Page:Translations (1834).djvu/36

xxxii left elegies on his death, which bespeak at once the high estimation in which the writers regarded his talents, and the respect they entertained for his private worth. The spirit of rivalry, which may naturally be imagined to have existed during the life of the bard, was at once extinguished by his death, or manifested itself only in the generous trophies heaped upon his tomb.

Of the merit of our poet’s productions it is almost superfluous to speak: the meedmead [sic] of praise, awarded by his contemporaries, has received the sanction of four centuries, and Davyth ap Gwilym is still regarded as one of the most eminent of the Welsh bards, whether we estimate him by the originality of his genius, or the harmonious character of his versification. Nor should it be forgotten that he wrote at a period when the laws of Welsh poetry were in a state of considerable fluctuation, exposed to the various caprices of writers, who, having abandoned the rich and full-flowing melody of the old metres, were severally anxious to substitute in their stead their own crude inventions. Davyth ap Gwilym was among the very few that rose superior to the prejudices and disadvantages of the age; and he had the peculiar honour of establishing a style of versification which has become a model to all succeeding bards. He is likewise supposed to have introduced the Cywydd, a species of composition that has since his time been constantly adopted in Wales.