CHAPTER XXXVIII.DENMARK.
WE are coming down to Denmark. Down from Norway and along the coast of Sweden. First through the Skagerack and then the Cattegat, in the steamerExcellent Toll, by name, with twenty American passengers. Fleets of sailing vessels were in sight, the crews engaged in the mackerel fishery, a great business off this coast. The day was as lovely as the suns of Italy ever show, and the sunset revealed such splendors as I never saw except in Mantua, under Italian skies.
The sun went down as if into the western ocean, where poets often tell us he “quenches his beams.” A few clouds were lying along the horizon, in long rifts stretching a quarter of the way around the great circle of the heavens.They were burnished with golden splendors, and among the rifts the sky seemed painted with the hues of the rainbow. The passengers stood on the upper deck, andallwere in raptures of admiration gazing upon the magnificent scene. Long after the sun was gone the great picture hung on the northern sky, and we watched it till the many-colored painting gradually and finally faded into the sombre tints of evening. The moon then gave us silver for gold, and for some hours after sunset it looked as though the sun were rising!
We passed the night on this voyage, touching at Gottenberg at midnight, for an hour only. The next day (July 10) was equally brilliant with the first, and the run along down the coast was exciting and pleasant. About midday we entered the Sound and soon came to Elsinore, where we had no Sound duties to pay. From time immemorial—so long that the date of the origin of the custom is lost in the fogs of the region—the Danes have been accustomed to demand and receive toll from every vessel passing Elsinore. No end of trouble was the result of this. The Vienna treaty of 1815, after Napoleon’s downfall, confirmed the Danes in their enjoyment of this imposition. Some nations afterwards commuted with Denmark, and the whole thing was abolished in 1857.
In the time of Tycho Brahe, the famous astronomer, whose house we saw on one of the lakes in Sweden as we were going to Upsala, the Danes built a mighty castle here, calledKronborg, and mounted big guns, so as to sweep the Sound and make it very desirable for vessels to stop as they were going by and pay their toll. If they refused to do so they were spoken to by these guns. And sometimes it was a word and a blow. This castle is famous in the legends and history of Denmark, and within the last hundred years it has held distinguished and royal prisoners, who have exchanged dungeons for the scaffold. Down inthe subterranean casemates a thousand men may be stored away—soldiers to defend the castle, or prisoners to pine in captivity. In one of these secret hiding places, where neither light nor pity finds its way, a noted mythical giant of Danish story is said to reside. He never comes up to the surface of the earth, but when the State is in danger, and then he takes the head of the army and leads it on to victory. His grasp is so strong that his fingers leave their imprint on an iron crowbar when he holds it in his fist.
The views from the castle and from any of the elevations in Elsinore embrace the town, the fortifications, Helsingborg on the other side of the Sound, the Great Belt, the Baltic dotted with sails,—a grand panorama indeed.
Shakespeare was kind enough to make this vicinity classic and famous by his Hamlet, whose grave is said to be here, and travellers come to find it, as they look for Romeo and Juliet’s at Verona. In vain we are told that Hamlet did not live nor die in these parts; that Jutland and not Zealand, was his country. But they pay their money and they take their choice, and most of people choose to believe that Hamlet was buried hereabouts, and any heap of stones with Runic characters upon them would answer the purpose, but they cannot find even this. Drop the letter H and we have Amlet, and that signifiesmadman, and so you have the beginning of the story on which the tragedy was founded. And the story runs in this wise in the gossipy guide-books, so useful to travellers, and especially to those who have to write about their travels.
According to the Danish history of old Saxo Grammaticus, Hamlet was not the son of a Danish king, but of a famous pirate-chief, who was governor of Jutland in conjunction with his brother. Hamlet’s father married the daughter of the Danish king, and the issue of that marriagewas Hamlet. Hamlet’s father was subsequently murdered by his brother, who married the widow and succeeded to the government of the whole of Jutland. As a pagan, it was Hamlet’s first duty to avenge his father. The better to conceal his purpose, he feigned madness. His uncle, suspecting it to be feigned, sent him to England, with a request to the king that he would put Hamlet to death. He was accompanied by two creatures of his uncle, whose letter to the English king was carved upon wood, according to the custom of the period. This Hamlet during the voyage contrived to get possession of, and so altered the characters as to make it a request that his two companions should be slain, and which was accordingly done on their arrival in England. He afterwards married the daughter of the English king: but subsequently returning to Jutland, and still feigning madness, contrived to surprise and slay his uncle, after upbraiding him with his various crimes. Hamlet then became governor of Jutland, married a second time to a queen of Scotland, and was eventually killed in battle.
