On Snowdon’s haughty brow I stood, And view’d, afar, old Mona’s flood;— Carnarvon Castle, Eagle-crown’d, And all the glorious prospect round. But soon each gay idea fled, For Snowdon’s favorite Bard is dead;— Poor Bard, accept a genuine tear, And read thy true eulogium _here_; Here, in my _heart_, that rues the day, That stole Eryri’s pride away: But lo! where seen, by fancy’s eye, His visionary form glides by, Pale, ghastly pale,—that hollow cheek,— That frantic look does more than speak, And tells a tale so full of woe, My bosom swells, my eyes o’erflow:— To want and to despair a prey, He pin’d, and sigh’d his soul away! Ungrateful countrymen, your _pride_, Your _glory_, wanted bread and died! Whilst Ignorance and Vice are fed, Shall Wit and Genius droop their head? Shall fawning Sycophants be paid For flattering fools? while thou art laid On thy sick bed, the mountain {131} heath, Waiting the slow approach of Death, Beneath inhospitable skies, Without a friend to close thine eyes? Thus, shall the chief of Bards expire? The Master of the British Lyre! And shall thy hapless reliques rot, Unwept, unhallowed, and forgot? No, while one grateful Muse remains, And _Pity_ dwells on _Cambria’s_ plains, Thy mournful story shall be told, And wept till Time itself grows old. R. WILLIAMS, of Vron, near Bala.—1799. About the year 1805, John Closs, son of Robert Closs, the Innkeeper at Llanberis, a little boy about seven years of age, was persuaded to go and reside with his grandmother, at Caeau gwynion, in Nant y Bettws, not far from Quellyn Pool, and his mother having come to see him, the love of home revived in his memory, and the thoughts of seeing his brothers and sisters became so powerful, that he resolved to follow his mother to Llanberis, unknown both to her and his grandmother; he therefore pursued her up the mountain at some distance: it was in the winter time, late in the evening, and it began to snow, he lost his way, and after wandering some time, he perished on the mountain. His mother, (though she once fancied she heard a child crying) thought he was at his grandmother’s, and the did woman concluded he was gone home with his mother, thus both being deceived, it was some time before it was known that he had followed his mother on that fatal evening; after two or three days painful search, (numbers of the neighbours having collected together) his body was found at the verge of a precipice, near the top of Moel Aelia. The following lines were composed on that melancholy occasion: A luckless lad, one winter’s day, Unknown to Granny, ran away, Nor longer at her house would stay Without his mother.