Place names—Bell ringing for lost travellers—A Robber's Grave and its story—Wild Wales—A picturesque interior—The fascination of the moors—Machynlleth—A Royal and ancient house—Ten miles of beauty—Aberdovey—Tramps and their ways—The poetical tramp.

Out of Craven Arms I took the fine old coach road that leads to Shrewsbury, intent on seeing Church Stretton on the way, for I had heard much in praise of the scenery round about that quiet little Shropshire town. From my map I gathered that the road for some miles went between high hills, and so promised me a pleasant drive, for I am a lover of hills.

Of the ten miles or so on to Church Stretton one spot alone now comes back distinctly to my memory, a spot where I was sadly tempted to desert the broad highway for a tempting lane that led westward into a mystery of moorlands. I had some difficulty in resisting the temptation, but I desired to see Church Stretton. For once I had a definite destination before me, yet I almost wished I had not, for it robbed me of my freedom.

First we came to Little Stretton, where we had for company the ancient Roman Watling Street with its parvenu follower, the railway. I wonder will the railway endure as long as the Roman road has done! Soon afterwards we found ourselves in Church Stretton, with the green hills rising grandly around and forming a pleasant background to the straggling, old-fashioned town built along the sides of the highway; hence, possibly, its name is derived from Street Town, but this is mere guessing, and in guessing you sometimes go sadly wrong, as I found out once when I deemed I was certainly right. In Sussex there are two villages not very far apart—one is called Friston, the other Alfriston. Now I jumped to the conclusion that Alfriston meant Old Friston, to distinguish it from the younger village; but a learned antiquary would have none of my guessing, he declaring that Alfriston stood for Alfric's tun or town, it having been given by the king to one Alfric, lord of the manor, who gave the place his name.

At Church Stretton we tarried a time, but I am not going to describe the familiar; the guide-book writers have written fully of the place. I do not desire to enter into a needless competition with them. Merely will I say that those who love hill rambles and scrambles will not be disappointed with the country round about Church Stretton, for it is a pedestrian's paradise. The churchyard there contains one or more curious epitaphs; that to Ann Cook, who died in 1814, runs:

On a Thursday she was born,
On a Thursday made a bride,
On a Thursday broke her leg,
And on a Thursday died.

In old times I was told the church bell was rung on foggy days and nights, as a guide to the town for travellers who might be lost on the hills around; now they are not so thoughtful for the fate of befogged wayfarers. Not that I think that the ringing of a bell is really of much guidance under such circumstances, for once I lost myself on the South Downs in as dense a fog as well could be, and though I heard some church bells in the distance faintly ringing, I could not make out with any certainty from what direction the sound of the bells came; in truth they rather confused than helped me.

On to Shrewsbury a change gradually came over the scenery; we left the hills behind and entered into a pleasantly undulating, pastoral country. We dallied not in Shrewsbury, but drove straight through that ancient and interesting town, for who that professes to know his own country knows not Shrewsbury by the winding Severn side? My object was not to revisit places I knew full well, however attractive these places might be; I was in search of the fresh and the unfamiliar.

Being at Shrewsbury, after a glance at my map I suddenly made up my mind to strike from there right through the heart of Central Wales to Aberdovey and the sea, steering, roughly, a westerly course as the roads permitted. A longing to get a glimpse of wild Wales had taken possession of me, to refresh my eyes by a sight of its tumbling rivers, foaming falls, lone mountains, and heathery boulder-strewn moors. Then this portion of Wales being out of the general tourist beat, I looked forward to seeing it in its native simplicity. I would I could have seen North Wales in the days of David Cox before the railway and the cheap tripper had invaded and vulgarised it, the days when Bettws-y-Coed was a poor and primitive village, before the "Royal Oak" there—then the haunt of tweed-clad artists and cheery anglers—was converted from a homely little inn into a flourishing hotel where noisy tourists mostly congregate. I am afraid I am a selfish man, for, amongst the mountains, the only company I crave is the landscape painter, the honest angler, and the weather-beaten shepherd; these are in unobtrusive harmony with their surroundings, and claim their part in it from ancient right.

