manuscripts, which has been mouldering on the dusty shelves of an unfrequented library, but which, from the historical value of its contents, and from the quaint and amusing manner in which those contents are registered, merits the especial attention of all those who are attached to the study of the earlier history of our country.

This learned composition-and learned indeed it is- was never intended for publication. Like the History of the Gwedir Family, it was written by a descendant to commemorate the mighty exploits of an ancestor, who, as we may learn from his numerous titles, was a man of no ordinary importance in his day. The writer lived and flourished under the erudite reign of James the First; and we have every reason to believe that the documents made use of in the compilation were perfectly authentic indeed, we have cause to know that several of the incidents which are recorded-although trivial in themselves-are borne out by facts of greater importance, and so placed beyond the reach of doubt. It must not be supposed that a man of Rice ap Thomas's rank and consequence left no traces of his glory among the mountain-wilds of the Principality: there are still in existence several traditions of his prowess, his wisdom, his wealth, and his valour; and although, in many points, these traditions differ from the grave details of his biographer, the variation is only such as we might expect to find between the distant traditions of an untutored and partial peasantry, and the deliberate reflections and records of a learned historian.

We pass over the "Proëme or Apparatus," as it is called, and come at once to the introduction of our hero.

"Oh! there was a time when we had our Mutii, our Fabritii, and our Reguli, as well as Rome; and we had our Socrates, and our Catos, too, men little dreading fine, poverty, torment, prison, or death, when the saving or upholding of their country's honour were once in question. That we may not suffer the fame of our noble progenitors utterly to perish, let us but imagine this spacious goodly island to be a fair triangular garden, and out of each corner thereof, among the many sweets there growing, let us select some choice flower of chivalry to solace and refresh our too-much dejected spirits. Fix we our eyes first upon that noble chieftain the stout Earl Percy, and then upon his no less noble antagonist, the renowned Earl Douglas. Examine we their brave actions and doughty performances in that memorable combat of bravery and of gayté de cœur, as the French term it. In Chevy Chace, there may we behold Hector against Ajax, and Ajax against Hector, both conquerors, both conquered equal combatants. Had England and Scotland been wagered for the garland there as Rome and Alba were in time past, there had been champions for them indeed! Now, to add unto these

two worthies (and so make up my triangle) give me leave to point out a third in Wales; for Wales, as that famous commander himself said of the Carthaginians, had its Hannibal too, even the great Rice, the subject of the ensuing discourse,-nay, more than a Hannibal, carrying yet this advantage with him, that he never met with a Marcellus to teach him in martial affairs. He was, to do him right, both a Marcellus and a Fabius Maximus; for, as they of Rome, so he of Wales, might truly be called their sword and buckler. You shall seldom read in martial story of any man adorned with such high attributes and epithets of honour as this Rice was, both by English historiographers, and especially among our Welsh bards; who, in their rhymes and carols, magnify him above all that ever were in those parts."

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His various cognomina then follow, and very grand and sonorous they are. Thus-Tudor Alud, "a famous poete in those days," calls him the sword and buckler of his country; another bard terms him the shield of Britain; a third, the champion of Wales; while others have chronicled his fame under the titles of the head of the world; the scourge of the obstinate, the protector of the innocent, the heart of the soldier, the flower of Cambro-Britons; and, lastly, Camden doth him the honour to call him, Delicia Henrici Octavi. Thus you may see," quoth our annalist," by clapping these eulogiums and favours upon him, of what high estimation that noble gentleman was in those days, when his virtues hammered and hewed him out these glorious titles. Now, should these three brave champions (Percy, Douglas, and Rice to wit) have met and encountered in a fight, this, of necessity, must have followed, England had been England still, Scotland Scotland, and Wales Wales. But peace, and the God of peace, hath produced those effects by conjoining these three in one, which (perhaps) otherwise the doubtful valour of their invincible swords might have perpetually severed―trino uni sit gloria."

