WRITTEN IN RHUDDLAN CASTLE, NORTH WALES .

Retreat of our fathers, who battled and bled
Against the unhallowed invasion of Rome,
Who, vanquished by numbers, were scattered and fled
To find 'mid these solitudes freedom and home,
Preserving through sorrows and changes untold,
The firmness, the feelings, the language of old.

I come, in the light of the blue summer skies,
To visit thy beauties, wild Cambrian land!
Already thy mountains rise dark on my eyes,
And blooming before me thy valleys expand;
Thy rude rocks invite me, thy floods, as they flow,
Allure me to follow wherever they go.

I will muse in thy castles, I'll look from thy hills,
I'll plunge in the depths of thy forests and vales;
I will climb to thy cataracts, drink at thy rills,
And list to thy songs and thy stories, old Wales!
I will dream by thy rivers, and proudly explore
Every path which Tradition hath trodden before.

A pilgrim I am, and a pilgrim I've been,
And a pilgrim I would be while vigour remains,
My fond feet have wandered o'er many a scene,
But none which surpasses thy mountains and plains;
And I marvel that e'er I could linger to see
A land less enchanting, less glorious than thee.

There are beings I love without coldness or guile,
There are friends I would cling to whatever betide,
My absence from these may be borne for awhile,
But the others will mourn me away from their side;
Yet a season will come when my manhood is past,
That will bind me to one little circle at last.

With a feeling of wonder I pause on my way,
In a ruin where monarchs held splendour and place,
But pleasures await me for many a day,
In a region of poesy, grandeur, and grace;
For a time I will linger by hill, stream, and glen,
Then back to the common existence of men.