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116
ROESKILDE.
Chap. VIII.
tion of character. She is small in stature, somewhat
below the middle height. On her head she wears
the regal circlet; a rouleau of hair, twisted with gold,
binds her brow ; two short bandeaux, brought down on
each side of her face; a long veil hangs pendent from
the circlet; massive gold bracelets adorn her wrists, and
she wears a girdle of the same precious metal, with five
pendent chains, from each of which is suspended a
ball, or pomander-box, to contain perfumes and other
matters. The broken alabaster figure of her brother
Duke Christopher of Lolland, only son of Valdemar,
lies unrepaired in one of the adjoining chapels.* He
is said to have died from the effects of a wound in the
head from a Lombard in a naval engagement in 1359;
but it is certain he lived some years later, half-witted:
his brain never recovered from the effects of the injury.
The sword of King Christian I. still hangs in the
chapel of the Elephant. He lies interred by the side
of his predecessor King Christopher the Bavarian,!
whose widow Dorothea J he had espoused tl to make
* It was broken, with those of Harald Blue-Tooth and Svend, in 1420,
and at the same time Bishop William was removed into his pewter coffin.
t Christopher was beautiful in face, but short and fat in figure ; and
when he walked through Stockholm by the side of his grand
chamberlain Carl Knudsen, the people remarked that Carl was handsome and
more fit to bear a crown. “ Don’t walk so near me,” said Christopher,
jokingly; “for the people say you should be king, not I.” With all
his joking he never forgave it. Knud got dismissed from his office,
and was later exiled in Viborg Castle. Sovereigns love not to be
overshadowed by their attendants.
I Dorothea was daughter of John of Brandenburg, the Alchymist,
as he was called ; not that he ever made any gold; on the contrary, all
his substance passed away in the prosecution of his experiments ; and
it was the joke of the day, that the Queen, when she espoused her first
husband, King Christopher the Bavarian, had received her dower in
smoke. Scarce were their nuptials celebrated when a letter arrived
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