Crossing the Welsh Bridge at Shrewsbury, we followed, for some long way, a winding road through a country given over to farming; a country of fields, hedgerows, and growing crops, of sleepy hamlets and stray farmsteads; idyllic but unexciting. Still, there were peeps of hills and the promise of wilder things in the vague beyond to which we were bound. No amount of disappointment robs the beyond of its glamour, for the unknown unfailingly attracts, the disenchantment of to-day may be followed by the surprise of to-morrow. Yet distance is but a gay deceiver; where we may be at any moment, is not that the delectable distance to others far away? "The delusion that distance creates contiguity destroys."

We kept steering a westerly course to the best of our ability, and on the whole we succeeded in doing so fairly well, trusting to arrive somehow and at some time at Aberdovey. Who has not heard of the sweet bells of Aberdovey?—I know not whether they ring sweetly still, for no bells rang for us when we were there. For many miles the scenery, though pleasant enough, was devoid of special character, but as we progressed the country grew wilder and the villages lost their indefinable English look; we had not arrived in Wales, but we were nearing the borderland. Long Mountain rose grandly to our right, clear cut as a Grecian statue against the sky, and to our left the curiously-shaped range of hills known as the Stipperstones stood prominently forth, their summits broken by huge rugged rocks, "the fragments of an earlier world," that stand boldly forth from them. According to a local legend, at times on stormy nights "Wild Edric," an ancient warrior chief, may be seen riding in the air above the Stipperstones, and when he is seen it forebodes some calamity. Give me the West Country for legends! I have heard of ghostly huntsmen with their yeth-hounds being seen there; of ghostly highwaymen; of headless horsemen who pursue lone travellers at night on lonely roads; of the ghosts of men and horses who once a year, on the anniversary of the battle of Sedgemoor, may be heard a-galloping away from that fatal field; and of the Devil himself riding across country, whose horse once cast a shoe, when the Devil called at a blacksmith's to have it re-shod, and how the blacksmith declared he caught a glimpse of his Satanic majesty's cloven foot beneath his cloak—and this within the memory of living man!

Most singular is the formation of the Stipperstones. Of course there are sundry legends to account for these gigantic rocks that strew the crests of the hills, as though some cyclopean city had been ruined there, and the Devil plays a prominent part in all. How busy the Devil appears to have been in England during the old days! I call to mind the Devil's Leap, the Devil's Dyke, the Devil's Bridge, the Devil's Punch Bowl, the Devil's Stone, the Devil's Den, the Devil's Frying-pan, and many another spot named after him. The one sin of idleness cannot be placed at his door. Then as we drove on Marton Mere, church, and village made a pleasant diversion, and shortly afterwards the tiny old town of Montgomery came into view, climbing the steep hillside, with its ruined castle above, and tumble of hills beyond. From this point Montgomery presents such a picture as Turner loved to paint—a prominent castle, grey and old, a sleepy little town below, with dreamy hills beyond, and a winding road leading the eye towards them.

When last I was at Montgomery—let me see, that was over twenty long years ago. Alas, how time flies! Still, however I may have changed, the old town looks to me just as it did then; it is one of those delightful, remote places that never seem to change, let the outer world wag as it will—Well, twenty years or so ago the clerk (may he be alive and as well as I!) showed me the Robber's Grave in a quiet corner of the churchyard there, a grave on which no grass will grow, in proof of which the grave was pointed out to me, a bare spot roughly in the shape of a coffin, when all around was freshly green. Whether the grave be still bare I know not, for my present road did not lead me into the town; I almost wish now I had gone the short distance out of my way to reinspect the spot. This is the story I noted down at the time of the Robber's Grave as told to me by the said clerk, only retold in brief. A certain John Newton, a long while ago, was accused of highway robbery, convicted and sentenced to be hanged, such an offence being then punished by death. On the scaffold Newton loudly proclaimed his innocence, exclaiming, "I have prayed God in proof of my innocence that no grass may grow on my grave." I forget now how many years the clerk told me he had been clerk there, but they were many, during which period he had carefully watched the grave, but not a blade of grass would grow upon it. Fresh sods had been laid there, but they withered away even in one night; the earth was dug up and grass seeds sown, but they would not come up, so the grave remained bare and brown. "I've been clerk here for all those long years," said he, "and I'm only telling you the truth." I cannot say why, but that clerk reminded me of another of the fraternity who exclaimed to a certain Dean he had shown over his church, "I've been clerk here for now over forty years and never missed a service, and, thank God, I'm still a Christian"!

