On we went on the top of the tide, rounding promontories, and gliding among bosky bowers and wooded dells, till at last our panting conveyer panted no more, and we lay alongside the pier of Chepstow. The tide at this place rises to the incredible height of fifty, and sometimes, on great occasions, of seventy feet; so they have a floating sort of foot-bridge from the vessel to the shore, that sinks and rises with the flood, connected with the land by elongating iron chains, and illustrating the ups and downs of life in a very remarkable manner. I will not attempt to describe Chepstow on the present occasion, for a stay in it did not enter into our plan. The Three Cocks grew in interest the nearer we got to their interesting abode. We determined to hurry forward to Abergavenny--thence to send a missive of enquiry as to the accommodations of the hostel--to go on at once, if we could be received--and (leaving all the lumber, including the maids and the younger children) to make a series of voyages of discovery, that would entitle us to become members of the Travellers' Club. A coach was on the strand ready to start for Monmouth; a whisper and half-a-crown secured the whole of the inside and two seats out, against all concurrents; and the Wye, the boat, the knot-tying passengers, were all left behind, and we began to climb the hill as fast as two miserable-looking horses could crawl. A leader was added when we had got a little way up; but as they neglected to furnish our coachman with a whip long enough to reach beyond his wheeler's ears, our unicorn pursued the even tenor of his way with very slackened traces, while our friend sat the picture of indignation, with his short _flagellum_ in his hand, and implored all the male population who overtook us, to favour him by kicking the unhappy leader to death. An occasional benevolent Christian complied with his request to the extent of a dig with a stout boot under the rib; but every now and then, the furibund jarvey apologised to us for the slowness of our course by asking--"Won't I serve him out when I gets a whip!" A whip he at last got, and made up for lost time by belabouring the lazy culprit in a very scientific manner; and having got us all into a gallop, he became quite pleasant and communicative. All the people in Monmouthshire are Welsh, that is very clear; and Monmouthshire is as Welsh a county as Carnarvon, in spite of the maps of geographers, and the circuits of the Judges. The very faces of the people are evidence of their Taffy-hood. We have had no experience yet if they carry out the peculiar ideas on the rights of property, attributed to Taffy in the ancient legend, which relates the method that gentleman took to supply himself with a leg of beef and a marrow bone; but their voices and names are redolent of leeks, and no Act of Parliament can ever make them English. You might as well pass an Act of Parliament to make our friend Joseph Hume's speeches English. And