III.On returning from South Wales to Carnarvonshire in the summer of 1881, I tried to discover similar legends connected with the lakes of North Wales, beginning with Geirionyđ, the waters of which form a stream emptying itself into the Conwy, near Trefriw, a little below Ỻanrwst. I only succeeded, however, in finding an old man of the name of Pierce Williams, about seventy years of age, who was very anxious to talk about ‘Bony’s’ wars, but not about lake ladies. I was obliged, in trying to make him understand what I wanted, to use the wordmorforwyn, that is to say in English, ‘mermaid’; he then told me, that in his younger days he had heard people say that somebody had seen such beings in the Trefriw river. But as my questions were leading ones, his evidence is not worth much; however, I feel pretty sure that one who knew the neighbourhood of Geirionyđ better would be able to find some fragments of interesting legends still existing in that wild district.I was more successful at Ỻanberis, though what I found, at first, was not much; but it was genuine, and to the point. This is the substance of it:—An old woman, called Siân15Dafyđ, lived at Helfa Fawr, in the dingle called Cwm Brwynog, along the left side of which you ascend as you go to the top of Snowdon, from the village of lower Ỻanberis, or Coed y Đol, as it is there called. She was a curious old person, who made nice distinctions between the virtues of the respective waters of the district: thus, no other would do for her to cure her of thedefaid gwyỻtion16, or cancerous warts, which she fancied that she had in her mouth, than that of the spring of Tai Bach, near the lake called Ỻyn Ffynnon y Gwas, though she seldom found it out, when she was deceived by a servant who cherished a convenient opinion of his own, that a drop from a nearer spring would do just as well. Old Siân has been dead over thirty-five years, but I have it, on the testimony of two highly trustworthy brothers, who are of her family, and now between sixty and seventy years of age, that she used to relate to them how a shepherd, once on a time, saw a fairy maiden (un o’r Tylwyth Teg) on the surface of the tarn called Ỻyn Du’r Arđu, and how, from bantering andjoking, their acquaintance ripened into courtship, when the father and mother of the lake maiden appeared to give the union their sanction, and to arrange the marriage settlement. This was to the effect that the husband was never to strike his wife with iron, and that she was to bring her great wealth with her, consisting of stock of all kinds for his mountain farm. All duly took place, and they lived happily together until one day, when trying to catch a pony, the husband threw a bridle to his wife, and the iron in that struck her. It was then all over with him, as the wife hurried away with her property into the lake, so that nothing more was seen or heard of her. Here I may as well explain that the Ỻanberis side of the steep, near the top of Snowdon, is called Clogwyn du’r Arđu, or the Black Cliff of the Arđu, at the bottom of which lies the tarn alluded to as the Black Lake of the Arđu, and near it stands a huge boulder, called Maen du’r Arđu, all of which names are curious, as involving the worddu, black. Arđu itself has much the same meaning, and refers to the whole precipitous side of the summit with its dark shadows, and there is a similar Arđu near Nanmor on the Merionethshire side of Beđgelert.One of the brothers, I ought to have said, doubts that the lake here mentioned was the one in old Siân’s tale; but he has forgotten which it was of the many in the neighbourhood. Both, however, remembered another short story about fairies, which they had heard another old woman relate, namely, Mari Domos Siôn, who died some thirty years ago: it was merely to the effect that a shepherd had once lost his way in the mist on the mountain on the land of Caeau Gwynion, towards Cweỻyn17Lake, and got into a ringwhere theTylwyth Tegwere dancing: it was only after a very hard struggle that he was able, at length, to get away from them.To this I may add the testimony of a lady, for whose veracity I can vouch, to the effect that, when she was a child in Cwm Brwynog, from thirty to forty years ago, she and her brothers and sisters used to be frequently warned by their mother not to go far away from the house when there happened to be thick mist on the ground, lest they should come across theTylwyth Tegdancing, and be carried away to their abode beneath the lake. They were always, she says, supposed to live in the lakes; and the one here alluded to was Ỻyn Dwythwch, which is one of those famous for itstorgochiaidor chars. The mother is still living; but she seems to have long since, like others, lost her belief in the fairies.After writing the above, I heard that a brother to the foregoing brothers, namely, Mr. Thomas Davies, of Mur Mawr, Ỻanberis, remembered a similar tale. Mr. Davies is now sixty-four, and the persons from whom he heard the tale were the same Siân Dafyđ of Helfa Fawr, and Mari Domos Siôn of Tyn18Gadlas, Ỻanberis: the two women were about seventy years of age when he as a child heard it from them. At my request, a friend of mine, Mr. Hugh D. Jones, of Tyn Gadlas, also a member of this family, which is one of the oldest perhaps in the place, has taken down from Mr. Davies’ mouth all he could remember, word for word, as follows:—Yn perthyn i ffarm Bron y Fedw yr oeđ dyn ifancwedi cael ei fagu, nis gwyđent faint cyn eu hamser hwy. Arferai pan yn hogyn fynd i’r mynyđ yn Cwm Drywenyđ a Mynyđ y Fedw ar ochr orỻewinol y Wyđfa i fugeilio, a byđai yn taro ar hogan yn y mynyđ; ac wrth fynychu gweld eu gilyđ aethant yn ffrindiau mawr. Arferent gyfarfod eu gilyđ mewn ỻe neiỻduol yn Cwm Drywenyđ, ỻe’r oeđ yr hogan a’r teulu yn byw, ỻe y byđai pob danteithion, chwareuyđiaethau a chanu dihafal; ond ni fyđai’r hogyn yn gwneyd i fyny a neb ohonynt ond yr hogan.Diweđ y ffrindiaeth fu carwriaeth, a phan soniođ yr hogyn am iđi briodi, ni wnai ond ar un amod, sef y bywiai hi hefo fo hyd nes y tarawai ef hi a haiarn.Priodwyd hwy, a buont byw gyda’u gilyđ am nifer o flynyđoeđ, a bu iđynt blant; ac ar đyđ marchnad yn Gaernarfon yr oeđ y gwr a’r wraig yn međwl mynd i’r farchnad ar gefn merlod, fel pob ffarmwr yr amser hwnnw. Awd i’r mynyđ i đal merlyn bob un.Ar waelod Mynyđ y Fedw mae ỻyn o ryw dri-ugain neu gan ỻath o hyd ac ugain neu đeg ỻath ar hugain o led, ac y mae ar un ochr iđo le têg, fforđ y byđai’r ceffylau yn rhedeg.Daliođ y gwr ferlyn a rhoes ef i’r wraig i’w đal heb ffrwyn, tra byđai ef yn dal merlyn araỻ. Ar ol rhoi ffrwyn yn mhen ei ferlyn ei hun, taflođ un araỻ i’r wraig i roi yn mhen ei merlyn hithau, ac wrth ei thaflu tarawođbity ffrwyn hi yn ei ỻaw. Goỻyngođ y wraig y merlyn, ac aeth ar ei phen i’r ỻyn, a dyna điweđ y briodas.‘To the farm of Bron y Fedw there belonged a son, who grew up to be a young man, the women knew not how long before their time. He was in the habit of going up the mountain to Cwm Drywenyđ19and Mynyđy Fedw, on the west side of Snowdon, to do the shepherding, and there he was wont to come across a lass on the mountain, so that as the result of frequently meeting one another, he and she became great friends. They usually met at a particular spot in Cwm Drywenyđ, where the girl and her family lived, and where there were all kinds of nice things to eat, of amusements, and of incomparable music; but he did not make up to anybody there except the girl. The friendship ended in courtship; but when the boy mentioned that she should be married to him, she would only do so on one condition, namely, that she would live with him until he should strike her with iron. They were wedded, and they lived together for a number of years, and had children. Once on a time it happened to be market day at Carnarvon, whither the husband and wife thought of riding on ponies, like all the farmers of that time. So they went to the mountain to catch a pony each. At the bottom of Mynyđ y Fedw there is a pool some sixty or one hundred yards long by twenty or thirty broad, and on one side of it there is a level space along which the horses used to run. The husband caught a pony, and gave it to the wife to hold fast without a bridle, while he should catch another. When he had bridled his own pony, he threw another bridle to his wife for her to secure hers; but as he threw it, the bit of the bridle struck her on one of her hands. The wife let go the pony, and went headlong into the pool, and that was the end of their wedded life.’The following is a later tale, which Mr. Thomas Davies heard from his mother, who died in 1832: she would be ninety years of age had she been still living:—Pan oeđ hi’n hogan yn yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, yr oeđ hogan at ei hoed hi’n cael ei magu yn Cwmglas,Ỻanberis, ac arferai đweyd, pan yn hogan a thra y bu byw, y byđai yn cael arian gan y Tylwyth Teg yn Cwm Cwmglas.Yr oeđ yn dweyd y byđai ar foreuau niwliog, tywyỻ, yn mynd i le penodol yn Cwm Cwmglas gyda dsygiad o lefrith o’r fuches a thywel glan, ac yn ei rođi ar garreg; ac yn mynd yno drachefn, ac yn cael y ỻestr yn wag, gyda darn deuswỻt neu hanner coron ac weithiau fwy wrth ei ochr.