Welsh Journals

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SPRING came and passed almost unnoticed. In this, our time of trouble, even her radiance and laughing grace seemed somehow to jar. The green of the larches, the blue mist of the wild hyacinths on the hills, the lambs in the meadows- for all this we were out of tune. I felt it as I wan- dered by the Backs of the Colleges, so strange and empty of their tenantry of last year. What a change one little year had wrought. Then, gay groups of men, in the dawn of manhood, easy, well-groomed, confident, calling no man master. What a place for youth-the careless camaraderie, the freedom of opinion, the easy distinction, the tacit convention of caste, of breeding, the calm possession of these unrivalled cloisters of ancient tradition and learning. It seemed but yesterday since the May week-the gaiety of the river, the pretty frocks and faces, the vigorous youths in flannels, the savour somehow of well kept country rectories, ancient names, armorial bearings and the broad lands of the county houses, All that beauty all that wealth e'er gave." It was little wonder that the older varsities leave so tender an afterglow in the memories of their sons. Indeed, the wonder was that after living 'midst such citadels of learning and religion and beauty men could endure the existence of those broad tracts of England which remained ignorant, pagan and squalid. But, perhaps, these ample courts were merely places for men to dream in, for now, as evening is falling, these calm courts of King's College seem not unlike a fabric builded in a dream. The freshness of the Spring's first unsullied leaves, the bridges, the water- ways, the slumbering towers, the smooth green lawns, the quiet quadrangles that echo the mellow chimings of the hours-it was all so separate from the strife and squalor of the workaday world without. How quiet it all is The high pinnacles of the College Chapel slumber above, haloed in the last golden light of the sunset. Around them and in their crevices pigeons coo and murmur their gentle philanderings and from ledge to ledge flit softly in the waning light. The windows of the College Chapel were dark. Someone was playing over the morrow's music. Fragments of harmony would peal out and cease abruptly, leaving one hanging in expectation of some grand chorale. Once the vox humana rose high yearning like a god in pain," and the deep antiphon of the bass boomed and throbbed in disconsolate harmony. So the moments passed, and the light had waned and the pigeons slumbered by the gar- goyles, and the organ, too, was silent. And now, a great sadness seemed to speak from the heart of this Alma Mater bereft of her children. I wondered CAMBRIDGE 1915 whether in distant lands, in the stillness of the Egyptian night, from the^trenches of Flanders, in the loneliness of suffering or death, some of her soldier sons were remembering this tranquil gentle place. The pathos and the problem of pain fell heavily. On the mother and her sons and all their weariness the deep night steals till all is lost. save the quiet stars above, and below. the inexorable tolling of the hours. Nid oes twrw-hun distawrwydd Dwng yma'i le, ers tri chan mlwydd Mae hyny'n oes fel mewn un awr I Fel dim onid dim yw'r tymmawr Onid dim, dim ond dammeg Yw ein hynt oil i henaint teg. Ond 0 Dduw Nef pie, pie mae'r plant Heinyf hoywon yma fuant ? Trosglwyddwyd yr ysgolyddion I lawer math o leoedd 0 dreigl chwyrn dirgel a choedd. Un j'w le yn yr hen wlad Trofa ei hen gartrefiad, Rhyw bell fangre yw lle'r Hall Wyneb dwr, neu y byd arall, Ryw gwm sy rhy drwm i'w dramwy Am obaith maingc yma byth mwy. Never since the Middle Ages had there been such a host of armed Welshmen together, never such an invasion of East Anglia from the turbulent hills of Wales. Sleepy Suffolk villages were billeting troops from Carnarvonshire, and the yokels listened won- deringly to the strange speech and song of these hill folk. For the first time the British Isles were realizing their solidarity. In Cambridge it was very curious to see soldiers everywhere and to overhear groups of lads speaking Welsh. Knots of sallow dark-eyed men from Carmarthen and Glamorgan would be talking excitedly over some drill grievance, or laughing uproariously at some witty sally. In-* genuous, homely-looking lads from the hills of Merioneth or Montgomeryshire wandered through the quadrangles of Trinity and Johns. saw two young soldiers going shyly round the Trinity ante- chapel with all its statues and tablets to the mighty dead. They stood, silent, before the arresting statue of Newton. I thought how a century ago another then unknown lad from Northern hills had shared the awe of this place. The ante chapel where the statue stood Of Newton with his prism and silent face The marble index of a mind for ever Voyaging through strange seas of thought alone.