CHAPTER XXXVII. Manor of Voergaard-Skipper Clemens and Bishop Crump againLady Ingeborg Skeel and the architect - The message of her husband Her disturbed spirit- Her prison, the Rosodonten - Her Sunday pastime - Her monument — The road-side inns of Queen Margaret Jutland mode of boiling eggs. VOERGAARD. THE postboy turns off the high road to Voergaard, one of the most interesting châteaux, both from its architecture and history, in the whole of Vendsyssel, a splendid specimen of the early Renaissance, built of red brick and sandstone. As you pass under the gateway, rich in stone carvings, of a somewhat diabolical character, above stand two shields, the armorial bearings of its founders, Frue Ingeborg Skeel and her husband Otto Banner, with the date 1538. In the earlier part of the fifteenth century Voergaard was the property of the Børglum bishops. In 1534 it underwent the fate of all noble residences in these parts, was destroyed and burnt to the ground by Skipper Clemens and his band, "who hunted," says the old chronicler, "Bishop Crump" (Bishop Crump, who looks as good as gold on his tombstone) and "his Frille" (impossible to translate such a word when speaking of an ecclesiastic) "Elizabeth Gyldenstierne from their good rest;" so that the Bishop "krob udi muus hul"-crept into a mouse-hole; an exaggeration of the chronicle, for it was only in a baker's oven that he took refuge. Voergaard is burnt and sacked, and later comes into the possession of our present heroine, the lady Ingeborg Skeel, a woman of high birth and strong mind, endued with consummate taste, but unfortunately without the means of gratifying it. Build a manor-house she would, by hook or by crook, and one that in richness and beauty should surpass all her neighbours. So she sends for an architect, orders in timber-of that there is no want on her own estates-bakes her own bricks, and has sandstone over from the island of Bornholm. The first cargo arrives, and that she pays for, but when the second and the third appear her purse is empty, but her wit is sharp. A storm arises in the night; she sends down her trusty minions, causes the cables of the vessels to be cut, an east wind drives them ashore, and she, lady of the manor, by the ancient law of "flotsam and jetsum," claims the cargo as her own. The building now advances, the towers rise; rich and quaint are the stone carvings around the windows and portals. Never were such yet seen in Vendsyssel. At last it is completed, but the architect must be paid, and where is the money to come from? Here's a puzzler again! Don't be alarmed: trust the lady Ingeborg. Where there's a will, there's a way; so she orders the architect to bring his bill receipted and prepared to receive his money. The architect arrives with the massive keys of the castle, ready to hand them over to its noble mistress. "But, before we settle our accounts," says she, "we will first go together over the whole castle, and see that all is right. Leave your bill here, Knight of the Keys of Bronze," she playfully adds, passing the bunch, weighing nearly half a ton, round his neck. "Leave them where they are, I insist; you shall not take them off!" so they proceed together to examine the rooms one after the other, and then pass -the poor architect groaning under the weight of his burden-over the drawbridge which connects the moat with the castle. "Stop!" she cries; "look at that eastern tower; surely, the piles have sunk. Lean over!" The man obeys. A push from the lady-he falls headlong into the moat, borne down by the weight of the keys, to rise no more. When Ingeborg feels sure he is drowned she calls wildly for assistance. The body is withdrawn from its watery grave, but the receipted bill remains in her possession. She was a fine old Jutland gentlewoman, The The husband, Otto Banner, was just as bad as Ingeborg herself, and the cruelties and extortions practised by both on their peasant serfs were beyond belief. At last Otto dies, and on the anniversary of his death the lady Ingeborg drives to church in great state, and says to Claus, her coachman, "I should like to hear how my husband is." The coachman replies, "My lady, that is not so easily known; but I do not think he suffers from cold where he now dwells." lady became furious, and threatened the coachman with death if he did not, before the third Sunday, bring her tidings of her lord. The affrighted Claus applies to the parson of Albæk, "who was as learned as any bishop;" but he declined the task. Happily Claus had a brother a clergyman in Norway; and as, says the legend, the parsons of Norway are more cunning in these matters. than any other, Claus went to his brother, who takes him at midnight to a cross-road in a forest, where he conjures up his deceased master. Claus delivers the message of the lady Ingeborg. "Tell her," replies his master, "that I have gone where a chair is preparing for her, and she will be taken when it is finished, unless she gives back the meadows of Agersted. But to prove that you have spoken to me, I give you my bridal ring to show to her." Claus reaches forth his hat to receive the ring, and waits on the third Sunday at the churchgate for his mistress. He gives the message and the ring. "Well," said the lady, "you have saved your life; but I will never give back the meadows of Agersted." Shortly afterwards there is a great funeral feast at Voer church, for the lady Ingeborg is to be buried; but do not imagine she rested quiet in her grave-she returned every night and made such unearthly noises in the courtyard, that the parson of Alsted was forced to conjure her down in a bog hard by, called the Pulse. But she still appears on Christmas-eve, when she drives over the drawbridge into the inner courtyard in a coach drawn by six horses, with fire glaring from their nostrils and mouths, and she is often seen in the Pulse combing her long hair with a golden comb. On every New Year's night she is permitted to advance the length of a cock's step towards the manor-house, and when she has reached it Voergaard will inevitably sink. Neither grass nor moss ever grows at the place where she has been conjured down into the mose, and, by help of the scorched spots in the adjacent field, it may always be ascertained how many lengths of a cock's step she has proceeded towards Voergaard. The château consists of one corps de bâtiment, flanked by two octagonal towers; the wings, if there were any, have been destroyed. When standing in the courtyard among the milk-pails-for we have here. 300 cows, each morning some ton and a half of butter made before breakfast*-I could not help thinking how well one of our water-colour artists might have limned this out. It is a wonder they never travel in Jutland; they would find living cheap and a new subject for their pencils. The intendante came out with her keys, and asked us if we should like to visit the rooms: one, hung with splendid embossed Flemish leather, alone attests the former magnificence of the building. The oak and walnut carved doors still remaining show that Frue Ingeborg knew what she was about. As for the loft, you might lodge a regiment therein, and the timber walls are constructed with a solidity only to be accomplished by those who do not pay their reckonings. Ingeborg, too, had no idea of being defenceless. In the cellars at the basement of her octagonal towers were placed cannons, ready to sweep the neighbouring country at a moment's notice. As for her prisons, the "Rosodonten,"-with its iron hooks for hanging and torture, her own invention,-without window, door, or opening, in which human bones were lately discovered, is one of the most horrible that can be imagined. In the year 1841 several murders were committed in the Vendsyssel, and the people suspected lodged in the prison of the Rosodonten. One night was sufficient; terrified, they declared, by the menaces of Frue Ingeborg Skeel, they one after another confessed their crime, declaring they would rather be hanged or lose their * Calculating the Danish ton at 118 lbs. English, nearly 180 per diem. |