parish of Neuodh, also near Cardigan, is another very large cromlech; and near it is a parcel of large hewn stones nineteen in number; which, it is said by the vulgar, cannot be counted.
