THE PIGEON.
It is said that if a sick person asks for a pigeon’s pie, or the flesh of a pigeon, it is a sign that his death is near. There is also a superstition that people cannot die in ease if there are pigeon’s feathers in their pillows. A writer in “Bye-Gones” refers to the case of a woman who died in 1803 at a farm-house called Southern Pills in the Parish of Lawrenny, Pembrokeshire, and states that on her death-bed the nurse snatched the pillow from under her head.
THE BEES.
The bees understand Welsh; for a woman on the borders of Cardiganshire and Carmarthenshire informed me that they have a Queen, who leads, and that they follow, when she bids them to come in these words:—
“Dewch, Dewch, Dewch.”
(Come, come, come.)
There are many superstitions about bees. There was a custom once of telling the bees of a death in the family, and they were even put in mourning. It was once considered by some very lucky to find that a strange swarm of bees had arrived in the garden or tree; if, however, they alighted on a dead tree it was an ill omen.
THE BEES AND ST. DAVID.
“Modomnoc, a disciple of St. David, went to Ireland, and a large swarm of bees followed him, and settled on the prow of the ship where he sat. They supplied him with meat during his Irish Mission; but he, not wishing to enjoy their company by fraud, brought them back to Wales, when they fled to their usual place, and David blessed Modomnoc for his humility. Three times the bees went and returned, and the third time holy David dismissed Modomnoc with the bees, and blessed them, saying that henceforth bees should prosper in Ireland, and should no longer increase in Glyn Rosyn. ‘This,’ adds Rhyddmarch, ‘is found to be the fact: swarms forthwith decreased at David’s; but Ireland, in which, until that time, bees could never live, is now enriched with plenty of honey. It is manifested that they could not live there before; for if you throw Irish earth or stone into the midst of the bees, they disperse, and, flying, they will shun it.‘—“Pilgrimage to St. David’s.”