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                               FOLK-LORE
                                   OF
                           WEST AND MID-WALES


                                   BY
                        JONATHAN CEREDIG DAVIES

   Member of the Folk-Lore Society, Author of "Adventures in the Land
                  of Giants," "Western Australia," &c.

                             With a Preface

                                   BY
                        ALICE, COUNTESS AMHERST.


                       "Cared doeth yr encilion."


                              ABERYSTWYTH:
         PRINTED AT THE "WELSH GAZETTE" OFFICES, BRIDGE STREET.
                                 1911.







           This book is respectfully dedicated by the Author

                                   to

                    COUNTESS OF LISBURNE, CROSSWOOD.
                        ALICE, COUNTESS AMHERST.
                           LADY ENID VAUGHAN.
                  LADY WEBLEY-PARRY-PRYSE, GOGERDDAN.
                    LADY HILLS-JOHNES OF DOLAUCOTHY.
                  MRS. HERBERT DAVIES-EVANS, HIGHMEAD.
                MRS. WILLIAM BEAUCLERK POWELL, NANTEOS.







PREFACE

BY

ALICE, COUNTESS AMHERST.


The writer of this book lived for many years in the Welsh Colony,
Patagonia, where he was the pioneer of the Anglican Church. He
published a book dealing with that part of the world, which also
contained a great deal of interesting matter regarding the little known
Patagonian Indians, Ideas on Religion and Customs, etc. He returned
to Wales in 1891; and after spending a few years in his native land,
went out to a wild part of Western Australia, and was the pioneer
Christian worker in a district called Colliefields, where he also
built a church. (No one had ever conducted Divine Service in that
place before.)

Here again, he found time to write his experiences, and his book
contained a great deal of value to the Folklorist, regarding the
aborigines of that country, quite apart from the ordinary account of
Missionary enterprise, history and prospects of Western Australia, etc.

In 1901, Mr. Ceredig Davies came back to live in his native country,
Wales.

In Cardiganshire, and the centre of Wales, generally, there still
remains a great mass of unrecorded Celtic Folk Lore, Tradition,
and Custom.

Thus it was suggested that if Mr. Ceredig Davies wished again to
write a book--the material for a valuable one lay at his door if
he cared to undertake it. His accurate knowledge of Welsh gave him
great facility for the work. He took up the idea, and this book is
the result of his labours.

The main object has been to collect "verbatim," and render the Welsh
idiom into English as nearly as possible these old stories still told
of times gone by.

The book is in no way written to prove, or disprove, any of the
numerous theories and speculations regarding the origin of the Celtic
Race, its Religion or its Traditions. The fundamental object has been
to commit to writing what still remains of the unwritten Welsh Folk
Lore, before it is forgotten, and this is rapidly becoming the case.

The subjects are divided on the same lines as most of the books on
Highland and Irish Folk Lore, so that the student will find little
trouble in tracing the resemblance, or otherwise, of the Folk Lore
in Wales with that of the two sister countries.


ALICE AMHERST.

Plas Amherst, Harlech,
North Wales, 1911.







INTRODUCTION.


Welsh folk-lore is almost inexhaustible, and of great importance to
the historian and others. Indeed, without a knowledge of the past
traditions, customs and superstitions of the people, the history of
a country is not complete.

In this book I deal chiefly with the three counties of Cardiganshire,
Carmarthenshire, and Pembrokeshire, technically known in the present
day as "West Wales"; but as I have introduced so many things from the
counties bordering on Cardigan and Carmarthen, such as Montgomery,
Radnor, Brecon, etc., I thought proper that the work should be
entitled, "The Folk-Lore of West and Mid-Wales."

Although I have been for some years abroad, in Patagonia, and
Australia, yet I know almost every county in my native land; and there
is hardly a spot in the three counties of Carmarthen, Cardigan, and
Pembroke that I have not visited during the last nine years, gathering
materials for this book from old people and others who were interested
in such subject, spending three or four months in some districts. All
this took considerable time and trouble, not to mention of the expenses
in going about; but I generally walked much, especially in the remote
country districts, but I feel I have rescued from oblivion things
which are dying out, and many things which have died out already. I
have written very fully concerning the old Welsh Wedding and Funeral
Customs, and obtained most interesting account of them from aged
persons. The "Bidder's Song," by Daniel Ddu, which first appeared
in the "Cambrian Briton" 1822, is of special interest. Mrs. Loxdale,
of Castle Hill, showed me a fine silver cup which had been presented
to this celebrated poet. I have also a chapter on Fairies; but as I
found that Fairy Lore has almost died out in those districts which I
visited, and the traditions concerning them already recorded, I was
obliged to extract much of my information on this subject from books,
though I found a few new fairy stories in Cardiganshire. But as to
my chapters about Witches, Wizards, Death Omens, I am indebted for
almost all my information to old men and old women