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Chap. XXXVI.
SAND-STORM.
109
pretty, clean, striped houses, backed by a little grove of
trees; then again, beyond the village, in the centre of
a baby forest, stands the house of the chief magistrate;
you can hardly see it, so shut in is it from the wrath of
wind and sand.
Further still, on the western coast, stands, rising from
a mountainous sea of silver-glistening sand, the
halfburied church of “ Gammel Skagen,” long since
disused,—built, says tradition, of the stones brought by
English and Dutch seamen; not improbable, as in old
popish days these church landmarks fared well in
offerings from the grateful mariner.
It was in the year 1775, on a common prayer day,—
of which in the Danish Church there were formerly
many, thanksgivings for fires extinguished and pestilence
stayed, and other mercies long since forgotten,—while
the inhabitants of Skagen were engaged in divine
service, there arose suddenly a storm, accompanied by a
whirlwind of “ flying sand,” carrying desolation over
the fields and the village of this devoted settlement,
and entirely filling up the holy well of St. Lawrence,
whose water proved infallible even in the 18th century.
Before the affrighted inhabitants could leave the
building, where they still remained cowering for shelter,
the church was half-buried beneath its fury, the doors
blocked up, and they compelled to escape by the windows
of the belfry. Since that period the building has been
no longer used. The colony emigrated to the opposite
coast, where the village is now situated.
We inquired if any English vessels ever touched at
Skagen? “Yes,” the man at the lighthouse replied;
11 when they are wrecked, not otherwisea visit
more honoured in the breach than in the observance.
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