Tegid Voel and Caridwen his wife lived on an island in the midst of
Lake Tegid. (Nowadays the lake is called Bala, and there is no
island to be seen.) They had an elder son, a fair and comely youth,
and a very beautiful daughter; but their youngest son was uglier than
anyone in the whole world. This troubled his mother Caridwen at
first; but she said to herself: "If he cannot be handsome, he shall,
at anyrate, be very learned." Now, Caridwen was a witch, so she set
to work to boil a Cauldron of Knowledge, of which the boiling must
not cease for a year and a day. At the end of that time it would
yield three drops of precious liquid, which would make whoever drank
it wise for the rest of his life. She set Gwion Bach, who was
passing by, to stir the cauldron, and a blind man named Morda to keep
up the fire underneath; but, fearing that Gwion Bach had seen what
she put into the cauldron, and would tell her secrets to others, she
made up her mind to kill him directly he had done his work for her.
Now, one day, as the end of the year drew nigh, while Caridwen was in
the fields gathering herbs, it chanced that the three magic drops
flew out of the cauldron, and fell on the finger of Gwion Bach. They
scalded his hand so that he promptly put it to his mouth, and sucked
his fingers; and immediately he became very wise, and knew all that
Caridwen meant to do to him, and his need of guarding against her
wily plots! He fled from the house, therefore, and ran towards his
own land; and the cauldron, left unstirred, burst in two, and the
poisonous liquid ran out of the door, and into a stream where the
horses of Gwyddno were drinking; and when they had drunk of the
poisoned water they all died.
When Caridwen returned, and saw the year's work was lost, she took up
a billet of wood, and began to beat the blind man Morda. But he
answered: "You do wrong to beat me; the loss was not because of me."
"You speak truly," said Caridwen. "It was Gwion Bach who robbed me."
And she set to running after him as fast as she could. He soon
looked back, and saw her, and changed himself into a hare; for the
magic liquid had given him many different kinds of skill. But as he
fled, she changed herself into a greyhound, and had nearly caught him
up when he ran towards a river and changed himself into a fish. Then
she became an otter, and chased him till in his weariness he took the
form of a bird. But she at once changed herself into a hawk, and
gave him no rest in the sky.
Just as he was in fear of death, he saw a heap of grains of wheat on
the floor of a barn; so he dropped among them, and became one of the
grains. Then Caridwen changed herself into a high-crested black hen,
and scratched among the grains till she found him. She was just
about to swallow him, when, with his last remaining effort of skill,
he became a very beautiful little child, and when she looked at him
she had not the heart to kill him on the spot. So she took her own
form again, and, having put the child into a leathern bag, she cast
him into the sea just below the weir of Gwyddno, which is not far
from Aberystwith, on the 29th of April. Then Caridwen returned home
again, and thought no more of the matter.
Now, it had been the custom on every May-day eve to go fishing in
that weir, and every year fish were taken to the value of a hundred
pounds. Its owner, Gwyddno, had an only son named Elphin, the most
unlucky of youths, who was always needing and never getting. This
year his father, pitying his ill fortune, granted to him all the weir
should contain on May-day, in order to give him something wherewith
to begin the world. So the nets were set to catch the fish below the
weir, and next day Elphin hurried to see how many they had caught.
But the nets were quite empty, and nothing was to be found but a
leathern bag which had caught in one of the poles of the weir. Then
said one of his companions: "Men were unfortunate before, but never
so much as now, when your luck has turned away the fish from a weir
that has been worth a hundred pounds every May-eve till now, when
there is nothing but a skin in it."
"Perhaps," said Elphin, "the bag may have something in it which is
worth a hundred pounds." So his friend hooked up the bag, and opened
it, and there peeped out the bright face of a little lad. "See, what
a bright face within the bag!" cried his companion. And Elphin said:
"Let him be called Taliesin, then" (which means "bright or shining
face"), and lifted the child gently on to his horse, and made it walk
softly, and went homeward with a very heavy heart.
[Illustration: THE FINDING OF TALIESIN]
But as he rode along, the boy behind him sang to him a song of
consolation so sweetly that Elphin was much amazed, and asked how he
had learnt so beautiful a song. The child replied that, though he
was very little, he was notwithstanding very wise.
Then Elphin asked if he were a mortal child or a spirit; upon which
the boy sang another song, telling what he had been, and how he had
fled from Caridwen, and how he came to be entangled in the weir.
When Elphin reached the house of his father, the latter asked him if
his haul were good.
"Father," he answered, "I have caught a poet-minstrel."
"Alas! what good will that do thee?" said Gwyddno.
And Taliesin answered for himself: "He will do him more good than the
weir ever did for thee."
Then Gwyddno looked at him, and said: "Art thou able to speak when
thou art so little?" And the child replied: "I am better able to
speak than thou to question." "What canst thou say?" asked Gwyddno.
