The Mari Lwyd

It was Christmas Eve, and Julia was sitting in the parlor by the fireplace reading tales from the Mabinogion, a collection of ancient Welsh myths and legends.  There was a knock at the door.

 

Julia got up and went to the door, looking out through the glass.

“Who is there?” she asked.

“We knock, you open, we enter in!

“And now your favor we shall win!” came the reply.

“That sounds like Leah,” Julia thought to herself.

 Then she gasped when she saw who, or rather, what was outside, wanting to get in.

 

 “The Mari Lwyd is at your door!  

 Let us in or we’ll rhyme some more!”

  

“The Mari Lwyd?” Julia said to herself, “The Grey Mare!  That’s an old, traditional Welsh Christmas custom.  Leah must be doing this because she is so proud of her Welsh ancestry.”  She yelled through the door, “Don’t come it!  You’ll frighten the other girls, especially little Clarice!”

 Leah answered her.

“You must answer with a rhyme,

”Or you must let us in this time!”

  

Julia caught on.  “So that’s how this works.

“Get out of here!  And go away!

“And don’t comeback any other day!”

 

“I’m really good at playing this game,

“So let in the horse, she’s very tame.”

 

“I’m not going to let you in this night,

“You’ll make a mess and cause a fright!”

 

“Listen, you, this is your last chance,

“Let us in to sing and dance!”

 

“To let you in I do not want,

“Get away from here or . . .

“Oh, drat!  What rhymes with ‘want’?”

 Leah laughed, and the horse whinnied. 

            “Haha!  Haha!  The game we’ve won!

            “We’re coming in to have some fun!”

 With great trepidation, Julia opened the door and stood back.  The Mari Lwyd galloped into the parlor, whinnying shrilly and clomping around.  Leah was shouting to the horse to be still, and Julia jumped up on a chair, shrieking with a mixture of fear and excitement. 

 

The horse knocked over furniture and came close to upsetting the lamp in the window.

“What will it take to quiet her down?”  Julia was frantic.

“Offer her something to eat or drink, or hand over some money; that usually does it.”

The horse was going crazy.  Julia shouted as loud as she could, “I have cookies and hot chocolate for you if only you’d stand still and be good!”

 The Mari Lwyd stopped and was quiet.  Julia held out the plate of cookies.

“Help yourself!”

 From under the horse’s white sheet emerged little Clarice.  “Thank you for the cookies!  How about some hot chocolate, too?” she said.

 The three friends ate cookies and drank hot chocolate.

“What a way to start Christmas!” exclaimed Julia.

“Well, I’ve enjoyed it,” said Leah, “And as my grandfather from Aberystwyth would say, ‘Nadolig Llawen!’”

Behind the Scenes

 

NEW!  IMPROVED!  Doll Photography Studio and Storage

 

I have finally finished a project which I began some time ago, turning an alcove in our attic into a doll photography studio, with my doll furniture, accessories, and other props stored nearby in some sort of order. 

 

All this stuff had been crammed into one tight corner, fitted together like a Chinese puzzle.  Believe it or not, there is now a logical order to this pile. 

 

Here is the studio itself, set up for its first photo shoot (well, actually, in the process of being dismantled).  The lighting is from two clamp work lights with the highest wattage full-spectrum LED bulbs I could find. This is the new dayroom/bedroom set which is on the back of the library set.

 

There is a ventilation pipe that runs up from the bathroom below, preventing long-range photography from certain angles, but it doesn’t get in the way of close-up work.

 

Here is the dining room/kitchen set, folded up and waiting its turn.  The parlor/old dayroom set is downstairs, waiting to get used for the Christmas set-up in a corner of the living room.

 

Tea Party Conversation

 

When the short-lived company, A British Child, first marketed their Elizabethan doll, Jane deLacey, she came with a book, “Jane deLacey and the Voice in the Tower”, and the promise of a second book, “Jane deLacey and the Spanish Captain.”  The company folded before the second book was offered for sale.  The title suggests that the book took place after the defeat of the Spanish Armada.

Because the second book was never published, whatever transpired in it never happened.  Or did it? 

TEA PARTY CONVERSATION

(JANE’S DREAM)

            “I have had that self dream yesternight that I have had oft-times before,” said Jane one afternoon at tea.

            “You have a recurring dream?” Nellie inquired, “Would you like to . . . talk about it.”

 

            “Certainly,” Jane responded, “In my dream I am back home at deLacey Hall, but this has me gemisht - I am the age I was when I left, but it seems as though the Great Armada has just been licked, and that I know happened when I was but three.”

           

“You left in 1594, and the Armada was in 1588?” asked Gila.

            “Aye, it is one of my earliest memories.  I remember seeing Father in armor, hot-footing it from deLacey Hall at the head of a band of soldiers.  All was not hunky-dory, and some of the maid servants were blubbering.  I did not tumble to what was happening until I was much older, but he was lighting out for Tilbury, there to join the Queen.”

           

“What in your dream is about the Armada?” asked Nellie.

            “I am following odd clues that lead me to a Spanish soldier, a captain, holed up in the woods near the Hall.  He is a shipwrecked survivor of the scrap with the Armada.  I am faced with a moral dilemma:  Should I help him, out of pity, or should I hand him over to Father, and so cook his goose?”

           

“What do you do?” asked Gila.

            “Usually the dream does end there, and I awake all geschtern.  But last night, it kept going.  I kept the captain hidden, and brought him food, but he was discovered and taken before Father.  But, moved by my kindness, Father proved to be a mensch, and had him given safe conduct to France, to skedaddle back to Spain from there.”

            “For a dream, that is quite an adventure,” declared Nellie, “That could be a book!”