Howey Choir c1912

There's no better book on Radnorshire than Ffransis Payne's two volume travel book Crwydro Sir Faesyfed. The inhabitants of Howey might not agree, however, with his dismissive comment about their village: Fel y dywedais yn barod yr oedd y lle hwn yn adnabyddus am ei gôr meibion hanner canrif yn ôl, am a wn i nid yw'n adnabyddus am ddim heddiw - "As I said before this place was well known for its male voice choir half a century ago, as far as I know it's famous for nothing today."

Well Mr Payne was wrong on one count at least as the choir in question was mixed rather than male voice. Here is a picture dating back to perhaps 1912, and in order to placate any wounded spirits perhaps we should try to put a name to as many of these faces from the past as we can.

Back Row standing (left to right): Stan Jones, Bill Lloyd, a Mr Tidman, George Thomas, Sid Thomas, a Mr Smout, David Charles Jones, Les Brick. Middle Row seated (left to right): Nelly Thomas, Ada Jones, Ida Webb, Veenie Jones, Phillip Gough, Nelly Cadwallader. With the cup: (?) and (?). Kneeling (left to right): Anne Jones, Dolly Jones, Katie Hughes. Any corrections or additions welcomed.

Fred Melenydd Roberts

This young fellow doesn't look particularly happy about things, although he was an heir to a great musical tradition - y delyn deir-res or triple harp. It's well known that the triple harp tradition was kept alive by members of the Romany clan, the Woods, at a time when a combination of Methodism and the fashion for pedal harps had all but driven the instrument out of the cultural mainstream.

Llandrindod Wells with its thousands of visitors was a lucrative market for the triple harp players and young Fred - a great great great grandson of Abram Wood, the clan patriarch - was the son of the harp player John Lewis Roberts (1853-1928), himself a son of the leading player of the nineteenth century, John Roberts, Alaw Elwy (1816-1894). Fred's uncles also played in the town, you can read about the Roberts family here.

At the time of the 1901 Census young Fred and family were living at Bank Cottage in Builth moving to Oak Cottage, Llanyre in 1902. Fred's mother Eliza Davies was from Llanbister and his grandmother Eleanor, who was born in Rhayader, was the daughter of another famous harpist Jerri Bach Gogerddan (1778-1867).

London Gazette

The London Gazette is a good source for filling in the biographical gaps for some of the more obscure pre-war racers. The Welsh-born Brooklands driver Philip Turner is a good example, the Gazette records his change of surname in 1919, the collapse of his business in 1935 and his death in Brighton on 30th March 1949. Irene Schwedler, her real name was Ilse, was a well-known competitor before the war who seems to have disappeared without a trace as far as the motor-sport world is concerned. What happened to her? The Gazette shows a change of name to Sadler in 1947.

Another good thing about the Gazette, you can check which of your neighbours has ended up in the bankruptcy courts.

Silver John

Silver John is dead and gone
So they came home a-singing.
Radnor boys pulled out his eyes
And set the bells a-ringing

According to W. H. Howse in his book Radnorshire this little ditty was sure to provoke trouble if recited in the presence of a New Radnor man, commemorating as it does the murder of the charmer and bone-setter Silver John by a gang from the village in the late eighteenth century.

According to this site Silver John was a member of the Lloyd family of bone-setters and the deed was done in 1830. Meic Stephens, a descendant of the Lloyds, in his Oxford Companion to Welsh Literature agrees that Silver John was John Lloyd and tentatively dates him as living between 1740-1814.

The records of the Court of Great Sessions have a different tale to tell. Here Silver John is named as John Jones of the parish of Llanfihangel Rhyd Ieithon. Now there is no reason at all, given the longevity of the Welsh patronymic system, why a John Lloyd should not also be known as John Jones. The murder however is dated to 12th December 1773, the body not being found until the following April.

Jones was described as an idle drunken person, who had been very troublesome on the night of the murder and had to be dragged out of the house of Edward Breese, a New Radnor carpenter. Others indicted with Breese were David Bedward, know as Edwards, also a carpenter; Margaret Herbert (alias Morgan); Jacob Holl, butcher; William Holl; John Meredith, labourer; and Alice Price (alias Phillips). The verdict "No True Bill" - no case to answer.

You don't need a weather man to know which way the wind blows

Time was we blamed bad weather on the wrath of the gods and placated them by sacrificing a virgin or some such. Nowadays we blame bad weather on the new god of global warming and are asked to sacrifice ….well, our cars.

