62 SCANDINAVIA. 



A little to the north-west is the old royal castle of Jelling, where are to be seen the 

 tumuli raised about 960 to Gorm and Thyra by their son Harald " of the Blue 

 Tooth." 



Like Vejle, Horscns stands at the head of a fiord, whereas Aarhus, the 

 lar"-est town in Jylland, is built on the coast, and has a well-sheltered harbour. 

 It is the central station of the Jylland railway system, and the chief point of com- 

 munication with Copenhagen. Formerly the political centre was Vihorg, which 

 stands on the shores of a lake in the heart of the peninsula. It was the principal 

 residence of the old Danish kings, and its cathedral, recently rebuilt, is one of the 

 finest churches in Denmark. East of it lies Randers, communicating directly 

 with the sea by a winding fiord, though large vessels get no farther than the deep 

 anchorao-e of TJdbyhoi, near its mouth. Randers is a chief centre of the manufac- 

 ture of the so-called "Swedish gloves." 



Aaiborg, stretching along the south bank of the Lim -fiord, here crossed by a 

 fine railway bridge, has a brisk trade, though the bar gives access to small craft 

 only. Yet a large seaport and harbour of refuge are much needed at this place 

 between the two stormy channels of the Kattegat and Skager Rak. Here are 

 yearly wrecked some thirty or forty of the forty or fifty thousand vessels passing 

 through the straits, and in November, 1876, thirty-nine foundered at Vejle. The 

 port of Frcderikshai-)i, south of the Skaw, is quite inadequate as a harbour of 

 refuge, and the idea has been entertained of enlarging it by enclosing the 

 neighbouring islets of Hirtsholmene. The town of Skar/eii, at the Skaw, is 

 the most important Danish fishing station. Here vast quantities of whiting, 

 cod, turbot, soles, and other fish are taken and shipped for Copenhagen and other 

 places. 



On the island of Fyen stands Odoisc, the " Town of Odin," one of the oldest 

 places in Denmark. The cathedral contains some royal tombs, and it is the 

 birthplace of the delightful writer of children's tales, Andersen. Although at 

 some distance from the sea, it is the centra of a considerable trade, promoted by 

 the line of railway crossing the island and placing it in direct communication with 

 Mkldelfart and Strih, on the Little Belt, and the fortified port of Nijhorg, on the 

 Great Belt. On the south coast of Fyen, and facing the islet of Taasinge, is 

 Svendborg, an important commercial centre for the neighbouring islands of Taasinge, 

 ^ro, and Langeland, and surrounded by some of the loveliest scenery in Den- 

 mark. The brothers Oersted were natives of Langeland, and the great philologist 

 Rask was the son of a Fyen peasant. 



Copenhagen. — Copenhagen (Kjobenhavn), capital of Sjalland, contains of itself 

 alone about one-eighth of the entire population of the kingdom, and more than that 

 of all the other Danish towns together. It is, moreover, something more than 

 the capital of a decayed state, still maintaining a special position as a European 

 city, the common property of all the northern nations. 



Its geographical position, like that of Constantinople, presents a double advan- 

 tage as the intersecting point of two great highways, the Avater route from sea to 



