We find too, that their beliefs, so far as Adamnan indicates them, possessed the same character. Thus he tells us that on one occasion, when Columba had been tarrying some days in the province of the Picts, he converted a certain peasant with his whole family, through the preaching of the Word of Life; and that the husband was, together with his wife, children and domestics, baptized. A few days afterwards one of his sons is attacked by a dangerous illness and brought to the point of death; whereupon the ‘Magi,’ or _Druadh_, began with great bitterness to upbraid the parents, and to extol their own gods as more powerful than the God of the Christians, and thus to despise God as though he were weaker than their gods. The son dies; but Columba comes and raises him from the dead, and thus confirms the faith of the peasant.[233] These gods, too, appear as demons dwelling in fountains. Thus we are told that again, when Columba was staying in the province of the Picts, he heard that there was a fountain ‘famous among the heathen people, which the foolish men, having their senses blinded by the devil, worshipped as God. For those who drank of this fountain, or purposely washed their hands or feet in it, were allowed by God to be struck by demoniacal art, and went home either leprous or purblind, or at least suffering from weakness or other kind of infirmity. By all these things the pagans were seduced and paid divine honour to the fountain.’ Columba blesses the fountain in the name of Christ; and, having washed his hands and feet, he and his companions drank of the water he had blessed. ‘And from that day,’ adds Adamnan, ‘the demons departed from the fountain,’ and people, instead of being injured, were cured of many diseases by it.[234] Then we find Broichan, the ‘Magus,’ or _Drui_, of King Brude, informing Columba that he will prevent him from making his voyage along Loch Ness; ‘for,’ he says, ‘I can make the winds unfavourable to thy voyage, and cause a great darkness to envelope thee in its shade.’ The Saint goes to the lake with a large number of followers, and the ‘Magi’ begin to exult, seeing that it had become very dark and that the wind was very violent and contrary. ‘Nor should we wonder,’ says Adamnan, ‘that God sometimes allows them, with the aid of evil spirits, to raise tempests and agitate the sea.’ Columba calls on Christ the Lord, and embarks in his small boat, which at once carries him along against the wind.[235]