I wish we could stop at Frederiksborg, but we must come back to it from Copenhagen. For here is the royal castle of Denmark, built in 1600, and now the repository of works of art and objects of antiquarian interest connected with the reigning house. It was in this castle that the unfortunate queen of Christian VII. died at the early age of twenty-three, a broken-hearted victim of slander and conspiracy. In one of the private rooms in which this beautiful woman was a prisoner, she wrote with a diamond upon the window pane this touching and self-sacrificing prayer:—
“O keep me innocent, make others great.”
“O keep me innocent, make others great.”
“O keep me innocent, make others great.”
The woodland scenery around the castle is charming. The Royal Forest covers a vast extent laid out with lovelywalks and drives, and the whole island of Zealand ispreservedfor royal pleasures in forest and field.
A drive through this forest brings you to theCastle of Peace, so called because a treaty of peace was concluded in it with Sweden; and perhaps it keeps its name the more fittingly, as the palace is now cut up into apartments which are occupied by families, once rich, now poor, belonging to thearistocracy. They find it very convenient to live in a palace free of rent, and as the neighbors are all in the same condition with themselves, they are not mortified by the fact that they are dependents of the State. We would call such a place the royal poor-house. In England, the splendid palace at Hampton Court, which Cromwell built and gave to his king for fear he would take it without, is used for decayed families of the British aristocracy, who live genteelly in kings’ houses at very little expense.
Denmark is not one of thegreatcountries of the earth, but very far from beingleastamong the kingdoms. It has a history, and a future too, civilization, religion, science, art, and enterprise. It made a fine show at Paris in the World’s Industrial Exhibition, and has no reason to be ashamed of her agriculture, manufactures, andfish. I was surprised to notice in the fields so many of the productions common in the northern States of America. A kitchen garden looked homelike, with its pease and beans and cabbage and potatoes and turnips, and all the ordinary vegetables cultivated in the same way with our own; and the crops on the broader farms, wheat and rye and oats; so that the children, playing the games of the country and singing as they played, were doubtless familiar with the farmers’ song,—
“Oats, pease, beans, and barley grow.”
“Oats, pease, beans, and barley grow.”
“Oats, pease, beans, and barley grow.”
Let us study the history of Denmark for a moment. Time was when Denmark was the ruling power in Scandinavia,which name includes her and Norway and Sweden. Time was when Denmark conquered all England, and Sweyn I., the king of Denmark, was on the throne that the Georges and Victoria have since filled. Canute the Great was also king of Denmark and England, and a line of kings after him swayed the same double sceptre. This was when the Christian era was in the 1000’s, and perhaps Denmark has never had a more illustrious period of history than in the first part of the eleventh century. Then England and all the north, with part of Prussia, were under her crown.
She fell. And not by the superior prowess of any rival foreign prince, but through the treachery and violence of one of her own subjects. Those were turbulent times doubtless, and it is wonderful that the mighty monarch of such a kingdom could be seized, as Valdemar II. was (by one of his own subjects) while he and his son were hunting in the woods, carried on board a sloop and off to a foreign castle and immured in prison for three years. The proudest king in Europe was thus insulted and bearded and degraded, while Europe looked on without raising a hand to deliver him. At length the Pope threatened, and one word from him did what the kings of the earth could not. Valdemar was released and restored, but his prestige was destroyed and he never recovered from the effects of his fall. Provinces revolted and became independent. England set up for herself again. In 1387, Queen Margaret came to the throne of Denmark and Norway, and subdued Sweden. For a hundred years the three Scandinavian countries were under the same government. In 1448, the king of Denmark died, and for a whole century no male heir was left by any sovereign for the throne. Then the German dynasty came in, and the Duchy of Schleswig was united with Holstein, which was annexed to Denmark under Christian I.Therebegins that Schleswig-Holsteinquestion, which bothered Europe and has plunged the country into war even in our day. The very next king, Christian II., lost Sweden; and then Denmark became a little monarchy, all by itself, which you will find embracing a peninsula and several islands on the north-west coast of Europe.
