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316
NYKJØBING.
Chap. LI.
Nykjøbing. It stands on the water-side, and you might
easily while away a week among the surrounding
forest and its coasts. Herds of deer, wild chevreuils
in number, and fawns of all sizes, as well as hares,
cross our path. Chevreuil and roe-deer are not the only
game which abound in this island. In the year 1G92
Christian V., together with his queen and many
illustrious personages, on their journey from Møen to
Nykjøbing, enjoyed a goodly sport, slaughtering in one
day four hundred and twenty wild swans by the village
of Gjedsen. Battues of wild swans were a favourite
diversion of the last century, for Molesworth writes,
“ These wild swans haunt a small island, about one mile
distant from Copenhagen, and breed there. About this
time of year the young ones are near as big as the
old, before the feathers are grown long enough for them
to fly. The king, queen, and the court ladies, with
other nobles, are invited to take part in this sport.
Every person of condition has a pinnace allotted to
him, and when they come near the haunt surround the
place, and a great multitude of swans—sometimes a
thousand—are killed. The flesh is worthless, but the
feathers and down are preserved.”
Superstition thrives in Falster as elsewhere. The
farmers have nisses, but cottagers are compelled to
put up with “ familiar spirits ”—a preposterous fairy
called Dragedukke, who not only supplies them with
all manner of good things, but also gives them the
power of transferring the good luck of others to
themselves. A woman of Kragehave was possessed of a
Dragedukke. In vain her neighbours tried to churn;
she could take away all the butter from them, while she
had plenty herself even in the worst weather: money, too,
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