Welsh Journals

Propaganda against Irish home rule made little impact in Wales, and much the same is said to be true of imperialist sentiment in the Boer War. All who fought the English evidently had the sympathy of the Welsh, while the Scots identified with the empire and with Protestant Ulster. As a result, Wales swung further to the Left between 1885 and 1910, while Scotland moved in the opposite direction. The link between non- conformity and Liberal voting is demonstrated for Wales as for all regions of Britain by Dr. Pelling; so is the link between coal-mining and Liberalism. Outside the coalfield, however, it seems that capacity to speak Welsh correlated more highly with Liberal voting than any other factor. Considering the difficulties of unearthing electoral detail in Britain, Dr. Pelling has a remarkable achievement to his credit, even if some of the accounts which rely on local papers or memoirs are bound to be impres- sionistic, and the evidence adduced cannot be more reliable than the witnesses themselves. This will be a standard reference book for a very long time. PETER PULZER Christ Church, Oxford AMERICANS FROM WALES. By Edward H. Hartmann. The Christopher Publishing House, Boston, Mass., 1967. Pp. 291.$6.50. The flood of writings on Welsh-American topics seems to continue in full spate. Apart from articles in learned journals and accounts of various religious communities, there was formerly little of any value, In particular, there were few works of interest to the general reader, and such as did exist were uncritical to a degree. Typical of them is Zella Armstrong, Who Discovered America? (Chattanooga, 1950). It would be unkind to criticize this book, and it may be a sufficient indication of its scholarship that the author cites as evidence 'an old Welsh verse' which turns out to be a recitation piece for children, written by John Ceiriog Hughes in the last century (and incredibly garbled at that). It was a relief to turn to three works of a very different calibre, namely those of Berthoff, Shepperson and Conway, which have already been reviewed in this Journal (ante, I, No. 3 (1962) ), three scholarly books by authors who had been prepared to undertake the formidable task of learning Welsh. The author of the new book under review is the son of a Welsh-born, Welsh-speaking mother. It is admirable in every respect. The early chapters give a narrative account of the Welsh migration. In the colonial period he discusses the importance of John Myles, the founder of the