England and Denmark have been good friends notwithstanding the unpleasant relations that once existed. Three or four times the royal families have intermarried, and the Prince of Wales of the present day depends far more on the popularity in England of his Danish wife, than on any merits of his own for his future success on the British throne. These pleasant relations were disturbed in the early part of the present century when the British destroyed the Danish fleet and commerce; and, since that time, Denmark has cultivated the arts of peace, making for herself a name better than the glory of arms or extent of territory.
Christianity fought with paganism in Denmark during the eighth and ninth centuries; and, after a terrible struggle, triumphed over Thor and Odin, whose superstitious power is still felt in the minds of the more ignorant of the people. Then the Romish religion reigned, until the Luther reformation came with healing in its beams, and Protestantism became the religion of Denmark. The Lutheran form of worship is established, but, under the constitution, toleration is enjoyed.
In no one department of public interest have I been more pleased to be disappointed, than in the general intelligence prevailing among the people of these northern countries of Europe. They are Protestants, and, therefore, knowledge is diffused; the people wishing it, and the government encouraging it. No Roman Catholic government favors free schools and the universal elevation of the people. The Danes have a school in every parish, and every child isobliged to go to school and learn to read and write. There are higher grades of schools in all the towns, and two universities,—one at Copenhagen and one at Kiel. Thus the means of education being brought within the reach of the humblest, the whole country is enlightened.
A Domestic Scene in Denmark.
A Domestic Scene in Denmark.
A Domestic Scene in Denmark.
The women are good-looking, and in this matter there are national peculiarities worth noticing. At a fair or public entertainment, where men and women of the working classes are brought together in great numbers, the women of Denmark will be pronounced above the average for good looks, and, perhaps, the same thing would not be said of the men.
Copenhagen is the capital of Denmark, and the capital of Copenhagen is Thorvaldsen’s Museum. Copenhagen has other and manyattractions, but this museum isthecrown and glory of Denmark. Art has her victories, and those of war are not so enduring in their glory as the fruits of genius and peace. Here in this ancient and beautiful city, in 1770,—a hundred years, save one, ago,—was born Albert Thorvaldsen, the son of an Iceland ship-carpenter. Poor, obscure, and friendless, but inspired with the genius of his future art, the boy made his own way to Rome. He found employment in the studio of Canova, and his talents soon commanded respect. But he lacked the aid of a patron and friend, and he was about to abandon Italy in despair, when an English banker, by the auspicious name ofHope, appreciated the artist, ordered a marble statue ofJason, which was standing in the clay, and from that glad hour his career was onward and brilliant, till he attained wealth and fame unsurpassed by any sculptor of ancient or modern times. He loved his native Scandinavian climes, and often visited the city of his birth, which he enriched with the noblest creations of his marvellous hand. But he dwelt in Rome, unmarried, save to his art; and when he returned, at the age of sixty-eight, to Copenhagen, he was received as a conqueror, was domiciled in the palace, and, six years afterwards, died in the midst of the lamentations of the people, who loved him and whom he loved.
Façade of the Thorvaldsen Museum, Copenhagen.
Façade of the Thorvaldsen Museum, Copenhagen.
Façade of the Thorvaldsen Museum, Copenhagen.
As he made the people the heir of his glorious works—in large part the models of the statuary he had executed forkings and nations and wealthy individuals—it was resolved to erect a monument to his name, which should be at once a museum of his creations and a mausoleum for his remains. In the midst of the city, and on an open square, a building—a vast parallelogram with a court-yard in the centre of it—has been reared; the successive stories filled with the productions of the genius of this one man, including the minutest specimens, up to the model of his “Christ,” the highest achievement of his, not to say of human, art. In the midst of the little court-yard, surrounded on its four sides by the walls of this museum, so that every window on the inner side looks down into the court, there lie in solemn and sublime repose the ashes and bones of the man who made all these things! It is silent; but oh! how eloquent the lesson of the greatness and the vanity of genius! It is something, it is a grand thing, to have made all these marbles for the joy and instruction of mankind; and it is sweet to die with the consciousness of leaving for after generations the works that shall teach them lessons of virtue and strength and beauty. But to die and leave themall! To lie and moulder in the midst of them! To be rotting while even the clay that one’s fingers moulded into life-like shapes is admired—this makes the cup of life an insipid draught, and the wise man cries it is vanity, all vanity, after all. Yet not so vain after all! No man liveth unto himself; and one would gladly take the pay that a good, great man gets, who adds to the material wealth of the world the glorious creations of art for all time to come, and then dies in the midst of them. It is more also to be useful than to be great; and he who lives to make others happy, though not an artist in stone or oil, lives to a noble purpose, and his mausoleum is in the hearts made glad by his kindness while he lived.
