Welsh Journals

disillusion of Liberal Wales. The most substantial of the other con- tributions is a calendar, prepared by Brenda Parry-Jones, of the correspondence between Richard Richards of Caerynwch, Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer, and Lord Chancellor Eldon, between 1809 and 1822. One letter gives a startling picture of the extent of pauperism in the Dolgellau area in 1817. In the Bulletin of the Board of Celtic Studies, XXI, part iii (November 1965), two articles of historical interest appear in the Language and Literature section. Prys Morgan documents the lineage and career of Elis Gruffudd who served in Calais from 1530 until its capture by the French in 1558, and who completed his valuable chronicle in 1552. Mr. Morgan provides some illuminating sidelights on life in a frontier town during the Tudor period. Thomas Jones follows this with Gruffudd's description in his chronicle of Cardinal Wolsey's visit to France in 1527, based on information Gruffudd received after joining the Calais garrison. In the History and Law section, Enid Roberts, in another article in Welsh, traces the history of the 'Mostyn Christ', an oaken statue now in Bangor cathedral, back to the Black Friars of Rhuddlan in the early sixteenth century. Finally, A. D. Carr prints documents which illustrate Welsh barony in Edeyrnion and Dinmael in the years after the Edwardian conquest. Volume XIV (1965) of the Transactions of the Denbighshire Historical Society is a substantial contribution to local history. D. Pratt writes of mediaeval Holt, comparing its 1315 survey with that of 1391 (printed here). The borough was never able to compete commercially with Wrexham, but its fourteenth-century history illustrates trends familiar in other Welsh towns: a falling population, the concentration of property in fewer hands, the intrusion of Welsh burgesses, and a decline in the lord's income. Tudor Denbighshire also receives new shafts of light, especially from Glanmor Williams's re-assessment of William Salesbury, whose vision of Wales in the Renaissance world enabled him to prepare the Welsh language and literary tradition for the challenge of the New Learning. Two articles (by I. Edwards and E. Rogers) deal with the industrial north-east in the early nineteenth century. The Wrexham iron industry was always of small proportions, and its promise was never fulfilled in the unstable years of over-speculation, cut-throat competition, and heavy landowners' royalties. Social conditions in the iron and coal industries deteriorated in depression years and created a hot-house atmosphere in which Union clubs emerged after 1830, despite the violent opposition of ironmaster and coalowner. Finally, Sir Ben B. Thomas contributes a memoir of Robert Richards (1884-1954); University lecturer and Labour M.P., his breadth of interest and humanity encompassed India and his native Llangynog, adult education and Welsh monasticism, foreign affairs, and bird migration. This volume is an admirable memorial to the man who was the first president of the Society that produced it.