"I should also like to see my family; they have written to me to come.
Listen: make your journey through Funen, and only remain three or four
days with us. My mother's carriage shall convey you then to Middelfart.
Say 'Yes,' and we will set out this evening."

"That cannot be done!" replied Otto; but half an hour later, as both
sat together over the tea-table, and Wilhelm repeated his wish, Otto
consented, but certainly more through a feeling of obligation than
through any pleasure of his own. Toward evening, therefore, they set out
in the beautiful summer night to travel through Zealand.

Smartly dressed families wandered pleasantly through the city gate
toward the summer theatre and Fredericksberg. The evening sun shone
upon the column of Liberty; the beautiful obelisk, around which stand
Wiedewelt's statues, one of which still weeps,

"In white marble clothing,
Hand upon the breast,
Ever grief-oppressed,
Looking down upon the gloomy sea,"

where were closed the eyes of the artist. Was it the remembrance which
here clouded Otto's glance, as his eye rested upon the statues as they
drove past, or did his own soul, perhaps, mirror itself in his eyes?

"Here it is gay and animated!" said Wilhelm, wishing to commence a
conversation. "Vesterbro is certainly your most brilliant suburb. It
forms a city by itself,--a little state! There upon the hill lies the
King's Castle, and there on the left, between the willows, the poet's
dwelling, where old Rahbek lived with his Kamma!"

"Castle and poet's dwelling!" repeated Otto; "the time will be when they
will inspire equal interest!"

"That old place will soon be pulled down!" said Wilhelm; "in such a
beautiful situation, so near the city, a splendid villa will be raised,
and nothing more remind one of Philemon and Baucis!"

"The old trees in the park will be spared!" said Otto; "in the garden
the flowers will scent the air, and remind one of Kamma's flowers.
Rahbek was no great poet, but he possessed a true poet's soul, labored
faithfully in the great vineyard, and loved flowers as Kamma loved
them."

The friends hail left Fredericksberg behind them. The white walls of the
castle glanced through the green boughs; behind Soendermark, the large,
wealthy village stretched itself out. The sun had set before they
reached the Dam-house, where the wild swans, coming from the ocean,
build in the fresh water fake. This