On the outside of this museum the walls are covered with fresco paintings illustrating the mechanical processes by which the statuary was brought to its place. This is the antique Grecian, and even Egyptian, idea of celebrating an historical event. It might be called Thorvaldsen’s triumph. Within the frieze of the grand hall is the triumph of Alexander the Great. The Hall of Christ contains the casts of the Saviour and all his disciples—that wondrous group which in marble illuminates the chief church in Copenhagen. And as we ascend from floor to floor, and pass through successive chambers—all of them filled with the handiwork of the same great artist who sleeps in sight of every window—one is filled with admiring awe, while charmed with the beauty of the design and execution. Beauty is not the word, though much here is very beautiful. Thorvaldsen was one of the first to appreciate and encourage our own sculptor Powers, whose works are morebeautifulthan the Dane’s. Strength, majesty, power—these are the attributes that cover as with a garment the face, the head, the limbs of the heroes whom Thorvaldsen by his magic chisel turned into stone. The divine is revealed in his conception of the Redeemer of men. Thegod-like is in Moses and Peter and John the Baptist; and his ancient heroes are inspired with a sentiment that is easily drawn from the mythology of Scandinavia, in which the worship of Thor and Odin seems to be incorporated ineffaceably.
Portrait of Thorvaldsen.(By Horace Vernet.)
Portrait of Thorvaldsen.(By Horace Vernet.)
Portrait of Thorvaldsen.(By Horace Vernet.)
Away in the farthest corner of the museum is a collection of gems and bronzes and vases and coins and antique sculpture, which his taste and money had gathered in Italy. Here is the furniture of his sitting-room as it was the day he died, and here is a cast ofLuther, which on that day of his death he had begun to work! Here are sketches he had made with pen and pencil, the dawn of his gigantic conceptions, afterwards made perfect in marble—now interesting as the outlines we have of the first thoughts of Raphael and Michael Angelo and others on their immortal works!
Never was an artist so honored by his countrymen; never was one’s fame more precious in the memory of hisfellow-men. And I may easily convey to you an impression of the reverence in which he is held by saying thatThorvaldsenis to-day in Denmark what in our country is the name ofWashington.
Vor Frue Kirke, theNotre Dame, the Church of our Lady, is the royal church—the Cathedral of Copenhagen.
I worshipped there yesterday; and of all the days in the year, and of all the churches in Europe, not one could have been selected more crowded with interest to a traveller whose tastes flow in the channels of religion and art.
For as I came to it there were standing on one side of the portal a statue of David, and on the other one of Moses, in bronze, both of them by the hand of Thorvaldsen, and sublime with the inspiration of his power. I stood a few moments before them, and thought of the royal poet and the inspired law-giver, and wondered at the art which could embody and express their spirit and mission with such silent eloquence. And then I entered the church itself, and it was all ablaze, not with five thousand candles, as I had seen at St. Peter’s at noonday, not with flaring gaslights, nor even the glorious sunlight alone, but with the greatest of modern statues, theChristin marble, standing over the altar, and the twelve apostles, six on one hand and six on the other, along the sides of the house (Paul being put in the place of Iscariot), and all by the hand of the same master. Thorvaldsen chose this sanctuary as the place to be made beautiful and glorious with his works,—his triumphs. TheSaviouris represented with extended arms, as if he were saying the sweetest of all his words, “Come unto me,” and on the face of his disciples rests the expression that sacred art might desire to present as characteristic of each one of the chosen group. In the middle of the chancel a marble angel, of loveliness unspeakable, is kneeling and holding in his hands a shell, which is the font for baptism. Copies of this are multiplied till the world is familiar with it. Near the door is a group representinga child walking with his face heavenward, and an angel follows, pointing with his finger over the child’s head. And on the other side of the door is a Mother’s Love in marble.
Those who worship here from day to day become familiar with all this sculpture, and are not distracted, if they are not aided by the beauty and the majesty of such a wealth of art. But a stranger within the gates, for a morning only, seeing it all at once for the first and the last time, would find it difficult to withdraw his soul from the marble and contemplate for an hour the unseen and eternal. And this would be more difficult when the worshipper is unable to understand a word of the service.
