WIZARD MARKING THE CULPRITS.
It was believed in Cardiganshire and Carmarthenshire, that Harries, Cwrtycadno, could mark out thieves, and also persons who had an “Evil Eye,” by causing a horn to grow out of their foreheads. A man in Tregaron had witched a woman, but the conjurer marked the mischievous person by putting a horn on his head.
A farmer from the parish of Llangwyryfon, in Cardiganshire, whose cattle had been witched by a neighbour who had an evil eye, went to Llangurig in Montgomeryshire, to consult, a well-known conjurer who only died a few years ago. The Wizard for the payment of 10s. showed a picture of the offender in a magic mirror, and offered to cause him to die of a strange disease. The farmer begged the conjurer not to do that; that he did not desire to kill his enemy, only to punish him, and he was punished. My informant was a farmer who lives near Talybont, Cardiganshire.
This Llangurig wizard was continually consulted by clients from Montgomeryshire, Cardiganshire, Radnorshire, and other counties. Not long ago, there was also a conjurer at Llanidloes, in the same county (Montgomeryshire), who was consulted on all cases of cursed fields, bewitched cattle, horses, pigs, churns, backward lovers, bewitched women, etc.
A WIZARD AND THE YOUNG MAN WHO HAD BEEN CURSED.
An old man named Evan Morris, who lives at Goginan, near Aberystwyth, informed me that about 60 years ago, a young man in that neighbourhood was struck dumb all of a sudden, that he could not utter a word. As he had neither been ill nor met with an accident it was suspected that he had been witched by some neighbour. So his father at last went over the mountain to Llangurig, about twenty miles off, to consult a well-known wizard named “Savage.” The wizard opened his magic book, from which out came a big fly, buzzing or making a humming noise, boom, boom, boom, near the conjurer’s face, who exclaimed, “What is the matter with this old fly?” The wise man then struck the insect with his hand and commanded it back into the book, and closed the volume; but he opened it again at another page, and out came another fly of a different colour. This fly again was buzzing till the wizard commanded it back into the book, which he now closed altogether; and addressing the man who had come to consult him, said to him: “You have suspected a certain man in your neighbourhood of having witched your son; but you are wrong; another man whom you do not suspect is the guilty. But your son has not been witched at all; he is under a curse.”
Welsh conjurers made a distinction between witchcraft and a curse. Thomas Jones, of Pontrhydfendigaid, informed me that a conjurer at Llangurig, named Morgans, told him once, that some men who were born under certain planets, possessed an inherent power of cursing, “and their curse,” said he, “is worse than witchcraft itself.”
When the man returned home from the conjurer, to his great joy and surprise, he found his son able to speak. My informant vouches for the truth of the story, and added that this conjurer was so deep in the Black Art that he could do almost anything.