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 his 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

Whittney perceiving, new doubts and jealousies began to tumble in his brains for, thought he, if Griffith ap Nicholas appear thus in a hostile manner unto us, with multitudes of men prepared and fitted as for the field, it is not likely he will obey our commission, or stand at all to the trial of justice, unless he be innocent. They had not gone above five miles further, to a house of his called Newton, but Ŏwen ap Griffith, the second son, saluted them in a far braver equipage, having two hundred horse attending, well manned and well armed. This Owen had much of his father's craft and subtilty in him; he was bold, besides, and active; he could, like the Camelion, or Proteus-like, take all shapes, turn himself into all colours; an excellent artisan he was in discovering men's secrets, and observing their dispositions. The commissioners had not rested themselves above an hour or two, but he dived so far into their counsels as gave him assurance his father was the chief man shot at in that commission, a thing they were ignorant of before. Whereupon, consultation was taken for to steal away the commission, which this Owen undertook, and performed accordingly. To Carmarthen, at last, they came, where in their way at Abergivilly, a small village about a mile this side the town, Thomas ap Griffith, the elder, a man of a sweet, mild, and gentle disposition, presented his services first to his father, and then to the commissioners: he had five hundred tall men, following him, and they well disciplined, whom, before, in good order, on foot he leads, even till they come to the commissioners' lodgings, and there Griffith ap Nicholas left them for that night, commanding his three sons to attend them at supper, and to see them fairly entreated."

With this injunction, these dutiful sons complied to the very letter. The commissioners "were so well liquored, that, for that night, they forgot quite the erraud they came for ;" and Owen ap Griffith succeeded in gaining possession of the commission. The next morning, Griffith ap Nicholas was formally summoned to appear before the commissioners, the mayor, and sheriffs, and he was arrested, in the king's name, to answer certain accusations preferred against him. Griffith, well aware of the loss which the commissioners had unwittingly sustained, submitted with a shew of much obedient humility, at the same time observing, that "he held himself not bound to stand to the arrest, or to make any answer to the charge," unless the commission was publicly read, and every thing managed in a fair and legal manner. "Reason good," said the Lord Whittney, "and you shall both see it, and hear it read:" and so putting his hand up the sleeve of his cloak for the commission, he found that there it was not, neither did any of his fellows or followers know what was become of it, or whom they might charge. It was now Griffith's turn to act the great man, and accordingly he "starts up in a fury, clapping his hat upon his head, and looking about upon his sons and friends. What,' says he, have we cozeners and cheaters come hither to abuse

6

the king's power, and to disquiet his true-hearted subjects?' Then, turning about to the commissioners, he raps out a great oath, and says, ere the next day were at an end, he would hang them up all for traitors and impostors,' and so commands hands to be laid on them and to carry them to prison." By this manœuvre the Welchman made his own terms, and my Lord Whittney and his colleagues were fain to make their exit out of the country, without insisting upon any compliance with the terms of their commission. What was the issue of this great affront," observes our author, or how digested by the state, I could never learn, only it is to be imagined that it was hushed up and smothered, as fearing, in those wavering and tottering times, to proceed in a rough and harsh way, with one so potent among the Welsh as this man

was."

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One consequence of this adventure, however, was the termination of the cautious neutrality, which the Welch chieftain had hitherto maintained, with regard to the "rival roses," and he "directly and resolutely thrust himself into the Yorkish cause," to the great satisfaction of the adherents of that party.The hostility which had existed between Griffith and the Duke of York was speedily ended, and the new ally entered, with heart and hand, into the plans and operations of the Duke's party. But the time was now approaching, when the valorous Griffith was to be gathered to those fathers, whose honour he had so highly magnified. After the battle of Wakefield, where the Duke of York was slain, the Earl of March, his eldest son, collected all the force in his power to revenge his father's death.

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Among the many that resorted unto him, Griffith ap Nicholas was of most eminent note, having seven or eight hundred men following of him, well armed, well ordered, goodly of stature and hearts answerable thereunto. The Earl of March's design was, to have met and encountered with the Queen, and his father's murderers, in the field, but Jasper, Earl of Pembroke, stood as a block in his way, who, for his honour's sake, at that time had been better employed elsewhere; although he proved somewhat cross to the Earl of March's purpose's, yet Griffith ap Nicholas was much joyed thereat, hoping now to be fully revenged of the Earl of Pembroke for old displeasure. To be brief, both armies met on a plain, near Mortimer's Cross. After large demonstrations of prowess and magnanimity on either side, Griffith ap Nicholas receives a mortal wound. Owen ap Griffith, his second son (the eldest being left at home to secure his own fortunes) stands at the head of his father's troops, maintains the fight, and pursues the Earl of Pembroke even to flight: so the day fell to the Yorkish side. Then Owen ap Griffith, making search for his father, found him lying on the ground, panting and breathing for life, to whom he made a short relation of the Earl of