scruple as to the sufferings of their people in furnishing the requisite funds. A Danish king, in the last century, told his young queen, in a fit of gallantry, that if she should kill a deer in the chase, he would build a palace on the spot. Such, I am told, was the actual origin of one of the numerous palaces which now adorn the country. To find ourselves now in this gray, old-fashioned château, and be told that the king lived in it, seeing as we did no trace of any state or pageantry whatever, and scarcely any mark of the place being inhabited at all, raised some curious speculations in our minds as to the change of the relations of monarch and subject since the days of Christian IV.

The grand sight of Fredericksborg is the royal chapel, forming the lower floor of one side of the square. It is a superb specimen of that mixture of Grecian and Gothic which prevailed at the end of the sixteenth century; no grandeur of plan, but infinite ornament of detail, gilt reliefs (especially on the ceiling), carvings, and fine inlaid woodwork. The pulpit has pillars of silver, and the altar-piece glows with golden images and sculptures. 'The Swedes,' says Feldborg, 'took away twelve apostles in silver, leaving the figure of Christ, which was formed of the same metal, to preach the Gospel at home, as they wickedly expressed themselves, but declaring that his apostles should do so abroad.' The screened recess for the royal family still contains a range of chairs with wrought seats, which must be coeval with the chapel, as they contain Christian's initials. There is even still the same charity-box at the door, into which this grand old prince must have popped his donations as he passed to worship; for it, too, bears his initials. The coronations of the Danish kings take place here, and this has led to an unfortunate modernisation being effected at one end of the chapel for the accommodation of the throne, with seats for the knights of the Order of the Elephant. In every other particular it is preserved exactly as it was in the days of the founder. I may remark that the shields of the living Elephantine knights adorn the gallery. When they die, these symbols of their glory are removed to a clean, well-kept crypt beneath one of the angles of the palace, where the whole series for the last two centuries may be seen. This is at once a curious historical study and a touching lecture on the transitoriness of all human grandeur.

Over the chapel, and therefore occupying the same area, is the Banqueting-Hall, certainly a most magnificent apartment, being no less than 150 feet long, and of proportionate breadth, though generally thought to be a little deficient in height. This large room is beautifully paved with diced marble, and is covered all over with gilt and painted ornaments, particularly in the ceiling, while each space of wall between two windows contains a portrait of some monarch which had been presented to the Danish sovereigns. The ceiling alone, which is said to have been the work of twenty-six carvers for seven years, might detain a curious visitor for a day, since there is scarcely a familiar animal, or a trade, or art, which is not represented in it. In one compartment you may study the business of Distillatio; in another that of Impressio Librorum, and so forth. One sees in this and similar places many valuable memorials of the things of a former age, which he cannot but regret to leave after only a hasty and superficial inspection. I am convinced that a painstaking and leisurely person, who could take accurate drawings of such objects, would, in the course of a few years' rambles over Europe, acquire the means of producing almost a complete resuscitation of our mediæval ancestors in their dresses, habits, and all other external circumstances.

When we had satisfied our curiosity with the Fredericksborg palace, we returned to the inn, and speedily resumed our char-a-banc, but with fresh horses. I observed with some surprise that the driver, in passing out of the town, deemed himself at liberty to take a short cut through the half-ruinous gateways and rain-bleached courts of the palace, notwithstanding the presence of royalty within the mansion. We found some fine woods extending from the palace in this direction, and peopled with deer. A short drive brought us to another palace, called Fredensberg, more modern than the last, and with some pretensions to notice. But we were too much satiated with such sights to care for an inspection of Fredensberg, and we therefore passed on to Elsinore, where we arrived betimes in the evening.

An Englishman usually approaches this town with his mind full of Shakspeare and Hamlet, and an eager expectation to see places hallowed by association with the name of him of the inky cloak: supply naturally follows demand, and hence it is not surprising to find that a place called 'Hamlet's Garden' has been 'got up' in the neighbourhood, and established as the scene of the murder of the royal Dane. Not being disposed to have much faith in the reality of a northern prince of the fourth century before the Christian era, I entered Elsinore with comparatively sober feelings. It is a very ordinary-looking mercantile town of 8000 inhabitants (yet the fourth in Denmark), situated on a low plain beside that Sound which has originally given it consequence. Not much less than a hundred vessels of all flags lay in the calm sea in front, waiting for wind, or till they should pay their dues to the king of Denmark. It is admitted that L.150,000 per annum are thus extorted under favour of the cannon of Cronberg Castle, which raises its huge form near by, like the beggar in 'Gil Blas,' whom the reader may remember described as having his gun presented on a pair of cross-sticks to enforce a demand neither less nor more justifiable. It is certainly surprising that a system so little different from the predatory practices of the Rhenish barons of the fourteenth century should still be found in vigour. I am afraid that my only true English associations with the place referred to things at which the Shakspearian enthusiast will scoff—to wit, James VI. dating during his honeymoon from Cronberg, 'quhair we are drinking and driving ower in the auld maner,' and his descendant, Queen Matilda, here sighing over the lost peace which was never more to be hers.[1] The mind is sometimes strangely perverse and wayward, and I often find myself interested in things for reasons sufficiently trivial. For instance, while passing through the fosses and walls which surround this hardy fortress, and while my companions were probably lost in admiration of its stately proportions, I could not help recalling a passage in Spottiswoode the historian, where, speaking of James's winter in this castle, he mentions with complacency there being no such thing as a quarrel between the Scotch and the Danes all the time, a circumstance the more wonderful, says he, 'since it is hard for men in drink, at which they were continually kept, long to agree.' After all, Cronberg is only a great quadrangular palace in the centre of a set of ordinary fortifications. The casemates in the walls are usually, however, a subject of curiosity, in consequence of a legend thus related by a native writer:—'For many ages the din of arms was now and then heard in the vaults beneath the Castle of Cronberg. None knew the cause, and there was not in all the land a man bold enough to descend into the vaults. At last a slave who had forfeited his life was told that his crime should be forgiven if he could bring intelligence of what he found in the vaults. He went down, and came to a large iron door, which opened of itself when he knocked. He found himself in a deep vault. In the centre of the ceiling hung a lamp which was nearly burnt out; and below stood a huge stone-table, round which some