There are so many precautions necessary against the Devil that it is a miracle that many more people do not succumb to his wiles and tricks.  It is not known in which form the Devil visited her.  Did he look like a handsome young man or like the ugly, horrible incubus that women have nightmares about?  The next morning the girl knew that he had been there, although she had neither seen him nor heard him.

Her father confessor would not believe her, but when she insisted, amid tears, that she just knew the Devil had been there, he instructed her to fast except on Fridays, and to avoid all enjoyment except sleeping.  This she did, with great perseverance.

Soon her condition became evident for all to see, and the women of the village asked her who the father was.  She said she did not know, so the women said: “You must love him very much that you protect him thus by keeping his name secret.  We hope that he will be grateful to you.  Few men are.  They just take!”

In those days, it was law in Wales that if a woman found herself pregnant without a husband, she had to name the man who had done that to her.  The judge would then marry them so that disgrace for the town might be avoided and God would be pleased.  If she refused to give the man’s name, she would be executed by fire because she had brought impurity to her town.  However, the judges decided to postpone the sentence until the baby was born, since the child was innocent.

Finally the baby was born, and a heavy boy it was, chubby-cheeked and smiling, a delight for any mother to have, except that his body was covered in soft black down, like a young bird. So they called him Merlin, which means blackbird.  The girl asked her father confessor if he would baptize the child.  The wise priest had no objection since he knew that Christianity is in the soul and charity is in the heart, not in the skin, no matter what people whispered about the baby.

His mother fed the boy herself, since no wet nurse would touch a hairy child.  After a year she weaned him, and by that time he was as big as a child of two.  She embraced him, saying: “My poor fatherless child, soon you will be motherless as well, for I shall be executed because of you in spite of my innocence.”  Suddenly the child opened his mouth and said, smiling: “No, mother, you will not.”  His mother was speechless with surprise.  One day while she carried him through the village, they overheard two women saying: “What a shame, such a nice girl, she has to go to the stake for that ill-starred child!” Suddenly the child turned to them and spoke:  “Leave my mother alone! Don’t gossip behind her back! You are bigger sinners than she is! No one will be capable of harming her as long as I am alive.”