Page:EB1911 - Volume 16.djvu/852

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LLANES—LLANTWIT MAJOR

of Berwick, Glyn, Hencoed and Westowe, only amounted to 2972; in 1840 the inhabitants of the borough hamlet alone had risen to 4173. Llanelly is now the most populous town in Wales outside the confines of Glamorganshire. In 1832 Llanelly was added as a contributory borough to the Carmarthen parliamentary district.


LLANES, a seaport of northern Spain, in the province of Oviedo, on the river Carrocedo and the Bay of Biscay. Pop. (1900) 18,684. The streets are mostly narrow and irregular, and contain some curious old houses. The principal buildings are a fine Gothic church and an old Augustinian monastery, which has been converted into a school and meteorological station. In summer the fine climate, scenery and sea-bathing attract many visitors. Llanes is a second-class port for light-draught vessels; but the entrance is narrow, and rather difficult in rough weather. The trade is chiefly in agricultural produce, timber, butter and fish.


LLANGOLLEN, a picturesque market-town and summer resort of Denbighshire, N. Wales, in the Dee (Dyfrdwy) valley, on a branch of the Great Western Railway, 9 m. S.W. of Wrexham, 2021/2 m. from London by rail. Pop. of urban district (1901) 3303. The Dee is here crossed by a 14th-century bridge of four arches, “one of the seven wonders of Wales,” built by John Trevor, afterwards bishop of St Asaph (Llanelwy). The Anglican church of St Collen, Norman and Early English, has a monument in the churchyard to the “Ladies of Llangollen,” Lady Eleanor Butler and Hon. Sarah Ponsonby, of Plas Newydd, (1778 to 1829 and 1831 respectively). The house is now a museum. Castell Dinas Brân (the castle of the town of Brân; the mountain stream below is also called Brân), the ruins of a fortress on a high conical hill about 1 m. from the town, is supposedly British, of unknown date. “An old ruynous thinge,” as the Elizabethan poet Churchyard calls it even in the 16th century, it was inhabited, apparently, about 1390, by Myfanwy Fechan of the Tudor Trevor family and beloved by the bard Howel ab Einion Llygliw, whose ode to her is still extant. Valle Crucis Abbey (Llan Egwest) is a Cistercian ruin at the foot of Bronfawr hill, some 2 m. N.W. of Llangollen, founded about 1200 by Madoc ab Gruffydd Maelor, lord of Dinas Brân and grandson of Owen Gwynedd, prince of Wales. Llan Egwest, dissolved in 1535, was given by James I. to Lord Edward Wootton. In the meadow adjoining, still called Llwyn y Groes (“grove of the cross”), is “Eliseg’s Pillar.” Eliseg was father of Brochmael, prince of Powys, and his grandson, Concen or Congen, appears to have erected the pillar, which is now broken, with an illegible inscription; the modern inscription dates only from 1779. At Llangollen are linen and woollen manufactures, and near are collieries, lime and iron works. Brewing, malting and slate-quarrying are also carried on. Within the parish, an aqueduct carries the Ellesmere canal across the Dee.