The church was full of people, going out and coming in, as in Romish churches. The officiating minister had on a white robe, ruffles, and red mantle, with a broad gilt cross on his back. He stood before the altar, on which was an image of the crucifixion, and two candles four feet high, and burning. After a brief service and sermon, he administered the sacrament of the Lord’s supper to a few who remained to receive it, kneeling; he gave them the bread, with a few words to each, and an assistant followed, putting the cup to the lips of the communicant. The formalities of the ceremony, the tones of the priest, the tergiversations, the responses of the choir, &c., were similar to the forms in use in the Church of Rome.
When this sacrament was concluded, I was about leaving the house, which was now nearly deserted, when I noticed something going on in the chancel. Twenty mothers, each with a babe in her arms, and a female attendant, entered and arranged themselves in a large circle around the kneeling marble angel holding the baptismal font. Twenty women, twenty babes, twenty female friends, not nurses, but god-mothers; not a man appeared. It was a beautiful spectacle; perhaps it would be impossible to invent a more lovely tableaux. The mothers, theinfants, the friends, all clothed in white, all before the altar in a circle, in the midst of which was this white angel kneeling, and above the whole the finest statue on earth of Jesus, with open arms, as when he said, “Sufferlittle children to come unto me.”
The priest read a form of baptism, and then, passing around the circle, made the sign of the cross on the face of each child; he then read again; again he went to each child, and laid his hand upon its head as if in blessing: then he read again. The service was now so protracted that the mothers were allowed to sit down, and then, one by one, each came up with the attendant, and, the cap being removed, the babe was held over the font, the priest took water and poured it three times from his hand upon the head of the child, pronouncing its name and that of the Triune God.
This being concluded, and as I was coming out of the church, a carriage arrived with an elegantly dressed lady and her attendant with a babe, to be baptized after the people of the humbler class had received the sacrament. Alas! I said to myself, is aristocracy in religion the same everywhere?—and cannot the noble of this world be humble before God? So I would not return to the baptism of this “better born” infant, but went on my way praying that all alike might be washed in the blood of Christ, and made children of the kingdom.
It will surprise you—it certainly did me—to find that the people of these northern countries of Europe give far more time to mere amusements than the Americans do. I was struck with this on coming to Sweden, and saw something of it, but not so much in Norway; and here in Copenhagen they are as much given to it as the Athenians were to news.
Perhaps the French and Italians are more disposed to make themselves merry in crowds. But on recalling the habits of the masses as they are seen in public places inParis and Florence, I think that I was never in any city in the world where so many people in proportion to the whole number go from home to be amused. On the outskirts of the city—but not so far away as to be difficult of access—there are large gardens, so called, laid off with walks and shrubbery and fountains, and in the midst are all sorts of spectacular games and plays, combining in one enclosure theatre, circus, gymnastics, music and dancing, concerts, orations, and whatever is usually found scattered in different parts of a city, and to be visited only after paying a fee for each admission. To enter this garden—for one is a type of many—you pay about ten cents, and that gives you theentréeto nearly all the shows. The theatre may charge another trifling fee, but the one admission makes all these amusements open to the visitor. Around every stage are little tables and chairs, and refreshments are served, if you choose to call for them, at an extra charge. To such places as this thousands upon thousands of respectable people resort night after night, usually comingbefore dark, for the days are long and nights short; men bring their wives and children, and take their evening meal together in little stalls provided for the purpose, and go home in good season. This is their refreshment after a day of toil, and it is not unlikely that it helps them to bear with patience the burdens of a working life.
These gardens are theinstitutionsof Copenhagen, for the entertainment of the people. They arecheap, so as to be within the reach of all; and they arecheap, as one of the proprietors told me, becauselow pricesbring more money than high. Doubtless there are other and more intellectual enjoyments provided for those who prefer them; but when you consider the enormous expense incurred to fit up and furnish every night such entertainments as these, you see it requires the attendance of many thousands, at the insignificant charge, to make them pay at all.
On certain days, the Royal Picture Galleries and Thorvaldsen’s Museum are thrown open to the people, and the throngs of working people, evidently in very humble life, as their dress and manner indicate, who pack the halls and rooms, show that the people have also a taste for something higher and better than plays. Something might be said of the effect of so much amusement upon the morals of the masses; but it is not safe for a transient visitor to speak with certainty of any thing but what he actually sees as he goes along. To me it is a pleasant, and only a pleasant reflection, that the people in these northern countries, who do not accomplish much beyond making a decent subsistence from year to year, find both time and money to spend in amusements that are not in themselves as demoralizing as the sensual and intoxicating pleasures which so many of our own poor pursue to their ruin.
