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feed their horses with large slices of barley bread. We passed some neat farm-houses, having the barn with two large folding doors in the centre, the offices belonging to the farm on one side, and the farm-house on the other; the whole upon a ground floor, and under one roof.

As we approached Flensborg, the country became more agree able, and we observed the wonderful activity with which nature was every where exerting herself, in a climate which so much confines her to time: it was then the 30th of May; and the ground had been covered with snow only three weeks before, and some bitter winds very sensibly informed us that winter had not ás yet retreated very far.

At a very clean inn, where we dined, we found some excellent red dried beef, sweet butter, good bread, baked like English tops and bottoms, and miserable vin du pays. In our dining-room the best china and glass tumblers made a gala show upon the tester of the bed, which gave a double capacity to the room. I was highly pleased to observe, that whilst the postillion took very good care of himself, he did not neglect his horses.

At eight in the evening we reached Flensborg, having accomplished twenty-five English miles in nine hours; a tedious time, sufficient to make any traveller peevish who had been accustomed to the velocity of an English mail. It was solely owing to the great depth of the roads; for upon better ground, our horses were not hollow pampered jades of Asia, which cannot go but thirty miles a day."

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As soon as we had entered the inn, our driver presented us with a small printed paper, that directed the traveller to state his opinion of the conduct of the former, which is afterwards submitted to the postmaster; and, by an ordinance of government, if any cause of complaint arises, the postillion is punishable.

Upon a traveller's reaching the end of a Danish post, it will be lucky for him if he does not find his patience put to a trial, by having to wait in general an hour for horses to forward him, which, at the time of his arrival, are nibbling the blade in some distant field. Our inn was the post-house, which every where affords the best accommodations.

Flensborg is a large commercial town, very neat and pleasantly situated. It is well supplied with excellent water from foun

tains, which are placed at certain intervals in the centre of the principal street: the houses are like those at Husum, with the addition of strong braces of iron. The view from the quay, the river, and the opposite village, is very beautiful; the language thus far is German, and the religion of the country throughout is Lutheran. The English chariot was still the object of admiration; smiths thronged the yard to examine the springs, and wag gon-builders to contemplate the wheels and body. The patent boxes of the former excited uncommon astonishment. At the corner of the yard, the last beams of the setting sun threw an agreeable tint upon a variety of interesting faces, all waiting for intelligence the friend, the lover, and the merchant; for the postman had just arrived, the

-Messenger of grief

Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some;
To him indiff'rent whether grief or joy.
Houses in ashes, or the fall of stocks,
Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles wet

With tears, that trickled down the writer's cheeks,

Fast as the periods from his fluent quill,

Or charg'd with am'rous sighs of absent swains,

Or nymphs responsive, equally affect

His horse and him, unconscious of them all.

When I had retired to my chamber, the constant dashing of the fountain in the court-yard, the frequent crowing of a little hoarse bantam cock, two cats making violent love, and a party of foraging fleas, united their powers most successfully to keep tired nature's sweet restorer" from my lids the greater part of the night. In the morning, at five o'clock, we entered the great road to Copenhagen, from the city of Slesvig, and proceeded along the shores of the Baltic, through a sandy and dreary coun, try; our progress was now encreased to five English miles an hour. We found the population very thin, the land but little cultivated, and the solitary cottage, which appeared to cover more misery than industry, had rarely a little garden by the side of it. The only vegetables which we met with were small stinted asparagus and parsnips, both of which the good people here boil in their soup. The few houses which we saw on the road side were, however, neatly built, with a light brown brick, and thatched.

The steeple and the body of the church were every where divided from each other: whence their separation arose in Denmark can be no more accounted for, I should suppose, than their conjunc tion in England.

Upon strolling into one of the church-yards, I remarked that their monuments were principally composed of a frame of an ob long square, divided by cross pieces of wood painted black, and the spaces between filled with stones.

The country about Abenraac, a small fishing town, where we changed horses, was very pretty, and much resembled that beautiful slope of wood in Lord Borringdon's park at Saltram, which parts the high road to Plymouth. The country from Abenraac to Hardersleb is hilly, woody, fertile, and romantic. The cattle were every where tethered, or fastened by a cord, to a circle of pasture.