‘When she was a girl, living at Yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, there was a girl of her age being brought up at Cwmglas in the same parish. The latter was in the habit of saying, when she was a girl and so long as she lived, that she used to have money from theTylwyth Teg, in the Cwmglas Hollow. Her account was, that on dark, misty mornings she used to go to a particular spot in that Hollow with a jugful of sweet milk from the milking place, and a clean towel, and then place them on a stone. She would return, and find the jug empty, with a piece of money placed by its side: that is, two shillings or half a crown, or at times even more.’A daughter of that woman lives now at a farm, Mr. Davies observes, called Plas Pennant, in the parish of Ỻanfihangel yn Mhennant, in Carnarvonshire; and he adds, that it was a tale of a kind that was common enough when he was a boy; but many laughed at it, though the old people believed it to be a fact. To this I may as well append another tale, which was brought to the memory of an old man who happened to be present when Mr. Jones and Mr. Davies were busy with the foregoing. His name is John Roberts, and his age is seventy-five: his present home is at Capel Sïon, in the neighbouring parish of Ỻanđeiniolen:—Yr oeđ ef pan yn hogyn yn gweini yn Towyn Trewern, yn agos i Gaergybi, gyda hen wr o’r enw Owen Owens, oeđ yr adeg honno at ei oed ef yn bresennol.Yr oeđynt unwaith mewn hen adeilad ar y ffarm; a dywedođ yr hen wr ei fod ef wedi cael ỻawer o arian yn y ỻe hwnnw pan yn hogyn, a buasai wedi cael ychwaneg oni bai ei dad.Yr oeđ wedi cuđio yr arian yn y ty, ond daeth ei fam o hyd iđynt, a dywedođ yr hanes wrth ei dad. Ofnai ei fod yn fachgen drwg, mai eu ỻadrata yr oeđ. Dywedai ei dad y gwnai iđo đweyd yn mha le yr oeđ yn eu cael, neu y tynnai ei groen tros ei ben; ac aeth aỻan a thorođ wialen bwrpasol at orchwyl o’r fath.Yr oeđ y bachgen yn gwrando ar yr ymđiđan rhwng ei dad a’i fam, ac yr oeđ yn benderfynol o gadw’r peth yn đirgelwch fel yr oeđ wedi ei rybuđio gan y Tylwyth Teg.Aeth i’r ty, a dechreuođ y tad ei holi, ac yntau yn gwrthod ateb; ymbiliai a’i dad, a dywedai eu bod yn berffaith onest iđo ef, ac y cai ef ychwaneg os cadwai’r peth yn đirgelwch; ond os dywedai, nad oeđ dim ychwaneg i’w gael. Mođ bynnag ni wrandawai y tad ar ei esgusion na’i resymau, a’r wialen a orfu; dywedođ y bachgen mai gan y Tylwyth Teg yr oeđ yn eu cael, a hynny ar yr amod nad oeđ i đweyd wrth neb. Mawr oeđ edifeirwch yr hen bobl am lađ yr wyđ oeđ yn dodwy.Aeth y bachgen i’r hen adeilad lawer gwaith ar ol hyn, ond ni chafođ byth ychwaneg o arian yno.‘When a lad, he was a servant at Towyn Trewern, near Holyhead, to an old man about his own age at present. They were one day in an old building on the farm, and the old man told him that he had had much money in that place when he was a lad, and that he would have had more had it not been for his father. He had hidden the money at home, where his mother found it and told his father of the affair: she feared he was a bad boy, and that it was by theft he got it. His father said that he would make him say where he got it,or else that he would strip him of the skin of his back, at the same time that he went out and cut a rod fit for effecting a purpose of the kind. The boy heard all this talk between his father and his mother, and felt determined to keep the matter a secret, as he had been warned by theTylwyth Teg. He went into the house, and his father began to question him, while he refused to answer. He supplicatingly protested that the money was honestly got, and that he should get more if he kept it a secret, but that, if he did not, there would be no more to be got. However, the father would give no ear to his excuses or his reasons, and the rod prevailed; so that the boy said that it was from theTylwyth Teghe used to get it, and that on condition of his not telling anybody. Greatly did the old folks regret having killed the goose that laid the eggs. The boy went many a time afterwards to the old building, but he never found any more money there.’
III.On returning from South Wales to Carnarvonshire in the summer of 1881, I tried to discover similar legends connected with the lakes of North Wales, beginning with Geirionyđ, the waters of which form a stream emptying itself into the Conwy, near Trefriw, a little below Ỻanrwst. I only succeeded, however, in finding an old man of the name of Pierce Williams, about seventy years of age, who was very anxious to talk about ‘Bony’s’ wars, but not about lake ladies. I was obliged, in trying to make him understand what I wanted, to use the wordmorforwyn, that is to say in English, ‘mermaid’; he then told me, that in his younger days he had heard people say that somebody had seen such beings in the Trefriw river. But as my questions were leading ones, his evidence is not worth much; however, I feel pretty sure that one who knew the neighbourhood of Geirionyđ better would be able to find some fragments of interesting legends still existing in that wild district.I was more successful at Ỻanberis, though what I found, at first, was not much; but it was genuine, and to the point. This is the substance of it:—An old woman, called Siân15Dafyđ, lived at Helfa Fawr, in the dingle called Cwm Brwynog, along the left side of which you ascend as you go to the top of Snowdon, from the village of lower Ỻanberis, or Coed y Đol, as it is there called. She was a curious old person, who made nice distinctions between the virtues of the respective waters of the district: thus, no other would do for her to cure her of thedefaid gwyỻtion16, or cancerous warts, which she fancied that she had in her mouth, than that of the spring of Tai Bach, near the lake called Ỻyn Ffynnon y Gwas, though she seldom found it out, when she was deceived by a servant who cherished a convenient opinion of his own, that a drop from a nearer spring would do just as well. Old Siân has been dead over thirty-five years, but I have it, on the testimony of two highly trustworthy brothers, who are of her family, and now between sixty and seventy years of age, that she used to relate to them how a shepherd, once on a time, saw a fairy maiden (un o’r Tylwyth Teg) on the surface of the tarn called Ỻyn Du’r Arđu, and how, from bantering andjoking, their acquaintance ripened into courtship, when the father and mother of the lake maiden appeared to give the union their sanction, and to arrange the marriage settlement. This was to the effect that the husband was never to strike his wife with iron, and that she was to bring her great wealth with her, consisting of stock of all kinds for his mountain farm. All duly took place, and they lived happily together until one day, when trying to catch a pony, the husband threw a bridle to his wife, and the iron in that struck her. It was then all over with him, as the wife hurried away with her property into the lake, so that nothing more was seen or heard of her. Here I may as well explain that the Ỻanberis side of the steep, near the top of Snowdon, is called Clogwyn du’r Arđu, or the Black Cliff of the Arđu, at the bottom of which lies the tarn alluded to as the Black Lake of the Arđu, and near it stands a huge boulder, called Maen du’r Arđu, all of which names are curious, as involving the worddu, black. Arđu itself has much the same meaning, and refers to the whole precipitous side of the summit with its dark shadows, and there is a similar Arđu near Nanmor on the Merionethshire side of Beđgelert.One of the brothers, I ought to have said, doubts that the lake here mentioned was the one in old Siân’s tale; but he has forgotten which it was of the many in the neighbourhood. Both, however, remembered another short story about fairies, which they had heard another old woman relate, namely, Mari Domos Siôn, who died some thirty years ago: it was merely to the effect that a shepherd had once lost his way in the mist on the mountain on the land of Caeau Gwynion, towards Cweỻyn17Lake, and got into a ringwhere theTylwyth Tegwere dancing: it was only after a very hard struggle that he was able, at length, to get away from them.To this I may add the testimony of a lady, for whose veracity I can vouch, to the effect that, when she was a child in Cwm Brwynog, from thirty to forty years ago, she and her brothers and sisters used to be frequently warned by their mother not to go far away from the house when there happened to be thick mist on the ground, lest they should come across theTylwyth Tegdancing, and be carried away to their abode beneath the lake. They were always, she says, supposed to live in the lakes; and the one here alluded to was Ỻyn Dwythwch, which is one of those famous for itstorgochiaidor chars. The mother is still living; but she seems to have long since, like others, lost her belief in the fairies.After writing the above, I heard that a brother to the foregoing brothers, namely, Mr. Thomas Davies, of Mur Mawr, Ỻanberis, remembered a similar tale. Mr. Davies is now sixty-four, and the persons from whom he heard the tale were the same Siân Dafyđ of Helfa Fawr, and Mari Domos Siôn of Tyn18Gadlas, Ỻanberis: the two women were about seventy years of age when he as a child heard it from them. At my request, a friend of mine, Mr. Hugh D. Jones, of Tyn Gadlas, also a member of this family, which is one of the oldest perhaps in the place, has taken down from Mr. Davies’ mouth all he could remember, word for word, as follows:—Yn perthyn i ffarm Bron y Fedw yr oeđ dyn ifancwedi cael ei fagu, nis gwyđent faint cyn eu hamser hwy. Arferai pan yn hogyn fynd i’r mynyđ yn Cwm Drywenyđ a Mynyđ y Fedw ar ochr orỻewinol y Wyđfa i fugeilio, a byđai yn taro ar hogan yn y mynyđ; ac wrth fynychu gweld eu gilyđ aethant yn ffrindiau mawr. Arferent gyfarfod eu gilyđ mewn ỻe neiỻduol yn Cwm Drywenyđ, ỻe’r oeđ yr hogan a’r teulu yn byw, ỻe y byđai pob danteithion, chwareuyđiaethau a chanu dihafal; ond ni fyđai’r hogyn yn gwneyd i fyny a neb ohonynt ond yr hogan.Diweđ y ffrindiaeth fu carwriaeth, a phan soniođ yr hogyn am iđi briodi, ni wnai ond ar un amod, sef y bywiai hi hefo fo hyd nes y tarawai ef hi a haiarn.Priodwyd hwy, a buont byw gyda’u gilyđ am nifer o flynyđoeđ, a bu iđynt blant; ac ar đyđ marchnad yn Gaernarfon yr oeđ y gwr a’r wraig yn međwl mynd i’r farchnad ar gefn merlod, fel pob ffarmwr yr amser hwnnw. Awd i’r mynyđ i đal merlyn bob un.Ar waelod Mynyđ y Fedw mae ỻyn o ryw dri-ugain neu gan ỻath o hyd ac ugain neu đeg ỻath ar hugain o led, ac y mae ar un ochr iđo le têg, fforđ y byđai’r ceffylau yn rhedeg.Daliođ y gwr ferlyn a rhoes ef i’r wraig i’w đal heb ffrwyn, tra byđai ef yn dal merlyn araỻ. Ar ol rhoi ffrwyn yn mhen ei ferlyn ei hun, taflođ un araỻ i’r wraig i roi yn mhen ei merlyn hithau, ac wrth ei thaflu tarawođbity ffrwyn hi yn ei ỻaw. Goỻyngođ y wraig y merlyn, ac aeth ar ei phen i’r ỻyn, a dyna điweđ y briodas.