Chapter III

Midsummer Eve--The Druidic Ceremonies at Pontypridd--The
Snake Stone--Beltane Fires--Fourth of July Fires in
America--St. Ulric's Day--Carrying Cynog--Marketing on
Tombstones--The First Night of Winter--The Three Nights for
Spirits--The Tale of Thomas Williams the Preacher--All
Hallows Eve Festivities--Running through Fire--Quaint Border
Rhymes--The Puzzling Jug--Bobbing for Apples--The Fiery
Features of Guy Fawkes' Day--St. Clement's Day--Stripping
the Carpenter.

I.

Midsummer Eve, or St. John's Eve (June 23rd), is one of the ancient Druidic festivals, still liberally honoured in Wales. The custom of lighting bonfires survives in some of the villages, and at Pontypridd there are ceremonies of a solemn sort. Midsummer Eve, in 1878, fell on a Sunday. Upon that day the 'Druids and bards' at Pontypridd held the usual feast of the summer solstice in the face of the sun. There is a breezy common on the top of a high hill overlooking the town, where stand a logan stone and a circle of upright stones constituting the 'temple of the Druids.' Here it is the custom of the present-day adherents of that ancient religion, beside which Christianity is an infant, to celebrate their rites 'within the folds of the serpent,' a circle marked with the signs of the zodiac. The venerable archdruid, Myfyr Morganwg, stands on the logan stone, with a mistletoe sprig in his button-hole, and prays to the god Kali, 'creator of sun, moon, stars, and universe.' Then the white-bearded old man delivers a discourse, and new members are initiated into the 'mysteries,' Occasionally these new members are Americans from over the sea, and they include both sexes. Large crowds gather to witness the impressive spectacle--a shadow of the ancient rites when from Belenian heights flamed high the sacrificial fires. It was a former belief that these fires protected the lands within their light from the machinations of sorcery, so that good crops would follow, and that their ashes were valuable as a medicinal charm.

The Snake-stone is another striking Welsh tradition, associated with Midsummer eve. At this time of the year there are certain convocations of snakes, which, hissing sociably together among one another, hiss forth a mystic bubble, which hardens into the semblance of a glass ring. The finder of this ring is a lucky man, for all his undertakings will prosper while he retains it. These rings are called Gleiniau Nadroedd in Welsh--snake-stones in English. They are supposed to have been used by the ancient Druids as charms. There is a Welsh saying, respecting people who lay their heads together in conversation, that the talkers are 'blowing the gem.'

II.

The traditions connected with the Beltane fires are very interesting, but the subject has received so much attention in published volumes that it need not here be dwelt upon. The lad who in the United States capers around a bonfire on the night of Independence Day has not a suspicion that he is imitating the rites of an antiquity the most remote; that in burning a heap of barrels and boxes in a public square the celebrators of the American Fourth of July imitate the priests who thus worshipped the sun-god Beal. The origins of our most familiar customs are constantly being discovered in such directions as this. On the face of the thing, nothing could be more absurd as a mode of jollification, in a little American town, with its wooden architecture, on a hot night in the midst of summer, than building a roaring fire to make the air still hotter and endanger the surrounding houses. The reason for the existence of such a custom must be sought in another land and another time; had reflection governed the matter, instead of tradition, the American anniversary would have found some more fitting means of celebration than Druidic fires and Chinese charms. (For it may be mentioned further, in this connection, that the fire-crackers of our urchins are quite as superstitious in their original purpose as the bonfire is. In China, even to this day, fire-crackers are charms pure and simple, their office to drive away evil spirits, their use as a means of jollification quite unknown to their inventors.) A far more sensible Midsummer rite, especially in a hot country, would have been to adopt the custom of St. Ulric's day, and eat fish. This saint's day falls on the fourth of July, and Barnabe Googe's translation of Naogeorgius has this couplet concerning it:

Wheresoeuer Huldryche hath his place, the people there brings in
Both carpes and pykes, and mullets fat, his fauour here to win.

III.

The Welsh saint called Cynog was one of the numberless children of that famous old patriarch Brychan Brycheiniog, and had his memory honoured, until a comparatively recent period, in the parish of Defynog. Here, on this saint's feast Monday, which fell in October, there was a custom called 'carrying Cynog.' Cynog was represented by a man who was paid for his services with money, or with a suit of clothes--sometimes a 'stranger' from an adjoining parish, but on the last recorded occasion a drunken farmer of the neighbourhood. He was clad in dilapidated garments, and borne through the village; after which he was tumbled headlong into the river amid the jeers of the crowd, to scramble out as best he might. It was not a very respectful way of commemorating a saint who had been buried a thousand years or thereabouts; but such as it was it died out early in the present century. The ducking which ended the performance has been supposed to be a puritan improvement on what was before a religious ceremony, or mystery. It is more than possibly a relic of the Druidic sacrificial rites; in cases where a river ran near, at the time of the Beltane fires, a sacrifice by water was substituted for that of flame.

The feast of St. Cynog continued for a week. On the Tuesday there was a singular marketing in the churchyard; from all about the farmers brought their tithe of cheese, and taking it to the churchyard, laid it on the tombstones, where it was sold for the parson's behoof.

IV.

