The tiny lake of Llyn Gwyn and the island where Gwyn, son of Mudd the king of the underworld, held his court.

But if fairy men did not marry human women, they did prefer them as midwives or foster mothers.  These stories also follow typical patterns.  The midwife is collected at her home and taken to a richly adorned cave where she attends the fairy mother.  After the baby is born, she is given some ointment with which to clean the baby.  She is warned not to get any of the mixture into her eyes, but she invariably does.  Her powers of sight then change, and she finds herself in surroundings of either extreme poverty or opulence.  The midwife does not disclose her new ability and is generously rewarded for her help and taken home.  Sometime later she sees the father once again, perhaps at market or in the village, and asks him how his wife is.  He answers amicably, but, as their conversation continues, asks with which eye she saw him.  She tells him, and he promptly blinds her in that eye.  She is never again able to see fairies.

In our final tale, the midwife rides with a mysterious prince to a small cave on an island in the middle of an isolated lake. The ointment gets into her eyes, and she finds herself in the most richly adorned palace, surrounded by servants and courtiers, where she had once been alone.  The location for this tale is Llyn Gwyn, the fairy kingdom that lies in the heart of the Welsh hills.

Stephen Osmond is assistant senior editor of the Culture section of THE WORLD & I.