The Holyhead Road: The Mail-coach Road to Dublin. Vol. 2Harper, Charles G. (Charles George)
History
The Holyhead Road: The Mail-coach Road to Dublin. Vol. 2
Harper, Charles G. (Charles George)
A5 Road (England and Wales); England -- Description and travel; England -- Social life and customs
The chief monument in the churchyard (ornament it is not) is the
triangular pillar to those fantastical old frumps, the Ladies of
Llangollen, and their servant. On it you may read of the “Amiable
Condescension” of the one, the friendship of the other, and the faithful
service of the servant. “It is believed,” continues the epitaph, “they
are now enjoying their Eternal Reward.” Let us hope so—but what may be
the most appropriate reward in the hereafter for collecting old oak and
entertaining society travellers along the Holyhead Road to tea and
small-talk, it is not easy to imagine. Let us hope the Bricklayers,
Cabinet-makers, Blacksmiths, and Bakers who lie around, with their
trades all duly specified on their tombstones, also have _their_ reward
for well and truly bricklaying, cabinet-making, blacksmithing, and
baking.
That Llangollen is not only geographically but socially in Wales is very
evident, in the churchyard, in the names over the shops, and in the talk
of the streets. Griffiths, Jones, Williams, Roberts, and Evans have it
all their own way, and are repeated over and over again, recalling the
humorous story of how the Welsh originally got their names. Llewelyn—was
it?—had spent a long time in naming the clans, and at last, growing
weary of the work, said: “Let all the rest be called Jones!”
As for the talk, the bridge over the Dee is the place to hear Welsh.
That favourite lounging-place becomes on market-days as noisy as a
parrot-house with the excited talk of Welshmen black-haired and Welshmen
red. Who can shout like a Welshman, and who but a Taffy or Frenchman
works himself up into such gesticulating rages on such trivial
occasions? Feather-headed pride, conceit, insincerity, treachery, fickle
enthusiasms, religiosity, falsehood, and superstition, have always
characterised the Welsh in the pages of history; but the modern Welshman
is not superstitious, and has no faith in the wild legends of his own
land, nor belief in the _diablerie_ that was part of his grandparents’
creed. He regularly attends the services of his hideous
Calvinist-Methodist Chapel, and is as completely, religiously and
politically, under the thumb of the Boanerges who ministers within as is
the Irish peasant beneath the sway of the Romish priest. The Welshman
clings fanatically to his nationality and his language, and is saturated
with matter-of-fact Radicalism; but although he does not believe in the
fairies, is careful not to speak ill of the little people, lest evil
come of it; and although so pious, is commonly a shameless and
resourceful liar. Untruthfulness has always been a characteristic of
Taffy, and judges have quite recently commented upon the prevalence of
perjury in Welsh courts of law.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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