According to the Independent; “It's official: the heavier rainfall in Britain is being caused by climate change, a major new scientific study will reveal this week, as the country reels from summer downpours of unprecedented ferocity. More intense rainstorms across parts of the northern hemisphere are being generated by man-made global warming, the study has established for the first time ­ an effect which has long been predicted but never before proved.”

Well done the scientists, although it took them long enough. After all the UK record for rain in an hour was set as long ago as 12th July 1901 in Maidenhead, 3.6 inches. Most rain in a day, Dorset, 18th July 1955, 11 inches. Funny how July keeps popping up in these records. Reminds me of the great Howey flood of 9th July 1853.

Anyway thank heavens the scientists have finally worked out the reason for all these unprecedented downpours, I’m off outside to slaughter the Metro.

Radnorshire Bardic Poems, 40

Here is another praise poem to Philip ap Rhys and Gwenllian of Cenarth, St Harmon. Ffransis Payne considered it the best of the poems composed for the family. It is the only surviving work by the bard Ieuan Gyfannedd.

Praise of Philip ap Rhys and Gwenllian vz Owain Glyndwr (IG)

Philip, a generous royal stock,
Ap Rhys, there‘s mention of you,
Lover of our song;
And much, too, of Gwenllian;
Honour to you and this goddess,
Famed Arthur of Gwerthrynion.

You dwell in the house of fame,
You and the girl from Glyn;
You are firmly seated
On the bench of the men of estate;
Loyally the bards, all who would cultivate
Your land, would not leave its support
In summer or in winter,
God’s blessing on your house.

I’ve composed a wide acre of praise
In the borderlands, it’s honourable;
Like an agreement for joint-ploughing,
I refer to you in furrows of harmonious praise.
The datgeiniaid have sung, have harrowed,
Have dug over an acre of song.

It has been sown a hundred times
With the blessings of the weak.
Chieftain of our land, your praise was ever
A fresh shoot, like that of Rhys,
It has been sown, like the seed corn
From the wheat, the world’s blessing.
Your dominion is more than a saint’s,
The land has been sown with a chaired poem
In your praise, Mary’s blessing upon you;
The world has been sown, unto the grave,
With songs to the girl from Gwynedd.

This tall house in the hill’s fold
Is the wheat store of blessings;
You are the best of men, with a fair wife
And a house for every charity;
Your hall has been stitched
With good poetry, your delight;
The carpenters of praise measure their trunks
By a man’s goodness, not with greenwood;
Today, Rhydderch’s nephew, is lifted up
By the work of carpenters of love,
And on high, the belfry of their praise
Will be ready by morning.

A long life to you and the girl from Gwynedd,
To give there in mead and song.
A long life was given to Moses,
Old Noah lived to a great age,
You and Gwenllian will grow old
In the land of fame, in the hill’s fold.

Radnorshire Bardic Poems, 39

Philip ap Rhys of Cenarth, St Harmon was the son-in-law of Owain Glyndwr. After Maredudd, Owain's son received a pardon from Henry V in 1421 it seems that Philip refused to surrender and continued the war against the English. In this poem the bard Llawdden praises Philip, still at large in the woods of Arwystl.

Praise of Philip ap Rhys of Cenarth (10)

I’d love to go with a fine poem,
Merlin’s gift, to where great fame is found,
Dear Philip, form of a stag
The lover of this southern land.
The stag of Rhys loves to give
Gold and a steed, in maintenance,
A lord from Philip Fychan, a true support
A Bendigeidfran of provision.
More than anyone he’s our life,
The face of Arthur for Gwerthrynion,
Another Ieuan Llwyd, lord of Glyn Aeron,
On to victory, chieftain!
Proof of the spirit of the nobility
Is found with this heir and his mead,
The wood in the apple-tree then
That causes its branch to sprout on high.
Philip ap Rhys is a tree from
The highest bud of the Isle of Honey,
The fine customs of a baron,
Generous God bestow on him,
The generosity of Einiawn’s race,
The face of a Goodman with the fairest look.
Majesty was given to my eagle,
The manner of a falcon amongst the goodmen,
A fine sight on a stallion, without ugliness,
Princely, God’s salvation for him!

There’s a longing amongst his nation
For the fair governance of Cynan’s grandchild.
In our land none but the birds and
The woodland branches care for him,
No minstrel, we who once made merry,
None can be found to salute him.
A fine journey awaits me, for love of him,
By the three months of summer,
I’ll cross yonder Pumlumon
With poems as gifts for him;
By my faith, how distant the respected one,
I’ll meet with my swan.

