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Chap. XIV.
MRS. SOPHIA MOTH.
215
Among the effects of Frederic IIL’s time—whose
enamelled cipher brooches, with pendent pearls, are
well worthy of notice—are many miniatures of high
interest, by an artist named Prieur, a painter of great
merit. That of the sovereign himself, 1663, is of great
beauty, as well as one of Charles II. of England and the
Duchess of Cleveland. Further on, somewhat in the
background—as she deserves to be—in a corner, sneaks Mrs.
Sophia Moth, mistress of Christian V., the only portrait
of her, I believe, extant—a fair-haired, insipid beauty,
and one whose fame is not free from reproach for her
share in the fall of Griffenfeld. She received, so
declare the scandal-mongers of the day, sundry sacks
of gold as bribes to use her influence with her
sovereign in compassing the overthrow of a minister to
whom Denmark owed much. Daughter of the Royal
physician, she was created Countess of Samsø, and was
mother of two Gyldenløves, of whom all historians speak
well. Molesworth says, “The young gentlemen are
handsome and hopeful, and looked upon as necessary
ornaments to the crown.” On these children Christian V.
conferred certain privileges, giving to them and their
descendants the title of Excellency, as well as
precedence over the rest of the nobility, with an extra fleuron
on their coronets, and permission to wear the scarlet
liveries, which put the nobles in a passion if it did
nothing else.
In an adjoining room is the portrait of Christian V.,
embroidered in silk by Eleanor Ulfeld during her
rigorous captivity at Copenhagen in the Blaatarn, or
Blue Tower; around the portrait is worked the
following inscription in Danish verse :—“ Behold here a
king of angelic mind, who governs his people and his
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