‘To the farm of Bron y Fedw there belonged a son, who grew up to be a young man, the women knew not how long before their time. He was in the habit of going up the mountain to Cwm Drywenyđ19and Mynyđy Fedw, on the west side of Snowdon, to do the shepherding, and there he was wont to come across a lass on the mountain, so that as the result of frequently meeting one another, he and she became great friends. They usually met at a particular spot in Cwm Drywenyđ, where the girl and her family lived, and where there were all kinds of nice things to eat, of amusements, and of incomparable music; but he did not make up to anybody there except the girl. The friendship ended in courtship; but when the boy mentioned that she should be married to him, she would only do so on one condition, namely, that she would live with him until he should strike her with iron. They were wedded, and they lived together for a number of years, and had children. Once on a time it happened to be market day at Carnarvon, whither the husband and wife thought of riding on ponies, like all the farmers of that time. So they went to the mountain to catch a pony each. At the bottom of Mynyđ y Fedw there is a pool some sixty or one hundred yards long by twenty or thirty broad, and on one side of it there is a level space along which the horses used to run. The husband caught a pony, and gave it to the wife to hold fast without a bridle, while he should catch another. When he had bridled his own pony, he threw another bridle to his wife for her to secure hers; but as he threw it, the bit of the bridle struck her on one of her hands. The wife let go the pony, and went headlong into the pool, and that was the end of their wedded life.’The following is a later tale, which Mr. Thomas Davies heard from his mother, who died in 1832: she would be ninety years of age had she been still living:—Pan oeđ hi’n hogan yn yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, yr oeđ hogan at ei hoed hi’n cael ei magu yn Cwmglas,Ỻanberis, ac arferai đweyd, pan yn hogan a thra y bu byw, y byđai yn cael arian gan y Tylwyth Teg yn Cwm Cwmglas.Yr oeđ yn dweyd y byđai ar foreuau niwliog, tywyỻ, yn mynd i le penodol yn Cwm Cwmglas gyda dsygiad o lefrith o’r fuches a thywel glan, ac yn ei rođi ar garreg; ac yn mynd yno drachefn, ac yn cael y ỻestr yn wag, gyda darn deuswỻt neu hanner coron ac weithiau fwy wrth ei ochr.‘When she was a girl, living at Yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, there was a girl of her age being brought up at Cwmglas in the same parish. The latter was in the habit of saying, when she was a girl and so long as she lived, that she used to have money from theTylwyth Teg, in the Cwmglas Hollow. Her account was, that on dark, misty mornings she used to go to a particular spot in that Hollow with a jugful of sweet milk from the milking place, and a clean towel, and then place them on a stone. She would return, and find the jug empty, with a piece of money placed by its side: that is, two shillings or half a crown, or at times even more.’A daughter of that woman lives now at a farm, Mr. Davies observes, called Plas Pennant, in the parish of Ỻanfihangel yn Mhennant, in Carnarvonshire; and he adds, that it was a tale of a kind that was common enough when he was a boy; but many laughed at it, though the old people believed it to be a fact. To this I may as well append another tale, which was brought to the memory of an old man who happened to be present when Mr. Jones and Mr. Davies were busy with the foregoing. His name is John Roberts, and his age is seventy-five: his present home is at Capel Sïon, in the neighbouring parish of Ỻanđeiniolen:—Yr oeđ ef pan yn hogyn yn gweini yn Towyn Trewern, yn agos i Gaergybi, gyda hen wr o’r enw Owen Owens, oeđ yr adeg honno at ei oed ef yn bresennol.Yr oeđynt unwaith mewn hen adeilad ar y ffarm; a dywedođ yr hen wr ei fod ef wedi cael ỻawer o arian yn y ỻe hwnnw pan yn hogyn, a buasai wedi cael ychwaneg oni bai ei dad.Yr oeđ wedi cuđio yr arian yn y ty, ond daeth ei fam o hyd iđynt, a dywedođ yr hanes wrth ei dad. Ofnai ei fod yn fachgen drwg, mai eu ỻadrata yr oeđ. Dywedai ei dad y gwnai iđo đweyd yn mha le yr oeđ yn eu cael, neu y tynnai ei groen tros ei ben; ac aeth aỻan a thorođ wialen bwrpasol at orchwyl o’r fath.Yr oeđ y bachgen yn gwrando ar yr ymđiđan rhwng ei dad a’i fam, ac yr oeđ yn benderfynol o gadw’r peth yn đirgelwch fel yr oeđ wedi ei rybuđio gan y Tylwyth Teg.Aeth i’r ty, a dechreuođ y tad ei holi, ac yntau yn gwrthod ateb; ymbiliai a’i dad, a dywedai eu bod yn berffaith onest iđo ef, ac y cai ef ychwaneg os cadwai’r peth yn đirgelwch; ond os dywedai, nad oeđ dim ychwaneg i’w gael. Mođ bynnag ni wrandawai y tad ar ei esgusion na’i resymau, a’r wialen a orfu; dywedođ y bachgen mai gan y Tylwyth Teg yr oeđ yn eu cael, a hynny ar yr amod nad oeđ i đweyd wrth neb. Mawr oeđ edifeirwch yr hen bobl am lađ yr wyđ oeđ yn dodwy.Aeth y bachgen i’r hen adeilad lawer gwaith ar ol hyn, ond ni chafođ byth ychwaneg o arian yno.‘When a lad, he was a servant at Towyn Trewern, near Holyhead, to an old man about his own age at present. They were one day in an old building on the farm, and the old man told him that he had had much money in that place when he was a lad, and that he would have had more had it not been for his father. He had hidden the money at home, where his mother found it and told his father of the affair: she feared he was a bad boy, and that it was by theft he got it. His father said that he would make him say where he got it,or else that he would strip him of the skin of his back, at the same time that he went out and cut a rod fit for effecting a purpose of the kind. The boy heard all this talk between his father and his mother, and felt determined to keep the matter a secret, as he had been warned by theTylwyth Teg. He went into the house, and his father began to question him, while he refused to answer. He supplicatingly protested that the money was honestly got, and that he should get more if he kept it a secret, but that, if he did not, there would be no more to be got. However, the father would give no ear to his excuses or his reasons, and the rod prevailed; so that the boy said that it was from theTylwyth Teghe used to get it, and that on condition of his not telling anybody. Greatly did the old folks regret having killed the goose that laid the eggs. The boy went many a time afterwards to the old building, but he never found any more money there.’
III.On returning from South Wales to Carnarvonshire in the summer of 1881, I tried to discover similar legends connected with the lakes of North Wales, beginning with Geirionyđ, the waters of which form a stream emptying itself into the Conwy, near Trefriw, a little below Ỻanrwst. I only succeeded, however, in finding an old man of the name of Pierce Williams, about seventy years of age, who was very anxious to talk about ‘Bony’s’ wars, but not about lake ladies. I was obliged, in trying to make him understand what I wanted, to use the wordmorforwyn, that is to say in English, ‘mermaid’; he then told me, that in his younger days he had heard people say that somebody had seen such beings in the Trefriw river. But as my questions were leading ones, his evidence is not worth much; however, I feel pretty sure that one who knew the neighbourhood of Geirionyđ better would be able to find some fragments of interesting legends still existing in that wild district.I was more successful at Ỻanberis, though what I found, at first, was not much; but it was genuine, and to the point. This is the substance of it:—An old woman, called Siân15Dafyđ, lived at Helfa Fawr, in the dingle called Cwm Brwynog, along the left side of which you ascend as you go to the top of Snowdon, from the village of lower Ỻanberis, or Coed y Đol, as it is there called. She was a curious old person, who made nice distinctions between the virtues of the respective waters of the district: thus, no other would do for her to cure her of thedefaid gwyỻtion16, or cancerous warts, which she fancied that she had in her mouth, than that of the spring of Tai Bach, near the lake called Ỻyn Ffynnon y Gwas, though she seldom found it out, when she was deceived by a servant who cherished a convenient opinion of his own, that a drop from a nearer spring would do just as well. Old Siân has been dead over thirty-five years, but I have it, on the testimony of two highly trustworthy brothers, who are of her family, and now between sixty and seventy years of age, that she used to relate to them how a shepherd, once on a time, saw a fairy maiden (un o’r Tylwyth Teg) on the surface of the tarn called Ỻyn Du’r Arđu, and how, from bantering andjoking, their acquaintance ripened into courtship, when the father and mother of the lake maiden appeared to give the union their sanction, and to arrange the marriage settlement. This was to the effect that the husband was never to strike his wife with iron, and that she was to bring her great wealth with her, consisting of stock of all kinds for his mountain farm. All duly took place, and they lived happily together until one day, when trying to catch a pony, the husband threw a bridle to his wife, and the iron in that struck her. It was then all over with him, as the wife hurried away with her property into the lake, so that nothing more was seen or heard of her. Here I may as well explain that the Ỻanberis side of the steep, near the top of Snowdon, is called Clogwyn du’r Arđu, or the Black Cliff of the Arđu, at the bottom of which lies the tarn alluded to as the Black Lake of the Arđu, and near it stands a huge boulder, called Maen du’r Arđu, all of which names are curious, as involving the worddu, black. Arđu itself has much the same meaning, and refers to the whole precipitous side of the