"At night a bed of rushes was laid down along one side of the room,
covered with a coarse kind of cloth, made in the country, called
_brychan_; and all the household lay down on this bed in common, without
changing their dresses. The fire was kept burning through the night, and
the sleepers maintained their warmth by lying closely; and when, by the
hardness of their couch, one side was wearied, they would get up and sit
by the fire awhile, and then lie down again on the other side. It is to
this custom of promiscuous sleeping, that some of the worst habits of
the Welsh at the present day may be ascribed; and from the same custom
which their forefathers, the ancient Britons, practiced, arose Cæsar's
supposition that they were polyandrous polygamists."

These habits, which were a matter of necessity with the ancient Welsh,
have become converted, by the lapse of time, among their descendants of
the present day, into an amatory custom precisely similar to that
practiced formerly in New England.[6]

A tourist through Wales, in the year 1797,[7] thus speaks of the Welsh
_bundling_: "And here, amongst the usages and customs, I must not omit
to inform you that what you have, perhaps, often heard, without
believing, respecting the _mode of courtship_ amongst the Welsh
peasants, is true. The lower order of people do actually carry on their
love affairs in bed, and what would extremely astonish more polished
lovers, they are carried on honorably, it being, at least, as usual for
the Pastoras of the mountains to go from the bed of courtship to the bed
of marriage as unpolluted and maidenly as the Chloes of fashion; and yet
you are not to conclude that this proceeds from their being less
susceptible of the _belle-passion_ than their betters; or that the cold
air which they breathe has 'froze the genial current of their souls.' By
no means; if they cannot boast the voluptuous languor of an Italian sky,