it from another fource. Surely this is not afking too much, and yet it is "hardly granted."

Poffibly, my highly endowed and, highly-refpected friend, I may, all this time, have been forcing you out of the path of your contemplations into mine; but I had a better motive for it than most intruders can give; and, I truft, my design is in fome measure answered. Our défires and averfions, you know, are for the most part the fame. I exult in the refemblance; and wherever we are of oppofite ideas, I am so fatisfied you have the best reafons for your oppofition, that I immediately fet about examining my own ideas, and have been more than once the better for the fcrutiny. In life, and at death, I will thank you! Farewell.

P. S. I have a month's Gleanings to present you with, and shall lay the whole fheaf at your feet in my next. It would be doing a violence to my feelings, were I to mix any matter with this letter, not in keeping with the object to which it is facred. You can account for this. Adieu.

LETTER IX.

TO THE SAME.

Abereftdwith.

THIS town is neither good nor bad. The streets are beyond comparison the dirtiest I ever faw, a proof of which is their being at this moment indicted by the inhabitants. No wonder, therefore, if ftrangers complain. Indeed, they must be rugged and unpleasant at all times, for the country here is flat, stoney, and rugged. The environs are neither barren nor fertile, and the only walks, or in truth walkable places, are thofe at the end of the town, round the ruined caftle, another, round the church-yard, and another, very short one, by the fide of the harbour. The beach is impaffable, and the bathing places difficult and unchearful. In fine, it is in almost all refpects the reverse of Barmouth, except that it has the advantage in the number of houfes, and of courfe in the company. I fhould not have thought any thing here worth mentioning, had it not been to give you a few hints by way of directory, not to let the greater popularity of this place draw you from the other (Barmouth) where your bath will be more comfortab1

comfortable, and your agrémens, from the furrounding objects, out of all comparison what-

ever.

For want of other allurements, I chose this place, to throw together the observations that were feattered about my-note-book, refpecting certain customs, usages, and a variety of otherthings, it may be proper for a traveller to be apprized of, particularly the articles of expen diture,

In the first place it is a fettled usage, and custom, throughout the principality, for the trading part of the people to over-reach you in your little marketings, or bargains, with them; that is to say, they will ask all strangers, of genteel appearance, about a third more than they would afk a native or countryman; but even allowing this, you will have almost all the neceffaries, and most of the luxuries of life, at least, by a third cheaper than (with very few exceptions) the cheapest parts of England at first you may put up with a little extortion, which will diminish, as you become refidentiary. All places, as they get. into reputation for any beauty or convenience, and are, therefore, the reforts of people that, fince they can afford to travel, are supposed to

be wealthy, grow dear, at first imperceptibly, till, in a few years, that commodity, which you could procure for fixpence, is not to be ob tained for a fhilling, and fo on in proportion. This is remarkably verified in Wales; ground, houfe-rent, and the neceffaries of life, are fo much raised in price, fince my first tour of this country about twelve years ago, that were not the fact universally admitted, I should be afraid you would fufpect me of profiting by the licence expected to be taken by travellers, were I to mention the comparative difference betwixt that time, and the present, in both North and South Wales.

Nevertheless, a good economist might, in the family way, even at the present day, makeone hundred pounds tell in this country to three hundred in any other belonging, properly, to England: I here fpeak, however, of comparative prices in the fmaller towns, and villages in the cities, the reftimate must be about two to one in favour of Wales. In Caermarthen and Caernarvon, for example, the one a principal town to the fouthward, the other northward, you get fish, fowl, butcher's meat, eggs, bacon, and firing, (certainly the grand articles in domestic establishment) on an average, at the following rates:

Salmon,

Salmon, fresh and fine, from the market, per pound

A fine turbot, ditto

Fine cod, each

Eggs, eight, nine, ten, for

In little villages higher up the country, both ways, the cheapnefs, for want of a market, is still more extraordinary; if we except the remote places of England, near the fea-coaft, and certain parts of Cornwall and Yorkshire, this ftatement, which you may depend on it, is the correct refult of refidentiary remark, will convince you that this principality is not more abundantly fupplied with the ornamental than the useful: and that, as those who have tate, fortune, and talents could not be more gratified in vifiting it on the fcore of romantic beauty, they, who found it expedient to retrench, to narrow their establishment, and yet to diminish none of the comforts to which they have

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