summit with its dark shadows, and there is a similar Arđu near Nanmor on the Merionethshire side of Beđgelert.One of the brothers, I ought to have said, doubts that the lake here mentioned was the one in old Siân’s tale; but he has forgotten which it was of the many in the neighbourhood. Both, however, remembered another short story about fairies, which they had heard another old woman relate, namely, Mari Domos Siôn, who died some thirty years ago: it was merely to the effect that a shepherd had once lost his way in the mist on the mountain on the land of Caeau Gwynion, towards Cweỻyn17Lake, and got into a ringwhere theTylwyth Tegwere dancing: it was only after a very hard struggle that he was able, at length, to get away from them.To this I may add the testimony of a lady, for whose veracity I can vouch, to the effect that, when she was a child in Cwm Brwynog, from thirty to forty years ago, she and her brothers and sisters used to be frequently warned by their mother not to go far away from the house when there happened to be thick mist on the ground, lest they should come across theTylwyth Tegdancing, and be carried away to their abode beneath the lake. They were always, she says, supposed to live in the lakes; and the one here alluded to was Ỻyn Dwythwch, which is one of those famous for itstorgochiaidor chars. The mother is still living; but she seems to have long since, like others, lost her belief in the fairies.After writing the above, I heard that a brother to the foregoing brothers, namely, Mr. Thomas Davies, of Mur Mawr, Ỻanberis, remembered a similar tale. Mr. Davies is now sixty-four, and the persons from whom he heard the tale were the same Siân Dafyđ of Helfa Fawr, and Mari Domos Siôn of Tyn18Gadlas, Ỻanberis: the two women were about seventy years of age when he as a child heard it from them. At my request, a friend of mine, Mr. Hugh D. Jones, of Tyn Gadlas, also a member of this family, which is one of the oldest perhaps in the place, has taken down from Mr. Davies’ mouth all he could remember, word for word, as follows:—Yn perthyn i ffarm Bron y Fedw yr oeđ dyn ifancwedi cael ei fagu, nis gwyđent faint cyn eu hamser hwy. Arferai pan yn hogyn fynd i’r mynyđ yn Cwm Drywenyđ a Mynyđ y Fedw ar ochr orỻewinol y Wyđfa i fugeilio, a byđai yn taro ar hogan yn y mynyđ; ac wrth fynychu gweld eu gilyđ aethant yn ffrindiau mawr. Arferent gyfarfod eu gilyđ mewn ỻe neiỻduol yn Cwm Drywenyđ, ỻe’r oeđ yr hogan a’r teulu yn byw, ỻe y byđai pob danteithion, chwareuyđiaethau a chanu dihafal; ond ni fyđai’r hogyn yn gwneyd i fyny a neb ohonynt ond yr hogan.Diweđ y ffrindiaeth fu carwriaeth, a phan soniođ yr hogyn am iđi briodi, ni wnai ond ar un amod, sef y bywiai hi hefo fo hyd nes y tarawai ef hi a haiarn.Priodwyd hwy, a buont byw gyda’u gilyđ am nifer o flynyđoeđ, a bu iđynt blant; ac ar đyđ marchnad yn Gaernarfon yr oeđ y gwr a’r wraig yn međwl mynd i’r farchnad ar gefn merlod, fel pob ffarmwr yr amser hwnnw. Awd i’r mynyđ i đal merlyn bob un.Ar waelod Mynyđ y Fedw mae ỻyn o ryw dri-ugain neu gan ỻath o hyd ac ugain neu đeg ỻath ar hugain o led, ac y mae ar un ochr iđo le têg, fforđ y byđai’r ceffylau yn rhedeg.Daliođ y gwr ferlyn a rhoes ef i’r wraig i’w đal heb ffrwyn, tra byđai ef yn dal merlyn araỻ. Ar ol rhoi ffrwyn yn mhen ei ferlyn ei hun, taflođ un araỻ i’r wraig i roi yn mhen ei merlyn hithau, ac wrth ei thaflu tarawođbity ffrwyn hi yn ei ỻaw. Goỻyngođ y wraig y merlyn, ac aeth ar ei phen i’r ỻyn, a dyna điweđ y briodas.‘To the farm of Bron y Fedw there belonged a son, who grew up to be a young man, the women knew not how long before their time. He was in the habit of going up the mountain to Cwm Drywenyđ19and Mynyđy Fedw, on the west side of Snowdon, to do the shepherding, and there he was wont to come across a lass on the mountain, so that as the result of frequently meeting one another, he and she became great friends. They usually met at a particular spot in Cwm Drywenyđ, where the girl and her family lived, and where there were all kinds of nice things to eat, of amusements, and of incomparable music; but he did not make up to anybody there except the girl. The friendship ended in courtship; but when the boy mentioned that she should be married to him, she would only do so on one condition, namely, that she would live with him until he should strike her with iron. They were wedded, and they lived together for a number of years, and had children. Once on a time it happened to be market day at Carnarvon, whither the husband and wife thought of riding on ponies, like all the farmers of that time. So they went to the mountain to catch a pony each. At the bottom of Mynyđ y Fedw there is a pool some sixty or one hundred yards long by twenty or thirty broad, and on one side of it there is a level space along which the horses used to run. The husband caught a pony, and gave it to the wife to hold fast without a bridle, while he should catch another. When he had bridled his own pony, he threw another bridle to his wife for her to secure hers; but as he threw it, the bit of the bridle struck her on one of her hands. The wife let go the pony, and went headlong into the pool, and that was the end of their wedded life.’The following is a later tale, which Mr. Thomas Davies heard from his mother, who died in 1832: she would be ninety years of age had she been still living:—Pan oeđ hi’n hogan yn yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, yr oeđ hogan at ei hoed hi’n cael ei magu yn Cwmglas,Ỻanberis, ac arferai đweyd, pan yn hogan a thra y bu byw, y byđai yn cael arian gan y Tylwyth Teg yn Cwm Cwmglas.Yr oeđ yn dweyd y byđai ar foreuau niwliog, tywyỻ, yn mynd i le penodol yn Cwm Cwmglas gyda dsygiad o lefrith o’r fuches a thywel glan, ac yn ei rođi ar garreg; ac yn mynd yno drachefn, ac yn cael y ỻestr yn wag, gyda darn deuswỻt neu hanner coron ac weithiau fwy wrth ei ochr.‘When she was a girl, living at Yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, there was a girl of her age being brought up at Cwmglas in the same parish. The latter was in the habit of saying, when she was a girl and so long as she lived, that she used to have money from theTylwyth Teg, in the Cwmglas Hollow. Her account was, that on dark, misty mornings she used to go to a particular spot in that Hollow with a jugful of sweet milk from the milking place, and a clean towel, and then place them on a stone. She would return, and find the jug empty, with a piece of money placed by its side: that is, two shillings or half a crown, or at times even more.’A daughter of that woman lives now at a farm, Mr. Davies observes, called Plas Pennant, in the parish of Ỻanfihangel yn Mhennant, in Carnarvonshire; and he adds, that it was a tale of a kind that was common enough when he was a boy; but many laughed at it, though the old people believed it to be a fact. To this I may as well append another tale, which was brought to the memory of an old man who happened to be present when Mr. Jones and Mr. Davies were busy with the foregoing. His name is John Roberts, and his age is seventy-five: his present home is at Capel Sïon, in the neighbouring parish of Ỻanđeiniolen:—Yr oeđ ef pan yn hogyn yn gweini yn Towyn Trewern, yn agos i Gaergybi, gyda hen wr o’r enw Owen Owens, oeđ yr adeg honno at ei oed ef yn bresennol.Yr oeđynt unwaith mewn hen adeilad ar y ffarm; a dywedođ yr hen wr ei fod ef wedi cael ỻawer o arian yn y ỻe hwnnw pan yn hogyn, a buasai wedi cael ychwaneg oni bai ei dad.Yr oeđ wedi cuđio yr arian yn y ty, ond daeth ei fam o hyd iđynt, a dywedođ yr hanes wrth ei dad. Ofnai ei fod yn fachgen drwg, mai eu ỻadrata yr oeđ. Dywedai ei dad y gwnai iđo đweyd yn mha le yr oeđ yn eu cael, neu y tynnai ei groen tros ei ben; ac aeth aỻan a thorođ wialen bwrpasol at orchwyl o’r fath.Yr oeđ y bachgen yn gwrando ar yr ymđiđan rhwng ei dad a’i fam, ac yr oeđ yn benderfynol o gadw’r peth yn đirgelwch fel yr oeđ wedi ei rybuđio gan y Tylwyth Teg.Aeth i’r ty, a dechreuođ y tad ei holi, ac yntau yn gwrthod ateb; ymbiliai a’i dad, a dywedai eu bod yn berffaith onest iđo ef, ac y cai ef ychwaneg os cadwai’r peth yn đirgelwch; ond os dywedai, nad oeđ dim ychwaneg i’w gael. Mođ bynnag ni wrandawai y tad ar ei esgusion na’i resymau, a’r wialen a orfu; dywedođ y bachgen mai gan y Tylwyth Teg yr oeđ yn eu cael, a hynny ar yr amod nad oeđ i đweyd wrth neb. Mawr oeđ edifeirwch yr hen bobl am lađ yr wyđ oeđ yn dodwy.Aeth y bachgen i’r hen adeilad lawer gwaith ar ol hyn, ond ni chafođ byth ychwaneg o arian yno.‘When a lad, he was a servant at Towyn Trewern, near Holyhead, to an old man about his own age at present. They were one day in an old building on the farm, and the old man told him that he had had much money in that place when he was a lad, and that he would have had more had it not been for his father. He had hidden the money at home, where his mother found it and told his father of the affair: she feared he was a bad boy, and that it was by theft he got it. His father said that he would make him say where he got it,or else that he would strip him of the skin of his back, at the same time that he went out and cut a rod fit for effecting a purpose of the kind. The boy heard all this talk between his father and his mother, and felt determined to keep the matter a secret, as he had been warned by theTylwyth Teg. He went into the house, and his father began to question him, while he refused to answer. He supplicatingly protested that the money was honestly got, and that he should get more if he kept it a secret, but that, if he did not, there would be no more to be got. However, the father would give no ear to his excuses or his reasons, and the rod prevailed; so that the boy said that it was from theTylwyth Teghe used to get it, and that on condition of his not telling anybody. Greatly did the old folks regret having killed the goose that laid the eggs. The boy went many a time afterwards to the old building, but he never found any more money there.’
