I took out a shilling and said: "It is but right that I should pay half of the reckoning, and as the whole affair is merely a shilling matter, I should feel obliged in being permitted to pay the whole, so, landlord, take the shilling and remember you are paid." I then delivered the shilling to the landlord, but had no sooner done so than the man in grey, starting up in violent agitation, wrested the money from the other, and flung it down on the table before me saying:-"No, no, that will never do. I invited you in here to drink, and now you would pay for the liquor which I ordered. You English are free with your money, but you are sometimes free with it at the expense of people's feelings. I am a Welshman, and I know Englishmen consider all Welshmen hogs. But we are not hogs, mind you! for we have little feelings which hogs have not. Moreover, Iwould have you know that we have money, though perhaps not so much as the Saxon." Then putting his hand into his pocket, he pulled out a shilling, and giving it to the landlord, said in Welsh: "Now thou art paid, and mayst go thy ways till thou art again called for. I do not know why thou didst stay after thou hadst put down the ale. Thou didst know enough of me to know that thou didst run no risk of not being paid.""But," said I, after the landlord had departed, "I must insist on being my share. Did you not hear me say that I would give a quart of ale to see a poet?""A poet's face," said the man in grey, "should be common to all, even like that of the sun. He is no true poet, who would keep his face from the world.""But," said I, "the sun frequently hides his head from the world, behind a cloud.""Not so," said the man in grey. "The sun does not hide his face, it is the cloud that hides it. The sun is always glad enough to be seen, and so is the poet. If both are occasionally hid, trust me it is no fault of theirs. Bear that in mind; and now pray take up your money.""The man is a gentleman," thought I to myself, "whether a poet or not; but I really believe him to be a poet; were he not he could hardly talk in the manner I have just heard him."The man in grey now filled my glass, his own, and that of his companion. The latter emptied his in a minute, not forgetting first to say "the best prydydd in all the world!" the man in grey was also not slow to empty his own. The jug now passed rapidly between my two friends, for the poet seemed determined to have his full share of the beverage. I allowed the ale in my glass to remain untasted, and began to talk about the bards, and to quote from their works. I soon found that the man in grey knew quite as much of the old bards and their works as myself. In one instance he convicted me of a mistake.
I had quoted those remarkable lines in which an old bard, doubtless seeing the Menai Bridge by means of second sight, says:- "I will pass to the land of Mona notwithstanding the waters of the Menai, without waiting for the ebb" - and was feeling not a little proud of my erudition, when the man in grey after looking at me for a moment fixedly, asked me the name of the bard who composed them.
"Sion Tudor," I replied.
"There you are wrong," said the man in grey; "his name was not Sion Tudor but Robert Vychan, in English, Little Bob. Sion Tudor wrote an englyn on the Skerries whirlpool in the Menai; but it was Little Bob who wrote the stanza in which the future bridge over the Menai is hinted at.""You are right," said I, "you are right. Well, I am glad that all song and learning are not dead in Ynis Fon.""Dead," said the man in grey, whose features began to be rather flushed, "they are neither dead nor ever will be. There are plenty of poets in Anglesey - why, I can mention twelve, and amongst them and not the least - pooh, what was I going to say? twelve there are, genuine Anglesey poets, born there, and living there for the love they bear their native land. When I say they all live in Anglesey, perhaps I am not quite accurate, for one of the dozen does not exactly live in Anglesey, but just over the bridge. He is an elderly man, but his awen, I assure you, is as young and vigorous as ever.""I shouldn't be at all surprised," said I, "if he was a certain ancient gentleman, from whom I obtained information yesterday, with respect to the birth-place of Gronwy Owen.""Very likely," said the man in grey; "well, if you have seen him consider yourself fortunate, for he is a genuine bard, and a genuine son of Anglesey, notwithstanding he lives across the water.""If he is the person I allude to," said I, "I am doubly fortunate, for I have seen two bards of Anglesey.""Sir," said the man in grey, "I consider myself quite as fortunate, in having met such a Saxon as yourself, as it is possible for you to do, in having seen two bards of Ynis Fon.""I suppose you follow some pursuit besides bardism?" said I; "Isuppose you farm?"
"I do not farm," said the man in grey, "I keep an inn.""Keep an inn?" said I.