d, as often happens, he brought a regular shrew into the house, so
that there was no end to the trouble and quarrelling.

The first wife had left a clever and intelligent girl named Elsie,[137]
who was now seven years old. The wicked stepmother made the poor child's
life more intolerable than hell; she banged and cuffed her from morning
to night, and gave her worse food than the dogs. As the woman was
mistress in the house, the father could not protect his daughter, and
even the smoke of the house was forced to dance to the woman's tune.
Elsie had now endured this miserable life for more than two years, and
had shed many tears, when she went out one Sunday with the other village
children to pluck berries. They strolled about as children do, till they
came accidentally to the borders of the Wood of Tontla, where the grass
was quite red with the finest strawberries. The children ate the sweet
berries, and gathered as many as they could into their baskets, when all
at once one of the older boys recognised the dreaded spot and cried out,
"Fly, fly, for we are in the Wood of Tontla!" The wood was more dreaded
than thunder and lightning, and the children rushed off as if all the
monsters of the wood were close upon their heels. But Elsie, who had
gone rather farther than the others, and had found some very fine
strawberries under the trees, went on plucking them, although she heard
the boy shout. She only thought, "The dwellers in the Tontla Wood cannot
be worse than my stepmother at home."

Presently a little black dog with a silver bell hung round its neck ran
up to her barking. This brought a little girl dressed in fine silken
garments to the spot, who quieted the dog, and said to Elsie, "It is a
good thing that you did not run away like the other children. Stay with
me for company, and we will play very nice games together, and go to
pluck berries every day. My mother will not refuse her consent, if I ask
her. Come, and we will go to her at once." Then the beautiful strange
child seized Elsie by the hand, and led her deeper into the wood. The
little black dog barked for pleasure now, and jumped upon Elsie and
licked her hand as if she were an old acquaintance.

O what wonders and magnificence made Elsie open her eyes! She thought
herself in heaven. A beautiful garden lay before her, filled with trees
and bushes laden with fruit; birds were sitting on the branches, more
brightly coloured than the most brilliant butterflie