Llythyrau Goronwy Owen/Llythyr 39
| ← Llythyr 38 | Llythyrau Goronwy Owen golygwyd gan John Morris-Jones |
Llythyr 40 |
𝔏𝔩𝔶𝔱𝔥𝔶𝔯 39.
At RICHARD MORRIS.
DEAR SIR,
I RECEIVED your kind Letter of the 6th inst., as also Mr. Lewis Morris of the 27th ult., both of which were very agreeable, & gave me a great dale of pleasure, you may think, at a time when my weak condition rendered me incapable of any other amusement. The conversation of a Friend (tho' only upon paper) is the best cordial for low spirits. I thank God I am now much better tho' still but weak, which, I bless God, I can bear with patience & contentment; for the worse of it (as I am free from pain) is, that it will not suffer me to apply closely to any business, but requires frequent intervals of rest. As the Duty is very great in this Parish, I am forced to stir out as soon as I am able to crawl, tho' at the hazard of my life; & that was actually the cause of my relapse. Please to make my Compliments to Mr. Llewelyn ddû & tell him, when he talks of low Spirits, he seems to take the effect for the cause; as if lowness of spirits was the cause of my illness, & not vice versa, which I can assure him is wrong in the main; for while God grant me health, it is not a little thing that can cast down my Spirits; & without Health the highest Spirits must droop & sink. I am however infinitely obliged to you both for your kind concern for me, & it gives me a very great concern to hear of the prejudicial effects of the Town the fog & Smoke have upon Mr. L. Morris's health. However I sincerely wish & hope he may be able to bear up under those inconveniences, 'till his business there is over. I have been, sometime after my illness, troubled with a shortness of Breath, & am still with a sort of involuntary sighing, which comes upon me unawares, very frequently & suddenly. I would have answered your last Letter sooner, but that I had a good part of the Cymmrodorion paper to translate, & all to write fair over, which is now done in the best manner I could do. I hope it will please the Cymmrodorion in general, & Mr. L. Morris, & yourself in particular. I gave it a free translation on purpose to avoid that crampt stiffness that is unavoidable in a verbatim translation. I need not observe to you the inconveniency of. verbatim translations; I make no doubt but you, as well as myself, have observed the shamefull barbarisms, and harsh metaphors, &c, that are but too visible in some illtranslated Acts of Parliament, &c, and can be attributed to no other cause. You know there are many Metaphors, Phrases, &c, that are familiar enough, and not without their beauty in English, which in Welsh, would make a monstrous & shocking figure, and so on the contrary. For instance, a Field of Knowledge, does well enough in the English; but he must have more than common knack at guessing, that could find out the sense or meaning of Maes (or Cae) o Wybodaeth; & I don't think that Ager, &c. Scientia would sound much better. Cynt y gwyddid pa beth yw Gardd o Foron yn y Lladin cystal ar Gymraeg. I hope however that this present Translation is intelligible to all that understand the Language, & that there is nothing in it, that is not agreeable to the property of the British Idiom. I am not so vain as to think it has any merit; but I dare affirm that if I had recourse to my Dictionary for every word, it would have been worse; as a proof of this I would recommend the experiment, to be made on one Paragraph only. There may be other Orthographical faults in it notwithstanding all my care which I beg you would be so good as to correct in the perusal. My invariable rule in that respect was, never to double a Consonant, when I thought a single one would do as well, as in genym, cymeryd, &c: for I think we have already too many double ones, which we must use unavoidably, as long as we make use of the present Characters & Orthography.—Bellach am yr Enwau dyrys chwedl y Bobl. Mae Hynafiaeth yn ddiddadl cystal gair am Antiquity, nad rhaid mo'i well; ac am hynny, minnau a gymerais gennad i alw Antiquary yn Hynafiaethydd, a gobeithio na bu'm yn rhy hy. Mi allaswn ei alw'n Anticwariad, ond, pe gwnaethwn, pa sut a fuasai i mi wynebu i atteb am yr hyn a ddywedpwyd yna, sef "Bod yr Iaith, heb gymmorth dim geiriau dieithr, yn adrodd yn gyflawn holl ddychymmygiadau 'r meddwl?" Dyna'r ffordd i Sais ein dal mewn celwydd yn yr hyn na atto Duw. Am y Gair Barbariad a'r cyffelyb, mae ini gystal hawl arnynt a'r gorau: nid yw Barbariad ddim gair yn y byd o'r dechreuad, ond rhai o Gym'dogion y Groegiad (y Phrygiaid neu'r Troiaid mae'n debyg) oedd a chanddynt ryw air go anhepgor, megis Bar, Bar; a'r Groegiaid, yn ddig fod neb yn siarad heb iddynt hwy eu dyall, a'u galwasant Barbariaid bôd y pen, o wir ddial ac atgasrwydd, fal y geilw'r Gwyndyd Wyr y Deheudir Hwynthwy fach yn awr. Ac fal y geilw'r Cymry i gyd bob peth na ddyallont Sisial, a Sibrwd, a Sio, a Sisyful, &c., heb achos yn y byd, ar a wn i, ond bod y Llythyren S yn rhy fynych yn Iaith y Saeson, ac yr wyf yn cofio Dyn yn yn y Mwythig a arferai ddywedyd rhywbeth yn Saesonaeg, (yr hon oedd yr unig Iaith a ddyallai,) ond gan roi ch yn nhîn pob gair, fe fynnai ei fod yn ddifai Cymraeg, a hynny am fod y Llythyren ch yn tra mynychu yn yr Iaith Gymraeg.—Am y Galli, chwi ellwch eu galw yn Galliaid neu Geltau, neu fal y mynnoch. Dyma ystori Iwl Caisar ynghylch yr enw; sef mai Celta y gelwid hwy yn eu hiaith eu hunain, ond yn y Lladin, Galli. Yn wir wedi i Iwl eu curo hwynt, fe allai gymeryd rhyddid a rhwysg i'w llysenwi fal y mynnai; ond hysbys agos yw gennyf mai camgymeryd yr oedd Iwl yn yr Enw arall, ac na alwodd y Bobl erioed monynt eu hunain—Celta. Yr wyf yn ffyddlon a sicer gredu mai Gallau neu Galluau, y galwai'r Bobl eu hunain, (& by the by, they had had a better title to that appelation than their present High Mightinesses) ond na fedrai Iwl na'i bobl ystumio mo'u tafodau i ddywedyd y Llythyren mwy nâ charn Sais.—You know that even our latter Ancestors pronounced the Letters D & G much harder than we do, almost as hard as our T & C. Then consider how they would pronounce Gallau, & ask an Englishman to to say Callau, and I marvel if he does not say Calthai or Caltay; as they nickname Llangollen and Llanfyllin, Clangothlin and Lan or Clan Vothlin, or Votling. Add to this, that it is more than probable that the Vulgar of the latter Romans did (as it is certain the old Romans did, witness Aurai, Pictai, &c &c.) pronounce their Diphthong æ or œ, as we do au, or the Greeks their αι; for it is certain they never joined the two vowels æ thus, but as we do in the same words in traed, gwaed, &c. If so what difference is between their Celta & the Κελται of the Greeks? Which (bating the mis— pronunciation of ll as I said above) comes near enough to our Gallau to fix and determine the Original of the Word— Myfi ydwyf, Yr eiddoch,