g up they lost sight of it."

"And how did you learn this?" said the last who had addressed me.

"I read the story," said I, "in a pure Welsh book called the Greal."

"I now remember hearing the same thing," said an old man, "when I was a
boy; it had slipt out of my memory, but now I remember all about it. The
ship was called the _Robert Ellis_. Are you of these parts, gentleman?"

"No," said I, "I am not of these parts."

"Then you are of South Wales--indeed your Welsh is very different from
ours."

"I am not of South Wales," said I, "I am the seed not of the sea-snake
but of the coiling serpent, for so one of the old Welsh poets called the
Saxons."

"But how did you learn Welsh?" said the old man.

"I learned it by the grammar," said I, "a long time ago."

"Ah, you learnt it by the grammar," said the old man; "that accounts for
your Welsh being different from ours. We did not learn our Welsh by the
grammar--your Welsh is different from ours, and of course better, being
the Welsh of the grammar. Ah, it is a fine thing to be a grammarian."

"Yes, it is a fine thing to be a grammarian," cried the rest of the
company, and I observed that everybody now regarded me with a kind of
respect.

A jug of ale which the hostess had brought me had been standing before me
some time. I now tasted it and found it very good. Whilst despatching
it, I asked various questions about the old Danes, the reason why the
place was called the port of the Norwegian, and about its trade. The
good folks knew nothing about the old Danes, and as little as to the
reason of its being called the port of the Norwegian--but they said that
besides that name it bore that of Melin Heli, or the mill of the salt
pool, and that slates were exported from thence, which came from quarries
close by.

Having finished my ale, I bade the company adieu and quitted Port Dyn
Norwig, one of the most thoroughly Welsh places I had seen, for during
the whole time I was in it, I heard no words of English uttered, except
the two or three spoken by myself. In about an hour I reached
Caernarvon.

The road from Bangor to Caernarvon is very good and the scenery
interesting--fine hills border it on the left, or south-east, and on the
right at some distance is the Menai with Anglesey beyond it. Not far
from Caernarvon a sandbank commences, extending for miles up the Menai,
towards Bangor, and dividing the strait into two.

I went to the Castle Inn which fron