"Is there anything to relate about Nyborg, Herr Pastor?" asked Hardy.
"There is not much specially," replied the Pastor. "There is the story of the monkey taking Christian II. out of his cradle when there was a royal residence at Nyborg, and jumping out of the window with him, and taking him upon the roof, so that it was with difficulty that they got him down again. There is also the story of the ghost of Queen Helvig, who was married to Valdemar Atterdag. She is said to have appeared for years to the sentry on the ramparts, and to have always left a dollar under a stone, which he collected; but one day, he was sick, and told a comrade to fetch the dollar, but no dollars were placed under the stone after. Queen Helvig was imprisoned there for a long time, under a charge frequently preferred in those days."
"Had you not particular days called Mærkedage, to which particular importance was attached?" asked Hardy.
"They were principally the greater festivals of the Church, or on New Year's Day," replied the Pastor. "Thus, for instance, if the sun shone out so long on New Year's Day that a horse could be saddled, it was a sign of a fruitful year; also, if a girl or a young man wished to know whom she or he would marry, they write the names of suspected persons on different pieces of paper, and put them under their pillows on New Year's Eve, and the one thus dreamt of is the one selected; also, if a turf is cut from the churchyard New Year's Eve, the person who puts it on his or her head can see who will die in the year, as their ghosts will appear in the churchyard. There is also another means to the same end, and that is when people sit at a table New Year's Eve; those that will die in the year cast a shadow, but without a head. Tyge Brahe has particularized many days in the year as being unlucky, on which to attend to any business or to do anything important, but they are so numerous that they are not regarded."
"Herr Pastor," said Mrs. Hardy, "you are tired with your walk about Nyborg, and your speaking so much in English; I wish to suggest a subject that will give you something to think of."
"What may that be?" asked the Pastor.
"I have thought," said Mrs. Hardy, "that you might like to see us at home in England before the winter. John will leave at the end of August, and you might go with him. What I feel is, that I should like during the winter you should feel that your daughter is well cared for."
"I will go," said the Pastor; and he held out his hand to Mrs. Hardy in his Danish manner, and the matter was at an end. Mrs. Hardy's kindly tact always overcame him.
The visit to Svendborg entailed so much to see and explore, that it was not until late in the evening that the yacht was reached. The Pastor was, however, fresher than the evening before, possibly because they had not walked so much, but had driven.
"What we have seen at Svendborg, Herr Pastor, is very pretty," said Mrs. Hardy, "but it differs from an English landscape; and it is only by seeing both that you can realize the contrast."