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Such we may suppose to have been the "domus regia," whence the saint walked out in a very bad humour to the river Ness, from the pebbles of which he selected one white stone, to be turned to an important use. Broichan, the Magus, had in his possession a female slave from Ireland.
The messengers rushed in immediately after to claim the saint's intervention. Broichan had been suddenly stricken by an angel sent for the purpose; and as if he had been taking his dram in a modern gin-palace, we are told that the drinking-glass, or glass drinking-vessel, "vitrea bibera," which he was conveying to his lips, was smashed in pieces, and he himself seized with deadly sickness.
Columba's request was refused. Losing patience, he had resort to threats; and at length, driven to his ultimatum, he denounced death to Broichan if the slave were not released before his own return to Ireland. Columba told his disciples to expect two messengers to come from the king to tell of the sudden and critical illness of Broichan.
Just such scenes were enacted, with at least as much of tragic earnestness, when Patrick worsted the Druid Lochra in the hall of Tara, or when Columba baffled the devices of Broichan, the arch-Druid of Brude, the Pictish king.
Columba sends the consecrated pebble, with a prescription that the water in which it is dipped is to be drunk. If, before he drinks, Broichan releases his slave, he is to recover; if not, he dies. The Magus complies, and is saved. The consecrated stone, which had the quality of floating in water like a nut, was afterwards, as we are told, preserved in the treasury of the king of the Picts.
His name is Broichan, and he is tutor to Brud, king of the Picts, with whom he dwells on the banks of the Ness.
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