Notwithstanding the high honour and excellent fame of his hero, our biographer considers it incumbent upon him to explain, very particularly, why he has been induced to presume to write his life; and these, he says, are my reasons:

"First, to revive an ancient custom of writing the lives of worthy men, that so their fame might not perish. My second reason proceeds from a desire I have to dash in pieces some false forged traditions concerning this Rice, which daily (so apt, for old affection, we are to believe wonders of that man) increaseth among the credulous multitude, and may, hereafter, if not prevented, bring his name, as of others, into suspect. And, lastly, in discharge of the reverence, I owe to his memory (for I may not deny but I have an interest in his blood) I could not chuse but let my pen play the part of a spade, to dig him out of the pit of oblivion. Truth,

then, is the thing I do earnestly aim at, which cannot be attained but by conference with old records. If the gentlemen of Wales, especially they of the North, who are best preservers of antiquity, will peruse their moth-eaten writings, and communicate their knowledge with mine, they shall do great honour to Rice ap Thomas his ashes, and, perhaps, thereby revive the memory of their own noble ancestors, who ran the fortune of the wars with him."

Having thus satisfactorily explained the reasons of his presumption, our historian proceeds with his narrative, commencing with a brief survey of the birth, exploits, lineage, and death, of Griffith ap Nicholas, the grandfather of Rice; a man of great wealth and considerable consequence, "having for power and command, together with fastness of kindred and friends, few equals or superiors; having, also, an estate at least of seven-hundred pound a year, old rent of assize, seven strong castles, and seven houses. For his descent, he was in the fourth degree to Sir Glyder, surnamed the Black Knight of the Sepulchre." As the said Griffith ap Nicholas was actively engaged in the civil commotions, which were occasioned by the rivalry of the houses of York and Lancaster, when

"here a snow-white rose,

And there a red, with fatal blossoming

And deadly fragrance madden'd all the land,"

we shall briefly epitomise his valorous deeds before we proceed to the narration of the exploits of his gallant grandson; commencing with our author's own quaint and curious introduction to those deeds of " high emprize," and stormy turbulence.

"In the niffling days of Henry the Sixth and Edward the Fourth, when we were at our cujus est terra? Abner's question: and no Edipus then living to resolve the same. When the fair face of this flourishing kingdom was so unnaturally scratched and disfigured by the uncivil hands of its own inhabitants. When our crown lay between the anvil and the hammer, in extremo discrimine, neither York's nor Lancaster's; fortune, still like herself, playing at fast and loose with them both, sometimes raising, sometimes depressing the beams of sovereignty with a false finger. When our king was a true lawful king to day, and a traitor to morrow, and so adjudged to be by act of Parliament. Woeful times! when a parliament, the mouth of justice, wrested from its own true bias, durst speak in no other language (true or false) but such as the sword did dictate. When our princes of the blood, and our nobles, had no way of appeasing the fury of Bellona, but with a sacrifice of their own blood. When our commons, and the whole body of this realm, either fearing the event, or perplexed with the tedious debatement of the title, or tired with the heavy pressures of their lingering calamities, were ever ready to split upon a desperate rock, and to conclude (if we guess not

amiss) among themselves juxta vocem illam meretriciam, nec Eboraco soli, nec Lancastria soli, sed dividatur. Oh! the days! In those days, I say, tumultuary, tempestuous days, there was of Wales, among the many that fished in those troublous seas, one Griffith ap Nicholas, a man, for power, riches, and parentage, beyond all the great men in those parts."

Like other great and renowned heroes, the gallant career of Griffith ap Nicholas was predicted to his mother, before he was born.

"The child (now Griffith ap Nicholas) growing in years, proved to be a man of hot, fiery, and choleric spirit; one whose counsels were all in turbido, and, therefore, naturally fitly composed and framed for the times. Very wise he was, and infinitely subtle and crafty, ambitious beyond measure, of a busy, stirring brain, which made many to conjecture (as Themistocles Kis school-master did of him) that sure some great matter hanged over his head."

