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"This is my wush," said the Laird, striking his rung upon the ground. The words had scarcely passed his lips when the whole homestead of Brockburn, house and farm buildings, was planted upon the bleak hill-side. The astonished Laird now began to bewail the rash wish which had removed his home from the sheltered and fertile valley where it originally stood to the barren side of a bleak mountain.
Although his sixth cousin on the mother's side, as he returned one night from a wedding, had seen the Men of Peace hunting on the sides of Ben Muich Dhui, dressed in green, and with silver-mounted bridles to their horses which jingled as they rode; and though Rory the fiddler having gone to play at a christening did never come home, but crossing a hill near Brockburn in a mist was seduced into a Shian or fairy turret, where, as all decent bodies well believe, he is playing still in spite, I say, of the wise saws and experience of all his neighbours, Brockburn remained obstinately incredulous.
"Wush away, Brockburn, and mak the nut as hard to crack as ye will." The Laird at once began to cast about in his mind for three wishes sufficiently comprehensive to secure his lifelong prosperity; but the more he beat his brains the less could he satisfy himself.
Brockburn put them into his pocket, briefly saying, "I'm obleeged to ye;" but as he followed the Man of Peace down the hill-side, he found the obligation so heavy, that from time to time he threw a stone away, unobserved, as he hoped, by his companion. When the first stone fell, the Man of Peace looked sharply round, saying: "What's yon?"
"I'm nae your doggie, I'm a Man of Peace," was the reply. "Dinna miscall your betters, Brockburn: why will ye not credit our existence, man?" "Seein's believin'," said the Laird, stubbornly; "but the mist's ower thick for seein' the night, ye ken."
Was there ae body that ye expected?" asked his wife. "The Man o' Peace, woman!" cried Brockburn. "I've ane o' my wushes to get, and I maun hae't." "The man's mad!" was the gudewife's comment. "Ye've surely forgotten yoursel, Brockburn. Ye never believed in the Daoiné Shi before." "Seein's believin'," said the Laird.
And pushing the collie from him, he sat up in bed and looked anxiously but vainly round the chamber for the Man of Peace. "Lie doun, lie doun," cried the gudewife from beside him. "Ye're surely out o' your wuts, Brockburn. Would ye gang stravaging about the country again the nicht?" "Where is he?" cried the Laird. "There's not a soul here but your lawful wife and your ain dear doggie.
How many miles he wandered thus, the Dwarf keeping silently beside him, he never knew, before he sank exhausted on the ground, saying: "I'm thinking, man, that if ye could bring hame to me, in place of bringing me hame, I'd misdoubt your powers nae mair. It's a far cry to Loch Awe, ye ken, and it's a weary long road to Brockburn." "Is this your wush?" asked the Man of Peace.
"Then roun' wi' ye!" shouted the Man of Peace; and once more seizing the Laird by the arm, he turned him swiftly round this time, to the right and at the third turn the light vanished, and Brockburn and the Man of Peace were once more alone together in the mist. "Aweel, Brockburn," said the Man of Peace, "I'll alloo ye're candid, and have a convincible mind.
"Turn roun' to your left, man, and ye'll see," said the Dwarf, and catching Brockburn by the arm, he twisted him swiftly round three times, when a sudden blaze of light poured through the mist, and revealed a crag of the mountain well known to the Laird, and which he now saw to be a kind of turret, or tower.
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