Welsh Folk Lore

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7. _A Boy taken to Fairy Land_.

Mrs. Morris, of Cwm Vicarage, near Rhyl, told the writer the following
story. She stated that she had heard it related in her family that one
of their people had in childhood been induced by the Fairies to follow
them to their country. This boy had been sent to discharge some domestic
errand, but he did not return. He was sought for in all directions but
could not be found. His parents came to the conclusion that he had
either been murdered or kidnapped, and in time he was forgotten by most
people, but one day he returned with what he had been sent for in his
hand. But so many years had elapsed since he first left home, that he
was now an old grey-headed man, though he knew it not; he had, he said,
followed, for a short time, delightful music and people; but when
convinced, by the changes around, that years had slipped by since he
first left his home, he was so distressed at the changes he saw that he
said he would return to the Fairies. But alas! he sought in vain for the
place where he had met them, and therefore he was obliged to remain with
his blood relations.

The next tale differs from the preceding, insomuch that the seductive
advances of the Fairies failed in their object. I am not quite positive
whence I obtained the story, but this much I know, that it belongs to
Pentrevoelas, and that a respectable old man was in the habit of
repeating it, as an event in his own life.

_A Man Refusing the Solicitations of the Fairies_.

A Pentrevoelas man was coming home one lovely summer's night, and when
within a stone's throw of his house, he heard in the far distance singing
of the most enchanting kind. He stopped to listen to the sweet sounds
which filled him with a sensation of deep pleasure. He had not listened
long ere he perceived that the singers were approaching. By and by they
came to the spot where he was, and he saw that they were marching in
single file and consisted of a number of small people, robed in
close-fitting grey clothes, and they were accompanied by speckled dogs
that marched along two deep like soldiers. When the procession came
quite opposite the enraptured listener, it stopped, and the small people
spoke to him and earnestly begged him to accompany them, but he would
not. They tried many ways, and for a long time, to persuade him to join
them, but when they saw they could not induce him to do so they departed,
dividing themselves into two companies and marching away, the dogs
marching two abreast in front of each company. They sang as they went
away the most entrancing music that was ever heard. The man,
spell-bound, stood where he was, listening to the ravishing music of the
Fairies, and he did not enter his house until the last sound had died
away in the far-off distance.

Professor Rhys records a tale much like the preceding. (See his _Welsh
Fairy Tales_, pp. 34, 35.) It is as follows:--"One bright moonlight
night, as one of the sons of the farmer who lived at Llwyn On in Nant y
Bettws was going to pay his addresses to a girl at Clogwyn y Gwin, he
beheld the Tylwyth enjoying themselves in full swing on a meadow close to
Cwellyn Lake. He approached them and little by little he was led on by
the enchanting sweetness of their music and the liveliness of their
playing until he got within their circle. Soon some kind of spell passed
over him, so that he lost his knowledge of every place, and found himself
in a country the most beautiful he had ever seen, where everybody spent
his time in mirth and rejoicing. He had been there seven years, and yet
it seemed to him but a night's dream; but a faint recollection came to
his mind of the business on which he had left home, and he felt a longing
to see his beloved one: so he went and asked permission to return home,
which was granted him, together with a host of attendants to lead him to
his country; and, suddenly, he found himself, as waking from a dream, on
the bank where he had seen the Fairy Family amusing themselves. He
turned towards home, but there he found everything changed: his parents
were dead, his brothers could not recognize him, and his sweetheart was
married to another man. In consequence of such changes, he broke his
heart, and died in less than a week after coming back."

Many variants of the legends already related are still extant in Wales.
This much can be said of these tales, that it was formerly believed that
marriages took place between men and Fairies, and from the tales
themselves we can infer that the men fared better in Fairy land than the
Fairy ladies did in the country of their earthly husbands. This,
perhaps, is what might be expected, if, as we may suppose, the Fair Tribe
were supplanted, and overcome, by a stronger, and bolder people, with
whom, to a certain extent, the weaker and conquered or subdued race
commingled by marriage. Certain striking characteristics of both races
are strongly marked in these legends. The one is a smaller and more
timid people than the other, and far more beautiful in mind and person
than their conquerors. The ravishing beauty of the Fairy lady forms a
prominent feature in all these legends. The Fairies, too, are spoken of
as being without religion. This, perhaps, means nothing more than that
they differed from their conquerors in forms, or objects of worship.
However this might be, it would appear that their conquerors knew but
little of that perfect moral teaching which made the Fairies, according
to the testimony of Giraldus, truthful, void of ambition, and honest.