So small a town is Montgomery, though the capital of the shire, that a man, it is said, who once tramped there in search of work, inquired in the town how far it was to Montgomery, for he thought he was merely passing through a village on the way to that place.

Now our road wound round the side of a wooded hill, from which there was a fine view of the country; and in this wood I sought shelter from the sultry sun and rested there awhile for refreshment, when the birds began to sing for my special entertainment, for there was no one else for them to sing to, and the "Wind, that grand old harper," struck his harp of pines by my side and played a soft accompaniment. Reclining at ease on a mossy bank I smoked a fragrant pipe, well pleased with my wayside hostelry, my comfortable couch, and the music provided with my meal. "The outer world, from which we cower into our houses, seems after all a gentle habitable place," says Stevenson. Only at night in the summer time do I desire to "cower" into a house, and that for the convenience of it; indeed the only room I can suffer on a summer day is a library walled round with a goodly company of books, and with just a picture here and there of a pleasant landscape for my eyes, when in a lazy mood, to rest upon. On winter days, when the wild Nor'-easter blows and the rain and hail descend, I grant it is good to be indoors; then give me a seat in a good old-fashioned ingle-nook with a blazing wood fire upon the wide hearth before me, the sweet incense of it reminiscent of the forest. As Richard Jefferies says, "The wood gives out as it burns the sweetness it has imbibed through its leaves from the atmosphere which floats above grass and flowers."

Once more on the road we dropped down into a valley and soon came to the Severn again, here in its youth lashing and frolicking along—how good it is to be young and gay! So we followed the rejoicing river up to Newton, where I took the precaution of filling my petrol tank before making my dash across wild Wales. The man who sold me the petrol asked me where I was going—this, as he politely explained, in case he might give me any information as to the route. Such is the friendliness of the road. When I told him where I was bound, he exclaimed, "You've got a lovely drive before you, through the most beautiful scenery." I was glad to hear this, though I expected much of the country, and I was pleased to find that the vendor of petrol had a thought for the scenic charms around. He was not a mere vendor of petrol, though he courteously supplied it to a needful world.

Soon after leaving Newton we entered upon a pleasant valley, as pleasant a valley indeed as shapely hills, shady woods, and a sparkling river running through it could make a valley; an uncommercial clear-running river, for it turned no mill by its banks as far as I could see. Its only concern was to be beautiful, and after all that is no small concern. Clouds appear as devoted to the hills as a lover to his lass, and here we found the clouds prevailing over the blue sky, shadowing for a time the hills; then as the clouds passed over them, and a gleam of sunshine came, the hillsides would stand forth all in glowing colour, purple where the heather grew, glowing with gold where the gorse was in bloom, a yellow green on their grassy slopes, and a gleaming grey where the wet rocks showed. For the rich and varied colour of its landscapes I know no country to compare with Wales, though it has its dull days, of course, like most other lands.

So we drove on in contemplative enjoyment, and then we came to Carno, a tiny hamlet pleasantly placed on a crag above the voiceful river that would be heard as well as seen. I wish all Welsh villages had such easily spelt and such pronounceable names as Carno; for many a day and many a time, when I have been on the road in Wales, have I been unable to ask my way because I could not pronounce the names of places so that a Welshman could understand me. What can you make of a gathering of consonants, with only a stray vowel here and there amongst the lot? At Carno I espied a homely little inn, the "Aleppo Merchant," to wit, though what possible connection there could be between an Eastern merchant and this remote and tiny village I could not fathom. There I pulled up and called for a glass of ale as an excuse to take a glance at the interior of the old house in case it were answerable to its exterior, for some of these Welsh houses within are most picturesque; nor was I disappointed. There I caught sight of a low, brown-beamed, ceilinged room—I think it was the kitchen, for there was a fire in it though the day was warm, and above the fireplace, arranged in orderly array, were sundry old brass utensils, so brightly polished as to glow like gold; and mingled with these were some pewter pots that shone like silver, and how pleasant they were to look upon. For decorative effect there is nothing like blue and white china, and polished brass and pewter, and they are all as much at home in a mansion as in a cottage. Hanging from the beams I saw a goodly display of hams, no less than thirty-four in all, for I carefully counted them out of curiosity. "Home-cured," the maid who served me with my ale declared. I thought I would buy one, for home-cured hams are not easy to come by nowadays, and such a ham is a delicacy to be enjoyed. But they were not for sale; not even one of them would they spare me, though I did not haggle about the price. "We want them all for ourselves," explained the maid, and with that she went away to serve another customer. I thought to myself these Welsh country people do not fare so badly.

