Ill with his prey the fox may wend,
When the young lion quits his lair :

Sharp sword, strong shield, stout arm, should tend
On spirits that unjustly dare.

To me the wandering breezes bear
The war-blast from Caer Lleon's brow;
The avenging storm is brooding there

To which Diganwy's towers shall bow.

"If the wind talks to you," said Maelgon, "I may say, with the proverb, you talk to the wind; for I am not to be sung, or cajoled, or vapored, or bullied out of my prisoner. And as to your war-blasts from Caer Lleon, which I construe into a threat that you will stir up King Arthur against me, I can tell you for your satisfaction, and to spare you the trouble of going so far, that he has enough to do with seeking his wife, who has been carried off by some unknown marauder, and with fighting the Saxons, to have much leisure or inclination to quarrel with a true Briton, who is one of his best friends, and his heir-presumptive; for, though he is a man of great prowess, and moreover, saving his reverence and your presence, a cuckold, he has not yet favoured his kingdom with an heir-apparent. And I request you to understand, that when I extolled you above my bards, I did so only in respect of your verse and voice, melody and execution, figure and action, in short, of your manner; for your matter is naught; and I must do my own bards the justice to say

Ἐν δὲ σιδαροδέτοις πόρπαξιν
Αἰθᾶν ἀραχνᾶν ἔργα πέλονται.

Euripides, in a fragment of Erectheus :

Κείσθω δόρυ μοι μίτον αμφιπλέκειν
Αράχναις.

And Nonnus, whom no poetical image escaped (Dionysiaca, L. xxxviii.) :

Οὐ φόνος, οὐ τότε δῆρις· ἔκειτο δὲ τηλόθι χάρμης
Βακχιὰς ἑξαέτηρος ἀραχνιόωσα βοείη.

And Beaumont and Fletcher, in the Wife for a Month:
“Would'st thou live so long, till thy sword hung by,
And lazy spiders filled the hilt with cobwebs ?"

A Persian poet says, describing ruins :

"The spider spreads the veil in the palace of the Cæsars." And among the most felicitous uses of this emblem, must never be forgotten Hogarth's cobweb over the lid of the charity-box.

that, however much they may fall short of you in the requisites aforesaid, they know much better than you do, what is fitting for bards to sing, and kings to hear."

The bards, thus encouraged, recovered from the first shock of Maelgon's ready admission of Taliesin's manifest superiority, and struck up a sort of consecutive chorus, in a series. of pennillion, or stanzas, in praise of Maelgon and his heirship presumptive, giving him credit for all the virtues of which the reputation was then in fashion; and amongst the rest, they very loftily celebrated his justice and magnanimity.

Taliesin could not reconcile his notions of these qualities with Maelgon's treatment of Elphin. He changed his measure and his melody, and pronounced, in impassioned numbers, the poem, which a learned Welsh historian calls "The Indignation of the Bards," though, as the indignation was Taliesin's, and not theirs, he seems to have made a small mistake in regard to the preposition.

THE INDIGNATION OF TALIESIN WITH THE BARDS OF MAELGON GWYNETH.

False bards the sacred fire pervert,
Whose songs are won without desert;
Who falsehoods weave in specious lays,
To gild the base with virtue's praise.

From court to court, from tower to tower,
In warrior's tent, in lady's bower,

For gold, for wine, for food, for fire,
They tune their throats at all men's hire.

Their harps re-echo wide and far
With sensual love, and bloody war,
And drunkenness, and flattering lies:
Truth's light may shine for other eyes.

In palaces they still are found,
At feasts, promoting senseless sound :
He is their demigod at least,
Whose only virtue is his feast.

They love to talk; they hate to think;
All day they sing; all night they drink :
No useful toils their hands employ;
In boisterous throngs is all their joy.
The bird will fly, the fish will swim,
The bee the honied flowers will skim;
Its food by toil each creature brings,
Except false bards and worthless kings.

Learning and wisdom claim to find
Homage and succour from mankind
But learning's right, and wisdom's due,
Are falsely claimed by slaves like you.

True bards know truth, and truth will show ;
Ye know it not, nor care to know:

Your king's weak mind false judgment warps;
Rebuke his wrong, or break your harps :

I know the mountain and the plain;
I know where right and justice reign;
I from the tower will Elphin free;
Your king shall learn his doom from me.
A spectre of the marsh shall rise,
With yellow teeth, and hair, and eyes
From whom your king in vain aloof
Shall crouch beneath the sacred roof.

He through the half-closed door shall spy
The Yellow Spectre sweeping by ;
To whom the punishment belongs

Of Maelgon's crimes and Elphin's wrongs.