It must, however, be confessed, that there is much that is mythical in
these legends, and every part cannot well be made to correspond with
ordinary human transactions.

It is somewhat amusing to note how modern ideas, and customs, are mixed
up with these ancient stories. They undoubtedly received a gloss from
the ages which transmitted the tales.

In the next chapter I shall treat of another phase of Fairy Folk-lore,
which will still further connect the Fair Race with their conquerors.

FAIRY CHANGELINGS.

It was firmly believed, at one time, in Wales, that the Fairies exchanged
their own weakly or deformed offspring for the strong children of
mortals. The child supposed to have been left by the Fairies in the
cradle, or elsewhere, was commonly called a changeling. This faith was
not confined to Wales; it was as common in Ireland, Scotland, and
England, as it was in Wales. Thus, in Spenser's _Faery Queen_, reference
is made in the following words to this popular error:--

And her base Elfin brood there for thee left;
Such, men do chaungelings call, so chaung'd by Faeries theft.

_Faery Queen_, Bk. I, c. 10.

The same superstition is thus alluded to by Shakespeare:--

A lovely boy, stol'n from an Indian king,
She never had so sweet a changeling.

_A Midsummer Night's Dream_, Act II., Sc. 1.

And again, in another of his plays, the Fairy practice of exchanging
children is mentioned:--

O, that it could be prov'd,
That some night-tripping Fairy had exchanged
In cradle-clothes our children, where they lay,
And call'd mine, Percy, his Plantagenet:
Then would I have his Harry, and he mine.

_Henry IV_., Pt. 1., Act I, Sc. 1.

In Scotland and other countries the Fairies were credited with stealing
unbaptized infants, and leaving in their stead poor, sickly, noisy, thin,
babies. But to return to Wales, a poet in _Y Brython_, vol. iii, p. 103,
thus sings:--

Llawer plentyn teg aeth ganddynt,
Pan y cym'rynt helynt hir;
Oddi ar anwyl dda rieni,
I drigfanau difri dir.

Many a lovely child they've taken,
When long and bitter was the pain;
From their parents, loving, dear,
To the Fairies' dread domain.

John Williams, an old man, who lived in the Penrhyn quarry district,
informed the writer that he could reveal strange doings of the Fairies in
his neighbourhood, for often had they changed children with even
well-to-do families, he said, but more he would not say, lest he should
injure those prosperous families.

It was believed that the Fairies were particularly busy in exchanging
children on _Nos Wyl Ifan_, or St. John's Eve.

There were, however, effectual means for protecting children from their
machinations. The mother's presence, the tongs placed cross-ways on the
cradle, the early baptism of the child, were all preventives. In the
Western Isles of Scotland fire carried round a woman before she was
churched, and round the child until he was christened, daily, night and
morning, preserved both from the evil designs of the Fairies. (Brand,
vol. ii, p. 486.) And it will be shortly shewn that even after an
exchange had been accomplished there were means of forcing the Fairies to
restore the stolen child.

It can well be believed that mothers who had sickly or idiotic babies
would, in uncivilized places, gladly embrace the idea that the child she
nursed was a changeling, and then, naturally enough, she would endeavour
to recover her own again. The plan adopted for this purpose was
extremely dangerous. I will in the following tales show what steps were
taken to reclaim the lost child.

Pennant records how a woman who had a peevish child acted to regain from
the Fairies her own offspring. His words are:--"Above this is a
spreading oak of great antiquity, size, and extent of branches; it has
got the name of _Fairy Oak_. In this very century (the eighteenth) a
poor cottager, who lived near the spot, had a child who grew uncommonly
peevish; the parents attributed this to the _Fairies_, and imagined that
it was a changeling. They took the child, put it into a cradle, and left
it all night beneath the tree, in hopes that the _Tylwyth Teg_, or _Fairy
Family_, or the Fairy folk, would restore their own before the morning.
When morning came, they found the child perfectly quiet, so went away
with it, quite confirmed in their belief."--_History of Whiteford_, pp.
5, 6.

