Welsh Journals

for was not every word in it the Word of God "? My grandfather, on my mother's side, could turn at once to any verse you might want, and tell you before-hand on what page of his own big Bible it was to be found, and whether at the top, middle, or bottom. I have a fairly distinct memory of this grandfather of mine. His name was William Williams, and he died when I was about ten years old. I can just see him stooping over and leaning hard on the two sticks by the help of which he walked. Above all, I remember seeing him on his knees in the big pew of the little chapel, with his head thrown far back and his face turned upwards, as he pleaded in passionate earnestness in prayer with his God. I remember him also in the Sunday School, which he attended to the end of his life with faithfulness. He was over 70 years of age at the time,, and so, I have no doubt, were most if not all of his fellow-scholars in the class. His teacher was a rich old shop- keeper of the name of Robert Roberts. I don't know what to do with that old shop-keeper," grumbled my grandfather one Sunday afternoon after the Sunday School. He has been gloating for three Sundays over the chapter that tells of the wealth of Job, wondering what the price of a camel and a yoke of oxen was in those days. I can't get him away from it." For the Sunday School in Wales is an institution for adults as well as for children; and the sanest of all educational institutions in that respect, for it rests on the assumption that the care of the soul, like the care of the body, should be life-long-an assumption which not even a life spent amongst college dons has been able to disprove. My grand- father lived next door to my father and mother, and made walking-sticks in the evenings, while my grandmother stitched and sewed patchwork quilts; and he made presents of the walking-sticks to the most select of his friends. One item more com- pletes his life as far as I remember it. He gave me a lesson in reading Welsh, and, one day, sitting on the side of the bed in my father's workshop, he impressively put on his spectacles, examined the stitches, one by one, which, by way of learning to be a shoemaker, I had put in a leather patch, and he criticised them, praising here and blaming there, as if he was dealing with a work of high art. He was a born teacher." He was also, most probably, a natural orator, for he was the most beautiful public reader of the Bible in all the country round; and most probably of quite a dis- tinct literary genius. In any case his life was very beautiful; for his was kindly and very playful, as well as devout; and he nursed and nurtured his character on the finest book in the world, day by day, throughout the whole of a long, humble, industrious, and very peaceful life. During the latter part of his life, and for a great many years, he worked on the estate of the Squire, Sandbach. When he became old his wages were repeatedly reduced. They were at last reduced to 4s. a week, which was starvation wages even in those days, and on this 4s. a week he was expected to live himself and keep his home going. But the ultimate reward of his long and faithful service was half-a-crown for a week's work, and then, my mother told me, he broke his heart." Of my grandfather on my father's side I have much less to say. He was the tenant of a small farm, situated near the borders of three parishes-Llanfair Talhaiarn, Llan- sannan, and Llanefydd. The farm was itself bordered on the one side by a deep, dark, thickly wooded gully, which was infested at night with bogies. No one who could help it went through Nant-y-Chwil at or after midnight. His name was John Jones, and he was the son of a Harri Jones, a farmer, whose descent I cannot trace, except to Adam and Eve. John Jones was a little man, very fond of horses (and horses of him); and he had a tall wife and nine children, of whom my father, Elias, was the eldest. John Jones died when he was about 60 years old. He was ploughing in his shirt- sleeves in a shower of rain, got thoroughly wet, and after that put on his jacket. He caught a chill, and died of it. His wife, my grandmother, lived after him for many years. She visited us occasionally, and I can always see her knitting and hear her