"I don't understand Welsh. That's
what I call a good one."

"Medrwch siarad Cumraeg?" said the short figure spitting on the carpet.

"Medraf," said I.

"You can, Mr! Well, if that don't whip the Union. But I see: you were
born in the States of Welsh parents."

"No harm in being born in the States of Welsh parents," said I.

"None at all, Mr; I was myself, and the first language I learnt to speak
was Welsh. Did your people come from Bala, Mr?"

"Why no! Did yourn?"

"Why yaas--at least from the neighbourhood. What State do you come from?
Virginny?"

"Why no!"

"Perhaps Pensilvany country?"

"Pensilvany is a fine State," said I.

"So it is, Mr. Oh, that is your State, is it? I come from Varmont."

"You do, do you? Well, Varmont is not a bad state, but not equal to
Pensilvany, and I'll tell you two reasons why; first it has not been so
long settled, and second there is not so much Welsh blood in it as there
is in Pensilvany."

"Is there much Welsh blood in Pensilvany then?"

"Plenty, Mr, plenty. Welsh flocked over to Pensilvany even as far back
as the time of William Pen, who as you know, Mr, was the first founder of
the Pensilvany State. And that puts me in mind that there is a curious
account extant of the adventures of one of the old Welsh settlers in
Pensilvania. It is to be found in a letter in an old Welsh book. The
letter is dated 1705, and is from one Huw Jones, born of Welsh parents in
Pensilvany country, to a cousin of his of the same name residing in the
neighbourhood of this very town of Bala in Merionethshire, where you and
I, Mr, now are. It is in answer to certain inquiries made by the cousin,
and is written in pure old Welsh language. It gives an account of how
the writer's father left this neighbourhood to go to Pensilvania; how he
embarked on board the ship _William Pen_; how he was thirty weeks on the
voyage from the Thames to the Delaware. Only think, Mr, of a ship
now-a-days being thirty weeks on the passage from the Thames to the
Delaware river; how he learnt the English language on the voyage; how he
and his companions nearly perished with hunger in the wild wood after
they landed; how Pensilvania city was built; how he became a farmer and
married a Welsh woman, the widow of a Welshman from shire Denbigh, by
whom he had the writer and several other children; how the father used to
talk to his children about his native region and the places round about
Bala, and fill t