Another story of the same musician is that he was returning home from a feast in the early morning, and daybreak overtook him as he sat on a stone--still pointed out at Portmadoc--and there, watching the soaring skylark, he composed the air “The Rising of the Lark.” The melody “Hoffedd merch Dafydd Manuel” (“The delight of David Manuel’s daughter”) is associated with a member of a very remarkable family. Dafydd Manuel was a poor cottager, born in Trefeglwys, Montgomeryshire, in or about 1625. He became a poet, and lived to a very advanced age, dying in 1726 at the age of a hundred and one. He left three children, two daughters--also excellent poets--and a son David. The elder daughter, Mary, noted for her wit and as a great harpist and singer, is she whose tune is called “The delight of David Manuel’s daughter.” Another member of the family, John, who fought in Egypt under Sir Ralph Abercromby, was thoroughly conversant in English, French, and Welsh. His daughter Sarah was quite illiterate till her thirtieth year, when she learned to read fluently and became well acquainted with the current literature of the day. Thomas Manuel, a sawyer, was illiterate till he grew to manhood, but accidentally becoming possessed of a French Testament, he resolved on mastering that language, which he did very quickly. His son William was a very remarkable boy, who at an early age--it is said at four, but this is hardly credible--could read English, Welsh, Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. At the age of eight he was placed in Christ’s Hospital, where he died of consumption on attaining his twelfth year. This extraordinary child had two brothers also possessed of great natural gifts. Thomas, the eldest, was an excellent Welsh, Latin, Greek, and English scholar. He also died of decline. Edward, the youngest, gave promise of even more extraordinary abilities than William. It is asserted that he could read English, Welsh, German, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew when only four years old, and he died of consumption at the age of five. Precocious geniuses are like candles that blaze away and gutter and are out quickly. The mother of these remarkable children, perceiving the thirst for learning evinced by them, taught herself to read and translate Latin and Greek, for the sake of helping them in their studies. Some of the Welsh hymn tunes are magnificent, and one cannot but desire that some had been taken into such popular collections as _Hymns Ancient and Modern_, in place of the utterly insipid trash which has found its place there. But some are quite impossible of transference, as “Crug-y-bar,” one of the very best. The Welsh accent so differs from that of English, that to render the words into English, or write others to suit the melody that are not nonsense, is almost impossible.