beci)mes, therefore, important to examiue the sources from which

the story has been derived tnd the story itself. It is perfectly ob ious that eveu if it is snbstmtitlly true, mtny of the detdls must have no surer foun&ttion than the imagination of writers. How. for instmce, was it possible to know the length of time occupied by the second voyage, if with it all intercourse between the new colony and Wtles had ceased'? But though one historigin bts gone so ftr as to give the exttct strength, viz., eighteen vessels, aml three thousaud inch, of the force which sailed on the second expeditiou, and the exact date, 1164, ith the further details that Mtdoc took possession of the Mexican throne, tnd thtt the ftmily tr;tditions of the Aztecs, when Cortes arrived, clearly showed their connection with Vtles; and though tnother has recorded the discovery of Madoc's cpit;tph in the Vest Indies, such things add discredit but do not wholly disprove. It is the nature of a tradition to acquire detail in trimsmission.

First, then, as to the sources of the tradition. There is no allnsiou to Madoc in the 'Brut y Tywysogion,' or 'The Chrouicle of the l'rinces of Wales,' which appears to have been coinposed in the twelfth century, about Madoc's date, and which lmtkes frequent mention of Owain Gwynedd, his father? Mtd is first nlentioued by a twelfth-century poet a as having been slain, tpp;trcntly in battle. As the poein, in which this reference occurs, opens with an appeal to Owain, and lunents the death of several of ]ils children, it is only fair to conclude that here is the Madoc who wts supposed to h;tve stilcd to America. Another poem, by its reference to" assassin slaying Mtdoc," s strengthens this belief. It is not till the nfiddle or close of the fifteenth century that there is any trace of the trtdition as we now hve it, when Meredydd ap Rhys sings,

given in If. B. Anderson's ' America not Discovell hy ',luml,us' (l'hicago, pp. 142-1411. '1' this sh.uhi be added the article "M:uhg" in the 'Diet. Bi,gral,hy,' vol. 33, which is distinctly uufivoural,le. )ther reftrelives are given J. Winsor's ' Histo T of America' (Ltanhn, 18S), vol. i. 11 l, mte 8.

a 3I-rgan, ' British Kymry,' 166. e Hwell, quoted in Madoc, M.n. Brit., , . l'ide also text in the same volume. The dale of the the lh-ut is tbm'teenth century. It is ascribed to qm ('aradoc. The absence of all mention of [adoc is not absolutely conclusive as the book may have been composed hefire he Icame

I'ynddelw, Madoe, S. :' lAywatch, Madame, 12. The oh-quotl passage fi'om Llywax.h, "Ker abet I'.lgwy," etc. eems to have nothing whatever to do with Madoe. Madoc, 21)3, Ill,res.