Welsh Journals

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that which is to be found in the Saxon genealo- gies. There is a great deal in Welsh literature, but for a moment we may leave that literature on one side. Nevertheless, if there were nothing more in all literature than the short reference in the Saxon genealogies, does not that, in itself, furnish a wonderful epitaph? What more can anyone want said of him or her, when the end comes, than that 'They fought bravely' ? Even St. Paul, and St. Paul, in some ways, speaks at times as an egoist, was content with some such epitaph, "I have fought a good fight; I have finished my course; I have kept the faith." "They fought bravely." Sometimes they won, sometimes they lost; they were fighting forces infinitely greater and stronger than their SCHOOL DAYS FIFTY YEARS AGO IT was my lot to spend my childhood in a forgotten corner of Wales, where no railway had penetrated and where the manners and customs of long ago still lingered. Its schools were so different from those of the present day that I think some account of the one I attended may be of interest. Generations of children in this remote spot owed their education to a family whom I will call Carlyle. The first Mr. Carlyle had come from England. He and his descendants kept schools in which my mother, uncles and aunts, and, in turn, my brothers and I received our early education. The Welsh Not prevailed in the school of the Mr. Carlyle of my mother's day. This was a ruler on which the letters W.N. were carved. The speaking of Welsh in school was strictly forbidden; any boy or girl guilty of the offence was given the Welsh Not, which he or she handed on to the next offender, the unfortunate one who held the Welsh Not at the end of the school ses- sion becoming the scapegoat who bore the punish- ment for the sins of all. Mother, being a lively child, was in frequent possession of the Welsh Not, but was never allowed to pay the penalty; a chivalrous boy cousin always asked for it in Welsh and took the punishment himself. In my time the school was ruled by a Miss Carlyle, and the Welsh Not had gone out of fashion, but the use of the ruler for punishment with strokes upon the palm of the hand was still the mode of correction for serious offences, while own; but the one outstanding thing which is said of them, that has come down to us, is "that they fought their fight bravely." That is the key-note of the lives of Urien and Owain-and I do so want to lay stress upon it- as their story developed in literature. It is just that quality that made them not only live in Welsh literature, but sent their name and their fame ringing throughout the whole of Europe. Now, as I said before, it doesn't very much matter whether they actually lived in the VIth century, or the XIIth, or any other time, or never at all. There was a belief, and I believe in that belief, that they did live and did fight for their land, 1,400 years ago. What does signify, over and above all questions of date and of time, is that it was believed that they fought bravely. What was it that they fought for ? [To be continued.] by Mrs. Hugh Lewis for minor faults we were put to stand in the corner. Tall, strict and commanding, Miss Carlyle inspired as much awe among her pupils as any one of her predecessors could have done. The school had become a kind of finishing school for the daughters of the less well-to-do farmers, and a commencing school for those little boys and girls who would have wider opportunities later. They did not mix very well. I remember a rosy- cheeked elder taking me aside to ask if I would tell her what made my face so white-was it eating raw rice ? or drinking vinegar ? She had tried both in vain. Delicate child that I was, always being dosed with tonics because of my pale face, her strange question puzzled me enor- mously. Miss Carlyle was justly renowned for her thorough instruction in the arts of reading, writ- ing and spelling, the secret of her success being constant practice. Her methods of teaching other subjects had the merit of simplicity. In arithmetic we were provided with small books called Tutors. These taught a rule by giving a sample sum which they worked out, and imme- diately below several sums of a precisely similar type were set. Without any explanation from Miss Carlyle or any conception of the meaning of the problem, or the why or wherefore of the pro- cess, we copied slavishly the jugglery in the model before us and compared the results we obtained with the answers in Miss Carlyle's book. In this way, by the time I was ten, I had