The Llugwy, more and more a mountain stream as we proceed, borders the road, on one side or the other, as far as Capel Curig. Half a mile beyond the Swallow Falls, it is crossed at Ty-Hyll bridge, and is thenceforward on the left-hand. The road still ascends, crosses a wild tract with an ancient fir-crowned tumulus, and comes steeply up to Pont-y-Cyfyng and the Cyfyng Falls, a pretty scene, among scrub oaks and silver birches, with one of Telford’s happily placed little alcoves, for the amateurs of the picturesque, built out from the breastwork protecting the road. [Illustration: CYFYNG FALLS.] Here the great road enters upon its wildest and most impressive stretches, but not without such compensations to the traveller as the pretty, artist-haunted inns of Tan-y-Bwlch afford. Another toll-gate—never, surely, was there a great highway to vie with this in the number of them—blocked the way until the close of 1890, and the old house remains. Just beyond it, and full in view of the trim peaks of Snowdon, of Moel Siabod, and their great cloud-capped brethren, is the little village, or rather hamlet, of Capel Curig, lying in the valley where roads go off left to the stormy pass of Llanberis and so on to Carnarvon; and on the right to Holyhead. Capel Curig was, like Bettws, never more than a chapelry in the wilds; but, unlike Bettws, it has not grown with modern times. One may seek the reason with success in the fact that no railway comes near it. A contributory reason is perhaps found in the nature of its surroundings. Grandeur of scenery, and purity of air do not compensate holiday-folks for the mists, the furious storms, and the frequent rains that haunt the spot. Visitors to Capel Curig have been known to drive into it through the rain, to stay as indoor prisoners to stress of weather for a week; departing without ever once having seen the mists disperse that cling so fondly about Snowdon, and veil his majesty from many eyes. A thunderstorm here is a terrific and appalling thing, with the encircling mountains acting as sounding-boards to the demoniacal peals of thunder that crash with ear-rending reverberations along the valleys. Fortunately for those who are unwilling witnesses of this elemental strife, Capel Curig possesses a very large and resourceful hotel, standing off the Holyhead Road, by the twin lakes in the valley. It was built about 1802 by the then Lord Penrhyn, one of the first to urge the improvement of the Holyhead Road and the adoption of this route, instead of the older and more circuitous one by Chester. He probably could not, with the best will in the world, have erected a plainer building. When Borrow, tramping eighteen miles on a hot and dusty day, came here, he found the fashionable company in the grand saloon surveying him with looks of the most supercilious disdain. They thought him some poor fellow, tramping from motives of economy. [Illustration: CAPEL CURIG.]