Page:A Picture-book without Pictures and Other Stories (1848).djvu/34

 are the baths, is built like a Dutch town, with houses one story high, sloping roofs, and gables turned to the street. The number of strangers there, and the presence of the Court, gave a peculiar animation to it. The Danish flag was seen waving, and music was heard on all hands. I was soon established in my quarters, and was invited every day to dine with their majesties as well as to pass the evening in their circle. On several evenings I read aloud my little stories to them, and nothing could be more gracious and kind than they were. It is so well when a noble human nature will reveal itself, where otherwise only the king’s crown and the purple mantle might be discovered.

“I sailed in the train of their majesties, to the largest of the Halligs, those grassy runes in the ocean, which bear testimony to a sunken country. The violence of the sea has changed the mainland into islands, has again riven these, and buried men and villages. Year after year are new portions rent away and in half a century’s time there will be nothing left but sea. The Halligs are now low islets, covered with a dark turf, on which a few