"When King Gylfe reigned in Sweden, a woman came to him, and she enchanted him so by her singing that he gave her leave to plough so much of his land as she could in a day with four oxen, and what she thus ploughed should be hers. This woman was of the race of the giants (Aseme). She took her four sons and changed them into oxen, and attached them to the plough. She ploughed out the place she had chosen, and thus created the island of Sjaelland. She did this from the Maelar lake in Sweden; and it is said that where there is a point of land in Sjaelland there is in the Maelar lake a bay, and vice versa, so that both the Maelar lake and Sjaelland island have one form, one is land, the other water. This tradition is common over Denmark, and with us has become classical. The woman's name was Gefion." "I have seen a delineation of the tradition," said Hardy, "at one of your Danish palaces, on a ceiling at Fredriksborg." "Yes, it is there; but you will find it everywhere in Denmark," replied the Pastor. "Of traditions of churches, they are endless; but we will take one example, possibly by no means the best. When Hadderup church, between Viborg and Holstebro, was building, the Trolds tore down every night what had been erected in the day. It was therefore determined to attach two calves to a load of stones in a waggon, and where the calves were found in the morning to build the church. This, however, did not answer, and at last an agreement was made with the Trolds that they should allow the church to be built, on the condition that they should have the first bride that went to the church. This succeeded, and the church was built. When the first bridal procession should, however, go to the church, at a particular place a sudden mist fell upon them, and when it cleared off the bride had disappeared." "A very striking tradition," said Hardy. "It has a good deal of picturesque colouring." "Yes," said the Pastor, "and that is why I told you that particular tradition. But of places there is a tradition of Silkeborg, with nothing supernatural about it; but as you have been there fishing, it may interest you to know why it has obtained that name. The story is, that a bishop wished to build a house there, but he was uncertain where; so he threw his silk hat into the water as he sailed on the Gudenaa, and he determined that where his silk hat came to land, that there would he build his house. The hat came ashore at Silkeborg. The bishop, however, could not have sailed up the Gudenaa, and the probability is he must have gone down the lake, as the Gudenaa runs from the lake through Jutland to the sea at Randers."