until you open the door that looks towards the mainland; and after you
have once opened that door you can stay no longer, but must set forth to
London to bury the head, leaving it there to look toward France."

So they went on to Harlech and there stopped to rest, and sat down to eat
and drink. And there came three birds, which began singing a certain song,
and all the songs they had ever heard were unpleasant compared with it;
and the songs seemed to them to be at a great distance from them, over the
sea, yet the notes were heard as distinctly as if they were close by; and
it is said that at this repast they continued seven years. At the close of
this time they went forth to an island in the sea called Gwales. There
they found a fair and regal spot overlooking the ocean and a spacious hall
built for them. They went into it and found two of its doors open, but the
third door, looking toward Cornwall, was closed. "See yonder," said their
leader Manawydan; "that is the door we may not open." And that night they
regaled themselves and were joyful. And of all they had seen of food laid
before them, and of all they had heard said, they remembered nothing;
neither of that, nor of any sorrow whatsoever. There they remained
fourscore years, unconscious of having ever spent a time more joyous and
mirthful. And they were not more weary than when first they came, neither
did they, any of them, know the time they had been there. It was not more
irksome for them to have the head with them, than if Bran the Blessed had
been with them himself. And because of these fourscore years, it was
called "The Entertaining of the Noble Head."

One day said Heilwyn the son of Gwyn, "Evil betide me, if I do not open
the door to know if that is true which is said concerning it." So he
opened the door and looked towards Cornwall. And when they had looked they
were as conscious of all the evils they had ever sustained, and of all the
friends and companions they had ever lost, and of all the misery that had