to be done which should not be postponed, much less overlooked. We have not received the long hoped-for account of St. Dogmael's Abbey in North Pembrokeshire, with its associated religious houses; for its presiding genius has been taken to his rest. We know nothing as yet, in an antiquarian sense, of the abbeys of Talley and Whitlands in Carmarthenshire. We want good architectural accounts, in an accessible form, of the great Glamorganshire houses of Neath and Margam; similarly of Brecon; of Cwm Hir in Radnorshire; and of many other houses in various parts of Wales. A few observers, especially in Powysland, are awake to the importance of such subjects; but there is ample need of activity and research, and the attention of the Association should be turned in that direction.

In respect of Welsh manor houses very little has yet been done. This department of national antiquities is much richer in materials than is commonly supposed. Every county possesses them; but hardly anywhere do we find antiquaries willing to examine and to record. Promising beginnings have, indeed, been made in Anglesey, Glamorganshire, and Pembrokeshire; but there are nine other counties, besides those of the Marches, still to be explored, and enough to fill volumes of the Journal with only selections of the most interesting buildings that remain. What a harvest, in this respect, exists in Monmouthshire, Herefordshire, and Brecknockshire! When will the sickle be put into it?

It is much to be desired that the good beginning made by one of our General Secretaries for the domestic architecture of South Pembrokeshire, may be followed up by an extension of his own researches in that part of Wales, and in others. Evidently there is much to do; and equally manifest it is that time is herein more especially precious; for landlords, agents, and farmers, are all leagued against ancient domestic buildings; and the ravages made by ruthless improvers and builders, in such a county as Glamorganshire alone, are only samples of what is going on elsewhere,-indeed, almost all over the Principality.

VOL. XV., 3RD SER.

6

Laying aside the topic of the village churches, which may soon become mute and ruined memorials of a state of things doomed to destruction, neither doubtful nor remediable in Wales, I cannot avoid mentioning that the great labour of examining the Welsh records among the Public Repositories of London still remains to be taken in hand. A visit to the Record Office would soon shew the extent and value of the labour to be undergone,—a labour that can hardly be undertaken by any private individual; but which calls, and calls urgently, for the united efforts of our Association. We have, indeed, an antiquarian giant in South Wales, who might well make himself answerable for this work; but his energies and varied acquirements are wanted elsewhere, and we must be content to wait; for he works harder than most men; and of him it may truly be said, "Nihil non tetigit quod non ornavit."

To make remarks on this subject more practically useful, it is proposed to compile a series of papers in which each district or county will be adverted to separately, and the desiderata connected with each pointed out; beginning with that county in which the next annual meeting of the Association is to be held, and from which it derives the greatest amount of support.

GLAMORGAN.

The county of Glamorgan is one of the most important and interesting of all in Wales, not only on account of its modern wealth and resources, but also for its historical associations and antiquarian remains. It is happy too in having within its limits those who have done so much towards describing and illustrating its remains, as well as those who have not only raised it to its present high standard of prosperity, but seem well-calculated to maintain and improve its material welfare. There is more intellectual activity, more energy of every kind, and more wealth to be found in Glamorganshire than in any other county in Wales, and it might almost be said. than in all the rest of the principality together.

On entering the county from the eastward its main

natural features make a division of territory, by which the antiquary cannot avoid being influenced in his researches, that of "The Hills" and "The Vale." The former constitute a noble group of hills, or rather mountains, well defined by the Taff on the east, and the Loughor on the west; whilst "The Vale" fills up all the interval between "The Hills" and the sea.

The former, as having remained the longest in an uncultivated state, is full of memorials and evidences of old British life; the latter is rich in remains of all periods of British and English history from the time of the Romans at least, to those of the Commonwealth; but The Hills have been much less explored by antiquaries than The Vale, and, except some occasional notices in our own Journal, very little has been placed on record in any publication of note. And yet The Hills are easy of access, for they are deeply indented by valleys running down from their summits to the flatter country, and up many of these valleys at the present time railroads have penetrated, while a dense population has in numerous cases become settled. Whatever may have been the cause of this division of the county having been so little explored in former days, such impediments can hardly be considered to exist at the present day. The table-lands on the tops of the hills can now all be visited with comparative ease, and a knowledge of their peculiar features of interest may readily be gained from the Ordnance Maps, or from local information.