All Hallows eve is by the Welsh called 'Nos Calan Gauaf,' meaning 'the first night of winter;' sometimes, 'Nos Cyn Gauaf,' the 'night before winter.' It is one of the 'Teir Nos Ysprydnos,' or 'three nights for spirits,' upon which ghosts walk, fairies are abroad, mysterious influences are in the air, strange sights are seen, and in short goblins of every sort are to be with special freedom encountered. They may be conjured to appear, by certain enchantments, and to give their visitors glimpses of the future, especially as regards the subject of marrying. On this night it is customary for the young people, gathered in many a merry circle, to seek by tricks and charms of various sort to become acquainted with their future lovers and sweethearts. Not that it is always necessary to employ such aids, for on the Teir Nos Ysprydnos the phantoms of future companions have been known to appear unsummoned. There are many such stories as that of Thomas Williams, the preacher, who slept in the hills on a Nos Ysprydnos, and although he used no charms nor tricks of any sort, he saw his future wife. As he was just about putting out his light, having jumped into bed, the door opened and the goblin mother of the young woman he subsequently married walked into the room, leading her daughter. 'Here, Thomas,' said she, 'I am going, but I leave you Mary.' And when he came down home out of the mountains he found that the old mother had died in her bed at the very moment he saw her goblin. To have done less than marry the girl, after that, would have been to insult the good old lady's ghost, and cast reflections on the reputation of All Hallows eve.

The two other spirit-nights, it may here be mentioned, are May-day eve and Midsummer eve; which with All Hallows were three great festivals of the ancient Druids, when they commemorated the powers of Nature and love in the manner which has been alluded to. I have two accounts of this matter, however, and I know not which is the older in tradition, as I have both from the mouths of the people; but one account calls Christmas-night the third spirit-night.

The festivities of All Hallows in Wales are in the main like those of other Christian lands, in so far as they consist of feasting and making merry. Bonfires were kindled in many places until recently, and perhaps are still, in some parts, again in pursuance of the Druidic rites, which the Christian Church adopted and continued while changing their significance. In Owen's account of the Bards occurs a curious description of the autumnal fires kindled in North Wales on the eve of the first of November, and the attendant ceremonies. There was running through the fire and smoke, and casting of stones into the fire, 'all running off at the conclusion to escape from the black short-tailed sow.'[129] This custom of running through the fire is said to survive in Ireland. It is no doubt related to the ancient sacrificial rites. As testimonies to the kinship of our race, all these customs possess a deep interest, which is increased in this direction as they lose in the charm of the unique.

On the Welsh Border there prevails a Hallow-e'en custom among the children of going about to the houses singing the rhymes which follow:

Wissel wassel, bread and possel,
Cwrw da, plas yma:
An apple or a pear, a plum or a cherry,
Or any good thing to make us merry.

Sol cakes, sol cakes,
Pray you, good missus, a sol cake;
One for Peter, and two for Paul,
And three for the good man that made us all.

The roads are very dirty,
My shoes are very thin,
I've got a little pocket,
To put a penny in.
Up with the kettle and down with the pan,
Give us an answer and we'll be gan.

(_A loud rap at the door._)

_Spoken._ Please to give us a 'apenny.

Some of these rhymes are heard in Glamorganshire and elsewhere at Christmas and New Year's.

The puzzling jug is a vessel in use in some quarters as a means of increasing the hilarity of a Hallow-e'en party. It is a stone jug, 'out of which each person is compelled to drink. From the brim, extending about an inch below the surface, it has holes fantastically arranged so as to appear like ornamental work, and which are not perceived except by the perspicacious; three projections, of the size and shape of marbles, are around the brim, having a hole of the size of a pea in each; these communicate with the bottom of the jug through the handle, which is hollow, and has a small hole at the top, which, with two of the holes being stopped by the fingers, and the mouth applied to the one nearest the handle, enables one to suck the contents with ease; but this trick is unknown to every one, and consequently a stranger generally makes some mistake, perhaps applying his mouth as he would to another jug, in which case the contents (generally ale) issue through the fissures on his person, to the no small diversion of the spectators.'[130]

Another merry custom of All Hallows was--and is--twco am 'falau, bobbing for apples. A large tub (crwc) is brought into the kitchen of a farm-house and filled with water; a dozen apples are thrown into it, and the rustic youths bob for them with their mouths. To catch up two apples at a single mouthful is a triumphant achievement. Again the revellers will form a semicircle before the fire, while there depends above their mouths from a hook in the ceiling, a string with a stick attached. At one end of the stick is an apple, at the other end a candle. To snatch the apple with the lips, and yet avoid the candle, is the aim of the competitors. The stick is so hung that it turns easily on its axis, and the bobbers often find themselves catching the candle in their hair while aiming at the apple. This appears to be a relic of the ancient Welsh game of quintain, or gwyntyn.

FOOTNOTES:

[129] Brand, 'Pop. Ant.,' i., 191.

[130] 'Camb. Sup.,' 174.

V.

November the Fifth, the anniversary of the Gunpowder Plot, is much observed in Wales. 'God grant,' said Bishop Sanderson in one of his sermons, 'that we nor ours ever live to see November the Fifth forgotten, or the solemnity of it silenced.' The words are similar to those used by a great American, of the early days of the Republic, with regard to the 4th of July--God grant it might never be forgotten. But the rites by which both days are celebrated are as old as tradition, and much older than history. As the Americans have given a historical significance to bonfires and fireworks, so the English before them did to sacrificing a puppet on Guy Fawkes' Day; and so again some Catholic nations have made the rite a religious one, in the hanging of Judas. All three customs are traced to the same original--the ancient Druidic sacrifices to the sun-god Beal or Moloch. It is noteworthy that the Fifth of November and the Fourth of July--or rather the fiery features of these days--are alike voted a nuisance by respectable and steady-going people in the countries to which they respectively belong.

VI.

On St. Clement's Day (the 23rd of November) it was customary in Pembrokeshire in the last century to parade an effigy of a carpenter, which had been hung to the church steeple the night before. Cutting the effigy down from where it hung, the people carried it about the village, repeating loudly some doggerel verses which purported to be the last will and testament of St. Clement, distributing to the different carpenters in town the several articles of dress worn by the effigy. After the image was thus stripped of its garments, one by one, the padded remains were thrown down and carefully kicked to pieces by the crowd.