ross
purposes. I asked him about Rhys Goch and his chair. He told me that he
knew nothing of either, and began to talk of Her Majesty's ministers and
the fine sights of London. I asked him the name of a stream which,
descending a gorge on our right, ran down the side of a valley, to join
the river at its bottom. He told me that he did not know, and asked me
the name of the Queen's eldest daughter. I told him I did not know, and
remarked that it was very odd that he could not tell me the name of a
stream in his own vale. He replied that it was not a bit more odd than
that I could not tell him the name of the eldest daughter of the Queen of
England: I told him that when I was in Wales I wanted to talk about Welsh
matters, and he told me that when he was with English he wanted to talk
about English matters. I returned to the subject of Rhys Goch and his
chair, and he returned to the subject of Her Majesty's ministers, and the
fine folks of London. I told him that I cared not a straw about Her
Majesty's ministers and the fine folks of London, and he replied that he
cared not a straw for Rhys Goch, his chair or old women's stories of any
kind.

Regularly incensed against the old fellow, I told him he was a bad
Welshman, and he retorted by saying I was a bad Englishman. I said he
appeared to know next to nothing. He retorted by saying I knew less than
nothing, and almost inarticulate with passion added that he scorned to
walk in such illiterate company, and suiting the action to the word
sprang up a steep and rocky footpath on the right, probably a short cut
to his domicile, and was out of sight in a twinkling. We were both
wrong: I most so. He was crusty and conceited, but I ought to have
humoured him and then I might have got out of him anything he knew,
always supposing that he knew anything.

About an hour's walk from Tan y Bwlch brought me to Festiniog, which is
situated on the top of a lofty hill looking down from the south-east, on
the valley which I have described, and which as I know not its name I
shall style the Valley of the numerous streams. I went to the inn, a
large old-fashioned house standing near the church; the mistress of it
was a queer-looking old woman, antiquated in her dress and rather blunt
in her manner. Of her, after ordering dinner, I made inquiries
respecting the chair of Rhys Goch, but she said that she had never heard
of such a thing, and after glancing at me askew, for a moment,