Early British remains.―There must have been a sharp look-out always kept up by the Hill populations upon the proceedings of their more powerful neighbours in the Vale; and it is highly probable that a connected. chain of hill-fortresses, beacons, and other rude military precautions may be found all along the tops of the hills from the banks of the Taff to those of the Loughor. Along the great valleys leading to the spots where Merthyr Tydfil and Aberdare are now situated, we may expect to meet with similar military outposts above the steep mountain-sides, to watch the valleys below; and

especially towards the upper portion of these valleys may explorers direct their attention. All along the moors. round Merthyr, and especially between these and the Monmouthshire or Gwentian border, there are numerous indications of British occupation well worthy of careful exploration. The hills on the limits of Brycheiniog and Morganwg, from the Beacons to the Blorenge above Abergavenny, promise well for the antiquary who would. survey them in a scientific manner.

There are probably several lines of ancient British roads to be made out here, such as the Heol Adda above Dowlais, the ancient road running over the Bwlch between the two beacons of Brecon, etc. Indeed, every valley may be expected to be accompanied by an ancient British trackway running more or less parallel to it on the dry ground of the mountain top, and all this is well worth looking after for traces of the early Britons. Thus on the mountain road now running over the moors up to the Bwlch beneath the westernmost of the Brecon beacons, and not many miles from the wellknown hostelry of the Lamb and Flag, may be found numerous pits of no great size or depth, much resembling small limekilns cut out of the solid rock. They have no vents at the bottom; and it is probable that they are the remains of ancient habitations, such as have been observed by that careful antiquary, Mr. C. Warne, during his exploration of the moors of Dorsetshire. They are worth looking after, if with no other object than that of determining their negative features. Again, farther to the west, on the moors above Ystradgynlais and Cwm Twrc, there is an ancient line of communication leading into Carmarthenshire, reputed to have been that by which the black cattle were driven up from the Vale of Glamorgan into the Vale of the Towy; and the hospitable owner of the Castle of Craig-y-nos, at the southern foot of these moors, is rich in a fund of tradition relating to the subject. There are several ancient trackways, used indeed in modern times, about the upper part of the Loughor valley, all worth looking after; and along the Vale by the foot of the mountain ground, early earthworks have

been, and will again be, found; but they all want connecting with each other in a systematic survey.

On the hills above Neath, Margam, and Llantrisant, groups of stones, isolated stones, and other early remains are known to exist: they all require careful survey.

Roman remains.-The main line of Roman road from Cardiff to Loughor still requires to be determined with greater accuracy than hitherto. Even its precise exit. from Cardiff, and indeed its entry into that station, are not accurately defined. It may have come in by Roath, over the eastern tidal marshes; and it very probably went out by Llandaff, where the trace of an ancient road may still be observed in the grass fields north of the modern village of Canton; but something more positive is wanted. It went, perhaps, not very far from Caerau and St. Lythan's on its way to BovIUM, which may well be considered as synonymous and identical with the modern Cowbridge; from thence to Ewenny, but its course should be well looked after and defined: for there the difficulty begins. It must have passed, so to speak, by Kenfig; for there are traces of it on the Newton Downs, but whether it then went up towards the foot of the hills by Margam, or whether it followed the coast line, so much changed by inroads of the sea in the Tudor times, is not yet settled. The discovery of a Roman inscription many feet below the sand when excavations were making for the entrance of Port Talbot, where it is still preserved in the harbourmaster's house, favours the presumption of the coast line having been adopted. If so, it must have passed where Aberavan now stands; but from thence to Neath itself (NIDUM) all is uncertain: very probably it ran up the Cwmavan valley, and so turned over the hills on the western side into the Vale of Neath; but at Neath itself nothing seems to be known of it; and, indeed, whoever can take the Roman road satisfactorily into NIDUM, and take it out again with equal probability on its way to LEUCARUM or Loughor, will thereby do great service in advancing the survey of Britannia Secunda.

On the hills westward of the Neath Valley a road