In the battle which followed, and which was fought on the 25th of October, 1415, the King alighted from his horse to head his footmen, and to encourage them to resist the charge of the second line of the French army, then advancing; when eighteen French cavaliers, who had bound themselves by an oath to kill King Henry, or perish, rushed upon him in a body, and one of them with a blow of his battle-axe so stunned the King that he would have fallen an easy victim, had not Sir David Gam, with his son-in-law, Roger Vaughn, and his kinsman, Walter Llwyd, of Brecknock, seasonably sprung to his rescue. They slew fourteen of the assailants, and delivered the King, when they fell at his feet, covered with wounds. In the heat of the battle, Henry was separated from his brave defenders; but being soon afterwards informed that their wounds were mortal, he immediately repaired to the spot where Sir David and his faithful companions lay; and, as the only recompense in his power then to bestow, he knighted them all three upon the field, where they soon after died. {176} Thus ended the life of Sir David Gam; but the remembrance of his loyalty, and the fame of his valour, will live, and perpetuate his memory. “So sleep the brave, who sink to rest, By all their country’s wishes bless’d. When Spring, with dewy fingers cold, Returns to deck their hallow’d mould, She there shall dress a sweeter sod Than Fancy’s feet have ever trod. By fairy hands their knell is rung, By forms unseen their dirge is sung. There Honour comes, a pilgrim grey, To bless the turf that wraps their clay; And Freedom shall awhile repair, To dwell a weeping hermit there.” It is conjectured that Shakspeare took Sir David as a specimen, when he wrote the character of Captain Fluellen, in Henry V. Returning towards Llangollen from Glyndyfrdwy, along a beautiful level road, made at the expense of Government, with the Berwyn Mountains rising abruptly on the right hand, and the murmuring Dee pursuing its devious course on the left, I pass a small brook, which divides the counties of Merioneth and Denbigh. A pillar on the top of the mountain above is for the same purpose. The views over the Dee are incomparably charming. LLANGOLLEN Church. “Hail, ancient edifice; thine aisle along, In contemplation wrapt, now let me stray; And stealing from the idly busy throng, Devoutly meditate the moral lay.” LLANGOLLEN Church, which stands in the middle of the town, is a low gothic structure; and the south side appears the most ancient part of the edifice. At the east end, on the outside wall, are two knees, which seem to have been intended as the spring of an arch, for an enlargement of the building. The roof is slated, and there is a tower steeple at the west end, containing four bells and a clock, with quarter chimes.