You would have to go far and search long before you would find a more interesting museum than that ofNorthern Antiquities, which occupies part of the Christiansborg Palace. This northern country abounds in curious relics of past ages, defunct systems of religious worship, modes of warfare now wholly unknown; and by law all these remains, wherever found, belong to the crown. In every parish in Denmark the minister is made the agent of government, to have every thing discovered, and that promises to be of any interest, sent to the museum, where a fair price is paid for it to the finder.
There is scarcely an end to the number and variety of these curious objects, illustrating the manners and customs of the long-buried past. Weapons of war form the most conspicuous feature of such an exhibition, and stone is the material from which the most formidable are made; clubs and axes, arrow-heads of flint, chisels and knives most singularly and beautifully wrought; urns from ancient sepulchres, with bones of other animals than human, are here; and tradition tells us that the old Norse heroes were buriedwith their dogs and horses, to bear them company in the world of spirits. It is hard to say what part in the funeral ritesa sievecould perform, but it is often found in the ancient tombs.
The Runic monuments are the most remarkable objects in the collection; and the one that has excited the closest scrutiny came from Greenland, in latitude 73, and is said to bear a date 1135.
Among the fire-arms of the earliest years of their use, we have old cannons to be loaded at the breech, and guns on the revolving principle, though we have been in the habit of thinking that both of these are inventions of our own times.
Besides these collections, there is the Royal Arsenal, and the Museum of Natural History, and the Royal Museum, and many others, which are but the repetition and extension of these and like objects of interest,—interesting, indeed, to look at for a few hours, tiresome after a while; and I will not weary you with the details.
Setting off by rail from Copenhagen to Hamburg, I encountered a gentleman who claimed to be a countryman of mine, because he hailed from South America. He was German born, in England bred, and he went to Uruguay, S. A., where he had been twenty-four years in business. He was now travelling with his family in the North of Europe. He was a shipping-merchant, and vessels in which he was interested come from Hamburg and Havre and England with furniture, tin-ware, and a thousand manufactured articles, and carry away hides, tallow, and so forth. It was easy to see that he had an eye to business in the midst of his pleasure travel, and that he was learning what wants of the North of Europe could be supplied from the South of America. My conversation with him developed the beautiful relations of the different parts of the earth to each other: the climate, the soil, the position of one country supplementing another, and showing that no country“liveth unto itself” any more than a man lives to himself. There is a thorough mutual dependence running through society and the whole world.
Hamburg.
Hamburg.
Hamburg.
Our rail ride was across the island of Zealand—flat, poor, wet, cold soil; the peasants’ houses were low, of stone, and thatched. The windows were so few and small, they must be ill ventilated, and probably unwholesome. Mustard wasgrowing in large quantities, fields of rye were fair, and grass was looking well. Cattle abounded in the meadows,—not on the hills, for those were not in sight.
At ten o’clock at night, and while it was yet light, we reached the steamer at Corseow. It was a large, commodious, and well-furnished vessel, excepting that it had no state-rooms. The berths were good, but were all in one open cabin. The decks were crowded with live-stock,—pigs, calves, cows,—whose squeals, bleating, and moaning were to be our serenade till the morning light. A bountiful supper was served,—tea and coffee, meats, eggs, &c.,—and the charge for the whole was twenty-seven cents! And this being over, I spent the livelong night fighting, not wild beasts, nor the tame ones overhead, but those pestering fleas, which seem to be one of the pet annoyances of the travelling world.
We arrived at Kiel very early in the morning, and went ashore through mud and rain; and the only way to ride was on the outside of an omnibus, to the railroad station. This is a famous seaport, and like all other seaports, so that Kiel will not have a sketch. We make no stay, but by rail set off for Hamburg. Wheat and rye and buckwheat cover the fields. Little Indian corn is raised in these countries, where the soil and climate are as well suited to it as parts of our country where it flourishes. The gardens are filled with the same vegetables as our own,—potatoes, pease, beans, lettuce, radishes, beets, carrots, cauliflower, cabbage,—making it pleasant to know that the good things at home are just as abundant here. The flowers, too,—roses and lilies and lilacs, others wild, and cultivated,—make the wayside and the court-yards of the humble dwellings smile. All the fields of grass and grain are ridged, and a ditch is made about every twenty feet for a drain. Small tiles are used for underground draining. Few evidences appear of high cultivation; very little attention is paid to scientificpreparation of manures, which might greatly enhance the value of the land.
