At our very doors, however, there is a small nation of largely
different blood and of wholly different speech from our own; a
nation forming a part of our own kingdom, even more closely than
the Scotch or the Irish, and yet in some respects further from us
in mind and habit of life than either; a nation marked rather by
the poetical and artistic, than by the mechanical and practical
temperament--the ancient and noble Welsh people. It would hardly
be reasonable to expect from the Welsh exactly the same kind of
success in life which we often find in English workmen; the aims
and ideals of the two races are so distinct, and it must be frankly
confessed the advantage is not always on the side of the Englishman.
The Welsh peasants, living among their own romantic hills and
valleys, speaking their own soft and exquisite language, treasuring
their own plaintive and melodious poetry, have grown up with an
intense love for beauty and the beautiful closely intwined into the
very warp and woof of their inmost natures. They have almost always
a natural refinement of manner and delicacy of speech which is
unfortunately too often wanting amongst our rougher English
labouring classes, especially in large towns. They are intensely
musical, producing a very large proportion of the best English
singers and composers. They are fond of literature, for which they
have generally some natural capacity, and in which they exercise
themselves to an extent unknown, probably, among people of their
class in any other country. At the local meetings of bards (as they
call themselves) in Wales, it is not at all uncommon to hear that
the first prize for Welsh poetry has been carried off by a shepherd,
and the first prize for Welsh prose composition by a domestic
servant. In short, the susceptibilities of the race run rather
toward art and imagination, than toward mere moneymaking and