By the name of the Yellow Spectre, Taliesin designated a pestilence, which afterwards carried off great multitudes of the people, and, amongst them, Maelgon Gwyneth, then sovereign of Britain, who had taken refuge from it in a church. Maelgon paid little attention to Taliesin's prophecy, but he was much incensed by the general tenor of his song.

"If it were not," said Maelgon, "that I do not choose to add to the number of the crimes of which you so readily accuse me, that of disregarding the inviolability of your bardship, I would send you to keep company with your troutcatching king, and you might amuse his salmon-salting majesty with telling him as much truth as he is disposed to listen to; which, to judge by his reception of Rhûn's story of his wife, I take to be exceedingly little. For the present, you are welcome to depart; and, if you are going to Caer Lleon, you may present my respects to King Arthur, and tell him, I hope he will beat the Saxons, and find his wife; but I hope, also, that the cutting me off with an heir-apparent will not be the consequence of his finding her, or (which, bythe-by, is more likely) of his having lost her."

Taliesin took his departure from the hall of Diganwy, leaving the bards biting their lips at his rebuke, and Maelgon roaring with laughter at his own very excellent jest.

CHAPTER X.

THE DISAPPOINTMENT OF RHUN.

Παρθένε, πῶς μετάμειψας ἐρευθαλέην σέο μορφὴν ;
Εἰαρινὴν δ ̓ ἀκτῖνα τίς ἔσβεσε σεῖο προσώπου;
Οὐκέτι σῶν μελέων ἀμαρύσσεται ἄργυφος ἄιγλη
Οὐκέτι δ', ὡς τὸ πρόσθε, τεαὶ γελόωσιν ὀπωπαὶ.

Sweet maid, what grief has changed thy roseate grace,
And quenched the vernal sunshine of thy face?
No more thy light form sparkles as it flies,

Nor laughter flashes from thy radiant eyes.

VENUS TO PASITHEA, in the 33d Book of the
DIONYSIACA OF NONNUS.

ALIESIN returned to the dwelling of Elphin, auguring that, in consequence of his information, Rhon would pay it another visit. In this anticipation he was not mistaken, for Rhûn very soon appeared, with a numerous retinue, determined, apparently, to carry his point by force of arms. He found, however, no inmate in the dwelling but Taliesin and Teithrin ap Tathral.

Rhûn stormed, entreated, promised, and menaced, without success. He perlustrated the vicinity, and found various caverns, but not the one he sought. He passed many days in the search, and, finally, departed; but, at a short distance, he dismissed all his retinue, except his bard of all work, or laureate expectant, and accompanied by this worthy, returned to the banks of the Mawddach, where they resolved themselves into an ambuscade. It was not long before they saw Taliesin issue from the dwelling, and begin ascending the hill. They followed him, at a cautious distance; first up a steep ascent of the forest-covered rocks; then along a small space of densely-wooded tableland to the end of a dingle; and, again, by a slight descent, to the bed of a mountain stream, in a spot where the torrent flung itself, in a series of cataracts, down the rift of a precipitous rock, that towered high above their heads. About half way up the rock, near the base of one of these cataracts, was a projecting ledge, or natural platform of rock, behind which was seen the summit of the opening of a cave. Taliesin paused and looked around him, as if to ascertain that he was unobserved; and then, standing on a projection of the rock below, he mingled, in

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spontaneous song, the full power of his voice with the roar of the waters.

TALIESIN.

Maid of the rock! though loud the flood,
My voice will pierce thy cell:

No foe is in the mountain wood,

No danger in the dell :

The torrents bound along the glade;

Their path is free and bright;

Be thou as they, oh mountain maid!
In liberty and light.

Melanghel appeared on the rocky platform, and answered to the song of her lover:

MELANGHEL.

The cataracts thunder down the steep;
The woods all lonely wave:

Within my heart thy voice sinks deep
That calls me from my cave.

The voice is dear, the song is sweet,
And true the words must be :

Well pleased I quit the dark retreat,
To wend away with thee.

TALIESIN.

Not yet; not yet; let nightdews fall,
And stars be bright above,

Ere to her long deserted hall

I guide my gentle love.

When torchlight flashes on the roof,

No foe will near thee stray.

Even now his parting courser's hoof

Rings from the rocky way.

MELANGHEL.

Yet climb the path and comfort speak,

To cheer the lonely cave,

Where woods are bare, and rocks are bleak,

And wintry torrents rave.

A dearer home my memory knows,

A home I still deplore;

Where firelight glows, while winds and snows
Assail the guardian door.

Taliesin vanished a moment from the sight of Rhûn, and almost immediately reappeared by the side of Melanghel, who had now been joined by her mother. In a few minutes she returned, and Angharad and Melanghel withdrew.