four arches in the centre of the building; the style is perfect Gothic, and marks the age of Edward III. The church-yard is inclosed by a slate fence round the bottom of the cone-shaped hill; which, with the neatness of the edifice, and the perspicuous situation, gives it a pleasing appearance; it is celebrated for being the burial-place of Archbishop Williams: a mural monument,* with the figure of the prelate in his archiepiscopal robes, kneeling before an altar, is placed over his remains. This great man was longthe subject and the sport of fortune for a series of years he successively enjoyed her favours, was exalted to the see of Lincoln, became lord-keeper of the privy-seal, and was made metropolitan of York; while in the former station, he was tried by his peers, and being found guilty of subornation, suffered imprisonment from 1637 to 1640. After being liberated, he was raised to the archiepiscopal sce of York: be

* On sight of this monument, Dr. Davis felt himself poetically inspired, and produced the elegant lines preserved in Dodsley's collection, Vol. 6.

After lamenting over the fallen honours of the degraded Prelate, he breaks out in an animated apostrophe.

"Could not thy Lincoln yield her pastor room,
Could not thy York supply thee with a tomb ?"

And ends with this pleasing moral.

"Envied Ambition, what are all thy schemes
But waking misery, or pleasing dreams;
Sliding and tottering on the heights of state,
The subject of this verse declares thy fate.
Great as he was, you see how small the gain
A burial so obscure, a muse so mean."

ing shortly after banished, he died at the house of Sir Roger Mostyn, of Gloddaeth, in 1650, aged 68. Mr. Pennant has said, "that he must be considered as a wise, rather than a good man;" he is charged with being haughty, highly resentful, and his character fraught with duplicity; the protest he made in the House of Lords* is produced as a proof of the former, and the advice he gave his unfortunate master, with regard to the Earl of Strafford, of the latter.

It must be confessed, that in his political conduct the archbishop discovered too much of the cursed doctrine of Machiavel," a public and a private conscience;" but it should be remembered, that he lived in times when political and moral order were trampled under feet: when the spirit of party ran so high, as to overwhelm the consideration of strict justice : aas and the want of charity and honour were lost in the provocations of injury, and the prevarications suggested by the sudden impulse of self-preservation. He retired, in the latter part of his life, to the peaceful retreats of North Wales, devoted his life to me

* In 1641, on the debate for taking away the votes of Bishops in the House of Peers, he, by an impassioned speech, induced eleven Bishops to join him in the protest against all Acts that should pass the House during their forced absence; for this they were impeached of high treason, and doomed to eighteen months imprisonment, but soon after released upon bail. The Archbishop was banished his diocese during the disturbances in the county of York.

+ His advice to Charles was, in case the King could not win Cromwell by promises and fair treatment; to have recourse to stratagem, to secure his person and put him to death.

ditation and prayer, and is said to have met death with a fortitude that must have been inspired by a

believing hope and a resignation, that bespoke the

LETTER X.

DEAR SIR,

Conway.

LEAVING Bangor, with regret, as we pro

ceeded towards Conway the country increased in the richness and variety of the views: the Menai here begins to expand itself from the harbours of Beaumaris and Conway into the Irish sea, beyond the jetting promontories of the great and little Ormeshead the lofty Ogwyn stretching away to the eastward, the sullen Penman-Mawr in front, aud the variety of shipping to and from the harbour of Liverpool in the distant offing, beguiled the time till we found ourselves in the small, but celebrated village of Aber, at the entrance of a glen, that runs in about two miles, bounded on one side by a mountain covered with woods, and on the other by a tremendous slate rock, called Maes y Gaer. In the upper part of the glen, a semicircular rock presents itself, over which, in wild uproar rolls an impetuous mountain torrent, consisting of a double fall, the lowest of which may be about fifty feet, and forming a broad and white sheet of water, whose dashing foam produces a snowy spray or dew, not unlike the Stanbauch observed by travellers amidst the Alps.

The pleasing situation of the inn, under a group of mountains rising in proud pre-eminence above each other in the back-ground, while Anglesea displays her wooded shores in front, may induce the traveller to spend a day at

ABER.

Near the village is a conical mount, on which for merly stood a castle, the palace of the princes of North Wales; in digging lately, some remains of its foundation were discovered: it was here Llewelyn received the summons to deliver up the principality to the crown of England, upon the three qualified conditions advised by the Archbishop of Canterbury, and which produced the spirited memorial, which, for its animated and eloquent diction, might have reflected credit on a more polished age, and at once discovered the oppressive measures pursued by Edward, and the injurious treatment the Welsh experienced from their haughty neighbours. (Vid. Powell.)

This is one of the ferries to Anglesea: when the tide is out, the Lavan sands are dry for four miles over which the passenger has to walk to and from the channel, where the ferry-boat plies; these, frequently shifting, render it highly dangerous, and several instances have occurred of persons having been lost, attempting to cross them. As many are under the necessity of adventuring, a wise and humane precaution has been adopted: the large bell of Aber is rung

R