Upon which Taliesin sang a song of such wondrous beauty, that
everyone hastened to the spot to hear the marvellous child.
Soon afterwards Elphin, with his usual ill luck, managed to offend
the powerful King Maelgwn, who cast him into a dungeon barred by
thirteen locked doors. But when father Gwyddno was lamenting his
son's ill fate, the child Taliesin bade him be of good cheer, since
he was going to rescue him. Setting off at daybreak he reached the
King's palace at the time of the evening meal, and entered the hall
just as the bards were beginning to sing the praises of the King, as
was their custom every evening. Then Taliesin cast a spell upon
these bards, so that instead of singing they could only pout out
their lips and make mouths at the King. He forced them also, by his
magic power, to tap their fingers on their mouths, as they tried in
vain to sing, making a curious sound like "Bler-m! Bler-m!"
The King, naturally, thought they were treating him with great
disrespect, and ordered one of his squires to give a blow to the
chief bard; and the squire took a broom, and struck him on the head,
so that he fell back on his seat. This rough treatment seemed to
bring him to his senses, and he then explained that they could not
help themselves, but had been put under a spell by a spirit, who was
sitting in a corner of the hall under the form of a child. So the
King ordered the squire to fetch the child; and Taliesin, nothing
loth, was brought up to the head of the table. Being asked who he
was and whence he came, he at once proceeded to sing another
wonderful song, in which he informed them that he was the chief bard
of Elphin, that his native country was the land of Cherubim, but that
at present he was dwelling upon this earth, and might even stay here
until the Judgment Day.
The King and his nobles marvelled greatly, for they had never heard
the like from a boy so young as he. But as he was the bard of
Elphin, who had offended His Majesty, the King determined that his
own bards should get the better of him in song. So he ordered the
chief bard to stand forth, and then all the four and twenty of them,
to strive with Taliesin. But when they came forward to do his
bidding they could do no other than play "Bler-m! Bler-m!" on their
lips.
Then the King, angry and disappointed, asked the boy Taliesin his
errand.
And the child replied in song: "I am come to deliver Elphin, who is
imprisoned in this castle, behind thirteen locks."
"I will never let him go," said the King.
Then Taliesin foretold that there should come up from the sea-marshes
a wonderful golden worm, which would take revenge upon the King for
his cruelty; but, finding his threat had no effect, he turned, and
left the hall. Outside the castle he sang a charm to the wind,
bidding it blow open the prison of Elphin; and while he thus sang,
near the door, there suddenly uprose such a storm of wind that the
King and his nobles crouched in terror, expecting that the castle
would fall upon their heads. Directly he realised that this was the
work of the mysterious child-bard he sent for Elphin from the prison,
and implored Taliesin to stay the wind-storm, which he accordingly
did. So Elphin was brought into the hall, loaded with chains; at
sight of which Taliesin sang another charm song, and the chains
immediately fell off his hands and feet. By this time the King was
so full of admiration for the skill and wisdom of the boy that he
begged him to take the spell off his own bards, and to test them with
questions.
So Taliesin set them free from his charm, and then began to rain
questions upon them.
"Why is a stone hard?"
"Why is a thorn sharp-pointed?"
"What is as salt as brine?"
"Who rides the gale?"
"Why is a wheel round?"
"Why is the speech of the tongue different from any other gift?"
These were some of the questions he put, and ended with: "If you and
your bards are able, let them give an answer to me, Taliesin."
But none of them could answer a single word.
Then the King dismissed them all with scorn; but still he would not
let Elphin go free away.
Then Taliesin bade Elphin wager the King that he had a horse both
better and swifter than the King's horses. The King accepted the
challenge, and fixed day and time and place for the wager to be
tried, and promised him his freedom if he should win the race. The
King went thither with all his people and four and twenty of the
swiftest horses he possessed. The course was marked out and the
horses placed for running. Then came Taliesin with four and twenty
twigs of holly, which he had burnt black, and he bade the youth who
was to ride his master's horse to place them in his belt. Then he
ordered him to let all the King's horses get before him, and, as he
should overtake one horse after another, to strike the horse with a
holly twig over the crupper, and then let that twig fall, and then to
take another twig, and do the same to every one of the horses as he
should overtake them.
Moreover, he bade the horseman to watch carefully where his own horse
should stumble, and to throw down his cap on the spot. All this was
done, and, behold! each horse that was struck with the holly twig
began to lag behind, and the horse of Elphin easily won the race.
When all was over, Taliesin brought his master to the spot where his
horse had stumbled, and ordered workmen to dig a hole there; and when
they had dug deep enough they found a cauldron full of gold. Then
said Taliesin: "Elphin, take thou this as a reward for having taken
me out of the weir and reared me from that time until now."
So Elphin went home a rich man to his father, and the work of
Taliesin was accomplished.
_From the Welsh Romance of Taliesin. Thirteenth century._