A Tall Story

To cut a long story short, Dewi Sant, patron saint of our land, so loved his people that he made them a promise. Never, vowed he, would Death darken their doors without a warning. In this way the citizens of Cambria could prepare to meet their maker.

Since that day, the dim glow of ghostly tapers called “corpse candles” have appeared at the scene of fatal accidents or at the homes of the doomed. There are those who well remember the clutter of candles that hovered on the pithead before the explosion of Llanbradach.

There are those, too, only few and far between, who have the Vision, the power to read Hades’ horoscope. They peep through the veil of time to watch phantom funerals follow the final-resting place route.

Two such people had been known in the Rhymney Valley; Mari Thomas of Penyrheol, nicknamed Mari’r Witsh on account of her uncanny gift, and Levi’r Groes, an old man ancient as the Cross, who lived on Heol-y-Bwnsi.7

Neighbours were flummoxed by Levi’s power, especially when he predicted that two funerals would pass along Heol-y-Bwnsi en route for Abraham’s bosom by way of Groeswen Churchyard. One coffin would be carried by excessively short men, the other by very tall.

And, true to relate, within minutes, two processions paced the Bwnsi. One with bearers as short as stubble, another with mourners tall as trees on tiptoe.

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