III.On returning from South Wales to Carnarvonshire in the summer of 1881, I tried to discover similar legends connected with the lakes of North Wales, beginning with Geirionyđ, the waters of which form a stream emptying itself into the Conwy, near Trefriw, a little below Ỻanrwst. I only succeeded, however, in finding an old man of the name of Pierce Williams, about seventy years of age, who was very anxious to talk about ‘Bony’s’ wars, but not about lake ladies. I was obliged, in trying to make him understand what I wanted, to use the wordmorforwyn, that is to say in English, ‘mermaid’; he then told me, that in his younger days he had heard people say that somebody had seen such beings in the Trefriw river. But as my questions were leading ones, his evidence is not worth much; however, I feel pretty sure that one who knew the neighbourhood of Geirionyđ better would be able to find some fragments of interesting legends still existing in that wild district.I was more successful at Ỻanberis, though what I found, at first, was not much; but it was genuine, and to the point. This is the substance of it:—An old woman, called Siân15Dafyđ, lived at Helfa Fawr, in the dingle called Cwm Brwynog, along the left side of which you ascend as you go to the top of Snowdon, from the village of lower Ỻanberis, or Coed y Đol, as it is there called. She was a curious old person, who made nice distinctions between the virtues of the respective waters of the district: thus, no other would do for her to cure her of thedefaid gwyỻtion16, or cancerous warts, which she fancied that she had in her mouth, than that of the spring of Tai Bach, near the lake called Ỻyn Ffynnon y Gwas, though she seldom found it out, when she was deceived by a servant who cherished a convenient opinion of his own, that a drop from a nearer spring would do just as well. Old Siân has been dead over thirty-five years, but I have it, on the testimony of two highly trustworthy brothers, who are of her family, and now between sixty and seventy years of age, that she used to relate to them how a shepherd, once on a time, saw a fairy maiden (un o’r Tylwyth Teg) on the surface of the tarn called Ỻyn Du’r Arđu, and how, from bantering andjoking, their acquaintance ripened into courtship, when the father and mother of the lake maiden appeared to give the union their sanction, and to arrange the marriage settlement. This was to the effect that the husband was never to strike his wife with iron, and that she was to bring her great wealth with her, consisting of stock of all kinds for his mountain farm. All duly took place, and they lived happily together until one day, when trying to catch a pony, the husband threw a bridle to his wife, and the iron in that struck her. It was then all over with him, as the wife hurried away with her property into the lake, so that nothing more was seen or heard of her. Here I may as well explain that the Ỻanberis side of the steep, near the top of Snowdon, is called Clogwyn du’r Arđu, or the Black Cliff of the Arđu, at the bottom of which lies the tarn alluded to as the Black Lake of the Arđu, and near it stands a huge boulder, called Maen du’r Arđu, all of which names are curious, as involving the worddu, black. Arđu itself has much the same meaning, and refers to the whole precipitous side of the summit with its dark shadows, and there is a similar Arđu near Nanmor on the Merionethshire side of Beđgelert.One of the brothers, I ought to have said, doubts that the lake here mentioned was the one in old Siân’s tale; but he has forgotten which it was of the many in the neighbourhood. Both, however, remembered another short story about fairies, which they had heard another old woman relate, namely, Mari Domos Siôn, who died some thirty years ago: it was merely to the effect that a shepherd had once lost his way in the mist on the mountain on the land of Caeau Gwynion, towards Cweỻyn17Lake, and got into a ringwhere theTylwyth Tegwere dancing: it was only after a very hard struggle that he was able, at length, to get away from them.To this I may add the testimony of a lady, for whose veracity I can vouch, to the effect that, when she was a child in Cwm Brwynog, from thirty to forty years ago, she and her brothers and sisters used to be frequently warned by their mother not to go far away from the house when there happened to be thick mist on the ground, lest they should come across theTylwyth Tegdancing, and be carried away to their abode beneath the lake. They were always, she says, supposed to live in the lakes; and the one here alluded to was Ỻyn Dwythwch, which is one of those famous for itstorgochiaidor chars. The mother is still living; but she seems to have long since, like others, lost her belief in the fairies.After writing the above, I heard that a brother to the foregoing brothers, namely, Mr. Thomas Davies, of Mur Mawr, Ỻanberis, remembered a similar tale. Mr. Davies is now sixty-four, and the persons from whom he heard the tale were the same Siân Dafyđ of Helfa Fawr, and Mari Domos Siôn of Tyn18Gadlas, Ỻanberis: the two women were about seventy years of age when he as a child heard it from them. At my request, a friend of mine, Mr. Hugh D. Jones, of Tyn Gadlas, also a member of this family, which is one of the oldest perhaps in the place, has taken down from Mr. Davies’ mouth all he could remember, word for word, as follows:—Yn perthyn i ffarm Bron y Fedw yr oeđ dyn ifancwedi cael ei fagu, nis gwyđent faint cyn eu hamser hwy. Arferai pan yn hogyn fynd i’r mynyđ yn Cwm Drywenyđ a Mynyđ y Fedw ar ochr orỻewinol y Wyđfa i fugeilio, a byđai yn taro ar hogan yn y mynyđ; ac wrth fynychu gweld eu gilyđ aethant yn ffrindiau mawr. Arferent gyfarfod eu gilyđ mewn ỻe neiỻduol yn Cwm Drywenyđ, ỻe’r oeđ yr hogan a’r teulu yn byw, ỻe y byđai pob danteithion, chwareuyđiaethau a chanu dihafal; ond ni fyđai’r hogyn yn gwneyd i fyny a neb ohonynt ond yr hogan.Diweđ y ffrindiaeth fu carwriaeth, a phan soniođ yr hogyn am iđi briodi, ni wnai ond ar un amod, sef y bywiai hi hefo fo hyd nes y tarawai ef hi a haiarn.Priodwyd hwy, a buont byw gyda’u gilyđ am nifer o flynyđoeđ, a bu iđynt blant; ac ar đyđ marchnad yn Gaernarfon yr oeđ y gwr a’r wraig yn međwl mynd i’r farchnad ar gefn merlod, fel pob ffarmwr yr amser hwnnw. Awd i’r mynyđ i đal merlyn bob un.Ar waelod Mynyđ y Fedw mae ỻyn o ryw dri-ugain neu gan ỻath o hyd ac ugain neu đeg ỻath ar hugain o led, ac y mae ar un ochr iđo le têg, fforđ y byđai’r ceffylau yn rhedeg.Daliođ y gwr ferlyn a rhoes ef i’r wraig i’w đal heb ffrwyn, tra byđai ef yn dal merlyn araỻ. Ar ol rhoi ffrwyn yn mhen ei ferlyn ei hun, taflođ un araỻ i’r wraig i roi yn mhen ei merlyn hithau, ac wrth ei thaflu tarawođbity ffrwyn hi yn ei ỻaw. Goỻyngođ y wraig y merlyn, ac aeth ar ei phen i’r ỻyn, a dyna điweđ y briodas.‘To the farm of Bron y Fedw there belonged a son, who grew up to be a young man, the women knew not how long before their time. He was in the habit of going up the mountain to Cwm Drywenyđ19and Mynyđy Fedw, on the west side of Snowdon, to do the shepherding, and there he was wont to come across a lass on the mountain, so that as the result of frequently meeting one another, he and she became great friends. They usually met at a particular spot in Cwm Drywenyđ, where the girl and her family lived, and where there were all kinds of nice things to eat, of amusements, and of incomparable music; but he did not make up to anybody there except the girl. The friendship ended in courtship; but when the boy mentioned that she should be married to him, she would only do so on one condition, namely, that she would live with him until he should strike her with iron. They were wedded, and they lived together for a number of years, and had children. Once on a time it happened to be market day at Carnarvon, whither the husband and wife thought of riding on ponies, like all the farmers of that time. So they went to the mountain to catch a pony each. At the bottom of Mynyđ y Fedw there is a pool some sixty or one hundred yards long by twenty or thirty broad, and on one side of it there is a level space along which the horses used to run. The husband caught a pony, and gave it to the wife to hold fast without a bridle, while he should catch another. When he had bridled his own pony, he threw another bridle to his wife for her to secure hers; but as he threw it, the bit of the bridle struck her on one of her hands. The wife let go the pony, and went headlong into the pool, and that was the end of their wedded life.’The following is a later tale, which Mr. Thomas Davies heard from his mother, who died in 1832: she would be ninety years of age had she been still living:—Pan oeđ hi’n hogan yn yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, yr oeđ hogan at ei hoed hi’n cael ei magu yn Cwmglas,Ỻanberis, ac arferai đweyd, pan yn hogan a thra y bu byw, y byđai yn cael arian gan y Tylwyth Teg yn Cwm Cwmglas.Yr oeđ yn dweyd y byđai ar foreuau niwliog, tywyỻ, yn mynd i le penodol yn Cwm Cwmglas gyda dsygiad o lefrith o’r fuches a thywel glan, ac yn ei rođi ar garreg; ac yn mynd yno drachefn, ac yn cael y ỻestr yn wag, gyda darn deuswỻt neu hanner coron ac weithiau fwy wrth ei ochr.