Some way beyond Carno we began to climb out of the valley and reached a wide moorland, encircled by misty mountains. A moorland waste enlivened only by the dreary gleams of peaty pools, but how buoyant and bracing were the breezes that blew over it! The air was inspiriting if the scene was not. From the moorland we descended steeply to the Tal valley with its tumbling river by our side making wild music as it dashed on its downward way. We were

Amongst a multitude of hills,
Crags, woodlands, waterfalls, and rills.

That describes our road in two short but sufficient lines, and what need is there of more? At Cemmaes we found ourselves in the wider valley of the Dovey; then we rose again to another moorland high above it, with far-reaching prospects over the river to a confusion of bare hill-tops rising above the deep woods below. The Dovey is a river much favoured by fishermen, as our eyes bore witness, but one irate angler I afterwards met, who had fished it without success, declared to me that there were more fishermen on its banks than fish in the stream. Possibly he was prejudiced; possibly the river is much poached, for the Welshman is a born poacher, though, being religiously minded, I am told he considers it a sin to poach on Sundays.

I did not reach Aberdovey that night, for as I drove into Machynlleth, a town of unpronounceable name to me, the rain came down, and finding a good inn there I proceeded no farther, though Aberdovey was but ten miles on, but it was late and at Machynlleth I was certain of my quarters. Aberdovey could wait. There were two fishermen in the porch of my inn when I arrived; they had just returned from the river with empty creels. "It will be a good day to-morrow for fishing after the rain," one of them consolingly exclaimed. What virtue there lies in to-morrow and in the promise of it!

In the smoke-room that evening I discovered a man poring, and apparently puzzling, over some maps and guide-books, so I ventured to ask if I could be of any assistance. I learnt from him that he was a courier and was travelling in a motor-car with a lady and her daughter from the States, and that he was planning their route for the morrow; but what truly astonished me was his statement that his party had come over to England solely to see the moors and the mountains, and that he was instructed to avoid all large towns as far as possible. It certainly struck me as passing strange that any American should come to England in search of wildness to the avoidance of old-world places. "We've had a rough journey of it," the courier exclaimed. "We landed at Southampton, made straight for Dartmoor, then we did Exmoor, now we're doing the Welsh mountains in the most deserted districts, next we're off to do the Yorkshire moors, then we're going the round of Scotland. We've had awful roads, and the chauffeur does not much fancy the job. No more do I, for that matter, but when a woman with money has got a whim in her head, she's bound to carry it out. It's the funniest journey I've ever undertaken."

The rain was dashing against the window-panes. "What a day we shall have to-morrow over the mountains," said the courier; "whatever the weather, off we go; I've got to see the thing through, and to be at Liverpool at a certain date to catch the steamer." I found some entertainment in the conversation, and though I am prepared for surprises on the road, I was hardly prepared for such a surprise as this—an American to come to England in search of wildness. But one may travel till one ceases to wonder at anything. Now when I come to think of it, I do remember some years ago meeting at Warwick two American ladies who were on a driving tour, and who told me what impressed them most in the Old Country was "the weird wildness of the moors where the world seemed as though it had only just been created; we thought to see nothing but meadows and cultivated fields," continued they, "and we've found solitudes." So did John Burroughs, by the way, during his English wanderings. Now that the motor-car has been invented you meet American travellers on motor-cars in the most out-of-the-way and unexpected places, and they appear to delight in them and in their discovery. Columbus discovered America; now the Americans have set about the discovery of rural England. Soon there will be nothing left in the world to discover.