LLANQUIHUE (pron. lan-kè-wa), a province of southern Chile bordering on the northern shores of the Gulf and Straits of Chacao, and extending from the Pacific to the Argentine frontier. The province of Valdivia lies N. and is separated from it in part by the Bueno river. Pop. (1895) 78,315. Area 45,515 sq. m. It is a region of forests, rivers and lakes, and the greater part is mountainous. The rainfall is excessive, the average at Puerto Montt being 104 in. a year, and the temperature is singularly uniform, the average for the summer being 581/2°, of the winter 471/2°, and of the year 53° F. There are several large lakes in the eastern part of the province—Puyehue, on the northern frontier, Rupanco, Llanquihue and Todos los Santos. Lake Llanquihue is the largest body of fresh water in Chile, having an extreme length from N. to S., or from Octai to Varas, of about 33 m., and extreme breadth of nearly the same. There is a regular steamship service on the lake between Octai and Varas, and its western shores are well settled. The volcanoes of Calbuco and Osorno rise from near its eastern shores, the latter to a height of 7382 ft. The outlet of the lake is through Maullin river, the lower course of which is navigable. The other large rivers of the province are the Bueno, which receives the waters of Lakes Puyehue and Rupanco, and the Puelo, which has its rise in a lake of the same name in the Argentine territory of Chubut. A short tortuous river of this vicinity, called the Petrohue, affords an outlet for the picturesque lake of Todos los Santos, and enters the Reloncavi Inlet near the Puelo. The southern coast of the province is indented by a number of inlets and bays affording good fishing, but the mouths of the rivers flowing into the Pacific are more or less obstructed by sand-bars. Apart from the lumber industry, which is the most important, the productions of Llanquihue include wheat, barley, potatoes and cattle. The white population is composed in great part of Germans, who have turned large areas of forest lands in the northern districts into productive wheat fields. The capital is Puerto Montt, on a nearly land-locked bay called the Reloncavi, designed to be the southern terminus of the longitudinal railway from Tacna, a distance of 2152 m. An important town in the northern part of the province is Osorno, on the Rahue river, which is chiefly inhabited by Germans. It exports wheat and other farm produce, leather, lumber and beer.


LLANTRISANT, a small town and a contributory parliamentary borough of Glamorganshire, Wales, picturesquely situated with a southern aspect, commanding a fine view of the vale of Glamorgan, in a pass on the mountain range which separates that vale from the valley of the Taff. The population of the parish in 1901 was 10,091 and of the contributory borough 2057. A branch of the Taff Vale railway running from Pontypridd to Cowbridge and Aberthaw has a station, Cross Inn, 1/2 m. below the town, while nearly 2 m. farther south it passes (near the village of Pontyclun) through Llantrisant station on the Great Western railway main line, which is 1561/4 m. by rail from London and 11 m. N.W. from Cardiff. The castle, which according to G. T. Clark was “second only to Cardiff in military importance,” dates from the reign of Henry III. or Edward I. Of the original building nothing remains, and of a later building only a tall and slender fragment. It was the head of the lordship of Miskin, a great part of which was in the hands of native owners, until the last of them, Howel ap Meredith, was expelled by Richard de Clare (1229–1262). Since then it has always been in the hands of the lord of Glamorgan. It was in the near neighbourhood of the town that Edward II. was captured in 1327. In 1426 the then lord of Glamorgan, Richard, 5th earl of Warwick, granted to the residents a charter confirming grants made by his predecessors in 1346, 1397 and 1424. The corporation was abolished in 1883, and its property (including 284 acres of common land) is administered by a town trust under a scheme of the charity commissioners. The “freemen” of the borough, however, still hold a court leet in the town-hall. The market formerly held here has been discontinued, but there are four annual fairs. The church was dedicated to three saints (Illtyd, Gwyno and Tyfodwg), whence the name Llantrisant. Originally a Norman building, most of the present fabric belongs to the 15th century. There are numerous chapels. Welsh is still the predominant language. Oliver Cromwell’s forbears were natives of this parish, as also was Sir Leoline Jenkins, secretary of state under Charles II. There are tinplate works at Pontyclun and numerous collieries in the district.


LLANTWIT MAJOR (Welsh Llan-Illtyd-Fawr), a small market town in the southern parliamentary division of Glamorganshire, South Wales, about 1 m. from the Bristol Channel, with a station on the Barry railway, 5 m. S. of Cowbridge. Pop. (1901) 1113. About 1 m. N.N.W. of the town there were discovered in 1888 the remains of a large Roman villa within a square enclosure of about 8 acres, which has been identified as part of the site of a Roman settlement mentioned in Welsh writings as Caer Wrgan. The building seemed to have been the scene of a massacre, possibly the work of Irish pirates in the 5th century, as some forty-three human skeletons and the remains of three horses were found within its enclosure. Etymological reasoning have led some to suggest that the Roman station of Bovium was at Boverton, 1 m. E. of the town, but it is more likely to have been at Ewenny (2 m. S.E. of Bridgend) or perhaps at Cowbridge. On the sea coast are two camps, one known as Castle Ditches, commanding the entrance to the creek of Colhugh, once the port