8 THROUGH GLADE AND MEAD. 
walls of the Troll-garden, and wonder what is inside. 
One can conceive easily for oneself what from that 
moment would begin to happen. Some of the more 
adventurous clamber in; some, too, the Trolls steal 
and carry off to their palace. Most never return, but 
here and there one escapes out again and tells how 
the Trolls killed all his comrades; but tells, too, of the 
wonders he has seen inside, of shoes of swiftness and 
swords of sharpness and caps of darkness; of charmed 
harps, charmed jewels and, above all of the charmed 
wine; and after all, the Trolls were very kind to him— 
see what fine clothes they have given him—and he 
struts about awhile among his companions; and then 
returns, and not alone. The Trolls have bewitched him, 
as they will bewitch more. So the fame of the Troll- 
garden spreads; and more and more steal in, boys and 
maidens, and tempt their comrades over the wall, and 
tell of the jewels and the dresses and the wine, the joy- 
ous maddening wine, which equals men with gods; and 
forget to tell how the Trolls have bought them, soul as 
well as body, and taught them to be vain and lustful 
and slavish, and tempted them, too often, to sins which 
have no name.” 
The forest-dwellers conquered in the end, but they 
staggered for a long time under the burdens of their 
victory. . 
