The thrush shall sing. but thou shalt never hear it;
For thee in vain the deafening winter wind

Shall sound alarum on the wold, and call
From their dark caves his dreamy brotherhood:
Unbroken shall thy slumber be; but long
As the wild note of mountain pipe shall wake
The woodland echo, long as the cool wind
Shall flirt with the young cglantine-thy name
Shall be a thing of sweetness, blossoming
Like Sharon's rose in the wide wilderness.

A FISHING EXCURSION

AMONG THE

Black Mountains.

"We three
Fishermen be."

OLD SONG.

ON wandering through the village of LlandiloVauhr, which the natives in their simplicity dignify by the name of a town, it was our good fortune to espy a small travelling tent exposed to sale. It looked so completely the thing, that we could not resist the temptation of a purchase; and with due consideration to our worldly interests, emptied the wealthy breeches-pockets of our brother angler, Shenkin-ap-Morgan. Well, the tent was bought— paid for and consequently to be turned to account. In what way? you will perhaps ask. "Go on, my prose shall tell you as you read."

On returning to our cottage, a council of war (at the instigation of Drake Somerset, an ensign and brother angler, who was quartered with us at the time) was held on the propriety of making immediate trial of the tent in our next fishing excursion. No sooner said than done. There are some pusillanimous gentlefolks who always deliberate before they act; we always act before we deliberate, for it is with us as with the irritable," the blow and the word," by which vigorous process a world of consideration is saved.

After divers disputes, the 12th of July, anno domini 1821, was appointed for our excursion to Llynn-y-Van, or the pool among the Carmarthenshire Black Mountains. The previous time was spent in necessary preparations. Drake Somerset employed himself in making trout-flies from the plumes of an old military cap, while Shenkin wrought wonders in the way of tackle-mending. The kitchen, meanwhile, echoed with the beautifully blended hissings of roast and boiled, the shelves bent in graceful acknowledgment of their load, and the women-kind were up to their knees in the gore of defunct poultry.

The day at last arrived, "the great, the important day, big with the fate"―of us and of the trout. We rose, as agreed on over a jug of hot punch on

the previous night, by earliest peep of dawn, and even now blush while we remember the difficulty. Morgan's natural somnolence compelled us to have recourse to a bumper of cold water, and the musical proboscis of Somerset announced the intensity of his devotion to Morpheus. Our procession was at length arranged-rod, flies, tackle, all, like ourselves, in the finest possible discipline. Our appearance, like Mr. Coleridge's Christabelle, "was wild and singularly original and beautiful." The CambroBriton was dressed in a pair of picturesque brogues that reached only to his knees; where they were met by a pair of shooting gaiters, which, as if ashamed of so near an acquaintance, left the distance of an inch between them to show that they were in no wise connected. A wig of orthodox magnitude adorned his pericranium, on which was stationed a hat of singular diminutiveness. Drake, with the exception of a variegated fishing-jacket, was rigged out in his usual way, and your humble servant (of whom it doth not become me to speak) looked as elegantly conspicuous as an author on short commons-a servant on board-wages—or an officer on half-pay. As for our tent, it was carried on the shoulders of an alternate couple of the party, and a Welch poney laden with a hamper of eatables shuffled melodiously in the rear.

At a slight distance from the cottage we commenced our ascent of the first range of hills, and on gaining the summit round which the path winds to Llynn-y-Van, stopped for an instant to survey the rising sun. But while we were wrapt in breathless ecstacy, Morgan was pulling hard at the brandy-flask, insensible, as Lord Bacon would say, "to the spirit of the universe," and alive only to the spirit of the brandy-bottle. We reproved him for his want of taste; but he assured us that it was in order to improve it, that he fortified his stomach with a cordial.

After a toilsome walk of two hours, we contrived to have a peep at Llynn-y-Van, with the dun clouds resting on its bosom. The sight renewed our spirits, and we were at last rewarded for our exertions by gaining the loftiest peak. A most nagnificent spectacle presented itself below us. On every side rose a huge chaos of mountains like the tempestuous undulations of the ocean. At the base of Llynn-y-Van, the spire of Llandisent church presented itself, surrounded by the neat white cottages of the turf-cutters. Higher up, the smiling appearance of the lowlands vanishedwide heaths, rendered impassable in part by bogs, afforded but a few stunted thistles for the browzing flocks; while the wind, as it whistled along the