IN Scotland, long, long ago, there were two brothers named Donald and John Gilray. They lived together in a little cottage and worked for a farmer whose house was about a mile distant. One day the farmer sent them to dig peat turf in a pasture near a wild, rocky bluff known as Merlin’s Crag. After working for a considerable time, they saw coming toward them from the crag a little woman about eighteen inches in height, clad in a green gown, and wearing on her feet a pair of red shoes.
She waved a cane she carried at the astonished laborers, and said: “How would you like it if my husband was to come and take the roof off from your house as you are taking it off from ours? I command you to put back every turf exactly where you found it.”
Then she left them, and the two men, with fear and trembling, replaced the turfs. That done, they went to their master, and told him what had happened. The farmer only laughed at them. “You must have fallen asleep up there on the moor when you ought to have been working,” said he; “and you have had a bad dream to pay you for your neglect. Take a cart and fetch home the turfs you have dug immediately.”
The men went back with much reluctance; but nothing unusual happened while they were in the pasture, and they loaded a cart and drove with it to the farm. After they finished their day’s work and were passing Merlin’s Crag on their way home in the dusk of evening, they saw streams of brilliant light shining forth from innumerable crevices in the black rocks. They stopped and gazed. “Come,” said John, “let’s go and find out what this is all about. Many’s the time we’ve passed here, and we’ve never seen anything like that before.”
“No,” said Donald, “we’re safer to keep to the highway.”
But John would not be satisfied with that, and he moved toward the lighted crag, and Donald followed. As they drew near they were charmed by the most exquisite fiddling they had ever heard. By searching they found an opening in the rocks something like a rude window, and they looked in and saw a company of fairies engaged in a merry dance. Among the rest was the little old woman who had spoken to them on the peat bog. John was so overpowered by the enchanting jigs the fiddler was playing that he proposed they should go inside the crag and join in the fun.
“We should never be able to get away,” declared Donald. “I am as fond of dancing as anyone, but nothing would tempt me to dance in that company.”
However, John was more adventurous than his brother, and every new jig that was played, and every new reel that was danced inspired him with additional ardor. At last he could restrain himself no longer, and he leaped through the window into the midst of the dancers.
“Welcome!” cried the old fairy woman, and she held out her hands to him, and off they went in a mad whirl.
“He is there for no good,” said Donald, who still stood at the window. “What can I do?”
After thinking the situation over he began to shout remonstrances to his brother and to beg him to come out. But neither the fairies nor John would pause in their reel, and they only waved their hands, beckoning him to join them. There Donald stayed shouting to his brother until he heard a cock crow at his master’s farm. Immediately the lights flashed out, the music ceased and he was alone on the side of the wild crag.
He went back to the farm and told the melancholy tale of poor John’s fate. This was soon the talk of all the countryside, and it was generally agreed that John was lost forever. But one old man who was very wise in fairy lore came to Donald and unfolded a plan for accomplishing his brother’s rescue. “Make a little cross out of the wood of the rowan tree,” said he, “and carry it in your pocket, and the fairies will have no power over you. Then be sure to pass Merlin’s Crag every evening, and when you see it lighted, enter it boldly and claim your brother. If he refuses to go with you, seize him and carry him off by force. You need not be afraid, for as long as you have the rowan cross in your pocket the fairies will not dare to interfere with you.”
Donald was not so sure about his safety as the old man was, but he was willing to risk much to effect his brother’s rescue. So he agreed to try the experiment, whatever the result might be. He made the rowan cross and carried it in his pocket, and every evening he passed Merlin’s Crag watching for the lights. But the crag was perfectly dark until just a year after the day when the brothers first saw the fairies. That evening Donald saw the lights glimmering from the crevices of the rocks, and he at once left the road and climbed up till he found the very window that he had looked through a twelve-month previous.
There was the same scene within of merry dancers, and the music was just as stirring and delightful. In the midst of the dancers was John Gilray whirling about with the little old fairy, exactly as his brother had last seen him. Donald crept through the window and advanced with trembling footsteps. His courage returned as he went on, and presently he made a sudden dash in among the dancers and seized his brother by the collar.
“You must come with me,” said he.
“Yes, yes,” said John, “I’ll come, and you need not handle me so roughly. But first let me finish this dance. What is your hurry anyhow? I haven’t been here a half hour yet!”
“A half hour!” exclaimed Donald. “You have been here a whole year.”
John refused to believe this, but Donald dragged him away and got him outside. The little old fairy woman looked forth at them through the window. “Good-by,” she said, waving her hand to John. “We have had you here a whole year, a prisoner in our dance. That is your punishment for taking the roof off our house. But the grass has again grown green on the spot where you removed the turf, and the roof is nearly as good as ever. So you can go if you choose, but I warn you not to be digging your turf there again.”
She waved her hand once more, and suddenly the lights were gone, and the rocks of Merlin’s Crag were as black and solid as ever. It was now midnight, and the two brothers went home rejoicing.
