[Illustration: PISTYLL-Y-CAIN, DOLGELLEY] Religion is an integral part of the life of the Welshman. There is hardly any of that indifference to it which everywhere prevails in England. With us, in a country place, one quarter of the population goes to church, another quarter to chapel, and a half goes nowhere. That half may live, and does live, a respectable, but it is a godless life. That is not the case in Wales. There two-thirds of its population go to the chapels, one-third to church, and an infinitesimal proportion holds aloof from either. Religion enfolds the Welsh man and woman from infancy. It does much to develop in him the faculty of self-government; it moulds his opinions from the earliest age. But the form of religion he has adopted has its disadvantages. It narrows his view, it cuts him off from much that is wholesome and harmless, and limits his world to his sect. The theatre is taboo. I was in a little town of some 1,200 inhabitants, to which came a strolling company of players, with a programme of perfectly wholesome and, indeed, edifying pieces. It expected to reap a harvest of sixpences and shillings, and announced performances for four consecutive evenings. But no sooner were the placards up than in all the seven chapels the ministers denounced “the play” as a snare of the devil, and warned their congregations to eschew it as a step to damnation. One told an anecdote. A young man with whom he was acquainted went to the theatre, resolved to see a play; but, raising his eyes, he saw written up, “This way to the pit.” Then, conscience-stricken, he withdrew. “But,” said the preacher, “every way--gallery, and stall, and box--lead alike to the bottomless pit.” The result was that no Dissenters went, no Churchmen either, lest they should offend their “weaker brethren” of the chapel, and the poor players departed not having pocketed enough to pay their expenses for a single night. The Welsh are, however, a people with the dramatic instinct in them, as is the case with all high-strung, sensitive races. In former times they had their “Interludes,” just as the Cornish had their Miracle and secular plays. In Cornwall there exist still the “Rounds”--great amphitheatres of artificial construction, in which plays were wont to be performed in the open air to crowds of spectators. The Wesleyan Revival killed these plays, and the Rounds are now only employed for great preaching bouts.