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Extract from the writings of the bard Rhys ap Gweran ap Mathonwy:
"It was in the summer of the same year that the Lady of Albion
ordered a great festival for the barbarian travellers of the land. And
thus it was that a great camp was erected, twenty by twenty by seventy in
twelve days and twelve nights, and a lavish feast and entrertainments were
laid on within, such that travelers came even for days merely to view it,
and to hear the sounds of merriment from within the walls (see
footenote1). Entertainments and games were aplenty, of such merriment and
spendour that even I, Rhys ap Gweran ap Mathonwy, deigned to take part,
and the men boasted of their great exploits. Amongst them was one Sir
Corwyn of Ambrose, who claimed to be the greatest flee-er of the realm,
for he had fled no less than threescore battles, and once had fled an
entire host, and so swift was he that they could none of them catch him.
But of him we have heard in history.
A banquet there was then, of splendour and magnificence, such that even
the greediest were filled, for laid out there were [Gweran goes on to list
the vast quantities of food marshalled in the banquet]. At this time, too,
was the tourney, whence the Scadian knights of Albion battled amongst
themselves, and those assembled marvelled at their great ferocity and
size. Amongst them were Wolfgang Adolphus Jaegar who was called a master
of the arts of war and peace, Miles, who stood so tall that men claimed in
battle the Scadians would not build siege towers, but merely allow him to
pluck men from the battlements and send them hurtling to their death, and
Sir Michael de Brad whose features the Albes said would distort in battle,
and who they claimed descended from the line of Cu Chulain himself.
The Scadians offered to test their skills against their guests at that
time, freely and without malice. Such were their skills that all who
fought against them were either afeared unto death, or impressed so much
that they joined their number so that they might attain such skill. Thus
did Albion defend itself against those who might oppose it.
All these things happened, and as the day drew to a close, the barbarians
who had come went away amazed, and once again Albion grew. All these
things were I, Rhys ap Gweran ap Mathonwy, witnessed, and I say they are
true."
footenote 1: Gweran later notes that the visitors' reluctance to enter
may not have been occasioned by overcrowding so much as sartorial
differences, saying "The wandering people wear fabrics of strange,
coarse material that shines like metal, and afflicts them so that they
find clothing of wollen cloth and civilised cut unbearable."
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Picnic at Craigmillar Castle