Frederick VII is buried in an oak coffin ornamented with bronze. The surface is covered with allegorical figures. One of these—that on the right hand—represents the king’s motto: “The people’s love is my strength,” and that on the left, Denmark mourning his death. Upon the lid of the coffin I noticed two silver wreaths and a gold one—the last presented by Danish women. And well might the people of Denmark cherish this Frederick’s memory, for it was during his reign that the land was given a constitutional government; and well might they mourn his death, for his death without an heir led to bitter war and to the loss of the duchies of Schleswig-Holstein to Germany.
In striking contrast to the elaborate tombs of their predecessors are the plain oak coffins of the late Christian IX and his queen, Louisa. Beside Christian’s coffin is a silver wreath sent by the Danes of America. The king was their king during childhood and youth, until they adopted a new land; so the Danes of America had a friendly place in their hearts for him.
Most of the earlier Danish rulers—those of the twelfth, thirteenth and fourteenth centuries—are buried in the old convent church of Ringsted. And in the convent church of Sorö, which is near at hand, sleeps the great warrior bishop Absalon, founder of Copenhagen.
My next destination after leaving Roskilde was Odense, which is a corruption of Odins Ö, the Danish for Odin’s Island. In the heathen days the place was a favorite with the Father God, it seems. But the present-day Odense is a thriving town of about forty thousand, the third town in size in Denmark. It is the metropolis of the large island of Fyen, or Fünen, which is separated by the Little Belt from the peninsula of Jutland on the west, and by the Great Belt, from the island of Seeland on the east. Odense is a very lovable old place, possessing the air of dignity and wisdom frequently associated with ancient things; and this in spite of the fact that it contains many up-to-date manufacturing establishments.
St. Knud’s, the most important church in the town, is a red brick Gothic structure, with low, broad-spreading wings and a copper-roofed, blunt-pointed single spire, which as regards shape reminds me somewhat of Roskilde. Inside are the usual paintings, memorial tablets, and tombs; and below in the shadowy crypt, which possesses arches suggestive of those in the crypt beneath Lund Cathedral, are more tombs. Some of these tombs date back to the sixteenth century, and several have crude, interesting inscriptions. On the wall of the vestibule, for instance, I noticed a tablet dated 1670, bearing some verses beginning:
“Her under denne Steen
Sig hviler deris Been.”
which is, being translated,
“Here under these stones
There rest the bones,”
and then followed an account of the earthly tribulations of Rasmus Andersen. Rasmus Andersen lived in dark, weary days when fratricidal wars tore Denmark and Sweden.
In a quiet square, where the Odense children love to play, is a bronze figure of Hans Christian Andersen. It is a good statue; the limp, ungainly figure is faithfully reproduced. Upon the face is the sweet expression peculiar to the child-hearted man who never became sufficiently grown up to lose the children’s point of view.