Aer y Glyn, meifir rhoddlyn rhydd, 2. Ner mawlair naw rym milwr, 3. Dagrau dros vy ngrudd dygrych, O bonod, vawr glod v' Arglwydd! 4. Daroganawdd drymlawdd dro, 18 The omen alluded to was a ftar and fiery dragon; which, according to the interpretation of Merddyn, predicted the reign of Uthur, afterwards furnamed Pendragon, from having caufed two golden Dragons to be made, one of which he presented to the 3 Lord of Dwrdwy's fertile vale, Alas! in an unguarded hour! For high in blood, with British beverage hot, But foon my generous chief forgave 2. But leave me not, illustrious lord! I faw the god-like hero go; I faw, with aching heart, Wild with despair, and woe-begone, 3. The sweet remembrance, ever dear, Down Gruffudd's furrow'd cheek? I heard, (who has not heard thy fame ?) Loud echo'd by the trump of war, Which spoke thee brave, and void of fear; Yet of a gentle heart poffefs'd, That bled within thy generous breast, Wide o'er the fanguine plain to see On fea, on land, thou still didst brave The dangerous cliff and rapid wave; Like Urien, who fubdu'd the knight, And the fell dragon put to flight, Yon mofs-grown fount, befide; Before his fword the mighty fled: 6. In future times thy honour'd name How terrible thy afhen fpear, Which shook the braveft heart with fear! More horrid than the lightning's glance, The harbinger of death. Dire, and more dire, the conflict grew; Midft charging hofts unmov'd you stood, Or waded thro' a sea of blood. Though heroic Poetry was afterwards no more attempted in Wales, a long feries of Bards fucceeded, who by their elegies and odes have made their names memorable to ages. Among these Davydd ab Gwilym', the Welsh Ovid, poffeffes a deferved pre-eminence. He often adds the fublime to the beautiful; of which his Cywydd y Daran2, or Ode of the Thunder, is a noble proof. It is the picture of a well-chosen scene, admirably varied: it opens with placid ideas, and rural images; a lovely maiden, and a delightful profpect: then fucceeds a fudden and tremendous change of the elements; the beauties of nature overshadowed and concealed; the terror of animals, and the fhricks of the fair-one. A thoufand inftances of fimilar excel. lence might be produced from the writings of this elegant Bard, and his contemporaries. Let thofe who complain that by the present scarcity of works of genius they are reduced to beftow on Horace, Pindar, and Gray, a tenth perufal, explore the buried treasures of Welsh Poetry, and their fearch will be rewarded with new fources of pleasure, and new beauties of language and fancy. *The feal of Owain Glyndwr, as defcribed in a MS. was, the effigy of Owain fitting in a chair of ftate, holding a icepter in his right hand, and a globe in his left; and by his fide were three lions, two and one: on the other, he is reprefented on horfeback. Darydd ab Gwilym, flourished about the year 1370. All this Bard's poems are publifhed in an octavo volume, with an account of his life, &c. in English. The title is, Barddoniaeth Davydd ab Gwilym; and fold by Williams, Bookfeller, in the Strand. 2 The Ode of the Thunder is in p. 20. of Davydd ab Gwi lym's Works. For the following remarks I am obiged to that excellent Welfh critic, the late Mr. Lewis Morris. Mr. Pope, in his Preface to the Iliad, enumerating Homer's excellencies, next to his boundless invention places his imitative founds, and makes them peculiar to him and Virgil, and fays that no other poet ever reached this point of art. Davydd ab Gwilym, if I miftake not, has alfo a ftrong claim to this excellency. You muft either allow of the atomical philofophy; or thar, copying nature by its own light, he intended his Cywydd y Daran thould found what it really is a defcrip tion of thunder and lightning, though in his love poems, and other fott fubjects (of which I have now by me near a hundred), he is as fmooth, and glides as eafy, as an Italian fong. "Let thofe who are not over partial to the fchool languages, and are proper judges of ours, compare this poem in its founds, and the loftinefs of its metaphors, with the beft paffages of this kind in the above authors; and I doubt not but they will deem this boldness of comparifon excufable, let Homer's character be ever fo facred." Tlyfau'r hen oefoedd. ODE TO THE SUN*, by Davydd ab Gwilym 3. Tranflated into English, by Mr. David Samwell. This Ode was written by the Bard, to tefiify his gratitude to the inhabitants of the county of Glamorgan, who had (it would feem) by a general fubfcription, raised a sum of money to liberate him from confinement, into which he had been thrown, on account of a fine laid upon him, for an illicit amour with the wife of a person of the name of Cynvrig Cynin; whom he had fatirized in feveral parts of his work, under the name of Bwa bách, or the little Hunchback. The fairest planet thou, that flies O thou! with radiant glory crown'd, Before all planets thee I prize, *Milton finely calls the Sun, "The eye and foul of this world." 3 See the Life and Writings of Davydd ab Gwilym, p. 180. printed by Williams, in the Strand. But o'er her green vales through the day, Th' effulgence of thy light difplay; Great Sun! how wide thy glory ftreams! Whofe fons are brave, whofe daughters chafte; Difplays th' induftrious housewife's care, With wine and mead I fill my horn.- 1 ODE Dear Morvydh claims my first regard, Full oft, when Night her mantle spread, My ardent vows of endless love. I know her by her fragrant breath; Her voice I know the groves among, Abfent from her 1 find no reft, At her approach my forrows fly, My heart exults with ecstasy; The faithful Mufe renews her ftrain, Poetic visions fire my brain; Sound judgement leads my steps along, And flowing language crowns my fong; But not one happy hour have I If lovely Morvydh be not nigh. Monody on Sion Eós, or John the Nightingale, fo called from his celebrity on the Harp, for which he had no equal. He was fentenced to die for man-flaughter: his weight in gold was offered for his ranfom; but the law required life for life! This pathetic Elegy was fung by Davydd ab Edmwnt, a celebrated Bard, who obtained the badge of the British Olympics, about A. D. 1450. Drug i neb a drig yn ôl, Gwefł am un, gwas dymunol: O wyr! ban na bai orau, Ymryfon am yr oefau, A man punished for an action in his own defence! Let misfortune attend fuch that faileth. Of evils, the leffer the better. O then! had it not been better, fince one fell, not to facrifice the other through mere revenge? Avenged for fhedding the crimfon gore of an inveterate foe; one flain, the other punished; two enmities! An enormous failing, that fentence of death fhould be the iffue of chance-medley. Life for life they laid; the death of one was the dire effect; and that avenged; then both fell. A'i ddial, lladd y ddeuwr ! 2 corph, dros y corph os caid Tr iawn, oedd well yr enaid? See the original of this poem in Davydd ab Gwilym's Works, 8vo, p. 498. Davydd ab Gwilym informs us, in one of his poems, that he addreffed his beloved Morwydd with no less than a hundred and forty-feven Cywyddau, which is more extraordinary than that of Petrarch to Laura; because each of Davydd 3 Is the foul of the flain made happier, or his ghost appeased, by having life for life as an atonement? ab Gwilym's Odes are as long as five or fix of Petrarch's Sonnets. The works of this Eard, till extant, confifts of near 300 poems. Cardiganfhire. He died about the year 1400, and was buried at Arad Fflur, in Oedd |