e
as a servant," he wrote. "I want to give it, and my blood, to the
service of your Majesty, and I will serve you with all my might
while I live!"

The navy had need of that kind of recruits, and the King saw to it
that he was apprenticed at once. And that was the beginning of his
strangely romantic career.

Three years he sailed before the mast and learned seamanship, while
Charles was baiting the Muscovite and the North was resting on its
arms. Then came Pultava and the Swedish King's crushing defeat. The
storm-centre was transferred to the North again, and the war on the
sea opened with a splendid deed, fit to appeal to any ardent young
heart. At the battle in the Bay of Kjoege, the _Dannebrog_, commanded
by Ivar Hvitfeldt, caught fire, and by its position exposed the
Danish fleet to great danger. Hvitfeldt could do one of two things:
save his own life and his men's by letting his ship drift before the
wind and by his escape risking the rest of the fleet and losing the
battle, or stay where he was to meet certain death. He chose the
latter, anchored his vessel securely, and fought on until the ship
was burned down to the water's edge and blew up with him and his
five hundred men. Ivar Hvitfeldt's name is forever immortal in the
history of his country. A few years ago they raised the wreck of the
_Dannebrog_, fitly called after the Danish flag, and made of its
guns a monument that stands on Langelinie, the beautiful shore road
of Copenhagen.

Fired by such deeds, young Wessel implored the King, before he had
yet worn out his first midshipman's jacket, to give him command of a
frigate. He compromised on a small privateer, the _Ormen_, but with
it he did such execution in Swedish waters and earned such renown as
a dauntless sailor and a bold scout whose information about the
enemy was always first and best, that before spring they gave him a
frigate with eighteen guns and the emphatic warning "not to engage
any enemy when he was not clearly the stronger." He immediately
brought in a Swedish cruiser, the _Alabama_ of those days, that had
been the terror of the sea. In a naval battle in the Baltic soon
after, he engaged with his little frigate two of the enemy's
line-of-battle ships that were trying to get away, and only when a
third came to help them did he retreat, so battered that he had to
seek port to make repairs. Accused of violating his orders, his
answer was prompt: "I promised your Majesty to do my best, an