Welsh Folk-Lore Part 36

_A c.o.c.k Crowing in the Night_.

This, too, was thought to foretell a death, but whose death, depended on the direction of the bird's head whilst crowing. As soon as the crowing was heard someone went to ascertain the position of the c.o.c.k's head, and when it was seen that his head was turned from their own house towards someone else's abode, the dwellers in that house slept in peace, believing that a neighbour, and not one of themselves, was about to die.

It was supposed, that to make the prognostication sure, the c.o.c.k would have to crow three times in succession before or about midnight, and in the same direction.

_The Corpse Candle--Canwyll Corph_.

The corpse candle, or _canwyll corph_, was a light like that of a candle, which was said to issue from the house where a death was about to occur, and take the course of the funeral procession to the burial place. This was the usual way of proceeding, but this mysterious light was also thought to wend its way to the abode of a person about to die. Instances could be given of both kinds of appearances.

I have met with persons in various parts of Wales who told me that they had seen a corpse candle. They described it as a pale bluish light moving slowly along a short distance above the ground. Strange tales are told of the course the light has taken. Once it was seen to go over hedges and to make straight for the churchyard wall. This was not then understood, but when the funeral actually took place the ground was covered with snow, and the drift caused the procession to proceed along the fields and over the hedges and churchyard wall, as indicated by the corpse candle.

It was ill jesting with the corpse candle. The Rev. J. Jenkins, Vicar of Hirnant, told me that a drunken sailor at Borth said he went up to a corpse candle and attempted to light his pipe at it, but he was whisked away, and when he came to himself he discovered that he was far off the road in the bog.

The Rev. Edmund Jones, in his book ent.i.tled _A Relation of Ghosts and Apparitions_, _etc_., states:--

"Some have seen the resemblance of a skull carrying the candle; others the shape of the person that is to die carrying the candle between his fore-fingers, holding the light before his face. Some have said that they saw the shape of those who were to be at the burying."

Those who have followed the light state that it proceeded to the church, lit up the building, emerged therefrom, and then hovered awhile over a certain spot in the churchyard, and then sank into the earth at the place where the deceased was to be buried.

There is a tradition that St. David, by prayer, obtained the corpse candle as a sign to the living of the reality of another world, and that originally it was confined to his diocese. This tradition finds no place in the Life of the Saint, as given in the _Cambro-British Saints_, and there are there many wonderful things recorded of that saint.

It was thought possible for a man to meet his own Candle. There is a tale of a person who met a Candle and struck it with his walking-stick, when it became sparks, which, however, re-united. The man was greatly frightened, became sick, and died. At the spot where he had struck the candle the bier broke and the coffin fell to the ground, thus corroborating the man's tale.

I will now record one tale not of the usual kind, which was told me by a person who is alive.

_Tale of a Corpse Candle_.

My informant told me that one John Roberts, Felin-y-Wig, was in the habit of sitting up a short time after his family had retired to rest to smoke a quiet pipe, and the last thing he usually did before retiring for the night was to take a peep into the night. One evening, whilst peering around, he saw in the distance a light, where he knew there was no house, and on further notice he observed that it was slowly going along the road from Bettws-Gwerfil-Goch towards Felin-y-Wig. Where the road dipped the light disappeared, only, however, to appear again in such parts of the road as were visible from John Roberts's house. At first Roberts thought that the light proceeded from a lantern, but this was so unusual an occurrence in those parts that he gave up this idea, and intently followed the motions of the light. It approached Roberts's house, and evidently this was its destination. He endeavoured to ascertain whether the light was carried by a man or woman, but he could see nothing save the light. When, therefore, it turned into the lane approaching Roberts's house, in considerable fear he entered the house and closed the door, awaiting, with fear, the approach of the light. To his horror, he perceived the light pa.s.sing through the shut door, and it played in a quivering way underneath the roof, and then vanished. That very night the servant man died, and his bed was right above the spot where the light had disappeared.

_Spectral Funerals_, _or Drychiolaeth_.

This was a kind of shadowy funeral which foretold the real one. In South Wales it goes by the name _toilu_, _toili_, or _y teulu_ (the family) _anghladd_, unburied; in Montgomeryshire it is called _Drychiolaeth_, spectre.

I cannot do better than quote from Mr. Hamer's _Parochial Account of Llanidloes (Montgomeryshire Collections_, vol. x., p. 256), a description of one of these phantom funerals. All were much alike. He writes:--

"It is only a few years ago that some excitement was caused amongst the superst.i.tious portion of the inhabitants by the statement of a certain miner, who at the time was working at the Brynpostig mine.

