I have fled as a fox used to many swift bounds and quirks;
I have fled as a martin, which did not avail;
I have fled as a squirrel that vainly hides,
I have fled as a stag's antler, of ruddy course,
I have fled as an iron in a glowing fire,
I have fled as a spear-head, of woe to such as have a wish for it;
I have fled as a fierce bull bitterly fighting,
I have fled as a bristly boar seen in a ravine,
I have fled as a white grain of pure wheat;
Into a dark leathern bag I was thrown,
And on a boundless sea I was sent adrift;


Which was to me an omen of being tenderly nursed,
And the Lord God then set me at liberty."

Then Elphin came with Taliessin to the house of his father, and Gwyddno
asked him if he had a good haul at the fish-weir. "I have something better
than fish." "What is that?" asked the father. "I have a bard," said
Elphin. "Alas, what will he profit thee?" said Gwyddno, to which Taliessin
replied, "He will profit him more than the weir ever profited thee." Said
Gwyddno, "Art thou able to speak, and thou so little?" Then Taliessin
said, "I am better able to speak than thou to question me."

From this time Elphin always prospered, and he and his wife cared for
Taliessin tenderly and lovingly, and the boy dwelt with him until he was
thirteen years old, when Elphin went to make a Christmas visit to his
uncle Maelgwyn, who was a great king and held open court. There were four
and twenty bards there, and all proclaimed that no king had a wife so
beautiful as the queen, or a bard so wise as the twenty-four, who all