Jesus, I have a great longing,
He was in his beloved land,
A generous ruler, tall son of a chieftain,
When he left, a hunting ground.
Give him, powerful ruler,
A blow like Owain ab Urien;
In his story he succeeds,
Like the man on the Llychwr shore.
Old and fitting was the one who made,
A long campaign, a fine outlawdom,
Until he had justice and land and houses
From on high, he did not make peace.
After the nobleman’s son fled,
Philip is the equal of the Goodman:
He has rejected unjust rule,
And calls for victory,
Until which he dwells where he wishes,
Free like one of the stags.

As long as there is a fine mead feast
In the bright lands of Arwystl,
Swiftly to our land from Powys
A fair chieftain will come.
Where the houses and haunts of the father are found,
And the cultivated land of the great grandfather,
There one as old as Rhys’s son will dwell,
There he’ll deign to be by Christmas,
Let a long lifetime of fame and affection
Be given to the nephew of Rhydderch!

Book of the Month

After Lewis Glyn Cothi the bard Llawdden was perhaps the most prolific of the Fifteenth Century poets writing to patrons in and around Radnorshire. At least half the poems in this newly published book in the University of Wales's Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies' series Beirdd yr Uchelwyr have a Radnorshire interest. As usual the book is full of genealogical and historical interest for students of local history with copious notes on every poem.

It seems that Llawdden retired to farm in the parish of Cefnllys and what was to become Radnorshire was certainly his main area of bardic activity. Of particular interest are the five poems to the family of Phylib ap Rhys of Cenarth, St Harmon, poems to patrons at Croescynon and Garddfaelog in Llanbister, a fine obituary to Elen Gethin of Hergest and poems to patrons in what is now Herefordshire

What's in a Name?

Some of the old mechanics, who were around in the late 50s when Ireland first started to make a name for himself in the world of Motor Sport, still call him McGregor, rather than Innes. Why so? Well the answer is that this was the name that Innes himself used at that time. Here's an example from the 1958 Telephone Directory, where Ireland is described as a Sports Car Builder, his previous Rolls Royce repair business at the same address having closed as his interest turned to sport.

Radnorshire Bardic Poems, 38

This is a translation of a cywydd by Lewis Glyn Cothi in praise of the Sion and Hywel, two sons of Ieuan Coch. Lewis composed a number of praise poems to members of this family living in various parishes in Elfael Uwch Mynydd

No 155, Praise to the two sons of Ieuan Coch

Two generous men in fair Elfael,
Two braves, two oaks,
Two good sons and heirs
Of Ieuan Coch, a generous chieftain,
Both grandsons of Cadwgan,
The stags who break castles;
Sion with his successful look,
And Hywel, no-one is more generous.

There’s no more than an archer’s mark
Of woodland between their liberal homes,
And I am Lewis the strong archer,
Their two courts are my target,
I’ll shoot a poem from
My jaw at the two marks;
I’ll shoot a cywydd across the Ithon
At Sion, that is my office;
And then a bolt to where Hywel comes,
An ode of gwawdodyn metre.
I know well an idle game
Of bars between these two pure stags.
My feet have been running
Down between their fair homes.
I’m as swift as a swallow
As I follow after them.
I’m quicker to the sons of Ieuan
Than a breath of wind to a high bank,
Than white snow along the moorland,
Than a brown falcon to the forest,
Than an old eagle to the great cliff,
Than a wounded roebuck to the river cliff.
I’m a man of no use, in Llanfaredd,
For Sion, rose of the tribe.
I do not need to call for poems
From a book, just for Hywel his brother.

There are two more brothers
Who both learn the books of the others.
They’re four saplings from one oak,
They’re four fledglings.
There is no feebleness with these on side,
They’re loyal to a man.
Sion is the trunk in place of Ieuan Coch,
A stag, whom you know;
Hywel is the longest branch,
An old coffer I’ll get from him.
Two stags in the two battles,
Two swords of their country.
God gave Moses two tablets,
Golden images in two cloths;
Two are earth and sky,
Two bodies which are related;
Two days were one for a man,
For Roland against his enemy.
Two brothers are the men who permit us,
Stags, the same charity.
Two stars are special,
Two men dwell to turn steel aside.
Jesus, he who is an old man
Would give an age to these two men.

Radnorshire Bardic Poems, 37

In this jolly poem addressed to Ieuan ap Gruffudd Fychan of Gladestry, Lewis Glyn Cothi mocks a bardic rival called Hywel Bongam, none of whose work has survived.