Then one of the fishermen came in, but he never broached the subject of fishing; he appeared to take more interest in my tour than in his sport. I left the subject of conversation to him. He asked me where I had come from that day, and when I told him, I was interested to learn that he too was a well-seasoned road traveller who, like myself, knew his roads better than his Bradshaw, and that he considered the drive from Newton to Machynlleth one of the most beautiful in the kingdom, "because it is so changeful and so continuously pleasant." Truly it has no presiding peak, no particular waterfall, no old castle, no special coup d'oeil, no shrine for the tourist to worship at, nothing that you feel bound to admire whether in the humour or no, so you can quietly jog on your way without fatigue of mind or eye, without a thought of missing this or that you ought to see and friends expect you to see and perhaps praise. Where all is interesting there is no special assertive point of interest, and for one I prefer my scenic meal served thus. I certainly can commend that drive, and during the whole length of it I met no other car, so I imagine it is not a much-travelled road, unless it were the chance of circumstance that no motorists were in evidence then. It is an easy road, too, with only one really steep hill on all the way from Newton to Aberdovey.

Machynlleth is a cheerful town, which all Welsh towns are not; its wide main street is lined with trees, and what adds to the pleasantness of the place is its fortunate position in the sheltered Dovey valley from which rise wooded hills around; after Conway I think it is the cleanest and pleasantest town in Wales. Though it possesses no castle to centre its interest, or church of note, still it boasts of some old buildings that have the charm of character. One very ancient and historic building is the "Royal House," though its plastered front effectually disguises its ancientness, nor is there anything about it to suggest its past importance, but there it was in 1402 that Owen Glyndwr was crowned King of Wales, and there he held his Parliament, and within its walls his life was attempted by one David Gam. In this very house, too, Charles I. slept a night on his way to Chester. I was informed that the walls of the building were in parts of Roman masonry, so old is it, but as the walls are plastered over I had to take this statement on faith. Still it is within the bounds of probability, for the Romans had a fortified station at Machynlleth "to keep the troublesome mountaineers in order."

There is also another house, with some fine carving within, known as the "Mayor's House," on which the inhabitants set much store, though I saw little in it; it is a mildly picturesque structure of half-timber, with two large dormer-windows above, a building that strikes an odd note in a land of stone. On the front of it boldly carved in oak is the following enlightening inscription—

1628. I. OWEN. PVQHIOVXOR.

That is all of interest the town has to show, as far as I could discover or hear about; the scenery around is its chief attraction. Finding my quarters and the company at my inn to my liking, I determined to stay there over the next day, just putting through the spare time by driving to Aberdovey and back, by way of a partial rest from continuous travelling.

The beauty of the road from Machynlleth to Aberdovey was a surprise to me; the drive was infinitely more rewarding than the object of the drive. First we crossed the Dovey by a fine stone bridge (would that the Welshmen built their chapels as beautifully!) at a spot where the river chattered and danced over its pebbly shallows, and where its quiet pools were green with the reflection of the shady woods by its sides. For the rest of the way our road with many a bend wound about the base of the wooded hills, with the river brightly gliding on the other hand; now our road rounded a projecting crag, now it dipped down to rise again, following faithfully the natural bent of the land; it could not well do otherwise, unless it blasted its way through rocks and tunnelled under the hills. Had it been carefully engineered it would not have been half as pleasant; its very waywardness was the charm of it. Each bend of the road revealed some fresh combination of wood and hill, of rock and river, and the last bend of it the sea cheerfully gleaming in the sunshine. Beneath the woods and on the banks by the wayside the waving bracken flourished, forming a soft background to the many wild-flowers growing there, amongst which the stately foxglove, "chieftain of the wayside flowers," showed prominently. Approaching Aberdovey we had a fine view over the wide estuary of the Dovey, that almost looked like a lake with its background of hills. A signpost pointing "To the Roman Road" brought to mind the times remote when even the wild Welshman in these far-off mountain fastnesses felt the strong and extended arm of the Roman power. Then we came to the open sea, smooth and smiling as though there were never any hurt in it; it lapped the rocky shore in a friendly fashion without hardly a splash or a sound, a plaything fit for a child, as though it never longed for the wind, or the wreck of a ship, or took toll of the lives of men.