‘When she was a girl, living at Yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, there was a girl of her age being brought up at Cwmglas in the same parish. The latter was in the habit of saying, when she was a girl and so long as she lived, that she used to have money from theTylwyth Teg, in the Cwmglas Hollow. Her account was, that on dark, misty mornings she used to go to a particular spot in that Hollow with a jugful of sweet milk from the milking place, and a clean towel, and then place them on a stone. She would return, and find the jug empty, with a piece of money placed by its side: that is, two shillings or half a crown, or at times even more.’A daughter of that woman lives now at a farm, Mr. Davies observes, called Plas Pennant, in the parish of Ỻanfihangel yn Mhennant, in Carnarvonshire; and he adds, that it was a tale of a kind that was common enough when he was a boy; but many laughed at it, though the old people believed it to be a fact. To this I may as well append another tale, which was brought to the memory of an old man who happened to be present when Mr. Jones and Mr. Davies were busy with the foregoing. His name is John Roberts, and his age is seventy-five: his present home is at Capel Sïon, in the neighbouring parish of Ỻanđeiniolen:—Yr oeđ ef pan yn hogyn yn gweini yn Towyn Trewern, yn agos i Gaergybi, gyda hen wr o’r enw Owen Owens, oeđ yr adeg honno at ei oed ef yn bresennol.Yr oeđynt unwaith mewn hen adeilad ar y ffarm; a dywedođ yr hen wr ei fod ef wedi cael ỻawer o arian yn y ỻe hwnnw pan yn hogyn, a buasai wedi cael ychwaneg oni bai ei dad.Yr oeđ wedi cuđio yr arian yn y ty, ond daeth ei fam o hyd iđynt, a dywedođ yr hanes wrth ei dad. Ofnai ei fod yn fachgen drwg, mai eu ỻadrata yr oeđ. Dywedai ei dad y gwnai iđo đweyd yn mha le yr oeđ yn eu cael, neu y tynnai ei groen tros ei ben; ac aeth aỻan a thorođ wialen bwrpasol at orchwyl o’r fath.Yr oeđ y bachgen yn gwrando ar yr ymđiđan rhwng ei dad a’i fam, ac yr oeđ yn benderfynol o gadw’r peth yn đirgelwch fel yr oeđ wedi ei rybuđio gan y Tylwyth Teg.Aeth i’r ty, a dechreuođ y tad ei holi, ac yntau yn gwrthod ateb; ymbiliai a’i dad, a dywedai eu bod yn berffaith onest iđo ef, ac y cai ef ychwaneg os cadwai’r peth yn đirgelwch; ond os dywedai, nad oeđ dim ychwaneg i’w gael. Mođ bynnag ni wrandawai y tad ar ei esgusion na’i resymau, a’r wialen a orfu; dywedođ y bachgen mai gan y Tylwyth Teg yr oeđ yn eu cael, a hynny ar yr amod nad oeđ i đweyd wrth neb. Mawr oeđ edifeirwch yr hen bobl am lađ yr wyđ oeđ yn dodwy.Aeth y bachgen i’r hen adeilad lawer gwaith ar ol hyn, ond ni chafođ byth ychwaneg o arian yno.‘When a lad, he was a servant at Towyn Trewern, near Holyhead, to an old man about his own age at present. They were one day in an old building on the farm, and the old man told him that he had had much money in that place when he was a lad, and that he would have had more had it not been for his father. He had hidden the money at home, where his mother found it and told his father of the affair: she feared he was a bad boy, and that it was by theft he got it. His father said that he would make him say where he got it,or else that he would strip him of the skin of his back, at the same time that he went out and cut a rod fit for effecting a purpose of the kind. The boy heard all this talk between his father and his mother, and felt determined to keep the matter a secret, as he had been warned by theTylwyth Teg. He went into the house, and his father began to question him, while he refused to answer. He supplicatingly protested that the money was honestly got, and that he should get more if he kept it a secret, but that, if he did not, there would be no more to be got. However, the father would give no ear to his excuses or his reasons, and the rod prevailed; so that the boy said that it was from theTylwyth Teghe used to get it, and that on condition of his not telling anybody. Greatly did the old folks regret having killed the goose that laid the eggs. The boy went many a time afterwards to the old building, but he never found any more money there.’
III.
On returning from South Wales to Carnarvonshire in the summer of 1881, I tried to discover similar legends connected with the lakes of North Wales, beginning with Geirionyđ, the waters of which form a stream emptying itself into the Conwy, near Trefriw, a little below Ỻanrwst. I only succeeded, however, in finding an old man of the name of Pierce Williams, about seventy years of age, who was very anxious to talk about ‘Bony’s’ wars, but not about lake ladies. I was obliged, in trying to make him understand what I wanted, to use the wordmorforwyn, that is to say in English, ‘mermaid’; he then told me, that in his younger days he had heard people say that somebody had seen such beings in the Trefriw river. But as my questions were leading ones, his evidence is not worth much; however, I feel pretty sure that one who knew the neighbourhood of Geirionyđ better would be able to find some fragments of interesting legends still existing in that wild district.I was more successful at Ỻanberis, though what I found, at first, was not much; but it was genuine, and to the point. This is the substance of it:—An old woman, called Siân15Dafyđ, lived at Helfa Fawr, in the dingle called Cwm Brwynog, along the left side of which you ascend as you go to the top of Snowdon, from the village of lower Ỻanberis, or Coed y Đol, as it is there called. She was a curious old person, who made nice distinctions between the virtues of the respective waters of the district: thus, no other would do for her to cure her of thedefaid gwyỻtion16, or cancerous warts, which she fancied that she had in her mouth, than that of the spring of Tai Bach, near the lake called Ỻyn Ffynnon y Gwas, though she seldom found it out, when she was deceived by a servant who cherished a convenient opinion of his own, that a drop from a nearer spring would do just as well. Old Siân has been dead over thirty-five years, but I have it, on the testimony of two highly trustworthy brothers, who are of her family, and now between sixty and seventy years of age, that she used to relate to them how a shepherd, once on a time, saw a fairy maiden (un o’r Tylwyth Teg) on the surface of the tarn called Ỻyn Du’r Arđu, and how, from bantering andjoking, their acquaintance ripened into courtship, when the father and mother of the lake maiden appeared to give the union their sanction, and to arrange the marriage settlement. This was to the effect that the husband was never to strike his wife with iron, and that she was to bring her great wealth with her, consisting of stock of all kinds for his mountain farm. All duly took place, and they lived happily together until one day, when trying to catch a pony, the husband threw a bridle to his wife, and the iron in that struck her. It was then all over with him, as the wife hurried away with her property into the lake, so that nothing more was seen or heard of her. Here I may as well explain that the Ỻanberis side of the steep, near the top of Snowdon, is called Clogwyn du’r Arđu, or the Black Cliff of the Arđu, at the bottom of which lies the tarn alluded to as the Black Lake of the Arđu, and near it stands a huge boulder, called Maen du’r Arđu, all of which names are curious, as involving the worddu, black. Arđu itself has much the same meaning, and refers to the whole precipitous side of the summit with its dark shadows, and there is a similar Arđu near Nanmor on the Merionethshire side of Beđgelert.One of the brothers, I ought to have said, doubts that the lake here mentioned was the one in old Siân’s tale; but he has forgotten which it was of the many in the neighbourhood. Both, however, remembered another short story about fairies, which they had heard another old woman relate, namely, Mari Domos Siôn, who died some thirty years ago: it was merely to the effect that a shepherd had once lost his way in the mist on the mountain on the land of Caeau Gwynion, towards Cweỻyn17Lake, and got into a ringwhere theTylwyth Tegwere dancing: it was only after a very hard struggle that he was able, at length, to get away from them.To this I may add the testimony of a lady, for whose veracity I can vouch, to the effect that, when she was a child in Cwm Brwynog, from thirty to forty years ago, she and her brothers and sisters used to be frequently warned by their mother not to go far away from the house when there happened to be thick mist on the ground, lest they should come across theTylwyth Tegdancing, and be carried away to their abode beneath the lake. They were always, she says, supposed to live in the lakes; and the one here alluded to was Ỻyn Dwythwch, which is one of those famous for itstorgochiaidor chars. The mother is still living; but she seems to have long since, like others, lost her belief in the fairies.After writing the above, I heard that a brother to the foregoing brothers, namely, Mr. Thomas Davies, of Mur Mawr, Ỻanberis, remembered a similar tale. Mr. Davies is now sixty-four, and the persons from whom he heard the tale were the same Siân Dafyđ of Helfa Fawr, and Mari Domos Siôn of Tyn18Gadlas, Ỻanberis: the two women were about seventy years of age when he as a child heard it from them. At my request, a friend of mine, Mr. Hugh D. Jones, of Tyn Gadlas, also a member of this family, which is one of the oldest perhaps in the place, has taken down from Mr. Davies’ mouth all he could remember, word for word, as follows:—Yn perthyn i ffarm Bron y Fedw yr oeđ dyn ifancwedi cael ei fagu, nis gwyđent faint cyn eu hamser hwy. Arferai pan yn hogyn fynd i’r mynyđ yn Cwm Drywenyđ a Mynyđ y Fedw ar ochr orỻewinol y Wyđfa i fugeilio, a byđai yn taro ar hogan yn y mynyđ; ac wrth fynychu gweld eu gilyđ aethant yn ffrindiau mawr. Arferent gyfarfod eu gilyđ mewn ỻe neiỻduol yn Cwm Drywenyđ, ỻe’r oeđ yr hogan a’r teulu yn byw, ỻe y byđai pob danteithion, chwareuyđiaethau a chanu dihafal; ond ni fyđai’r hogyn yn gwneyd i fyny a neb ohonynt ond yr hogan.Diweđ y ffrindiaeth fu carwriaeth, a phan soniođ yr hogyn am iđi briodi, ni wnai ond ar un amod, sef y bywiai hi hefo fo hyd nes y tarawai ef hi a haiarn.Priodwyd hwy, a buont byw gyda’u gilyđ am nifer o flynyđoeđ, a bu iđynt blant; ac ar đyđ marchnad yn Gaernarfon yr oeđ y gwr a’r wraig yn međwl mynd i’r farchnad ar gefn merlod, fel pob ffarmwr yr amser hwnnw. Awd i’r mynyđ i đal merlyn bob un.Ar waelod Mynyđ y Fedw mae ỻyn o ryw dri-ugain neu gan ỻath o hyd ac ugain neu đeg ỻath ar hugain o led, ac y mae ar un ochr iđo le têg, fforđ y byđai’r ceffylau yn rhedeg.Daliođ y gwr ferlyn a rhoes ef i’r wraig i’w đal heb ffrwyn, tra byđai ef yn dal merlyn araỻ. Ar ol rhoi ffrwyn yn mhen ei ferlyn ei hun, taflođ un araỻ i’r wraig i roi yn mhen ei merlyn hithau, ac wrth ei thaflu tarawođbity ffrwyn hi yn ei ỻaw. Goỻyngođ y wraig y merlyn, ac aeth ar ei phen i’r ỻyn, a dyna điweđ y briodas.