stoop upon him, and he was in fear of death, he espied a heap of
winnowed wheat on the floor of a barn, and he dropped amongst the wheat,
and turned himself into one of the grains. Then she transformed herself
into a high-crested black hen, and went to the wheat and scratched it
with her feet, and found him out and swallowed him. And, as the story
says, she bore him nine months, and when she was delivered of him, she
could not find it in her heart to kill him, by reason of his beauty. So
she wrapped him in a leathern bag, and cast him into the sea to the mercy
of God, on the twenty-ninth day of April.

And at that time the weir of Gwyddno was on the strand between Dyvi and
Aberystwyth, near to his own castle, and the value of an hundred pounds
was taken in that weir every May eve. And in those days Gwyddno had an
only son named Elphin, the most hapless of youths, and the most needy.
And it grieved his father sore, for he thought that he was born in an
evil hour. And by the advice of his council, his father had granted him
the drawing of the weir that year, to see if good luck would ever befall
him, and to give him something wherewith to begin the world.

{Picture: p121.jpg}

And the next day, when Elphin went to look, there was nothing in the
weir. But as he turned back he perceived the leathern bag upon a pole of
the weir. Then said one of the weir-ward unto Elphin, "Thou wast never
unlucky until to-night, and now thou hast destroyed the virtues of the
weir, which always yielded the value of an hundred pounds every May eve,
and to-night there is nothing but this leathern skin within it." "How
now," said Elphin, "there may be therein the value of an hundred pounds."
Well! they took up the leathern bag, and he who opened it saw the
forehead of the boy, and said to Elphin, "Behold a radiant brow!" {121}
"Taliesin be he called," said Elphin. And he lifted the boy in his arms,
and lamenting his mischance, he placed him sorrowfully behind him. And
he made his horse amble gently, that before had been trotting, and he
carried him as softly as if he had been sitting in the easiest chair in
the world. And presently the boy made a Consolation and praise to
Elphin, and foretold honour to Elphin; and the Consolation was as you may
see,

"Fair Elphin cease to lament!
Let no one be dissatisfied with his own,
To despair will bring no advantage.
No man sees what supports him;
The prayer of Cynllo will no