THE OLD-TIME GWAHODDWR.
The Bidding is but one form of a feature of Welsh life which extensively prevails, known by the term Cymmhorth. The Bidding is a Priodas Cymmhorth; the Cyfarfod Cymmhorth, or Assistance Meeting, is much the same thing, minus the wedding feature. The customs of the latter festival are, however, often of a sort distinctly tending toward matrimonial results as an eventuality. A number of farmer girls of the humbler sort will gather at a stated time and place to give a day’s work to one needing assistance, and after a day spent in such toil as may be required, the festival winds up with jollity in the evening. The day is signalized on the part of those youths of the neighbourhood who are interested in the girls, by tokens of that interest in the shape of gifts. The lass who receives a gift accompanied by a twig of birch is thereby assured of her lover’s constancy. To her whom the young man would inform of his change of heart, a sprig of hazel is given. An earlier feature of this ceremony was the Merry Andrew, who presented the gifts in the name of the lover. This personage was disguised fantastically, and would lead the young woman he selected into another room, where he would deliver the gift and whisper the giver’s name.
The antiquity of the Bidding as a local custom is undoubted. The old-time gwahoddwr was a person of much importance, skilled in pedigrees and family traditions, and himself of good family. A chieftain would assume the character in behalf of his vassal, and hostile clans respected his person as he went about from castle to castle, from hall to hall. He bore a garlanded staff as the emblem of his office, and on entering a dwelling would strike his staff upon the floor to command the attention of the group before him, and then begin his address.
II.
The Horse-Wedding is of more ancient origin than the Bidding, and is still a living custom in some parts of Wales, especially Carmarthenshire and western Glamorganshire. It was in other days common throughout South Wales, and was scolded about by old Malkin (generally very cordial in his praise of Welsh customs) in these spicy terms: ‘Ill may it befal the traveller, who has the misfortune of meeting a Welsh wedding on the road. He would be inclined to suppose that he had fallen in with a company of lunatics, escaped from their confinement. It is the custom of the whole party who are invited, both men and women, to ride full speed to the church porch, and the person who arrives there first has some privilege or distinction at the marriage feast. To this important object all inferior considerations give way; whether the safety of his majesty’s subjects, who are not going to be married, or their own, incessantly endangered by boisterous, unskilful and contentious jockeyship.’[137] Glamorganshire is here spoken of. The custom varies somewhat in different localities, but it preserves the main feature, to force the bride away from her friends, who then gallop after her to church, arriving toujours trop tard, of course, like the carabineers in ‘Les Brigands.’
There have been cases, however, when the bride was caught by a member of the pursuing party, and borne away—an incident which occurred in the knowledge of an acquaintance, who related it to me. As may readily be inferred, the bride in this case was not unwilling to be caught; in fact she was averse to marrying the man who was taking her to church, and who was her parent’s choice, not her own. The lover who had her heart caught up with her by dint of good hard riding, and whisked her on his horse within sight of the church-door, to the intense astonishment of the bridegroom, who gazed at them open-mouthed as they galloped away. He thought at first it was a joke, but as the lovers disappeared in the distance the truth dawned upon him: a Welsh custom had served something like its original purpose.
But usually, the whole performance is a vehicle for fun of the most good-natured and innocent sort. It begins by the arrival of the neighbours on horseback at the residence of the expectant bridegroom. An eye-witness to a certain wedding gathering in Glamorganshire a few years ago states that the horsemen exceeded one hundred in number. From among them a deputation was chosen to go (still on horseback) to the bride’s residence to make formal demand for her. Her door was barred inside, and the demand was made in rhyme, and replied to in the same form from within. It often happens that a brisk contest of wits signalizes this proceeding, for if the voice of any one within is recognized by one of those outside, his personal peculiarities are made the subject of satirical verses. A voice inside being recognized as that of a man who was charged with sheep-stealing, this rhyme was promptly shouted at him:
Gwrando, leidr hoyw’r ddafad,
Ai ti sydd yma heddyw’n geidwad?
Ai dyna y rheswm cloi y drysau,
Rhag dwyn y wreigan liw dydd goleu?
(Ah, sheep-stealer, art thou a guardian of the fair one? If the doors were not locked thou wouldst steal the bride in broad daylight.)