"OwenMEdwards-AShortHistoryOfWales" - читать интересную книгу автора (Edwards Owen M)

fostered by the warm, moist west wind. Above it, the remaining third
is stormy sheep-run, wide green slopes and wild moors, steep glens
and rocky heights.

From north-west to south-east the line of high hills runs. In the
north-west corner, Snowdon towers among a number of heights over
3,000 feet. At its feet, to the north-west, the isle of Anglesey
lies. The peninsula of Lleyn, with a central ridge of rock, and
slopes of pasture lands, runs to the south-west. To the east, beyond
the Conway, lie the Hiraethog mountains, with lower heights and wider
reaches; further east again, over the Clwyd, are the still lower
hills of Flint.

To the south, 30 miles as the crow flies, over the slate country, the
Berwyns are seen clearly. From a peak among these--Cader Vronwen
(2,573 feet), or the Aran (2,970 feet), or Cader Idris (2,929 feet)--
we look east and south, over the hilly slopes of the upper Severn
country.

Another 30 miles to the south rises green Plinlimmon (2,469 feet);
from it we see the high moorlands of central Wales, sloping to
Cardigan Bay on the west and to the valley of the Severn, now a
lordly English river, on the east.

Forty miles south the Black Mountain (2,630 feet) rises beyond the
Wye, and the Brecon Beacons (2,910 feet) beyond the Usk. West of
these the hills fade away into the broad peninsula of Dyved.
Southwards we look over hills of coal and iron to the pleasant sea-
fringed plain of Gwent.

On the north and the west the sea is shallow; in some places it is
under 10 fathoms for 10 miles from the shore, and under 20 fathoms
for 20 miles. Tales of drowned lands are told--of the sands of
Lavan, of the feast of drunken Seithenyn, and of the bells of
Aberdovey. But the sea is a kind neighbour. Its soft, warm winds
bathe the hills with life; and the great sweep of the big Atlantic
waves into the river mouths help our commerce. Holyhead, Milford
Haven, Swansea, Newport, Barry, and Cardiff--now one of the chief
ports of the world--can welcome the largest vessels afloat. The
herring is plentiful on the west coast, and trout and salmon in the
rivers.



CHAPTER II--THE WANDERING NATIONS



By land and by sea, race after race has come to make the hills of
Wales its home. One race would be short, with dark eyes and black