No. 160, Praise of Ieuan ap Gruffudd Fychan.

You are a terror to the unwise,
Wise, silver-tongued Ieuan;
You are the liberal limb of yonder land,
A lieutenant over the land below.
Where you give, you are a Daniel,
A prophet, son of Gruffudd,
A Solomon seen throughout the March,
A Sir Ffwg of Llwythyfnwg and her lands.
Let the life of Gruffudd Fychan,
Be there upon your face, goodman.

Your strong word comes from the root,
It stands throughout Maesyfaidd
Like the green trees of Meifod
Stand above any snowfall.
You are a man who has grown wise,
An oak or some such tree;
Silver coins are your berries,
There is gold in the roots,
Under your branches, good prince,
I come quietly to shelter.

Yonder are my brothers.
We share an oath on the relics of Enlli;
Between us, by the image of Thomas,
There is a noisy battle for silver metal.
Hywel Bongam was very loud,
Not a single word is tolerable;
He comes from Manafon,
A servant of Morys ap John;
For myself, like office for the English,
If he deserves it, then I resign!
Jovial Dafydd asks you,
"Is every man to be a victor?"
This suitor is an adulterer,
The man has sought your patronage,
He seeks to seduce your oath;
For his own ends he does so.
I must insist, Ieuan,
To have my share from an Ifor Hael.
Men of poetry, my knave!
Who praise you in the dialect of Gwynedd!

You are a member of the chief council,
You are the Duke's right ear;
Do you deal justice fairly
Between the men there?
You are a foot in the land,
To uphold the office of the lord.
Along a road of propriety it should run
To the pathways of high law.
Ieuan, you are the right hand
Of the earl, watching over his share;
Hold that patronage like a harp string,
Through the means at your disposal.
Bring profit there for the Duke,
The Duke has given you good office.
Duke Richard brings and has given
The land of Llwythyfnwg to your ward,
He takes in Llanfar four lifetimes,
God will give you four lifetimes.

Memorabila

This unusal item was recently for sale on ebay.

A Bit of a Rant

We all know that English speakers can mangle Welsh names but what about some of the linguistic nonsense inflicted by Welsh speakers on the place names of Radnorshire.

A glaring example is Cwmdeuddwr which I guess most locals would pronounce Cwmteuddwr. Well Cwmteuddwr is infact the correct version, the full name of the place is Cwmwd Deuddwr (the Commote of the two waters if you like) and that d.D in the middle of the words naturally hardens to a T in spoken Welsh. So who decided the locals were wrong and inflicted the modern Cwmdeuddwr on the unfortunate inhabitants?

Here's another example Ffynnon Gynid - that's what the locals call the place, as did Lhuyd in his Parochiala of 1700. Nowadays the authorities insist on Ffynnon Gynydd, no-doubt they were convinced that the Radnorshire folk couldn't pronounce a DD. The fact is that what we have here is the Well of St Cynidr - the final r being dropped as in familiar words like ffenest for ffenestr. So a placename of some historical importance is mangled by the authorities presumably at the behest of a Welsh speaker who thought he knew better.

Next how about Llanyre - Llanllyr - the LL in the middle of a placename quite naturally being dropped in spoken Welsh as in the Cardiganshire Llanllwchaearn or Llanychaearn. The academic publishers of a Welsh atlas came up with the nonsensical version Llanhir. The old cynghanedd of the old bards showed that the local pronounciation is correct, spell it Llanŷr if you like. Something similar happened at nearby Nantmel where the experts decided that the brook must be named after honey or mêl - infact it's named after a person Mael.

A final example - generations of Llandrindod High school pupils have belonged to a house called Aran, named after a river - the Aran - which runs in a valley called Cwm Aran. Trouble is that there is no such place, the river was always called Cymaron by those real experts on Welsh placenames, the Welsh bards.

The Whole Truth

If an article in this month's Motor Sport is anything to go by then John Surtees wasn't Innes Ireland's biggest fan. Innes he says had "a big tantrum" when the new boy crashed the Lotus 18 testing at Silverstone. Later Chapman wanted John as his number one driver for the 1961 season and asked him who he wanted as his number two.....Surtees chose Jim Clark. "But Innes Ireland wasn't happy at all. He said I'd kicked him out of his seat at Lotus and there was a lot of ranting and raving. So I walked away, just couldn't stand the pressure."

