Welsh Journals

IN the issue of the Welsh Outlook of October, 1917, headed by the inspiring motto Where there is no vision the people perish," there was published the tribute which Mr. Lloyd George paid to Serbia during the visit to London of the Serbian Prime Minister. We consider this pronouncement not only a little chef d'ceuvre of the eloquent British statesman, but a spontaneous outburst of sympathy in honour of Serbia which only a Welshman could feel and express in such terms towards that much tried little country. A politician of the type of Mr. Lloyd George would in any case-after the achievements of the Serbian Army during this W ar-grasp the importance of a Greater Serbia at the gates of the East; but he must perhaps be Welsh who conceives the belief that by their attitude during this War Serbia and the Serbs will rise to an ideal, to a symbol of freedom-or better, to a symbol of love of freedom. Less consoling for Serbs is the attitude towards the Serbian Problem which the British Prime Minister had to take in practical politics, expressed in his statement of January last on Allied War Aims. But it is not this I want to bring before the reader. In the same issue of the Welsh Outlook, and just following the speech of Mr. Lloyd George, there is an article signed by the pseudonym Shenkyn ap Morgan," an extremely sympathetic and at the same time far-seeing and exact statement on The War in the Balkans," such as, I con- fess I have not read before in English, though there are already a hundred books and many hundreds of essays on the subject. It is probably the striking alliedness of the past of Wales with the present state of Serbia and the Serbs which makes these men penetrate so deeply into the Serbian problem and feel so sympathetic towards us. To a scholar of Indo-European nations the similarity between the Celtic and Slav races is, of course, no secret, and future researches can only make this fact more evident. I should like to note here that, for instance, in the November issue of the Welsh Outlook, in reviewing the History of Serbia by Captain Temperley, Professor J. E. Lloyd, of the University College, Bangor, the authority on Welsh history, has pointed out, after reading only a Serbian history, several striking resemblances between the Serbs and the old Welsh. The circumstances in which both Serbs and Welsh have found themselves at different epochs in their history have helped to increase the common points both had to fight for generations against invaders, and both became typical defenders of nationality and freedom, democrats and nationalists at the same time. When Mr. Lloyd George, alluding to the celebration of Kossovo Day by the Serbs, says that a nation that can sing about its defeat and not lose heart is a nation which is immortal," it is not merely returning the compliment to say that the same applies pre-eminently to the Welsh people. I am, fortunately, in a position to prove that this is not merely a compliment but a fact which the Serbs have believed for a long time. Side by side with the Lay of Kossovo and tales of Serbian heroes, and parallel with them, it was Old Wales and the Welsh songs and bards that a* part of the younger Serbian generation had before their eyes and in their minds during their national education. WALES AND SERBIA There is a great Serbian poet-Jovan Jovanovic ZmaJ- the greatest perhaps among the numerous Serbian poets for four or five generations, who, though not knowing Wales and Great Britain himself, took up the story of the ancient Welsh bards and, inspired by exactly the same present position of his own nation, wrote a beautiful and powerful poem which the Serbs all know by heart from their childhood. As a matter of fact, he borrowed the subject from a Hungarian (Magyar) poet-J. Arany,- and called it An old English ballad," but he gave it new life and its present form, in which it became famous with the Serbs as it never was in the original. It is recited on solemn occasions, and as frequently as the most popular and original of the beautiful Serbian national poems. It is noteworthy, and characteristic of English tolerance, that the same theme of the Welsh bards inspired one of the finest poems of the English poet Gray. Zmaj Jovan Jovanovic was a Hungarian Serb, but never- theless all his works are to-day put on the Index and prohibited in Hungary as well as in the other Serbian territories occupied by the enemy. His books of poems cannot be had to-day, even through neutrals or printed in Latin characters and I wonder if any example of his poems exists in Great Britain, except perhaps in the British Museum. Fortunately, as I said, we remember his poems, and especially the one on the "Bards of Wales," and I have been able to write it down from memory, almost word for word WELSH BARDS. King Edward pricks his fiery steed. Rider and steed aglow With lust of battle. See he sneers. The pride of Wales laid low! The meads are rich with human blood. With blood of rebel strain And like a trodden worm she lies Say will she rise again ? Grows corn enough for my good steed Where the nation sleepeth sure ? Say, have I filled the land with joy ? Will she my rule endure ? Oh, mighty king, thou dost behold In Wales thy fairest gem There are pastures rich, and fields of gold. To grace thy diadem. And Wales-ah, Wales is blest indeed. And happy her warriors brave, And there is peace-a deathlike peace, And a silence of the grave. And see, through the silence of the land The conqueror slowly ride Say, is there yet a soul alive, Who knows a Welshman's pride ? And lo, Montgomery town he sees, When the sun is sinking low And lo, Montgomery's chief comes forth To greet the conquering foe. He honours him with all he has, His board is richly spread. And there arc meats and sweets to spare, And servants lightly tread, 1A7