FOLK-LORE OF WEST AND MID-WALES BY JONATHAN CEREDIG DAVIES Member of the Folk-Lore Society, Author of "Adventures in the Land of Giants," "Western Australia," &c. With a Preface BY ALICE, COUNTESS AMHERST. "Cared doeth yr encilion." ABERYSTWYTH: PRINTED AT THE "WELSH GAZETTE" OFFICES, BRIDGE STREET. 1911. This book is respectfully dedicated by the Author to COUNTESS OF LISBURNE, CROSSWOOD. ALICE, COUNTESS AMHERST. LADY ENID VAUGHAN. LADY WEBLEY-PARRY-PRYSE, GOGERDDAN. LADY HILLS-JOHNES OF DOLAUCOTHY. MRS. HERBERT DAVIES-EVANS, HIGHMEAD. MRS. WILLIAM BEAUCLERK POWELL, NANTEOS. PREFACE BY ALICE, COUNTESS AMHERST. The writer of this book lived for many years in the Welsh Colony, Patagonia, where he was the pioneer of the Anglican Church. He published a book dealing with that part of the world, which also contained a great deal of interesting matter regarding the little known Patagonian Indians, Ideas on Religion and Customs, etc. He returned to Wales in 1891; and after spending a few years in his native land, went out to a wild part of Western Australia, and was the pioneer Christian worker in a district called Colliefields, where he also built a church. (No one had ever conducted Divine Service in that place before.) Here again, he found time to write his experiences, and his book contained a great deal of value to the Folklorist, regarding the aborigines of that country, quite apart from the ordinary account of Missionary enterprise, history and prospects of Western Australia, etc. In 1901, Mr. Ceredig Davies came back to live in his native country, Wales. In Cardiganshire, and the centre of Wales, generally, there still remains a great mass of unrecorded Celtic Folk Lore, Tradition, and Custom. Thus it was suggested that if Mr. Ceredig Davies wished again to write a book--the material for a valuable one lay at his door if he cared to undertake it. His accurate knowledge of Welsh gave him great facility for the work. He took up the idea, and this book is the result of his labours. The main object has been to collect "verbatim," and render the Welsh idiom into English as nearly as possible these old stories still told of times gone by.