"_Air Muire!_" cried Ian, buckling on his sword; "where is this fellow to be met with?" "At his own house," replied Lumsdaine. "I would have punished him there; but I love not to draw on a man under his own roof-tree." Now ensued a friendly contest about who should punish the Herredsfoged; Lumsdaine claimed the duty as the insult had been given to him; I claimed it as his senior, and Ian as mine. We tossed up a dollar, and the lot fell to me. I snatched up my sword, hurried away, and found my man smoking a pipe in his back garden. "You are the Herredsfoged?" said I, drawing my claymore. "I am," said he, with the utmost composure, for he was a strong fellow--a miller, and nearly a head taller than me. Requesting him to walk with me into a little plot which was screened by a privet hedge, I sternly commanded him to retract and apologise for his remarks anent the ration beer; but the Herredsfoged was a brave fellow, and swore by all the devils in Denmark, he would "never retract while there was a drop of blood in his heart!" We then measured our swords, and fell on like a couple of wild Tartars; I received a scar on one of my bare knees, by an ill-parried thrust; and the second, by piercing my left arm, disabled me for a time from using my dirk; but at the third pass I ran him through the left side, close by the ribs, and flung him prostrate, with his weapon hand below him. Then with my sword at his throat, while he lay grovelling among his own tulips and broken flowerpots, I compelled him to retract, and repeating after me word for word, acknowledge "that the said beer was only fit for dogs or Danes." I then helped him into the house, and had his wound looked to. We marched next day, and all kept the story of the duel as secret as possible; for such encounters had been expressly forbidden by an edict of Christian IV. in 1618. At Faaborg we found that the queen and her train had embarked for Laaland, and that nothing remained for us but to follow by the first shipping we could procure. For one night we occupied the little town, which has the waters of the Lesser Belt on one side, and those of deep marshes on the other. It had been burned in former wars by the army of Christian III., and now the greater portion of it consisted of ruins, encircling a shallow and unsheltered port.