‘To the farm of Bron y Fedw there belonged a son, who grew up to be a young man, the women knew not how long before their time. He was in the habit of going up the mountain to Cwm Drywenyđ19and Mynyđy Fedw, on the west side of Snowdon, to do the shepherding, and there he was wont to come across a lass on the mountain, so that as the result of frequently meeting one another, he and she became great friends. They usually met at a particular spot in Cwm Drywenyđ, where the girl and her family lived, and where there were all kinds of nice things to eat, of amusements, and of incomparable music; but he did not make up to anybody there except the girl. The friendship ended in courtship; but when the boy mentioned that she should be married to him, she would only do so on one condition, namely, that she would live with him until he should strike her with iron. They were wedded, and they lived together for a number of years, and had children. Once on a time it happened to be market day at Carnarvon, whither the husband and wife thought of riding on ponies, like all the farmers of that time. So they went to the mountain to catch a pony each. At the bottom of Mynyđ y Fedw there is a pool some sixty or one hundred yards long by twenty or thirty broad, and on one side of it there is a level space along which the horses used to run. The husband caught a pony, and gave it to the wife to hold fast without a bridle, while he should catch another. When he had bridled his own pony, he threw another bridle to his wife for her to secure hers; but as he threw it, the bit of the bridle struck her on one of her hands. The wife let go the pony, and went headlong into the pool, and that was the end of their wedded life.’The following is a later tale, which Mr. Thomas Davies heard from his mother, who died in 1832: she would be ninety years of age had she been still living:—Pan oeđ hi’n hogan yn yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, yr oeđ hogan at ei hoed hi’n cael ei magu yn Cwmglas,Ỻanberis, ac arferai đweyd, pan yn hogan a thra y bu byw, y byđai yn cael arian gan y Tylwyth Teg yn Cwm Cwmglas.Yr oeđ yn dweyd y byđai ar foreuau niwliog, tywyỻ, yn mynd i le penodol yn Cwm Cwmglas gyda dsygiad o lefrith o’r fuches a thywel glan, ac yn ei rođi ar garreg; ac yn mynd yno drachefn, ac yn cael y ỻestr yn wag, gyda darn deuswỻt neu hanner coron ac weithiau fwy wrth ei ochr.‘When she was a girl, living at Yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, there was a girl of her age being brought up at Cwmglas in the same parish. The latter was in the habit of saying, when she was a girl and so long as she lived, that she used to have money from theTylwyth Teg, in the Cwmglas Hollow. Her account was, that on dark, misty mornings she used to go to a particular spot in that Hollow with a jugful of sweet milk from the milking place, and a clean towel, and then place them on a stone. She would return, and find the jug empty, with a piece of money placed by its side: that is, two shillings or half a crown, or at times even more.’A daughter of that woman lives now at a farm, Mr. Davies observes, called Plas Pennant, in the parish of Ỻanfihangel yn Mhennant, in Carnarvonshire; and he adds, that it was a tale of a kind that was common enough when he was a boy; but many laughed at it, though the old people believed it to be a fact. To this I may as well append another tale, which was brought to the memory of an old man who happened to be present when Mr. Jones and Mr. Davies were busy with the foregoing. His name is John Roberts, and his age is seventy-five: his present home is at Capel Sïon, in the neighbouring parish of Ỻanđeiniolen:—Yr oeđ ef pan yn hogyn yn gweini yn Towyn Trewern, yn agos i Gaergybi, gyda hen wr o’r enw Owen Owens, oeđ yr adeg honno at ei oed ef yn bresennol.Yr oeđynt unwaith mewn hen adeilad ar y ffarm; a dywedođ yr hen wr ei fod ef wedi cael ỻawer o arian yn y ỻe hwnnw pan yn hogyn, a buasai wedi cael ychwaneg oni bai ei dad.Yr oeđ wedi cuđio yr arian yn y ty, ond daeth ei fam o hyd iđynt, a dywedođ yr hanes wrth ei dad. Ofnai ei fod yn fachgen drwg, mai eu ỻadrata yr oeđ. Dywedai ei dad y gwnai iđo đweyd yn mha le yr oeđ yn eu cael, neu y tynnai ei groen tros ei ben; ac aeth aỻan a thorođ wialen bwrpasol at orchwyl o’r fath.Yr oeđ y bachgen yn gwrando ar yr ymđiđan rhwng ei dad a’i fam, ac yr oeđ yn benderfynol o gadw’r peth yn đirgelwch fel yr oeđ wedi ei rybuđio gan y Tylwyth Teg.Aeth i’r ty, a dechreuođ y tad ei holi, ac yntau yn gwrthod ateb; ymbiliai a’i dad, a dywedai eu bod yn berffaith onest iđo ef, ac y cai ef ychwaneg os cadwai’r peth yn đirgelwch; ond os dywedai, nad oeđ dim ychwaneg i’w gael. Mođ bynnag ni wrandawai y tad ar ei esgusion na’i resymau, a’r wialen a orfu; dywedođ y bachgen mai gan y Tylwyth Teg yr oeđ yn eu cael, a hynny ar yr amod nad oeđ i đweyd wrth neb. Mawr oeđ edifeirwch yr hen bobl am lađ yr wyđ oeđ yn dodwy.Aeth y bachgen i’r hen adeilad lawer gwaith ar ol hyn, ond ni chafođ byth ychwaneg o arian yno.‘When a lad, he was a servant at Towyn Trewern, near Holyhead, to an old man about his own age at present. They were one day in an old building on the farm, and the old man told him that he had had much money in that place when he was a lad, and that he would have had more had it not been for his father. He had hidden the money at home, where his mother found it and told his father of the affair: she feared he was a bad boy, and that it was by theft he got it. His father said that he would make him say where he got it,or else that he would strip him of the skin of his back, at the same time that he went out and cut a rod fit for effecting a purpose of the kind. The boy heard all this talk between his father and his mother, and felt determined to keep the matter a secret, as he had been warned by theTylwyth Teg. He went into the house, and his father began to question him, while he refused to answer. He supplicatingly protested that the money was honestly got, and that he should get more if he kept it a secret, but that, if he did not, there would be no more to be got. However, the father would give no ear to his excuses or his reasons, and the rod prevailed; so that the boy said that it was from theTylwyth Teghe used to get it, and that on condition of his not telling anybody. Greatly did the old folks regret having killed the goose that laid the eggs. The boy went many a time afterwards to the old building, but he never found any more money there.’
On returning from South Wales to Carnarvonshire in the summer of 1881, I tried to discover similar legends connected with the lakes of North Wales, beginning with Geirionyđ, the waters of which form a stream emptying itself into the Conwy, near Trefriw, a little below Ỻanrwst. I only succeeded, however, in finding an old man of the name of Pierce Williams, about seventy years of age, who was very anxious to talk about ‘Bony’s’ wars, but not about lake ladies. I was obliged, in trying to make him understand what I wanted, to use the wordmorforwyn, that is to say in English, ‘mermaid’; he then told me, that in his younger days he had heard people say that somebody had seen such beings in the Trefriw river. But as my questions were leading ones, his evidence is not worth much; however, I feel pretty sure that one who knew the neighbourhood of Geirionyđ better would be able to find some fragments of interesting legends still existing in that wild district.
I was more successful at Ỻanberis, though what I found, at first, was not much; but it was genuine, and to the point. This is the substance of it:—An old woman, called Siân15Dafyđ, lived at Helfa Fawr, in the dingle called Cwm Brwynog, along the left side of which you ascend as you go to the top of Snowdon, from the village of lower Ỻanberis, or Coed y Đol, as it is there called. She was a curious old person, who made nice distinctions between the virtues of the respective waters of the district: thus, no other would do for her to cure her of thedefaid gwyỻtion16, or cancerous warts, which she fancied that she had in her mouth, than that of the spring of Tai Bach, near the lake called Ỻyn Ffynnon y Gwas, though she seldom found it out, when she was deceived by a servant who cherished a convenient opinion of his own, that a drop from a nearer spring would do just as well. Old Siân has been dead over thirty-five years, but I have it, on the testimony of two highly trustworthy brothers, who are of her family, and now between sixty and seventy years of age, that she used to relate to them how a shepherd, once on a time, saw a fairy maiden (un o’r Tylwyth Teg) on the surface of the tarn called Ỻyn Du’r Arđu, and how, from bantering andjoking, their acquaintance ripened into courtship, when the father and mother of the lake maiden appeared to give the union their sanction, and to arrange the marriage settlement. This was to the effect that the husband was never to strike his wife with iron, and that she was to bring her great wealth with her, consisting of stock of all kinds for his mountain farm. All duly took place, and they lived happily together until one day, when trying to catch a pony, the husband threw a bridle to his wife, and the iron in that struck her. It was then all over with him, as the wife hurried away with her property into the lake, so that nothing more was seen or heard of her. Here I may as well explain that the Ỻanberis side of the steep, near the top of Snowdon, is called Clogwyn du’r Arđu, or the Black Cliff of the Arđu, at the bottom of which lies the tarn alluded to as the Black Lake of the Arđu, and near it stands a huge boulder, called Maen du’r Arđu, all of which names are curious, as involving the worddu, black. Arđu itself has much the same meaning, and refers to the whole precipitous side of the summit with its dark shadows, and there is a similar Arđu near Nanmor on the Merionethshire side of Beđgelert.
One of the brothers, I ought to have said, doubts that the lake here mentioned was the one in old Siân’s tale; but he has forgotten which it was of the many in the neighbourhood. Both, however, remembered another short story about fairies, which they had heard another old woman relate, namely, Mari Domos Siôn, who died some thirty years ago: it was merely to the effect that a shepherd had once lost his way in the mist on the mountain on the land of Caeau Gwynion, towards Cweỻyn17Lake, and got into a ringwhere theTylwyth Tegwere dancing: it was only after a very hard struggle that he was able, at length, to get away from them.