Now of course this isn't the first time Surtees has spoken on this subject. Here's his description of the same incident from an article in C&SC a number of years ago:

"Colin said to me, "John - you're my Number One and you can have your choice of team-mate, Innes or Jim. I don't know," I said. "I've had so many mechanical failures that I'm getting a bit suspicious of your green cars."

"Then we'll paint 'em black!" said Colin, and he prepared a contract giving me choice of second driver and saying that the cars would be painted black. I told him that I would like Jim Clark as my number two, as I got on well with him, but then a few days later Innes Ireland called me from Paris. He told me that he had a contract for 1960 and '61 which stated that he was Number One at Lotus and that he had choice of team-mate! "What the hell is going on?" he wanted to know.

I went to see Colin."It's not true." he said, "I've got no arrangement at all with Innes. We're fixing him up with the British Racing Partnership." Innes still insisted that he had everything in writing, so I fixed another meeting with Chapman, taking Innes with me. He brought his contract, which said exactly what he claimed, but Colin just shrugged the whole thing off, so I said "I'm sorry, but that's it" and I walked out."

So there you have it and no doubt Ireland's "ranting and raving" are a bit more understandable when you have the full story rather than the truncated version in the Motor Sport article.

The Last Amazon

A new book has been published in France charting the life of Marie Marthe Camille Designe du Gast (1868-1942), the first woman driver to compete on equal terms with men, details here.

Camille's exploits are legendary: the parachute jump from a hot-air balloon in 1895; a 33rd place out of 122 starters in an underpowered 20hp Peugeot in the Berlin-Paris race of 1901 - she had been required to start last; the attempted duel fought on her behalf by the Prince de Sagan when the lawyer Barboux suggested that Camille was the model for a Gervex nude.

The ill-fated Paris-Madrid race of 1903 saw Madame du Gast among the leaders before she stopped to help the injured Englishman Stead, by the time the authorities had forced the abandonment of the race at Bordeaux she was still 45th out of 275 starters. Camille's reward, L'ACF banned women from competing in 1904!

Camille turned to the new sport of powerboat racing and was victorious in the ambitious Algiers-Toulon race of 1905. Not that she finished, her boat was closest to Toulon when she came to grief - the entire entry having been sunk by unseasonal storms.

A campaigner against bullfighting, her activities led in 1930 to the Minister of the Interior banning the "sport" in the department of Seine-et-Marne. Several thousand citizens marched through the town of Melun in protest, carrying an effigy of Mme. Du Gast accompanied by a cow and picadors riding asses. The effigy was burnt outside the prefecture to cries of Death! Now not many racing drivers can claim to have been burnt in effigy, not even Schumacher.

Radnorshire Bardic Poems, 36

This is an elegy by Lewis Glyn Cothi for Hywel Goch ap Rhys ap Dafydd ap Hywel Fain of Gwestun, Llangynllo:

No. 179, Elegy for Hywel Goch

The falcon with the long golden hair,
Who I saw in Rhiwlallt,
Today, he does not pay the costs
In the land of Gwestun.
He went, this great grandson of Hywel Fain,
Through the throng to the oak and the winding cloth.
He went, as if across a sea,
From Rhiwlallt, on a bier.
Hywel Goch, who would hunt the wicked,
Son of generous Rhys of the ready purse,
Famed throughout the land,
A bed of earth for Hywel ap Rhys.

He was a planted tree in Llangynllo,
He was tired after the planting.
God keeps a fair dwelling,
The vineyards of God are full of leaves,
There he cut down, after summer,
The tallest of the young growth.
Hywel was a very tall plant
From a straight, well-bred vine;
A useful plant where I played,
God is the carpenter who cut him down.
He cut down an oak tree of Maelienydd,
And now the woodland is weaker.
He broke a string with a talent
To sing out from the centre,
He broke a fine bow with a
Talent for aiming straight.
A fair, modest falcon has fallen,
By magic, as he flew.
A tree in the top of the river-cliff uprooted,
By the sun, the greatest in Rhiwlallt.
The hand of Rhys ap Dafydd
Has been hidden in the choir of Cynllo.

Rhys was a stag from the conquerors
His seven antlers were truly beautiful,
And the seventh, his favourite,
Has fallen beside Rhys.
Rhys was a tree for us throughout the dominion,
And upon it were seven roots,
Jesus with his axe one night,
Cut a good one from the seven.
There was a castle on top of Gwestun
With seven towers, one was shot down,
Once again one of the seven is broken
By a cannonball from heaven.