A person of Griffith's consequence was not long an object of disregard to the opposing factions in England: each was anxious to obtain his alliance; but he cunningly remained neuter. He had, however, his own private quarrels, and with men of the first rank in England.

"Richard, Duke of York, quarrelled with him, for detaining from him one half of two plough lands and a half of land with the appurtenances, lying and being in the Marches of Wales, for which the said Duke brought a præcipe quod reddat against him, to which he refused to appear, being often called upon and warned by the sheriff's summonitors thereunto. Griffith ap Nicholas was captain of the strong castle of Cilgeran, in Pembrokeshire, and held the same by letters patent from the King; which captainship Jasper, Earl of Pembroke, taking a liking to, wrought so by his power at court, that the said latters patent were torn, cancelled, and damned, and a new grant thereof made to the said Earl: and this was the cause of a perpetual heart-burning in them to each other. The quarrel between the Duke of Buckingham and him was the quarrel of old between great one's neighbourhood, and jealousy of each other's power and commandery; and that ceased not between their posterity, till Richard the Third's time, when the Duke of Buckingham and Rice ap Thomas were wrought to lay aside private spleen for the public good."

But notwithstanding the high rank and power of his enemies, Griffith entertained no fears of their vengeance; but remained unshaken and unmoved among the mountain-fastnesses of the country. "The more they bestirred themselves, the more fixed and immoveable was he, not unlike a tree, subject to wind and weather: quæ ipsa vexatione constringitur, et radices certius figit."

Although these great noblemen could not excite him into

open hostility, the sedulous exertions of his own countrymen compelled him sooner than he originally intended to make one of the actors in the busy scene. Griffith, like most of the Welch chieftains at that time, hated the English generally; and his countrymen took advantage of this, " persuading him the times were now fit and seasonable for revenge. Whereupon divers of them, building upon his countenance and protection, made somewhat bold with those of the Marches (a usual thing between the Scotch and English in the borders, upon the like disturbances), robbing and stealing from them their cattle, and what else they could lay hands on, to the great detriment, loss, and endamagement of those neighbouring counties, which Griffith ap Nicholas from time to time passed over, and took no notice." But these enormities grew more extensive, and complaints were at length made to the English government, who deputed a commission to inquire into the circumstances, the chief of which was Lord Whitney. Our amusing biographer shall relate the reception of the commissioners, and the result of their visit.

"Coming to Llanandifry, a town twenty miles distant from Carmarthen, Griffith ap Nicholas (for so goes the tale, which I the rather set down, because I have heard the same sweetened in the relation by that great light and ornament of our church, Andrews, Bishop of Winchester, at his own table; a man much given to the study of the British tongue in his later days, and so (perchance) by way of discourse with some of that country, might catch up this tradition) Griffith ap Nicholas, I say, having notice thereof, met them a mile or two beyond, upon the top of a hill, having four or five in his company raggedly attired, and poorlier horsed, leaving the rest of his train at a distance to follow him, and to be ever ready at his beck and call upon occasion. In the mean while, he salutes the commissioners, makes himself known unto them, and, withal, desires to attend them, for their better guidance and conduction, to the end of their journey. The Lord Whittney, hearing his name, and glad (as he thought) to have him in his toil, yet observing the poorness of his condition, and how beggarly he was attended, it would not sink into the Lord Whittney's head, that this was that great Nicholas, so much famed at court for the extraordinary power and authority he had in his own country; but rather some excursor or boot hailer, in those unquiet times, flying abroad for prey; or, at the best, but some scouts, or espialls, sent out to discover his approach, and so to give notice to malefactors to stand aloof. Well, on they go till they come to Abermarlais castle, and there all these doubts and fears were dispelled, and the true Nicholas ap Griffith discovered; for Thomas ap Griffith the younger, a stout and hardy gentleman, meeting his father in that place, with a hundred tall men bravely mounted, descended there from his horse, and kissed his father's stirrup, and desired to receive his commands, which the Lord