souls;

And for every man and woman in Rugen's island
found
Walking in air and sunshine, a Troll was
underground.

It chanced the little maiden, one morning, strolled
away
Among the haunted Nine Hills, where the elves
and goblins play.

That day, in barley-fields below, the harvesters had
known
Of evil voices in the air, and heard the small horns
blown.

She came not back; the search for her in field and
wood was vain
They cried her east, they cried her west, but she
came not again.

"She's down among the Brown Dwarfs," said the
dream-wives wise and old,
And prayers were made, and masses said, and
Rambin's church bell tolled.

Five years her father mourned her; and then John
Deitrich said
"I will find my little playmate, be she alive or
dead."

He watched among the Nine Hills, he heard the
Brown Dwarfs sing,
And saw them dance by moonlight merrily in a
ring.

And when their gay-robed leader tossed up his cap
of red,
Young Deitrich caught it as it fell, and thrust it
on his head.

The Troll came crouching at his feet and wept for
lack of it.
"Oh, give me back my magic cap, for your great
head unfit!"

"Nay," Deitrich said; "the Dwarf who throws his
charmed cap away,
Must serve its finder at his will, and for his folly
pay.

"You stole my pretty Lisbeth, and hid her in the
earth;
And you shall ope the door of glass and let me
lead her forth."

"She will not come; she's one of us; she's
mine!" the Brown Dwarf said;
The day is set, the cake is baked, to-morrow we
shall wed."

"The fell fiend fetch thee!" Deitrich cried, "and
keep thy foul tongue still.
Quick! open, to thy evil world, the glass door of
the hill!"

The Dwarf obeyed; and youth and Troll down, the
long stair-way passed,
And saw in dim and sunless light a country strange
and vast.

Weird, rich, and wonderful, he saw the elfin
under-land,--
Its palaces of precious stones, its streets of golden
sand.

He came unto a banquet-hall with tables richly
spread,
Where a young maiden served to him the red wine
and the bread.

How fair she seemed among the Trolls so ugly and
so wild!
Yet pale and v