These people by exposing their infant for a night to the elements ran a
risk of losing it altogether; but they acted in agreement with the
popular opinion, which was that the Fairies had such affection for their
own children that they would not allow them to be in any danger of losing
their life, and that if the elfin child were thus exposed the Fairies
would rescue it, and restore the exchanged child to its parents. The
following tale exhibits another phase of this belief.

The story is to be found in the _Cambrian Magazine_, vol. ii., pp. 86,
87.

1. "_The Egg Shell Pottage_."

"In the parish of Treveglwys, near Llanidloes, in the county of
Montgomery, there is a little shepherd's cot, that is commonly called Twt
y Cwmrws (the place of strife) on account of the extraordinary strife
that has been there. The inhabitants of the cottage were a man and his
wife, and they had born to them twins, whom the woman nursed with great
care and tenderness. Some months afterwards indispensable business
called the wife to the house of one of her nearest neighbours; yet,
notwithstanding she had not far to go, she did not like to leave her
children by themselves in their cradle, even for a minute, as her house
was solitary, and there were many tales of goblins or the '_Tylwyth Teg_'
(the Fair Family or the Fairies) haunting the neighbourhood. However,
she went, and returned as soon as she could; but on coming back she felt
herself not a little terrified on seeing, though it was mid-day, some of
'the old elves of the blue petticoat,' as they are usually called;
however, when she got back to her house she was rejoiced to find
everything in the state she had left it.

But after some time had passed by, the good people began to wonder that
the twins did not grow at all, but still continued little dwarfs. The
man would have it that they were not his children; the woman said that
they must be their children, and about this arose the great strife
between them that gave name to the place. One evening when the woman was
very heavy of heart she determined to go and consult a _Gwr Cyfarwydd_
(i.e., a wise man, or a conjuror), feeling assured that everything was
known to him, and he gave her his counsel. Now there was to be a harvest
soon of the rye and oats; so the wise man said to her:--'When you are
preparing dinner for the reapers empty the shell of a hen's egg, and boil
the shell full of pottage and take it out through the door as if you
meant it for a dinner to the reapers, and then listen what the twins will
say; if you hear the children speaking things above the understanding of
children, return into the house, take them, and throw them into the waves
of Llyn Ebyr, which is very near to you; but if you don't hear anything
remarkable, do them no injury.' And when the day of the reaping came,
the woman did as her adviser had recommended to her; and as she went
outside the door to listen, she heard one of the children say to the
other:--

Gwelais vesen cyn gweled derwen,
Gwelais wy cyn gweled iar,
Erioed ni welais verwi bwyd i vedel
Mewn plisgyn wy iar!

Acorns before oak I knew,
An egg before a hen,
Never one hen's egg-shell stew
Enough for harvest men!

On this the mother returned to her house and took the two children, and
threw them into the Llyn, and suddenly the goblins in their trousers came
to save their dwarfs, and the woman had her own children back again, and
thus the strife between her and her husband ended."

The writer of the preceding story says that it was translated almost
literally from Welsh, as told by the peasantry, and he remarks that the
legend bears a striking resemblance to one of the Irish tales published
by Mr. Croker.

Many variants of the legend are still extant in many parts of Wales.
There is one of these recorded in Professor Rhys's _Welsh Fairy Tales_,
_Y Cymmrodor_, vol. iv., pp. 208-209. It is much like that given in the
_Cambrian Magazine_.

2. _Corwrion Changeling Legend_.

Once on a time, in the fourteenth century, the wife of a man at Corwrion
had twins, and she complained one day to the witch who lived close by, at
Tyddyn y Barcut, that the children were not getting on, but that they
were always crying, day and night. 'Are you sure that they are your
children?' asked the witch, adding that it did not seem to her that they
were like hers. 'I have my doubts also,' said the mother. 'I wonder if
somebody has changed children with you,' said the witch. 'I do not
know,' said the mother. 'But why do you not seek to know?' asked the
other. 'But how am I to go about it?' said the mother. The witch
replied, 'Go and do something rather strange before their eyes and watch
what they will say to one another.' 'Well I do not know what I should
do,' said the mother. 'Oh,' said the other, 'take an egg-shell, and
proceed to brew beer in it in a chamber aside, and come here to tell me
what the children will say about it.' She went home and did as the witch
had directed her, when the two children lifted their heads out of the
cradle to see what she was doing, to watch, and to listen. Then one
observed to the other:--'I remember seeing an oak having an acorn,' to
which the other replied, 'And I remember seeing a hen having an egg,' and
one of the two added, 'But I do not remember before seeing anybody brew
beer in the shell of a hen's egg.'

