WELSH POETRY IN ENGLISH VERSE.*

FEw Englishmen, we suppose, know much about Welsh poetry: Such names as Merlin and, perhaps, Taliessin are vaguely familiar; there are one or two collections of Welsh songs and melodies ; while Eisteddfods and bardic coro- nations, as depicted in the illustrated papers, arouse at times a languid curiosity. But inquiry does not usually go further. For the Welsh language is cut off from us by a gap which no knowledge of the Aryan group of languages can bridge, and fragments of Welsh verse, even when accompanied by a translation (pp. 136, 139), still present a cipher which is without a clue. And yet there is no doubt that Welsh poetry is at once a national inheritance and also in a very remarkable manner a living force. Elsewhere in Europe the minstrel is extinct, but he is still to be found in the Principality, not indeed, as in the days when Arthur held his court at Caerleon-upon-Usk, among chiefs and nobles, but rather among the peasantry and common folk. Of modern "Bards," whose work is illustrated in this volume, Alun "was the son of a miner and apprenticed to a shoemaker "; Ceiriog was "a railway clerk in Manchester," and died as "station-master at Caersws "; Derfycla was "a machine-man in Lord Pen- rhyn's quarry," and Gruffydd started life in "Bethel School, • Welsh Peary Old and Mu is .114414 no.. By Alfred Pereeval Graves. London: Longman s and CO. Ds:64W Llanddeiniolen " ; while of the englyn, a very ancient form of four-lined epigram which "for complexity of form is now unparalleled in the prosodies of the world," Mr. Graves writes that there is "no bard so unskilful as never to have composed one, and few peasants so poor as not to hope that an englyn may adorn the blue slab which is their final coverlet." And everyone who ponders over these strange facts—almost unique, we think, in the modern world—will assuredly be grateful to Mr. Graves for bringing together some ninety specimens of Welsh verse. To politicians, indeed, if politics have any concern with what has been called "the soul of a nation," his volume ought to be indispensable ; but a literary critic may not venture on so great a theme, and must content himself with his own task, which in the present case is of special difficulty. For our interest in poetic translations arises either from the intellectual pleasure they afford by being compared with the original, or from the fact that they introduce us, as Cliaptuan's Homer did Keats, into a new world of creative imagination ; but Mr. Graves has to forgo both these sources of delight. For just as the Welsh language is generally unknown, so the subjects with which Welsh poetry deals seem always to be the most familiar. It loves the common emotions and experiences of life, and does not seek to be either unusual or profound. But if the substance is simple the form is the reverse. For Welsh verse is immensely complex. "I have not found under the sky so closely woven a web," writes Archdeacon Prys ; and "the four-and-twenty strict metres," which were "first classified" in 1451, " con- stitute," says Mr. Graves, "a system of prosody which is, for intricacy of construction, delicacy of form, and susceptibility of polish, absolutely without parallel outside the ki:..dred poetry of Irish "; while it is rich in every variety of "double rhymes, internal rhymes and assonances, together with peculiar vowel and consonantal sequences." Its appeal in fact is largely dependent, as is the case with Horace's Odes, on the pleasure it affords the ear, and lyric poetry of this type affords almost insuperable difficulties to the translator. But Mr. Graves is an adept in all the mysteries of rhymes and metres, and, apart from all other interests, this volume is a very treasury for all who seek to weave words into song with new cadences and measures. Take, for instance, this passage

from "The Sending of the Summer to Glamorgan" -

"Go forth in thine hour of beauty

And flourishing power, forth go! Summer, and on Morgannwg Thy benison full bestow ; Till on some sweetest morrow Thou greetest each mansion white, Changing the rigour of sorrow To a vigour of warm delight.

Over all her grey manors All thy gay banners wave ; All the pastures thereunder With verdant wonder pave !"

For all its apparent ease this is really almost a miracle of rhyming, while by making many rhymes "internal" and varying their relation to the verse accent, the writer avoids any "surfeiting with honey," and "the taste of sweetness," though abundant, is never in excess. Indeed, to all but metrical experts this use of internal rhyme will, we think, be so novel that we venture to give another instance, from Elis Wyn's "Counsel in View of Death," which also illustrates the strong tendency of modern Welsh poets to become chiefly

serious :- "Travellers by sea and land On remotest mount or strand, Have ye found one secret spot Where Death is not commanding?

Learned scholar, jurist proud, Lifted God-like o'er the crowd, Can your keenest counsel's aid Dispel Death's shade enshrouding P Fervent faith, profound repentance,

Holy hours of stern self-sentence- There alone can victory bring When Death's dread sting shall wring us."

But they can combine seriousness with other thoughts, as in this delightful ending to Ceiriog's "Jenny Jones "

" I love a good neighbour, I love rest from labour, Good music and preaching, my pipe and my purse : But above all and any, I love my own Jenny, For richer or poorer, for better or worse."

We should also, did space allow, like to " daily " over a very delightful- " Dolly " (p. 36) who provokes to extraordinary

extravagance of rhymes, or to introduce the reader to "my Susannah serious" (p. 43), who is also "Diana the imperious," and, above all, to quote at length the "Elegy on Sion Glyn, a Child of Five Years of Age," which as a model of quaint, simple, and touching pathos deserves a place in any anthology. But those who wish to understand either the spirit of "Gallant Little Wales" or Mr. Graves's vigour as a trans- lator will demand at least one stanza from the famous ballad of " Rhnddlan Marsh" :—

" Out of the gloom leap the loud crashing targes, Through the spear-forest the battle-axe breaks,

Arrows fly hissing—to thundering charges E'en to its marges the red morass quakes ! O'er the wild tumult, the wail of the wounded, Hark! the clear voice of Caradoc is rolled : 'Into you breach! or betrayed and surrounded On Rhuddlan Marsh let the moon find us colcL' "

Indeed, even if neither professional politicians nor metrical experts accept our commendation, we can safely leave this interesting volume to the judgment of all those who find in happy versification an amusement and a delight.