To this I may add the testimony of a lady, for whose veracity I can vouch, to the effect that, when she was a child in Cwm Brwynog, from thirty to forty years ago, she and her brothers and sisters used to be frequently warned by their mother not to go far away from the house when there happened to be thick mist on the ground, lest they should come across theTylwyth Tegdancing, and be carried away to their abode beneath the lake. They were always, she says, supposed to live in the lakes; and the one here alluded to was Ỻyn Dwythwch, which is one of those famous for itstorgochiaidor chars. The mother is still living; but she seems to have long since, like others, lost her belief in the fairies.
After writing the above, I heard that a brother to the foregoing brothers, namely, Mr. Thomas Davies, of Mur Mawr, Ỻanberis, remembered a similar tale. Mr. Davies is now sixty-four, and the persons from whom he heard the tale were the same Siân Dafyđ of Helfa Fawr, and Mari Domos Siôn of Tyn18Gadlas, Ỻanberis: the two women were about seventy years of age when he as a child heard it from them. At my request, a friend of mine, Mr. Hugh D. Jones, of Tyn Gadlas, also a member of this family, which is one of the oldest perhaps in the place, has taken down from Mr. Davies’ mouth all he could remember, word for word, as follows:—
Yn perthyn i ffarm Bron y Fedw yr oeđ dyn ifancwedi cael ei fagu, nis gwyđent faint cyn eu hamser hwy. Arferai pan yn hogyn fynd i’r mynyđ yn Cwm Drywenyđ a Mynyđ y Fedw ar ochr orỻewinol y Wyđfa i fugeilio, a byđai yn taro ar hogan yn y mynyđ; ac wrth fynychu gweld eu gilyđ aethant yn ffrindiau mawr. Arferent gyfarfod eu gilyđ mewn ỻe neiỻduol yn Cwm Drywenyđ, ỻe’r oeđ yr hogan a’r teulu yn byw, ỻe y byđai pob danteithion, chwareuyđiaethau a chanu dihafal; ond ni fyđai’r hogyn yn gwneyd i fyny a neb ohonynt ond yr hogan.
Diweđ y ffrindiaeth fu carwriaeth, a phan soniođ yr hogyn am iđi briodi, ni wnai ond ar un amod, sef y bywiai hi hefo fo hyd nes y tarawai ef hi a haiarn.
Priodwyd hwy, a buont byw gyda’u gilyđ am nifer o flynyđoeđ, a bu iđynt blant; ac ar đyđ marchnad yn Gaernarfon yr oeđ y gwr a’r wraig yn međwl mynd i’r farchnad ar gefn merlod, fel pob ffarmwr yr amser hwnnw. Awd i’r mynyđ i đal merlyn bob un.
Ar waelod Mynyđ y Fedw mae ỻyn o ryw dri-ugain neu gan ỻath o hyd ac ugain neu đeg ỻath ar hugain o led, ac y mae ar un ochr iđo le têg, fforđ y byđai’r ceffylau yn rhedeg.
Daliođ y gwr ferlyn a rhoes ef i’r wraig i’w đal heb ffrwyn, tra byđai ef yn dal merlyn araỻ. Ar ol rhoi ffrwyn yn mhen ei ferlyn ei hun, taflođ un araỻ i’r wraig i roi yn mhen ei merlyn hithau, ac wrth ei thaflu tarawođbity ffrwyn hi yn ei ỻaw. Goỻyngođ y wraig y merlyn, ac aeth ar ei phen i’r ỻyn, a dyna điweđ y briodas.
‘To the farm of Bron y Fedw there belonged a son, who grew up to be a young man, the women knew not how long before their time. He was in the habit of going up the mountain to Cwm Drywenyđ19and Mynyđy Fedw, on the west side of Snowdon, to do the shepherding, and there he was wont to come across a lass on the mountain, so that as the result of frequently meeting one another, he and she became great friends. They usually met at a particular spot in Cwm Drywenyđ, where the girl and her family lived, and where there were all kinds of nice things to eat, of amusements, and of incomparable music; but he did not make up to anybody there except the girl. The friendship ended in courtship; but when the boy mentioned that she should be married to him, she would only do so on one condition, namely, that she would live with him until he should strike her with iron. They were wedded, and they lived together for a number of years, and had children. Once on a time it happened to be market day at Carnarvon, whither the husband and wife thought of riding on ponies, like all the farmers of that time. So they went to the mountain to catch a pony each. At the bottom of Mynyđ y Fedw there is a pool some sixty or one hundred yards long by twenty or thirty broad, and on one side of it there is a level space along which the horses used to run. The husband caught a pony, and gave it to the wife to hold fast without a bridle, while he should catch another. When he had bridled his own pony, he threw another bridle to his wife for her to secure hers; but as he threw it, the bit of the bridle struck her on one of her hands. The wife let go the pony, and went headlong into the pool, and that was the end of their wedded life.’
The following is a later tale, which Mr. Thomas Davies heard from his mother, who died in 1832: she would be ninety years of age had she been still living:—
Pan oeđ hi’n hogan yn yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, yr oeđ hogan at ei hoed hi’n cael ei magu yn Cwmglas,Ỻanberis, ac arferai đweyd, pan yn hogan a thra y bu byw, y byđai yn cael arian gan y Tylwyth Teg yn Cwm Cwmglas.
Yr oeđ yn dweyd y byđai ar foreuau niwliog, tywyỻ, yn mynd i le penodol yn Cwm Cwmglas gyda dsygiad o lefrith o’r fuches a thywel glan, ac yn ei rođi ar garreg; ac yn mynd yno drachefn, ac yn cael y ỻestr yn wag, gyda darn deuswỻt neu hanner coron ac weithiau fwy wrth ei ochr.
‘When she was a girl, living at Yr Hafod, Ỻanberis, there was a girl of her age being brought up at Cwmglas in the same parish. The latter was in the habit of saying, when she was a girl and so long as she lived, that she used to have money from theTylwyth Teg, in the Cwmglas Hollow. Her account was, that on dark, misty mornings she used to go to a particular spot in that Hollow with a jugful of sweet milk from the milking place, and a clean towel, and then place them on a stone. She would return, and find the jug empty, with a piece of money placed by its side: that is, two shillings or half a crown, or at times even more.’
A daughter of that woman lives now at a farm, Mr. Davies observes, called Plas Pennant, in the parish of Ỻanfihangel yn Mhennant, in Carnarvonshire; and he adds, that it was a tale of a kind that was common enough when he was a boy; but many laughed at it, though the old people believed it to be a fact. To this I may as well append another tale, which was brought to the memory of an old man who happened to be present when Mr. Jones and Mr. Davies were busy with the foregoing. His name is John Roberts, and his age is seventy-five: his present home is at Capel Sïon, in the neighbouring parish of Ỻanđeiniolen:—
Yr oeđ ef pan yn hogyn yn gweini yn Towyn Trewern, yn agos i Gaergybi, gyda hen wr o’r enw Owen Owens, oeđ yr adeg honno at ei oed ef yn bresennol.
Yr oeđynt unwaith mewn hen adeilad ar y ffarm; a dywedođ yr hen wr ei fod ef wedi cael ỻawer o arian yn y ỻe hwnnw pan yn hogyn, a buasai wedi cael ychwaneg oni bai ei dad.
Yr oeđ wedi cuđio yr arian yn y ty, ond daeth ei fam o hyd iđynt, a dywedođ yr hanes wrth ei dad. Ofnai ei fod yn fachgen drwg, mai eu ỻadrata yr oeđ. Dywedai ei dad y gwnai iđo đweyd yn mha le yr oeđ yn eu cael, neu y tynnai ei groen tros ei ben; ac aeth aỻan a thorođ wialen bwrpasol at orchwyl o’r fath.
Yr oeđ y bachgen yn gwrando ar yr ymđiđan rhwng ei dad a’i fam, ac yr oeđ yn benderfynol o gadw’r peth yn đirgelwch fel yr oeđ wedi ei rybuđio gan y Tylwyth Teg.
Aeth i’r ty, a dechreuođ y tad ei holi, ac yntau yn gwrthod ateb; ymbiliai a’i dad, a dywedai eu bod yn berffaith onest iđo ef, ac y cai ef ychwaneg os cadwai’r peth yn đirgelwch; ond os dywedai, nad oeđ dim ychwaneg i’w gael. Mođ bynnag ni wrandawai y tad ar ei esgusion na’i resymau, a’r wialen a orfu; dywedođ y bachgen mai gan y Tylwyth Teg yr oeđ yn eu cael, a hynny ar yr amod nad oeđ i đweyd wrth neb. Mawr oeđ edifeirwch yr hen bobl am lađ yr wyđ oeđ yn dodwy.
Aeth y bachgen i’r hen adeilad lawer gwaith ar ol hyn, ond ni chafođ byth ychwaneg o arian yno.
‘When a lad, he was a servant at Towyn Trewern, near Holyhead, to an old man about his own age at present. They were one day in an old building on the farm, and the old man told him that he had had much money in that place when he was a lad, and that he would have had more had it not been for his father. He had hidden the money at home, where his mother found it and told his father of the affair: she feared he was a bad boy, and that it was by theft he got it. His father said that he would make him say where he got it,or else that he would strip him of the skin of his back, at the same time that he went out and cut a rod fit for effecting a purpose of the kind. The boy heard all this talk between his father and his mother, and felt determined to keep the matter a secret, as he had been warned by theTylwyth Teg. He went into the house, and his father began to question him, while he refused to answer. He supplicatingly protested that the money was honestly got, and that he should get more if he kept it a secret, but that, if he did not, there would be no more to be got. However, the father would give no ear to his excuses or his reasons, and the rod prevailed; so that the boy said that it was from theTylwyth Teghe used to get it, and that on condition of his not telling anybody. Greatly did the old folks regret having killed the goose that laid the eggs. The boy went many a time afterwards to the old building, but he never found any more money there.’