84 RURAL DENMARK 



Another still more remarkable church is the 

 cathedral of Roskilde, which is of much the same 

 period, although it has been more altered. Here lie 

 kings without number, all, or nearly all, in coffins above 

 ground, the vaults below being full of minor royalties. 

 Indeed the whole church is so crowded with the re- 

 mains of departed majesty that I understand it has 

 become a question where more of them are to find 

 place. 



It is a strange sight to see these sarcophagi, some 

 of them hundreds of years old, standing upon the floors 

 of the various chapels, and often still decorated with 

 gold and silver wreaths and insignia. I presume that 

 the velvet covering some of these coffins must have 

 been renewed, for it seems wonderfully fresh. 



The spectacle of the poor, earthly relics of all 

 this departed grandeur is in its way impressive, and 

 one that suggests the common reflections with more 

 than common force. Were I a king, however, I think 

 that I should prefer to be laid deep underground, lest 

 in the end my fate might be that of the heart of 

 Louis XIV., or of the mighty Pharaohs of Egypt. 



What would le Roi Soleil have said could he have 

 known the fate of that proud heart of his ? What 

 would have been the thought of Rameses had any 

 of his magicians foretold to him that a day would 

 come when his royal shape and it is royal still 

 would be exposed half-naked in the glass case of 

 a museum, to be the wonder, and sometimes the 

 mock, of tourists ? Yes, certainly I should prefer to 

 be buried deep or burned to ashes and scattered on 

 the earth, since at last, although that fate be delayed 

 for thousands of years, will come the antiquarian, or 

 the savage mob, or the drunken soldiery of the foe 