Aberdovey neither pleased nor disappointed me. I knew it was a watering-place, so I found what I expected: a row of ordinary houses, having apartments to let, facing the sea; a watering-place saved from being wholly uninteresting by a little jetty jutting out into the water, where at the time of our coming two coasting schooners lay alongside discharging their cargoes, a few shoremen looking languidly on. There is always a certain charm about ships of the old-fashioned sort, a suggestion of adventure; and what finer sight can there be than a ship in full sail on the sea? A sight that, alas, is a rare one to-day! How monotonous is the long, level line of the sea's horizon without a ship in sail on it; for a steamer is dark and is not the same thing to the eye as a sailer. One point about Aberdovey is that the distant Welsh mountains in part break this horizon line pleasantly.

I was glad to get back to Machynlleth, for it made no pretence of being anything but a quiet little country town at which the traveller might take his ease. I spent the evening seated in the porch of "mine inn" a-chatting with "mine host," having also an eye to the people on the road, and so to the life and the humours of the place. With the help of the landlord to tell me who was who, as far as he knew, and what part each one played on the town's stage, I was entertained enough. I think amongst the loiterers, if I had been a novelist, I could have picked out a character or two of service. Plots may get exhausted, but characters seem inexhaustible. Amongst the numbers of passers-by I noticed a poor specimen of humanity in the shape of a footweary tramp; and though I have so often been taken in by tramps, yet he looked so pitiful an object that I had a mind to take compassion on him to the extent of a whole sixpence; for how could I sit there, who had dined and was even indulging in the infrequent luxury of a cigar, and behold a fellow-mortal go by in need and not hold forth a helping hand? The landlord, too, had noticed him. "Look at that man," exclaimed he. "I know him well. He's on one of his yearly tramps. Always comes to Machynlleth regularly. Never did a day's work in his life. As lazy a good-for-nothing fellow as ever trod the road." I presumed the landlord knew, so hardening my heart I kept my sixpence in my pocket.

One might scarcely think it of so unprepossessing a person, but I have found the tramp to be occasionally an amusing individual, that is, when I have got him alone on the road and obtained his confidence—to accomplish which needs considerable diplomacy, a professed sympathy with his lot, and a certain expenditure of coin of the realm to prove such sympathy; then, when in a confidential mood, my tramp has more than once given me an insight into the sort of life he leads, and has even gloried in his mendacity, and has recorded with much self-satisfaction the way he manages to live and find shelter without doing a stroke of work. Such a one, as far as I can gather, would tramp the country even though weary and wet through at times, live on anything, rather than work. How is a man like that to be dealt with? He takes no pride in himself or anything; he has not even a character to lose. "It's a pretty poor life at times, I own," said one of the tribe to me; "but it's the only life worth living, it's so gloriously free. Take one day with another, it's not such a bad life after all in fine weather, and I always has my pipe and bit of 'baccy with me by way of company. I never got any pleasure out of life till I took to the road. Well, sometimes it's a bit lonely, but I can generally manage to pick up a companion on the way. We are a friendly lot, we tramps be," and so on.

Whether it is their lonely life or otherwise I cannot say, but it seems that some tramps are addicted to composing poetry. Here, for example, is a trifle, expressing his sentiments, that a certain tramp left behind him scribbled on a casual ward (at Newark I think it was):—

The sailor loves his good old ship,
The soldier loves his camp;

But give to me the good old road,
To live and die a tramp.

Some year or two back the Chief Constable of Berkshire, according to my morning paper, when discussing the subject of vagrancy before a meeting of the Charity Organisation Society, quoted the following verses written by a prisoner on the wall of his cell, as illustrating the predilection of tramps even for prison rather than work:—

I cannot take my walks abroad,
I'm under lock and key,

And much the public I applaud
For all their care of me.

The lowest pauper in the street
Half naked I behold,

Whilst I am clad from head to feet
And covered from the cold.

Thousands there are who scarce can tell
Where they may lay their head,

But I've a warm and well-aired cell,
A bath, good books, and bed.

Whilst they are fed on workhouse fare
And grudged their scanty food,

Three times a day my meals I get,
Sufficient, wholesome, good.

Then to the British public "Health,"
Who all our care relieves;

And when they treat us as they do,
They'll never want for thieves.