Another seaside resort in North Cardiganshire well known to English visitors is Borth, Eminent ministers preached there at special services on January 25th and 26th. David Morgan and his bosom friend and colleague in the Revival work, Thomas Edwards, Penllwyn, were invited there for the second day. As they rode early thither through a neighbouring village, they were told that the most influential of the special preachers was antagonistic to the Revival. The two friends soon afterwards tied their beasts to a fence and retired to a secluded place in a copse hard by. Having preached in the morning service, the Revivalist asked the unconverted hearers not to leave, as he had another message for them. On this he picked up his hat and went out. He was out a long time. Many feared he had taken his horse and departed, but it seems it was for private prayer that he had retired. When he returned to the waiting assembly, his face glowed with unearthly radiance, like that of Moses when he came down from Sinai. His eyes flashed around with lightning glances, and when the singing ceased he commenced, "Do you know what is our errand here? — we have come to search for gold dust in the sands of Borth." Every sentence that he uttered went straight and swift as arrows into the hearts of the King's enemies.'* As the converts stood up to come forward," records the Diary, "some divine power fell on the hearts of scores, and many burst out crying for their lives; that is, some of the old members, not the converts. These were weeping and trembling. These influences lasted like Greek fire for five minutes." "Something like a cloud-burst took place," writes another. In the height of the tumult, David Morgan cried exultingly, "The walls of Jericho are falling in heaps of ruin!" Then he went down among the converts. One of them was a young man named James Enos, on whose account there had been great searchings of heart because of his talents and the religious traditions of his family. When the Revivalist saw him, he leaped over four feet into the air with a shout — "The silver vessels are being gathered out of the rubbish-heaps."
One morning at eight, little children held a prayer- meeting on behalf of an aged sinner of eighty-four who was locally known as ''Old Aberleri." That same day in the afternoon service the old rebel yielded, conquered by love divine and human. " Bring forth the best robe," cried the Revivalist joyfully; " his Father has seen him." He was absolutely illiterate, but as a newborn babe he desired the sincere milk of the Word. He obtained it in halfpenny- worths by giving coppers to any children who would read a chapter to him.
David Morgan's text one evening was, "Thou art weighed in the balances." An old thatcher asked his neighbour at intervals, " Dost thou think He will come tonight? " He came^ as the unconverted were departing, when the minister appealed to them, "How dare you go out, and God weighing? "
One old sailor decided that he had better hide in the harbour when these hurricanes were sweeping the ocean. He avoided every meeting held by the Revivalist. He was left alone one evening when a service was on, and in the silence he felt something passing through the house. He could not define the experience more precisely, but his changed life proved it was that Wind which bloweth where it listeth that swept through the stubborn sailor's home, verifying the word, '*I was found of them that sought me not/'
The whole prayer of a convert on one occasion is recorded thus: "I thank Thee, O Lord, that Thou gavest me grace this week to plough the hill fields without cursing the horse, or the old rock, or the plough. Amen."
Many of the sailors who found salvation at Borth were called home in the storm of October 26, 1859, locally termed ** the Royal Charter breeze.'' They perished before the ardour of their first love had begun to cool.
Fro, 'The '59 Revival', by J J Morgn, pages 58-60.