1 GWIBNANT. to her brethren three notable rogues of the damned crew fit for any mischief, being followers of Howel ap Rys.' These watched the parfon, and as he went one morning to look to his cattle, cruelly murdered him; the fequel is told in the Welsh Tour, vol. i. p. 291, and the proper end of the villains.-Thefe extracts are taken from the hiftory of the Gwedir family, a curious publication, for which we are indebted to my true friend the Honorable Daines Barrington. WHEN I came into poffeffion of Downing, by the death of my excellent father David Pennant, the house had partly transome, partly fashed windows. By confulting a drawing of it in that state, may be known the changes made by myself. With the eflate, I luckily found a rich mine of lead ore, which enabled me to make the great improvements I did. The grounds were much hurt by a vile road running in front and on one fide of the house, and through the middle of the demefne, to the hamlet called Gwibnant, or the meandring glen. The house was planted up almost to the door, which gave it a very melancholy gloom. But I foon laid open the natural beauties of the place, and by the friendly exchange Sir Roger Moftyn made with me, enlarged the fine scenery of the broken grounds, the woods, and the command of water. The walks in the near grounds, the fields, and the deep and darkfome dingles, are at left three miles in extent, and the dingle not ill united with the open grounds, by a fubterraneous paffage under the turnpike road. I am not a little flattered by the admiration of those who vifit the place. Mr. Boydel has published a fine engraving of the house among his Welsh feats. I have, as a head-piece to p. 1. of this Work, given it in the prettiest representation. My VIEWS. My grounds confift of very extenfive walks along the fine GROUNDS. fwelling lands, beneath the fhady depth of the glens, or through the contracted meads which meander quite to the fhore. The views are various towards the hills, and the antient Pharos on Garreg. Over the channel of the Dee, the Hilbree ifles, on one of which had been a cell of Benedictines, dedicated to our Lady, and dependent on Chester and poffibly the hermitage called Hilburghey, which in the fecond of Edward III. received ten fhillings a year from a charity belonging to the caftle at Chester. The dreary woodlefs tract of Wiral, a hundred of Cheshire, ftretches eastward as far as its capital, chequered with black heaths, and with corn, a bad return to the prospect of our wooded flope; yet formerly was fo well cloathed as to give occafion to this diftich: From Blacon point to Hilbree A squirrel might leap from tree to urce. But our sea view is animated with the fight of the numerous fleets entering and failing out of the port of Liverpool, now fwelled into a vast emporium, from (a century and a half ago) a most infignificant fishing town. In the near view below the house are the ruins of the abbey of Molandina: notwithstanding they are not very confiderable, they do not want their beauties. Let me confess that this is a trap for antiquaries, the name derived from Mola being a deferted mill, antiquated by myself as an impofture innocente. Above this is a fpreading oak of great antiquity, fize, and extent of branches it has got the name of the Fairy Oak. In this very century FAIRY OAK. century a poor cottager, who lived near the fpot, had a child who grew uncommonly peevish; the parents attributed this to the fairies, and imagined that it was a changeling. They took the child, put it in a cradle, and left it all night beneath the tree, in hopes that the tylwydd têg, or fairy family, or the fairy folk, would reftore their own before morning. When morning came they found the child perfectly quiet, fo went away with it, quite confirmed in their belief. Shakspeare and Spenfer allude to this popular fiction. Spenfer is particularly allufive to the above: And her bafe elfin breed there for thee left, Such men do changelings call, fo chang'd by fairies theft. Besides this oak is another, on a spot within the pleasure-grounds called Mount Airy. It probably is of superior age to that I have just mentioned; it is truly picturesque, and has in it furrows fo deep, and of aspect so uncommonly venerable, as to render its shade as worthy of the folemn rites of the Druids, as thofe of Mone in its most profperous days. At a finall diftance below are three evergreen oaks, of a confiderable fize; I do not know how they came there, for the wood in my father's time was in a state of nature. Below thofe is a very antient towering oak of great fize; and in a dingle, near the field called the Coxet, is a tree of the fame species of great fize and beauty, yet retaining the very habit of a vigorous fapling. These and a fine Spanish chefnut are the boaft of my Sylvan fhades. If I digrefs, beyond them let me mention a most antient pear tree, which gives name to a field, Coitia Pren Gellig; the stem has not a relique of found timber, it confists entirely of rotten |