On his way to the mine one dark night, he said that he was thoroughly frightened in China Street on seeing a spectral funeral leaving the house of one Hoskiss, who was then very ill in bed. In his fright the miner turned his back on the house, with the intention of going home, but almost fainting he could scarcely move out of the way of the advancing procession, which gradually approached, at last surrounded him, and then pa.s.sed on down Longbridge Street, in the direction of the church. The frightened man managed with difficulty to drag himself home, but he was so ill that he was unable to go to work for several days."

The following weird tale I received from the Rev. Philip Edwards, whom I have already mentioned (p. 282). I may state that I have heard variants of the story from other sources.

While the Manchester and Milford Railway was in course of construction there was a large influx of navvies into Wales, and many a frugal farmer added to his incomings by lodging and boarding workmen engaged on the line. Several of these men were lodged at a farm called Penderlwyngoch, occupied by a man named Hughes.

One evening when the men were seated round the fire, which burned brightly, they heard the farm dogs bark, as they always did at the approach of strangers. This aroused the attention of the men, and they perceived from the furious barking of the dogs that someone was coming towards the house. By-and-by they heard the tramp of feet, mingled with the howling of the frightened dogs, and then the dogs ceased barking, just as if they had slunk away in terror. Before many minutes had elapsed the inmates heard the back door opened, and a number of people entered the house, carrying a heavy load resembling a dead man, which they deposited in the parlour, and all at once the noise ceased. The men in great dread struck a light, and proceeded to the parlour to ascertain what had taken place. But they could discover nothing there, neither were there any marks of feet in the room, nor could they find any footprints outside the house, but they saw the cowering dogs in the yard looking the picture of fright. After this fruitless investigation of the cause of this dread sound, the Welsh people present only too well knew the cause of this visit. On the very next day one of the men who sat by the fire was killed, and his body was carried by his fellow-workmen to the farm house, in fact everything occurred as rehea.r.s.ed the previous night. Most of the people who witnessed the vision are, my informant says, still alive.

_Cyhyraeth--Death Sound_.

This was thought to be a sound made by a crying spirit. It was plaintive, yet loud and terrible. It made the hair stand on end and the blood become cold; and a whole neighbourhood became depressed whenever the awful sound was heard. It was unlike all other voices, and it could not be mistaken. It took in its course the way the funeral procession was to go, starting from the house of the dead, and ending in the churchyard where the deceased was to be buried. It was supposed to announce a death the morning before it occurred, or, at most, a few days before. It was at one time thought to belong to persons born in the Diocese of Llandaff, but it must have travelled further north, for it is said to have been heard on the Kerry Hills in Montgomeryshire. The function of the _Cyhyraeth_ was much the same as that of the Corpse Candle, but it appealed to the sense of sound instead of to the sense of sight. Dogs, when they heard the distressing sound of the _Cyhyraeth_, showed signs of fear and ran away to hide.

_Lledrith--Spectre of a Person_.

This apparition of a friend has in the Scotch wraith, or Irish fetch its counterpart. It has been said that people have seen friends walking to meet them, and that, when about to shake hands with the approaching person, it has vanished into air. This optical illusion was considered to be a sign of the death of the person thus seen.

_Tolaeth--Death Rapping or Knocking_.

The death rappings are said to be heard in carpenters' workshops, and that they resembled the noise made by a carpenter when engaged in coffin-making. A respectable miner's wife told me that a female friend told her, she had often heard this noise in a carpenter's shop close by her abode, and that one Sunday evening this friend came and told her that the _Tolaeth_ was at work then, and if she would come with her she should hear it. She complied, and there she heard this peculiar sound, and was thoroughly frightened. There was no one in the shop at the time, the carpenter and his wife being in chapel. Sometimes this noise was heard by the person who was to die, but generally by his neighbours. The sounds were heard in houses even, and when this was the case the noise resembled the noise made as the shroud is being nailed to the coffin.

_A Raven's Croaking_.

A raven croaking hoa.r.s.ely as it flew through the air became the angel of death to some person over whose house it flew. It was a bird of ill omen.

_The Owl_.

This bird's dismal and persistent screeching near an abode also foretold the death of an inmate of that house.

_A Solitary Crow_.

The cawing of a solitary crow on a tree near a house indicates a death in that house.

_The Dog's Howl_.