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Thus the shrewd old shepherd, Vifil, naturally takes the place of the royal huntsman, Ivor; and Saxo, quite naturally, gives the story a marked Danish geographical and historical setting, which he does by introducing such names as Fyen and Seeland, and by connecting the Danish royal family in the beginning of the story with those of Sweden and Gautland.
It took us three days to go from Korsör to Copenhagen; now the journey is made in three hours. The pearls have not become more valuable that they could not be but they are strung together in a new and wonderful manner. I remained three weeks with my parents in Copenhagen, and Emil was with us there for a fortnight. When we returned to Fyen, he accompanied us as far as Korsör.
With a few transports he secretly conveyed an army across the Cattegat to the northern coast of Jutland, marched rapidly down those inhospitable shores until he came to the narrow strait, called the Little Belt, which separates Jutland from the large island of Fyen.
That autumn a second Swedish army under the veteran Stenbock was massacred in the island of Fyen, and Karl Gustav exclaimed when the beaten general brought him the news, "Since the devil took the sheep he might have taken the buck too." He never got over it. Three months later he lay dead, and the siege of Copenhagen was raised in May, 1660. It had lasted twenty months.
The old town, therefore, may have been called Al-haethum, or Haethum; so, that if Ohthere set out from Stockholm for this place, Gotland was on his right hand , and so was Zealand. And as he sailed between Zealand and Funen, or Fyen, all the Danish islands were on his left hand, and he had the wide sea, that is, the Schager-rack, and Cattegat to the right.
Thus thoroughly disabled, the strong king and his youthful son were carried through the midst of their own people to the strand and laid helplessly in the bottom of the waiting boat, which was rowed away with muffled oars, gliding across the narrow sound to the shore of Fyen.
With bold resolution King Charles determined to cross to the island of Fyen. The enterprise was full of risk. The ice swayed perilously beneath the marching hosts. At places it broke. But the island shore was safely reached, the troops guarding it were beaten, and soon the whole island was in Charles's possession. But a more daring and perilous enterprise confronted the king.
Yet new misfortunes gathered round him, the peninsula of Fyen being taken by the allies of Denmark, while the Swedish troops near Nyberg were attacked and taken prisoners, their commander alone escaping in a small boat.
This is certainly true during the latter part of his voyage, after turning round the south end of Sweden, and standing again to the northward, between Zealand and Fyen; but in coasting down the shore of Sweden to the south, he must have left Gotland to the left, E. Voyage of Wulfstan in the Baltic as related to Alfred .
The brooks do not rush down in foaming cataracts, through deep and dark clefts, but glide, still and clear, among sedge and underwood. When, from the delightful Fyen, we pass over to Jutland, we seem, at first, only to have crossed a river, and can hardly be convinced that we are on the continent, so closely resembling and near akin with the islands is the aspect of the peninsula.
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