THE most striking characteristic of the Wales of to-day is its unity—self-conscious and self-reliant. The presence of this unity is felt by all, though it may be explained in different ways. It cannot be explained by race; for the population of the west midlands and the north of England, possibly of the whole of it, have been made up of the same elements. It cannot be explained by language—nearly one half of the Welsh people speak no Welsh. Some attribute it to the inexorable laws of geography and climate, others to the fatalism of history. Others frivolously put it down to modern football. But no one who knows Wales is ignorant of it. The modern unity of the Welsh people—seen occasionally in a function of the University, or at a national Eisteddvod, or in a conference of the County Councils—has become a fact in spite of many difficulties. One difficulty has been the absence of a capital. The office of the University and the National Museum are at Cardiff, in the extreme south; the National Library is at Aberystwyth, on the western sea. The thriving industries, the densely populated districts, and the frequent and active railways, are in the extreme south or in the extreme north; and they are separated by five or six shires of pastures and sheep-runs, without large towns, and with comparatively few railways. In the three southern counties—Glamorgan, Monmouth, and Carmarthen—the population is between two and six people to 10 acres, and the industrial population is from twelve to three times the number of the agricultural. In the central counties—Brecon, Radnor, Cardigan, Merioneth, Montgomery—the population is below one for 10 acres; the industrial and agricultural population are about equal, except in Radnor, where the agricultural is more than two to one. Though Merioneth has more sheep even than Brecon—and each of them has nearly 400,000—its industrial population, owing to the slate districts, is double the agricultural. The population begins to thicken again as we get nearer the slate, limestone, and coal districts. In Denbigh it is two to the 10 acres, in Carnarvon it is three, and in Flint it rises to four or five. In these northern counties the industrial population is double or treble the agricultural. The fertile western counties of Pembroke and Anglesey come between the industrial and grazing counties in density of population. {4}