At Elmshorn,—a very pretty village where we stopped a few moments, and large numbers of people gathered about the train, as if they were quite at leisure,—old women brought baskets of strawberries and cherries to the cars for sale; as large and of as fine a flavor, and of such varieties as were quite familiar to the eye and taste.
The train moves slowly on, and the spires of Hamburg appear in the distance. We are now fairly out of Scandinavia. With hearts full of thanksgiving to Him who has safely led us through our journey, we turn away from the land of Odin and Thor, and in a few weeks are
Home Again.
Home Again.
Home Again.
Cambridge: Stereotyped and Printed by John Wilson and Son.
Cambridge: Stereotyped and Printed by John Wilson and Son.
Cambridge: Stereotyped and Printed by John Wilson and Son.
Transcriber’s Note
Transcriber’s Note
Transcriber’s Note
This book uses inconsistent spelling and hyphenation, which were retained in the ebook version. Some corrections have been made to the text, including adjusting spelling in the table of contents to match the main text and normalizing punctuation.
Further corrections are noted below:
p.62: in it the first mass was celebrated in 1805 -> in it the first mass was celebrated in 1085p.179: and the ablity of the organist -> and the ability of the organistp.230: to wear only on funeral occasious -> to wear only on funeral occasionsp.265: Order and quiet are my chracteristics -> Order and quiet are my characteristicsp.289: vast quantites of charcoal -> vast quantities of charcoalp.323: poured out their grateful ackowledgments -> poured out their grateful acknowledgmentsp.400: fifty rix dollars, or about twelve American -> fifty-six dollars, or about twelve Americanp.447: followed by eggs, carviar, beefsteaks -> followed by eggs, caviar, beefsteaksp.470: Copenhagen has other and many attactions -> Copenhagen has other and many attractionsp.476: Suffer little little children to come -> Suffer little children to come
p.62: in it the first mass was celebrated in 1805 -> in it the first mass was celebrated in 1085p.179: and the ablity of the organist -> and the ability of the organistp.230: to wear only on funeral occasious -> to wear only on funeral occasionsp.265: Order and quiet are my chracteristics -> Order and quiet are my characteristicsp.289: vast quantites of charcoal -> vast quantities of charcoalp.323: poured out their grateful ackowledgments -> poured out their grateful acknowledgmentsp.400: fifty rix dollars, or about twelve American -> fifty-six dollars, or about twelve Americanp.447: followed by eggs, carviar, beefsteaks -> followed by eggs, caviar, beefsteaksp.470: Copenhagen has other and many attactions -> Copenhagen has other and many attractionsp.476: Suffer little little children to come -> Suffer little children to come
p.62: in it the first mass was celebrated in 1805 -> in it the first mass was celebrated in 1085p.179: and the ablity of the organist -> and the ability of the organistp.230: to wear only on funeral occasious -> to wear only on funeral occasionsp.265: Order and quiet are my chracteristics -> Order and quiet are my characteristicsp.289: vast quantites of charcoal -> vast quantities of charcoalp.323: poured out their grateful ackowledgments -> poured out their grateful acknowledgmentsp.400: fifty rix dollars, or about twelve American -> fifty-six dollars, or about twelve Americanp.447: followed by eggs, carviar, beefsteaks -> followed by eggs, caviar, beefsteaksp.470: Copenhagen has other and many attactions -> Copenhagen has other and many attractionsp.476: Suffer little little children to come -> Suffer little children to come
p.62: in it the first mass was celebrated in 1805 -> in it the first mass was celebrated in 1085
p.179: and the ablity of the organist -> and the ability of the organist
p.230: to wear only on funeral occasious -> to wear only on funeral occasions
p.265: Order and quiet are my chracteristics -> Order and quiet are my characteristics
p.289: vast quantites of charcoal -> vast quantities of charcoal
p.323: poured out their grateful ackowledgments -> poured out their grateful acknowledgments
p.400: fifty rix dollars, or about twelve American -> fifty-six dollars, or about twelve American
p.447: followed by eggs, carviar, beefsteaks -> followed by eggs, caviar, beefsteaks
p.470: Copenhagen has other and many attactions -> Copenhagen has other and many attractions
p.476: Suffer little little children to come -> Suffer little children to come
The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.