The route down the valley to the town of Neath and the port of Briton Ferry, is rich in varied beauty. The river runs between the high road and the railway, with, in some part of its course, a canal. The surrounding hills are lovely in outline and richly wooded; and until we reach the seats of industry near the port, the water, lying in long reaches, or hurrying over its rocky bed, is crystal-clear. At a former time Briton Ferry was lovely beyond almost any other seaside resort. The river, here expanded to a noble breadth, flowed between lofty wooded cliffs to an open bay. The surrounding hills were crowned with noble oaks, and the romantic little village, protected from the north and east, had all the attractions not only of its own exceeding beauty, but of a mild climate, and of air exceptionally pure. All this is changed! [Illustration: 0220] Coal, copper, iron dominate the scene. The cliffs and the climate are there, and Swansea Bay is beautiful in calm or storm: but the oaks have fallen, the nooks and elens in the hills have become squalid in their bareness, the streams are polluted, the air is murky; but the docks are admirable, and the place is "rising rapidly." There is a divineness in man's industry, as well as in nature's beauty. "The old order yieldeth, giving place to new, And God fulfils Himself in many ways." We hurry away from the coalfields to where Carmarthen stands high on Towy bank, grandly overlooking the course of the river to the sea. Of the bay named from this ancient capital, the most beautiful part, perhaps, is where Tenby, from its rocky promontory, overlooks the sea. As we terminated our little tour in North Wales at Llandudno, so here at Tenby we bade farewell to the southern part of the Principality. But before leaving there was time for one little excursion along the coast, superb beyond all our expectation, especially for the first few miles, where the mountain limestone fronts the sea with bold, cave-pierced cliff. Our ramble terminated at Manor-beer Castle, one of the most extensive and complete of feudal fortresses in Great Britain. Perhaps there is no ruin of the kind in which the arrangements for residence as well as for defence can be so clearly traced, and certainly there are few which more nobly command the shore below.