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 stairway 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 into a banquet-hall with tables richly spread,