At Hadersleb, whilst dinner was preparing, we went to the bank, to exchange our Holstein and Slesvig money for the cur rency of Denmark Proper, previous to our embarking for the island of Funen. Here the exchange, which is governed by that of Hamburg, is always in favour of the traveller going to Copenhagen. For one hundred and thirty-five rix dollars Slesvig we procured one hundred and fifty-six current dollars and six skillings, which was at a premium of seventeen pounds per cent, in our favour. Upon our shewing the banker one of the new dollars from Bolton's mint, he appeared to be much gratified with its beauty, and begged that we would permit him to exchange it; a little favour which we gladly granted him.

On our return, we found a good dinner, in a long room, painted of a leaden blue colour, having the floor well sanded, three little windows decorated with festoons of muslin, an old-fashioned chandelier threatening peril to those who passed under it, and two ancient portraits of a king and queen of Denmark, who looked very smirkingly upon each other.

I must not omit to introduce the reader to the kitchen, in which, in Denmark as well as in Germany, the fire-place is raised about two feet and a half high from the floor, and very much resembles that of a blacksmith's forge; the meat is baked, or, as they call it, roasted, in a sort of cheese-toaster, and having undergone the previous operation of three parts boiling: such is a Danish inn.

The traveller in this country would do well to confine his supper solely to bread, butter, and eggs. The wine every where is very poor, and the beer detestable.

The peasantry appear to be clean and happy. It was pleasing to see, early in the morning, as we travelled, groups of young milkmaids, whose cheeks glowed with the bloom of health, balanc➡ ing their pails with great dexterity, and knitting and singing as they went.

"As we could save several tedious miles by crossing the Little Belt at its broadest part, we proceeded to Aversund instead of Snoghoi, where we found the country very undulating and beautiful, but the roads rather heavy. Nothing can be prettier than the situation of the post-house, with its gardens sloping to the water, to which a bright sun, distinctly marking out the little island of Arroe to the south, and the greater one of Funen in front, distant about eight English miles, added new charms. The boatmen, with uncommon dexterity, in about ten minutes hoisted, by means of tackles, our carriage entire and luggage into an open boat, and having a fair breeze, we crossed the Little Belt in about an hour and a half, and landed at Assens.

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- A stranger cannot but be surprised to see a kingdom so composed of islands. The province which we had just left, notwithstanding the desolate appearance of some parts of it from the main road, is, on account of the independent spirit of its peasantry, the most valuable of the crown of Denmark.

Rix

Dollars. Mark. Skills.

The passage for ourselves and carriage was 3
To assistants getting the latter into the boat

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At Assens we, for the first time, experienced the change of a large feather-bed, instead of a blanket and sheet. To an un travelled Englishman nothing can be more singular. In the morning, as the horses were putting to, a singular procession passed us. A young woman in gala, whose hair was stiffened almost to the consistency of stucco with powder and pomatum, on which was raised a high cap of lace, decorated with a profusion of artificial flowers, and with a large nosegay of spring and artificial flowers in her bosom, and a book in her hand, and turning in hey

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toes most abominably, passed in the most stately manner up the street, preceded by three girls in mob caps, decorated with little bits of silver and gold lace, and in red jackets, each with a book in her hand, and followed by two old women, holding books also. The fair heroine of this singular group moved to me as she pass ed. She was proceeding to the church, where her bridegroom was counting the lagging moments of her absence. The old and the young peeped out of the doors and windows as they passed. Heavens keep me from any thing like pomp or publicity on the marriage day!

In this island, as I have before intimated, the coin is provincial, thus:

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And one skilling of Holstein and Slesvig is equal to two of the. currency of Denmark Proper.

The post regulation as under:

1 horse per Danish mile

For fetching horses per pair
To the ostler

2 marks Danish currency.
6 skillings Danish.

4 ditto.

At Odensee, which is a large respectable town, an episcopal see, the richest in Denmark next to that of Copenhagen, and the capital of the island, we dined; there was nothing singular in our repast, but that the first dish was manna soup.

There is a public school here, where a small number of boys' are educated and maintained gratuitously, and a gymnasium for students of sixteen years of age. The cathedral is an ancient pile of brick, and is remarkable for nothing more than containing the tombs of John and the sanguinary Christian II, who seized upon the crown of Sweden by the right of conquest, and, in a cold-blooded massacre, put six hundred of the flower of her nobility to the sword. That scene of slaughter is exquisitely displayed in the beautiful tragedy of Gustavus Vasa, published, in 1738, by Henry Brooke, esq. and with which I am sure my reader will be delighted.

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-Think upon Stockholm

When Cristiern seiz'd upon the hour of peace,
And drench'd the hospitable floor with blood;
Then fell the flow'r of Sweden, mighty names!

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