The mother then went to the witch and told her what the twins had said
one to the other, and she directed her to go to a small wooden bridge not
far off, with one of the strange children under each arm, and there to
drop them from the bridge into the river beneath. The mother went back
home again and did as she had been directed. When she reached home this
time, to her astonishment, she found that her own children had been
brought back."

There is one important difference between these two tales. In the
latter, the mother drops the children over the bridge into the waters
beneath, and then goes home, without noticing whether the poor children
had been rescued by the goblins or not, but on reaching her home she
found in the cradle her own two children, presumably conveyed there by
the Fairies. In the first tale, we are informed that she saw the goblins
save their offspring from a watery grave. Subjecting peevish children to
such a terrible ordeal as this must have ended often with a tragedy, but
even in such cases superstitious mothers could easily persuade themselves
that the destroyed infants were undoubtedly the offspring of elfins, and
therefore unworthy of their fostering care. The only safeguard to
wholesale infanticide was the test applied as to the super-human
precociousness, or ordinary intelligence, of the children.

Another version of this tale was related to me by my young friend, the
Rev. D. H. Griffiths, of Clocaenog Rectory, near Ruthin. The tale was
told him by Evan Roberts, Ffriddagored, Llanfwrog. Mr. Roberts is an
aged farmer.

3. _Llanfwrog Changeling Legend_.

A mother took her child to the gleaning field, and left it sleeping under
the sheaves of wheat whilst she was busily engaged gleaning. The Fairies
came to the field and carried off her pretty baby, leaving in its place
one of their own infants. At the time, the mother did not notice any
difference between her own child and the one that took its place, but
after awhile she observed with grief that the baby she was nursing did
not thrive, nor did it grow, nor would it try to walk. She mentioned
these facts to her neighbours, and she was told to do something strange
and then listen to its conversation. She took an egg-shell and pretended
to brew beer in it, and she was then surprised to hear the child, who had
observed her actions intently, say:--

Mi welais fesen gan dderwen,
Mi welais wy gan iar,
Ond ni welais i erioed ddarllaw
Mewn cibyn wy iar.

I have seen an oak having an acorn,
I have seen a hen having an egg,
But I never saw before brewing
In the shell of a hen's egg.

This conversation proved the origin of the precocious child who lay in
the cradle. The stanza was taken down from Roberts's lips. But he could
not say what was done to the fairy changeling.

In Ireland a plan for reclaiming the child carried away by the Fairies
was to take the Fairy's changeling and place it on the top of a dunghill,
and then to chant certain invocatory lines beseeching the Fairies to
restore the stolen child.

There was, it would seem, in Wales, a certain form of incantation
resorted to to reclaim children from the Fairies, which was as
follows:--The mother who had lost her child was to carry the changeling
to a river, but she was to be accompanied by a conjuror, who was to take
a prominent part in the ceremony. When at the river's brink the conjuror
was to cry out:--

Crap ar y wrach--

A grip on the hag;

and the mother was to respond--

Rhy hwyr gyfraglach--

Too late decrepit one;

and having uttered these words, she was to throw the child into the
stream, and to depart, and it was believed that on reaching her home she
would there find her own child safe and sound.

I have already alluded to the horrible nature of such a proceeding. I
will now relate a tale somewhat resembling those already given, but in
this latter case, the supposed changeling became the mainstay of his
family. I am indebted for the _Gors Goch_ legend to an essay, written by
Mr. D. Williams, Llanfachreth, Merionethshire, which took the prize at
the Liverpool Eisteddfod, 1870, and which appears in a publication called
_Y Gordofigion_, pp. 96, 97, published by Mr. I. Foulkes, Liverpool.

4. _The Gore Goch Changeling Legend_.

