Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 7.djvu/96



The decimal system of coinage is in use in Denmark, the unit being the öre, 7½ of which are equivalent to an English penny; 100 öre make 1 krone, equal to about 1s. 1¼d. sterling.

Government.—In early times the government of Denmark was far from despotic; the succession to the Crown was even elective until the revolution of 1660. It then became entirely without constitutional check upon the will of the king. This singular change is to be explained by supposing, on the part of the nation, not so much an indifference to free institutions as a resentment of the overbearing conduct of the nobility, and a consciousness of the perpetual uncertainties of an elective Government. The court found it thus a matter of little difficulty to unite the clergy and commons against the aristocracy; and the power of the Crown has since continued without a parliament or any constitutional check. But when Frederick VII. came to the throne he promised to resign the nearly absolute power which had hitherto been connected with the Crown. Accordingly a charter was drawn up by an assembly elected for that purpose in 1849, and signed by the king in 1850, which acknowledged the principle of limited monarchy, the king sharing his power with a diet of two houses, both of which are elective. The first, called Folksthing, has the privilege of discussing the budget and other public questions; while the other is confined to the local affairs of the provinces. The liberty of religion and of the press, and the inviolability of person and property, were amply guaranteed by the new constitution. This great charter received a further revision on the 28th of July 1866, according to which the second chamber, called the Landsthing, consists of 66 members, 12 of whom are nominated for life by the king, and the others elected for 8 years—7 by the city of Copenhagen, 45 by the electoral districts of the towns and country, 1 by Bornholm, and 1 by the Faroe Islands. The Folksthing is composed of one representative for every 16,000 inhabitants, elected for three years. In 1875 it contained 102 members. The privy council consists of the king, the crown prince, and the ministers.

The financial state of the kingdom will best appear from the following net estimates contained in the budget for 1876-77, given in kroner (1s. 1¼d. sterling):

The national debt amounted in 1875 to 100,805,939 kr. (£5,600,330).

Army and Navy.—The army is regulated according to the principles fixed by the law of the 6th of July 1867. Conscription is practised. The service begins at the age of twenty-two years, and continues eight years for the line and the reserve (first grade); the second grade goes on to the age of thirty-eight years. The following table shows the condition of the Danish army according to the latest statistics:—

The staff of the army was composed, at the same time, of 25 commissioned and 37 non-commissioned officers. The navy of Denmark comprised, at the commencement of September 1875, 6 iron-clads, 12 unarmoured vessels, 7 gun-boats, and 5 paddle steamers,—the whole carrying a total of 286 guns. The navy is recruited by conscription from the coast population. It was manned in September 1875 by 911 men, and officered by 1 admiral, 15 commanders, and 81 captains and lieutenants. In March 1875 the mercantile fleet of Denmark comprised 2846 vessels, of an aggregate burden of 212,600 tons.

The fortifications of Copenhagen have within the last few years been entirely razed, but the city is still protected by some forts in the Sound. The castle of Kronborg, near Helsingör, interesting to Englishmen as the scene of Hamlet, is in good preservation, and well-manned. The port of Frederikshavn, in the extreme north of Jutland, is also strongly fortified.

Religion and Education.—The established religion of Denmark is the Lutheran, which was introduced as early as 1536, the church revenue being at that time seized and retained by the Crown. In no country of Europe was the Reformation introduced in a more bloodless and easy way than in Denmark. During the earliest Christian times the whole of Denmark was under the jurisdiction of the archbishop of Hamburg. King Erik Eiegod, after a personal visit to the Pope, contrived to place his kingdom under a Scandinavian prelate and his own subject, the archbishop of Lund in Skaania, which then belonged to the Danish dominions. After the cession of Skaania to Sweden, Roeskilde became the metropolitan see. At present (1877) there are six bishops, besides the metropolitan, viz., the bishops of Funen, of Lolland and Falster, of Aarhuus, of