"We can reach Nyborg to-night, Herr Pastor," said he, "and call and stop at Svendborg, and run round Moen's Klint to Copenhagen, and passing Elsinore to Aarhus again, stopping at any place on the way." "But the time?" asked the Pastor. "A week," replied John; "or you can land at any place, and return by rail in a few hours." "No, Herr Pastor," interposed Mrs. Hardy, "you must not bind us to time. We shall see if the cruise is a benefit to you, and if so, you must prolong it." The Pastor always surrendered when challenged by Mrs. Hardy. Whilst they were at lunch, the _Rosendal_ steam yacht was passing Samso. "This island," said John Hardy, "appears from the chart to be a sand bank washed up by the sea." "So is all Denmark," said Pastor Lindal. "The legends and traditions belonging to Samso, however, are not as old as those of Jutland, and it would therefore appear not to have been inhabited at so early a period. There is an historical tradition that in 1576 a mermaid appeared to a man of Samso, and directed him to go to Kallundborg, where King Frederick II. was then staying with his court, and tell him that his queen would have a son, which would become a mighty ruler. The king questioned the man, who stated that the mermaid's name was Isbrand, and that she lived in the sea, not far from land, with her mother and grandmother, and that it was the latter that had foretold the birth of Queen Margrethe, who united the three Scandinavian kingdoms under one crown. King Frederick sent the man home, and commanded him not to come to the court again. The king's son was Christian IV., under whose rule Denmark attained its zenith of power. Once, when Christian IV. was driven ashore by a storm on Samso, he saw the priest's man ploughing. The king took the plough and ploughed a furrow, and told the man to tell his master that the king had ploughed for him." "A good way to acquire popularity in those times," remarked Mrs. Hardy. "But are there any more stories of the kind?"