Ina Tan! hun! Ofe! mae Gorwedd! Corph ROE! ei oed! 60 Y Dudd! Y Cladd wud E brill! 10! 1719.
The other, immediately facing the pulpit, is a black piece of board, ornamented with an undertaker’s tablet of gilt copper, in the centre of which, upon black japan, is—
Thos. Williams Died Oct. 25 1836. Aged 74.
On leaving the church, there is a monumental slate slab on the left of the path, bearing the following inscription and verses:
Underneath Lieth the remains Of John, the son of Robert Closs, who was Interred Decr. 1st. 1805, aged 7 years.
Ar ben mynydd dydd-y-daith oî hoywder A che dodd y maith Gadewais (gwelais goeg waith) Drueni’r Byd ar unwaith. O erfel fu uchel a chos, i augau Llyn ingol i’mddangos Mantell niwl mewn lywyll nos A dychrymad dechreunos.
Upon returning to my inn at Gwrydd, I discovered that the landlady was sister to little John Closs; and from her I learnt the story of his melancholy fate. It is as follows:
John was a pretty boy, about seven years of age, with fair hair and blue eyes, of a sweet-temper, adored by his parents, and loving them most affectionately in return. Indeed, little John Closs was the talk of the parish, and held up as a pattern of filial love and reverence to all the children in the village. His uncle had a small farm at Nant Bettwys; and John’s father having sent him to reside there, for a few months, the fond mother would often cross the mountain to see her son and her sister, returning home in the evening of the same day. Little John got tired of living away from home, and one night, after his mother had quitted the cottage to return to Llanberis, he wept so bitterly, and prayed so earnestly to be permitted to follow her home, that the good people at Bettwys permitted him to try and overtake her, which they considered he might easily do, as she had not left the house ten minutes before he started.
The mother reached Llanberis in safety; but the poor boy lost his way in a snow storm on Moel Einion, and was not heard of for more than a week afterwards; when, one day, a man crossing the mountain, found the child stretched on the ground in a slumbering position, his face towards the earth, buried in his hands, and quite dead.
On the evening when he lost his way, a shepherd, by the name of John Davis, said he had heard cries, like those of a child, upon the mountain, which in his ignorance he believed to be the voice of a fairy; and, terrified at the idea of encountering some supernatural being, he took to his heels in a contrary direction, with all the speed he could make, while the poor sufferer, cold and dying, vainly exerted himself in straining his innocent voice for succour.