perfected. The Norsemen. it is true. made very long voyages :It an c:u'ly date, but they usually coasted as much s possible, and in sMling fnnn Norwy to Winlmd wouhl go I)y leehind. Greenhind.

tud Newfoundhind. when the tract of open sea t,-, be crossed was

comp;mttively small. The hVelsh had no reputation as navigators and their hards do not mentiou other voyages; indeed. they luu'dly Mlude to ships. Nme literature is full of ships aml nothing elec. The ships of the Welsh are perfectly unknown to ns. and therefore it is useless to speculate upm them. There is no evidence to sh-w tinct they had advanced ranch bevmnl the coracle at this datt,: we do not often meet their navy iu English history; we do not read much of hVelsh pirates at time whcu every seafaring nation t.ok to piracy: and hVelshmen were not prominent amongst onr early saiha%. There is some ground for thinking that the eu'iy Britons were fair sailors; there is none for supposing that the hVelsh had navv or ventured upon hmg voyages in the twelfth century. The talc of Madoc's ship is almost the only nawd incident in hVelsh archa-ology. ()f the gret naval battle in the 5Ienai Stntits we can find no trace in contemporary tmthorities; it scorns as much a figment as Madoc's wyages. a It is, then, superfluous to discuas the question whether

They occasionally v.yage, 1 t Ireland; cid" Brut y Tywysogion: hron. and Memorials of Great Britain,' p. , whert' the voyage of one Owain is noticl. It not neces.arily fi,lJow that he went in a Welsh ship, though this is l,rob:dde. Stel,hen,. Mad-c, 2o9. is against any voy:lge. tie thus sums up:There is ltO notice ,t' any naval expedition of the kind in any contemporary historian, though it is incredible that. if the voyage had t:tken place, it should not h:tve 1,een reconled. Girahlus who visited Wales in 11ss, is silent, though a lover ,ff marvels. The Bardic aaert that Madoc waa slain I,y an assassin; flint Llywatx-h was suspected tl' the murder, and that he was put upon his trial fin' it. Assuming a mysterious death Madoc, he explains the tradition from an:dogies in filklore. Pp. 21s, 2lb. a

Madoc. 207. Madoc was a great sailor, fired of travel, and built a ship wifitout iron, wifit stag-hon n:tils, to enter the vortex that the sea might not swallow her ul,. lie c:dled her the II, rn La,lll, and voyaged wilh her to finx. ign lands. Ilctm-uing. she was wrecked off B:trdsey. The story in its present fia'm dates front the close t' the sixteenth century, though we are told that it "had come down front hand to hand under cre, litable warntory t, this day

a 'l'het was a hattie, of come; lint all float the scanty allusions to it would seem Io iml,ly is, lhat the Welsh stood ,m the shore and strove to msist the attempted landing of the English sohliers. t't] St. phens, T., 'Literature of rite Kymry,' 17. 1. In Matfitew Paris' 'Chronicles and Memorials ,f (h'e:tt Britain,' vol. v. ;3:{, under the year 1257, :red con.quently q/'t,.r the English conquest of Wales, there is notice the Welsh txmhling the English with "massacre, fire and rapine." On this Edw:ml tlfi'ealens them wifi the n:tval stn, ngth of the Irish: and the Weldb to resist lite h'ih at sea, fm'nishtal themselves, we are told, with a fleet of galleys, "ldraticis armi et

victualliars commtmitas." Frmt this it wouhl appear fitat they lunl a hvfin'e l].e mihlle f the thirteenth century. The is in 1'-'12 (t'lose lb,Ils.