Welsh Journals

shy youth, too shy and inexperienced indeed, to refuse the convivial glass, and yet feel that he was acting within the bounds of politeness. After the dinner came the reckoning. As three bottles of port had been consumed, it was decided to charge one to each diner. The eldest brother, William who had not been present, learned with some concern and dis- pleasure of this extravagance. Happily, however, he accepted Alfred's explanation, and said no more about the matter. The same chapter is notable for a rather lengthy digression on what may be called- The Land Question'. Wallace became a noted advocate of land nationalization.1 The digression is occasioned by memories of his first visit to Llandrindod to make a survey and plan for the enclosure of common land. He argues that although the purpose of enclosure, according to the preamble of the Act which sanctioned it, was the im- provement of commons, increase of cultivation, and the productive employment of labour, the results were only too often the reverse. Al- though this is not the appropriate place to comment on these views, the local historian will read with interest his account of the extent of en- closure. Equally interesting is the information about the increase in the price of land after Llandrindod became a popular resort, and when access to the town became easy following the laying of the railroad from Shrews- bury to Swansea. When he took part in the survey, he refers to Llan- drindod as a village, and says that although the medicinal springs had been known to the Romans, only a few then came to take the waters. With acknowledgements to George Borrow in Wild Wales, he mentions the excellence of the local leg of mutton. One of the great luxuries here was the Welsh mutton fed on the neighbouring mountains, so small that a hindquarter weighed only seven or eight pounds, but when hung for a few days or a week, was most delicious eating Alfred Russel Wallace left Radnorshire in 1841, first returning to Kington, and then walking to Brecon. His work next took him to Breck- nockshire, Glamorgan, and to Shropshire. In 1848 he sailed from Liver- pool for the Amazon, the first of several now famous voyages of discovery as a Natural Historian of renown. lA. R. Wallace, Land Nationalization, 1882; also Studies Scientific and Social, Vol. 2. 1900.