Many the wounds on my cheek,
Many the cries of woe for Hywel Goch.
No healthy man, not two, can sing,
No human laughter with the string music,
No-one who comes is cheerful,
No-one puts on weight because of Hywel.
Are not the sons of widows upon every bench?
Are not the youngsters in a wretched state/?
Is not the world unpleasant for everyone?
Are the brooks of Gwestun not weeping?
Hywel is where we cannot see him,
We have need of him this month.
There is weeping for the soldier,
Heaven is now his home.

Eye Spy, Something Beginning with C

Back in July 1903 the Automobile Club held a series of events in the Emerald Isle which it described as the Irish Automobile Fortnight. Here for example we find C. S. Rolls in a 70 horse power Mors winning the cup presented by the Cork Constitution newspaper for the fastest time over a two mile sprint course, Roll's time 1-49.6. But who is this in third place in a 50 horse power Wolseley in a time of 2-04.5? A Lieutenant Cumming, much better known to history as Sir George Mansfield Smith-Cumming. In 1903 Cumming was already director of the foreign section of the Secret Service Bureau, later he would become the first director of MI6, the legendary C of popular culture.

Cumming is better remembered as a sporting pioneer of motor-boats rather than cars, but he was the first of quite a number of individuals linked to the world of espionage who had racing connections. No doubt we will highlight some of them over the next few months.

Llandrindod, A Welsh Canberra?

On 9th June 1919 the Chairman of the local Urban District Council, Mr Jeffrey Jones, opened the Welsh Home Rule Conference in Llandrindod Wells with a promise that the council were ready to donate a site for a Welsh Parliament House. That week's conference was covered by the London papers, which is more than can be said for this week's discussions between Plaid Cymru, the Tories and the Liberal Democrats about forming a coalition government at the National Assembly. As far as the English press are concerned the remarkable possibility of Nationalists and Conservatives sharing the admittedly limited powers on offer in Cardiff might just as well be happening in Tierra del Fuego.

Another summer, another meeting in Llandrindod. Nearly 700 "leaders of Welsh political, cultural and industrial life", as the Times described them, met on the 2nd of July 1950 to launch a petition calling for Parliamentary Self-Government for Wales. Some 57 years later and of course we are still waiting for a genuine law-making Parliament in Wales, I wonder if the council still have a spare site?

Radnorshire Bardic Poems, 35

This is a praise poem by Lewis Glyn Cothi to Henri ab Ieuan Fychan of Llansantffraid yn Elfael:

No 156, Praise of Henri ab Ieuan Fychan

Who is the apparent angel?
Who is the generous one in the parish of St Bride?
A long life filled with love
To you Henry, lion of half the land,
Son of Ieuan Fychan and like
Your forefathers, from the blood of Idwal,
Love from the father and the grandfather,
Proper authority to the righteous,
A leader where the great spears are splintered,
A bow of Elfael and Buellt,
A Bedwyr of Gruffudd ab Adam,
Let there be life for your mother’s son!
Arise and build for yourself,
The house of the father on the grandfather’s land.

Bryn Coch merits praise,
A hill of old wines and courtly song,
A hill of yellow gold and mead,
A healthy hill under a wide sky;
A hill of a noble baron’s line,
A hill of the bards and their eternal judgements.
For a bard and for a mere man,
Was there ever such a goodly hill?
Who made it, mead reared child?
Who? Cadwgan ap Hywel!
Ieuan was his natural son,
And after him his grandson Henri
Is in the courting place of his grandsons.
You come from Hywel Sais, from Lleision,
Generous one of your generation;
You’re a squire from Rhys Gryg,
You’re the fine linen of Tewdwr.
You began as a youth to share
The gold of the bank with all.
As a boy you gave me
The full bodied ale of Weobley;
A Goodman, for us at last there are
Gold and stallions, saddles and mead.
Never on this hill was born
Your better for sharing goods Henri.

You give us Henri, in one summer,
As much as a hundred since Henry the First.
You are the Henry of our day,
As brave as Henry the Third.
Henri you are, my lordship.
Henry of Derby was less than you.
Are you any worse for wine giving along
The banks of the Wye than Henry of Monmouth?
May you have health and a world of knowledge,
Henri your name will be recalled.
Their way one of riches,
May your hand have this Henri:
Half the lifetime that came to Moses,
May that be an added extra.

Another Book of the Month

Preacher's Son by Dewi Williams is an interesting book about everyday life in North Breconshire in the early 1950s, as seen through the eyes of a schoolboy - the son of the minister at Troedrhiwdalar. ISBN 1-84685-186-6, published by the Diggory Press.