The tale rendered into English is as follows:--"There was once a happy
family living in a place called Gors Goch. One night, as usual, they
went to bed, but they could not sleep a single wink, because of the noise
outside the house. At last the master of the house got up, and
trembling, enquired 'What was there, and what was wanted.' A clear sweet
voice answered him thus, 'We want a warm place where we can tidy the
children.' The door was opened when there entered half full the house of
the _Tylwyth Teg_, and they began forthwith washing their children. And
when they had finished, they commenced singing, and the singing was
entrancing. The dancing and the singing were both excellent. On going
away they left behind them money not a little for the use of the house.
And afterwards they came pretty often to the house, and received a hearty
welcome in consequence of the large presents which they left behind them
on the hob. But at last a sad affair took place which was no less than
an exchange of children. The Gors Goch baby was a dumpy child, a sweet,
pretty, affectionate little dear, but the child which was left in its
stead was a sickly, thin, shapeless, ugly being, which did nothing but
cry and eat, and although it ate ravenously like a mastiff, it did not
grow. At last the wife of Gors Goch died of a broken heart, and so also
did all her children, but the father lived a long life and became a rich
man, because his new heir's family brought him abundance of gold and
silver."

As I have already given more than one variant of the same legend, I will
supply another version of the Gors Goch legend which appears in _Cymru
Fu_, pp. 177-8, from the pen of the Revd. Owen Wyn Jones, _Glasynys_, and
which in consequence of the additional facts contained in it may be of
some value. I will make use of Professor Rhys's translation. (See _Y
Cymmrodor_, vol. v., pp. 79-80.)

5. _Another Version of the Gors Goch Legend_.

"When the people of the Gors Goch one evening had gone to bed, lo! they
heard a great row and disturbance around the house. One could not at all
comprehend what it might be that made a noise that time of night. Both
the husband and the wife had waked up, quite unable to make out what
there might be there. The children also woke but no one could utter a
word; their tongues had all stuck to the roofs of their mouths. The
husband, however, at last managed to move, and to ask, 'Who is there?
What do you want?' Then he was answered from without by a small silvery
voice, 'It is room we want to dress our children.' The door was opened,
and a dozen small beings came in, and began to search for an earthen
pitcher with water; there they remained for some hours, washing and
titivating themselves. As the day was breaking they went away, leaving
behind them a fine present for the kindness they had received. Often
afterwards did the Gors Goch folks have the company of this family. But
once there happened to be a fine roll of a pretty baby in his cradle.
The Fair Family came, and, as the baby had not been baptized, they took
the liberty of changing him for one of their own. They left behind in
his stead an abominable creature that would do nothing but cry and scream
every day of the week. The mother was nearly breaking her heart, on
account of the misfortune, and greatly afraid of telling anybody about
it. But everybody got to see that there was something wrong at Gors
Goch, which was proved before long by the mother dying of longing for her
child. The other children died broken-hearted after their mother, and
the husband was left alone with the little elf without anyone to comfort
them. But shortly after, the Fairies began to resort again to the hearth
of the Gors Goch to dress children, and the gift which had formerly been
silver money became henceforth pure gold. In the course of a few years
the elf became the heir of a large farm in North Wales, and that is why
the old people used to say, 'Shoe the elf with gold and he will grow.'"
(_Fe ddaw gwiddon yn fawr ond ei bedoli ag aur_.)

It will be observed that this latter version differs in one remarkable
incident from the preceding tale. In the former there is no allusion to
the fact that the changed child had not been baptized; in the latter,
this omission is specially mentioned as giving power to the Fairies to
exchange their own child for the human baby. This preventive carries
these tales into Christian days. Another tale, which I will now relate,
also proves that faith in the Fairies and in the efficacy of the Cross
existed at one and the same time. The tale is taken from _Y
Gordofigion_, p. 96. I will first give it as it originally appeared, and
then I will translate the story.

6. _Garth Uchaf, Llanuwchllyn_, _Changeling Legend_.

"Yr oedd gwraig Garth Uchaf, yn Llanuwchllyn, un tro wedi myned allan i
gweirio gwair, a gadael ei baban yn y cryd; ond fel bu'r anffawd, ni
roddodd yr efail yn groes ar wyneb y cryd, ac o ganlyniad, ffeiriwyd ei
baban gan y Tylwyth Teg, ac erbyn iddi ddyfod i'r ty, nid oedd yn y cryd
ond rhyw hen gyfraglach o blentyn fel pe buasai wedi ei haner lewygu o
eisiau ymborth, ond magwyd ef er hyny."

The wife of Garth Uchaf, Llanuwchllyn, went out one day to make hay, and
left her baby in the cradle. _Unfortunately_, _she did not place the
tongs crossways on the cradle_, and consequently the Fairies changed her
baby, and by the time she came home there was nothing in the cradle but
some old decrepit changeling, which looked is if it were half famished,
but nevertheless, it was nursed.

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