THE CONQUEST OF WALES.

AFTER the Saxons had possessed themselves of the greater part of South Britain, there was still a portion on the western coast which remained unconquered. It included Wales, the ancient Cambria,1 with Cornwall and Devon, or West Wales, as they were sometimes called. Here the Britons long maintained their freedom in the shelter of their hills and woods.

How the inhabitants of Cambria came to be

called Welsh 2 is not quite clear; but the name is probably derived from a word meaning foreigner, and applied to them by their Teutonic neighbours.

Athelstan, who died in the year 940, added the whole of the west of England to his dominions, and he made the Welsh kings pay tribute. The Normans preferred the same claim, and when it was rejected resolved to seize upon Wales. William the Conqueror promised to his followers the possession of any land which they could get; and those nobles called Lords of the Marches, who had been granted estates on the borders of Wales, were very willing to avail themselves of this offer. The turmoil that ensued may be easily imagined.

Henry I. settled a colony of Flemings, who craved his aid, in Pembrokeshire, and they were hateful to the natives. Indeed, for a long while there was no peace in South Wales, and it was considered as fair to murder an enemy as to slay him in battle. Only North Wales kept its independence. There, as elsewhere, the mountains were the refuge and the rampart of the oppressed, the last home of freedom.

The Welsh reaped the advantage of the wars between Stephen 5 and Matilda, which convulsed England for many miserable years; and when the English were too busy to hinder them, they won back some of the territory of which they had been deprived. In 1157, however, Henry II. determined to regain what had been lost, and with a large army he invaded Flintshire; but his expedition was a failure, for he did not know the country,

and on one occasion he was defeated by the mountaineers in a narrow, wooded pass.

A monk who travelled through Wales thirty years later has left on record his impressions, and the information he collected, respecting the country · and its people. He speaks of the cornfields and the pasture-lands, the salmon, the wild deer on the mountain tops, and the beavers in the river Teivy." He tells us how hardy the natives were, how moderate in eating and drinking, and how hospitable, quick-tempered, and proud of high descent. But he also says that they were apt to be faithless, and given to plundering. He alludes to their famous bards and harps, and notices how both men and women cut their hair short. The good monk's conclusion is, that it will be difficult to subdue them because of their pride and obstinacy.

There had been an admission of English supremacy on the part of Wales in early Saxon times, and again during the reign of Henry III. In consequence of some domestic feuds in the Welsh royal family, homage was also tendered to him by two of its princes, and he made a present of Wales to his eldest son. But this was only a nominal gift, for its actual conquest did not take place until a more spirited prince held the sovereignty.

This was the unfortunate Llewelyn, who had joined Simon de Montfort and the barons against Henry, but had afterwards promised fealty to him. He was betrothed to Eleanor, the daughter of De Montfort, in the days of her father's triumph, and in 1276 she sailed from France to meet her bride

groom in Wales.

This was when Edward I. was on the throne of England, and he had three times summoned the Prince of Wales as a vassal, but Llewelyn had declined to come without a safe conduct.8

To punish this disobedience, Edward seized the vessel which carried Eleanor, and kept her a prisoner, heeding neither Llewelyn's indignation nor his offered ransom; and the same year the Parliament pronounced his lands forfeited.

Edward's next step was the invasion of Wales, and Llewelyn was soon reduced to sore straits. His brother David, to avenge a personal wrong, had leagued himself with the English, and the harassed prince at last consented to the hard terms imposed on him. Eleanor was then given up to Llewelyn, but she did not live to see the utter ruin which overtook him and his cause.

Neither he nor his subjects, however, could brook the insulting usage which they received from some of the English barons; and in five years' time the war was renewed, David being the first to commence hostilities on behalf of his country. In this campaign Edward sustained great loss when trying to cross the Menai Straits by a bridge of boats; for the Welsh troops suddenly advancing, he was obliged to retreat hastily, and many of his men perished.

Soon afterwards Llewelyn fell in a skirmish ; and his chiefs, deprived of their leader, submitted to Edward; all but David, who held out until, being betrayed and made prisoner, he was put to death

at Shrewsbury, with horrible barbarity, as guilty of high treason.

The legend of a wholesale massacre of the Welsh bards seems to be without foundation, for they continued to abound in Wales. We all remember the pleasanter story of the infant prince,10 born in Carnarvon Castle, with whom his royal father endeavoured to soothe the wounded pride of the Welsh nobles. Ever since that time the eldest son of the king of England has been the Prince of Wales.

For a long while intense hatred was the strongest feeling of the Welsh toward the English. Edward showed a far-sighted wisdom by improving, without wholly changing, their laws; so that they were better off in this respect than they had been before. But seldom has a conqueror's hand pressed lightly in the beginning of its sway; certainly it was not wont to do so in the Middle Ages.

1 Cam'-bri-a, the Latin name for the land of the Cymry (pron. Cumry) or Britons.

2 Welsh: "All nations of the Teutonic blood have called the neighbouring tribes by the name of Wälsche, that is, Welshmen, or 'foreigners.' Walschland is the German name of Italy. The AngloSaxons called their Celtic neighbours Welsh, and their country by the name of Wales. The Welsh call themselves Cymry."

3 The march'-es, the country lying about and near the marks which indicate the limits of two kingdoms.

queror, seized on the English throne in opposition to Matilda, or Maud, daughter of Henry I. Her son, as Henry II., succeeded Stephen.

6 Tei'-vy, a river in Cardiganshire which falls into Cardigan Bay.

7 Lle-wel'-yn ascended the throne of North Wales in 1274. He was the last native prince.

8 Safe conduct, a guarantee that he should be protected in going and returning.

9 It was on his return from the battle in which Llewelyn fell that Edward is supposed to have ordered the slaughter of the bards. The poet Gray wrote a poem on this subject, entitled "The Bard."

10 The infant prince, afterwards Edward II., the first Prince of Wales.